Alright, this is my first foray into the valve 'verse. I say valve 'verse, because I consider Half life and portal part of the same universe. As this is a fic about Chell's life outside of aperture, there will be combine and zombies appearing, as well as, eventually, the characters from the half life games, because who doesn't want to see Gordon Freeman and Chell meet up and kick ass? However, the story will mostly follow Chell, not to say there won't be some POV from others later.

I am timing this so that Portal 1 takes place a short time after the 7 hours war. So, let's start this adventure!


A soft breeze blew through a field of golden wheat. The sun shone brightly upon the wild grain, a miracle in and of itself, as no one had tended this land in over 20 years. Yet the plant life, in its unstoppable way, had thrived without human hands to guide it. The only place that was left untouched was a small metal shed in the middle of the grain, and the small human who had just climbed out of it.

The girl, Chell, sat on a large, scorched cube. Her feet, encased in long fall boots were gently swinging back and forth, knocking against the heart decals on the cube's side. She was taking long, deep breaths in and out, concentrating on the wonderful feeling of fresh air passing through her chest.

'Really,' she thought, 'you don't know how wonderful simple things are until you are trapped 3 miles underground in asbestos filled, abandoned laboratories with your worst enemy speared on the end of your gun.'

And after such a long time solving puzzles and wandering through said laboratories, being outside might just have been the most wonderful feeling in the world. Of course, Chell couldn't know for certain just how long it had been since she had seen fresh air.

She didn't know how much time had passed between her first attempted escape and her eventful ride with Wheatley. She didn't even have an estimate as to how long it had been since he had woke her up, as the adrenal vapor pumped into the enrichment center had kept her from getting tired. And, most pathetically, she didn't know what year it had been before she had gone into the enrichment center for the first time. She didn't know how she had gotten to be there, or where she was, or if there were ever actual people in the massive institution.

The only thing Chell could be confidant about in regard to her past life was her name. She knew her name was Chell. For now, with fresh air, a clean sky, and a limitless future ahead of her, that was enough.

She stood up on top of the cube and slowly turned in a circle, looking for any landmarks in the distance that she could use to guide her. But the field extended as far as she could see out into every direction, with nothing to break it up except for the little metal shed. Chell sighed and hopped down. Maybe GLaDOS just wanted her to wander around forever in this field and die of starvation. Maybe this field was the only thing left of the world.

Chell briefly imagined a world that was one giant wheat field before dismissing the notion. After all, there were other plants. Rice and corn would have to fight wheat for territory, and then there would be constant and unending war. It was quite funny to her, the mental picture of all the stalks around her marching off to war against short, chubby corncobs, so she chuckled silently, laughing for the first time she could remember.

Since there were no landmarks and she wasn't just going to wait around in this small clearing until she died, Chell faced straight ahead of the door from which she had emerged and, taking a deep breath, headed off into the wheat. It quickly swallowed her into its depths, blocking her view in every direction but up. Chell just tried to walk as straightly as possible, trudging through and over the plant life. By the time the sun started to set she was slowly fading and getting hungry but was unwilling to stop and rest for fear that she would never get out of this massive field.

It was actually quite a novel experience for her, getting tired. She had never been tired before, at least, not that she could remember, having subsisted on adrenal vapor during the days she had been climbing through Aperture Science. But then she also had psychotic robots attacking her, or possible death by nuclear explosion giving her a reason to keep going. Now Chell only had her own strength of will to keep her moving through this seemingly endless plain that was so full of life, yet still seemed empty.

And though her will was strong, Chell could feel herself fading as the bright colors of the sunset gave way to night, a full moon providing enough light to see, but only barely. Chell looked up at the bright, full, moon, and wondered if Wheatley missed her.

It was a funny thing to wonder about, seeing as how the last time they met he had tried to kill her, but Chell was in a funny situation in general. She certainly missed him, though it was hard for her to admit it. His endless dialogue and good humor would cheer her up right now. She felt more alone right then than she could ever remember. Even in the lowest depths of the Aperture facility, Chell had always known that somewhere in the building there was another person, or at the very least an A.I which was as sentient as a human would be. But now, it seemed, no matter how much she walked there was nobody and nothing.

