A/N: Well, I think that this chapter may be longer than the others. I don't really know, and I don't change my ANs. To me, the AN before the story should be typed before the story is written, and the one after the story should be typed after the story is written. Anyway, on with the story!

The following 4 days which I spent with Vanellope whizzed by, and the trio didn't seem to have bothered us at all, the closest being Candlehead spotting us do some activity of ours. She seemed somewhat intrigued, and I think that if it weren't for Taffyta and Rancis being nearby (and me), she may have wanted to join us.

On the fifth day, I realised that Vanellope was being a lot more quiet than usual, and that was pretty strange, considering how energetic she normally was. To be honest, I don't even think I had 5 minutes of peace and quiet (except for sleep, but she'd normally roll around like she was having a nightmare. But then again, when I was small I used to do the same, so I guess that all is forgiven) in those past few days.

She had also told me what she knew about the game-King Candy, the other racers, how she was despised by the others and how her karts she made herself kept on being destroyed. When I heard that, I swore that the next time I saw them bullying her (if that ever happened again, that is) I would damage their karts, no matter how much they pleaded.

(The start of the day)

"So, Vanellope. What do you want to do today?"

Vanellope didn't respond, and continued to stare deeply into the wall opposite of her.

"Hello?" I waved my hand in front of her, hoping that she'd snap out of it and be back to her usual self.

No response.

"Hello?" I shouted, continuing to wave my hand in front of her face.

Still no response.

I sighed, thinking of something to say.

"KING CANDY'S HERE!" It worked, immediately making Vanellope jump up in surprise, accidentally slapping me in the face.

"Where is he?!" She shouted, running and looking around the volcano like crazy. "How is she so good at hiding when we play hide-and-seek if she can't even stop moving around to hide from King Candy?

After I had calmed her down and reassured her that King Candy was nowhere near and that he had no idea where we were, she glared at me angrily.

"What did you do that for?"

"I did that to snap out of that trance you were having. A 'thank-you' would've been nice."

"Thank-you?! You scared me so bad I thought I was going to die!" She shouted, irritated.

"Well, what else would've I done?"

"You could have shaken me or something which wouldn't have scared me out of my wits, stinkbrain!"

I smiled at the insult, as it meant that she was probably back to her old, joking self.

"Anyway, as I was saying before, what do you want to do today? Oh, and while you were staring at the wall, what were you thinking of?"

She returned back to the state when she was staring at the wall. "I dunno... I was just thinking of the fun times we had before." I could tell from her tone that there was some sadness in her.

"Vanellope, what's going on? Do you not want me to leave? You know that I have to, and anyways, we've got a way to communicate with each other!" I dug into my backpack and waved the phones around, just to show her and emphasise my point.

"Yeah, but like I said before, it's not really fun to live by yourself, especially when you know there's a whole world out there. I also know that I can't come into the real world because it'll just cause trouble for you."

To be honest, I never expected her to know or say that. She always seemed so carefree and happy, so when I was listening to her talking about how her life really was and that she knew it was bad, it seemed like she was a completely different person. She also seemed much more mature, and in fact, I was actually thinking that she was going to plead to come into the real world with me and I'd have to say no. I even had a whole argument prepared for that, just in case.

"How about we talk about the things we had done in the past few days for a small while?"

"Okay." She still seemed pretty deep in thought, so I tried to liven up the conversation a little bit.

"You go first, then."

"I don't know what to say. You should go first."

"Nah, you should go first. I need time to think."

"No!" A small smile slowly crept up on her face. "Wait... You think? Wow! I never knew that before!"

I rolled my eyes and said, "Anyways, you go first. As you think I am not smart at all, it should take me more time to think, so you should go first."

Vanellope looked slightly miffed. "Fine. How do you even think of these comebacks, anyway?"

"Logic. It's also pretty easy to learn. You're not too bad at thinking of comebacks either, really."

"Oh." Suddenly, she lit up and started to giggle. "Do you still remember the time I pushed you off the mountain when we went snowboarding? That was soooo funny. Who knew that people could actually bend that way?"

I sighed. I don't know why, but the word 'mountain' seemed to have sparked up something in my mind. Suddenly, I slapped myself on the forehead, and shouted out, "Of course! I can't believe that I forgot to go back up the mountain once we had finished dealing with Taffyta. Let's go now to see if anything valuable was broken. We can also snowboard there, like I said before."

(A few minutes later...)

"Well, we're here." I said, interrupting Vanellope.

She had been talking about the past experiences that she enjoyed most entire time, and while most people would find that annoying, I found that somewhat entertaining, and in fact, I felt relieved that she was no longer her old, grumpy or melancholy self. Strangely, she kept on referring back to when I was confronting the gang and stopping them from bullying her.

"Great!"

"Now promise me you won't push me off this time. I'm not taking any chances, so you go first."

She was about to protest when her eyes widened. "Uh-oh." Vanellope sounded very scared, and at once I knew that it was something horrible.

"What?" I asked, full with worry.

She put a finger over her lips, and then pointed behind me.

"Oh, no."

A/N: Well, sorry, but I just had to leave it there. There were so many things that could've happened, so I'm looking for suggestions of what people would want to happen. I also take back what I said about 1 or 2 more chapters before the end, because I had a whole new idea that would probably extend the story by 3+ chapters.

Please review! Flames (whatever they are) are welcome!

Vanellope: Stop asking for reviews. It's getting annoying.

Me: No. I also didn't ask last time (I think), so there. I don't do it all the time.

Vanellope: *Sighs and walks off*