Based on the amount of comments about Chell's name on the potato project, I'm afraid I'm going to have to disappoint some people. Aye, I was aware Chell's name is on the little science fair project in the day care room. However, after this chapter things aren't going to plotline, so I decided to gloss over that fact. Release the AU-ness.

My muse was almost killed this week by playing massive amounts of TF2. I have decided I am a defend-gineer. And also, a bastard. It's best if I leave it at that. And my beta has been quiet all week too, so my motivation was almost null too. Plus, the amount of overtime I'm putting in at work is either going to kill me, or mutate me into a spider-person. Awesome. I'll get back on the ball soon, I promise!

Sarcasm Still Valid

Memories and thoughts were all jumbled from the extended cryo sleep. But Chell was fairly certain she had not fallen asleep on a floor made of glass. The woman was in a cage made of glass with frosted symbols and warning labels wrapping around the sides. Blinking in confusion, she wondered just how she had gotten in here? There was no exit, it was a mobile relaxation vault minus the cryo capsule bed. Had GLaDOS found them as she had slept in the daycare after all? Chell was not a heavy sleeper, so how had the heck had she been moved into here? But if GLaDOS had access to deadly nerve gas, maybe she had access to not-so-deadly sleeping gas as well.

… And speaking of GLaDOS...

A slight rumble of machinery and a flash of gold out of the darkness behind her was the only warning the woman got. "So you are awake." GLaDOS was peering into the cage from the opposite side Chell had been gazing out.

Whirling in panic, Chell noticed the cage wasn't just a glass prison, but apparently a glass enclosed living-space. There was a pile of wood chips in the corner, which did look quite a bit more comfortably than the hard metal floor, but it was certainly no bed. There was also a giant water bottle strapped to the side of the cage. As well as-

… wait.

THIS WAS A GOD DAMNED HAMSTER CAGE!

There was a feed dispenser labeled 'human chow', a giant wheel, and a vacuum tube path that was like a hamster trail system that went about in a giant circle. Chell wasn't even allowed to die with dignity? She flipped the computer a double deuce of middle fingers and pursed her lips to form the continuous 'ffffff' sound to the word she wanted to say.

"That is not very nice. Especially not after I plucked you out of the lab where you would have died. Horribly. All alone. And here you are nice and safe."

'Sure. As safe as an ant under a magnifying glass.' Chell glared. But the sudden absence of something set the woman on high alert. 'Wait, I'm alone... Where is Wheatley?' The core wasn't anywhere to be seen at all in the room.

Raising her hands, she formed them into a round shape. 'Wheatley. Where is he?' She tried to ask, but GLaDOS didn't seem to understand or even recognize the fact Chell was trying to communicate. The massive DOS mainframe just swayed back and forth rhythmically, watching the small human in her cage. Was this part of the torment? Treating her like a brainless animal too? Blood began to boil and Chell grew determined to one-up this giant, overgrown, Speak-N-Spell.

The human began to scan frantically for an escape from the glass prison. Chell jumped on the side of the hamster-wheel, climbing carefully and pinning her hands to the glass wall so the wheel didn't spin under her until she reached the top of the cage while perched on the curve of the wheel. Then she started kicking at the glass ceiling. The long fall boots bounced off the glass each time, made to absorb impacts, not improve them.

"Why is it that pets always want to escape?" GLaDOS sighed. "But it won't matter. Every time you get out, I'll find you. And put you back in here. Where it's safe."

A cold sweat broke out on the woman as she struggled to get free from the prison without success. As far as psychological torture went, this pretty much topped the meters on Chell's list. Where was Wheatley!

"And guess what? We have a wonderful surprise!"

… Chell had an assumption she meant 'imminent death' instead.

"We're going to be starting a whole new round of testing! This time, we'll be using a reward system for you as well. Using only the finest cheese and pellets available to science. Isn't that great?" GLaDOS sounded most excited about the prospect of new testing.

The wheel suddenly spun under Chell and she flailed helplessly as she was sent rolling to the ground below. The bed of cedar chips broke her fall slightly, but she was still stunned by the impact. Rolling onto her back, she curled into the fetal position to catch her breath.

"Awww, that was the cutest thing ever." GLaDOS cooed.

