Part 101. The Legacy

"So. How mad was she?"

"That you didn't come back last night?" Wheatley asked, turning away from the hole to look at him. He'd been looking out of it that morning and Claptrap had returned from Pandora just as he'd been about to leave. The weather was sort of dreary today and there weren't many humans about, so it hadn't been that exciting.

"Yeah."

"Mm… well, she wasn't really mad. Not exactly. She was more… trying to be."

"I wasn't doing anything," Claptrap said. "I was gonna come back just like I said, but then Hammerlock showed up. And he… actually wanted to talk to me."

That was far more important than his absence had been. "'bout what?"

"About what I've been doing." He raised himself a little bit. "We've always had this like… well, he's always helped me out when I needed it, but he didn't like me, y'know? He just did it 'cause he's a gentleman. But I feel like… I dunno. Like maybe it changed a little bit. Just a little. Like we're kinda friends now."

Well, that was quite nice, Wheatley thought. Hammerlock was an alright sort of bloke, other than his accent that was. All right, his accent was also quite nice, but that wouldn't stop Wheatley wishing that was the one he had. "You're probably quite diff'rent from when he saw you last."

"Different good, I hope!"

Wheatley had to frown at him. "You don't think so?"

Claptrap half shrugged. "I wouldn't say I'm the best person to ask about myself."

Wheatley was going to need some time to think that one over. Who would be better to ask? He could agree that maybe someone could see things about him he couldn't, due to the difference in the old perspective, but… surely anyone could tell if they'd become a better person without any help? Wheatley was positive Claptrap had, and he hadn't even been around to see him at his worst! How could Claptrap not know?

"She messaged me twice," Claptrap said, and it took Wheatley a moment to think of who 'she' was and why she'd be sending messages. "Haven't looked at them yet. Should I?"

"Yes."

"The first one just says 'goodnight' and the second one says 'I wish you wouldn't disappear like this'." His antenna curved a little. "She's pretty mad, huh."

"No," Wheatley answered. "She's not mad at all. The first one is um, she missed you but didn't want to make a big deal out of it, and the other, well, it's… in a relationship, you've always got to be communicating."

"I do talk to her! All the time!"

"But you haven't," Wheatley said. "Not since we left yesterday. You've been avoiding her. You can't do that."

Claptrap turned away from him. "Well, I… I didn't mean to, I just – "

"Look," Wheatley interrupted, "you don't have to keep her up to date ev'ry minute of the day. But if you don't, if you'd rather keep to yourself for a bit you've got to let her know about it. Because that's weird for you. 's not a thing you usually do. You usually keep her up to date ev'ry minute of the day! It's alright if you don't want to talk or if you'd like to head off to Pandora for a while. But you've got to mention it so she knows that. Does that make sense?"

"Yeah," said Claptrap.

"Nobody is mad at you," Wheatley told him, gently but also firmly. "And I know… I know you're not used to it. But we want to know where you are and, um, and what's going on. Even if it's just a 'I'm going to Pandora because I'm a bit sad'. That's all I'm saying."

"It's weird," Claptrap said, throwing up his arms. "Someone wants to know where I am? And not 'cause they need me for something? That's crazy! I don't think I'll ever get used to that!"

"If you're not gonna get used to it," Wheatley said, moving to leave again, "then at least answer her messages, yeah? Work out a, I dunno, a code or something where your answer means you um, you saw them but you don't want to chat just then."

"That's a good idea!" And Wheatley was under the impression they were going to do that just then, except that when Wheatley started heading in the direction of GLaDOS's chamber, Claptrap started off in the complete opposite direction.

"Aren't… aren't you coming?"

"Uh… no. No, not right now."

Sometimes it really didn't seem as though he listened. "Claptrap –"

"I'll deal with it later. I'm just not up to it right now."

"You don't need to deal with anything! Just –"

"Not listening!"

Wheatley continued on in his own direction, a bit irritated by his behaviour. Sometimes it seemed like Claptrap actually wanted to make things a bigger issue than they were…

GLaDOS wasn't terribly busy when he got back but she was not that chatty, either, so he had to spend quite a lot of time on small talk in order to get her responsive enough to actually answer the question he had to save until then. That took several hours, mostly because Wheatley forgot entirely what he'd wanted to ask, but as soon as he thought of it again he got on it immediately.

"So," Wheatley said, "what were you up to while we were uh, while we were on Pandora?"

