A/N: I don't own Wreck-it Ralph! Please read and review!
"I can't believe he's alive," Calhoun whispered. "He's alive." The words were almost too good for her to say, especially given what had happened. She ran a hand through her hair as she paced the room, the candy-themed child watching her. "He's alive, maybe I can get back to normal."
Then the thought of seeing King Cybug in the code room stopped her from her thoughts. "Vanellope," she said. "You didn't see King Candy in there, did you?"
"Well, I think I did," Vanellope said sadly. "But I'm not sure."
"Shit," Calhoun murmured.
Don't worry, she heard Felix's voice inside her mind say. Everything will be okay.
"Tamora, my queen," the musical voice of King Candy wafted through the room. "Would you join me in the code room, please? And bring the girl."
Calhoun had no choice. She followed his orders, with Vanellope silently trailing behind her. The king had already tied himself down with a licorice rope, and held the other end out for Vanellope to take. Calhoun grabbed another rope and tied it around her waist, gently giving the other end to Vanellope. "If you release either of these ropes," King Candy said to the girl. "So help me, I'll drag you to another game and kill you myself." Tamora looked down at the frightened girl as she gasped.
"It will be all right," Tamora said quietly, tapping the blue scars on her arm, as if to show that Felix would protect them. Then she entered the code room with her king. It was imperative, she realized, that she act as though she had never seen it.
"There's actually room to move in here," she said quietly. "Back home, in Hero's Duty, we didn't have this kind of room. All sorts of cybug eggs floating every which way…it was hard to move around whenever one of us had to go in and change something."
"I'd wager, even though your game is newer and can support more code, there are more beings in this game. The candy spectators, all of the medals…"
Calhoun floated over to the egg sac she'd seen before. "What is this?"
"This," the king began. "will be our army."
"Our army?"
"Well, how did you think cybugs got created? They have to be replicated in the code. Cybrids are infertile, we have no way of multiplying our army by ourselves. So I went to the code room for a little bit of help. It's…awe-inspiring, isn't it? Just think how many cybugs we'll have tomorrow. By my count, we have a little under a thousand."
"Yes, it's, uh, quite impressive," Calhoun replied. It wasn't untrue – what the tyrant had done to Sugar Rush was quite impressive indeed.
"Now," the king said. "let's check our codes. For any….interference."
Oh shit, she thought. He definitely knows. Her heart began to beat faster and faster, then it slowed. Felix was calming her.
Be strong, Felix told her.
"You seem a little pale," the king said. "Maybe I should check your code first."
"I-I had a question first."
"Yes?"
"When I first came here a few days a-ago, and you infected me with the virus…"
"Don't worry, it won't harm you. I was only using it as a sedative, really. I didn't want you to feel much pain. A little, yes, but not very much. I didn't want you to be traumatized completely by your husband's death, nor your friend Wreck-it Ralph's…or by your transformation."
Maybe that bought me some time.
"Bought you some time? What ever do you mean?"
"I…nothing."
"I can read your thoughts, Calhoun. I thought you knew that. But," the king said as he accessed her code. "you apparently didn't."
She watched as the sea of red code appeared, and her eyes instantly went to the blue line that kept Felix alive.
"Interesting," the king said. "There shouldn't be any color other than red here…Would you come a little closer, please?"
Calhoun stood still.
"That was an order."
The king snapped his fingers and Calhoun found herself teleported next to the king. "Do you know anything about this little blue line?"
"Yes," she admitted.
"What is it?"
"F-Felix."
"I believe I've made a horrible mistake," the king said. "It would appear the cybug that ate you also ate your husband…and your husband, evidently, was not quite dead when he was eaten."
"What are you going to do?"
She found her vision clouding for a second, then saw things differently: her head swiveled to the left, and she saw herself, but her eyes were closed. "I've turned off your vision," he said. "You're now seeing things through my eyes. I wanted you to have a front row seat to this."
"No, please, please, don't cut his-"
She watched, through his eyes, as he took the thin blue wire in his claws. "Don't worry, my dear," he said. "You won't have anything to worry about from him anymore." He snapped the wire.
Her vision returned to normal, and her stomach and heart dropped.
"Let's go," he said. "Everything looks normal here."
