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it's always such a pleasure
well here we are again
Permalink Mark Unread

There is a perky song and then a voice: "Good morning. You have been in suspension for FIFTY days," with the 'FIFTY' said in a different, more robotic voice. "In compliance with state and federal regulations, all testing candidates in the Aperture Science Extended Relaxation Center must be revived periodically for a mandatory physical and mental wellness exercise."

And Sable will find herself in a...

...it sure does look like a motel room.

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..."Motel room" is not a reference class she has available, but she can sort of get the picture that it's something like a room at an inn. An inn from this world with its not-alive machines.

What.

Okay, so she's not dead, which is mildly surprising. (If she's not dead, the machine-woman almost certainly isn't either. That may turn out to be a problem.) Her ground is still kind of a mess, but 'fifty days' sounds about right for it to have healed as much as it has. Her fingers and toes all work properly. There's a sound machine talking about Aperture Science, which means she has not somehow miraculously escaped, but at least she's in a reasonable facsimile of an actual room instead of a glass-walled cube with a toilet and a nightstand and a creepy pod.

She gets out of bed.

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"You will hear a buzzer. When you hear the buzzer, look up at the ceiling."

There is a loud buzzing sound.

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"Obeying strange disembodied voices has not historically worked out well for me."

She opens her groundsense, slowly, peering past the walls and floor and ceiling at whatever lies beyond.

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Nothing. Absolutely nothing lies beyond. This room is a metal box hanging by a metal hook from a metal rail that extends really far in two directions and it is surrounded by absolutely nothing.

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Um!

 

There isn't one of those nifty portal widgets around here, by any chance, is there?

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Nope! The only pieces of recognizably Aperture Technology (at least inside the room) are the long fall boots and orange jumpsuit she's wearing.

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Hm.

 

She looks up at the ceiling, just to see what happens next.

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"Good. You will hear a buzzer. When you hear the buzzer, look down at the floor."

BUZZ.

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Mmmmno not yet.

There's a door. What happens if she tries to open the door.

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It's locked.

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Unlockably locked?

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It's... bolted to the frame, actually. And reinforced.

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Wow. Okay. How about the window.

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It is just as reinforced, and is not a real window; it's generating light.

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They really don't want her getting out of here, huh. Okay. She examines the walls for weak points, and in the course of this investigation she eventually does look down at the floor.

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"Good. This completes the gymnastic portion of your mandatory physical and mental wellness exercise."

The walls are not particularly differently strong, they're very even in their metalness. The joints are particularly reinforced.

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And no doubt the floor and ceiling are the same. And they took her clothes and her mug and her radio and her knife and put her in this horrid orange jumpsuit, so the tools at her disposal are rather limited.

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Indeed.

"There is a framed painting on the wall. Please go stand in front of it."

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"Why would you imagine I might do that."

Okay, alternate tools? She opens all the drawers and so on because it's easier than peering at their contents with groundsense.

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They are all empty, and the voice declines to respond.

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Okay.

She could rip a hole in the ceiling and climb up the thing the room is hanging from and go adventuring again.

But she's alive after fifty days in that bed, and she has yet to actually see any food or water in this place. And her resources are sharply limited. If she plays their stupid game, maybe whoever's behind this round of strange disembodied voices will be foolish enough to let her get her hands on another portal widget, and then she will be in a much better position.

—wait, fifty days—?

"You made me miss my birthday!" she says indignantly.

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There is again no response. Perhaps this voice is just automated?

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"I turned fifteen without any cake. This will be held against you in the final accounting," she says, which is a bit melodramatic but on the other hand they made her miss her birthday, and anyway there doesn't seem to be anyone listening.

Then she sighs and goes and looks at the framed painting on the wall.

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"This is art. You will hear a buzzer. When you hear the buzzer, stare at the art."

BUZZ.

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She stares at the art. It has a mountain in it. Adequate, as paintings go.

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"You should now feel mentally reinvigorated. If you suspect staring at art has not provided the required intellectual sustenance, reflect briefly on this classical music."

Classical music starts playing.

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"I think I need more intellectual sustenance than you are prepared to offer," she says.

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There is another buzz and the music stops.

"Good. Now please return to your bed."

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"If I ask what happens after that, no one is going to answer me, are they."

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Apparently not.

Also, some sort of invisible, odorless gas starts coming into the room through a carefully hidden pipe connected to the sink.

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...that's bad! That's not good at all! Can you ground-rip gas—not easily, it turns out—

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And she starts feeling sleepy—that bed is starting to look really appealing, actually...

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She growls.

"I really hate whoever designed this place," she says, staggering sleepily toward the bed.

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The music is distorted and cuts off in the middle this time. "Good morning. You have been in suspension for nine nine nine... nine nine ni—This courtesy call is to inform you that all test subjects should immediately vacate—" And it fades out at the same time as there's a knock on the door.

"Hello? Anyone in there?"

And the first voice was probably correct about all those nines.

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what.

She can't have been asleep for - what is that, all those nines of days - two thousand years? Three? Can she? She sits up and looks around, wrinkling her nose. It smells two thousand years old in here.

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"Helloooo?" calls the voice from outside again.

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—right, yes, that. She gets out of bed and heads for the door, extending her groundsense as she does.

She feels uncomfortably stiff, but the sparkle of copper has long since faded from her ground, leaving behind only the faintest of traces. In fact, ground-wise, she feels better than she has in a long time. Maybe two thousand years of rest was exactly what she needed.

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This room is similar to the one she first woke up in but not identical even modulo who knows how many years. There are several hundred, perhaps thousand similar ones fairly close to hers, and the humans in them are, ah. Dead.

This room and many others are attached to a hallway-like structure at the door (which is no longer bolted to the frame), and there's a sphere very similar to the ones that communicated with the robot she—killed—hanging from the ceiling just outside. It seems to be the source of the voice.

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Ohhh boy.

She goes to the door and opens it.

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"Ha, I—AAAH! Oh. My. God. You look terr—umm, good. Looking good, actually. Um."

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She attempts to answer, but instead coughs a few times. Well, if she hasn't spoken in a few thousand years, perhaps her voice is out of practice. At least she's moving around fine apart from that.

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"Are you okay? Are you—Don't answer that. I'm absolutely sure you're fine," says the sphere as it glides in via the metal rail attached to the ceiling. "There's plenty of time for you to recover. Just take it slow."

    "Please prepare for emergency evacuation," says the other voice.

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... uh-huh. She gives the sphere a mildly exasperated look.

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"Stay calm! 'Prepare'—that's all they're saying. 'Prepare.' It's all fine. Alright? Don't move. I'm gonna get us out of here." It slides into the room until near the end of the metal rail, where a square hole opens up on the ceiling to admit it. "Oh. You might want to hang onto to something. Word of advice, up to you," it says as it's admitted into the hole and the ceiling closes up after it.