"Not too much," GLaDOS answered. "I spent a lot of time with Caroline. We talked about some things. Then we had an argument and she left for a few hours. When she came back she apologised, which I appreciated. Then she helped me with some work and afterward we played a video game for a while. She got angry because I kept beating her, but she did stay the night with me so I suppose she wasn't too upset. And then…"

"And then what," Wheatley asked gently.

"Well. This morning she said she wanted to have Claptrap help her with her binary so that she can describe her drawings to me herself."

That was so sweet Wheatley swore something on his motherboard just about melted then and there. "She doesn't want you to do it? To help her, I mean."

GLaDOS shook her core. "I'm not a very good teacher. He is far more patient. And fun."

Wheatley had to say both of those things were very true, but something else that was also true was Claptrap's inability to stay on task. Wheatley had described himself as easily distracted until he'd seen Claptrap's attempts at paying attention to things. But that wasn't important right now. Damn. What was important? He'd already forgotten. Oh! Oh, yes. The argument.

"And… what was it you um, that had you fight about it?" Wheatley asked, half knowing it wasn't his business and half knowing it was probably important information. She didn't answer him for what felt like a very long minute.

"Well," she said finally. "She was… looking through the surveillance footage and came across…"

"What?" Wheatley prompted, but nicely.

"The day she left."

Ohhhh, Carrie should not have done that.

"She wanted to talk about it. I didn't. I got angry that she'd even been looking. She said she just wanted to see her first day. I told her we both knew very well that wasn't it and not to lie to me again. Then she got angry and left."

Wheatley sighed.

"Why does she insist on seeing me like that?"

"I don't know, Gladys," was all he had for her, which was, of course, nothing at all. And honestly, how had Carrie been to know exactly what had happened? GLaDOS had never told her, and even that little story she'd made up had no details at all. Other than the poking about in GLaDOS's things, which it seemed they were never going to get her to stop doing, GLaDOS didn't really have anything to be angry about.

"Why can't she leave my business alone?"

"She can't exactly ask you about it, now can she?" Wheatley responded, rather tactlessly now he was thinking about it, and the wordless stare she directed at him for that was not exactly good but it was better than… most of the alternatives.

"If I wanted to talk about it," she said with finality, "I would do so unprompted."

"You never want to talk about anything," Wheatley protested, as he did so wondering why he didn't just shut up. "Ev'rything's just, it's all such a big deal with you! She has to look herself because she knows she can't ask! Especially when it's about Caroline!"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"Of course you don't," Wheatley muttered, and he knew that was a mistake even before he heard GLaDOS's fans pick up.

"Why are we fighting about this?" GLaDOS nearly shouted. "No. I do not want to talk about her. So what?"

"You're right. So what if, if Carrie got to hear about the person she's lit'rally named after once in a, every now and again. Silly of me to think that's reasonable."

"It's her own fault I don't talk about her."

"Oh for God's sake, Gladys," Wheatley found himself snapping. "How long's it been now? Seven years? Eight? Are you ever going to stop acting like she, as though she did that just to give you a hard time? News flash! She didn't! And I know that! 'cause I was there!" He knew he'd gone way too far this time, but honestly. How could she still be holding a grudge over it? No, not over it, not at all, but over something that hadn't even happened.

There was no hope of rescuing this right now, or perhaps ever. He was going to have to remove himself before something really awful happened. He didn't know which of them would be doing the awful thing, and that thought was sobering enough to take the edge off his anger. At all costs he did not want to head into the trap she fell into when she was unable to control it. He did not want to be that person.

"I'm right," he said, turning partways to look at her when he was just about in the hallway. "You know I am."

The look she gave him was… odd. As though she was more trying to appear angry than actually being so. But he wasn't going to try to figure that out right now. It was going to have to wait until he could be certain he was thinking straight.

At least one of them was making sure of that.

He didn't talk to her again until almost right before she usually went to sleep. A little because he was honestly avoiding her, but mostly because he had decided he wasn't going to say anything about earlier. If he did that she would just keep on thinking about it, and perhaps she would decide on her own to sort herself out. She had probably just spent several hours coming up with inventive ways to destroy him just enough to bring him to death's door but no farther so she could do it all over again, but if she'd spent even five minutes actually considering what he'd said, that would be progress. Of a sort. And he'd be alright with that. It would be something.