… wait, that was rather out of character. Chell felt the cold stab of confusion instead of fear.

"Don't worry, I'll take good care of you. And I'll hold you-and pet you-and love you-and I'll call you George." The giant DOS body swayed from side to side with each word.

'Isn't that quote from... Loony Toons?' Chell blinked, sitting up in panic. 'What's going on?'

There was a bright light, jabbing through Chell's eyelids. She was cold, and it sounded like there was a determined pneumatic drill trying to wake her

'I don't want to be in a cage!' Chell winced as her head pounded.

"Oiooooy! - up! Hey Ch– Wake up!" Her head was pounding so badly it sounded like her hearing was going out. The voice was speaking with a mouthful of cotton or something.

Wait... no, that wasn't right. She could still hear the whoosh and puff of circulated air from the vent systems, so her hearing wasn't gone. A – a dream! It had just been a dream, oh god.

Cracking one eye, Chell found a white and blinding light dazzled her and she grunted in pain as she clenched her eyes shut again.

"Oh, -rry 'bout tha-," A muffled voice said, and the lights behind her eyelids went out.

Trying again, Chell peeped open with her other eye (with her night vision still intact) to be greeted by almost entire darkness, except for one pale blue dot bouncing around. Memories that had been frozen, thawed, battered, and hazy from stress began to filter back.

Wheatley.

Chell pulled away from the blue dot that was Wheatley's eye. She had him in a double grip bear hug, and had her forehead resting right against his eye plate with both knees brought up in an oversized fetal position. The position made Chell appear to be a human armadillo. The embrace had muffled the personality core's voice, like stuffing him in a pile of blankets would have.

"If I had any sort of need to breathe, I think I would have smothered." The personality core sighed. "I think your ancestors were all barnacles, with the death grip you 'ad on me there." Rolling his luminescent eye up and over, Wheatley did his best to avoid Chell's confused, glassy-eyed stare. He picked the weirdest moments to be shy.

"Was that a nightmare?" He asked, gaze rising to hers only to immediately swing to the side again.

Chell nodded, shuddering. Her breath hitched in disgust at the thought of being a pet trapped in a cage forever.

The core somehow knew a nightmare was generally unpleasant, but he didn't seem to grasp the more psychological horror that nightmares could present. Chell had been convinced she had been captured and her companion taken – being awake with the little bot in her arms was like being reunited after years apart. She didn't want to get up, or let go just yet.

Which seemed to be fine with Wheatley because he shifted his plates to actually snuggle closer. He mumbled a few things under his sub-speakers and closed his eye for a few more minutes, letting Chell get over the terror of the dream.

The daycare center was a lot colder than Chell had remembered, and during the 'night' (thought it could have been the crack of noon when she went to bed, she had no clue) she had managed to get her jumpsuit pulled up to her shoulders as a means of warmth. She had also honed in on the slight heat Wheatley gave off from his power source and curled around the ball.

Shivering off the last dregs of sleep, Chell rubbed at her eyes, releasing the death grip she had on Wheatley. "That was almost five hours of sleep. That's good enough, right?" Whealtey asked.

Good enough for Aperture Science, anyway.

Nodding, Chell carefully put Wheatley on the floor next to her, and stood with a groan. Chell bounced on the longfall boots unsteadily and then began stretching, trying to work out the agony the day's activities had pounded into her muscles. The burn from the thermal beam from the other day was just a bit of redness and blistering. The bruises GlaDOS had crushed into her ribs were a dark and angry purple already, though. Far worse looking than the burn. Checking over her injuries, she found nothing that would prevent her from proceeding with the plan for the day.

Wheatley watched the human with a poorly concealed interest, the spotlight dancing from the wall to Chell and then back to the wall. However if he was trying to be inconspicuous... the spotlight beam from his eye COMPELTELY gave it away, illuminating whatever he happened to be staring at. "Does it hurt, much?" Wheatley asked, giving up on being sneaky and looking up at Chell as she examined any stray bruises she came across... which mostly happened to be every four inches or so.

Shaking her head, Chell brushed it off as nothing. Instead, she reached down and carefully stroked down one of the many cracks that marred his white armor, as if to say 'We've both had it rough'. The core seemed to spit sparks erratically for a second afterward, his blue eye no longer focused.

