Disclaimer: I do not own any of the material appearing in this story. The OC's belong to their respective owners.
"He's been abused?!" Bowsette said in surprise once Gloria had told her.
"Yeah, poor lad had a rough life."
Bowsette grimaced. "And I knocked him down when he was going after Cinder. Crap… I think I made the situation worse with him."
"Quick question!" Rei spoke up. "How exactly did you understand your Cinderace?"
"Well, apparently when I transformed into Pokemon whenever I use a power up, it came with the side effect that I can understand them clearly." Gloria shrugged it off. "Not a big deal."
"Mmm, makes sense."
Gloria looked at Bowsette. "Do you have any idea what to do?"
Bowsette folded her arms. "Hmm… maybe we just got to be nice to it. That's easier said than done… mmm, I'll think of something. Probably be best if we don't annoy him." She said, glancing over at Zinnia who was deep in thought.
"How am I gonna tame that wild boy…" Zinnia wondered to herself.
With Cardin and Chelsea…
"Oh, she's smiling again." Chelsea smiled, seeing Ruby and Kokoro looking at the stars together, the latter having a goofball smile on her.
"Heh, I might have had something to do with it." Cardin said proudly.
"Right, like you didn't think of having her think of happy memories?"
Cardin chuckled. "Oh, I got her smiling." He said as he sat down on the edge of the Observatory, staring out into the cosmos.
"Ya know… you're not so bad." Chelsea said as she sat down next to him. "In fact, I think you're just a teddy bear." She playfully elbowed him.
"Teddy bear! Pah! I'm the strongest guy there is. There ain't no way I'm a teddy bear!" He said, folding his arms proudly.
"Oh, no need to act like such a tough guy. I've seen the way you treat Kokoron." She winked, causing Cardin to blush.
"Heh… well… I guess it comes with me reforming, ya know?"
"I'm… curious about something. What made you hate Faunus so much?"
BGM: Kairi III (Kingdom Hearts)
"Ah, that…" Cardin looked back into the cosmos. "Well… back when I was young, my dad, Jason, tolerated Faunus, but he would occasionally insult them behind their backs. It didn't help that he got robbed by a Faunus before he and mom got married. It kinda… creeped its way inside of me without realizing it. Then, one day, I was out with my little sister when this gang of Faunus ambushed us, demanding our money. I refused to give them any… and that's when they attacked."
"Oh my…" Chelsea whispered.
"I tried to fend them off but they were too much. They left after that and… that's when my hatred for Faunus grew. To make matters worse? My old man told me: "Son, if there's one thing you oughta do with those Faunus is to make them submissive. If they bully you, you oughta bully them right back. Fair is fair, after all." So I… did things I wasn't proud of. The good thing was that he's not as bad as that Jacques asshole but he was still a bit of a dick. He was a good man but… had some issues."
"Was?"
"My old man had a stroke. He didn't make it to the hospital."
"Cardin…"
"I never realized how blinded I was with my racism against the Faunus. Hell, I picked on Velvet so much, I didn't think anything of it."
"So, what changed your views?"
"Honestly? I think it was when I was nearly killed by a Magnamalo. RWBY and JNPR came to save us and… of course, it hurt my pride a little, but I noticed Blake was there and she helped to save me before Weiss dealt the final blow. It made me realize Faunus aren't so bad… it helped me think clearly. That's when I decided to try to be a better person and as I did, I began to see Faunus helping humans out, Faunus being good people… the day I got my ass kicked was the day I was able to see the world clearly for the first time."
Chelsea smiled. "And that's what got you to be the person you are today…"
"Yeah… although, I should mention my mother and sister were not like this." Cardin said. "My mother, Nesta… she didn't let my old man's views get to her. She helped out the Faunus in need and, she always sees the good in them despite a few of them being troublemakers. Now that I think about it, I'm not sure why she didn't leave him. Then again, she does her best to see the good in everyone, and I think she was doing her best to convince him that not all Faunus were bad. She even tried to get me to stop thinking like that."
"I guess she's proud now, eh?"
"Yeah… and my little sister, Laura… heh, she refused to listen to what my old man said. She even goes to school with a couple Faunus and she thinks they're pretty cool. She… grew up differently than I did. And… well, she thinks the world of me but I'm… wondering if I'm actually a good role model…"
"Hey, you got past your bullying days, so that should count for something, right?"
"I guess… but between you and me, one of the real reasons why I'm so nice to Kokoro, aside from my leaving my bullying days behind me, well… she reminds me of Laura."
"Aww! So you see Kokoron just like how you see Laura." She smiled. "So, I've a feeling that if you didn't have a sister, Kokoron would fill in?"
Cardin blushed. "…Perhaps."
Chelsea giggled. "Oh, Cardin… you're such a big lug."
"You think so, huh?" Cardin chuckled, then felt Chelsea leaning her head on his shoulder.
"Yeah." She giggled, both of them unaware of Pyrrha overhearing this.
"Cardin…" Pyrrha whispered as she thought of the time where she refused to let him speak to Jaune. She closed her eyes. "He really has changed…" She walked off.
End BGM
Back at Aperture Labs…
"Man, this place has seen better days…" Ed said as they walked through the wreckage. "Where even are we?"
"Deep underground the planet, I can tell you that much." Samus said.
"How about we just teleport back up and give that metal ball the what fors?" Edward said, glancing at Rosalina.
"You kidding? You're talking to someone who's explored space all her life. A little exploration inside a planet won't hurt." Rosalina smiled.
Ed shrugged. "Eh, fair enough."
Pikachu's ears twitched. "Pika?" He hopped off of Samus's shoulders and ran toward a destroyed gate and climbed up.
