"Don't worry, we're almost there, I'm absolutely sure of it."
Groaning inwardly, Chell shouldered the portal gun, trotting briskly along after Wheatley as he glided down the dimly lit corridor on the Management Rail overhead.
This was the third time that the little core had made such an insistence. And on two occasions, now, he'd steered them directly into dead ends.
As the pair turned the corner and passed through an open doorway, the corridor opened up into a broad room, shrouded in darkness, and she sighed in exasperation, shaking her head slightly.
Make that three times, then.
Almost as if reading her mind, the little sphere wiggled uncomfortably on the rail above, sweeping into the room ahead of her and scanning the area briefly with his flashlight.
"Or… maybe not. Well, you know what they say. Fourth time's the charm. Maybe there's another exit somewhere in here. Why don't you go and have a bit of a look around while I figure out how to put the lights on?"
With another frustrated sigh, she stalked forward into the darkened room, letting out a silent little yip of pain as she blundered into some sort of table or bench in the dark. An Erlenmeyer flask, balanced precariously on the edge of the table, slipped off, shattering noisily on the floor at her feet. Wheatley whipped around at the sound of the glass breaking, bathing her with the glow from his flashlight.
"Careful! Careful. Wouldn't want to, you know, break anything important, or something like that. Ah! Yes, the lights."
From somewhere in the darkness behind her came the snap of a switch, and abruptly, the fluorescent bulbs hummed to life in the ceiling above, revealing what appeared to be a chemistry lab of some sort, lined with shelves full of bottles, vials and flasks, and a rolling cart parked along the far wall, similarly burdened. Whoever had been working in it had apparently left rather hastily, because the bench was still covered with half-finished experiments and stacks of glassware.
Leaning against the end of the table and carefully laying the portal gun across it, Chell closed her eyes.
The first time she'd navigated the facility, she'd been frightened, depending on instinct and nerves frayed to the breaking point to keep her alive. Since waking up in the Extended Relaxation Annex, however, that fear had gradually begun to wane, and was being increasingly replaced by a sort of testy indifference. She was, for lack of a better term, running out of patience with Aperture, and all of its twists and traps, and infuriating minutiae.
Lulls in the action, like this one, she found particularly hard to stomach. It was times like these which, quite frankly, made her want to knock everything down and fling it to the ground, tearing out her hair in frustration.
Abruptly, a fresh notion crept into her mind, and she blinked, turning to stare at the closest beaker, perched in the center of the bench.
Knock everything down and fling it to the ground…
And why couldn't she?
Lashing out, she caught the beaker with the tips of her fingers, spinning it over the edge of the bench to join its friend in shards on the floor. Her partner jerked around again, staring uncomprehendingly at the mess.
"What-what are you…?"
Scooping up a large watch glass, she hurled it to the floor, smiling with satisfaction as it exploded into a starburst of glass. Laughing nervously and drawing his bottom eyelid up, Wheatley glanced anxiously toward the door before continuing in a hushed tone.
"Ummm, all right, you might want to… lay off a bit on the smashy-smash, there, luv. I mean-"
Chell snorted, popping open a cabinet built into the underside of the bench and yanking out the spare glassware, letting most of it tumble onto the floor, but pausing, one beaker gripped in each hand, as another idea struck her.
Straightening up, she set one of the beakers on top of the lab bench, and jerked her head toward it, giving Wheatley a pointed stare. He glanced blankly back and forth between her face and the instrument before the message sunk in, and then retreated slightly, drawing both handles in as tightly as possible and shaking his head, optic narrowing to a tiny dot.
"What, me? Oh, no. No, nononononono, I can't, I- what if She finds out? She'll be absolutely livid!"
Realizing his mistake and amending his statement, he rolled slightly on his rail in what she'd come to recognize as his version of a shrug.
"Well, I mean… more livid than She probably already is, and… umm…"
He considered this for a moment, glancing thoughtfully at the ceiling and spewing a shower of sparks onto the floor as he twitched involuntarily, before "shrugging" again.
"All right then. May as well have a go, actually, seeing as She's probably going to kill us anyway, if She catches us."
Studying the beaker hesitantly, he angled carefully forward, nudging it gently across the bench and onto the floor, where it cracked apart with a faint tinkle. Abruptly, his eye widened to its fullest extent, and the handles lifted slowly to their maximum height.
"Oooh… oh!"
Laughing silently at the look of understanding and sheer joy dawning on the little robot's face, Chell set the other beaker on the lab bench, giving him an expectant look.
"What, do another one?"
She nodded vigorously, gesturing to the beaker and grinning invitingly. The optic glanced shiftily back and forth before the bottom lid drew up into a look of glee.
"Well, all right… if you insist!"
Gleefully shooting forward on the rail again, he knocked into the glass container, sending it flying into the wall, where it shattered in a burst of gleaming shards.
And abruptly, the dam burst.
Slamming her arms down on one end of the bench, Chell swept the entirety of the remaining glassware off onto the floor, closing her eyes and drinking in the cacophony of cracking and shattering as if she were enjoying a classical masterpiece.
On the other side of the room, Wheatley had clattered his way into the chemical storage closet, and was gleefully knocking bottles and vials off of shelves, sending them rolling across the floor and scattering under the benches and stools. Said stools quickly became his next victims, tipping to the floor with ringing crashes.
Chell, meanwhile, had gotten a hold of a box of baking soda, apparently snatched from one of the cabinets. Hefting her weapon experimentally, she grinned wickedly before tossing it up at Wheatley. The box burst against his shell in a puff of white powder, showering her with its contents, and coating her head and shoulders with a fine layer of the stuff.
Paying her fresh coating no mind, she darted across to the rolling cart, cheerfully upsetting it and sending its contents sailing into the fray, some rolling along, others shattering, still others bursting open and spewing their contents into the air. She gave a few of the bottles a kick or two for good measure.
Nothing was spared.
Cabinets were emptied, bottles and boxes flung, and shelves and tables overturned. Shimmering arcs of chemicals crossed each other in mid air.
A couple of the compounds reacted violently as they met, changing colors, smoking, or fizzing. One or two even burst into tiny patches of flame, scattered across the lab like tiny gems.
With a loud shriek, the fire alarm announced its displeasure, and the sprinklers kicked in, extinguishing the flames and showering the chaos, a proverbial dose of icing on the cake.
Finally spent, the pair backed away, surveying their handiwork and beaming brightly at one another. Wheatley rolled cheerfully on his rail, laughing breathlessly.
"Ohhhhh, man alive! That was… ah! That was the most fun I've ever had! Bloody brilliant, that!"
Grinning at his enthusiastic reaction and making a futile attempt to brush the lumpy baking soda out of her sodden hair with her fingers, Chell nodded.
Still chuckling softly, the core turned back toward the chaos before his optic widened in surprise. The top eyelid closed slightly, and he shuddered noisily, rattling back and forth on his rail, blue iris shrinking to a pinprick.
"Oh. Oh, but I've just thought of something! Who's going to clean this up? I mean, seeing as we've smashed it to bits, and all?"
She considered this for a moment before scooping up the portal gun and pointing to the hallway beyond, slipping through the door and taking off at a run. The little sphere clattered quickly after her, darting one last glance at the destroyed lab behind.
"Rrrright! Good plan, excellent. Well done."