Author: Song for this chapter is "She Blinded Me With Science (Dubba Jonny Remix)" (original by Thomas Dolby).
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The first thing Wheatley realized when he woke up was that he was back in the ceiling above the foreboding room with all the monitors, peering down from his superior vantage, watching, waiting. For what?
The images on the monitors were changing, shifting from the CCTV footage of the hundreds of employee cubicles and offices to their corresponding employee numbers and back again, causing shadows around the room to dance and morph into frightening, almost demonic things Wheatley knew could not be there but seemed to be anyway. He wanted to run, get out of there immediately, but he couldn't - he was anchored onto the Rail™, almost as if he was being forced to watch for a reason he had yet to comprehend.
All the while the Narrator was yelling at him to get back, but he stayed. He had to stay. He stayed even when the man - Stanley - made his appearance, running out onto the catwalk and looking every bit as distraught as when Wheatley had seen him the first time.
Stanley turned his harrowed gaze upwards, meeting Wheatley's own gaze, and the Narrator's berating increased. Wheatley ignored him and continued watching Stanley while Stanley continued watching him. He could hear himself calling down to the man - "Don't worry, I'll find a way to get you out of there! Just hold on! Just sit tight!" - his eye searching for a way down there to help him even as he spoke, even as it was fruitless because there was no way down there, not unless Wheatley disengaged himself from the Rail™, which he wasn't ready to do yet.
But then Stanley's tired gaze suddenly turned serious, almost reproachful, sad and hard all at once. Wheatley was taken aback when the man's lips moved and out came his own voice from the man's mouth, "Promise you won't come looking for me."
He was so caught off guard that all he could do was stare - what in the bloody hell is going on here? - watch the man as the shadows danced around him, like they were closing in on him and something truly terrible was about to happen. Wheatley was caught between arguing with the man and shouting at him to look out because of the shadows, but nothing came out. The words caught and tangled up in his speech processor, forming a knot and preventing him from speaking at all.
And then Stanley's eyes turned fearful, terrified, as he looked back out the doorway. Something was coming. Wheatley could hear it - a machine of some kind, the movement of mechanical limbs marching along, loud whirs and clicks interlaced with commands to "STOP RUNNING" and "ASSUME THE PARTY SUBMISSION POSITION", commands he realized that were being given by both the machine and the Narrator, making them nearly indistinguishable from one another. The man peered over the catwalk railing as if negotiating whether or not he could make it if he jumped or slipped underneath the railing, then seemed to reconsider and turned back towards the doorway in uncertainty. He looked back up at Wheatley one last time, shouted "Get her out of here! GO!" at him, and then the man was running back through the door through which he had entered, towards the mechanical sounds.
Smoke began to fill the room, rising in dense, noxious, black clouds from the equally dense, noxious, black abyss below the catwalk, followed shortly thereafter by massive hellish flames, approaching so rapidly Wheatley knew he would not be able to get away in time. Something inside of him was all wrong, broken, and he couldn't pull himself together enough to be able to push past it and react. At the same time this was happening, all the monitors in the room flipped from the CCTV footage to a single word on each monitor - "WHEAT" - all in green against a black background, like someone was shouting at him from the other side, through the monitors themselves; and then those all changed to giant numbers, the same shade as blood, stretching across all the monitors, indicating a countdown:
00:00:03
00:00:02
00:00:01
00:00:00
The flames erupted from the pit, engulfing the room, the monitors popping and bursting outwards in a prickly rain of sparks and glass. Wheatley heard himself screaming, screaming in pain, fear, terror, screaming and screaming, screaming so hard and loud his voice processor strained. There were alarms going off, the room was shaking, incisive heat forcing itself into every orifice of his body and incinerating him, but he couldn't get away. He couldn't get away.
Dimly, through the haze of burning pain, he felt something brush up against him, realized it was the Line™, and then suddenly -
Rolling out of his booth and into the corridor, the first thing Wheatley noticed, aside from the alarming tremors and tremulous alarms, was that -
- he was back in his office.
Wait, what? What are you-...? How did you-...?
Wheatley was back in his office, alive, where all of the alarms and tremors were still going off, but he was alive. Not dead. Alive! Alive when he should have been good and dead. And he was no longer in any pain - he was fixed and whole again. Mentally he felt like he had been hit by a double-decker bus - either that or a ten-ton truck - and his intellectual capabilities would be forever in question, but physically he felt good as new.
Oh for crying out loud, I don't believe this. I killed you. I killed you. I killed you off and-
"I'm alive..." Wheatley muttered in shock, his optic blinking wide as he blearily looked around, drinking in the familiarity of his booth.
Yes... you are. I can't believe this-
Never before had he felt such joy at seeing his booth - this booth in its crumbling state of decay and its display of flashing red lights. But his joy at the sight of his boring office was nothing in comparison to the fact that he was alive. "I'm... I'm alive!" was all he could think to say, over and over, though there really was no need to as everyone could plainly see that he was, in fact, alive.
