Reviews :

BanannaSammich : Thank you SO much. I've been listening to Wrecking Limits, audio-book-style, whilst I do my workouts everyday, so I've been keen on sprinkling in some nostalgia. I sometimes need a solid refresher on what I h ave going on, so expect some more nostalgia and walks down memory lane! :)

chuckiboo : Aw, your last comment there had me grinning ear to ear, thank you so much! That's so sweet. It's super unfortunate though, because I feel as if I give my characters super solid advice, but the voice in the back of my head is like, 'you should be following this advice too!' and I'm like SHH. For my characters only. lmao! If only I could just read the advice I'm writing and apply it to my own life. Half the reason why I'm scared to write the fifth story, I feel as if I'll just be exposing myself to myself haha


Song Listened To :

invisible string by Taylor Swift


*Chapter 217*

In a jarring spark of environmental change, Berri, Ralph and Turbo were immediately time-warped right back to the larger, thin clearing of candy cane trees they were previously sat in. With the electrical pop of confused coding, the three came back to the sunny, warm climate with frost tipped to their hair, goosebumps plagued their skin, little, thin frays of snow and ice layered them. Although still shivering, Berri inhaled a shaky breath and barely glanced about the group they had previously left on a proverbial pause. Everyone flinched in a jolt of tender surprise as the air about the three seemingly fogged, as if they had transported the frigid, freezing air of The End with them, they watched it magically dissipate upward into the air. With a quick glance about the group, Berri noticed the majority of every wrecker, in the vicinity, press a little closer, though still dutifully gave Ralph and Turbo a wide berth.

Just as Ralph was about to open his mouth and speak, amidst his larger wrecking hand messily freeing his crazy, auburn hair free of frost, the air near them suddenly zipped with a collective mixture of silver and hot red coding. With a pop, Tessa and Lash came to the grid a few feet away, and with a firm glower of surprise, Ralph urgently altered his attention from Turbo, straight to Tessa and Lash. Tessa's eyes looked frantic, and though she was collected and alive with purpose, her gentle hand held to the inside of Lash's upper right arm. They hung tight to each other, as if Tessa had potentially begged Lash to come and be apart of this, for Turbo's sake, something Lash looked extremely apprehensive about; the raw idea of being out in the open, inside a group of thorny individuals, most of whom didn't trust him as far as they could throw him.

"Tessa," Ralph firmly lilted in full offense as he gestured to Lash, and though Lash exhaled a sharp breath through his nose and looked off, Tessa shook her head and shot her father a sharp look of challenge.

"Don't 'Tessa' me, dad, Lash agreed to come out here and help us," Tessa began to rush to explain, and just as Lash was due to opening his mouth and potentially letting some form of a witty retort fly, in Ralph's direction, Ralph wildly furrowed his eyebrows and gestured to Turbo in hot irritation, and though Turbo looked blistered in bewildered numbness, due to everything happening, he lofted Tessa a look of silent gratitude.

"I think we'd get on just fine without," Ralph blindly argued, to which Tessa gently unhanded Lash and motioned for Lash to be involved, in Turbo's direction.

"Right, we'd be JUST fine without the one person, outside of Berri, that knows Turbo the best," Tessa barked in her Queenly dominance as she crossed her arms and shot her father a stern look of further challenge, "If there's ANYONE in this whole Arcade that could help mitigate any anger or past, traumatic feelings that could arise here, in Turbo, it's Lash."

"That'd be me," Lash mumbled in soft humility as he gently raised his finger and looked down; the group about them ushered hushed chuckles at Lash's blossoming humor.

"I told Lash that this was a wrecking lesson, but... We all were certain some past issues had come up whilst you guys enjoyed your little vacation to The End," Tessa crossed her arms and finally gave Turbo a stern look of authority, as if to warn him that running off to such a taboo, dangerous place wasn't the wisest thing he could've done as blossoming royalty, "What was the reasoning behind that, Turbo?"

"I'm sorry, I didn't think... I just... Needed to get away for a second," Turbo mumbled in defeat, though his eyes still held that mysterious, gentle white glow, similar to the neutral glow that Throttle's eyes always held.

"Get away is a understatement," Lash choked a laugh and crossed his arms.

"Choose a closer spot next time, my love, you scared the pants off of all of us," Tessa's motherly voice laid over Turbo's immediately submissive, shivering soul.

"Every wrecker has their own way of dealing with things," Theo urged as he shrugged, he glanced about the smaller group he was with; him, Beaux, Mara and Koko all caught soft glances as they each bobbed nonchalant nods of agreeing, "Sometimes we run, sometimes we fight, sometimes we need to talk."