Chell wondered if there was anybody left in the entire world. All she had seen was wheat. Out of anger, she brought her arm around to hit some of the large plants to her side, but they just snapped back into place, one of them flicking her with a seed. Chell scowled and continued to walk, once again pondering the question of humans. Logic dictated to her that there must be others. Not everyone had worked at Aperture, or at least that's what she thought. But she had been gone so long. . .

And she was so tired. When had she gotten so tired? The moon had only just reached it's zenith when Chell collapsed onto the ground in pure exhaustion. She just couldn't walk anymore. Still, she desperately tried to get up, to pull herself from the ground and keep going, but the ground felt so comfortable and her head felt like it was too heavy for her neck to support.

But she was Chell. She was a dangerous mute lunatic, and if there was one thing that she had going for her in this big bad world, it has her inability to just lay down and die. If she had gotten through the mazes and tests of Aperture Science, she could get through a field. Chell could see GlaDOS just laughing at her from under the ground.

"Oh, my little test subject, I let her go but it didn't matter because she just died anyway. Laid down and died in the middle of a stupid field of stupid wheat, didn't even make it a day"

Resolve hardened, Chell pushed herself up onto her long fall boots. There was no way that she was going to let GLaDOS win at anything, even if it was just an imaginary GLaDOS inside of her head. Chell was stubborn like that, but so far her stubbornness had served her well.

Even more annoying than the ever present exhaustion that she felt as she trudged through the moonlit fields was the thirst. Chell couldn't remember ever drinking something before, but she knew that water was what she needed. But there certainly wasn't any to be found there. Well, there probably was if she went down deep enough, Chell thought, remembering fondly the large pool of water at the bottom of the Aperture facilities. But it was impossible to access it from where she was, and she didn't think it would be safe to drink if she could access it.

Eventually, the sun began to rise. The heat on her tired body was a wonderful feeling, and Chell stopped to savor it for a few moments, not sitting down for fear of never getting back up again. She hadn't noticed this simple joy yesterday, so full of both elation at her escape from aperture science and fear at the unknown. She did, however, notice when she walked straight out of the wheat and into a low grassy field.

It was covered in wild flowers and led down a gentle slope to a small but cheerfully bubbling brook. On the other side of the brook was what looked like a forest which held trees so large that Chell wondered why she hadn't noticed them when she had looked around while standing on top of the companion cube. The only thing that was missing was the sounds of any animals or birds. But not remembering ever being in the forest before, Chell didn't recognize that anything was wrong. After all she had been through, this seemed like paradise.

Chell rushed across the field toward the stream, heart nearly busting with joy at the sight. She dropped to her knees on the banks of the creek and threw her entire head into the cool bliss. It quickly replaced the feeling of the sun as the best thing that she could remember, and if she didn't have to come up for air, Chell thought that she could have stayed under there for hours.

But she did eventually have to breathe, although it was an impressively long time before she had to do so. After one long breath she went back under, this time gulping up as much of the water as she could. She drank for a long time after her thirst was quenched, until it filled her empty stomach and she began to feel a bit sick. So Chell simply collapsed on her back, half inside the river and half out, finally able to truly enjoy the sunlight on her face now that there was no risk of her dying by dehydration.

After a while, the water became more than she could stand. It was colder than even the air three miles under the earth was, and that was saying something. Chell wasn't sure what it was saying, though. Maybe it was just commenting on how absolutely ridiculous her life was that she even knew what air felt like three miles underground.

But it was easy enough to get out of the water, and Chell did so, wriggling until her whole body was on dry land. Soon she was entirely warm. Chell smiled. It was good to be free.

The light seemed to weight her down, and all of a sudden it seemed like all the things that had happened in Aperture Science and all of the hours she had refused her body any rest caught up with her. She didn't even try to fight it as she fell into a deep sleep and stayed there throughout the day and the next night, dreaming of a life she didn't remember.