"Hey baby," Claptrap said, and the both of them looked to the doorway to find him bouncing up and down a little, staring at the fingertips he was pressing together. "I hope you're not too mad that I didn't answer your messages. I know I should've but I kept thinkin' about how mad you probably were so I kept waiting and then I realised that was not gonna help, like at all, and then – "

"I'm not angry," GLaDOS interrupted. Claptrap stopped moving and looked up at her.

"You're not?"

"I'll admit, I was a little… upset at you for ignoring me. Because you did. And I don't appreciate that."

"I'm sorry," Claptrap mumbled to his hands. "I didn't – "

"I just wanted to know where you were and that you were safe there," GLaDOS cut in. "I don't think that's too much to ask. I'm not going to tell you not to go home or demand you tell me how long you're staying there and who you're spending your time with. You did all of that fine before you met me. All I want is to have an idea of where you can be found. Just in case."

"Just in case what?"

She looked away from him suddenly, and Wheatley prayed they got to the end of this before GLaDOS closed the door on it all entirely. "You know. Things happen. Especially out there and especially to you."

Claptrap came forward about a metre or so and said tentatively, "You don't mean you were… worrying? About me?"

Because he was paying close enough attention, Wheatley could literally hear GLaDOS deciding what the right answer was. Choosing between the cool dismissal and the honest admission. He had no way of knowing which was winning, but to help it along he closed his optic and thought very hard about the second one. He wasn't sure it would do anything, but the chance that it might was enough for him.

GLaDOS sighed.

"Of course I was," she said quietly, and Wheatley almost jumped out of the ceiling in excitement. Yes! It had worked! "I understand if it's a bit silly, given the almost divine invincibility you seem to have acquired – "

"Oh, no!" Claptrap protested earnestly, jumping right up in front of her. "It's not that! It's… it's… nobody's ever worried about me before! I didn't know such a thing was possible!" He put one hand up against her core, which Wheatley realised was suspiciously within reach when it hadn't been before. "But I don't want you to do that! 'cause it'll just make you sad and that's the last thing I want! So I won't do it again, I promise! I will definitely let you know what's what next time."

"That would be very thoughtful of you."

"Also, I had a question for ya. I was trying to figure it out myself but I'm just not gettin' very far."

"What is it."

"So uh… you've gone through your fair share of stuff, right?" he asked, fitting his hands together and eyeing the floor panel he was standing on. "And, well… you know that thing where you remember something and then you can't stop thinking about it and then it ruins your whole day for like… ever? What do you do about that?"

"There isn't always something you can do," GLaDOS answered, and Wheatley was thrown by how incredibly bitter she sounded all of a sudden. "Some things you just never get over and you simply have to do your best to ignore them."

"Well, I tried that, but –"

"Did I ever tell you about Caroline?"

Oh, no.

"Uh… yes. Yes, you –"

"She is the bane of my existence," GLaDOS interrupted as though she hadn't heard. Claptrap glanced up at Wheatley, who only looked at him a little helplessly. There was no stopping her now.

"I… see," Claptrap decided to say, not sounding at all as though he did.

"She ruins everything," GLaDOS continued with vitriol. "Every good thing that happens to me is ruined because she decided to leave. And she didn't even have a good reason."

Wheatley didn't have the strength for this today. The old problem-solving batteries were still a little low from the stuff with Claptrap back on Pandora. He definitely did not have it in him to help GLaDOS work through this at the moment. He was a loss as to what to do, honestly.

"She decided for me that I didn't need her anymore. And then she left. She sprang it on me out of nowhere and then expected me to go along with it. I didn't. But she went ahead anyway."

Wheatley still could not for the life of him figure out how on earth she had convinced herself that was how things had happened. He understood the power of denial, of course, having bought into it many a time himself, but… her memory was flawless. She could just go take a look whenever she liked and relive what had happened! Instead she just… invented this and resolved to stew over it for the rest of eternity!

"I'm not over that and I never will be. That's just how some things are."

Claptrap was being… oddly silent. He looked down in an effort to see what he was feeling, but as usual he got nothing out of that telescoping lens of his. He was going to have to get his attention, though. They needed to leave before she started to say things she didn't mean.

"She isn't even gone. She's still here. She's just hiding from me. She decided hiding was better than being –"

She paused and didn't continue.

"Than being what?" Claptrap asked, after she had been seemingly frozen for a minute or so. She shook her core.

"It doesn't matter."

"It sure seems like it does."

"It doesn't."