"It's something you're going to quickly discover about yourself," Ralph mumbled to Turbo, after he had glossed his grateful bout of eye contact to the kin about him, "You'll mature into a pattern of doing things, inside your new ability... Unfortunately for wrecking, you adopt a more brooding archetype of problem solving."

"I'd say, as a rare breed, we're all a little... I don't know..." Beaux pursed his lips, lazily gestured his larger hands, shrugged and tried to search for the right word to complete his statement, though two individuals softly filled the gap with sharp certainty.

"Troubled," Both Lash and Mara emit in confidence.

Lash sharply furrowed his eyebrows and stabbed his creepy, golden eyes to the icy blue pair of orbs that equally stabbed to his gaze, as well. In the swelling motion of wanting to wrinkle his nose in mild irritation towards any shred of camaraderie he had with the individuals who didn't trust him at all, Lash was halted in his usual routine of proverbially pushing people away and held his gaze tight with Mara's. She crossed her arms and did the work for him, she intuitively caught his vibe and yanked the figurative baton right out of his grip, she wrinkled her nose and gave him an urgently annoyed look, as if to show cute detest that she had an agreeing thought with the likes of someone who caused her home game, and family, great pain, once upon a time. Lash softened as her glower deepened, and as she yanked her eyes away in the carrying out of conversation about them, Lash aimlessly peeled his eyes away in soft, struck defeat and felt confusion crawl over him; he was jarred out of his discombobulated thoughts the second Ralph's louder voice pressed on to Turbo's shivering, yet renewing soul.

"So, you'll slip up some times and source anger for your wrecking. You'll feed in to the notion that your powers are stronger when there's a crazy amount of heightened emotion behind it," Ralph grumbled as Turbo locked his eyes tight to Ralph's, "Though, you'll leave a warpath in your wake... You'll look back and understand it didn't bring anything good to you. Source your identify, forgive yourself, lean in to your mistakes and understand that, no matter how great or small, we all make them."

"And it won't stop here or there," Tessa mumbled as Lash softly crossed his arms and eyed his big brother.

"No amount of anger and frustration will bring Turbotime back, brother," Lash mumbled in grumbling defeat as him and Turbo cautiously locked eyes, "You can now either carry on with darkness in your heart, or renew yourself and start fresh. You're either going to grow flowers or weeds, dude. Trust me... I understand your pain, but if you've taught me anything, you have to step out of the shadows. Whether it's someone else's shadow... Or your own pride's shadow."

Turbo urgently peered to Lash's eyes and felt his aura radiate a swathe of goodness, something that everyone cued to, goodness and warmth buried so deep in his little system that was finally pulling back the black veil of hurt. Turbo heaved a shaky breath through his nose, bobbed a nod and looked down to his opened palms. His coding swirled about inside of him, begging to renew with this brand new ability, this new strength that was foreign to him. He knew, full well, this could be used for either good or bad, though the solid group about him, the sheer amount of loving pairs of eyes honed tight to him, he finally peered to Ralph in a full show of readiness and eased Ralph a gentle nod of final, warm acceptance.

"It's all yours, my guy," Ralph mumbled with a soft smile as he gestured to the tall, thinner candy cane tree a few feet directly behind Turbo's positioning.

Though Turbo wanted to turn around and size up just the opponent he'd be dealing with, first hand, his nervous, white eyes dart about and took note that everyone, excluding Ralph, began to take at least five steps back, as if to prove to Turbo that they were prepared for his first fit of wrecking to be grand. Turbo nervously glanced to Berri, Tessa, Ralph, then Lash before lulling his eyes closed, inhaling a deep breath and allowing the world about him to go silent. With the snaking circuits and honeycombs of his and Berri's lovely, rosy coding, he sought out the structural integrity of the candy cane tree behind him with nothing but the information his coding could give to him. After a moment of assessing, he finally clenched his fist, grit his teeth, whirled around and struck the tree with a deep grunt of release.

Like lightning striking in perfect precision, the wood of the tree popped with the strike of Turbo's to fists, to the side of its' trunk, colorful bouts of wood suddenly spewed with the loud bang of impact, and as the tree urgently crumpled with Turbo's sudden outburst, leaves whisked about the place as the tree's mess thud to the ground in destroyed pieces. Turbo's chest heaved softly as he panted and watched the success of his first show of wrecking, and before he could quietly turn about and hopefully gain the approval of his fellow family members, everyone suddenly began to clap and cheer for Turbo in a show of congratulatory relief. Turbo finally allowed a nervous smile to grace his face as he bravely turned about and peered up to Ralph's proud demeanor.

