Practical Use of One's Time

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“Now then, I take it you’re here for the race?” Marylou enquired.
“Race? What race?” Artemis said, excited and caressing the go-kart.
Marylou studied his wobbly legs and frowned. “We’ll have to get you fixed up first. Here, eat this.”
She shoved something which looked like a Bassett’s Liquorice Allsort in his mouth. His legs almost instantly sprung back into shape, and working order.

“Why, I could kiss you!” He exclaimed and made to embrace the girl. “Eww! Cooties!” She cried, to further baby-Dwarfer laughter.

“Come on everyone,” she said, undeterred in her mission and wiping her face with a stripy sleeve, “I’ll show you where you can make your cars!”

“This could be a risk…” Alex said, serious for a moment.
“… But let’s do it! Come on Plisk!” He galloped over and grabbed Plisken’s arm, pulling him forward.

... Then he noticed the 'old man' didn’t have a beard any more and was as cute as a button.
He sat down on a candy rock and laughed till he cried.

Marylou rolled her eyes, impatient at the ridiculous new kids. It was like everything was fresh to them, like they hadn’t been children for over three million years or something.
She huffed a lock of hair out of her face and folded her arms.
"Have we quite finished?"
The others nodded, trying to be serious.
<snip/>

At first Artemis didn't believe that there was actually a candy themed racing world ahead of him, but then again in the last few days he had traveled dimensions fighting sapient rodents, found an alternate version himself, created a time paradox, married a Skutter, attended a warped holiday party with gerbils, and of course traveled 3,000,000 years aboard a giant blue tub into the future frozen to the floor of his lab. So maybe he was being too pessimistic.

Artemis examined his limbs as Marylou lead them to the kart factory. "Artemis dude, are you okay?" Asked a pint sized Jaxx. "Why yes my hybrid friend! I'm better than okay, look! My organic limbs are all back!" Artemis then proceeded to show him all the limbs that he was missing as a 48 year old man.

"I lost my liver and kidneys during a test of hyper-alcohol, my left aorta in a drunken knife fight with Seymour before he was in a wheelchair, my gall bladder in a bet, half of my small intestine to robot prostitute on Ganymeade...." "Dude, like how are you still alive?" Jaxx interrupted. Artemis' optimism disappeared. "You know, I'm not sure" Suddenly it returned, "I guess I'm just an awesome scientist!" Jaxx remembered that Artemis had forgotten to tell him of his right arm (he remembred how Artemis broke the robotic replacement during the afterparty). "Wait, what happened to your right arm dude?" Jaxx asked. "Uh....nothing, I just didn't like it" Artemis stammered. "I think you're lying dude" "Now look!" Marylou stepped in. "If you two don't pay attention then you won't know how to build your carts!" Behind Marylou was a colossal factory. "You all have to play a special mini game to build you race karts! If....." "Excuse me!" Artemis raised his hand anxiously. "Yes?" Marylou said, annoyed. "Can I build mine by hand?" "Why? This game is fun!" "Feh! Construction is a more practical use for one's time than some dinky little game! Besides, I'm a scientist!" "I don't think that building it by hand is...." Before she could finish, Artemis had collect tools, supplies, and the proper attire. "Fine...." Artemis slid his child sized goggles over his eyes. "Thank you!" He said in a low, creepy voice before skipping to his desired assembly location. Marylou lead the others to the factory where they assembled their carts.

Some time later, the Dwarfers rolled out their completed carts. Artemis was waiting with a professional-ish looking cart. "I call it, lächerlich über komplizierte süßigkeiten wiedergabe des Mach 1! Or just the Mach 1 for short" True to it's name, Artemis' cart looked exactly like Speed Racer's Mach 1. "How did you do that?" Marylou asked. Artemis leaned in close and whispered "Science". "She comes complete with candy countermeasures, a souped up Quantum Cotton Candy Drive engine, a Wether's Original Caramel Hardcandy Alloy body, Oreo High Performance Tires, and yes, a monkey in the trunk!" "How?" a dwarfer asked. "Laying banana candy baited traps in the candy cane jungle and hours of shock-therapy assisted training!" The monkey popped out of the trunk and gave the group a thumbs up. "I call him Bubblegum" Artemis said proudly. "Wasn't the monkey from Speed Racer called Chim Chim?" A Dwarfer asked. "Uh....." "Why is the Cart's name in German if Speed Racer was Japanese?" Asked another. "No further questions, I am quite full!" Artemis blurted, having not thought up a better retort.

Once the Dwarfers were done showing their carts off, Marylou lead the, down to the race.

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Make sure to write in the cart building mini game!