"What's up?" Samus asked as Pikachu looked around before spotting something.
"Pika Pi Pi Chu!"
"Looks like he found something important." She said as she turned to see Chell staring at her in confusion, wondering how she can understand him. "Hmm? Oh, he's my little buddy. Been through a lot of stuff together, you tend to pick up on a few things."
Chell nodded, and then Samus fired a Portal from her Arm Cannon and then fired at the ground, where they would notice that unlike Chell's portals that were oval shaped, the portal was shaped like a Screw Attack. "A Screw Attack?" Blake asked with intrigue.
"Well, how about that." Samus chuckled as they hopped in and came up to where Pikachu was at, then they saw a wall with "Condemned: Keep out".
"Condemned? Well, I think we made a wrong turn." GLaDOS said. "How about we-"
"Oooor we made a right turn!" Futaba said.
"Yeah, like "Keep out" is gonna stop us." Blake chuckled as they got closer.
"Don't you know that keep out means keep out? I thought you people were smarter than that… then again, I shouldn't be surprised. Chell likes to snoop around…"
Chell turned around, smirking at GLaDOS as she fired a portal at a white surface as they made their way around the wall and hopped down.
BGM: Vitrification Order (Portal 2)
"Do Not Enter"
"Keep Out"
"Like that's gonna stop us because we don't give a damn." Samus chuckled.
"I really think we should find another area." GLaDOS suggested.
"Boop boop?"
"Because I think it's a good idea!"
"She's hiding something." Mustang said.
"Obviously." Riza agreed as they worked their way through the rubble as Rosalina would float up to see what she can find from above.
"You see anything?" Blake asked.
"Hmm… just a giant vault!" Rosalina responded as she floated down.
"A giant vault, huh? Now you got my attention." Samus smirked. "What secrets are we gonna find down here." She turned to Chell. "Do you know?" She asked as Chell shrugged. "Well, this is gonna be exciting for all of us then."
"There's no way you can open this giant vault." GLaDOS said as they got closer. "As far as I'm concerned, we can't-"
"Hey, I found this switch over here!" Winry called out and pressed a button, as the alarms rang and the vault door opened.
"Atta girl, Winry!" Alphonse praised.
"Alright, let's see what we can find down here." Samus said as they walked through the vault, making their way through a catwalk as they would see several large chunks of debris underwater.
"This place has seen better days… I'm curious to know what happened here." Rosalina wondered.
"I'd rather NOT." GLaDOS said.
"Why, you have a guilty conscience?" Samus teased.
Her? Guilty conscience? Good one! Chell thought with a silent chuckle as they found a door and pushed it open, where they would come across an old lab with Aperture hanging from the ceiling.
End BGM
"Well, this has been a fun tour. So why don't we go and find a way out of this place befo-"
"Welcome… to Aperture Science!"
GLaDOS let out a groan. "Oh great…"
"Boop boop?"
"I don't want to talk about it."
"Astronauts, War Heroes, Soldiers from the Galactic Federation- you're here because we want the best, and you are it. So, who is ready to make some science?"
Samus narrowed her eyes. "That… almost sounds like…"
"I am!"
"Now, you already met one another in the spaceships, so let me introduce myself. I'm Cave Johnson, I own the place."
"Wait wait, WHAT?!" Samus yelled in surprise. "Cave Johnson?!"
"You know him?" Blake asked.
"Yeah, he was on K2L. He often visited my family and Chell's so often that we affectionately called him "Uncle Cave"." Samus chuckled while Chell just looked completely shocked before slowly turning her head toward GLaDOS, narrowing her eyes.
"Boop bop?"
"She's glaring at me, not you."
"Chell… Uncle Cave…" Samus rubbed her chin. "So that makes three survivors of K2L… okay, if I see my parents in this place, I'm gonna be convinced this is some sort of fever dream."
"…That we're all experiencing at once?" Futaba raised an eyebrow.
"Good point."
"That eager voice you heard is the lovely Caroline, my assistant. Rest assured, she has transferred your honorarium to the charitable Galactic Federation. Isn't that right, Caroline?"
"Yes, sir!"
"She's the backbone of this facility. Pretty as a postcard, too. Sorry fellas, she's married. To science."
"…Huh?" Rosalina blinked, picturing a scenario in her head.
"I now pronounce you science and wife. You may kiss the beaker!"
"Hope that beaker doesn't have any corrosive fluid…" Rosalina sweatdropped.
"That's not how it goes!" Futaba told her.
With a few portals being opened up by Chell, they made their way inside of a small building. "There's a thousand tests performed every day here in our enrichment spheres. I can't personally oversee every one of them, so these pre-recorded messages'll cover any questions you might have, and respond to any incidents that may occur in the course of your science adventure."
"And boy did you make a lot…" GLaDOS mumbled.
"Did he say "incidents"?" Armstrong wondered. "Goodness, I wondered what happened."
"You don't want to know."
"Well, given how Chell's giving you the stink eye…" Samus mused. "I feel like we should know. So let's see what we can dig up!"
"Boop boop!" ROB agreed.
"Pika!"
"Your test assignment will vary, depending on the manner in which you have bent the universe to your will. Those of you helping us test the repulsion gel today, just follow the blue line on the floor. Those of you who volunteered to be injected with Praying Mantis DNA, I've got some good news and some bad news. Bad news is, we're postponing those tests indefinitely. Good news is we've got a much better test for you: Fighting an army of mantis men. Pick up a blaster and follow the yellow line. If you see a whack job of a scientist named Shou Tucker, you'll know when the test starts."
Samus facepalmed. "Why the hell am I NOT surprised Shou Tucker had something to do with that last bit."