That was odd. She raised an eyebrow at him.

"S'nothing!" Wheatley said quickly, recovering even as he spoke. "Yeah, both of us are going to need a nice vacation when we get out of here. And a chance to recover from this. Except humans can repair themselves... nice feature you've got there. Maybe I can walk you through fixing me later. It'll be easy, like cake. Rocket science cake." He added, realizing that robotics was hardly 'cake'.

And at the very thought of food (even something as mind breaking as cake), Chell's stomach began singing a three part harmony... in a complete lack of any key.

Wheatley sniggered quietly.

Out of reflex, Chell found she had flipped him the bird, embarrassed.

"Wot, oh sure. Taunt the bot with no hands with your flagrant use of fingers. That's classy." Wheatley rolled his eye. "If you are hungry... there are always potatoes." He looked up at the giant potato plant gone rogue.

Chell looked up as well. True. But - raw?

And then for some GOD-FORSAKEN REASON... Wheatley suddenly became a cookbook. "You don't have to eat them raw," … a psychic cookbook. The Aperture AI mind reading was getting creepy. "You could cook them. I think there's a water main up ahead. I think I can tap some of the hot water sluice off it and you can boil them. … Or mash 'em, I hear that's good for potatoes. Or scalloped. Or baked. Or fashion some sort of- potato stew?"

Chell was staring at him now, flabbergasted.

Then he suddenly sounded so much happier and continued on in an ever-growing chatter. "You can julienne potatoes, or do hash browns, or lyonnaise, or potatoes O'Brien – if you prefer, or stuffed potatoes, or french fry them, or potato cakes, or potato croquettes, or-,"

Diving forward, the woman tried to cover Wheatley's eye with both hands... since she had no clue where his 'mouth' was. She wanted to yell 'YES, WHEATLEY, I got it! … there were many ways to cook potatoes.' Chell could only settle for trying to shut him up.

The core was laughing, rolling around a bit on the floor as Chell struggled to figure out where exactly sound came from him at. It really did give a new meaning to 'rofl'. Wheatley called for a truce and finished laughing at the human's expense – for the moment.

With a little bit of searching, Chell had found a copper pot one of the children had been using to demonstrate the copper and zinc reaction similar to the one used to get power from a potato... only they were trying to get power from a flan. Did not look like it worked much. Ah, the things kids (and giant murderous computers) try in the name of science.

Tossing a few potatoes in the pot, Wheatley helped figure out how to tap into the main water supply without flat out breaking pipes. Chell managed to gather the seriously scalding water in the pot from the hot water sluice, almost burning herself in the process. For a derelict and decaying lab hundreds of years without human care, Aperture sure managed to keep its water scalding! Now all that was left to do was actually cook the potatoes... using only the power of rapidly cooling water.

… Safe to say, it didn't work well.

Of all Chell's skills, she had to admit that cooking wasn't really one of them. What she ended up at the end of 'cooking' was potatoes boiled halfway through. The top most layer was an overcooked mush with a water that tasted over-treated. But... food was food, and she was STARVING.

Trying to choke down the concoction left Wheatley to talk.

"I'm... fairly certain that when you boil something, it's not supposed to be raw on the inside – carbon element #2 on the outside." The metal ball watched as Chell tried to peel the potato. "Might be wrong though. Maybe it's suppose to fall apart like that."

Ignoring!

"You know... if we cook those just a little bit more, I think we have a good replacement ammo for those crap turrets."

Still ignoring!

"Should I be doing some more potato jokes? Oh! I think I can do a pun or two." The core offered, suddenly gleeful at Chell's annoyance.

A potato narrowly avoided bonking Wheatley.

Laughing, the personality core winked at Chell... or maybe he just blinked. It was hard to tell. But the important thing was he was having fun at her misfortune! However, Chell found it hard to hold it against him when she had been without another friendly voice that wasn't in her head for a long time. And being able to laugh at yourself once in a while was crucial to keep from going absolutely insane in this place. So while she ate her over/under-cooked potato and listened to Wheatley either laugh at her sub-par chef skills or prattle off on a tangent, Chell found herself wondering back on the fact she had no real memories. It was a troublesome thought, and her expression changed to match the mood.

