Author's Note: !SPOILER ALERT FOR PORTAL 2! Just some thoughts about what else might be going through Wheatley's mind up in space. One could argue that it's a sequel of sorts to my other Portal 2 fan fic, "Who To Blame," especially seeing that the titles are similar, but they don't have to be, as the two stand on their own fairly well. Plus, "Who To Blame" was obviously written before Portal 2 was released, and it naturally has a detail or two wrong (but as I was reviewing it today, it's surprisingly accurate and can still fit with the game's continuity). Anyway, enjoy! :)

Wheatley had never thought about it before, but the Earth actually did look kind of pretty.

Particularly from his currently, cosmic, angle.

Wheatley sighed again, and not for the first time, wished he had a means of getting back down to that little blue orb. He wasn't sure what he'd do if he got down there, but he'd think of something. At the very least, he'd apologize for acting like…well, for the lack of a better word…a moron. And for causing so much trouble. And for nearly killing everybody.

Well, almost everybody.

He wondered how things had played out back down at Aperture Laboratories anyway. Did the she really let the test subject lady go free? Granted, he had no idea if this was actually part of the agreement, as he had been too busy being a crazy megalomaniac and trying to prove he was actually competent at the time. But now that he was up here in space and had time to think about it, he highly doubted it could have gone any other way. Given their history, some kind of agreement had to have been struck. And the most likely agreement was that the lady would be allowed to go free if the lady also got rid of him and put her back in charge of everything.

And now that Wheatley was thinking with a straight head, he saw just how much of a very bad idea that was. The lady shouldn't have placed any trust in her. Wheatley knew that the moment she was plugged back into the facility and was exposed to all that power…well…

All deals they had made would've been quickly forgotten, let's put it that way.

And yet Wheatley found that he even couldn't blame her for that. He didn't think it was her fault at all for being the way she was. He suspected it was the systems that supported her that was at fault. He wasn't sure how that was so, but seeing he fell victim to the exact same thing the moment he got plugged into those same systems, something he was convinced shouldn't have happened under any other circumstances. Something about being the controlling force of the whole facility also came with the price of losing your sanity by default, or so it seemed.

He wondered if the humans that made her even realized this. He now knew that the reason all of them personality cores even existed was to use them to try and control her unruly personality as the central and controlling computer of Aperture Science. Apparently the idea was to find a nice balance between her and some of the personality cores that would cause her to be nice and behave. That idea clearly failed, and the scientists paid for it with their lives.

As a result, Wheatley now thought they had been going about it completely the wrong way. Something in the system itself was causing the bad behavior. And as Wheatley saw it, the only way to get to stop would be to figure out what it was and remove it.

Of course, for him the best way to solve problems was to get rid of the problem maker in any way possible.

Probably why he had thought, when he had been plugged in as the controlling force of Aperture Science, he had thought that killing everybody was the best thing to do.

Not that he could do anything about it now, not where he was. He supposed he did get his just reward for all of that, but it pained him to think that way. Was that how they all really thought about him now? Something that was better off left out here? It hurt to even think about.

But he kept finding himself wondering about what had happened back down on Earth with her and the lady. Did things work out there? He distinctly remembered it being mentioned that she had already fixed that reactor core…thingy…from…well, from blowing up was what it really boiled down to. So in all likelihood, Aperture Science was still intact somewhere down on that big blue orb, chugging away as it always had.

Not that he cared.

And most likely, she was large and in charge again, causing who knew what kind of trouble. It was the only way Wheatley could think of for the mess he had caused to be undone. But if she was back and in charge, that probably meant she was back on her killing spree "for science," as she would no doubt put it.

"For science," please. Wheatley figured it had nothing to do with science. And he knew, because he had walked around in her proverbial shoes for a while. She tested because she had to. And she killed people due to that testing because she was, quite frankly, bored. What else would one do if you had all that power and a huge facility at your disposal anyway? At least, that was how Wheatley had felt about that matter when he had his chance to rule the facility.

But now Wheatley worried about the lady's safety, convinced now that she didn't follow through on whatever agreement the two had struck to get him out of control. He hoped that the poor lady had managed to escape her somehow, or had at least found safety. She seemed capable enough. She had managed to cheat death…what…three times now? At least? It was probably more, in all honesty.