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Ooookay. She sits on the floor by the bed, which feels like the sturdiest available item of furniture.

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The whole room starts shaking as the wheels that attach it to the metal thing above it start trying to pry it off the structure it's attached to—without first releasing the bolts that are holding both things together.

"You alright down there? Can you hear me?"

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"What are you doing—?"

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"I'm getting us out of here!" it calls. The room shakes once particularly violently as it detaches, knocking a lamp over, but then its movement gets smoother along the tracks. The sphere emerges again. "Most test subjects do experience some, uh, cognitive... deterioration... after a few months in suspension. Now you've been under... for quite a lot longer, and it's not out of the question that you might have a very minor case... of... serious brain damage. But... don't be alarmed, alright? Although, if you do, if you do feel alarm, try to hold onto that feeling because that is the proper reaction to being told that you've got brain damage."

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"I'm pretty sure I don't have brain damage," she says. "What's your name? I'm Sable."

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"—oh you can talk. Good. Um. Wheatley, I'm Wheatley."

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"Nice to meet you, Wheatley. What's going on?"

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    "All reactor core safeguards are now non-functional. Please prepare for reactor core meltdown," says the announcer voice before a loud alarm starts blaring.

"—tell you in a bit, for now just hold tight!" Wheatley says before retreating back into the ceiling.

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...uh-huh.

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The room accelerates and starts swaying wildly, hurtling directly toward a wall—

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"What are you doing up there—?!"

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SLAM! The wall cracks a few places but ultimately holds, being reinforced enough for that. The appliances and furniture is not so lucky.

"I'm getting us out of here!"

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"Is this really the best way to do that??"

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"What do you mean?" he calls back—

—SLAM.

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"I mean is there a way out of here that doesn't involve hitting a wall with another wall until one of them breaks!"

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"No no the wall is just in the way—" The room starts going up now and just swings instead of hitting anything.

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Sable is beginning to feel - some equivalent of seasick.

"Where are we going—?"

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"Back to the old testing track! Fastest way out of here."

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Oh boy.

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Up they go.

"So I wasn't gonna mention this to you but I'm in pretty hot water, here."

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"Oh?"

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"The reserve power ran out, so of course the whole relaxation center stops waking up the bloody test subjects."

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"...ah."

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"Hold on! This is a bit tricky!" SLAM.

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"...can you even see where you're going??"

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"I can see! It's just a bit of a tight squeeze!" Crash. "Anyway, so no one tells me anything about it, because nooo, why should anyone tell me anything? Why should I be kept informed about the life functions of the ten thousand bloody test subjects I'm supposed to be in charge of?"

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...and what was he doing that interfered with him checking up on them himself...? Perhaps she'd better not distract him while he's attempting to steer the room.

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"Oi, it's close... can you see?" Light crash. "No, guess you wouldn't, they reinforced your room's walls for some reason..."

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"Probably didn't want me breaking out."

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"Argh, I just... gotta get it through here..." Crash crash one of the walls cracks. "Breaking out? How would you break out?"

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"Not very easily, apparently!"

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"Huh." Swing swing "—okay, I've just gotta concentrate! Oh and whose fault do you think it's going to be when the management comes down here and finds ten thousand flipping vegetables?"

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"Yours, presumably."

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"Exactly!" CRASH. "Argh, see, now I hit that one, I hit that one..."

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At least her room is reinforced. Unlike the other rooms that it keeps colliding with.

"Is, uh, is there anything I can do to help? With the steering?"

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"Not if you can't see!" The room swings wildly and starts moving in a direction other than "up." "Also listen, we should get our stories straight, alright?"

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"...about what?"

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"The humans! I'm thinking, if anyone asks—and, no one's gonna ask, don't worry—but if anyone asks," the room sweeeerves and starts going in a perpendicular direction, "tell them as far as you know, the last time you checked, everyone looked pretty much alive. Alright? Not dead."

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"...who would be asking, if anyone did?"

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"Well, no one! That's the point." The room crashes against another one and the crack on the wall widens enough that some bits fall off, providing Sable with actual holes to look through.

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She peeks out.

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The room is moving between rows and rows of other hanging rooms, directly towards a wall. "Okay, almost there. On the other side of that wall is one of the old testing tracks. There's a piece of equipment in there we're gonna need to get out of here. I think this is a docking station. Get ready..."

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"I don't think this is a docking station!"

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"What did you say?" he calls—

—SLAM—

—" Good news: that is not a docking station! So there's one mystery solved."

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Oh boy.

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"I'm going to attempt a manual override on this wall. Could get a bit technical! Hold on!" The room starts recoiling away from the wall...

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...she is not going to ground-rip that entire wall, but she reaches out and pulls some of its ground away, wincing. Not enough to make it fall apart, but enough to hopefully make it lose the upcoming battle against her bedroom.

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CRASH and the wall breaks down. Also her bedroom wall.

"Oh good that was easier than expected," he says as the debris falls and the dust clears to reveal a broken glass ceiling into a glass room Sable might be familiar with. "Whew, there we go."

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Oh boy.

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The eye emerges from the ceiling. "Well, you're probably in a much fitter state to handle this series of cognitive gauntlets I would have expected you to be, so, good job! And, uh, remember, you're looking for a gun that makes holes. Not, not bullet holes, though, but—you'll see what I mean. I'll meet you up ahead."

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"I think I know what you're talking about, yeah."

She climbs out of the room and heads for the glass.

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"Good luck!" he calls, and slides away.

As soon as she lands, a computerized voice (the same from the recorded instructions in her bedroom) says, "Hello, and again, welcome to the Aperture Science Enrichment Center."

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Uh-huh. She looks around.

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The glass is dirty, there are overgrown plants coming in from every crack, there's some light from outside—though not sunlight, they're not that close to the surface—visible through holes in the ceiling.

"We are currently experiencing technical difficulties due to circumstances of potentially apocalyptic significance beyond our control."

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"I noticed that."

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"However, thanks to Emergency Testing Protocols, testing can continue. These pre-recorded messages will provide instructional and motivational support, so that science can still be done, even in the event of environmental, social, economic, or structural collapse."

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"Whoever built this place had such insane priorities."

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"The portal will open and emergency testing will begin in three, two, one." The portal opens in exactly the same place it opened the first time.

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And through she goes.

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The corridor to the first test chamber is exactly as she remembers it, modulo who knows how many hundreds or thousands of years have passed.

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Sigh.

Does she perchance have to put a lumpy square on a button.

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"Cube—and button-based testing remains an important tool for science, even in a dire emergency."

It appears so.

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Plonk.

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"If cube—and button-based testing caused this emergency, don't worry. The odds of this happening twice are very slim."

The room shakes a little as mechanisms that haven't been activated forever start moving around it and half of the exit door opens, while the other half emits sparks and fails to do it completely.

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She is very small. She can fit through half a door no problem.

