A/N: More exceedingly boring commentary: Written pretty quickly, actually. That last bit wasn't really intended but happened anyways. I'm amused.
I was listening to "LG Orbifold" from the Half-Life 2 soundtrack as I wrote this. It's great. Look it up on YouTube; I'd post a link but this site hates urls.
19. Silence
Summary: At first, it had been sheer stubbornness. Later, it wasn't.
Genre: General
Characters: Chell
Warnings: Bad word
At first, it had been sheer stubbornness.
She had not said a word to the test subject interviewer after she had been stolen away during Bring-Your-Daughter-To-Work Day, so she didn't see any reason to talk to the AI in control of the Aperture Science Enrichment Center, even after she realized there was more to it than just a set of prerecorded messages.
There wasn't any reason to talk to that thing, especially not after it had tried to kill her.
With him, it had been a little different. She was still a little mistrustful of all Aperture Science technology (save for her trusty portal gun), but he had seemed friendly enough.
Still, she had jumped when he asked her to speak.
It wasn't until she had fallen into a pit trying to find a portal device, and he had called down asking if she was still alive, that she had discovered her voice was gone. On instinct, she had tried to call back up - but the only thing that came out of her throat was a weak, strangled, croaking noise.
Whether it was brain damage from being in suspension too long, some twisted surgical procedure involving her vocal cords, or something else entirely - it didn't really matter what had happened. She had no voice.
At the moment, she didn't regret it. Eventually, she would; long after her release, when she came across the remnants of civilization after the Seven Hour War and the Uprising; when she found humans. Humans she couldn't communciate with; humans who, not always maliciously or intentionally, but the same, looked down on her for being a mute.
It wasn't that, however, she regretted most. It was the fact that, when the two AIs had taken turns trying to kill her, she couldn't say two words: "Fuck you."