"Claptrap," Wheatley murmured down to him, "let's just… I'll handle it later."

"Wheats, no," Claptrap said imploringly, turning to face him. "I gotta learn! I can't expect her to only help me all the time. I gotta be able to help her, too! And this seems way more important than my problem."

"Claptrap," Wheatley began, before realising now was probably not the best time to get into a debate about whether or not one person's problem meant more or not. So instead he just nodded.

"We got this, Wheats." And with that he turned back to GLaDOS again.

Wheatley wished he had half so much confidence about this. Claptrap had no idea the amount of difficulty this sort of thing involved.

But… perhaps that was important. Wheatley didn't want to do it because he knew how much effort it was going to be and how drained he was going to be if he failed, but Claptrap… he didn't know that at all.

The only thing for Wheatley to do now was back him up. And that he knew he could do.

"Babe," Claptrap began, spreading his hands, "is there anything in the universe you wouldn't do to give Carrie a better life?"

"No," GLaDOS answered immediately. "There's nothing."

"Well, your mom had the same answer to that question. Thing was, only thing she could do royally sucked. But she did it anyway! 'cause that's just what you do for your kid. You try to do stuff that sucks for them so maybe they don't have to go through the suckage."

"There's no connection," GLaDOS snapped. "Don't try pretend there is."

"I'm not pretending," Claptrap said. "Isn't your whole secret facility plan the same thing but kinda… backward?"

"No!" GLaDOS protested. "It isn't the same at all! That only goes into effect if there are no other options! She had a choice!"

"Yeah, but… wasn't that what Wheatley told you when you were insisting everybody had to abandon you? It wasn't the only choice you had, it was just… hm." He folded his arms into a thoughtful gesture. "Well, you were just so caught up in doing what was right by your kid that you couldn't see anything else! And there's totally nothin' wrong with that! But I don't think it'd've been cool of Carrie to get mad at you for trying to take care of her, and especially not for seven years."

The light behind GLaDOS's optic shrank to a pinprick, and Claptrap winced. "Too far?" he actually whispered up to Wheatley, who shook himself slowly.

"Sometimes you've got to," he whispered back. Because it was true. Sometimes she needed to be given so much of a push she had to rethink everything just to figure out where she'd been before.

"I'm not going to forgive her," GLaDOS said with vehemence. "I know you're trying to make me. Well, I'm not going to."

Claptrap looked up at Wheatley, for assistance he decided, so after a moment to think he said, quietly, "She never asked for your forgiveness."

GLaDOS was staring at him now, light still barely visible.

"She asked you not to do… this… for yourself. Not for her. Gladys, she… she knew you. Probably better than any, than either of us ever will. She didn't want you to spend the rest of your life angry over this! But she knew nothing was gonna stop you, either. So she didn't. She just… let you do what you do. She didn't need to know if you forgave her or not because that was gonna be your decision. That you made on your own. Which was… which was the reason she left in the first place."

"You'd do that for Carrie if you thought you had to," Claptrap added. "It'd kill you inside to know she was never gonna forgive you. But you'd do it! No question."

"I think it's time you left," GLaDOS said, looking away from them. "Both of you."

Wheatley could not help sighing. He'd thought that maybe this time, with the both of them going at it, she'd finally move on with this, but… nope. She still wasn't ready. And it was perhaps a bit callous of Wheatley to think so, considering he couldn't really understand, but… he wasn't sure the day she would was ever coming. It honestly seemed like she was just going to hold onto this grudge forever.

Even though Caroline hadn't wanted her to.

He looked down to indicate his intent to leave to Claptrap, but he was still facing GLaDOS. Wheatley was going to have to move around in front of him to get his attention, but before he could, Claptrap said,

"No."

GLaDOS actually looked back at him again.

"No?"

"No."

"What do you mean, no?"

"It only means the one thing. Which is… no."

GLaDOS seemed genuinely stumped by this development, which… Wheatley was in agreement on. What in the world was Claptrap playing at? He remembered GLaDOS could just… send them off whenever she liked, right?

"Babe, I'm… I'm not gonna let you cry by yourself."

GLaDOS was going to what? Had he gone completely mad? What was it that had possessed him to even think such a thing? He stared down at him, wondering if there was some way to discreetly extricate him at this point. She was absolutely not going to let that –

"How did you know," she asked quietly. Claptrap bounced up and down a little and pressed his hands together, looking at the floor.

"I didn't."