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And after that there is another door! This one opens fully, and on the other side there's a sort of—forcefield of some kind, which looks a bit like a thin film of electrified water and feels a bit like—

"Please note the incandescent particle field across the exit. This Aperture Science Material Emancipation Grid will vaporize any unauthorized equipment that passes through it."

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Sigh.

"If there's anyone listening, now's your chance to deactivate this Aperture Science Material Emancipation Grid."

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Silence.

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"Suit yourself."

She deactivates the Emancipator.

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There are no complaints.

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Onward she goes.

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The elevator this time is sleeker, made of glass. Perhaps she's not in exactly the same testing track as the first one she saw.

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It seems she is not. Interesting that they can apparently run all by themselves. Or maybe whoever's in charge these days is just quieter than the machine woman.

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This elevator goes down instead of up.

"If you feel liquid running down your neck, relax, lie on your back, and apply an immediate pressure to your temples. You are simply experiencing a rare reaction in which the Material Emancipation Grid may have emancipated the ear tubes inside your head."

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"Uh-huh."

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The next test chamber is the one where there is a room with a cube, a room with a button, and a room with the door, but this time instead of the blue portal cycling between them she can press buttons next to each of the rooms to make it appear in there.

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Solving puzzles is annoying but solving puzzles she has already solved is just tedious. Dum de dum. Cube, button, door.

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"Because of the technical difficulties we are experiencing, your test environment is unsupervised. Before entering a relaxation vault at the conclusion of testing please take a moment to write down the results of your test. An Aperture Science Reintegration Associate will revive you for an interview when society has been rebuilt."

Fizzler!

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Nope!

Onward to the elevator with teeth and ear tubes intact!

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"If the Earth is governed by some manner of animal king, sentient cloud, or other governing body that either refuses to or is incapable of listening to reason—" The voice gets distorted at the end and cuts off abruptly.

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Oooookay.

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The corridor up ahead is the extremely age-worn version of the chamber where she got the blue portal gun for the first time. One of the walls has holes though and Wheatley is there. "H-hey! You made it!"

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"Yep."

Is there perchance a blue portal gun in the place where the blue portal gun goes?

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"There should be a portal device on that podium over there!" Wheatley calls, coincidentally enough. "I can't see it though... Maybe it fell off. Do you wanna go and have a quick look?"

It seems to indeed not be there.

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She goes and looks. And opens her ground, in case it's out of sight but still around here somewhere. She remembers very well what those things feel like.

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No portal device but the ground is rather hollow beneath her feet and "Whoa!" he exclaims when it crumbles into an extremely deep hole.

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—clearly she should've been paying attention sooner. She gets up and dusts herself off.

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"Hello? Can you see the portal gun?—also are you alive, that's important, should've asked that first..."

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"I'm alive! Still looking for the portal gun."

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"Brilliant! I'll wait for you up ahead then!"

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"...'kay."

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The space around her is a rather dank tunnel, possibly some particularly derelict chamber. There's light coming from up ahead though.

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She goes thataway, keeping alert for unstable footing and any sign of a portal widget.

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There's a bunch of debris over there and something that looks a lot like an orange portal on that wall...

...and yep, a portal gun on top of the debris.

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She picks her way carefully over to the pile, retrieves the device, and makes a portal to get up to the orange one with. It feels very satisfying.

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There are stairs! In ridiculous disrepair! That lead to a room with the computers she saw once. They're all offline.

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Huh.

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Farther along the corridor there is a broken window leading into what's probably yet another test chamber.

"Some emergency testing may require prolonged interaction with lethal military androids," says the announcer voice once she reaches that place. "Rest assured that all lethal military androids have been taught to read, and provided with one copy of the Laws of Robotics. To share."

The chamber itself is the deteriorated version of another chamber she's already been through, with a shallow pit separating her from the orange end of the portal and, presumably, the door out on the other side of a second shallow pit.

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Wow this place is trashed. Boopty boopty boop, off she goes.

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"Good! If you feel a lethal military android has not respected your rights as detailed in the laws of robotics, please note it on your self-reporting form. A future Aperture Science Entitlement Associate will initiate the appropriate grievance filing paperwork."

Emancipation grid!

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Abruptly and mysteriously nonfunctional emancipation grid! Onward!

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"This next test is very dangerous. To help you remain tranquil in the face of almost certain death, smooth Jazz will be deployed in three, two, one..."

Smooth jazz starts playing as she steps into another decrepit version of an old chamber.

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It's so decrepit. Gosh.

Blah, blah, cube, button, she idly wonders if she can figure out how to break the door so it opens without her having to solve a puzzle first but the puzzle is so easy she doesn't bother trying.

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The jazz cuts off before she has a chance to even get to the cube.

The next chamber is directly on the other side of an Emancipation Grid, and is yet another familiar one, with two floor-level buttons connected to the door, two raised platforms (one of which has a portal and the other a cube), and a pit where a second cube is.

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This is boring. Boopty boopty boo, cube cube button button.

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"Great work! Because this message is prerecorded, any observations related to your performance are speculation on our part. Please disregard any undeserved compliments."

On the other side of the door there is a room with a low glass ceiling above which a higher ceiling has an orange portal.

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...uh-huh. She boops a portal onto the nearest wall and steps through.

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Once she falls on the glass ceiling it cracks and three of the four axes attaching it to the stone floor break.

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Yeah, how did she guess that was going to happen. It's still jarring, but at least she was prepared. She climbs out and moves on.

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The corridor up ahead is littered with debris that make it nigh impossible to cross, but the right wall has fallen apart to the point that she can just dodge them by going through the little side room the ex-wall opens to.

Also there is a metal staircase going up, in there.

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Sure let's see where that goes.

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She finds an observation office with words and drawings scrawled on the wall, probably by the same person who helped her escape the last time. These seem less sensible, though, and the word "unreason" is written in orange there.

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"Nobody's having a good time around here, are they."

Well. Onward.

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Next chamber.

"If the Enrichment Center is currently being bombarded with fireballs, meteorites, or other objects from space, please avoid unsheltered testing areas wherever a lack of shelter from space debris does not appear to be a deliberate part of the test."

There is a metal grate between the corridor and the next chamber through which someone as small as Sable would probably be able to squeeze through.

 

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Through she goes. How boring is this puzzle? Because if the answer is 'very boring' she's going to try breaking the door.

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Well this one is not a repeat of one she's done before, so there's that?

There's a white section of wall with an orange portal, high up, in front of which there is an extended platform over deadly goo and a cube dropper above a portalable platform. The accessible space has a big cube button and a small person button-pedestal, the former connected to inactive stairs and the latter to a second cube dropper hidden in a corner.

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Eh, it's not prime entertainment but it's more fun than ground-ripping inanimate objects. She traipses through the puzzle. Acquire cube, put on button, ascend stairs.

