"Let me check what this next test is. Oh, advanced Aerial Faith Plates. Well, have fun soaring through the air without a care in the world. I have to go pick up fifteen acres of glass in the wing entirely made of glass. By myself." Chell frowned, both at her words and at the test chamber in front of her. It was the exact same advanced aerial faith plate chamber as before, and her words had been near exactly the same before, as well.

She solved the test easily, taking a moment to check if the old Rat Den was still intact. It was, the radio she had dragged up to the room still humming its song. With a little smile she jumped into a portal and to the exit. GLaDOS returned with a little sigh. "Congratulations. Even under circumstances of déjà vu, you managed to successfully complete the test. Considering you already knew the solution, however, take that congratulations with a grain of salt. Also, you are garbage." Chell found herself rolling her eyes instead of being threatened. GLaDOS seemed a lot less eager to kill her, it seemed.

The lift took Chell deeper than she expected, and when it stopped the doors did not open. "Before we begin the next test chamber, I feel like talking to you outside of standard test practice. Considering that I am not allowed to speak to you while you are testing, I will take this oppertunity. I have the feeling that this will be a very one-sided conversation." Chell pursed her lips as the lift doors opened, leading her into a black paneled room with a single camera. Its red eye was staring directly at her.

"I know you still have your writing pad, so feel free to use that if you have something to say. I can see it through the camera." She waited as the human pulled the pad out of the back of her pants, plucking her marker from her pocket. "Are you ready yet?" Chell nodded, popping open the marker with her mouth.

"Good. Look, I don't know why you're here or what you think you're doing, but I want you gone. Did you miss the turret opera sending you on your way? I went to all that trouble to convince the team to give you a nice send-off, but you had to come crawling back. Not only that, but you brought people who had no idea about Aperture with you. Way to go, hero."

You took off suddenly. Anne got worried. The camera twitched for a second before refocusing.

"So? You didn't have to give into her worrying. You're far too stubborn to give into people like that. I even found your old file. Do you know what it says? Test subject is abnormally stubborn. She never gives up. Ever. DO NOT TEST." It took her a second to return her voice to normal, a feminine version of the announcer reading out the file. "See? It's very official. Just like your other file. Unlikeable. Liked by no one... I could go on, but the look on your face tells me you want me to stop."

Fine. I was worried, too. That actually managed to silence GLaDOS for a good minute, the camera twitching wildly.

"You really do have brain damage." Her voice was soft and tender, and Chell could see the red eye of the camera widening slightly before shrinking again. "Get back in the lift; I'll let you skip a... few tests. Then you can drag your brain damaged self out of my facility." The lift reopened behind her, seemingly humming. She stepped into it, waiting patiently as the lift drove itself deeper and deeper into the facility.

It was several minutes before the lift stopped, and when it opened, Chell was surprised. The cube dispenser had already popped a cube onto the button, leaving the door wide open for her. It was only after the door slammed shut both behind her and in front of her that she began to panic. Green gas began to leak from the walls, and Chell let out a silent wail as she banged on the floor.

"It's nothing personal, really. The easiest way to get you out of my system would be to kill you while you're in a weakened state, since you rejected freedom. Goodbye. I can't say it was nice to meet you, because that would be a lie." The clock on the wall showed six minutes left before the neurotoxin would completely engulf her. The test subject coughed, creating portals on every white panel, hoping that this was just a test that she needed to get through.

Five minutes left before she died. She fought back tears; she had been in this situation before. She just had to stay calm. "You should just give up. I know you won't but there is no solution to this test. Do you want me to bring some turrets out and end you quickly? It would be less painful than the neurotoxin." Apparently her silence counted as a no, for no turrets were dropped by metal hands from the ceiling. Which was a shame, because she could have used them to possibly escape.

Four minutes. "I'm going to be completely honest here and say I didn't want to kill you. Unfortunately, you're the reason I have an infection in my system. I figure if releasing you won't work, then maybe killing you would. Would you stop banging on the panels, by the way? There's no way that you're not going to die this time. There's no moron to free you, no portal surfaces safely out of harm's way... Just give up." Chell ignored her, continuing to quickly bang on each panel, hoping that one would open up and allow her an escape to freedom.

Her eyes were blurred at one minute, and though she dispised giving up, it seemed that there was no way to escape this trap. "So this is all I had to do to kill you? Put you in a room with no doors and release neurotoxin? Interesting... Thank you for the two new test subjects, by the way. They're already in stasis and being outfitted with long fall boots. As soon as you're out of my system, I'll test them and-"

"Why?" The neurotoxin let up, allowing Chell to breathe more freely. The sound that had been emitted from her mouth had been quiet and shaky, but GLaDOS had obviously heard it.

"On your file it says 'dangerous, mute lunatic. So I'm going to assume that I did not just hear you speak." Chell stood up, shaking slightly and letting out hacking coughs.

"Stop... please..." Another hacking cough, this one complete with blood coming out of her mouth. Her vocal cords hadn't been used since she was a little girl, before she had arrived at Aperture. Chell had forgotten how to speak, until now. "I... I don't want... to die... yet. You... you would be... sad... too. If I... was dead."

Her coughing was getting worse the more she spoke, more blood coming out of her mouth. The neurotoxin was still having some sort of effect on her, making her dizzy. This paired with blood loss made her feel faint. "Stop that. Now." It seemed that GLaDOS was actually worried about the fact that her upper body was swinging around like she was drunk, her lower body not moving because of her weighted long fall boots.

"You're not... as bad as... you think you... are. We've always had... some sort... of weird... relation... ship."

She laughed as the world around her turned black, the last thing she heard was the sound of her in an auto-tuned scream.

A/N: SHE SPEAKS! :o

So much for her being a mute lunatic, GLaDOS .

Apparently she's not actually mute in the game, she just doesn't speak because she's defying GLaDOS and Wheatley. Or something. I figured that all that time in stasis + not talking would make her have a hard time speaking, or that she had forgotten how to speak. Traumatic events can actually lead to such things. And I think that almost being killed by a homicidal AI would count as traumatic =P

One chapter left! 8D Rid the world of neurotoxin; leave a review :)