"That's not an easy question."
"Bullshit."
"It isn't."
"And I said bullshit!" Wheatley rose from his chair fast enough that the world started to tip sideways, and his brain sloshed against his skull. "You've known this whole time, haven't you?" He braced against the arm of the chair and watched the sparks from the dropped cigarette scatter. "You've known something! You- you let me go this whole time thinking I was piloting around some rube, some sorry bloke who'd been handy, but that's not the truth, is it?"
Doug's face remained an impassive barrier, but those tired eyes turned more hangdog, questing for a scrap of mercy Wheatley couldn't find at the moment. "I told you the truth. That body you're in; it was a friend's." He focused on the hall, hands wringing around his satchel bag. "…it would be easier if I showed you."
An impulsive need to close the distance jerked him forward, though what he'd do once he got there remained a mystery. Doug's shifty eyes and even shiftier hands weren't doing much to appeal to his good sense though. "No, no, no. You're not putting this off any longer. Having me run around, playing the fool, 'oh this human's memories, oh darn, I wish I understood it'! I want you to tell me. Right now."
"It won't take long, but it will be easier if we-"
Violence. That's what that impulse was. Something about having arms and the ability to swing them paired with a fine brew of anger and resentment brought out an ugliness in him. Doug didn't have to try too hard to dodge Wheatley's clumsily made fist, and that only incensed him further. "You're stalling!" He bellowed, ever the image of a petulant child. "You're just going to keep lying to me, aren't you? Give poor old Wheatley the run around, eh?!"
"I haven't lied. And I'm still not going to, but given that you will not trust my word, I need something more concrete." Exasperation bled into Doug's voice as he remained coiled, ready to spring if he needed to avoid another flailing hand. "Would you go with me if I told you our destination?"
Wheatley, for all his frustration, could feel the seriousness in his voice as heavily as he could feel the aches still present in his legs, as pleading as the eyes now searching his. "How do I know you aren't telling me some half truth again?" And yet, there was a wound there now, punctured just between his ribs, spreading outward slowly like a poison. It was the same collection of circuits that had replaced the image of a helpful and friendly Lady with the snooty condescending person he'd chucked down an elevator shaft. Betrayal, it shrieked, just as unbridled this time around, but now Wheatley could say it wasn't a total fabrication from Her. "Where would we be going?"
"The Donor Storage Vault. It has the information you're looking for." Doug didn't move an inch from where he blocked the door. "We will get there; I will explain, and you can ask me whatever you want. Deal?"
Wheatley, despite being made to consider only bad ideas, could find the logic in this. The Relaxation Center had files on the humans that inhabited them; it was sound to say these would carry the same. "…deal. But I need to rest my feet; walking on those things out there is absolute murder."
He paused, and then Doug's hand disappeared into his bag, retrieving something that made a good portion of the lumps pressed into the side of the canvas disappear.
"I was going to keep these a surprise." He murmured, producing the largest pair of white boots he'd ever seen, complete with black tips and long curling braces on the back. Wheatley would know long fall boots from any distance, though these were scuffed and housing a fair bit of moss, and the braces were flaking rust onto the floor. "I found the line where they manufactured them, and I figured you would appreciate an assurance that if you fell around here, you'd be alright."
The noxious pain in his chest doubled; it was to the point he wondered if that adage about words not hurting was another mistruth humans told themselves. Because despite the deflection and the truths that were but weren't, Doug had gone and done something stupid like being thoughtful, while Wheatley did nothing but yell at him and swing at his face. But he'd lied, he had to remind himself. Doug had deliberately kept this to himself when he was asked beforehand.
Wheatley balled his fists up against the apology trying to escape him. "This doesn't make me any less angry at you." He said tersely and plucked them out of his hands.
Getting the appendage into the thing wasn't the problem - a good old cram and wiggle was all it took - it was the clasps that Doug eventually stooped to take care of for him. Then it was the adjusted center of balance, having to shift onto his tiptoes and pitching forward into Doug once he stood. Each movement had the braces creaking ominously and dropping more rust shales onto the floor. Wheatley wasn't confident these could properly support his weight.
Shoes were strange. Just like the way his clothes made the skin of his chest and legs feel stuffy and damp, the boots were stifling to his feet and itchy against his soles. The clasps pressed into his legs and his already cold toes felt frigid in the toe box. And they fit perfectly, snug and sound.
"Do you need help?" Doug hovered next to him, hands a few inches from his forearm.
"I've got it. I've got it!" Realistically, no, no he really didn't. Wheatley still had the lump on his skull from where he'd toppled into the shower, and the boots gave him a similar first-time-walking stance. But he'd readily take another blow to the temple rather than accept help from the guy who'd lied to his face continuously and also done everything in his power to help him. What a complicated thing, to be both scandalized and indebted.
Wheatley stepped forward once, then twice, then over corrected on the third step and wheeled backward into Doug's waiting arms. "The only person you hurt by saying no is yourself." He spoke clinically, mimicking the same tone he'd taken when they'd first met.
"I don't want your help all the time." He unwillingly let Doug stabilize him with a hand to the hip and guide him forward.
"No, you don't want to need my help."
"Is there a difference?" Combined with the aching legs, Wheatley was surprised he wasn't back on the floor, ankles broken and head cracked open.
"There always is." Doug led him in a few circles around the desk. "Relax back into the balls of your feet; let the heel brace take your weight. The rust is only surface deep and it isn't pitted."
Wheatley tried to do as instructed, but his knee buckled, and he found himself supported more fully by Doug. The anger he'd started to walk out reared up. "Ugh," he righted himself and attempted to twist out of Doug's arms, "the Lady made it look so easy. All that running and jumping and falling in these things."
His companion didn't say anything to this, and he didn't try to fight to keep a grip on him either. Wheatley stumbled to and fro, wheeling his arms around before focusing on him. "Now, you promised me answers. Down in the Vault."