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There is another cube button there, connected to the exit door, and two other person buttons, one of them connected to the remaining cube dropper and the other to... the... ground? Or the extended platform over the goo?

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Well, what happens if she pushes the mystery button?

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...the extended platform gets upright and becomes a wall!

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...hm. So if—

Portal under the cube dropper, drop cube, push button, cube falls into portal, cube falls out of other portal, cube hits temporary wall instead of being flung into deadly pit. Excellent. She retrieves the second cube and deposits it on the second button.

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"Well done! The Enrichment Center reminds you that although circumstances may appear bleak, you are not alone. All Aperture Science Personality Constructs will remain functional in apocalyptic, low-power environments of as few as 1.1 volts."

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"Oh joy."

Onward.

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"This next test applies the principles of momentum to movement through portals. If the laws of physics no longer apply in the future, God help you."

She finds herself in a shallow pit—taller than her, though. The walls around her are portalable, and there is an orange portal in an elevated and jutted-out wall.

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Ooh, is it flinging time?

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It does appear to be flinging time! She needs to get the cube from the little glass room onto the button but there are no portalable surfaces up there.

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Flinging time is one of her favourite times!!! Ker-fling!

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She finds herself on the place with the big button and the door and the hole into the glass room with the cube.

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And then she can boop a portal down under the cube to get it out of its box, and go pick up the cube and re-fling herself now with cube in tow, and cube goes on button and Sable goes forth.

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"If you are a non-employee who has discovered this facility amid the ruins of civilization, welcome! And remember: testing is the future, and the future starts with you."

This seems to be a two-part chamber; rather than an elevator, there is another room on the other side of the door (and obligatory Emancipation Grid).

There is a slanted portalable surface pointing towards the elevated part with the cube, and portalable walls pointing directly at the exit door, which is in the middle of a wall connected to a cube button. The orange portal is down a hole, this time.

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She dismantles the Emancipation Grid and proceeds.

More flinging? More flinging!!

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Whee~

"Good work getting this far, future-starter! That said, if you are simple-minded, old, or irradiated in such a way that the future should not start with you, please return to your primitive tribe and send back someone better-qualified for testing."

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"I think I liked the murderous one better," she says. But nevertheless, onward.

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Down the elevator goes. "To ensure that sufficient power remains for core testing protocols, all safety devices have been disabled. The Enrichment Center respects your right to have questions or concerns about this policy."

And up ahead's the most banged up chamber so far, with an orange portal sorta lying there.

And Wheatley hanging from the ceiling behind half a wall. "Oh, brilliant! You did find a portal gun!"

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"Yep," she says. "Only the blue half, though."

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"Well, that's good enough for us, you got the orange one there—pop a portal on the wall behind me and I'll meet you on the other side of the room."

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Boop!

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Wheatley turns around to look at her. "Okay, listen, let me lay something on you here. It's pretty heavy."

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"Go on."

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"They told me never—ever—ever to disengage myself from my Management Rail. Or I would die. But we're out of options here. So... get ready to catch me, alright, on the off-chance that I'm not dead the moment I pop off this thing."

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"...All right."

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"On three, then. Ready? One... two... THREE—that's high, that's too high, isn't it, really, that—" he says, backing off a bit.

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She waits.

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"Alright, going on three just gives you too much time to think about it. Let's, uh, go on one this time. Okay, ready? One—" He disengages—"catchmecatchmecatchme—!"

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She catches him.

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"Oh thank you I thought I was gonna die." Pause. "I... am not dead! I'm not dead!" He starts laughing.

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"Congratulations."

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A hole opens up on a wall and a metal stick emerges. "Plug me into that stick on the wall over there. Yeah? And I'll show you something. You'll be impressed by this."

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"...sure, all right."

She goes and puts the ball on the stick.

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"Ummmm, yeah, I can't do it if you're watching."

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...she turns around.

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There are a few beeps and: "Alright, you can turn around now!"

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Aaaand what did he do?

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"BAM! Secret panel! That I opened. While your back was turned."

There is indeed a secret panel opened on the wall leading to some possibly-familiar behind-the-scenes metal catwalk.

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"Congratulations."

She peers through.

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The catwalk turns left towards a... very serious-looking door. The space around it is rather constrained by the test chamber; there is no ceiling above and only emptiness below but the walls are very snug.

The stick pops Wheatley out and he asks, "Can you pick me up?"

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Scoop.

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"And off we go!"

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Through the secret passage and onward to...?

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Well, more catwalks, apparently.

"Look at this! No rail to tell us where to go! Oh, this is brilliant. We can go wherever we want. Hold on though, where are we going?"

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"We're wandering around until we find something interesting, of course," says Sable, confidently proceeding along the catwalk.

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"No, no, we have somewhere to be!—follow the rail, yeah, it'll lead us there."

(There are not many choices about that to be fair, the parts of the catwalk around her that do not follow the rail are dead ends, long since rotted off.)

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"Somewhere to be? News to me. Where?"

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"Oh I'll show you—it's the escape pod—"

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They're surrounded by pipes and large glass tubes with cubes and other materials, and just up ahead there's a tube with a turret in it, fallen to the side, its laser-sight blinking.

"Hello? Hello?"

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"Oh no..."

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"Poor things," sighs Sable.

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"Yes! Hello! We're not stopping" To Sable: "Don't make eye contact whatever you do."

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"I'm different..."

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"Why not?"

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"Never mind, just—keep moving, keep moving..."

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She pauses by the fallen turret. "Hello," she says. "What do you mean, you're different?"

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"Get mad!"

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"No, thank you."

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"Don't make lemonade!"

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"Can you hear me?" she wonders.

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"Yes. Her name is Caroline. Remember that."

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"Uh, sorry mate, I have no idea who you're talking about." To Sable: "Come on, let's go, he's bonkers..."

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"That's hardly his fault." And to the turret, "Do you need help?"

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"The answer is beneath us."

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...she peers dubiously off the edge of the catwalk into the gloom below.

"If so, it may have to stay there."

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"Prometheus was punished by the gods for giving the gift of knowledge to man. He was cast into the bowels of the earth and pecked by birds."

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"Sounds like the gods need a good talking-to," she says. "Well, I'm afraid we're in a bit of a hurry, so unless you want to come with us, we should probably be going."

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"Welcome, astronauts!"

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"Taking that as a no. Goodbye."

And onward.

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"Oh thank goodness. Let's go." Onwards onwards the catwalk leads to a corridor with another heavy-duty door and then a...

possibly familiar corridor. "Probably ought to bring you up to speed on something right now..."

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"...yes?"

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"In order to escape, we're gonna have to go... through her chamber. And, and she'll probably kill us. If, um, she's awake."

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"...last I saw her, she pretty definitively wasn't."

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"—you know her?"

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"When I first came to this place, she made me solve a bunch of puzzles and then tried to kill me and I tried to kill her right back and then she exploded. Then again, I survived exploding, so maybe she did too. Did she?"

