route_1065 | [OPEN TO ROCKETS] Run, run, as fast as you can!

Current Location: Goldenrod City; Rocket Base.

Entry tags:

[OPEN TO ROCKETS] Run, run, as fast as you can!

Who: Vanellope von Schweetz and ANYONE AT THE BASE.
Where: Goldenrod City - Rocket base.
When: May 21st - after the day's newbie training.
Summary: Vanellope's got a real bed. Time to check out the rest of her new digs.
Rating: A for Adorable? I will put something real here if anything comes up.
Log:
[There's a cute little girl running around the Rocket base. ...Why in the world is there a cute little girl running around the Rocket base.

Well, for one: she's bored. Two: nobody's tried to kick her out, yet. And three: how the heck did she get here, this wasn't Diet Cola Mountain at all. It wasn't anywhere in Sugar Rush Speedway, which would be impossible. It's time to find the station gate around here and try to go back through it, even if she wouldn't necessarily mind staying a while, what with having something more comfortable than a candy wrapper to curl up in at night.

Unfortunately, all her zipping around just keeps getting her lost. Even the Zubat following her around doesn't really seem to know where they are.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

_{[Ralph hangs a thumb off his pocket and listens. He's still buttmad this stupid game would make a kid from a completely unrelated game be a badguy, but when Vanellope brings up The Medal, his mind record-scratch stops.]}

Woah, back up, short stuff. Did you say medal?

_{[Specifically HIS medal.]}

Gold, about yea-big?

[Prepare your ears for some sarcasm, buddy.]

No, Pink and sparkly, the size of King Candy's big, stupid head--of course it looks like that, Officer Fishbreath.

HEY. Watch it, you little snot. I'm tryin' to figure somethin' out here!

_{[Mop in-hand, Ralph narrows his eyes and stalks a circle around Vanellope.]}

You say we know each other. I've never seen you before in my life. You know about the medal. I had it when I left Hero's Duty. I didn't have it when I woke up here. Now explain that.

[Way to be creepy, Ralph.]

We really gotta go over this again?

[Huff.]

I borrow your medal-coin-thing, you get mad. I enter the race, you get mad. You help me, you get mad. I make a joke about Hero's Duty's name, you get mad. You help me again, and again, you get mad. So don't go getting all red and yell-y now, too, I'm not in the mood.

_{[Ralph wrinkles his nose at her explanation. He didn't get mad THAT often. Really! He didn't! She was totally blowing it all out of proportion!]

[But that didn't stop her story from seeming...plausible...though why in the world he'd help such a bratty little punk was beyond him. She'd said they were friends or something hadn't she?]

[You can practically see the steam as the gears between his ears work overtime. He brings his mop around and props himself up with it, chin on his hands. THINK. THINK. THINK.]

[_{Maybe my code did get scrambled} Owh his head.]}

[Well... Whose anger wouldn't fade after seeing that kind of painfully obvious confusion? Sure, she's still mad, but it's more at the situation in general instead of at Ralph specifically.]

Alright, alright, don't go breakin' nothing here. You believe me, right?

I dunno, kid...

_{[Kind of a lot of stuff happened these past few months and he's having trouble shrugging off much of anything as being impossible.]}

I ran into a guy from the arcade when I first got here, but he didn't remember me at all. I thought it was just because I didn't get out a lot.

[Ughhh, come on man, she needs her buddy.]

Okay, soooo... Heck of a coincidence, don'tcha think? I mean, sure, I've never left my game, but we've definitely met.

_{[Ralph shrugs kind of helplessly and holds a hand out for his mopping bucket.]}

Yeah, well, sorry you got roped into this. Whatever happened. I think...I'm getting a migraine. Achk. Never had one of those before. Aah. Aaaah. Ow.

[She eyes him up before reluctantly giving the bucket back.]

Alright, come on, let's get you sat down somewhere before you fall over and cause the entire building the collapse. Then when you feel better, it can be your turn to be helpful and explain what's goin' on.

Like the broken-game-bad-guy stuff. And Booger Bat and the steering wheel-shaped thing with the eye. These tutorial level things? Not helpful.

[The Zubat helpfully descends down onto Vanellope's head and gives a cheerful screech. Er, to bat ears. It's probably hard to tell just how friendly Boogie actually is by that sound alone.]

_{[Ralph shoulders the mop and pinches the bridge of his nose before starting to walk toward the lobby area. There were places to sit thre.]}

Aaaagh it's right between my eyes. Ah! Ah! Spots! Jeez. What'd you say your name was? Valarie? What game you from?

Uh-huh. Well, at least it proves you've got something in that head of yours.

[She skips on just ahead of him and starts to walk backwards--mostly so he can get the full effect of her offended face.]

VALARIE? Really? It's Vanellope. And I'm from Sugar Rush Speedway--by the Whac-a-Mole? That's what they say, anyway.