"Of course." Doug sorted through his bag, readjusting the contents to sit comfortably without the presence of the boots, then walked to the door. If only Wheatley could be so quick to follow. He grabbed his core off the table, then stumbled and tripped his way after, taking almost three times as long to cover the same distance. Although his countenance remained carved in stone, there was a softness in Doug's eyes, pity shining like crystal in the blue and oozing sluggish and tarlike from the brown.
It took a rake to the coals in his belly and threw sparks up his throat. "Oh would you quit looking at me like that!? I'm still upright, aren't I? Still putting one foot in front of the other-" the brace caught on the edge of the water-logged carpet, and jerked his leg out from under him, sending Wheatley sprawling. Slime and mildew squished into his palms. A loamy odor invaded his senses, and at this point, he learned what humans meant by a breaking point.
Wheatley yelled into the damp patch of fabric. He shouted every colorful and vulgar word he could think of as he sat up. The shadow rising in front of him did little to deter the onslaught. He sounded like he was saying something about how the universe could never be kind to him, but there was a wall of cellophane between his brain and his mouth that wasn't letting him through. A hand brought him back to a standing position, and the body that hand was attached to kept him upright until the words and the anger and the spittle had run dry.
He heaved big gulps of air, then noticed he wasn't standing on carpet anymore. He lifted his head. Doug had somehow managed to drag him to the steps without him realizing. "…Oh. We're… how did we…"
"You walk perfectly when you're not thinking about it." Doug stared at the bottom of the steps. "Do you feel better?"
"Yeah- yeah, yeah, no, I feel..." He warbled, limbs slackening. "…I'm still mad at you." Wheatley mumbled without much heat. Reverse engineering the process of descending the steps kept the second wind from kicking it up again, and once they got to the bottom, Doug took the lead, leaving him focused on not thinking about walking.
There was a current in the air as they shuffled down. Every day up until this point, with every memory he'd stored in his core, Wheatley had never known anything else other than that. He'd been designed, manufactured and put out onto the line. He viewed humans as an oddity. They bumbled about and managed to think hard enough to create him. This foray into an organic body had been new. Scary. It was moving into a new flat and the previous tenet left a few bits of furniture behind.
It wasn't supposed to be this. It wasn't supposed to be his old-new flat. Wheatley wasn't great with probability, but the chances of Doug putting him into a body with the same name and the same voice had to be pretty slim. Maybe he'd overlayed some of those 'biases' Doug mentioned; he was putting his own name in place of this persons, but trying to feel any conviction in that thought was difficult.
What answer was he hoping for? An entire life stripped away? Or the truth he'd learned to live with; he'd been designed from the ground up to be stupid? Wheatley only knew to hope that this could give him an answer, regardless of his want for it. It was dangerous to label that hope, but there was no other word for the yo-yoing his stomach was doing at the moment.
That hope was watered down by fear, though. Would all those memories come rushing back? What would happen when they did? Would it split the parts of him that were still firmly rooted in the core and what was apotheosizing into the human body? Wheatley was already having trouble, and Doug said it would get worse. He didn't know if he wanted to figure out what 'worse' meant.
Doubt crept in. Did he really want answers that badly? Maybe not. Maybe he wanted to stay as he was, with memories popping up every now and then. Wheatley didn't need to force it. In fact, maybe they could forget about this-
"This is it."
They reached the bulkhead, and shadows of the cave they'd crawled out of snarled at him. Bright yellow paint spelled out the same thing it had on the way out, but the meaning no longer flew over his head. His answers were stored in there – it had been staring him in the face the whole time and it wasn't even clever – and Wheatley suddenly found himself rooted to the spot. He wanted the memories because they nagged, and they nagged because there was something more to them he didn't quite have a grasp on yet.
But he was a man who specialized in talk and never action. This was an action. Wheatley wanted nothing more than to be a coward right now. "…this is it." He echoed.
Particularly cold air crawled out from the rocks and blanketed the small triangle of exposed skin between the boot and the cuff of the pants. The edges of the first two pods stared back at him. They were staring at a mausoleum, Wheatley realized. Human folklore would dictate their restless spirits still be wandering around here and he could feel them staring back.
Doug extended his hand forward, angling back to give him the space to enter. It sent his heart into a funny rhythm. Wheatley stepped onto the stone floor and finally took in what he'd missed during his stumbling exit maneuver.
The pods each had a dimmed screen next to the door and a stripe of paint that ran around the door frame. Each row was a different color. Wheatley walked slowly down the path, examining the large shipping containers that counted as enclosures for brain dead humans. How many were there? Every direction, he just saw more. Only one of the doors was open, in the row almost to the very back with a blue stripe around its frame.
Wheatley scanned over it. "Where…" the word echoed several times around him.
Doug had followed at a distance. He pointed to the screen. "That has your information on it. It should still have some power despite the short." Even as he whispered, the cave still managed to throw his words into a choir of layered instructions. The very walls of Aperture were gossiping about him; the ghosts were getting their fill. "I cannot guarantee that it will recover any memories, but it should help me illustrate my point."
"Just go up and-"
"The screen lights up at proximity."
Sure enough, white light flickered under the screen once he got close enough. The bulbs must be in a similar state of fizzle as every other electronic in the underground. Last chance to be a coward. Wheatley buckled down and pushed his glasses up and to get a better look.
Occupant Number 101007
Name: Wheatley Devonshire
DOB: 04/18/1967
Donation: 04/17/1997
Occupation: Internal Safety Officer
Vault Status: Standby
Core Status: N/A
Core Iteration: 5
WARNING: TRANSFER UNAVAILABLE
There it was. His answer. A whole life he'd been ripped away from. The reality he'd been dancing around, refusing to give life through words. It sank, leadened and unyielding, into his skin and hardened around his bones. "What…"
But Doug started talking. "The procedure they used to make the AI in the cores was called brain mapping. It took the structure of a person's brain and translated it into a structure that could be used in an inorganic chassis. Even after all this," he motioned out towards the other rows, "they still hadn't perfected it. They still hadn't perfected Her, so they kept trying smaller things. A core with nothing but an eye and something to process. Everyone knew if you were called to test it, you never came back out.