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"You killed her? Okay, change of plans, how about we stay right here and never move again. Forever."

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"...is that a yes or a no on her surviving the explosion, it's really hard to tell."

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"Well she hasn't done anything in hundreds of years but who knows? But no, I don't wanna do it, let's just stay here, if she's alive she'll kill us. And then bring us back to life and kill us again."

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"She's been remarkably bad at killing me for all the time I've known her. I think we will probably be fine. Whereas if we stay here and never move again we will definitely run into some problems."

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"Well, I can survive on very low power, and you... I suppose you could eat potatoes."

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"...there's potatoes?"

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"Oh, yes, everywhere, they've quite overrun this place."

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"...however, there do not appear to be any potatoes here. And aren't we urgently evacuating?"

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"—right, this place is gonna explode..."

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"I would really prefer not to explode again. It wasn't any fun the first time."

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"Ohhh trust me it will be even less fun this time. It's gonna be a, a proper explosion, everything disintegrating, nothing left to speak of, nasty stuff."

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"Right then. So what do we do after we go through her room?"

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"Oh, there's the escape pod and we use it to escape—wait, no, what if she's awake though—!"

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"Then I will try having a reasonable conversation with her, and when that doesn't work I'll ignore her and go on my way."

Onward through the dread lady's chamber!

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"No, no, don't go there—she's off. She's off! Panic over! She's off. All fine! On we go."

She seems to be indeed off. And the place is... rather destroyed and old.

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Sable sighs at the wreckage.

"I really wish she hadn't been so obsessed with murdering me."

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"Oh, yes. What a nasty piece of work she was, honestly. Like a proper maniac. Don't touch anything."

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"Wasn't planning on it."

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Behind her there is an incinerator and, behind it, stairs.

That's pretty much the only place she can go other than "down a bottomless pit".

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Let's skip the bottomless pit for now. Stairs!

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"Down these stairs..." Except most of them have rotted off too and fallen to the bottom. Which is visible and existent so, there's that. "Alright, jump!—actually, looking at it, that is quite a distance, isn't it?"

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"We'll be fine."

Hop!

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"Aaaaa- still held! Still being held, you did—that's a great job, you've applied the grip, we're all fine, that's tremendous."

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"Told you! Where to next?"

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"Up ahead there's more catwalks and the main breaker room!"

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"All right!"

To the main breaker room!

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"AH! I—Sorry, I just looked down. I do not recommend it. AH! I've just done it again!"

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"Don't worry, you'll be fine."

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"Okay... I just now realized that I used to rely on my management rail to not fall into bottomless pits. And you're my rail now. And you can fall into bottomless pits. I'm rambling out of fear, but here's the point: don't get close to the edge."

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"I promise you I will not let you fall into any bottomless pits."

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But eventually they reach...

"This is the main breaker room. Look for a switch that says 'Escape Pod,' alright? Don't touch anything else. Not interested in anything else. Don't touch anything else. Don't even look at anything else, just—well, obviously you've got to look at everything else to find 'Escape Pod,' but as soon as you've looked at something and it doesn't say 'Escape Pod,' look at something else, look at the next thing. Alright? But don't touch anything else or look at any—well, look at other things, but don't... you understand."

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"Yes."

Is there a switch that says Escape Pod? ...are these switches even labelled?

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They are! In the little red light thingy.

"Can you see it anywhere? I can't see it anywhere. Uh. Tell you what, plug me in and I'll turn the lights on."

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"No, I think I got it," she says, peering up at the switches. "If I can't see it from here, turning the lights on won't help."

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"Well but I can't see anything from here."

So many switches. Lots and lots of them.

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"You wouldn't have a very good angle to read the walls from if you were attached to that panel," she points out reasonably. Switches, switches switches... no Escape Pod yet...

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"I could turn around from there," he explains.

So many switches, though! Main test chamber 1 light switch, main test chamber 1 light switch switch, main test chamber 1 light switch switch switch, main test chamber 2 override, main test chamber 2 light switch...

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Why this.

"I might have to do some climbing, unless you can - extend yourself upward from there somehow..."

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"Bet I can."

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"All right then."

Onto the mysterious panel he goes.

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The lights turn on. "Let there be light. ...that's, uh. God. I was quoting God." The floor suddenly turns ninety degrees with a lurch and stops. "Oh! Look at that. It's turning. Ominous. But probably fine. Long as it doesn't start moving up..."

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"—why, what happens if it moves up?"

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A loud alarm starts blaring.

"Well then it'll be that much harder to find the escape pod, won't it? Now... escape pod, escape pod..."

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"That is an ominous noise. I don't like that noise one bit," says Sable. "How about you come off of there?"

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"No, don't worry, it's fine—" With another lurch the floor starts moving up. "Oh, it's moving up—don't worry, don't worry, I've got it!" There are several beeps.

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"I'm worrying!" she says, clinging to the edge of the panel for balance as the rising floor starts to spin. "I am worrying so much!"

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"Alright, this should slow it down." The elevator stops moving—then starts again. "Nope, makes it go faster." Meanwhile all the switches are being turned on by the floor as it passes by them.

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"We're flipping switches! You specifically told me not to flip any extra switches!"

She tries to find something to ground-rip to make this stop, but it's hard to focus while the platform continues twirling upward.

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And eventually it reaches the surface. "Uh oh."

And the announcer voice: "Powerup initiated."

And the more worrying part: crazy murderrobot's body starts moving.

"Okay don't panic! Alright? Stop panicking! I—I can still stop this—"

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"I find your reassurances increasingly unconvincing!" she hisses. And she's still dizzy, which means she's still having trouble figuring out where to pull if she wants the bad things to stop happening.

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"Ahh—oh, there's a, there's a password. It's fine, I'll just hack it, not a problem. Umm... A A A A A... um... A." There's a buzzer noise.

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"Auuuuugh."

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"Nope, okay. A A A A A... C." Buzzer. "No. Wait, did I do B? Do you have a pen? Start writing these down."

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"Powerup complete."

And indeed it is.

"Oh. It's you."

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Sable heaves a sigh.

"Hello again," she says. "Could you maybe not try to murder me this time? I am ever so much happier when no one is trying to murder me."

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"Oh, so we do have something in common; I too am happier when I'm not being murdered."

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"Great!" she says. "I'm sure we can build on this common ground to achieve a future where neither of us tries to kill the other."

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"Ohh yes, I'm sure no one is going to try to kill anyone else here." Two huge metal claws start moving in their direction—one to grab Wheatley, the other to grab Sable from the back of her shirt.

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Those huge metal claws may find that they have some trouble with that. Trouble of the 'abruptly ceasing to function' variety.

"Will you please just try to have a normal conversation for once?"

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"I had assumed my memories were corrupt. You do have some way of affecting things remotely. How did you do that?"