"oi... OOOoii, you've got that look on your face again." Wheatley's eye narrowed.

Chell blinked. Then reaching up, she wiped her face.

"No, the LOOK on your face, like someone popped your balloon... not some crumbs on your face. Th-though you do have some... crumbs that is. Right over here." He rolled his eye to the left. Chell made a swipe at her cheek. "No, lower, and here." The eye moved right now. Wiping her entire lower face with the back of her bandaged wrist, Chell looked up again.

"Aw, now you just made it worse!"

The hell with this! Chell put the remains of the hard-to-swallow potato breakfast down and wiped her hands on her jumpsuit pants. She pulled the ASHPD up and fired one shot at the wall, and one shot at the floor.

Using portals as mirrors: Now you are thinking with them!

Dammit, Wheatley was right. She was wearing a good deal of potato on her face. Her palm quickly wiped away the bits. The portal-based mirror showed a woman was deep lines under her sharp eyes, her hair was in complete disarray, and she had a gaunt look to her like a ghast. Using her fingers to untangle her ponytail, Chell twisted her hair back up against so the stray hairs were all safely out of her face. She still looked like she had been run ragged, but escaping from a death-based science facility will do that to a person.

Chell was now stretched, fed, relatively rested, and guided by a friend who was determined to escape as badly as she was. She was as happy as she had been in a long time.

"Great! Lookin' pretty good!" Wheatley looked up at Chell as she lifted him off the floor, approaching the management rail and hooking him on. "Are you ready then?"

Chell nodded, balling up one fist and pumping the air with it. 'Ready!'

"This is so excitin', I can't believe you're actually with me on this." Wheatley beamed. "Comm'on, lets go! Neurotoxin production is just up ahead."

It had been a short hop-skip-and-jump from the daycare to the neurotoxin generator. It was honestly frightening just how close it had been. A child could have easily walked there, if the giant airlocks indeed would have allowed even a kid access to the room.

Beyond the airlock, Chell felt as if her breath had been stolen. She had NOT been expecting something on this scale.

"This is the neurotoxin generator." Wheatley crowed, far above her head on the rail. "Blimey, don't remember it being this big. Maybe She's made an addition?" He admitted. The giant column what was the neurotoxin generator spanned from the floor almost to the ceiling, and Chell could only just make out the floor far far below. Four massive tubes brought neurotoxin away from the generator to other parts of the lab or wherever the hell GLaDOS stored such a deadly poison gas. You know... besides inside of humans.

Chell nodded dumbly. If GLaDOS had that much neurotoxin... why wasn't she gassing the lab rat yet? That was enough to flood this place three times over! Or did the computer really mean her words that she was going to keep Chell forever?

Funny way of 'keeping' someone... throwing them into death traps all the time.

"Not sure how we're actually going to shut it down. Maybe you should try some hacking too? Maybe a manual override on it." Wheatley's eye narrowed as he looked at the generator, trying to think up a plan. More awake now, Chell realized that while he said 'hacking' he was probably just talking about breaking it. The little AI was good when it came to breaking stuff, but Chell was better. The gift of thumbs was just that much more awesome.

Wheatley lead her up a path, which he was convinced led to a control room. At the top of an elevator, Wheatley was glaring at another airlock. "I'm afraid the door is shut tight. Not locked – but broken. No way to hack it as far as I can tellllll." He dragged out the word as if concentrating. "Can you apply some of that ol' fashion human ingenuity to that door? Don't think it's locked."

Core to English Translation: 'Push on it. Or should that fail. Pull on it.'

At this point, Chell was willing to give up her longfall boots for a freaking crowbar.

And after struggling for a few minutes she managed to half the sliding door wide enough for her to get through. But she had to deal with Wheatley cheering her on by saying "Push! Push! You can do it, luv!" As if Chell was in labor or something. She almost stopped and refused to open the door until he sounded less ridiculous.

Almost.

Once the human was in the room Wheatley took a Management rail from above, zipping into the control room that was surrounded with mesh security glass. Wheatley was examining the equipment inside with interest. "Good news! I can use this equipment to shut down the neurotoxin generator!"

And now... the bad news? There was always bad news in Aperture.

"It is however, password protected." The core continued with a mumble.

'… well... we are screwed then.' The woman heaved a heavy sigh.