"Wheatley Devonshire was in one of the last groups before She took over. They'd stopped pretending it was for the preservation of a person's mind and were asking the programmers to sheer off anything that the core didn't need to function." Doug wouldn't meet his eyes, knuckles bone white around the strap of his bag. "You were the result of their – of our – work."
The blow landed directly against his ribs, right next to the open would of betrayal. Any sort of hope or person he'd constructed under him in the past few minutes was ripped away under that resounding no. This wasn't Wheatley. This was the guy he'd been based off and subsequently replaced. "So I'm just… I'm just a copy." The full human spectrum of emotions ran the gambit through his stomach. Easier, Doug had called it. As easy as staring down the barrel of a gun, maybe. Wheatley propped himself up more on the wall, breathing chopping up into hyperventilating. "I'm some cruel imitation of a guy who used to work here, and you put me back in his body thinking that would make it all better."
"That's not necessarily what you are."
He settled on anger because at least when there was a fire burning, he didn't have to think about the wreckage underneath. "Yes necessarily! That's what you just said! Brain mapping? Translating? You know for a sec- for a second I thought I was finally going to find some sort of peace with this, but no! All I have is a single crummy memory of getting hired and a last name!" Wheatley's earlier tantrum in the office had done little to deter his energy as he stumbled back from the screen.
Doug didn't flinch and he didn't back away. He didn't react at all. "Do you feel like a copy?"
"Yes! No, I- augh!" Wheatley flung his hands up. "I don't know what I am! That's the problem!"
"Explain it to me." Ever the bastion of patience, this little man. Oh how he wanted to wring his scrawny neck for bringing him here.
"Oh for god's-" He started to pace the length between the middle hall and the screen, stalking and snarling like a caged animal. "This whole new body thing has been an absolute nightmare! It doesn't feel right, and then it does, and then suddenly it's mine and then it's not? I told you it was barbaric, but did you listen to me? Does anyone listen to me? This whole thing wouldn't have happened if you'd just left me where you found me!" Wheatley laughed, bitter and vindictive. "I never should have thought of leaving. I never should have woken the Lady up! If I'd just-" a pressure formed around his throat, condensed tighter and tighter with each heartbeat that wasn't supposed to be his.
Doug remained still, always on the edge of indifferent, not making eye contact. His lips pressed thin before he spoke, and Wheatley knew he'd hate the question before it came out. "I asked before, but what do you want?-"
"I want to be me!" His chest erupted, and the world blurred as the flashpoint of apoplectic fire spent itself in one go, leaving behind the smoldering ruins of his other emotions. "…I want to be me. And I don't know who that is." Wheatley's legs buckled as the last of his strength gave out on him. Standing wasn't worth it anymore, maybe a nice cold ground could help him.
Arms caught him before he dropped the rest of the way, and the impassive wall of warmth that made up Doug remained silent as the core turned two-meter-tall man wept like a baby into his shoulder. "It's not fair." He blubbered. "It's really really not fair."
Two fingers rubbed the spot over the port, where his skull met his spine.
A simple touch and finally, a crack, a spirit of a memory, breaking free from its confines and rushing up to meet him.
"I know, Wheat." Hands with fewer calluses rub up and down an unmarked neck, matching the soft voice speaking to him. "But life isn't fair. The best we can do is carry on and be patient. There will be a time down the line where our favor comes around again." The shape speaking to him is vague, but it's a woman's voice and he can see bright blonde hair, curling up at the ends.
"But they got away with it! They took it!"
"They did. And they expect that to knock down your spirits." The shape sounds like its smiling. "They won't expect you to be ready next time. Because next time you see them, you're going to tell them to leave you alone. And if they don't, that's okay; you're going to be wielding the biggest stick you can find, and you're going to knock that sense right into them." The overwhelming scent of floral perfume swirls around him. His mother always wears it to combat the smell of coal that never leaves the house.
He's confused. This isn't the advice they give on Children's Hour. "Aren't you s'posed to tell me to let it go? Be the bigger person?"
Laughter, bending and twisting, a sound he wishes he could bottle and take with him to school. "Yeah, I suppose I am."
They were on the floor now, and a voice that sounded scarily like his own reminded him Doug didn't like physical contact that much. "I wish it would stop doing that." It took every ounce of willpower to pry himself off and take the place beside him instead.
"Doing what?" Doug hovered still, then started rooting through his bag again and producing a scratchy bit of off-white cloth. He turned his focus to his cube once Wheatley took it.
"Handing me more memories. They aren't mine. I know I said I wanted them, but that was before…" Wheatley wiped away the tears still trying to make their journey to the floor. He felt like a particularly unlucky towel, spun in the wash and wrung through and yet still covered in dirt. "Why didn't you explain this when I asked?"
Doug didn't respond for a time. It looked like he was trying to hide behind the fringe of his hair. "The human mind is a powerful thing. It makes this confounding thing called reality and shapes it to its will. One of its favorite tools is denial." He ran his tongue over his bottom lip. "If I had detailed this before, would you believe me?"
The kneejerk reaction was yes, but it would be hypocritical to lie to himself now. "…probably not, no."
"Our reality is shaped by what we believe. I wanted to give you part of the narrative without a fight. I suppose we got there, eventually." Doug tipped away and dragged something across the floor. Wheatley realized he was gripping the lower handle of the core he'd so carelessly dropped to the floor in his breakdown. Its gaze was far sadder now, almost pitying. He took it when it was offered. "And I told you, not necessarily. Those memories are yours. You had them when you were turned on. You're just Theseus's paradox taken from theory and put into action. That reality is whatever you want it to be."
