Cycle
He draws a waning moon. It is a curved eaten shape, born to echo the lies of Aperture's songs. He has no fear to stop his hand, no obstacle on this concrete sheet; inside this prophecy, within this den, Doug can rest safely.
GLaDOS doesn't even try to fight back. As long as he is careful, her confidence will not break. He sees to it for her; he drifts from vent to vent without a sound, keeping the white ghost of the facility intact under her cameras. His plans flow steady and silent; just like minutes and hours, they walk on without a warning.
But if she can stop him, she has no power over the march of time — and the façade she has built will have no choice but slip away, night after night, until it all crumbles in the dark.
In the feverish wait, he outlines a dark moon.
It is the black day, and the shadows are on their side. He knows that, deep down in the steamy guts, Chell is running undercover — the story of her rebirth is a precise secret, written in places and times that cannot change.
She follows the one path, straight to the meeting point of too many lines. She destroys the lights and the dying sparks, filling the thin white space between the two halves of the night; she fights to keep her course, even when it goes all wrong.
In spite of it all, Doug fights to keep her alive. She has to be there when the world starts over — there has to be destruction, silence, to be reborn. She will outlive the eclipse; in the long night of the facility, between rust and water, she will breathe on.
He put her to sleep, and fades in a thin crescent.
The waxing moon widens on her skin.
Her hue is pale, dusted in sleep. She only has light to nourish her spirit — she fights to help it grow again, full and luminous against the walls in ruin.
She follows her story on the chambers, going back to her nature — ad if her silhouette is a faint nail against the sea of panels, the shadow she throws on them claims back her space. In a circle goes her search, in a circle it ends; the images and the sounds mirror the past, in change and repetition at the same time.
Her walk is broken in half, her weight thrown in a fall. But Chell does not give up; she rises again through the past, brightening the black half of the facility.
The full moon rises like a passing ghost in her mind.
The pale wheel of its borders, the prison, is still trapped at its back; it haunts her in her sleep and aches in her limbs, burning like fire all over her scratched skin. Still, just as it stole her, it came to set her free — it was the end of the story, and the beginning of a serene night.
The memory of its light guides Chell to the surface, reflected by dozens of turrets. It springs from the neon lights, it resounds in the air; it mingles with the sky in soft vapours, parallel and companion to the living sun.
It came in hues of grey and white, against the inky night, to create this world anew. Every inch of universe she sees — the colours, the breeze, the sound of a door that slams — was brought back to her by that same moon.
Her body is renewed, her face lit differently. It is her turn to begin another cycle and another phase.
She walks away; and down below, painted on the cold concrete, she leaves behind the last traces of this story.
Moon-themed one-shot. As you probably know, the moon is my love, and I can't stop being fascinated by its role in Portal. Thank you for reading!