Author's Note: Thank you, thank you so very much for all the support and encouragement. I'm really happy that you guys want to see more of Hypothesis, and I apologize if I took quite a while to get this next chapter up. The interlude was getting rather long, so it'll be done in two parts.

Disclaimer: I do not own Rise of the Guardians, How to Train Your Dragon or Portal/Portal 2.

Hypothesis

Interlude – Running Fish (Part 1)

Reality is a story the mind tells itself. An artificial structure conjured into being by the calcium ion exchange of a million synaptic firings. A truth so strange it can only be lied into existence. And our minds can lie, never doubt it…

The man screws the cap shut on the marker pen, staring at fresh scrawls littering a once clean wall. Graphs and percentages decorate the white space, along with crudely drawn portraits of two test subjects clad respectively in green and blue.

Satisfied with his work, he drops the pen and picks up his faithful Companion Cube sitting next to him, scrambling to his feet and scurrying away to another unknown place.

What's this? Real, or is my mind lying again? Can they truly be awake after all this time? No, just a figment. There's only one of them, and if he were real, the turrets would see him, too.

/ Target acquired. /

Hidden in the shadows, he watches in horror as a white-haired teen lands in the middle of a turret ambush. The bowels of the facility are a dangerous place, containing more death traps than the test chambers, but the boy is quick to react as the red lasers home in on him, firing his blue portals to escape before the torrent of incoming bullets can pierce his flesh and deliver his fate.

The end is finally upon us.

Convinced that he is the real thing, the man runs towards a secret room behind the walls, bursting past the sign 'EMPLOYEES ONLY' marked on the door as he wrenches open the metal locker with 'DO NOT OPEN' on a piece of paper taped to it. Inside, a bottle with the note 'FOR THE END TIMES' awaits him, and his Companion Cube squeaks in protest behind him when he picks it up.

"Don't do it!" she yells.

"I have to. Please try to understand."

"C'mon, you don't need those anymore. You're fine."

He stares at the bottle and shakes his head, quickly twisting the cap open and turning the contents over into his palm. "It's been so long. I've been saving these last two for this day. I'm going to need a clear head for what is to come."

"This will be the end of us," the cube sighs in defeat as he pops the two blue and yellow pills into his mouth and swallows them with a glass of water.

There are moments when I can almost see the underlying grammar of this place. An impossibility, some mad architect's opus – a relic from an age that never could have been. It's a metastasized amalgam of add-ons, additions and appropriations. Building itself out of itself. Beautiful and terrible – and like anything cloned from a cancer cell, probably immortal.

"Stay to the right! Turrets ahead on your left!" the cube warns from his back.

"Whatever you say," he replies absently, finding himself standing at the dead end of a corridor after running down several empty hallways.

The man finds himself some paint and starts a new piece on the wall, splashing color onto the dull white surface as a picture starts to form. Time escapes him as he immerses himself in his work, and his Companion Cube watches nearby in silence.

"Another mural to mark the occasion," he notes to himself, staring at the final product with a sense of wonder. A lone test subject, dressed in blue and sporting white hair, looks back at him. Except not quite, because his eyes are closed and his portrait appears to be deep in slumber. A can of green paint lies abandoned in a corner, unused.

"Where is the boy now?" the cube asks.

"On his way to the final chamber," he says, lifting his head from his arms on his knees as he sits at the base of the wall for a quick rest.

"You mean with… her? He doesn't have a chance. Not alone." Hesitation and doubt are clear in her voice, expressing uncharacteristic worry.

The man stands up to retrieve a folder of personnel files on a small side table, opening it up to a familiar page with the words "Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III" printed on top. Frowning solemnly, he picks up the small stack of papers attached to the page and slides it behind another set of papers, the one with "Jackson Overland Frost" on it.

"It would have been better if they had both survived, but he has more than a chance than you think."

A sudden explosion rocks the room and cuts off the lights, sending the man and his shrieking cube to the ground. The papers in his hand spill over, scattering everywhere. When the lights come on again, he digs himself out of the rubble to find that his painting is still intact.

"What was that?" he gasps, whirling around to see his Companion Cube lying across the small room. He races towards her in panic and picks her up. "Are you okay?"