He paused in his inspection of the new scratch marks and particulates caught in the metal. Wheatley's mood, ever like the wind, blew in the opposite direction and went from dejected to curious. "I'm what? What's that? Whose Theseus?"
Doug huffed his closest thing to laughter. "That's not the part that matters. It's a thought experiment about a ship. If you took a boat and replaced the components with new ones that looked the same, when do you consider it a new ship? Is it the same ship still? And if not, where did the old ship go?"
A pregnant pause hung in the air, enough for Wheatley to feel the length of each second as it passed them by. "Well? What's the answer?"
Much to his chagrin, Doug simply shrugged. "It depends who you ask. Everyone has their own answer."
Wheatley scowled. "Aw- that's a cop out. There's always an answer." Doug remained stubbornly mum. "At least tell me yours."
"I can't." Wheatley groaned, and he swore he saw his companion start to smile. "If I did, you'd take it as the correct answer and wouldn't think about it any further."
He grumbled in his direction, then fixated back on the screen as he situated the metal ball in his lap. The dates kept jumping out at him, but he couldn't figure out why. They sat in that silence for a while, enough for it to occur to Wheatley that he would need to be the one to break it. He'd still taken that swing at him and yelled at least twice. Perhaps he could get some practice in. "Doug, mate, I'm sorry. Sincerely, I am sorry. For yelling, and for trying to hit you."
"If it helps, I haven't taken it personally. I didn't expect you to have good emotional regulation." Doug said over his bag that he was once again rearranging.
Wheatley sat up and shook his head. "No. I was bossy, and I was unfair and snippy. And you know, it's not really mature, solving problems with violence. I don't regret trying to get out or waking the Lady up. If I was given the choice, I would do it all ag-"
"Chell." Doug corrected.
Wheatley physically startled out of his train of thought. "Pardon?"
"Chell. That was our Valkyrie's name." He spoke wanly. "You've never used her name. I didn't know if you forgot or if you were never told."
"…Chell…" A softer more pliable melancholy descended over him. "That's nice. No, she never told me." Before, he'd half convinced himself she hadn't bothered because of the brain damage. Wheatley knew better now. She'd known how to communicate, talking in smiles and head shakes, re-aimed bombs and an out-stretched hand through the depleting gravity of space. It had been a choice not to point it out when they'd passed by the tables. She didn't want him to know her name. Wheatley chuckled, but it caught awkwardly in his throat. "It appears to be a running joke that I'm bad with lady's names."
Doug tipped his head. "What do you mean?"
"I didn't properly tell you what I remembered, did I? It was my- it was this guy's interview. Lied a lot on his resume. I didn't bother to learn Caroline's name either…" Any phoned in joy fled as those words, and his lungs deflated. "Caroline." Wheatley's voice cracked around the word, around the impact. "Oh my god."
It had been right there the whole time just like the sign. Doug had told him everything but the fact that it applied to him and Wheatley had breezed right by it without asking questions.
Doug's expression was obscured behind his cube, but the note to his voice was as dry as the soot caking the back of his core. "You always took a while to put pieces together."
If he wasn't embarrassed before, he certainly was now. "Doug!"
"I'm sorry; it's true." Doug cleared his throat. "But thank you for apologizing."
He rolled his eyes and let them settle into a more companionable silence. Theseus' paradox… She had mentioned something in her little potato form about them not having an answer, but maybe he could take a crack at it now. If the ship was a metaphor for him, then the question remained, who was he? He'd replaced an entire ship with himself, but then if he was more technical, he was actually a digital scan of the ship that had been rendered and implanted with decay so they could replace it like they would a real ship-
And he'd lost the metaphor.
Okay, maybe just an answer. If they took stock of how many parts the ship had, then the minute they replaced over half, that was probably when it became a new ship.
…but that didn't take into account size of part, and if you replaced someone's arms and legs that didn't make them a new person. Even going in and replacing all their chest organs didn't really make them a new person. That was probably reserved for the brain.
What was the brain of a ship?
And now his head hurt.
Whatever, paradoxes were stupid anyway.
The screen flickered again, dimming further, and once again suckering in his attention. If he focused hard enough, he could get a sense of wisps similar to those he'd gotten outside the office. Blurry faces and figures that fit the word family. Muggy air cut through with a rocky aftertaste and blocky fingers encrusted with black dust smacking his shoulder. The click-clack of wheels on a track.
Wheatley frowned at the dates again. Odd that both his birth and a certain death both happened on the fourth. Odd that those memories would continue to nag. "Hey. You knew him before. And you helped me get a memory back."
"I cannot dictate all of your memories to you, even if I wanted to. It would take too long."
"You don't have to do all of them! But there has to be more." He insisted, jerking his thumb to the screen. "That can't be it. That's not all I am. Or he was."
"Your records were all kept in the file room, but we… there's no going back there." Doug worked his nail under the rubber stoppers on the edges of the cube. "What do you want to know?"
It would be unfair to answer with 'everything'. But that was all Wheatley could think of. He wanted to know why he had so many scars on his body. He wanted to know his favorite restaurants and movies and books. He wanted to know why he was chosen for this. He wanted to know why he was a moron. Everything and more wouldn't satisfy Wheatley's curiosity and he couldn't ask that of Doug.
It all started with a single question. Wheatley should start there. "Who was I?"
A slow, deep inhale. "Wheatley Devonshire started working for Aperture Science at the start of 1988, not long after Cave Johnson died. He was hired as a safety inspector, and nobody expected him to stay for the almost ten years he held the position." Doug hadn't changed the pitch of his voice, but the words sagged under grief suddenly exposed to the air after so many years. "He was also my best friend. We were both extremely lonely in our professional and private lives. I was branded by my diagnosis, and he was stuck with a job consisting entirely of lying. He just… kept showing up around me, even though I was a social pariah. We thought it amicable to share that loneliness with one another.
