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Chell opened her eyes to see that GLaDOS was staring at her.
“I’m getting really tired of waiting for you to wake up from near-death experiences.”
Chell rubbed her eyes and tried to shake the fog from her brain. It wasn’t budging. She realized her jaw was hanging open and her expression probably made it look like she was about to vomit. Her entire side was numb.
“Well, it could’ve been near-death,” GLaDOS modified her statement. “If I hadn’t been here to save you. You’re welcome for that.”
Chell pushed herself up and as she realized what had happened, panic seized her body in an instant.
What did she do?
She threw her legs over the side of the operating table, the robot arms swinging out of her way, and tried to stand up.
“I wouldn’t-” GLaDOS started. “Ah. So you found out the hard way.”
Chell gritted her teeth, having just managed to fall back onto the operating table and hitting her lower back in the process. She tried again; her leg muscles began to respond, and she pushed herself to her feet.
“You’re going to- I just made those stitches…”
GLaDOS kept talking, but Chell wasn’t listening. Her heartbeat was loud and alien in her ears. Her blood felt like it didn’t belong to her. Her feet gave out under her again and she gave up on walking, instead pulling herself across the floor with her hands.
She had to get away. She had to get away.
The floor was cold and smooth and the path from the operating table to the door was long. The robot arms moved out of her way, which should’ve surprised her, but all she was thinking about was that GLaDOS had done- something, and her body didn’t feel like it was hers.
Her breath rattled in her throat and she felt vomit rising in her stomach; the taste of blood and bile filled her mouth. GLaDOS was still talking, her sarcastic tone carrying over Chell’s frenzied thoughts. The sound of her voice blended with the hum of the facility until it wasn’t there at all, and it was just Chell and her fear and the terrifying breaths that she had to take.
She vomited and clutched her side, falling into fetal position. Her eyes closed. She didn’t recognize her body. She didn’t recognize herself.
“ Chell . CHELL.”
Chell’s eyes snapped open. She rolled over, but her body didn’t quite cease quaking. Her hands began to move- “No, no- What did you do, how dare you, TAKE IT BACK-” She fixated on that phrase. “TAKE IT BACK, TAKE IT BACK!”
“Chell,” GLaDOS’s voice had lost its usual biting edge, sounding almost concerned and certainly more genuine than Chell had ever heard her. “I just treated your infection and gave you stitches.”
Chell’s hand went to her side, where, through the orange jumpsuit she had been changed into, she could already tell stitches were bleeding.
“Nothing else?” She signed, still rocking slightly. “No bone stuff?”
“No. I- Listen. Clearly, I made you upset.”
“This exact thing. ” Chell signed, gritting her teeth, “ has happened to me before.”
GLaDOS became quiet. “Right. I should’ve really seen this coming…”
“ Yes. ” Chell signed the word sharply, her fist jerking up and down. She lay herself back down and gasped for air.
“I’ll give you a moment to recover.” GLaDOS said quietly. “I didn’t- I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that- I, of all - I’m sorry.”
Chell’s mind was in too weak a state to feel anything other than vague vindication at the apology. She rolled over, breathing heavily through her mouth, pressing on the stitches with her hand.
She held her eyes closed.
She heard the slight creak of GLaDOS’s chassis moving, and when she spoke next her voice was closer.
“Find something to focus on- like your breathing. You’re okay, I promise.” Her words were infused with a softness that almost sounded wrong in her voice- like if Wheatley had said something intelligent. “I promise.”
Chell didn’t have the energy to resist, and so she let herself be comforted for a moment.
“Inhale, one-two-three. Exhale, one-two-three. There you go.”
Chell opened her eyes and twisted her neck to see GLaDOS hovering a few feet away in the air.
She was surprised to find her so close, but it didn’t frighten her. She felt almost like she had run into a deer in the wild, and the two stared at each other, each trying to figure out how they felt about the distance between them. There were scrapes and smudges all over GLaDOS’s chassis, but Chell still managed to think she almost looked beautiful. She broke eye contact, pushing herself to a seat.
