Chell feels nervous. Trembles shake along her shoulders and roll down her back, and nothing's even happened yet.
Wheatley is tinkering with the metronome on the carpet. He's in front of the couch, hunched over, and has somehow managed to get himself covered in pieces of tape and the off-white styrofoam packaging bits from the box. He's still wearing his bedclothes, a mélange of dark navies and threads of silver, his short brown hair a sleepy and tousled mess.
"Almost got it," he says, readjusting his glasses. "Just messing with the settings a bit. I think this should do it… maybe… Ah, yes, there it goes. Brilliant!"
A rhythmic tock-tock-tock begins to thrum throughout the room, and Wheatley thrusts his arms upward in a thrilled yelp, reveling in the victory. He seems to realize that he's alone in his celebration after a few moments of posing, however, and so he glances over his shoulder, gazing at her worriedly.
"You okay over there? You're awfully quiet. Well, not quiet, sorry, shouldn't have said that. I meant… still. No, no, not still, that doesn't—well, yes, all right, still. Sorry, I'm not helping at all. Are you all right?"
Chell is huddled up on the end of the couch, farthest away from the metronome. She wants to be okay, she really does, but it feels like something is twisting around in her stomach, and it refuses to go away. She's even not sure why she feels like this. Everything had been so perfect yesterday in spite of the eggs. Are these second thoughts? Misgivings?
She hasn't spoken in… god, it's been so long, she can't even remember. Is she actually capable of speech? And what if she isn't? Would Wheatley still want to help? She bites her lip and crosses her arms over her belly, drawing her knees up against her chest as she tries to ignore the writhing anxiety inside of her. No, she doesn't want to think about that. She really doesn't.
"Hm… That definitely looks like a no. Hang on, hang on, sit tight." Wheatley grunts as he uses the muscles in his lanky limbs and lifts himself off the floor. He staggers for a moment, waiting for his equilibrium to realign, and when he's satisfied that he can walk without toppling over, he brushes off the styrofoam dots (tape is still sticking to his pajama bottoms) and plops himself down beside her on the couch. She feels the cushion sink toward him, and she sinks along with it.
"So," he says, "what's the matter? You've been distant all morning. Oh, that's what it was, distant!" He snaps his fingers emphatically. "That's what I was trying to say. Distant, not still. Bloody memory. Not nearly as efficient as a database. I don't know how any of you go on without one. Kind of miss it sometimes, to be perfectly honest."
Chell sighs heavily, burying her face against the back of the couch. Her dark hair is loose, and it tumbles in front of her eyes, effectively hiding her from him. While she appreciates his concern, she's not sure if there's anything he can do about this. It's apprehension and fear, knotting together so tightly that she's starting to think it would hurt more if they were to uncoil.
Wheatley pauses for a moment, studying her as if contemplating his next approach, and then he mimics her, bringing his face a few inches away. She can hear his steady breathing, the constant ticking of the metronome, and the cushion sinks back a little further.
"So, we're just going to play at this then?" he asks, peering at her between strands of her hair. "Not a problem. I can do that. I've got all the time in the world. Well, until lunch, at least. Can't miss that. But I've got all the time in the world until lunch, so you can just sit there and get cozy. I'll be waiting right here."
She sighs again and resists the urge to push him off the couch. Now she remembers why he had been so irritating.
Wheatley shifts a little, stretching his legs. "Right then! What to do for fun? Well, I'm not very good at guessing games, certain I've told you that before, but let's give it a shot. Couldn't hurt to try, right? Brush up a bit. Let's play… how about… oh, I know, let's play what's bothering the girl in front of me. Brilliant idea, I know. No, no, you don't have to thank me, I get it all the time. It's a talent. Got a knack for ideas. Absolute natural."
Chell brushes the hair out of her eyes, tucking it behind her ear. She narrows her gaze and gives him a sulking look, one that says you're really not helping, but he doesn't seem to care.
"Ah, and there's our participant now, finally out of the shadows," he says, flashing a smug grin. "Now, the whole point of the game is to guess what's wrong, but I'll be a good host and ask her if she'll tell us anyway. Lady, would you mind?"
Chell glares and shifts back against the arm of the couch.
Wheatley tsks at her. "Well, that was a right nasty scowl. Thought you'd be excited. You certainly were yesterday. Or at least it seemed like you were." He adjusts himself on the cushion, crossing his legs in front of him to face her as she huddles at the end. "You can tell me," he says, holding out a gentle hand. "Or, you know, gesture. I know we've still got that—well, the whole trust thing. And I understand, I do, I really do, but I promise, I promise, I'm not like that. I really do want to help."
She trembles a little. What she wouldn't give to tell him that for once, it's not him.