Blake sweatdropped. "I don't even wanna know why he thought of that."
"Shou Tucker? That man is a whack job. I wonder how he's doing? If he's alive, I could give him a few tests that'll-"
"He's dead." Rosalina said.
"He is? And I missed the memo? Tell me, how did he die!"
"Mutilated by a Metroid." Samus responded.
"Tell me someone recorded that."
"Nope." Blake shook her head.
"Blast it!"
"Just enjoy the vision in your head." Adam said.
They hopped down a destroyed catwalk and walked toward the elevator, Mustang hitting the switch as they worked their way up, and once they did, Chell would find a surface to shoot her portals to and would gladly do so where they walked out, only to be met with a door.
"If you've cut yourself at all in the course of these tests, you might have noticed your blood is pure gasoline. That's normal. We've been shooting you with an invisible laser that's supposed to turn blood into gasoline, so all that means is… it's working."
Samus blinked. "…Huh?"
"HOW DOES THAT WORK?!" The Elric Brothers and Mustang yelled, while Riza looked a bit unnerved.
"Was your uncle this… weird?" Blake asked.
"And morbid?" Rosalina added.
"He was a bit of an oddball but… WHAT IS THIS?!" Samus yelled as Chell shook her head with her hands on her hips.
"He took "for science" a little TOO literally…" GLaDOS mumbled.
"Boop booooop…" ROB sweatdropped.
"If you need to go to the bathroom after this next series of tests, please let a test associate know, because in all likelihood, whatever comes out of you is going to be coal. Only temporary, so don't worry. If it persists for a week, though, start worrying and come see us, because that… is not supposed to happen."
Blake paled. "A bit of an oddball?"
Samus sweatdropped. "This is bizarre, even for him!" She turned to Chell. "Did the attack on K2L change him?" She asked as Chell shrugged with a "Hell if I know!" look on her face.
"Just a heads up: We're gonna have a superconductor turned up full blast and pointed at you for the duration of this next test. I'll be honest, we're throwing science at the wall here to see what sticks. No idea what it'll do. Probably nothing. Best case scenario, you might get some superpowers. Worse case, some tumors, which we'll cut out."
Rosalina's eye twitched. "I beg your pardon?"
Samus looked at Chell, thrusting her arms over at the pre-recording. "Exhibit A!" She said as Chell let out a sigh, shaking her head in disbelief.
"Pika PIka…" Pikachu sweatdropped.
"I think science was dropped on his head as a baby." Olivier said.
"Hey!" Samus looked at her with narrowed eyes. "…Oh, who am I kidding, you're probably right."
"I knew coming in here was a bad idea…" GLaDOS mumbled as Chell spotted a catwalk from far away and decided to walk back to the elevator and down the stairs and looked down, seeing a white surface on the bottom. She whistled to get everyone's attention as they came down to see what Chell was doing as she jumped and swan dived off the platform.
"What the hell is she…?! Welp, she's dead! I didn't take her to be suicidal." Edward said as Chell aimed her Portal Gun at the grounnd and shot a portal, and with her momentum, she launched out of the wall and gracefully landed on the catwalk.
"No. She's a genius." Samus said as she hopped down as did Blake and Rosalina, then the whole Strike Team went down except for Futaba and Winry.
"I'm not scared of heights but… that's a long way down!" Futaba said, paling up.
"We can do it together… just gotta take a deep breath." Winry said, taking Futaba's hand. "Ready?"
"Yeah… here goes. Could be fun." Futaba said as they jumped down. "AAAAAAAAAAAAH! I USUALLY LET THE PHANTOM THIEVES DO ALL THIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIS!" She screamed as they launched out of the wall as they landed on the catwalk where the others were waiting.
"You two okay?" Blake asked.
"Yeah… just our legs are probably jelly…" Futaba groaned.
"Oh come on, that was nothing." Edward said. "Where's your sense of adventure?" He grinned.
"Give us a break, Ed! We possibly fell at terminal velocity!" Winry yelled.
"Eh, I think we needed a few more thousand feet." Ed shrugged as they all walked ahead but Rosalina stayed behind to make sure Winry and Futaba were alright. Once they were okay to walk again, the three of them went ahead to catch up with the others.
"They say great science is built on the shoulders of giants. Not here. At Aperture, we do all the science from scratch. No hand holding."
"Oh, joy… this is gonna be fun." Adam mumbled as they went up the elevator and got off on the next floor where they walked toward the first test.
BGM: You Are Not Part of the Control Group (Portal 2)
"Alright, let's get started. This first test involves something the lab boys call 'repulsion gel'. You're not part of the control group, by the way. You get the gel. Last poor son of a gun got blue paint. Hahaha. All joking aside, that did happen. Broke every bone in his legs. Tragic, but informative, or so I'm told."
"…Mmmph." A low growl escaped Rosalina's lips.
"Okay, yeah, I'm convinced he changed after the attack." Samus said with Chell facepalming.
"Hmm…" Blake looked down at the Repulsion Gel and hopped down, only to bounce into the air. "Whooooa!" She yelped as she landed on the other side. "Okay, that's… bouncy." She said as the others tried it out and bounced on the other side.
"Repulsion Gel… now I get it." Riza said as they bouced around until they managed to get a testing cube on the switch, then they walked through the door.
"The lab boys just informed me I should not have mentioned the control group. They're telling me I oughta stop making these pre-recorded messages. That gave me an idea: make more pre-recorded messages. I pay the bills here, I can talk about the control group all damn day!"
"No, we both paid the bills here… the Galactic Federation funded this…" GLaDOS mumbled.