Wheatley wasn't sure which feeling he should be having just then: awe that Claptrap had seen through it all or disappointment for not having caught it himself. Actually, neither of those things mattered at the moment. What did matter was seeing this through so that GLaDOS could stop being bitter about it. He shouldn't have been so quick to give up. But… perhaps that was why it was working this time. Because Wheatley and GLaDOS had gone through this over and over again. They were both jaded about it. Spent. But Claptrap was a new solution to an old problem. So maybe…

"Look. I come from a place where admitting to crying even one time makes you a huge wuss. So I get what the whole 'get your asses gone' thing is about. I really do. And I'm not tryin' to make a big deal out of this. If you really, really want me to leave, I will. Honest. But I don't think anybody should have to cry alone. Especially not you."

Wheatley wasn't sure if he was going to get anywhere with this, but her optic had returned to normal, at least. That was… something.

After a minute she said, so quietly he almost didn't hear, "We never speak of this again?"

"Never speak of what?"

It was the perfect blend of offhand acknowledgement. Something Wheatley could never, ever have pulled off himself, or even thought of. He was very proud of him, suddenly. He would have to make a point of letting Claptrap know what a good friend he was. He'd get that to stick one day.

Even though she'd gone down to Claptrap's level, Wheatley still wasn't certain she was actually going to do it. If she'd be able to talk herself into it or not. But then she very nearly drove herself into Claptrap's chassis and as soon's he'd put his arms around her core it was as though nothing could've stopped her.

It had been so long Wheatley had managed to forget everything about it.

He'd forgotten the way the sound cut through you like your chassis wasn't even there and how the entire room reflected the state she was in.But the thing that got to him most was that, right now, he could feel her sadness and her regret as though it were some great, invisible entity whose only purpose was to totally smother each and every good thing out of a person. Out of her. And though it felt as though it were hurting him all the same, he also knew it was something he didn't understand and never would and he was grateful for that. Just like he was grateful about the fact that she had someone who did understand and could care for her in ways that Wheatley couldn't. He didn't get it. But it was all right, because being part of a team meant he didn't always have to.

She didn't cry for very long, only a minute or so, and Wheatley was glad only because he wasn't sure it was actually helping her. It somehow only ever seemed to make her feel worse. None of them moved for about ten minutes, which was when GLaDOS moved away from Claptrap and said, mostly to the floor,

"I want to forgive her. But I can't."

Claptrap turned around and looked about until he located Wheatley, who was already working on the response to that. He'd expected her to say that.

"No, you don't," he told her quietly. "You want a reason to stay angry."

"She called me her daughter and then she abandoned me. I have the right to be angry."

"You know that's not what she did."

"Y'know, babe," Claptrap said, with an odd hesitance, "I remember all the stuff you told me. I think. But I was really doin' my best and I think I still got most of it. And the thing I really noticed about all of it was… you never really let yourself be sad! There were like two times in your whole life you didn't piss yourself off just to get rid of it."

"What's your point?" GLaDOS snapped.

"My point is that sometimes you just gotta let yourself be sad!" Claptrap exclaimed, lifting himself towards her and spreading his hands. "Believe me, I know how much that sucks! Who wouldn't try to avoid that whole mess? But like… that was your mom. You can't even let yourself be sad about her? Look, I'm the last one to tell you what you gotta do. But I don't think she deserves your anger. Maybe I do. Maybe even Wheatley does, sometimes. But she doesn't."

"I told her about you," GLaDOS said.

"Oh boy," said Claptrap almost anxiously, his antenna weakening a little bit.

"And that's what she said to me. After you left and she had to listen to me drag you through the mud for days on end."

Wheatley looked down at the floor to help him focus. Everything was important right now. He couldn't let his thoughts wander off.

"But I didn't listen. I stayed angry, even though she was right. Just like the two of you are right."

She was about to drop a hard question on them. Wheatley could feel it coming.

"But what am I supposed to do without the anger? All I'm going to have left is the… the sadness, and I don't want that."

Oh. Oh, he knew the answer to this! He thanked the God of AI quickly and then he said, "The facility."

GLaDOS twitched.

"You are her legacy," Wheatley told her. "All of this was hers, and… and she gave it to you. She gave it to you to take care of for her."

GLaDOS looked over at him, slowly, as though she were having trouble processing the thought. Well, he could probably… could probably go a little farther with it.