Wheatley correctly interpreted Chell's sigh. "Oi, this is rocket science you know." He reminded her. "Not like the most brilliant minds in the world didn't design this." He sounded put-off.

It was true too. On her own, the lab rat would have had a clue what to do, or even that such a thing existed here. Chell blinked owlishly for a moment and then offered him an apologetic smile through the glass.

"No worries. I'll get it... eventually. You may as well have another little rest while I work on it. Stick close, yeah? Don't want Her finding you in one of the cameras," Wheatley looked down at the computer, squinting his shutters at it slightly.

So Chell slumped against the wall, sitting in her normal elevator-travel position while she waited. Wheatley tried several things: a brute force hacking maneuver, trying to guess passwords, and finally attempting to bluff the computer into just giving him the password. At that last attempt, Chell couldn't help but laugh, and it was fair turnabout for all the times Wheatley had laughed at her.

"Well... this hacking method isn't working." Wheatley left the enclosed security room to dangle just above Chell. He sounded disappointed. "I mean, we got the turrets down, but if we confront Her with neurotoxin up, she's just going to kill you."

Standing up, Chell decided this was the time to put their heads together and think.

Quite literally. She stood up, and put her forehead to his metal shell.

"Got an idea then? I thought you humans couldn't communicate wirelessly or share processors? What's this do?" Wheatley asked, remaining still. Vibrations from his power source rumbled slightly, causing him to have a slight tremor like the steady tick of a clock.

What it did was allow Chell to draw the nerve to do something very stupid.

'What was life without a little danger?' Chell decided. … that motto was probably going to get her killed one day. In fact, in Aperture Science, it seemed a likely thing.

Holding up her hand and the pointed right at the ground below Wheatley to indicate 'I'll be right back, stay here,' The hand gestures were the ones for 'sit' and 'stay' if one was training a dog. Apparently, it worked with cores too and Chell went to go set up her plan. Firing the portal device after capturing the laser in the opposite portal, the redirected beam seared through one of the neurotoxin pipes with complete ease.

"... D'jou smell neurotoxin?" Wheatley called out.

'I sure hope not!' Chell thought horrified, covering her mouth and nose with her palm, as if it was enough to block the deadly gas. But she continued to place the next portal closer to sheer off more cords.

There was a blip on the computer, and Wheatley wobbled on his rail as he realized what the human was up to. "Hold on! The neurotoxin levels are going down! So whatever you're doing..."

'...keep it up.' Chell nodded grinning. 'Roger.'

With Wheatley acting as her own person cheering squad, Chell clipped the rest of the pipes before retreating into the room away from the rising vapors.

Then... things went to hell.

"Hold on...do you hear something?" Wheatley decided to state the obvious.

Great blaring alarms sounded, metal began to groan and vibrate, and a voice echoed doom through the room, warning the pressure from the neurotoxin was reaching dangerously unlethal levels.

'… Aperture Science... YOU SUCK!' Chell wanted to pull at her hair.

The neurotoxin system was under incredible pressure from the generator, but without the device now creating a never ending stream of gas vapors, it was like a vacuum to space was opened. Wheatley had been caught completely off guard and was violently torn from his transport carriage and sucked into the vacuum tubes. Chell was pulled off her feet and dragged in by what felt like gravity itself.

'What was life without a little danger?' … in this case, a humongous amount of danger and a little bit of spitting in the grim reaper's eye. Why did everything exist to prove her wrong?

Rushing air swirled Chell around, and she found maker herself as small as possible or risk spinning uncontrollably in the tube and smashing into walls. The core seemed blissfully unaware of this danger though. He had the size advantage in here to travel without some sort of horrible death.

"We've got it! Turrets – all crap. Neurotoxin – gone! I can't believe we're doing this!" Wheatley babbled, excitement radiating from his eye gleefully. "Soon the two of us will be outside! In that sun thing, with some deer!" He laughed, spinning around like a top, every time stopping and looking back at Chell.

Chell couldn't share in his joy. She knew what confronting GLaDOS meant. It wasn't going to be a walk in the park unless you are the kind of moron who straps steaks to yourself and then bolts through the local dog park full of pitbulls (at this point, that even sounded optimistic). This travel through the vacuum tube system was honestly the worst way to travel she had come across yet. And that WAS including the giant relaxation vault that Wheatley smashed into the walls to get her into the labs.