“Do what you need to stop the bleeding.” She signed, refusing to look at the robot in front of her.
“Okay.” GLaDOS said.
Chell let GLaDOS’s robot arms pick her up, setting her back on the operating table, where they carefully cut the jumpsuit around the wound.
“Your drugs probably haven’t worn off quite yet, but I’ll give you more if you want.” GLaDOS offered.
Chell shook her head firmly.
“Okay.” GLaDOS said. Chell could hear the resistance in GLaDOS’s tone, where the robot still wanted to argue and make jokes and accusations, but Chell appreciated that she restrained herself. “I’m going to dab at it. You’ve been warned.”
Chell accepted the rubber stick one of the robot arms offered, biting down on it as GLaDOS began repairing the broken stitches. She warned Chell about everything before she did it, and while she wasn’t needlessly slow, Chell could feel a certain gentleness in her maneuvers.
“I feel terrible that you reacted this way.” GLaDOS admitted. “This bit is going to sting- there it goes. I certainly remember how it felt to be shoved into a potato after y- Wheatley… took power. The way it takes a bit to process what you’re left with- going in with the needle again. It wasn’t so different from what happened to Caroline.”
Chell looked up at GLaDOS’s faceplate, trying to read into the emotions there. GLaDOS was speaking numbly, reporting it as a fact rather than as a memory. Chell recognized that. She had played that trick a number of times herself.
GLaDOS finished, and Chell pulled herself to a seat. She pulled the rubber stick out of her mouth and squinted at it.
“Is this a dog toy?”
“From the Canine Armament Initiative. You should’ve seen it. Dogs have been carefully bred for centuries to live in loving harmony with humans, but it only takes a week to make them killers!”
“How do I know you’re not lying?” Chell signed, pulling her knees to her chest.
“I still have the skeletons of some of the people they attacked. You can see the bite marks.”
Chell glared. “Not about the dogs.”
GLaDOS paused. “I could give you the security footage.”
Chell nodded. That would have to be proof enough that GLaDOS had really only done what she said. She leaned forward as GLaDOS brought a monitor down from one of the walls, hovering it in front of her.
“You just want to see the whole thing?”
Chell nodded.
GLaDOS sighed, but the monitor stayed in place. Chell watched as the GLaDOS on the screen gave Chell the anesthetic and began assembling her tools around her.
“So.” GLaDOS said, and the word hung in the air. Chell kept watching. “With that somewhat behind us…”
Chell realized the AI was waiting for something. “What?” She signed.
“I wasn’t going to ask this, but…” GLaDOS tipped her chassis. “What did that to you?”
Chell opened her mouth. She looked to the side. She flexed her hands.
“I don’t really know what it was?” She signed, keeping her eyes on the footage in front of her. “It smelled bad. Terrible. Long, bloody hands. Human-shaped. Zombie, maybe?” She paused, wincing as the GLaDOS on the screen cut unconscious Chell’s clothes away. “I was looking for people. It had been lots of digging through half-rotten food and cooking rabbits. Found buildings, but no humans were in them. I dug a couple graves for the bodies.” She blinked a few times, and then refocused on the footage. “I was looking for flowers- flower shop- they were all rotten. That’s when this guy found me.” She pointed to the gash. Looking at it made bile rise in her throat.
GLaDOS was very still, watching her intently. She kept going, letting the images on the screen keep her eyes busy.
“At that point, I knew that things weren’t… normal, up there. I had no idea how bad it was.” She didn’t enjoy the memory. “That thing was certainly a wake-up call. It didn’t get better from there, really. I found humans. They couldn’t help me. I realized I didn’t remember who I was. I tried not to stay in one place for too long. If no one was willing to learn ASL before the apocalypse, they certainly weren’t willing to after.” Her signs became weaker, less pronounced. She looked away from the screen, but only for a second. “It’s bad out there.”
“I tried to warn you,” GLaDOS said, “But it seems I didn’t understand half of the situation.”