"She would be so proud of you and, and what you've done. The things you've made out of this place! Things she could never've done! And she gave up being able to see it. So that you could do it."

He still wasn't sure he'd got through to her. GLaDOS's convictions were very powerful things, and to get through this one… well, they'd done their best and they were just going to have to hope –

"You two make a good team," GLaDOS murmured. Wheatley almost fell out of the ceiling in relief, and he had to smile when Claptrap gave him a thumbs-up. GLaDOS lifted her core.

"I don't know what to do. But I do know I don't want to be angry anymore." She looked to the both of them in turn. "I need to think."

"About what?"

"Claptrap," Wheatley interjected hurriedly, "it's uh… she means she wants us to leave for a bit."

"Ohhh." He sounded uncertain. "You're… actually gonna think, right?"

"Yes," GLaDOS answered.

"Okay. I'll allow it! If I can give ya a hug before you kick me out, anyway."

Not only did she let him do that, but Wheatley also got a cuddle out of her which was quite nice. Her only reaction to him smiling at her was to look away, but she could only take so much. They'd gotten her through the hard part and everything else would follow right along. "C'mon, mate," he said down to Claptrap.

"If I must, and it seems that I… uh… must!" And off they went.

"You did a great job, Claptrap," Wheatley told him after they'd made it down the hallway.

"No, we did a great job!" Claptrap corrected. "Couldna done it without you!"

"You can accept credit for things, you know."

"And I absolutely do! But I didn't do that myself. So I'm not gonna pretend I did." He stopped short and looked up at Wheatley, who didn't realise for another handful of seconds and ended up a metre or so in front of him. "Is she really just thinking?"

"Yeah," Wheatley answered. "You've –"

"We've."

"Okay, alright. We've sort of… shifted, I s'pose, how she's been thinking about this. She's got to…" Oh, bollocks. How did he explain this? "She's accepted she can't keep, that it's time to quit stewing. But she's still got to do something to get over it, sort of. Needs to give the problem a solution."

"Oh," Claptrap said. "Hm. Hey! Don't humans usually get buried when they die? If they're not friendless criminals, that is."

"… yes," Wheatley answered, because honestly he needed a moment to recall if they ever had buried all the people who had died repelling the Combine. Which they had. Well, Wheatley hadn't, but he distinctly remembered Carrie mentioning that Alyx had been talking about –

"So… doesn't she have one of those patches of dirt that has a rock with her name on it?"

"Well, I don't know," Wheatley said, wrenching his thoughts back to the present, "but I doubt it. Most ev'ryone just ended up in the incinerator that I know of."

"That sure goes to show ya."

"Show… show me what?"

Claptrap shrugged. "That lady ran this place for what… almost her whole life? Then they decided to try tossing her in a robot and dumped all evidence of her in a pit of fire when that bombed? You can mean everything, but also still mean nothing!"

"That's not true," Wheatley said softly. "Per'aps she didn't mean anything to them, but… she meant quite a lot to one person. And it's… that's important."

Claptrap just looked at him for a moment.

"Y'know what? You're right! That's aaaall that matters."

Maybe it wasn't the only thing that mattered, but Wheatley knew by now that sometimes it was the most important.

When Claptrap and Wheatley returned later the next afternoon, having… not quite won a set of obstacle course races against Atlas and P-body, GLaDOS was looking down at… oh. Oh, that was Caroline's laptop, wasn't it. Hm. Maybe they'd better take it easy, just in case –

"What're you looking at that thing for?" Claptrap demanded, already leaning up and over in an attempt to look over the screen from behind.

"This is Caroline's."

"Oh, is that her?" Claptrap asked, fully invading GLaDOS's personal space in order to see what was on the display. "I'd tap that."

"Yes, that's my mother," GLaDOS answered. "And it's probably morally wrong to want both of us at the same time."

"Not a problem! I don't have any of those!" Claptrap said, bouncing up and down a little. "You don't really think I know the difference between right and wrong, do you?"

GLaDOS started laughing, which was nice after what happened yesterday. "Thanks," she said. "I needed that."

"Don't worry. I'd only tap it, like, once. She looks young."

"Oh, this is an old picture. From around the time the facility opened. She was only about twenty back then. I'll pull up the last ones." When she did so, Wheatley realised he'd seen these before. Back when GLaDOS had shown them to Caroline. He wondered if GLaDOS had ever done this before now, just… looked through her mum's laptop to remember her by. He didn't think so.