"He was a man who would dig for any silver lining, even if he had to forge it himself. People thought he was naïve or sheltered, but he could talk anyone in circles if he wanted. He was just desperate to help out, to prove himself. And Aperture took advantage of that." Doug's eyes were misty once Wheatley tore his gaze away from the screen. "He wasn't stupid, no matter what they thought. When the memo came down, he tried to put it off, pretend he'd never seen it.
"I heard them take you away. It-" the grief seeped through into his expression, setting it on a tilt. "They knew by then. They knew doing it by force caused the brain to… it broke something. Most of the people they forced into it came out the other end corrupted. But they were getting desperate and didn't have any volunteers."
"But I was never corrupted."
Doug pointed to the screen. "Iteration five." His hand was shaking as he lowered it again. "At some point, they stopped fixing them. The first time… the first time they turned you on, you just kept screaming." Lights reflected from the sheen over his eyes. "You were terrified-"
-Small small cramped not right cold cold can't move can't breathe can't see can't feel where where where where who-
"-There was too much of you left over. They were going to dispose of you, but I offered to spare my time and work on it. I was told to go in and rip out everything that resembled a memory." He cradled his hand close to his chest. Doug's body had gone completely rigid. If it weren't for the flutter of his eye lids or the movement of his lips, Wheatley would think he was talking to a statue. "I couldn't do it. I thought hiding them would be kinder, but you just broke down the walls I put up, so-" He choked, and the sentence tapered off into a silent haunted stare.
Wheatley felt a unique kind of horror at that, and equally as much pity. "Jesus, Doug." The insinuation caught up a second later. "Wait, you worked on me. Why'd you make me a moron?"
"I didn't want that. I never wanted that." Doug's eyes locked on him like they were heat seeking. Guilt bogged down his expression. "It was Henry's idea." There was that guy again. "I half assed it. I was sloppy. I added a single program to try and accomplish something the brain simply can't do: stifle any good ideas." He stared up, unflinching with his intensity. "We cannot quantify an objectively good or bad idea. Those are classifications based on past experience, knowledge and conjecture. There's no single value I could set to true or false to make the brain listen to these labels. You slipped through."
There were many times in his life that Wheatley had wished to be someone else, but none more than right now. Supposedly, he was now, but he wasn't the right one. He wanted to be the man that Doug exalted. Heck, he wanted to be even half of that. And the worst part was not even knowing what he was missing. There wasn't much he could say to wipe the bereaved look off Doug's face.
Maybe he could do something about the missing bits. "Hey. How'd we meet?"
Doug blinked and his body loosened. "We worked in the same company, and you conducted safety inspections. I did work. At some point our paths had to cross."
"We-" He caught the glint of mischief breaking through and tsked. "Cheeky. Explain it to me. I want to remember."
He scoffed but obliged, and Wheatley curled around his core, pressing his cheek and watching him like he was preparing for a particularly riveting bedtime story. Funny, as he'd never had one before, technically speaking.
"It was your first or second day, and you came into my lab with a bullet hole in your jacket. You fell into my lab and told me what you were there for. We'd all learned by that point never to get attached to those running safety because they either quit or ended up with irreparable damage. It was very clear you had no idea what you were doing." Doug steepled his hands in front of him and closed his eyes, swept up in his own memory. "I thought you would just go around and check some things off, but you were insistent on speaking to me. I only obliged because you looked so… overwhelmed."
.
The metal door clicks and creaks open as he launches into it, out of breath and feeling the sting against his side. He prays it isn't bleeding. The last of the gunfire is tapering off behind him and he knows they can't walk, but he can't get into the room fast enough. Wheatley felt like an idiot. Safety inspector. He should have seen this coming. Barebones orientation, a 'good luck' instead of actual on the job training and no map. No one laughs over safety if they aren't always on the verge of killing someone.
He presses against the wall and scans the room he's supposed to inspect, half prepared to start running and dodging again. It's dim, dimmer than the rest, and he begins to dread until he spots the man at the center table, doing nothing more than typing on a computer. He isn't looking in his direction, and he doesn't seem to have any visible bandages like several other people he'd passed. Around the table is a bunch of metal and machinery, but none of it is on. None of it is shooting at him or expelling a red beam and the computer is of the normal screen-and-keyboard variety that won't attack him. Probably.
For once, he might be standing in a lab that won't kill him. Wheatley wonders why the other lab technician who pointed him in this direction was so… odd about it. Maybe the normality is what makes it strange.
"Hallo!" He straightens up and smiles as wide as he can muster, hoping it hides the soot on his coat, the sweat on his brow and how close he is to crying. "I'm here to inspect your safety!"
The man in the room doesn't turn away from his computer or regard him at all. He's just a head of jet-black hair bent close to a screen and the back of a white coat.
Wheatley tries not to let it bother him, but everyone keeps acting strange around him and he's starting to wonder. "Hello? May I come in? Well- suppose I already am in. May I look around? Get to my inspecting?"
The scientist in question shrugs. It's the most he's moved since he entered.
It's too quiet. The only sound is the tap tap tap of the keys as the man at the desk types away. He really needs to salvage his professionalism. "Right, well," Wheatley walks further into the room and starts an initial scan. He's still not sure what he's looking for, "the… the floor here, is very safe, you've got that going for you. Oh, and the walls! No spikes, or bullets, or- or flames. This office is practically livable!"
He scans the complicated boxes and list of requirements that he'd been struggling to understand. Maybe the man who works here would understand it better. "Do you have any violations that need reporting?"
"No."
The reply is too quick, just like every other person. Very clearly a lie. Wheatley's smile twitches. "Okay, well, I need to fill out this thing, with all its little questions and what not. Could you answer my questions? Honestly please?"