"You're… you're not nervous about all this, are you?" Wheatley tries to catch her gaze, leaning slightly forward, but she keeps it focused on her knees. "You are, aren't you?"
The tock-tock-tock of the metronome seems to echo between her ribs. Slowly, she manages a nod.
Wheatley laces his fingers together and drops his stare to his socks. "I'm nervous, too."
Chell glances up, surprise rippling through her. Wheatley, nervous?
"I know, I really shouldn't be. Kind of sprung that on you there, sorry." An awkward laugh shakes him, and he runs a hand through the disheveled mess on his head. "I've never done this before. Therapy. Or at least I don't think I have. I've been going on a memory, but it's… it's like it's incomplete. I can't access all of it, like half of it is someplace else, stored in another file, blocked off." He swallows, his adam's apple bobbing along his throat. "And—well, everything's sort of muddled. More than half of it I don't understand. I've been like this for a week or so now, but this whole business with the piano, this body, humans, food, touching, feelings, memories, all of it, all of it is new. I've never experienced anything like this before. But you know what? You know the one thing that isn't new, the one thing I recognize from before, the one friend I made back there in that awful place?"
Chell finds herself leaning forward, drawn in by the natural lilt of his voice. Her heart is starting to thump whimsical rhythms inside of her because she thinks she knows but she's not certain, she doesn't want to say, she can't be that important, she's never been.
He looks at her behind the thin frames of his glasses, a faint smile thinning across his lips, his eyes a warm comfort. "It's you. Just in case you didn't get that. And as crazy as it sounds, you're like… you're like my management rail. I know that sounds bloody ridiculous, trust me, but hear me out, all right? Hear me out. After I got out of Aperture, I just… panicked. I was left in that field and I didn't know what to do, being slammed in this fleshy thing. No experience, no files, no database, no nothing—but you, you picked me up, you really did, and you got me on track. And most of all, you taught me how to actually be this."
He motions to his lanky body, as if to present himself for examination. Chell gazes at him, flitting from limb to limb, muscle and bone, and then at last to his face; thin and somewhat young, shaped by angular jaws. He offers an uneasy chuckle, seeming embarrassed.
"Well, for the most part," he amends. "Still catching up on some things here and there and there's a few gadgets I haven't quite figured out, but—but that's not what I'm trying to say. What I'm trying to say is… you don't have to be nervous. And if you are nervous, well, that's all right, because I'm nervous right here with you. So if you want, I can try to be your management rail. I've never really been a rail before, but I'll bloody well try my best if it'll make you feel better."
He places a hand on her knee. It's warm, and the heat seems to spread down her calves, along her thighs, up to her ribcage, into her heart. He smiles at her, pressing his glasses further up the bridge of his nose.
"And I know it probably won't mean much coming from me, coming from little Wheatley who's not much help to anyone, but…" His fingers squeeze, skin pulling taut over bone. "I think I'd like to hear your voice. I'd like to hear you hum with me, and sing and talk and maybe even have a conversation. And… and well, I think you'd be brilliant. I know you would."
It's almost too much to absorb at once. The understanding comes in short, cognitive bursts. First: a friend? And then, why is he calling me a rail? And then, he wants to be MY rail? And then, nervous, nervous together, the both of us, and then he wants to hear me talk and—and sing.
Chell doesn't know why, but he sounds so sincere, and she finds belief spiderwebbing through her, taking roots into her chest, gripping tight beneath her lungs. Does he really care that much? She can't imagine being cared for, not like this; she doesn't know what it's like. She's always had to fend for herself, always, fighting and scrounging and running and focusing on staying alive, making it to the next chamber, holding the things that keep her from parting at the seams into a patchwork of flesh and bone on the floor.
Chell feels everything start to crumble, cracking beneath her, and she falls and flounders and the worries slowly begin to unravel with the rhythmic beats of the metronome, loosening coils around her heart, and she heaves a trembling breath that shakes her back as she breaks into a smile.
"Ah, there it is. Knew it was hiding in there somewhere." Wheatley reaches over and thumbs a lock of her hair away from her face. "Looks much better when you do that."
She can only nod, breathless.
He rises from the couch and offers her his hand. He towers over her, steady and strong. "Ready to give it a try?"
Chell swallows uneasily, but she stretches her fingers toward him, reaching, quivering, almost there, not quite, just a bit more—
And Wheatley closes the distance and holds tight, engulfing her palm.
"Come on," he says invitingly, pulling forward, lifting her off the safety of the couch.
She places her feet onto the floor, her toes sinking into the plush carpet. She's unsteady and swaying, but he's holding onto her, a lifeline, a rail, and she won't fall. Chell brings one leg forward and shifts her body, meaning to approach the metronome, but her knees buckle beneath her. Stumbling, she feels the muscles in her arm strengthen, swinging her weight, and the arc of her frame slams into the flat plane of Wheatley's chest.