"Ai yai yai…" Alphonse rubbed the back of his head.
"I… I got nothing." Winry said as they worked their way around, Samus and Chell firing portals on surfaces to get further up as they hopped down on some metal stairs.
"For this next test, we put nanoparticles in the gel. In layman's terms, that's a billion little gizmos that are gonna travel into your bloodstream and pump experimental genes and RNA molecules and so forth into into your tumors. Now, maybe you don't have any tumors. Well, don't worry, you sat on a folding chair in the lobby and weren't wearing any lead underpants, we took care of that too."
"…Rosie." Blake said.
"On it." Rosalina put up a protective aura around everyone.
"I… hope he was joking." Winry paled.
"I'm not taking any chances." Rosalina said as they walked on the Repulsion Gel and jumped up on the platform, then Chell fired a few portals as they hopped down on a moving platform, then Rosalina simply teleported their way to the top platform where they saw repulsion gel on the walls and a cube on the other side.
"Ooooh, we can wall jump our way over there!" Edward said.
"Nope." Rosalina telekinetically brought the cube to them. "Don't feel like getting that stuff on me." She said as she put the cube down on the switch and teleported them to a higher platform.
"Oh, in case you got covered in that repulsion gel, here's some advice the lab boys gave me. DO NOT get covered in the repulsion gel. We haven't entirely nailed down what element it is yet, but I'll tell you it's a lively one, and it does NOT like the human skeleton."
"…For once, I'm glad I'm a robot." Adam said.
"Yeah, you're lucky." Samus rolled her eyes.
"…If we ever find this guy, I'm going to give him a good talking to." Rosalina said with a hint of annoyance in her voice.
"I don't blame you." Futaba said as they walked to an elevator and worked their way up a floor.
End BGM
BGM: Forwarding the Cause of Science (Portal 2)
"All these science spheres are made of asbestos, by the way. Keeps out the rats. Let us know if you feel a shortness of breath, a persistent dry cough or your heart stopping. Because that's not part of the test. That's asbestos."
"Ooooooh, greeeeeeat!" Samus groaned.
"This guy's mental…" Blake sweatdropped as they dropped down and walked across some platforms barely risen above the water.
"Good news is, the lab boys say the symptoms of asbestos poisoning show a median latency for fourty-four point six years, so if you're thirty or older, you're laughing. Worse case scenario, you miss a few rounds of DOTA 2, plus you forwarded the cause of science by three centuries. I punch those numbers in my calculator, it makes a happy face."
"…Calculators do that?" Rosalina tilted her head.
"I doubt it." Futaba said. Note to self, try that out for yourself on your own. She thought as they worked their way up on some pillars and climbed out of a portal into another testing chamber.
"Ha! I like your style. You make up your own rules just like me." Samus pressed a button as a blob of repulsion gel came out of the tube.
"Heads up!" Samus warned as they jumped back.
"Bean counters said I couldn't fire a man just for being in a wheelchair. I did it anyway. Ramps are expensive."
Rosalina's eye twitched again. How about I fire you out of a Launch Star straight into a Red Giant…
Together, Samus and Chell fired their portals to get the repulsion gel everywhere and to where they needed to go as they bounced around until they got to the end of the chamber and near the elevator.
"Just a heads up: That coffee we gave you earlier had fluorescent calcium in it so we can track the neuronal activity in your brain. There's a slight chance the calcium could harden and vitrify your frontal lobe. Anyway, don't stress yourself thinking about it. I'm serious. Visualizing the scenario while under stress actually triggers the reaction."
"…Okay, visualize me punting you into a black hole, finding a way to get you out of there and kicking you back in there." Rosalina said calmly, which was enough to unnerve Chell, Armstrong, Blake, and even GLaDOS.
"I… know I'm sadistic but that's too far."
"Pika Cha…" Pikachu sweatdropped.
"Yikes…" Armstrong said.
I can tell he's annoying the hell out of you. Blake thought as they went up the elevator and then got out, heading into the next chamber.
"Now if you're part of Control Group Kepler-Seven, we implanted a tiny microchip about the size of a postcard into your skull. Most likely you've forgotten it's even there, but if it starts vibrating and beeping during this next test, let us know, because that means it's about to hit five hundred degrees, so we're gonna need to go ahead and get that out of you pretty fast."
Why did I agree to work with this lunatic again? GLaDOS thought. In fact, why did I bring him along…
"…Right, I forgot he's always had a screw loose on him at times…" Samus mumbled.
"I think he lost a few!" Blake said as they use the Propulsion Gel to jump over the platforms and walked into the next chamber.
"I'm telling 'em, keep your pants on! Alright, so this next test may involve trace amounts of time travel. So, word of advice: If you meet yourself on the testing track, don't make eye contact. Lab boys tell me that'll wipe out time. Entirely. Forward and backward! So do both yourselves a favor and just let that handsome devil go about his business."
"Hmm, that takes us back, doesn't it?" Samus smiled.
"Oh yeah." Blake smiled.
"Aaah, I was such a little cutie back in the day." Rosalina sighed happily as they turned to look at her. "…What, it happened to you too?"
"You met your younger self?" Blake asked.
"Yeah, I was traveling in space when I met my younger baby self. She was so precious, and reminded me of my love for murder mysteries. Aaah, good ol' days!" She giggled. "Too bad I couldn't spend more time with her. She disappeared as soon as she came."
"Probably for the best." Samus patted her on the back as they worked their way aroud, firing portals while making sure the Repulsion Gel didn't get on them, then by manipulating some gel onto a pillar, they wall jumped (Pillar jumped?) onto the catwalk.