Continued silence. Wheatley's gripping the pen so tight he can hear the plastic creaking. "Mate. Today, I have been shot at, singled, almost stabbed, and probably poisoned. So can you please just- please work with me." His smile is tense, and he figures he probably looks more like he's baring his teeth.
Finally, the scientist stops typing. He's still staring at the screen, but that must mean he's paying more attention. "I work on Aperture's Image Format Database. Sometimes I help with system maintenance and the coding of Artificial Intelligence. Sometimes I help repair basic machinery but there are no power tools or giant machines to worry about in here. I work with software and very little hardware. There isn't much to report."
He stares. "You're responsible for the code in those murderous things out there?!"
"I said I help with maintenance. I don't make them." The scientist starts typing again. "The only violations you're going to find in here is lack of PPE and signage, and improper means of egress."
It's probably an answer out of pity. It's also clearly a dismissal but Wheatley isn't raring to go back into the foray of bullets and lasers. He scans the list again, penning in a few things that he can obviously see. "And are there any dangerous pathogens in this room?"
Finally, the scientist – actually he's probably just a programmer – looks away from his computer. He turns his head enough for Wheatley to see the tip of his nose and the corner of his mouth angled down. "No? Just machinery. Why would there be pathogens?"
"Oh- I thought-" he realizes Kevin might have actually been telling some sort of inside joke that went over his head. "Kev said… Kevin warned me not to catch 'it' when I came in here."
Heavy silence crowds the room, only broken by the creak of the chair as the scientist turns completely to look at him, letting him make out his inspectees face. He shares a similar exhausted state that everyone else in the building has, deep bags and pallid skin that's even more ghoulish in the low lights. But it's more set there, more worn into his features. And there's more distinct about him. His eyes are different colors. One as blue as the sky as the sun set over Kent, and the other almost black, like the coffee his aunt makes.
It's strange, but not unpleasant. He's pretty in a Van-Gogh-missing-his-ear kind of way. Or maybe that's stray-dog-in-an-alley way. He's not scary, not like Kevin implied.
Wheatley realizes he's staring, and his companion hasn't said anything for far too long. He hides behind his clipboard as he speaks. "But- I'm- I'm sure he was just joking around. There doesn't seem to be anything that could cause contamination."
The scientist's face remains blank as he scans over him, then once again puts his back to him. It occurs to him that they didn't bother with introductions, but then again names aren't the first thing you think of when you're recovering from being shot at. "Uhm, my name is-"
"I don't want to know."
It's a right smack to the face. "Are all you scientists this rude?" He glares at the man's back. "Is it because we aren't all as smart as you lot in your science towers?"
"You're a safety officer. We're lucky if they last longer than a week. I will not need to know your name because soon you will be gone." The scientist's voice is approaching frigid.
Wheatley's feathers ruffle under the implication. "Well! I'm going to be different. In fact, I'll see you next week; you can be sure of it." He clicks his pen pointedly. "And you're going to learn my name whether you like it or not."
"Are you reporting your findings accurately?" The scientist is looking back over his shoulder.
"Yeah? Kind of why they hired me." He walks around to the side of the table, inspecting the various gadgets spread over the surface. It's laid out in a nice square, screw drivers on one side and pliers on the other.
"Then you will not see me next week."
"Did you not hear me say the stuff about being shot and burned?" Wheatley checks his side and points to the clear hole in his jacket. There's no blood, so maybe the bullets are actually rubber. "I don't know who was here before me, but clearly, they weren't doing that good of a job; this place is a death trap! Over half the staff are walking around with bandages, and I saw a higher-than-average number of crutches! How on earth is it still open?!"
His conversation partner peers over the top of his computer, then looks down at the clipboard in his hands. "We lie."
Wheatley follows his gaze. "No! I'm not going to do that. That's probably how it got this bad in the first place!"
"Then let me explain your options. You report all of this, and either Aperture hides the report and fires you, or worse, it does make it out, and you become part of Aperture's perpetual legal cases where they do everything in their power to sabotage you. Best case scenario, a bunch of people lose their jobs and most likely will never work in the tech and bio sector ever again." He explains it smoothly, eyes never leaving his face. Wheatley feels pinned to the spot. "Realistically, you end up like the rest of Aperture's whistleblowers: reported missing.
"Or, you lie, like the rest of us, and keep your paycheck while you look for some other place to work." The scientist holds his gaze for a beat longer then turns back to his work.
Wheatley stares down at his paper, thoroughly disenchanted. He should have known better. That offer wasn't a response to a heartfelt plea, that was a spider getting a fly in its web. He was the perfect stupid idiot to be put in this position. "Or, third option. I quit now."
"Did you read the contract you signed?"
"…no."
"You can't quit unless you have another offer."
"That can't be legal." He whines. "And it's my signature is on this. If they find out it's a lie, it's my head on a pike!"
"You will be the first person they throw to the wolves if it comes to it, yes. But they'll do everything in their power not to let that happen."
He sighs and looks over the lab. "What would you do?" He asks dejectedly.
The scientist fixes his computer with a thousand-yard stare. "My job."
Another dismissal. This one he'll take. Wheatley starts for the door but pauses as the man clears his throat. "You want to include a few suggestions that are cheap and doable. Removing refuse, replacing light bulbs, the sort of thing we don't have to spend a lot of money or time on. Having a spotless report is suspicious."
He raises his brow. "If you didn't want to know my name because no one sticks around, why're you helping me?"
"I believe in fighting chances."
Wheatley smiles as the scientist's back before taking a breath and preparing to sprint back down the hall.
—
"It's been a week."
"It has."
Wheatley has sought out his mysterious scientist again. This time he isn't working on a computer, he's bent over a hunk of metal, poking and prodding at some gears. He didn't greet him again, and Wheatley has been watching him for maybe ten minutes. He leans over the table, deliberately getting into his space. "You said we could exchange names now."
