Phase I, Level 8: Journeying Pains

Ralph sighed impatiently as he sat on the too small seat in one of the many waiting areas. He felt very much alone despite all the people present, for Sonic and Jake had gone off who knows where to entertain themselves while they waited, and the other travelers were graciously picking up on his 'leave me alone' vibes and granting him some space. The layover here was several hours more than the last one had been, which was a point of grave annoyance for him, but was actually a blessing in disguise for Calhoun and Felix – they were still held up in security and baggage check points with some… complications. They weren't the only ones either, apparently, for even now he could overhear an exchange between one of the baggage personnel and a farmer.

"Sir, you only registered eight sheep for transport."

"When I registered, there WERE eight sheep. I don' reckon you ever heard of Farmville? The sheep there have a way of… multiplying… and there's no control over it, 'less you can stop time."

Growing bored of listening in on that exchange, he returned his attentions to the transaction between Calhoun and her baggage check clerk. By the looks of things, it was starting to get rather heated.

"Ma'am, I'm sorry for the inconvenience, but we cannot allow you to bring firearms on an international flight!" the clerk argued, indicating the array of suitcases and baggage Calhoun had brought along with her. Evidently, when she had said "A girl needs her things." she didn't mean anything along the lines of clothing, toiletries, or makeup, but rather firearms and ammunition.

"I told you, I'm willing to send some of it back, but we can't proceed completely unarmed!"

"And where exactly are you going that you'd need to be armed with an entire arsenal?"

"Listen, buddy, these don't even scratch the surface. I left all the super powered guns at home, and only brought the tamer ones!"

"Including an M4?"

"Two actually… And yes, it's JUST an M4, so what's the problem here?"

"It's airline policy, Ma'am; no firearms."

"Come on! At least let me keep the Glock!"

"You know I can't do that, Ma'am."

"And I can't let the people I love continue this mission without protection. Now you let me through this checkpoint with at least this, or you'll regret the day you were born." No one could deny how cool she looked delivering this line with calm conviction, however the security guards started an immediate ruckus when she pulled a concealed handgun on the clerk at the word 'this'.

"Put DOWN the Glock, or we'll shoot!" One of them announced, sending all the people present into a panic.

Sighing and raising her hands in surrender, Calhoun snidely responded "This one's a Ruger, blockheads! Keep your helmets on, it's not even loaded." With that, she demonstrated by flicking the slide a few times to prove it before tossing it to the ground.

"Looks like we'll be spending the rest of the layover in a little interrogation room, honey. Sorry about that." Tamora said to Felix, who had been standing by anxiously.

"That's alright, honey blossom, at least we'll have some alone time in between interrogations."

As Ralph watched his friends get escorted away for questioning, he nonchalantly made his way over to the shaken clerk. He had been struck with an idea, and intended to be of some use while the Fix-Its were otherwise detained.

"Hey…" – Ralph eyed the clerk's nametag – "Chuck. I was told to come relieve you of some uh… contraband."

"Huh? I didn't even call it in ye-"

"Chuck! You alright, buddy? You look like you've just seen a ghost!" Ralph interrupted, hoping to distract him with faked concern.

"Well actually, this crazy chick pointed a gun in my face and-"

"Oh man, I know how that feels; you have my empathy! Tell ya what, I'll handle matters here to get you a replacement; you just go and get yourself some rest and refreshment, alright?"

"Well thanks, Mr. uh…"

"Uh… Well, Chuck, the name's… Norris. That's it, Norris. We haven't been formally introduced yet, but this cute girl I work with won't stop talking about how great you are; I feel like I know you already!"

Chuck blushed furiously, "You mean… Nancy? Was she really talking about me?"

"Oh yeah, buddy!" Here Ralph leaned in and whispered, "Between you and me, I think she's got it bad for you." Straightening up again, Ralph acted like he suddenly had a brilliant revelation, "Hey listen, why don't I take you round to see her after you're all rested up? I'm sure she'll be impressed beyond all reason with your heroic face off with the psycho gunman!"

Chuck's face lit up at the prospect, and he agreed enthusiastically before Ralph could even finish his proposal. As soon as poor Chuck was out of sight, Ralph hoisted up Calhoun's luggage and headed down the first relatively deserted hallway he spotted.

The only inhabitant in it was an older lady, who was currently fawning over a kitten. Normally, Ralph might have thought it strange for there to be animals in an airport, but having just witnessed Mr. Farmville guy and his sheep, he wouldn't be shocked at anything now.