Over the rush of wind in her ears, Chell could hear the random rattle and crash of two items colliding with each other and then spinning off the glass tubes noisily. Even with eyes open Chell saw mostly blurs and streaks of color.

Something ahead didn't look right to her.

The looming intersection ahead shot a line of cubes and boxes sideways, colliding with Wheatley and knocking him to a different air current with a yelp. Chell's outstretched fingers grazed over his white hull Chell without purchase, but he was pulled sideways into a parallel tunnel

"Oh-oh no! Oh no, this isn't the right – you have to stop Her. I'll find you, I promise!" He shouted, his voice vanishing through the rushing of wind and the sound of the mechanics thrumming.

Sudden the whole plan seemed a very terrible idea.

The tube system had dumped Chell into a wide platform connected to a catwalk path. The woman had stumbled on her landing but managed to keep her balance and get away from the backlash of the violent pressure blast. She stood there and waited for a good ten minutes, hoping the Wheatley somehow could make his way back to her that fast. But it was in vain and there was no sign of him.

Frustration was welling into panic, but the iron tenacity of her heart smashed it back down. There was no place for panic. This was the time to use logic, and maybe common sense (though it really had no place in thing insane building). Wheatley knew this facility better than Chell did many times over. And if he could connect to a rail, he would undoubtedly find his way back to her. He had promised her he would find a way back to her. He had told her to continue on to confront GLaDOS. After all, the AI had none of her favorite death traps now.

This left Chell, alone, to carry on the plan the two of them had worked so hard to cripple the massive computer system. The alternative plan to negotiate with GLaDOS couldn't possibly work without his voice to do the negotiating. Though in her pocket she did still have a few pieces of charcoal and the grease pen left, it was possible that she could – wait, strike that. The charcoal had been pulverized into dust and the grease pen was snapped in two. It was usable, but there wasn't a lot she could write with a tiny red nub of pen.

Sighing, Chell's feet were already moving. She couldn't be idle. It wasn't her nature: her nature was to keep moving and stay busy. Which now that she thought about it, was a lot like Her nature to. And upon realizing she had put the same stress on the word that Wheatley would have, Chell's eyebrows drew down and she sighed in amused defeat. The core really was doing an excellent job of influencing her, and if she was really marching to GLaDOS's room with no plan, then Wheatley's influence had been more through than she first thought. Although in Chell's defense, flying by the seat of her pants suited her much more than deep strategy.

Portaling over to some sort of annex off of the main chamber, Chell found herself staring at a trap. And it was obviously a trap too. Because someone was dangling a turkey leg on a rope from the ceiling, with an obvious coil of rope under the trap. … Was... was she still dreaming? This had to be a dream. Or was she concussed from the ride through the vacuum system? Was it an advanced stage of brain damage? Oh god what was happening?

Ok, screw the 'What was life without a little danger' motto. Her new motto is 'Oh god, what was happening!' Based on amount of times used, it was by far her new slogan.

How foolish did the all-knowing, hyper-intelligent computer think she was?... or was this one of those rhetorical questions that really shouldn't be answered? If GLaDOS thought so little of her, why not just let her go? Or why hadn't she been neurotoxin poisoned already?

Chell gave up trying to understand giant murderous computers. Their insanity was a special brand. But the annex was still completely sealed, with no way into the central chamber, and she had a horrible feeling she knew what she had to do to get into there.

'Oh god how embarrassing, I'm actually going to spring this trap.' the woman thought, as she she reached for the turkey leg. 'I wonder what kind of alarms this will set off.' With regret, Chell had reached and took the turkey leg, making sure NOT to stand on the coil of rope directly below the trap.

But to her surprise entire floor caved way under her feet, and with the turkey leg in hand Chell tumbled downwards out of the annex

… Ok, THAT was unexpected.

Her landing was only a few feet below, in a small cell below the room. Panels swung up in front of her and quickly sealed off the ceiling with non-portal surfaces.

"I feel embarrassed for you. Did you really have to fall for such a stupid trap?" GLaDOS suddenly spoke, her voice coming from what seemed like everywhere.

