"Marty! Wake up! C'mon kiddo, open your eyes!"
Marty groaned a little and rolled over. He forced his eyes open to see Doc's concerned face hovering above him. "Doc…? What the hell happened…?"
"You passed out," Doc explained, pulling him to his feet. "As soon as we landed you fell over and knocked your head on something."
Marty rubbed the back of his head, Sure enough, a small lump was beginning to form there. He took a moment to look around. There was broken and warped metal everywhere. Water dripped in from the ceiling, creating pools here and there. A fire was going, probably caused by the sparks from the broken elevator now hanging dangerously above them. There wasn't much light; anything that did break through only illuminated the dust and grime on every surface.
Now that he thought about it, Marty's attention turned to their clothes. By now, their jumpsuits were not as bright a colour as they had been. Several tears and burns were present on them. All the fabric from the lower half of the legs of Marty's jumpsuit had been torn clean away, revealing the grimy bandages covering his shins. Doc didn't look much better - his hair had traces of dirt in it and it was even more of a mess than usual. His face was tired, yet confident.
"We'd better keep going," he said, patting Marty's shoulder before picking up the portal gun and leading the teenager past some rusted metal and down a passage.
"Hey," Marty had just realised something. "Where's GLaDOS?"
"A crow flew off with her a minute ago. I tried to grab her but she was already being carried away. Heavens knows where she is now,"
The teenager sighed. He ran a hand through his hair. "Oh man, I can't believe Wheatley did that to us,"
"I can't either," Doc frowned. "But what's done is done. Let's just try and get out of here, get back to the car and go home. I've taken what few tools we need, so we should be able to fix the time circuits now,"
Marty nodded and shoved his hands in his pockets. It was strange down here. All around them, the sound of distant, but loud, creaks and thuds of metal echoed. Sparks fell from broken wires higher up in the building. Their feet splashed in puddles as they walked and the sound vibrated around them. The place looked like an older version of Aperture, but much more run-down. It looked even more abandoned than the new facility, now miles above them.
Doc was glad to see that the white substance that accepted portals was painted on numerous walls around here. The placement of these walls seemed very convenient and he used them to get himself and Marty through some of the rubble. As they kept walking, they found more and more signs reading "Keep Out", "Do Not Enter" and "Condemned Testing Area". Whoever had put up these signs clearly didn't want anyone being here, and Doc could see why. The entire area was a health hazard. Broken pipes and bits of rubble everywhere made the place dangerous. But if they wanted to get out of here and back home, they had to keep going.
Marty was getting worried. What if there was no way out of here? What if they starved to death down here before they found a chance to get out? What if, even if they managed to get out, Wheatley decided to try and kill them again? They were stuck in the very foundations of this place without GLaDOS. She was the only one who would know how to get out of here, and she was now stuck in a potato. The odds certainly were not in their favour.
Soon, they came to a huge vault door with two small offices on either side of it. Doc and Marty went up into one. On the desk, there was a large, red button with the word "OVERRIDE" printed next to it. What looked like a countdown clock was on the wall above the desk. Doc turned to Marty. "I think there's another button like this in the other office. It looks to me like we have to press both of them at the same time,"
Marty nodded and looked across the room at the other office. "I'll go over there,"
Once in the small office, there was indeed another red button. Doc pressed the one in his office and Marty pressed the other one. Immediately, a siren went off and an orange light started flashing. Creaks and groans were heard as a huge mechanism pulled the vault door up, revealing a small door set into the wall behind it. The pair headed over to the door and Marty pushed it open.
In this area, at least, there were fully-functioning electric lights. The pair could actually see where they were going. Passing through a second door, they came across what could only be described as a lake. The lake had the same stagnant appearance as the puddles earlier, but it covered the whole of the area in front of them. An old elevator stood on a separate platform in the lake, but it didn't seem accessible.
Marty and Doc walked up a small flight of metal stairs and came across some large doors. One of them was dented and propped open with rubble. It wasn't open enough for either of them to squeeze through, but Doc could fire a portal through it. He placed the second one on the wall beside them and they passed through. After pulling a lever, a screen door slid open.