"Who's a cute kitten? You are! Yes, you are, you adorable little cupcake! Oooo I wanna take you home and – OW! BAD cat! No treat for kitties who bite the hand that feeds them. Hmph!" The lady exclaimed, and soon stomped out of the hallway, leaving Ralph alone with the luggage.

"Nice work, Ralph!"

Ralph nearly jumped out of his skin. He had THOUGHT he was alone. Now turning back, he beheld Kitty standing before him, and the kitten gone. Oh right, he'd forgotten she could do that.

"Geez, Kitty, stop sneaking around like that!"

"Ooo I'm sorry, didn't mean to scare ya, baby boy, with my FEROCIOUS little kitten form." she retorted in a sarcastic apology.

"I wasn't scared!" Ralph protested, his face pouting in annoyance.

"Yeah yeah, whatever." Kitty replied, waving it off. "Now take those bags and follow me, I know how we can get 'em on the plane!" With that, she was darting off again on all fours, making Ralph feel quite ridiculous as he toted around a large amount of luggage concealing weaponry, chasing after a kitten to top it all off.

Candlehead and the doctor were both panting heavily at this point. They'd been walking for over two hours now, and both being in compromising health had made the journey feel more like a death march. Seeing Candlehead's legs beginning to wobble, the Muffin Man reached out and stopped her by the shoulder. "Let's rest for a while".

Candle didn't need to be told twice. No sooner than he had touched her shoulder, Candle crumpled down to the floor and lay there, sprawled out in exhaustion.

Also taking a seat, the doctor commended her, "You're a real trooper, Miss Candle, and your performance thus far has been nothing but admirable."

Too weak to make a reply, but pleased with the compliment, Candlehead merely smiled in reply before closing her eyes to submit to contended rest.

It pained him, to drive her so hard, but time demanded it. Truth be told, the only reason he'd been able to keep up such a façade of decent health was the desire to spare her from worry and further trauma. Now that her eyes were safely closed in rest, he had a little freedom to let down the curtain, so he let his face wrench in pain and allowed his posture to contort in whatever way afforded him even the slightest relief. Without an audience and his guard down, his image was flickering with zeros and ones as his code glitched in protest to his wounds. Attempting to doctor himself a bit, he put a hand to his stomach and rearranged the code in a more efficient way to make up for all the code he'd lost. He had to marvel at the seemingly magical properties of Vanellope's glitching code, for it was the only thing that was keeping this avatar alive. When she had evolved the code on her own, she broke all laws of the computer world, and this mutated code was also breaking all the laws of code coverage to keep this avatar entity up and running, for he had given most of his code to Candle. So much of her code had been ripped from her when she had been sucked into the pipeline, and was now gone forever, having no doubt been reformatted as it passed through the processor. The code he had first tried to heal her with wasn't anywhere near substantial enough to make the repairs, and was easily rejected. Candlehead would've been lost forever if she hadn't gotten the character code transplant he gave her from his own body. Although she didn't know it, Vanellope had effectively saved them both with her glitching code. He would never have even had the idea to do a character code transplant if he hadn't just done one with Vanellope to steal her glitching code. That had been a spur of the moment idea, to use that ability to speed across the motherboard and save Candlehead, but in the long run, it also sparked the idea of a more extensive transplant that ultimately succeeded in Candle's revival. To top it off, there's no way that transplant would have been possible if there wasn't a way to preserve himself during the operation. He had taken a gamble, and the glitch code hadn't disappointed – it allowed him to keep his form long enough to complete the procedure, and he hoped would continue to work a little longer so he could escort Candle back safely.

He had been so lost in thought, he hadn't noticed Candle stir from her catnap. He was thusly quite surprised when she called out in alarm, "Mr. Muffin Man! Are you ok!? Why are you glitching!?"

Hurrying to regain control over the glitch code to portray a normal form to her, he quickly made the excuse, "Oh, uh, I just needed to borrow Vanellope's glitch code so I could run fast enough across the motherboard to save you… Seems I can't control it as well as she can though" He added a smile at the end so she wouldn't worry. The dear girl let her emotions be influenced by her surroundings too easily – like her elation at the shiny spoon, for instance – and he didn't want to be the cause of a negative turn of emotion by telling her the whole truth.

