Chell darted back out onto the catwalk. "Come quick!"

The others followed her into the room. When they saw the scene on the bed, Morgan and Isaac shared a glace. Carrie darted to the man's side and laid a finger to his neck.

"He's dead." she intoned solemnly.

Morgan stepped forward. "I was afraid of that." She knelt beside Carrie, who was starting to cry. "Remember the incinerator, dear?" Carrie nodded through her tears. "Just below Her chamber, the incinerator room has a ledge. A platform, really, just as a failsafe. We all landed on it."

Chell interrupted. "But GLaDOS said I'd destroyed the cores- I mean, you. Erm, I mean… never mind."

"No," Morgan replied, "you just cut off our connection to Her. In the heat of battle, I suppose She couldn't tell the difference. Anyway," the way she said it made Chell feel quite guilty for interrupting, "we all landed on the platform. Anger was, well, closer to the edge. He was still writhing and growling, even down there, and… he shook too hard. He fell."

Isaac nodded. "It was sad. He yelled the whole way."

Carrie wiped her eyes. "And then we couldn't hear him anymore. But I thought he was still okay! I thought we could withstand temperatures up to 4000 degrees Kelvin!"

Morgan put her arm around the girl's shoulder. "But what use would an Emergency Intelligence Incinerator be if it weren't a few degrees higher?"

Carrie burst into a fresh wave of tears. Wheatley darted to the bathroom to fetch her a box of tissues.

Chell felt like crying, too, but the sadness was somehow detached. She was numb.

Then she felt it.

She had killed someone.

The shock must have registered on her face, because Wheatley offered her a tissue, too.

She was a murderer.

"Are you alright there, little lady?" Rick asked from the door, not really part of the emotional hoopla.

"I… I am a horrible person. She was right. I killed him." Chell mumbled to herself.

"What? No! That's- that's-" Wheatley seemed at a loss for words.

"Completely true." Morgan stated flatly. "Oh, don't look at me like that, it is. You threw him in an incinerator, and as a result, he died. However, it is almost certain that had you not thrown him in an incinerator, you would have died."

This didn't do much to calm Chell down, but it did make sense. After all, if she had waited a second longer to throw the Anger Core in the fire, the neurotoxin would have certainly done her in. Sighing, the lab rat reached over to pull the sheets over the dead man's face. Everyone but Rick wiped a tear from their eye as they left that lonely room.

"One core left…" muttered Wheatley. He glanced at his computer screen and gasped, his blue eyes widening, and he took off down the hall at a dead sprint.

)o( )o( )o(

By the time the rest of the group caught up with him, Wheatley was already in a chamber with the door wide open. Chell joined him in the doorway.

Curled up under the sheets was a boy, about twelve years old, with spiky blond hair. He was twitching in his sleep, mumbling.

Chell leaned closer.

"I'm in space… space… so much space…. in space….!"

Wheatley sighed with relief. "Space is an awfully long way away, I wasn't sure if the transfer would still work with that much distance. Looks like he's fine, though. Except, he's still asleep. Do you think something went wrong?"

Chell gently shook the boy's shoulder.

"Sp-space?" His eyes darted frantically around the room. "Where did space go?" He spotted Chell. "Space-lady! Hi space-lady! I was in SPACE!"

She smiled. "I know you were. But Wheatley here-"

"Wheatie? Wheatie's here?" The boy strained to see Wheatley, who came up to the bed. "Space-buddy!

"Yeah, yeah, I'm here, mate. How're you feeling?" Wheatley was smiling. Chell realized that they must've bonded while they were stranded in space.

"I feel… good. Not as good as when I was in-" Space sucked in a breath, and everyone braced for the inevitable shout of "SPAAAAAAAACE!", but it never came. To everybody's surprise, he continued calmly. "-space, but… pretty good."

"Do you know what happened?" Chell asked him carefully. As far as she was concerned, the less yelling the better.

"I was in space, it was space-tastic," he smiled at the made-up word, "and I woke up here. And apparently I can move?" He didn't seem to trust his latest information.

"Let me explain." Wheatley began. "No, there's no time. Let me sum up. I transferred everybody to human bodies, which actually are our human bodies from before we were cores, I know, weird, right? And so anyway, I went up to the surface and found Chell in a loony bin she's okay now, though, and we came back and we escaped from Her and saved Rick and Carrie and Isaac and Craig and Morgan and Avon was dead but you're okay, and that's brilliant! To make a long story short-"

"Too late," chorused everyone else.

Wheatley ignored them. "To make a long story short, we're humans, and we are almost certainly fleeing for our lives."

"W-wait, why does everybody have different names?" Space asked, trying to take in all this new information.

"We like our human names!" Carrie chirped from the hall.

"Who said that?" Space tried to stand and wound up flat on his face.

"I did!" Carrie said excitedly, coming in and giggling at Space's clumsiness.

Chell refrained from reminding her that she hadn't done much better.

Carrie helped him up. Once he could stand, Space had boundless energy.

"Human names? What's mine? Is it cool, like… Spacey McSpacecop?"

"Your name was… I mean, is… Seth. Seth Cole." Chell informed him. "Not exactly Spacey McSpacecop, but I think it fits you."

The newly-renamed Seth turned to Carrie and said excitedly, "Hey! Hey! Hey! Girl! Guess what!"

"What?" Carrie responded, delighted to have someone want her to ask a question.

"Space!" Seth replied with a huge grin.

"What's space?" Carrie asked, thrilled to learn something new.

"It's SPACE!" Seth explained unhelpfully.

Carrie, undeterred, asked, "What's in space?"

"Nebulas. Black holes. Star. Another star. Moon. More stars. Galaxies. SPAAAACE!"

"Tell me more about space!" Carrie took Seth by the arm, helping him balance as they went out onto the catwalk to chat.

"Huh." Wheatley said, a little shocked by what had transpired. "I… wasn't exactly expecting that."

"They make such a cute couple!" Chell said, smiling. "He'll never run out of things to say, and she'll never get bored of hearing them.

"Yeah, yeah, true love at first sight." Rick grumbled, clearly bitter that he was having worse luck than a twelve-year old kid.

When the main group rejoined the blond couple, they began to discuss their plans (or lack thereof.)

"Well, that should account for everyone," Chell said, looking around, "assuming there weren't any other cores…?" When all of the former robots shook their heads, she continued. "I was hoping I could get you all out before She noticed, but obviously that isn't going to happen. Now, I don't know what She's going to do to us, but we have to stick together and-"

Chell trailed off, gazing behind the group. On the catwalk was a woman in her thirties, dressed in business attire. A small red scarf was tied around her neck. Her hair was long and dark, and she carried a coffee cup in one hand.

"Oh!" said the woman, causing the group to turn around. "Hello. I didn't…" she stopped. Her brown eyes met Chell's grey ones, and the woman stopped, her pretty-as-a-postcard face twisting into a sneer.

"Oh. It's you."

And so she returns to our main plot, apparently with some Plot Hole Brand Coffee! Yum…

So yeah, sorry to all you Anger Core fans out there.

And yes, I totally ship Spacosity. Chelley is great, but Spacosity is just too cute!

Oh, and I have a ~surprise~ for Mystic 777 for getting Chell's reaction to the Anger Core situation exactly right. Deploying ~surprise~ in five, four, three, two- bzzt.