A gap in the floor, three platforms, and no cubes or buttons. This test is easy.

Well, it looks easy, anyway. I actually have no idea how to operate the gun. How am I supposed to get it right if she didn't give me any instructions?

Ok, Chell, you can do this. Just be careful, don't touch or look at the operational end of the device...

"We don't have all day, you know." Oh, so they'd plugged her back in. Great. "Your test timer is ticking."

Oh, so now I'm being timed? Well, forget you, lady, human brains don't work as fast as your stupid processor.

I need more creative replacement swears. I could use the real ones, but if I'm going to go back outside and possibly be around small children, I'll have to work to express my emotions in ways that won't get the parents mad at me. It shouldn't be too hard, if you say it angrily enough anything can sound like a curse word. Like...food, for instance. Chips! Oranges! Pie! Pie your face, lady, human brains don't work as fast as your processor!

I'll get back to that. The device was already on, and I shoot my first portal onto the floor. The thing only makes blue portals, unfortunately. I can't sell this, they're no good without the orange ones. Jump in, shoot another portal, step through the orange again...

"Excellent."

And trigger the voice. Just like I thought. The elevator closes behind me, I check to make sure all of my teeth are still there, and I start to move.

"Remember, Bring Your Daughter To Work Day is the perfect time to have her tested," the voice says.

Joke's on her. I don't have a daughter, or a son for that matter.

Unless they made me pregnant when I was out. With the magic curtain that can pull out teeth and a gun that isn't supposed to be fed after midnight, I wouldn't put it past them to put weird dog-human DNA fusions into a human woman's body. If I have puppies in the next year, I'll sue the place.

Maybe then I'll get the money I missed out on by the portal device only shooting blue.


The next test has another button. Stepping on it shows that it drops the cube, just like the first one. Into a pit this time, making it a little more interesting.

So, let's see. If I had a gun that shot two portals, I could put one on the ceiling above the button, shoot the other under the cube, and not have to move from this space. But, since I do not have a gun that shoots two portals, the ceiling-drop is ruled out.

Second option, ask the computer lady for a new cube. Ruled out, I don't want to speak to that thing if I can help it. Something tells me she'll respond with the type of sarcasm I like to try to keep in my head. I can't trust an AI until I know its real personality.

So, that left 'pick up the cube myself' as the only option.

I'll still try to aim for the cube, though. Just in case the 'drop' method would still work.

I miss, but at least it gives me a shortcut to the button, even if it does make me a little dizzy. Is she sure the portals are safe?

The button opens the door, and, as always, Computer Lady congratulates me. This time, though, her elevator speech makes me a little worried.

"As part of the next test, we will not be watching your progress in the next chamber. You are entirely on your own."

It's not like she or the scientists in charge have ever done anything to help me in the first place. The only difference I see in this case is that she won't be talking to me.

It's not a bad option, to be honest, but I kind of like annoying her by not solving the tests in twenty seconds. And, you know, I might like hearing her talk, too. Not the sound of her voice, but the fact is that humans are social creatures by nature. I wasn't particularly good with people, either, but just hearing voices from another source was enough to keep that part of me satisfied.

But maybe having no computer telling me what to do would be even better than I thought.


Minute #10. Still no sign of intelligence, artificial or otherwise, besides me. Ceasing personal test in three, two, one...

I tap my gun against the wall. Counting to sixty ten times - that's counting to six hundred - was more boring than anything I had ever done. I had mentally solved the test in the first three, but I wanted to see how long I could postpone the physical part before I cracked. Now that I know the answer is ten minutes, give or take a few seconds, I'm ready to move on.

I take aim and shoot my first portal at the wall, grabbing the cube from the ledge and dropping it onto one of the two floor buttons. I wish again for a two-colored portal gun, fire at the second cube, and pick it up through another wall-portal.

I have to hand it to them, the tests are getting harder. I'll admit that much. But the only things that can stop me are my own personal issues, and the computer isn't artificially intelligent enough to guess those, is she?

I shouldn't mention it. She might have guessed those things and was planning a test to put me face-to-face with my own weaknesses. I don't know what she'd be testing, though. 'Self-Esteem: Humanity's Most Fragile Enemy Of All.' Yeah, that would go so well on a science writer's resume...

"As part of the testing protocol, the statement that we would not be watching was an outright fabrication." Yeah, I thought so, you witch. You even made the way to the elevator require portals this time. You deserve to lose whatever I take from this place. "It took you long enough."

I run my tongue over my teeth as I make it to the elevator, still having no damage. If procrastinating got me scolded, it was probably a good thing.

"As part of the testing protocol, we will stop enhancing the truth in three...two..."

Static. Clever. I'm not trusting anything coming out of her speaker again.


Bouncing light above an orange portal, with an unknown device only a few feet from it. One portal above the strange device, and...yes, just as I imagined, test solved in four seconds flat.

"Unbelievable. You, [subject name here] must be the pride of [subject hometown here]."

Chell. Could she at least use Chell? For corn's sake, it's not like it's hard. She isn't addressing me with a number, so why shouldn't she use a name?

I shouldn't be upset. She's just a computer, after all. Maybe it's not in her programming.

The current room isn't as easy as the last one. There's no solving it from here, no portal where the moving light hits...

Wait. No orange portal...

Maybe the test is that easy, after all.

A blast to the wall that the light ball keeps slamming into should do it. Then another portal right above the platform...yes, that might work. I adjust the gun and take aim, knowing the computer is watching.

Primitive monkey fingers or not, I am on a roll here. The only downside is that the platform moves, and my timing is a little off. I'd better not have to do this again.

She doesn't have anything to say to me as I take the elevator to the next test. Maybe I'm finally getting out of here. I've lost count of how many tests I'd been put through, but to be fair I never counted in the first place. The gun would be useless in the outside world, so I could turn it in to the person in charge when I left. And the heavy knee braces, too. I liked the height involved in using them, but dragging them around is cutting down on my speed.

Wait. Maybe the braces are why I haven't smashed my face in when I fall through a portal. The knee braces help focus gravity so that I end up landing on my feet each time, and they absorb the shock of the impact for me.

Either Aperture Science is just as nuts as its founder, or this was actually a pretty good idea. I'm not sure which.


What the crap?

What the ACTUAL crap?

This has gone too far.

"Please note that we have added a consequence for failure." Oh, really? The potential of snapping the braces and breaking every bone in my legs not enough for you? Now you had to flood the room with A PIT OF ACID and you have the nerve to use the word CONSEQUENCE? Something tells me you don't want me to be alive anymore. Where are the scientists in charge of safety monitors?

"Contact with the chamber floor will result in an unsatisfactory mark on your testing record. Followed by death."

And a pie in your face, too.

Food swearing. Definitely off. I'll have to dedicate myself to finding the new child-friendly versions for when I go back outside. When I'm NOT facing down certain doom.

Wait. I have a portal gun. I'll just shoot myself to the other end and solve the test from there. Where's the orange space hole?

Oh. Over the death water. Of course. So testing first, then safety. Well, if they don't care about the safety of their employees, I'll just have to sue them for way more than they're worth.

So it's firing the light at the portal, but the seal is bouncing it back. A blue one across from the 'light-catcher,' as I'm calling it, and the moving platform carries me safely across the death-water. I'm expecting it to throw me off at any moment, but it behaves itself this time and just drops me off at the exit.

"Very good. Please note that any appearance of danger is there to help with your testing experience."

Liar. I'll just blow this place up and see how you like it then.