Huge lights automatically came on as soon as they entered, revealing a large building on one side and some rusted scaffolding hanging from the ceiling. For the first time since arriving, a recorded message greeted them.
"Welcome, gentlemen, to Aperture Science. Astronauts, war heroes, Olympians, you're here because we want the best, and you're it!" The voice was deep and authoritative. Confidence dripped from it like a wet sponge. "Now, who's ready to make some science?!"
"Do we have a choice?" Marty muttered.
The deep voice was answered by another. This one was female and sounded rather perky. "I am!"
"Now, you already met each other on the way here, so let me introduce myself. I'm Cave Johnson. I own the place. That eager voice you heard is the lovely Caroline, my assistant. Rest assured, she has already donated your honorarium to the charitable organisation of your choice,"
Marty groaned. "He sounds rather full of himself,"
"He owns a massive scientific research centre, of course he is," Doc replied.
"Isn't that right, Caroline?"
"Yes sir Mr Johnson!"
"She's the backbone of this facility. Pretty as a postcard too. Sorry fellas, she's married. To science!"
Marty looked up at the scaffolding. They had been standing in the chamber for a couple of minutes now and had made no effort to keep going. "Something tells me we've gotta go up there,"
Doc noticed a white surface on the floor. "Yes, we do. Then we have to throw ourselves across the room by jumping in there,"
Marty groaned but followed Doc up onto the scaffolding anyway. The scientist placed two more portals and jumped. The momentum carried him through the portal on the wall and he went sailing across the room, landing by another door. He turned to see that Marty was still standing on the scaffolding. "Come on! Jump!"
The teenager took a deep breath and jumped off the scaffolding. A moment later, he was stood beside Doc. He looked rather startled. "Jesus Christ!"
Doc chuckled and walked through the door. Another pre-recorded message came on instantly. "A thousand tests every day are performed here in our Enrichment Spheres. I can't personally oversee every one of them, so these pre-recorded messages will clear up any questions you might have and respond to any comments you might have during the course of your science adventure."
"When I got my doctorate, I didn't think this was part of the requirements," Doc muttered. "I'd rather invent stuff in the safety of my own lab."
Marty laughed. "I've done adventure courses before, but this has never been one of them,"
"Well that's something to add to your CV then, isn't it?" Doc chuckled. "'Test Subject for Dangerous Aperture Experiments',"
The teenager laughed again. From where they were now, they could easily reach the elevator. They got in and Doc pressed the button that allowed the elevator to ascend.
"Those of you helping us test the Repulsion Gel today, just follow the blue line on the floor. Those of you who volunteered to be injected with praying mantis DNA, I've got good news and bad news. The bad news is I'm afraid that test has been postponed indefinitely. The good news is we've got a much better test for you. Fighting an army of mantis men! Grab a rifle and follow the yellow line. You'll know when the test starts."
Doc and Marty exchanged a worried look. Whoever this guy was, despite the amount of confidence in his voice, he clearly wasn't all that intelligent. "Great," Marty muttered. "Now we've got mutants to add to the list of things that can kill us,"
"This place must have been out of use as long as the other one," Doc pointed out. "It's likely that anything that was alive down here is now dead."
"Apart from that crow," Marty replied.
"Let's just hope that wasn't a mutant crow, eh?" Doc sighed. "This seems like some sort of nightmare,"
"I've already pinched myself. Trust me, it's really happening," Marty frowned.
The elevator shuddered to a halt and the pair got out. They noticed a door on the far side of the chamber. The walkway leading to it was broken. On the opposite side of the chamber was a white wall, placed at an angle. Doc narrowed his eyes and walked down the steps. He found a white surface at the bottom of the elevator shaft. Placing a portal there and another on the white wall, he looked back up the stairs towards Marty. "Come on, follow me,"
Marty jumped into the portal with Doc and they went flying across the room, both landing safely on the walkway. They walked up to the door and pushed it open. They came to another office with a lever placed on a control panel. The gate allowing them to continue was shut. The words "Pump station Alpha" were painted on the wall in the chamber. Huge pipes filled most of the room.