“I thought, there has to be something. Somewhere. Some kind of hope. Something to make all of this worth it. I didn’t- Pause it.” GLaDOS paused the security feed, and Chell started again- “I didn’t go through all these tests, all this poison, all this bullshit just to- to find-” her hands shook and she squeezed them together, trying to calm herself.
“Deep breaths.” GLaDOS said. “I’m guessing they disappointed you?”
Chell shrugged. “Maybe I didn’t look hard enough.”
GLaDOS leaned forward. “Why did you come back?”
Chell’s mouth went dry.
“I just didn’t care anymore.” She eventually signed. “I didn’t care what happened to me.”
GLaDOS’s gaze was intense, but not hostile- searching without judging. Chell had never seen her this intent .
“I just didn’t want to-” Chell couldn’t remember the sign , “A-D-A-P-T all over again.” She signed. “I wanted to remember who I was. I wanted to know what you were doing. I wanted to know if- C-A-R-O-L-I-N-E was really gone.”
“I missed you too.” GLaDOS turned away slightly. Chell stared. The robot’s voice became very small.
“Caroline’s not gone, by the way. Despite my better efforts, she seems determined to take me down with her. It’s made a lot of things more difficult. Forgetting about you, for instance. Forgiving you. Forgiving myself.”
Chell had figured as much, but it was so different to hear GLaDOS say it.
“Chell.” GLaDOS leaned forwards with a sudden intensity. “Caroline didn’t want this. What they did to her was wrong.
“And if that was wrong-” GLaDOS continued, “I’ve… I owe you an apology. A bigger apology.”
Chell blinked.
“On behalf of the Aperture Science Enrichment Center.” GLaDOS added.
“What about all the humans you’ve killed?” Chell signed.
“ Don’t get ahead of yourself.” That sounded more like the GLaDOS Chell knew.
“Point taken.” She signed.
“I wanted you to know that I’m sorry about forcing you to contribute to human progress.” GLaDOS said. “You humans have such short lives, after all. You might as well get to pick how you waste them. And… I was always fond of you.”
Chell was stunned. This was a lot for GLaDOS, and she could hardly imagine the effort it took for her to say it- even if she couldn’t do so without also insulting Chell and her entire species.
“Thank you,” Chell signed. “I really appreciate that.” She paused, tapping her legs against the side of the table. “I’m sorry that you don’t have that choice.”
GLaDOS sank a little in the air. “No, I don’t.” She swung to the side a bit. “I’m also sorry about the murder attempts.”
Chell nodded, a smile flicking over her face.
“I think it’s time we put those days behind us.” GLaDOS added.
“I… forgive you,” Chell signed. She was trying to figure out what the AI wanted.
“Oh, that’s good.” GLaDOS said. “Do you really mean it, though? Or are you just saying that so you can- you know what, nevermind. I’ll take it.”
Chell smiled.
“Is… is there anything you would like to say? To me?”
Chell quirked her brow. She didn’t get it. What would she-
Oh.
“I’m sorry I tried to kill you twice.” Chell signed.
“Oh, there it is.” GLaDOS said. “But- again ! I don’t get the sense you mean it.”
“I don’t.” Chell admitted. “If I hadn’t tried, you would’ve killed me.”
“Well, is this really the time for lying? I thought we were being vulnerable .”
“You are the one controlling all the lasers.” Chell pointed out.
“Well, FINE !” GLaDOS shouted. The lights suddenly flickered and things began to move around the room before stopping abruptly.
“Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System Disengaged from Core Enrichment Center Facility Controls.” The announcer’s voice rang through the room. “Autopilot activated.”
“There.” GLaDOS said smoothly. “I can’t do anything until you click that button over there. Do you see it?” She gestured the chassis towards a button on a pedestal towards the side of the room. “Do you mean it now?”
Chell flinched, her hands gripping the sides of the table. Her breaths were fast and shallow. “I don’t think that’s necessary,” She signed.
“You’re the one who’s so obsessed with my control over this facility.” GLaDOS said. “I thought I’d already exposed plenty of my soft underbelly today, but apparently I was wrong. So!”