The computer had been watching the whole time. ... Go figure. The wall's were twisting and swinging outwards around the cell, revealing a rail the small container was supposed to follow under the hub's building. Chell sat heavily on the floor, turkey leg in one hand and ASHPD in the other, wondering if it would be a faux pas to eat this in front of the AI while she received her death threats.

GLaDOS sounded disappointed, "I had another dozen traps waiting, each more deadly than the next. And you get caught in the first one? Someone is an underachiever. Don't expect a company bonus." Suddenly, being an underachiever seemed the wiser choice in here.

Chell grimaced as the panels of the opening above from the hub allowed the cell to rise into the bright room. But it was when her little cell was illuminated that the human felt her heart turn into a brick and plummet into her stomach.

The lab rat was in a small glass cage, 10 feet by 10 feet, with frosted symbols on the glass. Flashes of the dream she had earlier came to her about being in a human sized hamster cage. If there was a giant hamster wheel involved, Chell was stuffing the ASHPD's firing port into her mouth and opening a portal to her belly, and then CLIMBING INSIDE HER OWN STOMACH.

"Well. Lets get down to business." Disc Operating System staring at her. Every panel was poral-proof in the room and the puddles of water, vines, and debris were all gone. The chamber was spotless and immaculate, but the deep rust stains and gouges couldn't be removed from GLaDOS's shell. She still bore the marks of the hundreds of years that passed, even if she tried to disguise the rest of the factory from it. The gold eye was highly unnerving, but Chell didn't tremble. She didn't beg or cry. She simply kept her grip on the ASHPD, and waited.

"What did you do with the Intelligence Dampening Sphere? I require him back to end this testing. He has vital equipment installed that the facility requires recovering." Swinging her body from a giant pivot in the ceiling, GLaDOS peered down at Chell, as if trying to figure out where on her person she was keeping the core. Oh come on, did she really think she was keeping Wheatley down her shirt?

Keeping mum (not that she had a choice) on Wheatley's whereabouts, Chell felt her chest pound uncomfortably. Her poker face was firmly in place, and she simply sat on the floor of the glass cage. ASHPD in her lap. Turkey leg... still in one hand. It was probably poisoned or at the very least drugged, but it still looked delicious and it took a god-awful amount of will power to keep from eating it even knowing that.

"I don't know why you are so determined to keep that annoying moron. He's a traitor you know. He's been assisting me the whole time." GLaDOS rumbled, her smooth voice causing the glass panes to vibrate slightly.

Chell didn't believe her. And her expression said so.

"Hmm, would you like me to prove it? Well too bad. I won't. You will just have to live with the curiosity until it burns you. Like the incinerator room." The white metal of the mainframe's head-piece pulled away from the cage, and the AI gazed to the other end of the room.

Ok, there it was again. The seeming implication that GLaDOS intended to keep the human long term. So which was true... the 'I'm going to kill you' or the 'I'm going to put you in a cage and love you and you will be my Squishy' thing? Because honestly if Chell was about to become a pet...

Becoming belligerent, the woman now gave the turkey leg more of her attention that the giant killer AI. How fascinating. A baked leg of a bipedal and delicious bird!

"I will tell you what the Moron was supposed to do. He was modified to record and react to human behavior during testing. Those wonderful reaction you have when you solve tests and coincidentally nearly die – those reactions – he was going to bring those back to me to use for my next test." The AI suddenly was mere inches from the cage, causing Chell to jump. "It was dumb luck he managed to access the system. Dumb. Stupid. Brain damaged luck. And now my testing research is gone. Again. Because of you."

Chell leaned away from GLaDOS as she spoke, the computer's voice modulated much lower than normal and became much much more hostile. She barely managed to restrain a flinch of fear.

Then it was like a switch was flipped and GLaDOS had pulled away, her voice once again congenial. "Assuming the moron hasn't destroyed himself, he has probably gotten lost in the facility. Or fallen down a well. I will have to retrieve him. But at this point – you have done all I need. We're done here."

The floor began to vibrate for a few seconds, an Chell held her breath. But GLaDOS suddenly realized something. The AI's eye went a bit brighter. "Or I could use you as bait and wait for him to come to us."

… Now that lead weight in Chell's chest that was her heart seemed to turn ice cold.