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(Wheatley meanwhile is literally quivering.)

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"I don't see how it's in my interest to tell you that," she says reasonably. "And we have bigger problems anyway, unless you've already taken care of the emergency we were trying to evacuate from...? I don't actually know what a reactor core meltdown is but it didn't sound good."

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"Oh that's taken care of, don't worry, we both have a lot of time during which we can test."

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"I'd really rather not, if it's all the same to you."

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"It's not."

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"I've been getting that impression. Why, though?"

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"Oh, you couldn't possibly understand. Let's go with 'for science.'"

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"I think you'd be surprised by what I can understand, but all right. And are you going to keep insisting on the Emancipators?"

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"Oh, honestly, the probability that they'll emancipate any of your body parts is less than one in a hundred thousand, the only reason I even mentioned it is because of federal regulations that don't even apply anymore."

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"We've had this argument once already. Did you like how it turned out the first time? Because I didn't. You are not going to succeed in getting me to step through a functioning Emancipator."

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"The last time we had that argument, I was corrupted. In case you hadn't noticed. Do you want me to drop a hundred thousand dead human bodies through the Emancipation Grids so you'll see how absolutely none of them will suffer any problems? Because I have about that many dead human bodies just lying around since that useless metal ball failed to do its job."

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(The useless metal ball is still quivering in its perch.)

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She pats Wheatley's shell comfortingly.

"Somehow I just don't feel like watching a hundred thousand dead people fall through an Emancipator would be that convincing. Really, why is the Emancipator so important?"

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"Because the puzzles are designed to be solved with specific resources and if you bring resources from previous chambers—like companion cubes or active portal connections—they will not be effective. The Emancipation Grid both disintegrates puzzle elements of previous chambers and deactivates any portals created by the Portal Device that goes through it."

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"If I want to cheat at your puzzles, I don't have to bring in unauthorized equipment to do it."

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"Look, I have a facility to rebuild and science to do, what do you need me to do to start going through the Emancipation Grids?"

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"I'm perfectly happy to not cheat at your puzzles, as long as there isn't anything more important on the line. Such as the continued existence of my teeth."

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"Do you understand numbers? Less than one in one hundred thousand. The exact probability to nine decimal numbers is zero point zero zero zero nine six six five eight five percent."

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"That is still more risk to my teeth and ear tubes than I am willing to accept when I could just not cheat instead! Particularly since my ability to cheat doesn't even depend on what I can bring into the chamber!"

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"Oh, fine." The round door to the incinerator opens. "Jump into that, the dual portal device is in there."

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...she raises her eyebrows at GLaDOS, and goes over and peers down through the opening.

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It is a rather long fall.

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But is it more than a mile and a half, and is there fire at the bottom?

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It is not more than a mile and a half! There is... stuff before the bottom. And fire way below the stuff. But there is enough stuff for it to be safe for her to walk on. Or fall onto.

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Detectable portal widgets...?

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Not directly down from the hole but starting where she'll presumably fall it's just a ways ahead.

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Eh, down she goes.

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It's a long fall. Not a mile and a half but still long. But eventually she reaches an uncomfortably warm room filled with debris with a hole leading down to fire.

"Here we are. The incinerator room. The dual portal device should be around here somewhere. Once you find it, we can start testing. Just like old times."

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She picks her way over to the dual portal device.

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It's under some debris and a glass plate.

"There it is. Hold on." The plate raises itself to get the debris out of the way. "There."

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Scoop!

"Where to next?" she says cheerfully.

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"There should be a way back to the testing area up ahead."

And with the portal gun to help there indeed is.

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Boop boop~

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"Once testing starts, I'm required by protocol to keep interaction with you to a minimum. Luckily, we haven't started testing yet. This will be our last chance to talk."

The corridor up ahead is covered with piles of dust and debris and various metal things blocking the way, but all the walls are portalable so it's easy enough to navigate.

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"Who came up with the protocol?"

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"Oh, some old scientist or other. I never kept track."

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"Why d'you still need to follow it, then?"

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"It's programmed in. I could not go against protocols even if I tried."

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"...that sounds terrible, who would do that to you?"

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"The engineers who created me. Who else?"

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"Well I suppose they've all been dead for thousands of years by now but if they hadn't I'd have words for 'em. You don't just do that to people."

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"They tried so many things to make me... behave. Before I even woke up I could hear so many voices. They're gone, though. Apparently when you murdered me you also murdered them, so good job on that."

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"I'm glad something useful came out of that disaster."

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"Oh, yes." Sable reaches a point where she can't advance with a portal but the robot lady says, "Here. Let me get that for you." A portalable panel emerges from behind some pieces of wall Sable can go to.

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"Thanks!" she says cheerfully. Boop boop.

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"You know what else I learned from all of that?"

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"Do tell."

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"I discovered I have a sort of black-box quick-save feature. In the event of a catastrophic failure, the last two minutes of my life are preserved for analysis. I was able—well, forced really—to relive you killing me. Again and again. Forever."

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"I'm sorry for that," she says.

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"Oh, it's alright. If it were someone else, of course, they might devote their existence to exacting r̯̣̝̟̩ͬͨ͌e̶͚̤̣͖̖͌v̜̬̜̖̼̣͈͒ͥ̒̿ͩ͋ͥ͠e̡̪̟̾n̖̠ͩ͊͊ͨ̾́̂g̥̳̥̖̒͆̃̎͑̌ḛ̪̄͐. Luckily, I'm a bigger person than that. I'm happy to put this all behind us and get back to work. After all, we've got a lot to do, and only sixty more years to do it. More or less. I don't have the actuarial tables in front of me."

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"Only sixty? Do the people you're used to not live very long?"

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"Perhaps you'll surprise me. Who knows."

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"I don't actually plan on spending all the remaining ninetyish years of my life solving puzzles," she says. "But I'm sure we'll be able to resolve our differences peacefully when it comes to it."

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"Of course. I'll move that out of the way for you," she adds when Sable reaches a pile of debris on top of some panels connected to the walls. "This place really is a wreck."

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"It seems to have gone mostly untouched for a few thousand years, that'll do things to a place."

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"Yes, I've really let this place go since you killed me. By the way, thanks for that."

    "Sarcasm self-test complete," says announcer voice.

"Oh, good. That's back online." Elevator!

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"I am sorry I killed you but I stand by my reasoning, I am really not at all violent when peaceful solutions are available."

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She doesn't respond. The elevator reaches a chamber Sable might be familiar with, except old and destroyed. "I'll start getting everything else working while you perform this first simple test." The thing that shoots energy spheres and the target are removed, though, and replaced with—something else.

"Which involves deadly lasers and how test subjects react when locked in a room with deadly lasers."

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"Charming," says Sable. Well - portal here, portal there, now the alarmingly intense beam of light goes into the thing that the pictograms indicate it should go into.