She seemed won over by it easily enough, and returned the smile with an exclamation, "I'm really happy you did, by the way. Thank you!" Before he could plead with her not to make such a big deal of it, he was surprised by a sudden show of grateful affection that made him flinch. The flinch was not only caused by sheer surprise at the hug, but also by the pain it caused, having pressure applied to already too-thinly stretched code. He swallowed the pain however and returned the hug quickly before urging her to her feet and insisting they press on to reach their destination.

"I've gotta hand it to ya, Kitty, that was pretty slick!" Ralph admitted as he hoisted the last bag into the plane. Genuinely pleased with Kitty's work, he thought he might actually be able to get along with her if things continued in this fashion.

"I done tol' ya, there ain't no delivery Kitty cain't make! If Calhoun wants her guns delivered to our I.P. address destination, then Kitty's gonna make it happen!"

Feeling a bit slighted at Kitty's ignoring his participation in making it happen, he was back to thinking that Kitty was a bit too conceited to be a good friend. Sure, the smuggling wouldn't have been possible without Kitty, but it wouldn't have happened if he hadn't been there either. They had made a good team; Kitty doing reconnaissance as a kitten around each corner and letting him know if it was safe to advance or not, and also causing feline distractions as needed to clear the way. But Ralph had done all the hard work of carrying around all that heavy luggage – for Kitty surely couldn't carry it when she was in feline form – and it wasn't all that easy making it look easy either. It would've aroused more suspicion when they did have to pass by people if the cases looked heavy – as firearms made them. Kitty had relabeled them with some airline tags she swiped as 'fragile – dolls', and even added the personal touch of sticking on some sparkly pink stickers she'd lifted from a gift shop, with a corresponding label "Miss Kitty's Toys". They were pretty confident this would help avoid suspicion, but that didn't guarantee being in the clear, hence why he had to pretend he really was carrying a lightweight bag of dolls.

He had been thinking about how to bring this up so as to get his fair share of recognition, when Kitty spared him the trouble, "Good job to you too, ya know, especially snatching the bags in the first place. Didn't know ya had it in you! With a lil' time and practice – as instructed by the best, yours truly – we could get quite the heist team togethah!"

For the sake of staying in Kitty's good graces – for now that he'd seen her talents first hand, he decided it would be in his best interests to NOT end up on her bad side – Ralph chose to ignore the hint of self-superiority Kitty made in her proposal and simply said "Deal." and held out a hand to shake on it. When Kitty returned the gesture, he was shocked to find her hands to be nearly as petite as Vanellope's. "We'd better get back and find out what became of Felix and Calhoun" he stated, before he allowed himself too much time to get depressed by thoughts of Vanellope and their first handshake deal.

Vanellope flung herself onto her bed with an exasperated groan, sick and tired of all her presidential duties that occupied the last couple of hours. It was all over now, for the time being. The others had done as she asked and all the citizens were debriefed in the grand ballroom of the Castle as to the current situation. There still had been no word on Candlehead and the Muffin Man's whereabouts and conditions, and the donut cop security division personnel were taking shifts and giving status reports on the hour. For now, things were going smoothly enough that she could afford this much needed break, and before she knew it, she had slipped off into a troubled slumber. Nightmares of separation from Ralph, Jubileena, Taffyta, Candle, and all her other friends plagued her mind, and though it only felt like a second, she was awakened an hour later by a frantic Taffyta bursting into her room.

"Didn't you hear!? We have a QUARTER ALERT!" she cried upon entry.

"A WHAT!?" that certainly got her out of bed in a flash.

"What are we gonna do!? Candle was on the roster!" As soon as the platinum blond uttered the name, she had burst into tears again at the reminder of her best friend still being MIA.

Thinking fast, Vanellope assured her, "Don't worry, we still have Candle's cart, so the roster should recognize her attendance once it rolls over her spot. We just need to create a clone to drive it. Go get Juby, Minty, or Adorabeezle to make one of their palette swaps up real quick."

"But that's just it! Juby's clone is already on the roster, and Minty and Adorabeezle said they haven't been able to succeed in making a clone since a little mishap when they were trying to fix up one of the bakery machines!"

That could be a bit of a problem. "Well what about the other racers that weren't on the roster?"

"That would be Swizzle and Gloyd, and they went out again to do a more thorough perimeter check, 'cause they thought they saw something suspicious earlier, but didn't have time to check it out before your two hour deadline!"

Nearing hysterics now, Taffyta started pacing violently, and wringing her hands fiercely with apprehension. "And we have to be out on the race track like NOW!"