Vanellope, right, right. Yeah, I know that game. I see it every once in a while when they throw me off the building.

_{[Once they enter the lobby, Ralph doesn't waste any time. He shuffles over to the nearest bench and plunks down on the far end. It bows under his weight.]}

Ssssss ow, Jeez, maybe I did get a little scrambled. So neither of us have that medal then, huh?

[Against her better judgement, Vanellope plops down next to him, elbows going to her knees and her chin landing in her hands. Out of the corner of her eye, she begins to study him.]

Nah, we gotta win the race, first. Winner gets the entry fees for the race as a reward.

[She figured being clear was best, if Ralph was experiencing technical difficulties.]

_{[Ralph massages his forehead.]}

Racing, huh? The last thing I remember is spiraling out of control in a space ship with a giant bug for a back-seat driver...

There are medals you can win here, but I'm not very good at this kind of game.

Oh yeah. You crashed, and you took a chunk of the trees with you. That's why I'm going to be the racer.

[Probably not the best time to bring up the fact that she can't actually drive. Ralph's head might explode.]

Medals are more your thing--seriously, you practically drool when they're mentioned. I mean, more than usual. [Vanellope perks up a little, taking a look around the lobby. Oh, she's ran through here a few times.] What kinda game is this, anyway?

_{[Ralph wondered if something had happened to him when he'd come out of that chute. It didn't help his headache at all. He does stop pinching his brow long enough to roll one eye down at Vanellope.]}

I do not.

_{[He finally gives up making his head feel any better and mimics her pose, chin on hands, elbows on knees.]}

A weird one. There's no screen or anything. I'm not even sure there's a player. That's how busted it is. We're supposed to catch these little monster guys called Pokemon and then they fight each other and get stronger. Then you take 'em around to these gym places and fight those pokemon to win medals. From there? I got no idea.

And we get to be the bad guys.

How come we gotta play if there's no player?

[Though the thought of her being an actual playable character was...kind of thrilling. Figures it'd be in a game just as broken as she is.]

What'd you expect? People always think we're the bad guys.

I dunno...I don't think anybody here really knows what's goin' on. _{[He lowers his voice as a gaggle of Rockets passes them by on the way to the long halls]} Heck, some people I've met don't even know they're in a game.

_{[There was always a weird disconnect when he ran into people that didn't use gamespeak.]}

I'm tired of being the bad guy. That's the whole reason I left my game, but then I got stuck here and it's like some big sick joke!

_{[To punctuate himself, he kicks his mop bucket, sending it wheeling across the lobby.]}

Huh? Any idiot could know this is a game. [Pause.] Unless everyone's coding gets scrambled when they get here. Can they do that?

[Vanellope sighs, drooping even more as she watches the bucket.]

Okay, so it sucks, you're right about that. I'm sure we can do something to fix it, though. We were this close back home, and people don't know us in this game, right? Maybe we can get 'em to see we're alright even if we're on this team thing.

Apparently they can. _{[Ralph taps the side of his head.]}

I've met a few nice people outside Team Rocket but no matter what, don't let anybody know we're the bad guys, alright? That's a one-way ticket to jail.

_{[Ralph's doom and gloom lifts slightly.]}

But nobody can make us steal pokemon or attack people. We can do somethin' else. I, ah...mop. I guess. And do laundry. It stinks, but it's better than bein' bad. There's this girl I met named Alice, she doesn't steal either. _{[THAT HE KNOWS ABOUT Aahahahaa. Ha.]

[He squints at Vanellope.]} Actually, you two might get along.

Huh...

[But Vanellope was already screwed up before she came here, and glitches couldn't leave their games.

Had they fixed her instead? She hadn't bugged out for a whole day and a half.

Oh well. Even if they did, it didn't change the fact that they had messed with her only friend's code and made him forget about her.]

Alice? [She sounds skeptical, but that might be because her stomach did an uncomfortable flop at the idea of Ralph making friends without her.] What's she like? Is she the "bad guy" [--complete with finger quotes--] in her game, too?

_{[Oblivious, Ralph just shakes his head.]}

I think she's actually from team of good guys. None of them wound up here. She got my behind out of trouble more than once.

This place doesn't seem to care about who you were. It just sticks you on one side or the other.

[She leans back into the bench instead, allowing her legs to kick back and forth. Being a ~good guy~ instead of a bad-guy-but-not-really didn't do much to earn this Alice person any points, but surely anyone who helped Ralph--multiple times, to boot--couldn't be...too horrible...

Right? Right.

So now to just...keep that in mind. Yeah.]

How come y'think I'd like her?

She's stubborn like you, for one thing.
_{[He's already picked up that Vanellope doesn't drop something just because somebody disagrees with her.]}

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[action] ;-; Vanellope bb

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