"You're well on your way," Ralph encouraged warmly, he bobbed a nod and put his hands on his hips, and as everyone slowly began to gather in a tighter circle, Lash crossed his arms and looked off with a wide, cheeky grin.

"Give the poor guy MORE ammunition," Lash blurt in an annoyed tone, though he finally lofted his smile to Turbo's in a reserved show of warmth he only dedicated to his big brother.

"I do believe we warned yah," Oliver mumbled cutely as Wren, Tatum, Emery and Throttle began to mosey over so to join in on the conversation.

"You did great, though," Theo bobbed a nod, though before he could continue on with his hand warmly laid to Turbo's broad shoulder, Berri's icy voice cut the group's chatter in half, cleanly.

"Congratulations," Berri quipped sharply as she stabbed her vivid blue stare tight to Turbo's, and though Turbo's white gaze very fiercely shot back to a joyous gold, his grin sagged with Berri's delivery, the gold in his eyes began to fade to that of a muted yellow, a threaten to go grey in a numb show of sorrow.

Turbo frowned and peered hard to Berri in soft apology, though as the glower in her expression deepened, her whole body silently came alive with their rosy coding, and with a flicker of newfound time warping ability, she was suddenly off with a pop of attitude. Turbo sagged his shoulders and huffed a faltered breath of wanting to clumsily rush to her aid, to apologize for being so angry and cold, for potentially lumping Berri into a stereotype of physical anger and frustration that not every wrecker was precisely perfect about concealing. Turbo looked down with a hot, frustrated exhale as the group was dead silent in whole confusion. Just as Turbo inhaled a steady breath and was due to warping away, so to find Berri and put a stop to the confusion and hurt, Lash cleared his throat and softly gave his curious golden eyes to Tessa's.

"Allow me, please," Lash inquired in a full show of patience, something that caught everyone, excluding Turbo off guard; Lash's emotional and social progress had only come along in leaps and bounds, behind closed doors, causing everyone to steal confused glances to each other. Lash rolled his eyes, looked off for a moment before bringing his piercingly, haunting golden eyes back to Tessa's, "Yeah, yeah, I know, it's weird, I'm being friendly, maybe I really am turning over a new leaf, blah blah. Please just... Let me talk to her."

"Do you even know what's going on?" Nox suddenly defended in soft confusion, to which Lash furrowed his brow and shot his little brother a look of hot irritation.

"Course I do, I live with the girl," Lash snapped, to which Turbo exhaled in faltered annoyance and looked off in now quick defeat. Lash shot Ralph a look and shrugged, "She's angry because THIS one has a world of stuffed anger and frustration, and now that Berri GAVE Turbo this power, she's blaming herself that Turbo is now finally looking back at his reflection in a clean mirror, for once."

"Scary accurate," Tessa muttered as she rubbed her forehead.

"I may be an asshole, but I'm not stupid," Lash muttered, he bravely glanced in Mara's direction, purely in curiosity; her facial expression read that of still irritation, though her arms were crossed and her head was tilted in Lash's direction in now cold intrigue. Lash stabbed his eyes back to Tessa's and did whatever he could to keep the Queen's attention, "Please just... Teleport me to wherever she went, I'll talk with her."

"User-speed," Beaux mumbled quietly as he raised his eyebrows with dull impress and looked down; the group snickered towards Lash, the majority of them not being able to see his full progress, they still resorted to lighthearted bullying.

Tessa tightened her lip, glanced to her father in soft curiosity and read his demeanor; frozen with whole uncertainty, he gently shrugged and gave Tessa a defeated look, as if to display that he had given up trying to keep Lash contained in a box, due to just how much information he had, information on the Arcade, and everything that entailed, that likely rivaled Turbo's knowledge. Tessa finally heaved a hot sigh through her nose, pulled her phone out of her pocket and began to cue up her remote access to the code room, where Vanellope, Ace, Zed and Libby remained.

"You brought me out here for a reason," Lash blurt with a soft laugh as Tessa nodded in defeat and rubbed her forehead a little harder, "A brave act, really. Don't leave me out here for too long, I might teleport us all back to The End... Oh wait..."

"Dude, we get it, I fucked up, just leave," Turbo suddenly blurt in hot irritation, to which Lash eased a mean, playful grin and bobbed a nod.

"You said it, not me," Lash chirped with obnoxious finger guns as Tessa hurried to teleport him away; with a whisk of hot red coding, he was off, leaving the group of delightfully confused gamers in his wake.