The man rolls his eyes and ducks out from under him, dragging the mechanism with him. "You said that. I never agreed."
"You'll also remember that I said you'd know my name whether you liked it or not." Wheatley watches him flutter his hand over a few different screwdrivers. "And for making me wait, I'm giving you my last name too."
"I'm shaking." He replies drably. "Tell me after your first mandatory test."
"My first what?"
"Employee 101007, please report to testing sphere 3." A chipper voice pipes over the intercom.
—
The scientist loops clean white bandages over the clearly second-degree burn he now sports on his left forearm. "Can you contact a doctor if it gets infected?"
"Maybe." Wheatley winces as he ties it, picking at the small bandaid across his forehead glumly. He figures he might have a concussion now. "Why do they make us do this?"
"There's several answers to that question. Management will tell you that it's your duty as an employee to advance science. Miss Clark would say that no one wants to volunteer and that they're starting to introduce a number of laws that require informed consent to those undergoing scientific and medical procedures."
"And… you would say?"
His mysterious scientist huffs, and it catches, almost sounding like a laugh. "I would say they realized the employees are far more willing to endure the stress these tests put people under, and far less likely to report anything due to normalization." He pulls out a small bottle of disinfectant and splashes it over his palms.
Wheatley shudders. "…you think I could get a doctor's note?
"If mine doesn't work then yours won't either." The scientist inspects his handiwork. "Don't pop any blisters that form." He squints before backing away.
Wheatley examines the gauze, then manages a rather triumphant smile. "I passed your test then. Or I guess they're test, but yours too. You get my name. Wheatley Devonshire. Resident man from across the pond." He sticks his hand out toward the man who gazes at it aloofly. "This is where you…" he wiggles his fingers. "…this is where you say 'nice to meet you, my name is…'"
Finally, the mysterious man cracks a smile. It's small, fleeting, and doesn't reach far up his face before its gone. "Doug." He says without taking his hand. Wheatley lets it drop onto the table. "Is that what you wanted?"
"Of course!" He chirps. Wheatley has tried to ask around about Doug the mystery man, but all he's turned up is a few odd looks, a vague blob of resentment, a recommendation to simply ask Doug about it and the word 'crazy' from his good buddy Kevin. "Why are people so strange about you, Doug?"
Doug pauses, and his good humor vanishes in a puff of smoke. "You would have to ask them." He focuses across the room.
Wheatley drums his fingers on the table, propping his other hand up on his chin. "Why do you think people are so strange about you?"
"There could be many reasons. I try not to think about them." He gathers up the first aid kit and tucks it into the cabinet he retrieved it from. Wheatley sees something else tucked in the back, a brown paper bag that's torn open and a piece of white plastic poking out, but the door is closed before he can make out what it is. He watches Doug idle then looks back at him. "I get the feeling I should clarify. That is not a challenge for you to discover what is wrong with me. I am asking that you let it be."
He frowns, goes to clarify his own position, but the intercom once again cuts him off. "Cave here: break times up! Back to work or I let the door hit you on the way out!"
—
"Why are you back?"
"Can a man not take his lunch break?"
"I would think the safety officer would know about violations concerning food and the workplace."
"Exactly! That's why I'm allowed to break them."
"Are you spying on me?"
"…what?"
"…never mind. Sure. Eat in here. Just don't expect lively conversation."
—
He doesn't have an office, not really. It's more of a closet with a piece of paper taped to the front. It's a really great place to hide, especially when he removes said paper. In many ways, 'safety officer' translates to 'errand boy'. No one assumes he's all that busy. Wheatley dreads hearing his name now, knowing there's a request attached to the end of it, so he's learned to not move through the halls if he can help it. Plus, if he keeps the lights low, he can pretend he's a starving Victorian author trying to file his taxes.
Wheatley is trying to cram in some of the paperwork they're years behind on when there's a rapping upon his closet chamber door. He's hidden between a stack of folding chairs and an Aperture branded mop. "…come in?" No one's ever visited him before.
The door opens slowly, and a face he's never seen outside its designated lab pops in.
"Doug!" He beams, cramped pains and forms completely forgotten. "Haven't seen you come around these parts."
"You've picked up some bad habits from me." Doug is carrying something with him.
Wheatley laughs and gestures around. "Well come in. I've got plenty of chairs and no space to put them." He picks up his pen. "What're you doing here?"
Doug shuffles, looks back sheepishly, then closes the door and takes up the space in front of him. "…you didn't come by on your lunch break." He offers up the small sack he's carrying. "I'm on mine."
"I haven't taken it yet, I got so caught-" A childish glee bubbles up his throat, and he's smiling like an idiot. "You missed me." He truly thought the break time visits were annoying Doug, but it's much preferable to the crummy little room everyone designates 'the break room'. It's only a whisper larger than his closet office.
Doug shrugs but refuses to look up as he withdraws his food. "I don't like changes to routine."
"Wouldn't me showing up be a change-"
"Wheatley. I'm only here for five minutes." His food is a strange blur that smells kind of like fish.
He laughs. "Only because I managed to convince Caroline that ten-minute breaks were better for everyone."
Doug squints as he unwraps whatever his meal may be. "You're on a first name basis with Miss Clark?"
"Never bothered starting with the second. It seems so impersonal." He shuffles his papers off the metal sheet he's using as a desk. Wheatley pulls out the bag with the yellow M he'd been neglecting and digs through it. "Mum also wasn't the greatest at teaching me manners."
It seems like they're in their own world in this closet. Unlike with Doug's lab, there's no screaming reminder that he's in Aperture save for some branding. And this time they're sharing a meal instead of Wheatley watching as Doug works. He can pretend for a moment that it's something more personal and friendly than the mild animosity he's been catching. Though, maybe that's not what's happening. You don't go out of your way to find the closet of someone you hate so you can eat lunch with them. If he were any braver in that assumption, he'd joke about the single bulb passing for candlelight on their first date.