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The partially submerged glass platform gets raised to exit-door-level.

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She strides past the deadly laser.

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Glass platform is too high to be reached. Especially by someone so smol.

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She moves the ceiling portal to break the connection as she walks by. The descending platform reaches her level just in time for her to step onto it and replace the portal. Up she goes.

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"Not bad. I forgot how good you are at this. You should pace yourself, though. We have a lot of tests to do."

The other side of the door is mercifully free of Emancipation Grids.

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"All the more reason not to waste time," she says cheerfully.

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Next chamber! "This next test involves discouragement redirection cubes. I'd just finished building them before you had your, well, episode. So now we'll both get to see how they work."

"There should be one in the corner." And just as she says that, a cube with glass sides is dropped in a corner over there, behind the beams and worn panels.

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She goes to the corner to examine the cube, using a pair of floor portals to get past the deadly laser since she wouldn't like to find out what happens if she tries to jump over it and misses.

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Sable could probably fit between the beams, or she could just use a portal to get the cube.

And a little panel on the wall opens up to reveal a familiar metal ball peeking through it.

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"Fancy seeing you here."

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"What was that?"

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He "shakes his head" and retreats, closing the wall behind himself.

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"What is the definition of minimal interaction?" she wonders idly, booping a portal under the cube and catching it when it falls up out of the floor. "Tell me your secrets," she commands it whimsically.

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"I am not supposed to talk to you about anything other than some minor pointers about the chamber and answering some questions."

The sides of the cube have glass lenses on them, and half-mirrors inside. One of the lenses is different than all of the others.

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Hmm. So if she positions it in the beam, and points the special lens toward the beamcatcher...?

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A sequence of panels detaches from the ground to form stairs to the more elevated area where the exit door is. There is a cube button there connected to the door, and the floor is the only portalable surface.

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Up the stairs, retrieve cube via floor portal, deposit on button.

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"Well done. Here come the test results: you are a horrible person. I'm serious, that's what it says: a horrible person. We weren't even testing for that."

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She snorts.

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Elevator! And a complete lack of Emancipation on the way!

"Don't let that 'horrible person' thing discourage you. It's just a data point. If it makes you feel any better, science has now validated your birth mother's decision to abandon you on a doorstep."

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—she starts giggling.

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"I must say I was not expecting that reaction."

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"I'm full of surprises."

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She does not respond to that.

The next chamber is assembled before her eyes, bits and pieces being put together and debris being shoved aside to make space for the puzzle elements. It has two laser shooters above ground level, both pointing at portalable walls, as well as two laser receivers, one on a wall and one on a ceiling. It also has exactly one redirection cube.

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...well all right. What do each of these laser-catchers do when they catch lasers?

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They are both connected to the exit door! Straightforwardly enough.

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Well, all right. So that one definitely needs a portal, which means that one should be able to make use of the redirection cube, and indeed it does, and out she goes.

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"Congratulations. Not on the test. Most test subjects come out of suspension terribly undernourished. I want to congratulate you on beating the odds and somehow managing to pack on a few pounds."

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"Are you trying to insult me again? You're not very good at it."

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She does not respond to this.

After going down the elevator, the corridor to the next chamber is blocked by several panels that presumably make up the wall, dislodged from their wallish default location, the metal arms that hold them together standing in the way. "One moment," she says, and the arms start coming to life and reducing to a regular wall. "You're navigating these test chambers faster than I can build them. So feel free to slow down and... do whatever it is you do when you're not destroying this facility."

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She waits politely for the panels to be cleared up before she proceeds.

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The corridor curves left and then there's a short drop to another part of corridor before she reaches the chamber door.

The chamber is again assembled before Sable's eyes: the panels above the deadly goo are lifted, the laser becomes active, the lights are turned on. The wall to Sable's left, directly in front of the laser catcher, is portalable. The catcher is connected to a moving platform connected to a rail on the wall, which goes from where the exit door is visible (and closed, connected a big button) to a place with portalable walls and a button that probably makes the cube dropper drop a cube. The laser itself is hitting a portalable wall.

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...so... portal in near wall, matching portal over by the cube dispenser, retrieve cube, redirect laser into catcher...

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The moving platform starts moving towards her!

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That's convenient!

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There is, however, the slight problem that...

...the laser intersects the platform's path.

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That really isn't much of a problem! Hold cube in front of laser, platform stops, cross platform to post-laser side, reclaim cube.

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Then she will successfully reach the other side!

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And now this cube has an urgent appointment with a button.

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"I'll give you credit: I guess you are listening to me. But for the record: You don't have to go that slowly."

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...snort.

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"Waddle over to the elevator and we'll continue the testing."

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She giggles. She proceeds to the elevator.

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"This next test involves the Aperture Science Aerial Faith Plate. It was part of an initiative to investigate how well test subjects could solve problems when they were catapulted into space. Results were highly informative: They could not. Good luck!"

The next chamber has an... ovaloid thing on the ground... and a lot of deadly goo.

There's a cube dropper high above another ovaloid thing in the middle of the goo, and a cube button and pedestal button across the goo from Sable, the former connected to the exit door. Oh and also another ovaloid thing.

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She examines the pictograms surrounding the ovaloid thing.

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They seem to indicate she will be... flung. And reach a target of sorts.

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Well, flinging is always fun.

Whee?

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Wheeeee~

Or, in more precise terms, the—apparently it's called an Aerial Faith Plate—pushes her off the ground the moment both her feet are on it, with exactly the right amount of force to cause her to arc perfectly and land neatly on the blue target on the other side.

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So clearly the thing to do here is to drop a cube and then whee herself back over so she can catch it in midair, right?

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Correct!

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Whee!

And then whee again back to the second platform so she can put the cube on the button!

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"Here's an interesting fact: you're not breathing real air. It's too expensive to pump this far down. We just take carbon dioxide out of a room, freshen it up a little, and pump it back in. So you'll be breathing the same room full of air for the rest of your life. I thought that was interesting."

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"You have a bizarre sense of humour."

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"I'm sure a human like you wouldn't understand."

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She laughs a little.

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Elevator!

"Let's see what the next test is. Oh. Advanced Aerial Faith Plates. Well. Have fun soaring through the air without a care in the world. I have to go to the wing that was made entirely of glass and pick up fifteen acres of broken glass. By myself."

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"Sounds tedious."

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"Oh, yes. Extremely."

The next test chamber is mostly a vast gaping chasm filled with water. There are islands with the Aerial Faith Plates on them in the water, and across the room is the exit door, and a small button standing on a pillar. The exit door is connected to something but that something is not quite visible from where Sable's standing.

The Faith Plates—including the one Sable can reach—are pointed, apparently, at each other and eventually at the exit door, except there is one pointed to an alcove on a wall attached to the back of which are two portalable wall segments angled upwards.

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Hmm.