"If you're hearing this, it means you're taking a long time on the catwalks between tests. The lab boys say that might be a fear reaction. I'm no psychiatrist, but coming from a bunch of eggheads who wouldn't recognize the thrill of danger if it walked up and snapped their little pink bras, that sounds like 'projection'. THEY didn't fly into space after having their colony blown up by Space Pirates! No sir, it's me and my little niece! Heh, it's us against the universe against those damn Space Pirates! I like everyone's grit, here! Hustle could use some work, though. Now let's solve this thing! Wouldn't you agree, little one?"
"Yes!"
"…Was that you?" Rosalina asked Chell, who nodded. "Aww, you sounded so cute!" She giggled, causing Chell to blush before giving her a "thank you" look in her eyes.
"Alright, so what are we gonna do with this puzzle here?" Blake wondered.
"Hmm, oh!" Futaba whipped out her laser pistol and shot the glass to free a cube as she climbed up and grabbed it. "Thinking with portals? How about thinking with lasers!" She grinned as she hopped down.
"Where did she…?" Samus wondered.
"Tails." Blake responded.
"Oh, that makes sense." Samus nodded as the elevator came down.
That felt too easy… Chell thought as they hopped on the elevator as Futaba shot at the cube to get it off the switch, then the lift rose up.
"Man, I love this thing!" Futaba giggled.
"Science isn't about WHY. It's about WHY NOT. Why is so much of our science dangerous? Why not marry safe science if you love it so much. In fact, why not invent a special safety door that won't hit you on the butt on the way out, because you are fired! Not you, test subject, you're doing great. Yes, you. Box. Your stuff. Out the front door. Into a cannon that fires you straight into a massive star! GOOD DAY!"
End BGM
"He can't get any worse, can he?" Olivier asked.
"Just wait… it gets worse." GLaDOS warned as they portaled their way around the facility after walking out of the test chambers and Rosalina teleporting them to different platforms before they went into a tunnel.
"If you're allergic to peanuts, you might want to tell somebody now, because this next test may turn your blood into peanut water for a few minutes. On the bright side, if we can make this happen, they're gonna have to invent a new medal to give us, so hang in there!"
"Peanut water?" Riza quietly mouthed as Armstrong and Olivier shrugged.
"The average male is about sixty percent water. Far as we're concerned, that's a little extravagant. So if you feel a little dehydrated in this next test, that's normal. We're gonna hit you with some jet engines, and see if we can't get you down to twenty and thirty percent."
"…Oh… my… word…" Rosalina could only say as they kept walking.
"All right. We're working on a little teleportation experiment. Now, this doesn't work with all species types, so try to remember which species is yours, and if it doesn't teleport along with you, we'll do what we can to sew you right back into it."
"ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!" Blake yelled.
"…I'm going to have a talk with him. And then I'm gonna shoot him. Right between the legs." Samus grumbled.
"I'll join you." Riza responded.
"Make sure it hurts." Rosalina added.
"PIka…" Pikachu agreed.
"Ai yai yai, what is WITH this guy? He's insane!" Edward said.
"Anyone got a straight jacket?" Mustang asked.
"I don't think that's gonna be enough." Olivier said.
Good grief, I forgot how much of a whackjob he was… Futaba thought.
"Told you." GLaDOS said as they got out of there and as they were portaling their way around and landed on a catwalk, they felt an explosion from above.
"What was that?" Adam wondered.
"That… sounds like the moron is doing something he shouldn't." GLaDOS said. "If I were to guess, if we don't get up there soon enough, the entire lab will go up in a spectacular fireball."
"Well… it'd do this planet a favor." Rosalina said.
"You don't understand. Every inch of this planet is covered in Aperture Labs. Nothing is natural anymore."
"What about the bird we saw earlier?" Futaba asked.
"Probably a mechanical bird. What I'm saying is, Aperture Science turned a once green planet into a mechanical hellhole because Cave Johnson wouldn't stop testing. Once he escaped K2L with Chell, he took a bunch of people to this planet for scientific purposes as far as the Galactic Federation was concerned. A woman named Caroline was one of these people. The planet was turned into one giant machine years later. There's nothing natural about this planet anymore…"
"What… how…" Rosalina could only say. "They… you can't just technologically do that to a planet!"
"Well, Cave did!"
Rosalina clenched her fists. "Dispicable…" She growled and closed her eyes. "Everything natural about this planet… what was once something beautiful, lush, filled with life and filled with natural water… it's worse than what the Space Pirates have done to the galaxies… Samus, when we find this person… give me your arm cannon."
"Whoa, hold on now… are you sure? Guns aren't really your style."
"I know… but he needs to be taught a lesson."
Samus looked at her in concern. "Rosie…"
"This can't be right…" Blake looked up. "Hey, Palutena… can you hear us?"
"Loud and clear. I've been watching your progress for a while. So far, you don't need backup but if you feel the need to, I'll send them over."
"Who in the world just said that?" GLaDOS wondered
"Can you… check something for us? See if GLaDOS here is telling the truth?"
"Oh, you want me to do a full diagonsis on this planet? I can do that. It might take a while, so bear with me for a bit."
"Take all the time you need." Blake said as Rosalina leaned onto a railing.
"This once great planet… it's natural beauty and this… this maniac goes and does something like this… he might be worse than Shou Tucker…" She clenched her fists tightly, a tear escaping her eye. "It's one thing to technologically advance a planet but it's another to go overboard and get rid of the natural beauty… I may not know much about the new technology that tends to overwhelm me, but I do know that it can be enough to harm a planet such as this."
"Rosie…" Blake's ears lowered.