Doug's head snaps up suddenly, and he's leaning over to examine closer to the walls. "…Doug?"
"I think you might have mice." He taps a finger against the plaster.
"Pardon?"
"You don't hear them running?" Doug scans his face and must see something because he's losing color like a runaway printer. "Oh."
Wheatley wants to ask. It's the perfect opportunity. But he's refrained thus far. He hasn't bothered anybody, as if they'd really tell him without it being gossip, and he hasn't gotten close to the topic since Doug bandaged him.
"Ask." Doug sees through it. He's very good about that.
"No."
"You want to."
"And you don't. What I want doesn't matter and prying would make me an arsehole."
Something breaks in the storm cloud of his expression. Doug's shoulders droop. "You haven't…" He splays his hands out over his knees. "…Schizophrenia."
Wheatley stares up from where he's about to bite into his sandwich. "Gesundheit?"
"No, that's…" He sighs and makes a face like he's wishing he could become a shadow on the floor. "That's what's wrong with me. I thought maybe you'd asked around and been informed by someone else. I thought you were taking your breaks in my lab out of pity."
"Ah, schizophrenia. Yes, that… that thing." Wheatley smiles. "Have you seen a doctor about that?"
Doug stares at him, then really, truly does laugh. It's rough and honking, and it sounds like a laugh made by someone whose only ever had the sound described, but it makes him feel lighter than air. "You have no idea what that is."
"Haven't a clue." He grins. "But I'm sorry, if it's serious. I had a friend back home who was born without a kidney. You couldn't even tell but kids would still make fun of him once they knew."
His friend - he hopes that's what they are now - is still smiling as he shakes his head. "I suppose that's kind of close on the surface. No. I'm a paranoid schizophrenic. Sometimes I hear things, and sometimes I see things. My mind likes to lie to me, and sometimes it lies so much I start to really believe it." He points to the wall. "I heard something in the walls. My mind told me it was someone spying on us. I said it was rats because I still thought what I heard was real."
Wheatley listens as well as he can. "Oh, one of those mental things." He nods along, and to a certain extent begins to feel some pity. If he couldn't trust his own head, he didn't know what he'd do. But Doug certainly does. "That doesn't sound contagious?"
"Not everyone knows that. Or cares."
He frowns. "That's not fair."
Doug shrugs and goes back to his meal. "It doesn't have to be."
The meal feels sour now. Such a heavy topic isn't appropriate for their little world. Wheatley clears his throat. "Speaking of that git, d'you want to know what he called me today?" He waits until Doug is looking over again. "A rubber stamp machine! Could you believe it?"
It melts the tension. Doug tries to hide in his meal. "That is what you are."
"Augh, not you too! I thought we were friends!"
He watches the light so absent from his companion's eyes flicker to life for just a moment. "…well, as a friend, I'm merely informing you."
Wheatley laughs.
—
"Do you ever miss them?"
"Hm?"
"Your parents. And any siblings you may have had."
"…Yeah. I miss mum the most. She was the coolest person I knew for a while. Always had something to say whenever I got down."
"And your father?"
"There are some things I miss, yeah. But there are other things I don't. He was in Korea, and I don't think he ever fully left. Couldn't ever let anything pop in the house or he'd go mad. And he wasn't the type to believe in help."
"I assume you didn't have any siblings."
"Nah. Mum figured one was enough. Told me they'd worked hard enough to get me …and I… up and abandoned them. To come work here, of all places."
"Are they the kind of people to be proud of that?"
"I don't know. I think dad would call it driven. Do you think they miss me?"
"…"
"…would you miss me? If I vanished like I did to my parents? Or would you be terribly angry with me."
"I don't think I want to find out."
.
Ah. There was his sudden blast of memories. Wheatley realized Doug had stopped speaking by now. He was staring off, and the ghost of tear tracks were drying on his cheeks. The fuzz of memory had eaten away his focus, and the tips of his fingers were tingling like he'd just woken up from a particularly refreshing nap. He lifted his head off his core, feeling a little guilty for missing his friend's account.
Neither was willing to break the silence, and Wheatley wasn't sure how bad an idea it was to inform him of his sudden wealth of memories. He didn't know how to tell him that they fit in far cleaner than the previous snippets, or how he found the same warmth in memory-Doug like he did in present-Doug.
Wheatley kept all of this close to his chest, and pretended to reread the screen, and then really reread the dates. The dates. They kept sitting strange in his stomach, off kilter and-
"Wait a moment." He croaked and Doug opened his eye. "He- you're American, you swap the- I was only a day from-" Wheatley looked at him with wide eyes. Doug wasn't looking at him again. His eyes weren't anywhere near his face. He was looking at the boots. And now Wheatley was looking at his boots and remembering they were supposed to be a surprise.
Doug cleared his throat. "Based on my own math and the clock, you have been transferred for almost 24 hours." He tracked his eyes up to a spot near his face. "Happy 30th birthday, Wheatley."
The sentence took a battering ram to his heart. It gave him nothing and yet it also gave him everything. Identity or no, ship or not, he was thirty. Wheatley Devonshire was thirty years old. A laugh escaped when he wasn't looking, along with several tears chasing it down. "Oh- you- you nutter. You caring, terrible nutter, you. I can- how do you do that?"
"Do what?"
"Put up with me and still have enough left over to be thoughtful?"
Doug jerked one shoulder up, but at least he didn't look as sad. "Trial and error, I suppose."
Wheatley tapped the tips of the boots together with belated glee. He glanced to Doug. "So did you miss me?"
It had the intended affect. He startled, turned, scanned him intently, then practically melted. "Yeah." It was a terrible noise that left his chest rather than a fully formed word. "Yes, Wheatley. I missed you."