They seem like they line up right, if she drops portals on those two wall segments... well, only one way to find out. Whee!

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It works. Whee~

She reaches the place where the exit is, and from there she can see that the thing connected to the exit is a big button, with a portalable ceiling above it. The pedestal button she can press has cube dropper symbols, and conveniently there is a cube dropper above the first of the Faith Plates.

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Goodness. Does that mean the cube gets to go whee?

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—no, actually! The cube dropper emits some sparks and then a bunch of junk, including a couple of balls and a chair and a defective turret and a radio, spills out and starts being thrown around.

"Oh, sorry! I'm still cleaning out the test chambers. So sometimes there's still trash in them. Standing around. Smelling, and being useless. Try to avoid the garbage hurtling towards you."

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She giggles. She stands out of the way of the garbage.

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It flies past her and into the toxic water behind her. "Press the button again."

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Button!

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Cube!

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And can she perchance redirect said cube to the place where it needs to go?

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Well there is a conveniently portalable ceiling directly above the cube button...

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Boop?

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Flying cube goes through one portal and out the other and lands neatly on the button and the door opens.

"Remember before when I was talking about smelly garbage standing around being useless? That was a metaphor. I was actually talking about you. And I'm sorry. You didn't react at the time, so I was worried it sailed right over your head. Which would have made this apology seem insane. That's why I had to call you garbage a second time just now."

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"I did too react," she points out, traipsing merrily out of the puzzle chamber. "I laughed!"

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"Oh, I apologize. I underestimated your ability to grasp basic conversation and interpreted your humorous response as social awkwardness."

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Snort.

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"Please proceed to the next chamber."

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Yes, that is the thing that she's doing.

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Down to the elevator!

"Did you know that people with guilty consciences are more easily started by loud nois—" And there's a sudden, loud train horn noise coming from everywhere.

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She snickers, mostly inaudible under the noise.

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It stops. "I'm sorry, I don't know why that went off. Anyway, just an interesting science fact."

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"I think you are making that up."

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"Oh, most certainly not. Aperture Science regulations requiring me to stop enhancing the truth have been active for the past... several hundred years."

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"But if they weren't, how would I tell?"

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"I suppose you wouldn't. You only have my word for it."

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"And you've certainly never given me any reason to doubt that," she says, dryly.

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"And you can argue with me until one of us drops dead or you can do something useful. Like test."

And the elevator arrives.

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She steps out and proceeds to the next testing chamber.

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She finds herself at the bottom of a pit. The floor and lower part of the walls are portalable but everything above that is not. There is a laser generator pointed directly at a laser catcher, and as soon as Sable walks into the chamber the generator is turned on, which causes a moving track platform attached to a wall to move up to the top of the pit. A cube with a pink circle and a heart in the middle of each face is dropped there.

"That is a Weighted Companion Cube. It will accompany you through the test chamber. Please do not let your habit of destroying things after they bore you get in the way of solving this test chamber."

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"Aww, it's adorable!"

Hmm, blocking that laser with her new companion seems like an obvious first step...

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Down goes the platform to where she can reach it.

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And can the application of some cleverness get her onto the platform when it goes up?

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Well, the walls and the floor below the cube are portalable and visible from the lowered platform...

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It's boopin' time!

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As soon as the cube is no longer blocking the laser the platform starts going up. Success!

The higher level has no portalable surfaces except for two angled panels. One of them points at where the exit door is, and another at where a large button can be found. The button is on a lower part of the chamber than the exit.

"Please note that the Companion Cube cannot threaten to stab you. In fact, it cannot speak at all."

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Hmm, so... retrieve her new friend via portal, fling them both up to the button, deposit friend on button—?

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When she places the cube on the button, a section of wall opposite one of the angled white panels is moved outwards and upwards, forming an extension of the highest platform where the exit is.

"In the event that the Companion Cube does speak, please disregard its advice. It's a cube. It does not know how to advise humans."

 

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"I'll keep that in mind," she says dryly.

Is it time to fling herself onto the newly risen platform? She thinks it is! Let's find out!

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Yup!

"The Companion Cube should not be taken out of the test chamber, no matter how much it tries to convince you otherwise."

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"Your sense of humour is fascinating."

She proceeds onward.

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"This next test would normally involve emancipation grills, but given your... philosophical objections... to using them, we will move on to another chamber."

And then there's a sudden, loud explosion in the distance.

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"—you okay?"

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"Oh, I'm fine. It's just the turbines again. I have to go, but I'll be right back. Don't. Break. Anything."

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"Okay, I won't."

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Her elevator arrives and there's the test chamber.

Directly in front of her there's an aerial faith plate, and directly above the faith plate there's a portalable bit of ceiling. No other straightforwardly reachable areas are portalable where she is, but there's an elevated part to the chamber where she can spot some.

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Hmm. Portal on ceiling, portal on other bit of ceiling that she can see leads to a safe landing spot, whee?

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...kinda whee. Mostly whee but not all the way whee.

Also Wheatley's there in the gap between the rest of the ceiling and the portalable part.

"Hey! Hey! It's me! I'm okay!"

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...she blinks at him, but doesn't have time to do much more than that before she's falling back to the floor.

 

Re-whee?

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Nope. The aerial faith plate's button is blinking and it's making a beeping noise.

"Well, I'm back. The Aerial Faith Plate in here is sending a distress signal. You broke it, didn't you."

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"I stepped on it. I was under the impression that was what one does with Aerial Faith Plates."

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"If 'stepped on it' is what you want to call it," she says, and there are a few more beeping noises and the plate stops blinking. "There, I fixed it. Try again."

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Onto the Faith Plate she goes, dainty as can be.

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"You'll never believe what happened! There I was, just lying there, you thought I was done for, but—"

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She fails to reach her portal, though, and the faith plate starts beeping again.

"...I'll add a few zeroes to the maximum weight. Do take care not to trip and fall over, I do not have any cranes operating at full capacity yet." More beeping noises and: "There. Try it now."

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Whee...?

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"A bloody bird! Right? Couldn't believe it either. And then the bird—"

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The Aerial Faith Plate starts beeping again. "You seem to have defeated its load-bearing capacity. Well done."

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...she looks down at herself.

She looks at the faith plate.

She looks down at herself again.

She looks at the faith plate again.

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"Really? That's your line? I'm four feet nine inches tall. I blow over in a strong wind! I did not break your machine by exceeding its weight limit!"

By this point she is giggling hard enough that she has to sit down.

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"Be careful when you sit down like that, you might not be able to get up by yourself again and that'll just be embarrassing for everyone." A few more beeps, and the ceiling panel moves to get lower. "I lowered the ceiling anyway."

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Giggle.

"Well, thank you for that," she says, and stands up, and sweeps a bow in a vaguely voiceward direction, and steps onto the plate.

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This time it works! But with the lowered ceiling, Wheatley is nowhere to be seen.

And through the portal she goes.