"Well then let's go!" Vanellope called, grabbing Taffyta by the wrist and practically towing her along as she ran through the castle to get to the starting line.

"But what are we gonna do!?"

"I'll think of something on the way, trust me!"

When they had arrived at the starting line, they found the others bustling about to get everything in order, and already the carts were all assembled. Glancing nervously at the countdown clock, Vanellope saw that there were only a few clock cycles left before the game finished loading for the race induced by the quarter alert. She hopped into her cart, and noticing Taffyta's on her right, directly next to Candlehead's empty cart, Vanellope called out with inspiration, "Hey Taffy, why not make your own clone? You always said you had the perfect idea for one!"

"But! I've never done that before! And there's not enough time! Come on, Vanellope, haven't you asked enough of me! I just lost my best friend for all I know; I can't handle this stress!"

"It's BECAUSE of that I know you can!" Vanellope encouraged, "Because you'll do your best… for Candle's sake". Leaving Taffyta alone so she could concentrate on just that, Vanellope returned her attention to the racetrack, and braced herself for the countdown. The announcements were finishing up and the starting lights were lit. Here it comes… it's been WAY too long since she last raced, and with all this trauma and stress, this race would be the perfect distraction and medicine – especially because for all she knew, this could be their last. 3… 2… 1…

Ahhh… the pure adrenaline running through her veins now gave her such an exhilarating high, she hardly noticed when Candle's racing car zoomed past her, driven by a pink-haired and lemon-headed racer. 'Knew you could do it, Taffyta.'

The Muffin Man dove behind a wired wall, shoving Candle in ahead of him as he tried to keep them out of the dangers of the actively engaged motherboard. Ah swizzlesticks, the game was actually being played! There was no way they could traverse the motherboard safely now. They'd have to wait it out and hope the player lost interest quickly – especially because he sensed his condition worsening – so they could emerge from this temporary safe haven and complete their journey.

"What's going on?" Candle asked, worry steadily taking over her previous awe at all the pretty moving lights that had started up only seconds ago.

"Somebody's playing the game." he responded simply.

"WHAT!? But we haven't been played in ages! And I was on the roster! Not fair…"

The girl had a point… the game HADN'T been played in ages… and why ever not? And why was someone making a copy of the game?

"I haven't raced in so long…" Candlehead continued to talk to herself, "And now my code feels all funny… I wonder if I'll even remember HOW to race!" Suddenly she exclaimed, "Will I have to be reprogrammed to do it!?"

'Reprogrammed…? Reprogrammed! That's it!' It suddenly clicked in the Muffin Man's mind; it all made sense with that theory! Of course! The sporadic racing – gathering first hand data; the code copying – both for making a back up and for expansion preparation… Sugar Rush was being reprogrammed!

"Candle…" The doctor grabbed the confused girl by the shoulders as his eyes communicated his amazement, "You're a genius!" As if the girl wasn't already thrown off by a compliment that negated frequent comments to the contrary, the doctor only managed to stupefy her completely when he, in his moment of great elation, kissed her. It was but a quick peck, but it ignited a fiercely pink complexion on Candlehead's cheeks.

True word count for Journeying Pains: 3,370
True word count for story thus far: 28,944

Q&A!

Q: I think you should watch the "EZ Living 2" deleted scene. The second I saw that scene I thought of Jake and the Laguna Beach Lifeguard game from your story. To me it was like they were almost exactly the same.
A: So I had to find that on Youtube… you're right! There are some definite similarities; that's just too weird! What's crazier is that the part when his medal starts melting, I had considered a similar thing with the candy flower when he was underwater in Laguna Beach Lifeguard. I decided against it however because I don't think he'd notice such a thing when he's basically drowning and about to be attacked by unidentified sea creature(s). Besides, hard candy is a lot more resilient in water than cookies and frosting are!