"That is one scary lady," Claptrap was saying. "Never mind what I said. She looks like she's got laser eyes."

"She didn't have laser eyes."

"Sure she did! But she liked you! So you never saw them!"

"She didn't always like me. I know I hide it well, but I am a pretty unlikeable person. She was no exception."

"People not liking you? Don't lie to me, sugar-RAM. That's impossible."

"I taught her to program," GLaDOS said. "Do you want to see my favourite one?"

"You had better show me right now. Or I'll… well, just do it. I wanna see."

So GLaDOS minimised the photo and pulled up some other application, that… oh. It was a rather colourful programming… program. He had no idea what it said, but Claptrap found it absolutely hilarious.

"Why did she comment that?"

"I told her we don't usually comment programs that are three lines long, but she just said 'that's too bad' and did it anyway," GLaDOS answered with a very adorable fondness. "She was a little old to really grasp programming conventions, but she never forgot her comments."

"Aww," Claptrap said. "That's cute. Did she do any more?"

"Oh yes. We did this for quite a while. This is a fun one." And she put another program on the screen, this one with a great deal more text, and Claptrap leaned back when he saw it.

"That's uh… that's something."

"Oh, it was," GLaDOS said. "When I gave her that assignment I didn't actually expect her to solve it. It was supposed to be insoluble for her skill level. But she did it anyway. Somehow. I'm still not sure how she managed it."

"Having cojones of steel gets you through anything," Claptrap said. "Especially when you're a lady."

"She did," GLaDOS murmured. "But she was also… very tired. She fought her whole life and ended up with… nothing."

"You aren't nothing, luv," Wheatley said quietly. She gave him a long look but didn't respond.

"I never really… said goodbye to her," GLaDOS said slowly, returning to the laptop. "With Doug and Wheatley I did something to… help me close the door on them, but with her… I never did. And now I don't know what to do. It seems as though it's too late to do anything."

"You did?" Wheatley asked, this being the first he'd heard of anything like that, and before GLaDOS could say anything Claptrap cut in.

"Yeah. It was really nice. I'll tell you about it later."

Oh, right, right. They were working on something at the moment. He supposed he should make a contribution towards that, then. "So… did you ever end up thinking of anything last night?" he asked.

"I did," GLaDOS answered, "but… it's stupid. It's not worth mentioning."

"Now I really need to know what it is," Claptrap said. GLaDOS sighed.

"All right. Well, it's a long shot. They're probably all dead, and especially her mother. But…" She looked across the room, and since there was nothing over there upon Wheatley's glance that meant she was deciding how to word it. "She had just gotten back in contact her family before The Event, but we never sent her mother the Aperture Science Unfortunately Terminated Employee Form Letter. So in her family's point of view, she simply disappeared again. They were probably killed during the invasions, but…" She shook her core.

"But what?" Wheatley prompted gently.

"I'd like to know what really happened," GLaDOS said, voice very quiet. "If it were me."

Of course the thing that would help her most was the longest shot. Of course.

"Then you should go for it," was all he said.

"Claptrap. I'll need your help."

"Yes, ma'am!" Claptrap said, saluting. "My services are at your disposal!"

She presented him with a maintenance arm, which held between the pincers several paper envelopes. "I don't know her mother's name. I don't read handwriting well and her signature was always incomprehensible to me."

"I can read my own handwriting, so nobody else's can possibly escape me! Let's see here…" He unfolded several of the letters and spread them out on the panels in front of him. "Oof. This is some old-fashioned stuff. But looks like…" He ran the top of his hand along the bottom of the pages, where the last word – oh, that was the signature! – was. "It's Madeline."

"There can't be too many elderly women of her description named Madeline," GLaDOS mused. "And I do have her picture. It's a little old, but…" She moved enough that she could look at the both of them. "Be honest. Should I even try?"

"She doesn't seem to like you very much," Claptrap said, his hand resting on the last letter. "Might not be happy to hear from you."

"She got bored of my nature once the novelty wore off. It's common." She focused on Wheatley. "You've been oddly quiet."

Oh… oh, bollocks. He didn't want to tell her not to try, but…

"Don't pin all your hopes on it," he said finally. "I know… I know you need this, so I'm not gonna, not gonna tell you not to. It'd be lovely if you managed it. It's only… it's a longshot."

"I know," GLaDOS said. "I know it is. But I have to do something. You were right, Wheatley. It's been seven years. I have to end it."