Welcome back, Wheatley. Welcome back to the story. As was intended, I'm sure. Let me just check my notes, there must be something here to explain this; something must have- Oh. Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho, I see now. I see what You™ did there, You™ menace. Well, good riddance to You™ at last. Now, Wheatley-
"I, I-I-I can't believe it, I'm alive! Actually, really alive!" he went on - even though he was supposed to be actually, really dead - his voice high-pitched in disbelief, ignoring the voice that was speaking directly to him, if only he would pay attention. "And healed! I mean, look at this - look at this!" he cried, spinning around in his casing and stretching out all of his panels, all which were intact and reset to their previous state of scuff marks and normal wear and tear. "Hahahahaaaa! Absolutely, perfectly, 100% alive! I can't remember the last time I felt-.."
I do hate to interrupt your little celebration there, but I've just figured out what happened - why you are still alive, that is - and I thought you should know that the Line™ has paid dearly for you to have this opportunity right now.
"What? What are you talking about? The Line™'s right h-..." He looked up at his management rail and all at once deflated, his joy sucked straight out of him as if by a sudden pressure differential, "Wait, where's the Line™?"
It™'s gone, Wheatley. Dead and gone in your place.
"No. No no no no no, that's- that's impossible!"
Oh, it's possible all right. I suppose I should be thanking you. The Line™ has been nothing but a nuisance ever since I first employed It™s use in the Stanley Parable - always popping up where It™'s neither wanted nor needed - and now It™ will never again be able to darken my doorway. Were it not for your little adventure, I never would have had the chance to get rid of that pesky Line™. So, yes, I do believe some gratitude is in order.
ACHIEVEMENT REVOKED: Gain a sidekick!
ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED: Receive gratitude from the Narrator
There you go, there's your receipt. Now you can look upon it whenever you need to feel better about yourself.
"The Line™- The Line™ is- It™ can't die! It™'s a line! It™'s not like a, like a, a living being. It™ could travel between time and stories and everything! How could It™ die?!" Wheatley refuted, feeling his entire body shake in response to the influx of emotion threatening to tear him apart, "What did you do?!"
It wasn't what I did, it's what the Line™ did. It™ appears to have invoked a Deus Ex Machina in order to save your life and bring you back to the beginning. Rather droll in my opinion. Cheap. Banal. But lucky you. Lucky you to still be alive while the Line™ died in your place. Not so lucky for me, though, seeing as I'm still stuck here with you. Oh well. Let's just count this whole experience as a valuable lesson learned on your part and give the story another try, shall we?
Wheatley shook his chassis in denial, "You're- you're, y-y-you're lying!"
You don't have to believe me for it to be true. In either case, now that we're both here, I think-
But Wheatley ignored him and went about accessing his internal map software instead, only for it to reveal that not only had a good portion of the facility become visible again, but that the Line™ was nowhere to be seen. Feeling a tightness inside of him that could be attributed to many things - not the least of which was guilt - he then took in an artificial breath before belting out the song that had summoned the Line™ in the first place.
"DA DA DA DA, DA DA DUM!"
Heaven forbid he quit his day job.
It's useless, Wheatley.
"DA DA DA DA, DA DA DA DUM!"
Singing the world's worst rendition of "Following Stanley" won't bring It™ back from the dead, you know. In fact, it might make It™ more dead.
"DA DA DA DA, DA DA-"
Now, it's time to get back to the story-
Wheatley rounded on the voice, still not knowing exactly where it was, so he ended up just looking at the ceiling and turning in circles until he felt sick and stopped, "YOU KILLED ME! You- or at least you tried to kill me!"
What's your point?
"My point- You think I'm just going to go along with you after you tried to kill me?!"
Yes, well, you aren't dead and the Line™ sacrificed itself to give you another chance, it seems to me we should both seize the day and get on with things. It would be a disservice to the Line™ to do otherwise.
"You didn't even like the Line™! What makes you think I'm going to want to go back to your story now, huh?! After all of that- all of that-..!"
You should already know what will happen if you don't, Wheatley. Suffice to say if you don't, not only will you die again, but so will Test Subject #2845. So I suggest you get a move on with things.
"The lady..." Wheatley was suddenly breathless with worry, his own stubborn sense of self-preservation diminished. "Oh my God, the lady- is she-..."
Hmmm, well, let's see. There's only one way for you to find out, isn't there?
Without any need for further prompting, Wheatley briskly exited his office.
Oh, and do try not to get yourself into such a situation where I am forced to kill you again - you only get one Deus Ex Machina per story and the Line™ isn't around to help you out anymore either. Going forward, you only get brought back if I want you brought back.
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