He coughs from the force of the impact. "All right, was not expecting that," he manages. "You okay? Not hurt, are you? Oh, good. Brilliant, then just on the floor there. There you go, that's it. Wow, that was something."
Chell is lowered beside the metronome and she tentatively lets go of his hand. She can feel the ticking work its way into her internal rhythms. She worries at her lip with her teeth, and when Wheatley sits down beside her, fingers rubbing where she had crashed into him, she curls her arms around her ribcage in attempt to placate her blossoming anxiety.
"All right then," he says, crossing his legs, "before we get started, let's just get a few things straightened out. Nothing big or anything, so don't worry, just little questions that'll help me out. Hopefully." He settles his hands on his thighs, slumping his shoulders as he tries to get comfortable. "I know memory is a tricky sort of deal, so we'll jump from there. Do you remember anything? About music, I mean. Most anything will work. Even simple things, maybe, like nursery rhymes. You know, Mary Had a Little Lamb, Three Blind Mice, London Bridge, other children's songs—things like that?"
Chell hugs herself a little tighter. She tries to remember, grasping about in the dark for pieces of her childhood, fumbling for fragments, but nothing comes forth, nothing but white and black and orange. Slowly, she shakes her head.
"No? Hm." He strokes his chin, the pad of his thumb scratching along coarse stubble. "Well, that's unfortunate. But no matter! Wheatley'll take care of it. I happen to know of several we can start with."
He clears his throat and reaches for the metronome, his fingers flipping the tock-tock-tock to a slower beat. She notes that his face has begun to flush, and she watches him lick his lips as he straightens his back, his eyes looking at the machine in front of them with an apprehensive stare.
"Uh, and just as a little forewarning—a caveat of sorts, you know, just before we start, something I think you should know—I… I can't sing. Well, I can sing, I'm just not very good at it. Don't let that discourage you, though, that's a problem with me, not with you. I'm certain your voice won't sound like mine. Well, almost certain. But don't think about it too much. Not going to be singing for a while anyway. All right? All right. Brilliant." He nods to himself and cracks his knuckles, setting his jaw determinedly. "We're going to start easy. First, I'm going to hum a melody. It's not going to be difficult or anything, just nice and simple, ranging a good bit of notes, and it's going to be in time with the metronome. Every beat will signal the stress of a word. I've slowed it down quite a bit so you can get used to the idea and follow along. All you need to do right now is listen and focus on the rhythm. Breathe with it, and listen."
He glances to her, his eyes an amalgam of blue and fear and anticipation. Wheatley draws in a deep breath, and Chell sees his chest expand and contract as he releases the air through clenched teeth.
"Right then. Let the lesson begin."
And with that, he begins to hum.
It's a low and thrumming noise in his throat. A soft tenor; quiet, but not unpleasant. The tune that rumbles from him is slow and leisurely and somehow familiar (she swears she's heard it before, but where, where), and it falls perfectly into the steps of the metronome's lead. Chell finds herself closing her eyes, letting the song seep into her, feeling the beat pulse beneath her skin, under her eyelids, through her veins. Pressure is applied to her lips as she listens to the melody, and she wants to do something, to join in, to help, and the muscles in her throat struggle as she opens her mouth and tries to shape it around the sounds. Everything feels disconnected but strangely linked, and she senses a tightness in her chest that hasn't been there before, resisting, fighting, forcing its way through, climbing up the ladder of her ribs.
Chell breathes. She breathes, slowly, sucking in the rhythm and the song and holding it between her lungs. Wheatley's humming is growing stronger, more confident, and his voice strengthens and seems to lift her off her feet. Elation bursts inside her stomach, flowering along her hips, curling along her collarbone and down the curved vertebrae of her spine, and it fills her head to toe, pushing past her heart, through her legs, into her head and beyond her mouth, flooding, pressing—and with a sudden flicker of rapture, she opens her eyes.
Something is strange, resonating, and she feels it echo inside of her, a swell of strength. The metronome is tocking back and forth, thumping with the beat of blood rushing through, and a shock of warmth envelops her shoulder, a hand.
Listen. Focus on the rhythm. Breathe with it, and listen.
She doesn't let go. She grasps onto the feeling and holds it with all her might. Her throat hurts, it hurts, but she continues to breathe and concentrates all her worth into the thrum, holding it, capturing it inside of her, and then she lets it carry, letting it roll up her chest and thrive on the tip of her tongue, and the world seems to blur and darken around her.
Wheatley's voice is gone. She's not sure how long it's been gone, but it is, vanished into silence, and nothing is left but the mechanical beat of the metronome and her heart—
And the soft, shivering hum of her voice.