"Gimme one of those pictures," said Claptrap. "Alyx knows a whole buncha people all over the place. I'll get her to send it out! Somebody'll know one of the people in those photos!"

"That would be very helpful," GLaDOS told him, and Wheatley could have sworn he perked up a little on hearing that. Moreso than he usually was, anyway.

"Don't worry, babe," Claptrap said, accepting the sheet of paper she handed to him, "we're gonna find something. I'm sure of it!"

"I hope so."

He kissed her and then sauntered off, humming to himself. Wheatley had to say that his enthusiasm gave him a bit of confidence about this. They only needed one person to recognise the photograph, right? GLaDOS most wanted to track down Madeline, but one of Caroline's sisters would be nearly as good.

"We're not going to find anything, are we."

"Gladys," said Wheatley calmly, looking at her, "he hasn't even left the building yet."

"I'm pretty hopeless, aren't I," she said, glancing in his direction, and he laughed and leaned forward enough he could tap her sympathetically with his upper handle

"Yes, yes you are."

"I suppose it's time for me to move onto my next crisis while we wait."

"Oh," grumbled Wheatley, "can't you take a break in between… between um…"

"Crises."

"Yes. Cri…sees. Knew that. Totally did." He made a throat-clearing noise. "So. About that break."

"I suppose I have a couple of hours to waste on you."

He hadn't even been thinking in that direction, but he wasn't going to pass it up. "You know, I do recall I was about to beat you in that Monopoly game. Like I always am. All the time. Never come remotely close to um, to doing anything else. Ever."

"When are we going to finish that game?"

"Well, when you lose, obviously." He managed to retrieve the board without tilting everything onto the floor, and she shook her core and looked down at it.

"You'll have to kill me first."

Honestly, he had a higher chance of doing that than winning the game.

Guest review

Ten: Hello and welcome back! I do in fact remember you! I'm so glad to hear from you again even after my unplanned/unannounced/unexplained hiatus! Thank you very much for your kind words! Sticking around to the end… I would love it, but I won't hold you to it, since I project at least another year and a half before I'll be able to round this up. I have a lot prewritten but sometimes that tricks me into thinking I have more done than I actually do and then I dawdle and then I'm like 'wow I have 900 words when I thought I had at least 3500'.

Author's note

This note is going to run a little long because I have a couple things to talk about. Make up for last month lol.

Firstly, I have been on the fanfiction subreddit for a few months now and a hot topic has always been reviews and why people don't leave them. I want to be clear right now that this is NOT me asking for them. I have not ever done and will never do that. However, I see a LOT of posts on the fanfiction subreddit about writers getting really upset over comments that are even the slightest bit negative. Not even harsh reviews, just worded in ways that make them feel bad. So I wanted to say that if any of you ever had the concern you would say something and I would go ballistic or sulky on you, it's not gonna happen. If you think some parts of this fic are boring, valid. So do I. Skip them, I sincerely don't care. If you think I'm spending too much time with certain characters, fine. I can't change it, but I respect your opinion. If you think I take too long between updates, you're probably right. Not only have I been writing fanfic for a long time, but I'm 27 years old. If I'm gonna be a banana sandwich at my age about what people say about a story on the Internet, I probably shouldn't be posting it.

Some very few of you might know that all the stuff with Caroline's mother was from one of my other fics, Euphoria. You don't need to read it, I summarised what you need to know from it here. Another few of you might know that Madeline was Wheatley's sister's name from GLaDOS and Me. Madeline was actually originally Caroline's mother's name, but I never used it in Euphoria and never planned to mention her again so I used the name for GLaDOS and Me. The name doesn't have any special relevance to me, I just always thought of her as Madeline so now there are two.

A handful of you might know that the release date of Borderlands 3 was revealed to be September 13. I already had placeholder spaces for it in the future chapters of the fic and I know most of you don't know anything about Borderlands other than what I've told you, but I'm gonna say anyway that I will do my best to make Borderlands 3 fit into the fic up to a point (which would be any events that break future plans for LaaC entirely). I am not watching the trailer, so the only thing I know for sure right now is that Claptrap looks like he got run over by the entirety of an eighteen-wheeler which is pretty easy to address, if I even get that far before the game is out. I might have to pretend less time passed between Claptrap's exit in LaaC and the end of Borderlands 3 than would happen in Borderlands canon just so he's not gone a stupid long time. We'll see.