[A/N]
Today's the day people! A decision will be made! A future will be shaped!
Can you tell I'm running out of things to say yet!
Seriously though, I'm pretty sure you're going to enjoy this one. Well, at least about half of you. Maybe a bit more. Just.. read the chapter, and you'll know what I mean! Enjoy!
"Now how are we going to do this?"
"Digital to organic data transfer is… complicated. I'll need to run some test first."
At that, the little blue-eyed core turned panicky again.
"Is tha- is that gonna hurt? Seriously, though, is that, is that going to cause anyyyy, well, any pain, on my, erm, part?"
"…Maybe."
"NO! Erm, no, I don't want to do this, I'm- just, please?"
"It won't hurt much, moron. Put him into the receptacle."
The girl hesitantly lifted the little core up. He was still afraid, with his most feared enemy messing about with his insides. You couldn't blame him, really. She felt the urge to try to soothe him, like helping a little child get over their fear of the dark.
"Please! I don't- I don't- I don't want to do this! Please!"
"It'll be okay. It won't hurt much, will it?" She said, turning to look at GLaDOS.
The AI paused for a bit, apparently fighting back the urge to mentally scar the core again. "No.", she eventually said.
"So- this isn't gonna hurt, is that- is that what you're saying? I mean-"
"Yes." The test subject quickly said. The core still seems used to talking both sides of the conversation for her. That's what he always did.
She plugged him in. The core was silent, for a bit, still fearful.
"Ah! That- that, that wasn't that bad actually, you were right, this really isn't that- AAAAAaah!" He let out a scream. It wasn't nearly as bad as the one during the core transfer, but still pretty terrifying to the girl.
Said girl immediately turned to face the AI, glaring at her.
"What? That's it. It's over."
"All of the tests?"
"No, of course not. That'll take a few hours. I extracted his synthetic DNA"
"Right. So, he can come out now?"
"Not yet. The link has to remain at all times during the tests. You can go."
"Wait, are you- are you just gonna leave me here? Ahh, I should've known. Are you, though? Going, that is. Are you-"
"I'll stay."
"Oh. I, erm, I honestly didn't expect that. Erm, thank you, luv. For that."
She just smiled, and sat down against the receptacle, right next to him. He was nice and warm. He just chattered about, like he usually did, now with the human occasionally responding.
They had a surprisingly good time, for a test run. Nothing else really happened to the little core, he seemed unaffected by the port in his back. He couldn't move his optic, though, which was a bit of a shame.
They even found a way to play rock-paper-scissors, with Wheatley adjusting the light of his optic for each choices. Most of the time, the human did win easily, but that didn't matter to him.
GlaDOS, on the other hand, didn't seem to enjoy it so much. She'd turned around, sometimes looking at the machinery below her. The area below the supercomputer was, again, open, with one little raised up tube in the center.
Hair-thin lasers were controlled with microscopic precision as to attempt to construct the DNA. Jerry and the other microbots helped, too.
A few hours later, the test came to an end, and the little core was released from the receptacle, which quickly sank back into the ground.
"Well. There's no point in delaying it, I'll get straight to the point here. The transfer is… impossible."
"WHAT?" The human and the core spoke almost simultaneously.
"With the technology available to Aperture, reconstruction of living DNA is impossible. Even with my precision."
"…No." The human fell down onto the ground. "No, no, there has to be another way!"
"I'm afraid there is."
This startled the human a bit. 'I'm afraid there is.' A solution's a solution, right?
"What is it? It can't be that bad, can it?"
"You see, Synthetic to Organic isn't possible in the way we need it to be. Organic to Synthetic has always been easy. Do you see my point?"
Silence. The human understood what she meant, and that might not be a good thing. She'd live forever. Then again, that might not be a bad thing. She imagined her future.
A few minutes passed, in utter silence. Not even the little chatterbox dared to interfere. He knew that look. She was thinking, racing, determined to find out what she needed. Back in the testing tracks, this wasn't unordinary. In here, right now, however, it seemed all the more… odd, to see the human like that.
"…Yes." She said eventually. "I know what to do."
[A/N]
If some of you don't get what GLaDOS is trying to say, which is very unlikely, but I won't judge you if you don't, here's a hint;
The title.
Onto the next chapter!