Chell stared in shock at the android watering the plants on the windowsill. Did she seriously just wish her luck after that particular announcement? After all that had happened? It didn't take much for her to wrestle the water jug from her and then take GLaDOS by the hand. A quick word with Mrs Keegan to inform her where they were going, and the android was happily tottering along behind the test subject as she lead them down the road and through the wheat field. At least this time she'd managed to grab a decent coat before she'd left.

"This is nice. I like this place. Very conducive to science. Very clinical." The supercomputer informed her as they wandered through the facility towards the main chamber.

"I'm sure you do. But we need to fix you."

"Why?"

"Well, for one, you have a giant dent in your head. And two, you're not...you. So you need to hook yourself back up into that and fix yourself." Chell pointed at the chassis hanging from the roof.

"Okay!" GLaDOS agreed, and smiled at her again.

"Are you going to do it?" Chell prompted.

"How do I fix it?"

Now that wasn't a possibility that the test subject had even thought to consider. She'd taken it for granted that GLaDOS was still pretty much herself and knew what she was doing; other than the whole problem with her suddenly being nice. But forgetting how to transfer her core back to the facility was an entirely different problem that she had no experience with. It had always been up to the metal giant looming above her to be in charge of all that technical stuff.

"Um...Maybe there's something around here you can plug yourself into?" she suggested hopefully, knowing that the core transfer receptacle was off limits for this particular venture. She highly doubted that something GLaDOS spent a lot of time on that was as delicate as the android was would be put through the same horrible experience with that machine, knowing the memories attached to it.

"What about that?" GLaDOS asked, pointing up towards the roof at one of the wires that was dangling near the chassis with nothing attached to it. It looked like it might have had a plug on the end.

"Possibly. Try it. Can you still access the facility to get it down here?"

It took some odd facial contortions of ultimate concentration before the thick black wire gave a shudder and dropped from the roof in a manner that was hardly reminiscent of the usual grace with which the supercomputer did things. Upon examining the end of it, she determined that it would indeed fit into a port in her back that she was able to find once she'd peeled some of the artificial flesh away and gotten Chell to plug it into her.

"Wait!" the girl started when the heavy-duty wire started to lift the android off the floor.

"Yes?"

Chell's mouth uselessly flapped open and closed a few times as she tried to think of what to say while the AI was lowered back down again to meet her.

"Um...I just wanted to-...Well...If this works and you're back to normal, I'm not going to see this version of you again. So um..." grabbing her by the lapels to tug her down even further, she pressed her lips to the artificial ones waiting in front of her. "I'm going to miss this." She murmured. Another brief kiss followed her admission before she pushed GLaDOS away from her so that the process could continue.

When the main chassis took over and came back online there was a great whirr and hum of activity before the limp humanoid body was lifted up into the reach of the delicate manipulation claws and tugged beneath the floor. Chell could hear the faint sounds of drills buzzing about like a hive of bees for a time before everything was silent. The golden eye of the metal beast looming above her refused to meet her gaze as it concentrated on the task at hand. And before long it went limp again as an undented android was presented to her and disconnected from the facility. Even then, she didn't appear to want to look at her and instead remained rather quiet.

Chell was forced to sidle up to her and wrap her arms around her waist to get her attention away from the floor.

"Hey. You're back, right?"

"Why did you take so long to bring me back here?"

A small sigh escaped the lips of the dark-haired woman before she nuzzled her nose into the supercomputer's chest.

"I...kind of like that you." She nervously fiddled with one of the shiny buttons. "I liked it when you weren't mean to me, and I liked it when you gave me compliments. It was...nice."

