Chapter 4: Nearing the End
"So, let's get started shall we?"
A claw came down and picked Wheatley off the floor, Amber was too late in getting to him. The vents then started to open with green gas flooding out.
"You know, I never imagined myself, a simple little core, to be doing what it was intended for," A.A.C.E stated, "We have time before you die, I'll tell you my life. I started out as a simple program on a computer…"
Amber stopped listening to him; she had about 3 minutes before the gas would melt her brain. You think being the daughter of a scientist would make her smart, but it wasn't. Not because she was dumb, but because she had to defeat a murderous A.I who was going on about his life from a computer program to an A.I that lived in a USB.
'Think Amber! Think!' Amber screamed to herself, 'How do I defeat him?!'
Amber then remembered something, something she can't believe she forgot.
"That's it, the rocket sentry!" Amber accidentally yelled aloud.
"I then made my way from a calculator to a- sorry, what?"
"Um, n-nothing, continue..."
"How STUPID DO YOU THINK I AM?!" A.A.C.E yelled
"Um…"
"Don't answer that, it was a rhetorical question!"
Amber was afraid, to say the least, for her life.
"I can't believe I forgot about that little thing, I also can't believe you were going to use it, well, thanks for reminding me, time to start uninstalling it-"
"Oi!" Wheatley yelled, still hanging from the claw.
A.A.C.E sighed.
"You can't do that to the poor old thing!"
"Oh? Why can't I?"
"Um, b-because, it's got a wife and family, yep, met them once. Nice they are, have a short temper though," Wheatley explained.
"Oh! Can't forget about the children, scary little things they are. Have a knack for blowing things up, um, a-almost blew me up once! Oh-oh man, what a great time though, had fun really, we…um, we played who could blow the most things up, they won, obviously. We, um, also played who can hack a door the fastest, that was a close one, really, almost beat them with my elite hacking skills," Wheatley continued to explain.
"Are you going somewhere with-"
"That reminds me! They were, uhh, going to have a manufacturing day tomorrow, it's when they celebrate the day they were made. I promised them I would attend, BUT! We can't enjoy it if you kill him so, let him live. Also, almost forgot…"
Amber was amazed, Wheatley was distracting A.A.C.E with his endless blabbering, but she knew this would only go on for so long. Amber picked up the portal device and quickly made her way to where the four desks sat to turn on the rocket sentry.
She typed in a quick code and saw the sentry turn online, she then typed for it to fire rockets at the Central A.I. The rocket sentry turned, aimed upwards, and fired a rocket.
"AH!" A.A.C.E yelled in pain and dropped Wheatley. The bottom of the A.I body was blackened and sparking by the explosion. A.A.C.E looked over at her, "So, you want to play like that eh?"
The rocket sentry stopped aiming at A.A.C.E and turned to aim at Amber. Amber backed up and typed in a command on the computer. What came back made her face go pale, "ACCESS DENIED". Amber looked back over at A.A.C.E.
"You can't use it on me, if it's targeting you" A.A.C.E explained with a smile. Amber paled even more when the rocket sentry aimed its laser onto her head.
Everything seemed to go slow motion when the rocket was fired. All Amber remembered was firing a portal in the chamber and one at her feet, she fell through the portal before the rocket even got close. Actually, everything was still in slow motion, while in the air, Amber placed another portal on to floor before she landed. She fell through the portal and went soaring through the air. Amber ended up landing directly on A.A.C.E, the rocket sentry turned to fire another rocket at her, when it fired she jumped off A.A.C.E. The rocket hit A.A.C.E directly in the body.
Amber expected this to follow along with the 'rules of three', but it didn't A.A.C.E's little spherical body was hanging from a wire that was still attached to the body. Amber went over to A.A.C.E and pulled his little body right out. With A.A.C.E's body on the floor sparking, Amber went back over to Wheatley, picked him up, went back to A.A.C.E and picked him up. She couldn't hold both cores AND the portal gun, since it required two hands to hold. So, Amber decided to leave it behind, she had a feeling like she wouldn't need it anymore. The rocket sentry went back into the floor as Amber walked to the door, it opened to the hallway, that was still be deconstructed, or was, the arms deconstructing it stopped, the giant claws that would grab cores to incinerate stopped moving as well. Amber kept walking through hallways, until she came across a catwalk, below was nothing, it just kept going down, and down, and down. Amber smiled, held A.A.C.E up and looked directly in his eye. "Have fun," was all she said before tossing him over the railing. She then continued walking, hearing the echoing 'clang' of metal hitting the ground with a ton of force.