But even Wheatley had to admit that the odds just weren't in her favor. He feared the lady was probably very much dead by now.

And Wheatley felt bad about that, and wished there had been some way to prevent that. If only there had been some way to have unplugged himself from the central systems without plugging her back in. Obviously, if that had happened, the facility would've blown up. But if it hadn't been for that…if they could have just left that central computer unplugged…maybe things could've worked out for the better.

For everyone.

But that wasn't an option. Someone had to fix the reactor core. There wasn't enough time at that point to escape, as they would never get far enough away in time to survive. He couldn't have done it, as he just didn't know how to, otherwise he would've never had allowed it to reach that point, even with himself not thinking straight. The only one who could fix it was by plugging her back in. And that's exactly what happened.

The only problem was that there was no way she was going to let herself be unplugged again. Once you had all that power pumping through you, you never wanted to be pulled away from it again, he knew this from bitter experience. But once you were pulled away and had gotten moment to get over the initial shock…it actually wasn't so bad. It's just once you have the power, you'd never willingly want to go back, so you'd never find out until someone or something else intervened. And when you have that much power at your disposal when someone tries to mess with you…well…

It didn't really help to think about it.

Nor did wondering what could've been, but Wheatley did it anyway, wondering what would've happened for things to have worked out better. Maybe then he could figure out what went so wrong so quickly. First, he decided, if the reactor core wasn't melting down, there wouldn't have been any need to plug her back in.

But then, for the reactor core to not be melting down would've meant that Wheatley shouldn't have been plugged instead, because he was the one that let it get in that state.

And he wouldn't have been plugged in if he hadn't come up with the idea to have the lady go ahead with the core transfer. And if they hadn't done the core transfer, they couldn't have defeated her.

They wouldn't have needed to, however, if Wheatley hadn't led the lady there.

But she needed to escape from her, that's why Wheatley had done that.

But then she wouldn't have needed to escape if Wheatley hadn't woken her up to try and escape in the first place.

A sudden thought came to Wheatley. Up until now, he had considered her to take at least partial blame for everything that had happened. And that was true…up until the event all those many years ago when the lady "murdered" her, as was the popular term. After that point in time, none of this would've happened…

…If Wheatley hadn't interfered.

So that was it then. This mess that ultimately landed him in a skiwampus lunar orbit of sorts wasn't anyone's fault…

…except his.

He was to blame.

But then they would've still died, because the reactor core was about to go critical then, too. That's why he woke up the lady in the first place.

But, given everything that had happened…maybe that would've been better.

That way, the curse of Aperture Science, and everyone involved in making it that way, would've been destroyed forever.

And it wasn't like anyone was going to miss them, because there didn't seem to be anybody left on that little blue orb except the three of them, at least no one that was technologically savvy in anyway, at least. He knew, because once it had fully sunk in that he was stuck out here, one of the things he tried was to radio the facility back on Earth, if only to see what happened. But he got no response, and seeing that she was back in control of the facility, he wasn't really surprised by that. So he spread the frequency to the rest of the planet, to see if he'd get a response.

He was at it for weeks on end.

There never was a response.

So, looking at it logically, Wheatley saw that there was only him, her, and the lady left who were still alive.

Maybe. If he was right about how things played out back at Aperture, then it was likely was dead.

And Wheatley felt responsible for that.

But as he had already thought more than once, getting stuck out in space was probably more than enough punishment. Not even he could survive out here for much longer. All Aperture Science technology was designed to run on as little as 1.1 volts of electricity, but Wheatley soon wouldn't be able to even get that much. Not without suddenly sprouting solar panels out of his sides.

A power down was inevitable.

But, even though everything seemed bleak for him as those final 1.1 volts was used up and existence started to fade out, he did allow himself one good thought. If the lady had been killed, as tragic as that was, it did mean that she would be out of a human test subject now, meaning that would severely hinder her testing until she could come up with replacements. And as Wheatley himself had discovered when he was in control, robots could work, but looking back, that would only be a weak patch to a gaping hole that really needed to be properly filled.

And that couldn't be done without more humans.

Which she wasn't ever going to get now.

Right?