Doc walked over to the control panel and pulled the lever. Lights came on and a clear sound of something flowing through the pipes could be heard. The gate swung open. The pair walked through the gate and along the path. The scientist noticed that the only way out was via another walkway above them, so he placed some more portals and hopped up. Marty followed him through. They walked along a pipe until they came to another elevator.
"This place is huge…" Marty let out a whistle. "It must have taken decades to built it,"
"It looks like it was built into an abandoned salt mine," Doc replied. "I think I saw a newspaper article about it earlier. It looks a lot more worse-for-wear though,"
"I feel sorry for anyone who had to work here," Marty murmured. "Stuck miles underground for goodness knows how long."
"Well all we can do is keep making our way closer to the surface," said Doc. "I just hope Clara and the boys are alright,"
"I hope Jennifer's alright too," Marty murmured. "Man, I wish she was here,"
"We'll be able to get back to them soon, Marty, I promise," Doc assured, squeezing Marty's shoulder. "For them, it'll be as though we never left in the first place,"
"But we did leave," Marty replied. "My family aren't idiots, they'll realise something's up when I turn up home looking like this,"
"I'm sure you can get cleaned up at my place before you go back home," Doc said. "With any luck, our clothes and other possessions from home are right where we left them,"
"That is if Wheatley hasn't destroyed the place," Marty pointed out with a sigh. "God, I'm gonna punch that moron when I see him,"
"I wouldn't recommend it," the scientist muttered. "You're more likely to break your hand than cause him any harm,"
"Oh, right…" Marty sighed. As they approached the lift, another pre-recorded message came on.
"They say great science is built on the shoulders of giants. Not at Aperture. Here, we do all our science from scratch. No hand-holding,"
The pair passed through the emancipation grid at the entrance to the elevator and the door slid shut behind them. The elevator shuddered upwards. It soon ground to a halt inside a huge metal structure (that must be one of the testing spheres). More of that stagnant water lined the bottom of it and the pipes they'd seen earlier ran into a smaller chamber. Doc and Marty followed the walkway into the chamber.
"Alright, let's get started. This first test involves something the lab boys call repulsion gel. You're not part of the control group, by the way. You get the gel. The last poor son of a gun got blue paint. Ha ha ha! All joking aside, though, that did happen. Broke every bone in his legs. Tragic, but informative. Or so I'm told."
There was a second platform opposite them, across a small ditch. In the ditch, a blue gel-like substance covered the floor and walls. Large, orange arrows pointed in the direction of the other platform. Doc noticed that the door was up on a higher platform. On the wall opposite them was another white wall. The platform opposite the doorway had one as well. Taking a deep breath, Marty ran forward and jumped down into the ditch.
The sensation was peculiar. It was as if he was on a trampoline. Instead of landing in the ditch, Marty was thrown back upwards and onto the opposite platform. He grinned. "Hey, Doc! You gotta try this!"
Doc looked uncertainly at the gel. "I don't know, is it safe?"
"Well I'm not hurt, am I?" Marty called back. "Just come on over here!"
Doc jumped into the ditch and, after almost falling over, joined Marty on the platform. He placed two portals, allowing them to reach the higher platform. Now they could see that there was a large, square button, which obviously meant that they needed to get a cube from somewhere. Looking across the chamber, they spotted a smaller button.
Marty jumped off this platform and landed on the gel again. With equal force, he was sent flying upwards and onto the platform beside the door. He pressed the button and a cube was released from a dispenser they hadn't noticed earlier. The cube bounced and landed on the platform below them. The teenager grabbed it, put it on the larger button and the door slid open. They both jumped onto the gel and landed beside the door.
"The lab boys just informed me that I should not have mentioned the control group. They're telling me I oughta stop making these pre-recorded messages. That gave me an idea: make more pre-recorded messages! I pay the bills around here, I can talk about the control group all damn day!"
Doc and Marty exchanged a glance and kept moving along the walkways. That repulsion gel seemed fairly easy to use, the only problem appeared to be how to stop bouncing when they landed on it. They would just have to cross that bridge when they got to it.