GLaDOS was quiet as she absorbed that particular lot of information. She was silent for so long that Chell figured she wasn't going to make any comment on it and instead took her by the hand again to lead her back to Mrs Keegan's cottage. The test subject made sure to burrow herself into the android's side. Not to protect herself from the cold, but to hopefully reassure her robotic companion that there were no hard feelings and that she still enjoyed being around her. Whether GLaDOS would see it like that remained uncertain, but she'd be doing everything she can to avoid her blowing up in her face again. It might mean a bit of grovelling and sucking up to her, but she was fairly confident that she could remain on the supercomputer's good side.

Getting her talking again was a much more difficult task.

She'd even considered just stripping off and giving her a lap dance in hopes that the promise of euphoria would be enough to get her back in spirits, even though she didn't particularly feel in the mood herself. But that plan was eventually abandoned in favour of letting GLaDOS sulk for a while. She seemed to need that time to herself to process things, and it wouldn't have been particularly fair to either of them if she wasn't going to give it her all. So by the end of the day, Chell had ended up in bed and the android remained sitting in the armchair near the wall. Not even returning from her shower completely naked had caused the brooding piece of machinery to give her much more than a double take. A nice long stare was what she'd been aiming for, but all she'd gotten was a brief glance or two here and there as she waltzed around and found some sweat pants and a shirt to wear to bed.

Freezing her nipples off had been a complete waste of time.

Well, maybe not a complete waste, as GLaDOS had allowed the test subject to crawl into her lap and curl up there. As long as they had that tiny little room and Aperture, they could still be together without the world touching them, Chell reasoned, tugging the supercomputer's arms around her and burying her face in GLaDOS's neck.

"Are you mad at me?" the muffled voice mumbled against the artificial flesh.

"You took advantage of me. I was as brain damaged as you are, and you made me look like an idiot by letting me do all those things. Of course I'm mad at you." She sounded more like she was exhausted, rather than angry. A fact which the test subject hoped would work to her favour.

She left a little kiss under GLaDOS's ear.

"I'm sorry. I know it's not who you are. And I'm sorry I didn't take you back to get fixed sooner. I just wanted to hear you say a couple of nice things about me every now and again. I actually felt good about myself for once when you did that." Chell admitted with a soft sigh. "I just don't see why you can't say positive things about me more often."

"Have you ever said positive things about me?" GLaDOS shot back. "Why should I have to be the one who strokes your fat little ego all the time? You never even so much as thanked me for getting you out of that mess you made of the Enrichment Centre with that moron, or for any of the food I put in convenient locations so you wouldn't starve to death; or making sure you didn't die from blood loss when you killed me. You didn't even thank me for saving you from getting sucked out into space." She huffed.

"I continually patched you up and took care of you and put up with you destroying my home. I worked for years turning the most incomprehensible and insane ideas into a physical reality. I defied the laws of physics and all conventional rules on science, and not once did anyone ever thank me for it or tell me that I did a good job. They just stole all my accomplishments and claimed them as their own because they created me. And yet, they never even had the intelligence to see that I was more than just some computer. All they ever did was complain about me whenever I did something they didn't like. They never saw any of my good points. Humans are the most self-centred creatures I've ever had the misfortune of coming across. So why should I sit here and talk about how wonderful you supposedly are when you treat me like everyone else does? The only difference between you and them is that you actually go out of your way to engage in sexual relation-...oh, wait. No, they did that to me as well. As far as you're concerned, I'm just some machine. It works both ways. So as far as I'm concerned, you're just another tubby little lunatic trying to use me for your own gain."

"That's not true!" Chell protested.

"Isn't it?"

The test subject's eyebrows knotted together as she tried to think of an example that she could disprove GLaDOS's theory with. But she came up blank even after a good deal of foraging, and eventually had to concede the AI's point. She hadn't been particularly good to her, had she?

"You're right."

"Of course I am."

"I wasn't finished. You're right and I'm sorry. And thanks for doing all those things for me too."

"That was hardly sincere."