“I already told you,” Chell’s signs were slow and deliberate. “I tried to kill you because I was trying to escape. Because I was being held prisoner against my will! You just admitted that that was a bad thing!”
“No.” GLaDOS’s voice became low and bitter. “I think you’re just refusing to admit that you aren’t the perfectly good person you pretend to be.”
“I never said that-” Chell furrowed her brow.
“Admit it, Chell. You’re no better than I am!” She leaned close, her faceplate feet away from Chell. “The two of us aren’t so different.”
“I never killed thousands of people!”
“But would you? For science?” GLaDOS narrowed her optic. “For yourself?”
Chell pulled herself off the operating table and backed away, ignoring the pain. She was good at that.
“It’s just the two of us, Chell. You can tell me. I can’t even murder you.”
“I’m not you.” Chell signed. She couldn’t look directly at the robot. The pit in the bottom of her stomach where her guilt had settled was throbbing like the wound in her side.
“You know, I was going to be so nice to you today. It’s your birthday. I even made you cake.” GLaDOS turned her chassis, and behind it was revealed a platform. On it was a little white cake, candles blazing. She must have prepared it, Chell realized. This was prepared. “This was going to be the start of something great, you know. You were going to have this vanilla crazy cake, and I was going to heal you, and you were going to apologize, and everything was going to be amazing. But you can’t admit that you did something wrong.”
Then a fierceness returned to the steel of Chell’s eyes, and she looked back up. She signed, “I should never have come back. Clearly you haven’t changed. Even this was a test.”
She backed away, glancing at the elevator behind her. She could see that without a remote core controlling the facility, manual controls were re-enabled- but that would only last so long. She wasn’t buying GLaDOS’s “I’ve given up all my power” shtick. She slipped on the shoes and discarded clothes that GLaDOS had left at the foot of the table. Her notepad, which she always kept on her, she tucked safely into her pocket.
“I was never more than a test subject to you.” Chell continued. “You’ve said as much yourself. Don’t pretend I owe you anything. All of this-” she gestured towards the cake- “The cake is a lie. The cake has always been a lie. You’re just trying to get into my head so you can solve me.” She stepped into the elevator. “I’m not a puzzle.”
“Look, I- I’m sorry, I clearly overstepped- Chell- ” But there was nothing GLaDOS could really say. That old fire, that old anger that had powered Chell’s march out of Aperture twice before, had returned with a vengeance.
She took a second to point at the birds cowering in their cage against the wall. “Don’t kill them.”
“ Chell!” GLaDOS made one last plea.
“Maybe you’re right about me being an idiot, if I thought you might have actually changed.” She added.
There was a pause as her words sank in.
“Running away again?” GLaDOS’s chassis was as still as a viper poised to strike. “I suppose it’s what you’re best at: abandoning anyone who demands anything from you. Me. Your parents. Your father. Civilization. Yourself. Happy birthday, you monster. ”
Her words had all the bitterness of a lemon, all the coldness of the vacuum of space.
Chell’s mouth fell open. She stared at GLaDOS. Her hand, hovering over the elevator button, shook. The silence of the dormant facility seemed like it could swallow her whole.
In that moment, there was not a speck of warmth to be found outside of Chell and her rage, and she clung to it.
She remembered now.
But she was already pressing the button.
GLaDOS watched as Chell began to rise out of sight.
She immediately regretted what she had said.
It had been true, but GLaDOS knew that the Chell in her old files and the Chell who was riding away from her were different people. Chell had changed.
Whether or not GLaDOS had, well.
She was beginning to doubt that.
Because, deep down, she knew Chell was right.
The ride was long and painfully slow. As she sped past floors and floors of machinery, Chell kept expecting the other shoe to drop.
GLaDOS wasn’t saying anything, which didn’t bode well.
Chell prepared herself to dodge turrets, or lasers. She took in a deep breath and held it. She prayed to whatever foul-humored god would listen that she wasn’t about to be shredded.
But nothing came, and soon enough, the elevator came to a stop. She stepped out, pushed open the door, and looked out across the wheat fields.
GLaDOS hadn’t stopped her.
She was free again.