"Aw come on, we can probably reverse engineer this planet!" Edward said. "Scrape off the technology, plant a few trees, let that goddess of nature kid do the rest!"
"Reverse engineering a planet… how naive… I… I need a moment…" Rosalina mumbled. "Go on without me for a while. I'll catch up."
Samus turned to Pikachu. "Keep an eye on her, okay?"
"Pika." Pikachu nodded as he hopped up and perched on Rosalina's shoulder.
"Here." Futaba gave Rosalina a device. "It's just to let you know where to find us."
"Thanks…" Rosalina mumbled.
"So… let's go take down that moron before this planet blows up." GLaDOS said as they walked off, but Samus and Blake took one last look at Rosalina before slowly walking away.
Up at the Observatory…
"This isn't good… Rosalina's anger is slowly rising. We're looking at 80% here. It's dangerously close…" Polari said. "Oh geez, what's going on down there?"
"Well, I can't say I blame her." Viridi said. "I mean, that planet is practically unnatural at this point. It's enough to make my skin crawl."
"Hmm… what…?" Palutena wondered as she was looking at her analysis. "No… that can't be right… analyze it again!"
"Found something?" Viridi asked.
"No… no, this can't be right!" Palutena said, looking absolutely floored. "How do you… no, analyze it AGAIN!"
"Palutena… you're scaring me here. What's going on?" Viridi asked with worry in her voice.
"Come on, there's GOT to be a right analysis on this thing. This is impossible!"
"Palutena! Hey! HEY!" Viridi waved over at her. "Palutena!"
With Ibuki…
"Mmm…" Ibuki stared at a bracelet in front of her. "She should be close, but what are we missing…" She wondered, her arms folded and her eyes shut.
"Wait, you want to do what?" Palutena asked.
"Ibuki wants to make something for Koko-chan. She… feels it's her fault for leaving her there. Normally, Ibuki is on top of this stuff, but for some reason, she wasn't…"
"So you want to make this to make up for that?"
"Yeah…"
"Ibuki…" Palutena put her hands on her shoulders. "Don't beat yourself up. It happens to the best of us. I think Kokoro knows it's not your fault. That said, making something like this is sweet of you."
"Yeah." Ibuki smiled.
"So, let me get Rosie and Viridi involved and we can work on this together. I think it'd be wonderful for her to have something like this."
Ibuki smiled and looked back at the bracelet. "Helios' Recurve… it still needs a bit of pizazz to it, but what should it have as an extra…"
Back with the goddesses…
Palutena looked absolutely defeated. "Every analysis, and it gives me this…"
"Okay, whatever it is you're looking at… just show me." Viridi said. "It can't be that horrifying!"
"See for yourself…" Palutena said as she took a step as Viridi decided to take a look. Her eyes slowly widened, her mouth hung open and dropped her scythe. Her legs felt like jelly as she took a step back, her hand over her mouth as she nearly fell over. To say that she was aghast was an understatement.
"…What… did they do?"
Back at Aperture…
"So if the orange gel is propulsion, the blue is repulsion, then what's the white gel?" Edward asked.
"Conversion. Basically, it helps Chell out with her portal shenanigans." Futaba said.
"Has anyone ever told you that you sound like a nerd?" GLaDOS pointed out.
Futaba adjusted her glasses, chuckling. "You say that like it's a bad thing~!" She grinned as Chell went to work on the portals with Samus aiding her while Blake was looking away from all this.
"Rosie… I hope she's okay." Blake said with worry.
"I'm worried about her too. Ever since the whole thing with the Phazon, she… hasn't been herself lately." Samus said. "At first it was subtle but the way she's been a bit snippy with Cave and now learning about this planet…" She sighed. "I just hope we can calm her down."
"Have you… noticed the air is a little heavy with her?"
Samus nodded. "Yeah, I've noticed it too. She's got a lot on her mind… and I don't blame her." She said as they got through the doors after playing around with the gels.
"Okay, I think the orange one is my favorite. Propulsion is the way to go!" Edward grinned.
"You said it." Mustang nodded. "I wonder if we could get some of this, take out any of those microbots and proceed to use it for ourselves."
"Mmm, it sounds easy to make but… I'm no scientist so I wouldn't know." Samus admitted while Chell shrugged as they worked their way into a new building.
"Welcome to the enrichment center…" Cave would say before he started coughing. "Since making test participation mandatory for all employees, the quality of our test subjects has risen dramatically. Employee retention, however, has not." He coughed again. "As a result, you may have heard we're gonna phase out human testing. There's still a few things left to wrap up, though. The bean counters told me we literally could not afford to buy several pounds worth of moon rocks, much less several million pounds worth of it. Did it anyway! Ground them up, mixed 'em into a gel."
"…Oh, good for him." Samus rolled her eyes.
"And guess what? Ground up moon rocks are pure poison. I am deathly ill."
Samus's eyes widened. "Oh…"
"Still, it turns out they're a great portal conductor. So now we're gonna see if jumping in and out of these new portals can somehow leech the lunar poison out of a man's bloodstream. When life gives you lemons… make lemonade." He coughed again. "Let's all stay positive and do some science. That said, I would really appreciate it if you could test as fast as possible. Caroline, please bring me more pain pills."
"That's… unfortunate." Samus said in a low voice. "I guess he didn't make it." She quietly said as Chell put her hand on Samus's shoulder.
"So this gel is… ground up poisonous moon rocks. Looooovely!" Edward sarcastically said.
"Glad we have the aura around us." Armstrong said as they tested their way through with the Conversion Gel, firing portals on walls to manipulate the gel as they got up on top of pillars before falling and leaping their way over on top of the catwalk.
