Some Fantastic, Chapter Nine

Some Fantastic, Chapter Nine

By PippinRocks

0o0o0o0o0

Calhoun swam through the system, her keen eyes tracing lines and paths the others couldn't hope to fine, let alone follow. This was a field almost as familiar as killing.

And she was very good at killing.

It wouldn't take long to find an unprotected user account. From there, she just had to access the outgoing mail, mask the origin as being from Magic Quest, and tell Litwak how to fix Fix-It Felix Jr. It was downright simple compared to what they'd already done.

'There.' She spotted a dimly flickering box about a hundred feet below. Someone hadn't used their account in awhile.

She swam to the box and clutched it. Lines of code appeared. She scanned them, nodded, and began crafting her message.

Just as she finished sending, she sensed it, trailing her, getting closer. Yelling for Wreck-It to yank her would leave her vulnerable and expose her position. Not to mention Felix would probably jump in to try and save her.

She began to move smoothly upward. If she could close some of the distance between the portal, she might make it out alive.

'Anti-spy ware.' She growled softly. She'd been so stupid! Of course the game had security, it housed thousands of people's personal data, credit card info, everything.

She felt the air below her move. It was getting closer.

0o0o0o0o0

"Tammy?" Felix called. He'd lost sight of his wife some time ago, but periodically called her name.

"Felix, I'm sure she'd fine." Ralph let out a little more line.

"What if she's not? What if she's in trouble, and we can't hear? What if we pull up that cord and all that's left is a raggedy end?" Felix asked, angry and miserable.

"Felix, she's fine." Ralph blew a bored breath at the ceiling. "I'll tug the line again in a few minutes, okay?"

"Not really."

"What do you want me to say? 'Here's some rope, go check it out?' She'd kill me."

"Brother, this whole thing has been a mess. I just want to fix it."

"Calhoun is fixing it. She's almost as good as fixing our problems as you are." Ralph smiled. "Remember the time she though a cy-bug made it into our game?"

"Brother do I. She nearly tore the whole place apart. I had plenty of work to do that night."

Ralph continued to talk about the last six months with his friend, trying to distract the both of them. Ralph was nearly as worried as Felix, but he didn't dare let on, lest the handyman jump into the void after his Dynamite Gal.

"I hope Vanellope's okay."

"You want me to check on her?" Felix perked up.

"Sure. Tell her to check in a little more often." They'd seen the girl only once, when she'd glitched in to report 'a really stupid looking cow-thing' that chatted with her about video games for a few minutes. Naturally, she'd recommended Sugar Rush.

As Felix went to the door, Ralph thought he felt the line shift. He tugged it gently. It spooled into the black depths, out of sight.

It jerked violently in his hands.

"No, no!" He hauled on the slack rope.

"What? What is it?" Felix was back in an instant, Vanellope trailing him.

"I don't know, the rope jerked!" Ralph felt another strong tug. "Something is going on down th--"

Felix grabbed the rope with both hands and dove into the void.

"Felix, wait!" Vanellope perched on the lip, ready to jump after him.

"Oh, no!" Ralph grabbed her. "You stay here!"

"But--"

"But nothing! Felix is going down, and I can't pull the rope and watch the door!" Ralph threw a glance behind him. "So you're staying here!"

Vanellope cast a worried look after Felix, but the handyman vanished into the depths. "What about Felix and Calhoun?"

Ralph shook his head and kept pulling.

0o0o0o0o0

"Tammy!" Felix shouted, half swimming, half climbing down the rope. "Where are you?"

"Felix, get up that blasted rope NOW!" Calhoun hollered from below. "There's a bot on my tail!"

Felix caught sight of her, a hundred feet below, as she swam furiously upwards. There was a bit of slack in the line as Ralph hauled it, and she easily outpaced it.

Below her, something white and bulbous rose from the depths. It was the size of the nicelander's apartments...no diet cola mountain...no. Felix had never seen anything that big before.

"Jiminey jaminey." He felt the blood run from his face. "Tammy, it's getting closer!"

"I know!" She snarled. "Get out of here before that thing spots you!"

Now there was an idea.

Felix let go of the rope, and tried to ignore the oddity of anti-gravity. He stroked wildly to the left, like a swimmer drowning.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!" Calhoun screamed from below. "OUT! NOW!"

"Sorry sweetheart." Felix gulped. The creature below them was changing direction, ever so slightly.

Now it was barreling towards him. It moved past Calhoun, and Felix breathed a sigh of relief.

His job wasn't done yet, though.

"Felix!" Calhoun was fifty feet away from the portal, slightly further from her husband. "Get out!"

"No Ma'am. He'll turn tail and come after you." Felix wasn't as strong a swimmer as the creature or his wife. He was losing ground. Quickly.

"Felix, NO!"

He couldn't bear the anguish in her voice. He looked down at her, and put on a brave smile.

"I love you."

The creature closed the gap, and Calhoun lost sight of him.

"NOOO!"

0o0o0o0o0

Vanellope and Ralph watched the scene play out as he hauled rope.

"C'mon Felix, swim, swim!" Ralph hissed. It didn't even look like he was trying to get away. More like...

'He's distracting it.'

"Felix, NO!" He screamed. His voice was lost in the void.

Vanellope stared in horror as the scene played out. "I'll glitch down and get him, Ralph, I can get--"

They both trembled as a massive CRUNCH cut off her words.

Felix was gone.

The leviathan, satisfied that an intruder had been stopped, vanished into the depths, to patrol elsewhere.

Ralph continued to pull the rope, hands independent of his mind.

"Felix…" Vanellope whimpered as Calhoun climbed out of the void

Her head was turned, her hair falling over her features. "Let's go."

"Calhoun, we can't just—"

"What, Wreck-It? We can't WHAT?" She got into his face. There were tears streaming from her eyes. "You're game is going to be unplugged because that…that IDIOT tried to save me!"

"He did save you." Vanellope wept quietly.

"Not the point." Calhoun turned her head. "I'm out. The exit is in a hut like this in the village where we started. I've gotta get home. Hero's Duty I'll be unplugged if I'm missing."

She ran out the door. Ralph let the rope fall from his hands.

"Ralph?" Vanellope went to him. "Ralph, he's not really dead, right?"

"I…I don't know."

0o0o0o0o0

To be continued…

0o0o0o0o0

A/N Sorry to leave it there but…I'm gonna. Until the next chapter, of course…