Amber continued walking down the catwalk when she heard Wheatley ask something.
"Is…um…is he dead?"
"Yes, Wheatley, he's dead," Amber replied. She turned a corner and went back into the white hallways. Amber walked by a lot of rooms, one was another security feed, when she looked at it her eyes went wide. She took a detour into the room to get a closer look at the screen. On it was the video of a girl, lying in bed, in the exact same motel room as Amber was.
"Um…who is she?" Wheatley asked.
"She is Chell…my Sister…"
"You're what?! Sorry, didn't mean to burst like that, but, you have a sister? Why's she down here?" Wheatley asked.
"I don't know much, when I was younger my parents told me I had a sister. One day she ran away, I think it's because people would either do stuff for her or help her when she wanted to be independent. When she ran away no one ever saw her again. I never thought she would end up here…"
"Well, why don't we go and get her! We can all escape together! Brilliant plan, on my part,"
Amber sighed, "I wish we could Wheatley, but if she ran away because people kept helping her, why would she come with us?" "Oh…I see…oh…not so brilliant plan then…well, what DO you want to do then?" Wheatley asked Amber
"We can only pray she can make it out alive…" Amber said as she turned out of the room and continued down the hallway.
Amber kept walking; she looked into a room that had tons of artwork in it. One of the artwork showed a little white ball next to something that looked like a bomb. She shrugged it off, not caring what important message it had. Eventually she found the room she was looking for, "EXIT NUMBER 122421".
Amber stood in front of the glass tube. This was it, her escape from this nightmare. "Well, this is it…um…it's been fun right? Apart from the whole 'insane A.I trying to kill us', it was like an adventure,"
Amber simply nodded her head. "Right, well, um, I don't think this lift is automated…so…plug me into that port over there," Wheatley pointed his eye to the core port that popped out of the wall. Amber looked at the core port, then back at Wheatley.
"I know, I know, it's hard to say goodbye, but, I'll be alright. A.A.C.E is dead, so, don't have to worry 'bout him…um…oh! Tell you what, after you leave I'll pop on over to your sister's Cryogenic sleep…uh…motel thing, wake her up and escape with her, another brilliant plan!"
Amber didn't really want to say goodbye, but if Wheatley was to 'help' her sister escape, well, maybe it wouldn't be so hard to say it after all. Amber plugged Wheatley into the core port. A ding sound was heard and a lift came down.
"There we go, so, um, goodbye I guess, see you later," Wheatley said to Amber.
Amber stepped into the lift and turned to Wheatley. "Goodbye, my hilarious British friend," Amber replied. The door closed and the lift began to go up quite fast.
"Don't worry Amber, I'll find her and- ooo, what's this? 'Do Not Use', well, no one is around to stop me sooo…let's try it." However, when Wheatley decided to try it he was immediately electrocuted. "Ah!" Wheatley screamed. The sudden shock coursed through his systems. Not only did it hurt, no, something else was clearly wrong, but he couldn't think of it. When the shock was over Wheatley opened his eye. "Huh? W-where am I?"
Up top on the surface the door on a little shed opened and Amber walked out into a grass field, she kept walking forward until her feet hit something; she looked down and saw flowers, a picture and a note. She bent down and picked up the note.
"I'm sorry I brought you here Amber, I truly am…
Signed
Terry"
Amber put the note in her pocket and picked up the picture, it was herself and her dad, smiling at the camera. Amber put the picture in her pocket and looked up at the world. She had one question in her mind, 'What now?'
She heard someone coming from behind the shed, she then heard him speak. "Did you lose someone too?" The man asked. Without moving she nodded her head. "I lost my daughter to the monster we created down there, her name was Amber," The man, who Amber recognized as her dad, said.
Amber turned to see her dad looking at the shed; she could see tears in his eyes. "Do you think she's still alive?" Amber asked. "I pray she's still alive…you sound a lot like her," Terry replied.
"Maybe that's because I am her," said Amber with a smile. Terry wiped his eyes and looked over at her, they widened when they focused on her. "I'm Still Alive dad."