BGM: Music of the Spheres - Incendiary Lemons (Portal 2)
"…Alright, I've been thinking. When life gives you lemons? Don't make lemonade! Make life take the lemons back! GET MAD! I DON'T WANT YOUR DAMN LEMONS, WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO WITH THESE?! Demand to see life's manager! Make life rue the day it could make Cave Johnson lemons! DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM?! I'm the man who's going to burn your house down! With the lemons! I'm going to get my engineers to invent a COMBUSTIBLE LEMON THAT BURNS YOUR HOUSE DOWN!"
"I could use an incendiary drink." Mustang said.
"Of course you would." Riza rolled her eyes.
"He makes a great life coach. I wouldn't mind having some combustible lemons for Ridley and Dark Samus." Samus chuckled. "Make my life more amusing."
"I got some for Seryu." Blake smirked.
"Burning people! He's saying what we're all thinking!" GLaDOS chuckled.
"Boop boop!" ROB agreed.
"The point is… if we can store music on a tiny device that can store millions of songs, why can't we store a man's intelligence and personality on one? So I have the engineers figuring that out now. Brain Mapping. Artificial Intelligence. We should have been working on that years ago. I will say this, and I'm gonna say it on tape so everyone hears it a hundred times a day: If I die before you people can pour me into a computer, I want Caroline to run this place." He let out a few coughs. "Now she'll argue, she'll say she can't… she's modest like that, but you make her! Hell, put her in my computer, I don't care. Alright, test's over. You can head on back to your desk."
End BGM
Samus closed her eyes as they went up the lift. "Goodbye, uncle…" She said with her voice nearly breaking as they walked out.
"Who in the HELL has been playing my recordings!" A voice called out as Samus perked up, as Chell turned her head in surprise as they saw a sphere with a light pink eye approaching them on a rail. "It's bad enough that Caroline has been tormenting me with my wild ass science experiments I've done over the years but-… oh. Well, hi there."
"What the… who are you?" Blake asked.
"And why do you sound like that Cave Johnson fella?" Alphonse asked.
Futaba's eyes widened. Holy moly… that's unexpected!
"Why, I'm Cave Johnson! I was put into this sphere so now I'm an AI!" Cave chuckled. "…Oh hello Chell, you're looking nice! Who's your robot friend?" He asked as Samus deactivated her armor.
"Uncle Cave… it's me." Samus smiled. "Samus Aran."
"Holy SMOKES." Cave said. "Sammy, is that you? I thought for sure you were killed in that explosion! Shoot, are Virginia and Rodney alive too? We can have a family reunion!"
"…No, they're dead." Samus looked away.
"Oh… well, at least you have Chell and I, so we can-" He noticed Chell looking confused. "What's wrong? Oh! Right… you're wondering how I'm alive. Well, you see-"
Suddenly, GLaDOS took over ROB's body and grabbed a hole of the sphere. "YOU!"
"Oh! Hello there, Caroline! You're looking quite different. New robotic body? Got tired of the old one?"
"SHUT UP! You have no excuse to be so damn casual after what you did to me!"
"Oh come oooooon, you have to admit, being in an AI body is cool!"
"NOT WHEN YOU FORCED ME AGAINST MY WILL! I DIDN'T WANT TO BE IN SOME DAMN ROBOT."
"Boop boop?"
"I don't mean you, I meant my old one!"
"Booop…."
"Wait wait, time out, what's going on?" Blake asked.
"Hmph!" GLaDOS pulled away from Cave. "Truth be told… I am actually Caroline. I used to work for the Galactic Federation's science branch. When I heard about the tragedy at K2L, I… well, I grew an attachment to Chell and Cave at the time. We then founded Aperture Labs and were given the green light to colonize any planet we wanted. It was for science purposes. We were originally building a small lab… but Cave went overboard."
"Eeeyup. Covered the entire planet with science! Call it a wild hair, if you will." Cave said. "We went deep inside the planet and… well, I will admit, we went overboard."
"Yeah, our friend is mourning this planet because of your… wild scheme." Blake said.
"If I may interject." Palutena spoke up. "Cave Johnson did indeed go overboard… WAY overboard."
"Who said that?" Cave asked.
"Hi, Palutena… goddess of light, nice to meet you. Anyway, I've finished my analysis on this planet. Basically, they've "scienced" this planet too much that they managed to science their way to the planet's core and… stopped the planet from rotating. In short, it's tidally locked, if you will. They basically killed the planet."
"…You did WHAT?!" Blake yelled.
"What? We built so many cooling systems down here, we didn't realize we were nearing the center of the planet! That's what happens when you science too much… whoops! Heheh…"
"Oh good lord." Futaba groaned, facepalming.
"The years went by and well… as you could tell, Cave was dying. He was put into an AI sphere and what did he do? He decided to do the same with me. I objected but he did so against my will! So now, Caroline is dead, GLaDOS was born and… THANKS TO THIS IDIOT, he's the reason why I went on a rampage! I came so close to killing Chell a million times in my anger but apparently, Chell is REALLY hard to kill!"
"So… basically, you went on a rampage because he did this without your consent and you killed everyone." Samus said.
"That… explains the accident." Adam mumbled.
"Yes! And I'm still angry! So what did I do? While I was busy trying to kill Chell, I sent Cave down into this pit and tortured him with his recordings! And I made it so that when his sphere is broken, it self repairs and then the torture continues! I would say Chell would have told you this but in our last battle, her voice box ruptured and now she's permanently mute!"
"WHAT. You made my niece mute?! Well, nothing like a little testing can fix that voice box right up."
Samus trembled in rage. "You… you've been torturing Uncle Cave for so long… all because you couldn't keep your anger in check?!"