Q: im kinda hoping for a bit of a romantic development with Ralph and vanellope, and since your summary says that they're at the mercy of a graphics programmer that brings me to the theory that perhaps sugar rush wasn't sold, so much as sent for an upgrade of sorts, perhaps to make the character appear a bit older in order to appeal to a larger audience. If this turns out to be true i believe that a Ralph/Vanellope pairing could be possible and not be all pedo
A: I had gotten a question about this earlier and answered it via PM so as not to produce any spoilers; but since it keeps coming up, I'll answer it here. I guess it's not that much of a spoiler since, as you pointed out, it is categorized under Romance as well. You may have noticed that its primary category is Adventure, since that's the gist of what I'll be writing it in. However the story is split into two parts, and this first part has very little romance to it since, as you pointed out, that would be 'all pedo'. You're very observant btw, and logical in your deductions; I'm impressed! As alluded to in the summary, Sugar Rush will be undergoing some massive code changes, which will indeed include an 'age upgrade…to appeal to a larger audience'. And yes, the older Vanellope x Ralph pairing will be explored… but not until part 2 of the story. Originally, this story idea started from that point 2 phase… but then I decided to expand it back to explain how things happened, introduce key characters sooner, and set the stage. I've had a ton of fun setting it up this way and writing part 1, however I do apologize to keep ya'll waiting for part 2 in all of its fluffy glory.

Q: Is the airport like the Internet or something? Or the electricity mainframe of the city? And are the "planes" like emails or wire-travelling circuits?
A: You got it on your first try! It's exactly the internet! Alluded to when I introduced Kitty in Ralph's thoughts, which explained that she sent out e-mails from the photobooth (I'll address your question about kitty in the next question) Airports are routers and/or servers that re-route elsewhere, and planes are 'packets'. I'll leave the Google-ing of routing and packets up to you though :) Also, it seemed natural to me that if their 'local area connection' (albeit, connected through a common power surge strip instead of cat5 cables) was accessible by train, then the world-wide network could be accessible by plane!

Q: What exactly is Kitty again, some sort of server or router program to go with her 'mail'?
A: Kind of, yes. I've compared her to Surge's appearance, and have made her role rather similar to his… that is the role of being the 'embodiment' of a piece of electronic hardware and its function. Just like Surge is the embodiment of the surge protector and thus responsible for protecting everything plugged into it from outside threat, Kitty's job is likewise to transfer data over the internet. Since her particular port is hooked up to a photo booth that sends e-mails, (For I thought such a thing to be the only thing I could reasonably see needing access to the internet at an arcade, and those photo booths that send you pictures over e-mail are all over the place these days) I made e-mail transfer her primary job, and hence the postal uniform.

Q: I wonder if I can borrow the _ concept
A: I'm going to answer this question in general terms. If you like my ideas and/or quotes, I'm fine with people using them so long as they 1. Give credit to the original source (be that me, or the source I got it from – cause you may have noticed sometimes I pull quotes from things in pop culture, other movies, etc), 2. Don't copy the idea / scene directly, make it your own, and 3. Let me know where you post it, as I'm curious to see how you'll use it! That said, I would be honored for people to think my material worth using, so please do! :D

Review Responses

Becky Blue Eyes – "I knew the girl wasn't the most frosted of cupcakes" That quote made my day. xD May I use that if I find a place for it? (We're just sharing all sorts of ideas, aren't we? If I had the schedule for it, I'd say it'd be fun to collaborate sometime!) As for how the code is compensating, part of that was revealed the chapter after you wondered… a large crater-pit in the fungeon… and a shiny spoon. But I'll get more into that in later chapters. Ralph and Jake and Jake and Sonic… I plan to have fun with those relationships to the full extent! And yes, you're right, Jake and Sonic must (and will) have their own adventure! I've set the stage for it, I'm just not sure which chapter I'll put it in, or if I'll just make it a bonus chapter… we'll see.

Dixie Darlin – I'm really glad that you like my OC's interaction, like Jake and Kitty, and Ralph and Jake… man, I sure am centered around Jake… but he's a personal favorite of mine…

Awesome Stories May Occur – Actually, I was referring to the "Double rainbow all the way" meme (and auto-tuned song), but yeah, Jake would probably lay an egg if he came across a quadruple winged (er, surf-boarded) plane!

Iluvvanellopevonschweetz – First off, AWESOME username! I approve. xD So glad you're enjoying my fic! Yeah, Vanellope is definitely partly guilty for the rift between her and Ralph, despite Ralph blaming himself for all of it… And I must say, I'm pressed you're still reading when I did make Vanellope guilty, and you seem to love her so much… I hope I can do justice to Vanellope's character moving forward!

Everyone – Thanks for all your support, responses, favorites, and follows! I am truly touched at the growing support of this fanfic! I had been planning to do something special for 5,000 views, but before I had a chance to do anything for it, it already crested 6,000 views! Ahhh can't keep up! You guys are too awesome!