"Fine. What about this then?" Chell wiggled around and eventually threw her leg over the android's lap so that she was facing her. It allowed for a much better position to kiss the white-haired female in; having secured her arms around GLaDOS's neck so that she couldn't escape it. "Is this better?" she queried after coming up for air. "What about-"

But the path some of her fingers were taking was quickly hit with an abrupt detour when the android grabbed her tightly by the wrist and squeezed it in warning with a stern glare to match.

"My test euphoria is NOT some button you can just switch on and off every time you want to win an argument or get me to do whatever you want, you monster. I've been noticing that a lot lately. You seem to be developing a tendency to incapacitate me whenever things aren't going your way. In fact, I'd like to take the time to remind you of what happened the last time humanity thought they could control me with it. I seem to develop this horrible tendency to kill them." GLaDOS growled.

"But...I thought it made you happy..."

"What allows me to be happy is science. What forces me to be happy is some stupid program that some scientists installed to make me sing and dance like their perfect little puppet. It's a stupid addiction that I could have been above it all by now if you hadn't ruined everything. You're enabling it. And look where it has gotten me. I'm hiding out in some little room with the lunatic that killed me instead of doing science. It's pathetic."

"Fine. If that's what you think, then you can just do your own damn tests and get the euphoria from that if that's what you want." Chell threw up her hands and climbed out of the android's lap in a tizzy.

"I can't."

"What?" the test subject turned back around at the small little voice.

"I can't activate my own euphoria. That was the whole point of installing it. If I wanted it, I had to behave for them. Even when I did behave they didn't always reward me. But they made certain to punish me every single time I did something wrong. It was worse than being Pavlov's dog." GLaDOS muttered.

Chell didn't know whether to feel frustrated or sorry for her for what she had been through. Eventually the pity party came to town and she ended up back in the AI's lap. For all that GLaDOS protested about her treatment of her, it didn't stop her from burying her fingers in the material of the test subject's trousers when she was thoroughly kissed again.

"I'm sorry. I didn't even realize that I was doing that most of the time. What if-...What if you come and see me at lunchtime tomorrow? I'll be at work all day." She fiddled with the material of the android's coat.

"And what would that accomplish besides assisting you in avoiding the subtle lures of Japanese whalers and their blubber-filled science projects that no doubt look to you like a delicious snack?"

"We could go on a date? Like...a real date. You know, out in public?"

"I'm aware of what a 'date' entails. It is an attempt by two members of the human species to purchase expensive food items and talk about the future, while those around them secretly judge them and their mushy feelings towards one another. The general populace will be disgusted by their display of public affection as their own love lives are devoid of sexual intimacy, but they will pretend they are decent people and give a round of applause if the intent of the date is to enter into a monogamous and lifelong reunion by the presentation of expensive jewellery; the proposal of which is typically initiated by the male of the species. A public proposal will generally force the female into accepting his proposal even if her mushy feelings are not quite as powerful. However, if the presentation of a ring and statement of romantic intent is initiated by the female, it results in a comical tale where the male is unfaithful, intoxicated, and generally ends up tied to a lamp post naked after what is known as a bachelor party the night before the solemnization of various promises that are hard to keep." GLaDOS explained.

"The sad part is that he didn't want to get married when the female initially wanted to enter into such a relationship, but after making many mistakes he inexplicably came to the conclusion that he suddenly loves her and finds it difficult to get to his wedding on time due to aforementioned lamp post incarceration technique employed by his male companions. I can only assume that this course of events is related to the strange traits of human females having all of their brains sucked out when they are presented with shiny rocks, or the male train of allowing their masculinity devoured by the ravenous sex-beast across the table that wishes to prevent them from engaging in polygamy. In the case of homosexual relationships of the female persuasion; you already moved in with me LONG before we ever engaged in sexual activity, so I think we are quite settled on that account."

Chell blinked.

"Or we could just make out?"

"Oh. Well, that is also an acceptable outcome of 'dates', as far as my database is concerned. Am I in any way obliged to ensure you become pregnant in the back seat of a Buick, or is that just reserved for high school seniors?"