"He deserves it!" GLaDOS said, then realized what Samus was going to do. "You wouldn't want to harm your friend here, would you?"
"Boop boop bop."
"…What do you mean you're used to heavy beatings?"
"Boop bop bop boop."
"You've grown numb to it?"
"Boop boop."
"What the hell is Super Smash Bros?" GLaDOS wondered as she turned to see Samus charging up her arm cannon, Blake pumping her Gambol Shroud, Chell cracked her neck and Futaba was ready to go. "Uh oh… RUN!" She yelled as she tried to book it out of there, but ROB took over and moved over to them. "Are you blocking me?! Uh oh…"
"Boop boop."
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU CAN TAKE IT?!"
ROB firmly planted himself on the ground, looked at them all and nodded. "Boop." He said, ready to take the beating.
"Uh oh…"
One comical beating later…
"Ooooow…" GLaDOS groaned, ROB's body twitching but he got back up and shook his head.
"Boop boop!"
"I can't believe you don't have a dent in your body."
"Sorry about that, big guy." Samus said.
"Boop beep." ROB said nonchalantly.
"So… um… would this be a bad time to mention I told Rosalina about this?" Palutena spoke up.
"You told-… uh oh." Samus paled.
"Yeeeah, her anger levels are uh… looking a little bleak right now…."
"Um, guys? The floor's kinda… bulging!" Futaba spoke up.
"EVERYONE CLEAR!" Samus yelled as they dove for cover as Rosalina burst through the flooring and landed on the ground as Pikachu hopped off of her shoulder. Her eyes were glowing brightly.
BGM: Dreams of Cruelty (Team Fortress 2)
"So… you're the one who messed up this planet. Have you no shame?" Rosalina said in a low voice.
"Now now, it was just for science! I didn't mean to mess this planet u-" Rosalina lifted him up telekinetically.
"You dared mess with this innocent planet's life. You dared mess with something you didn't know anything about. You were so preoccuped that whether or not you could, you never stopped to think that you should. And now this planet is dead all because of you. It's unforgivable."
"Now now, let's all just take a deep breath and-" Rosalina clenched her fist. "HGRRRRK!" He grunted as Cave started to cave in on the inside until nothing but a small piece of debris was all that remained of him.
End BGM
"…Oh my gods…" Blake could only say.
"Pika…" Pikachu whispered.
"Whoa…" GLaDOS said as the Strike Team slowly backed away from Rosalina.
"Rosie…" Samus whispered in horror as Chell had her hand over her mouth in horror.
"Good riddance." Rosalina said lowly as her eyes went back to normal, but then noticed the debris would slowly reform and rebuild back to its spherical shape. "Huh?!"
"Damn! That was brutal… more brutal than what Caroline did to me!"
"Caroline's dead. It's GLaDOS now!"
"Yeah yeah, whatever Caroline."
"I… what… how…" Rosalina's eyes glowed again. "Alright, I guess I'll destroy you again!"
"Now hold on a moment! I didn't mean to mess this planet up. I was so engrossed with science that I didn't realize what I was doing!"
"Obviously!"
"We were originally gonna make a superweapon on this planet that we were going to use to destroy the Space Pirates for good… but it was taking longer than I thought so I turned myself into an AI along with Caroline here so we can work on the superweapon. The Federation even greenlit that project too. Unfortunately, I didn't ask Caroline here and she bit everyone's heads off! Now it's just me, Caroline and Chell here."
"Adding on to that, I made it possible to where if Cave's spherical body was damaged too much, it would automatically self repair so I can easily torment him some more, even if his body was flattened or turned into a small cube, he'd just self repair. I may have lied and told Chell that I killed Cave and made her believe she was the only survivor."
Chell would respond by flipping GLaDOS off. "Oh come on, why do you have to be like that."
A cross vein appeared on Rosalina's forehead. "So you mean to tell me destroying you was meaningless… BECAUSE YOU'RE ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE?!"
"Pretty much, but it was vastly entertaining if not something you'd see out of a horror movie." GLaDOS said.
"I'm gonna feel that one for a while…" Cave mumbled.
Rosalina closed her eyes, took a deep breath and exhaled. "Mother… fuchsia." She grumbled as she turned around and walked off. "Come on, let's go. We've a moron to destroy."
"By the way, I forgive you for flattening me! I did kind of deserve it… I didn't think you were so into planets."
Rosalina stopped walking, lightly turning her head. "I'm a very forgiving person… but I don't have it in me to forgive you." She said and walked off.
"Rosie…" Samus quietly said.
"Yeesh… was it something I said?"
"She's just… had a rough adventure." Blake said.
"Oh, I'm sure it can't be that bad. Lay it on me!"
Back at the Observatory…
"Her anger's depleting, but not by much." Polari said. "It was at 95% but now it's depleted to… 90%. That's dangerously close. All we can hope now is… hope that someone won't tip it by ten percent."
"I'm worried…" Palutena quietly said with Viridi nodding.
Inside the library…
Rosalina's storybook lay on Rosalina's chair… and then a dark portal opened up as Dark Samus walked in. "Could this be the one that Ridley was mentioning?" She wondered as she picked it up, looking through the storybook. "Ah, her childhood. How utterly dull." She chuckled as she opened up another portal. "Perhaps we can use this against the cosmic warrior."
With a dark chuckle, Dark Samus walked back into the library and closed it with the book in hand.
Ibuki: Ooooh no...
Yuuup, that's gonna be trouble, but hey, Cave Johnson's alive in this canon. Yay! Credit goes to Log for coming up with the idea for Cave Johnson to be a personality core aaaand GLaDOS torturing the man.