That's what learning is, after all; not whether we lose the game, but how we lose and how we've changed because of it and what we take away from it that we never had before, to apply to other games. Losing, in a curious way, is winning.
-Richard Bach
Chell sat impatiently at a desk. Normally, these offices were a sardine can of people, but down here it was empty. Most of the staff at Aperture had either been fired, quit, or had 'mysteriously vanished' while being a test subject. The only person who seemed to be stagnant was the man in front of her. He was an intern at the facility and had been given the task of 'watching' Chell while her father was at work with the Genetic Life form and Disc Operating System. It surprised her that the intern still had a job. He was incredibly clumsy, and came up with the most terrible ideas she had ever heard.
He had told Chell his name; Wheatley. In a strange way it matched his personality. Wheatley was a lot like wheat; he had sandy hair, eyes the color of the sky, was incredibly tall, and just sat around being useless until someone plucked him up and put him to work. Naturally he wasn't given any task a five year old couldn't do.
Wheatley gathered the papers he had been organizing over the past half-hour and looked up at her.
"Right, we should move on to the next task," he said.
Finally, Chell thought. She was tired of watching him take twenty times longer than normal people on easy tasks.
She got up and followed him out the door. As they wandered the halls, Chell marveled at how complex Aperture was. It formed an intricate labyrinth of offices, laboratories, and test chambers. Wheatley seemed to know his way around pretty well. It didn't surprise, seeing as how he had worked her for about 4 years.
Eventually they reached an elevator and got in. On the way up, Wheatley found the need to explain what was going to happen. He talked incessantly, a trait that had not shown up in Chell. She rarely spoke, and when she did it was only in necessary circumstances.
"So," he explained, "What we are doing next is a systems check on Her."
'Her' was how Wheatley addressed GLaDOS. He seemed to not enjoy saying the name, which confused Chell since all other personnel said it without a second thought. Then again, he was a lot more of a coward than most people. It reminded Chell of a little kid seeing a lion for the first time.
"Relatively simple," he continued, "Only that… we will need to turn Her on; and She'll probably kill us as soon as She can."
That seemed to be the only real issue with GLaDOS. All in all she was a perfect machine, a true marvel of science; except for the fact that she murdered whoever turned her on. The lab boys were still working on that. It didn't help that the person they had turned into GLaDOS, Caroline, had done so completely against her will and shortly after the death of her employer, Cave Johnson. Cave Johnson had created Aperture and lead it through triumphs and hard times, including the near-bankruptcy in the sixties.
When they got out of the elevator, Chell noticed the drastic change in environment. Where the offices were bright and inviting with colorful walls and various propaganda posters, this room was dark and cold. All the walls were black, making it look uninviting even without the metal beast at the center. Chell had never seen GLaDOS, but she could tell this was her. Even powered off, she gave off a feeling of pure hatred and anger.
Wheatley walked into a small and Chell followed. Apparently this was where GLaDOS was turned on. The office wasn't very impressive; it only contained a desk and a small computer. He proceeded to sit down and turn on the computer, typing mad strings of codes that she had no clue about. If there was one thing Chell was bad at, it was computers. Wheatley, however, seemed to be doing pretty well. That is, until it came to the password. Whoever had decided against tattooing all of the company passwords on his arms was seriously mistaken.
"Alright," Wheatley reassured himself, "Let's get started; AAAAA, uh, A"
*BEEP*
"Okay; AAAAAC"
*BEEP*
"Oh, I forgot B, didn't I? We should probably write this down. Actually, let's just skip ahead, because the password is probably not going to be something simple, just putting that out there. The password is definitely going to be something difficult; but, uh, let the games begin. Okay: ABCDG, um, H."
*Ding*
"Wait, that actually worked? Yes! I did it! I hacked it! Ah, that is brilliant!"
Another thing with Wheatley was that he hated letting people down and was almost addicted to successes, no matter how small they were. That trait did not get along well with the idea-making part of his brain, which worked really hard but was completely terrible at its job; not unlike Wheatley himself.
GLaDOS started to power on and, although could tell he wanted to cower behind the desk, Wheatley walked slowly out of the office and towards the machine, Chell trailing behind. It took about thirty seconds until the power startup was complete and GLaDOS turned her unblinking yellow eye at them.
"Hello there"
Wheatley trembled but kept his stance, looking back up at the eye. To tell the truth, Chell was nervous as well. It wasn't every day you spoke to a murderous, omnipotent robot. She expected it would not happen again after this.
"Uh, hello," Wheatley said, "Just doing a systems check, please don't kill us. I know you don't like people, but this girl next to me, she doesn't actually work here. So by killing us, you're killing an innocent civilian."
He was fidgeting with his tie in order to keep himself from running away. GLaDOS just stared at them curiously, as if she were trying to remember something.
"Who said anything about killing?"
"Oh, uh, nobody really; just that you do kill people quite often."
"Those people deserved to die."
"Oh, I'm not saying that they didn't! I'm just saying that… we don't, and that, uh, maybe there's something better we could do?"
"You're completely right; there is something better you can do."
Wheatley's eyes widened in realization that he had not said the right thing at all.
"Wh-what's that?"
GLaDOS chuckled as she carefully picked up a trembling Wheatley from around the waist. He looked completely terrified and so was Chell, although she was keeping her cool fairly well.
"Science."
Chell felt the ground open beneath her and she dropped down into the test chamber below.
Wheatley trembled inside Her arm. He has just made a huge mistake. Again. Only this time someone innocent was involved and was probably going to die because of him.
"You realize I could just kill you right now?"
Wheatley did know, and that's what scared him.
"Wh-why aren't you then- killing me, I mean?"
"Because you're right; there is something better for you to do. You are going to help me in a little experiment. All you need to do is be yourself, and in exchange I let you live."
"Alright"
Wheatley didn't quite know what was going to happen, but he trusted Her. It didn't make sense, he just did. Besides, this way he might be able to help Chell.