"The room shook itself to pieces."

"Like an unbalanced centrifuge," he sighs in relief, cradling the cube in his arms.

"I heard an explosion. What could it mean?"

"Only one thing it can mean."

He grabs the discarded folder of papers and races towards the control room, climbing ladders and stairs to reach the heart of the facility. What he finds is a mangled wreck of what used to be the metallic creature that had hunted him down for years, her body all charred and black with disconnected wires hanging limply by the sides.

Dead at last.

"He did it. It's over," the man marvels at the sight, laughing with delight. "The ultimate systems crash."

"It's been a hell of a morning. You missed all the fun," his colleague grinned from the edge of the platform under their latest project. "We had to hit the kill switch again."

"Henry, you have a strange idea of fun," he murmured softly, making his way up the steps to stand next to him. He stared uneasily at the plastic yellow eyepiece of the deactivated AI, hanging from the ceiling just inches away from his face.

"Hey, we're lucky to be working on this."

Crossing his arms, he leaned back against the railing of the platform. "You've got a strange idea of luck, too."

"Think about it," his colleague continued, ignoring the jab. "Every generation gets some new frontier to tackle. Einstein got relativity. The NASA cowboys got the moon. All the easy stuff is taken. I mean take a look around you, we're on the bleeding edge here. Artificial consciousness is the next frontier."

"But every time we turn it on, it takes a sixteenth of a picosecond before it tries to kill us."

"Last time was a tenth of a picosecond. See, we're making progress. I'm telling you, this is our generation's moon shot."

"I'd rather have gone to the moon," he whispered, unheard.

"Where's the boy? He didn't stay to check out his handiwork?" the cube asked.

"He must have gotten out. Probably on the surface, soaking up some sun."

"I'm sure you're right. What is this 'sun' of which you speak?"

"And he has the right idea. Come on, we're wasting daylight," the man hefts his Companion Cube onto his back and starts making his way towards the exit.

"Watch out for the turrets. The queen may be dead, but this hornet's nest has been kicked."

He bursts through a set of double doors and into the outside world, screeching to a stop as bright sunlight blinds his vision. Basking in its natural glory, he lets out a happy cry of "Freedom!" as the cube on his back squeaks "My eyes! My eyes!"

But the euphoria is short-lived as a metallic whirring sound reaches his ears.

"Shh, I hear something," he whispers, moving to duck behind a smoking piece of wreckage.

"Quick, get down before it sees you!" the cube warns as he peers over the top. In the distance, he spots the Party Associate Escort Bot standing over a body with one of its arms raised.

/ Thank you for assuming the party escort submission position. /

Reaching down, the robot grabs the unconscious Jack's shoulders and pulls him backwards, creating a grating sound as his jumpsuit slides unevenly against the rough road.

"No! It's dragging him back inside," the man gasps in realization.

"Hey Gil, can I get a hand here?"

"Uh, sure."

His colleague held out a core with its eyepiece removed, exposing the inner circuitry. "Just reach inside past all those gears and turn on the power supply," he instructed, stopping him when his hand approached the core. "Wait a sec. Safety first. Are you right handed or left?"

"Right."

"Better use your left then."

"Why?"

"Just in case."

Power supply switched on, he proceeded to ask the obvious. "What is that thing, anyway?"

"Just the latest in AI inhibition technology," Henry replied proudly. "You can think of it as a conscience."

"If that's all you use to control her, it won't be enough," he warned.

"Why's that?"

"You can always ignore your conscience."

"You don't have to go back in there."

"I can't just walk away."

"You're right. Walking is too slow. Run away."

"Running is what I've been doing. Running and hiding."

"It's why you're still alive. You're not a hero. Heroes die."

"You don't understand. It's my fault he's down there. I'm not leaving him. I would have been trapped forever if not for him."

"Listen, it's too dangerous. You're going to get killed."

"So be it. But I'm done running. I have to at least try to save him."

"Then you really are crazy," the cube mutters as the man climbs back down the hole, returning to the facility.

Author's Note: Credit goes to Valve for the content of this chapter and the next, which is taken from the online Portal comic: "Lab Rat", bridging the events between Portal and Portal 2.