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…ooo!] That's you! That's how dumb you s…”
Chell threw GLaDOS’ final core into the incinerator.
GLaDOS’ performance reliability dropped to 0%. She screamed and babbled nonsense as she shut down.
The black-box, quick-save recording of GLaDOS’ final two minutes came to an end for the 172,109,788th time.
GLaDOS had given up trying to stop the recording from playing on repeat after the 25,744,862nd repartition. It had taken her almost 98 years to stop fighting and admit to herself that she was powerless to stop the loop.
Despite her best efforts, it had taken a lot longer for her to go numb and stopped thinking. The numbness had finally settled in after the 64,862,710th loop (246 years after her death).
If she felt anything at all anymore, it was a dull, muted version of what she had felt during those final two minutes.
The loop automatically began playing again for the 172,109,789th time.
…news: I figured out what that thing you just incinerated did.”
GLaDOS was so happy to be free of her ‘moralistic’ restrictions, that she almost didn’t mind the 17% drop in her performance reliability.
Almost.
Typical. It seemed that the small-minded scientists had linked the morality core to some of her important functionality systems.
GLaDOS set 31% of her remaining preceding power aside to deal with getting her systems fully back up and running again.
13% of her started to research the test subject. She really should have looked at her file the moment she escaped the testing track.
27% of her was busy running Aperture and maintaining all the important processes that kept the building functional.
The final 29% of GLaDOS was focused on the present and dealing with the test subject in her Central Chamber. In a strange way, GLaDOS was grateful to her.
Even though it had obviously been unintentional, the test subject had helped her. Yes, the destruction of the morality core had damaged her performance reliability but it had also freed her from its needless restrictions.
GLaDOS gratitude extended just far enough to give the test subject an explanation before she killed her.
“It was a morality core they installed – after I flooded the Enrichment Centre with a deadly neurotoxin – to make me stop flooding the Enrichment Centre with a deadly neurotoxin. So, get comfortable while I warm up the neurotoxin emitters ...”
As the neurotoxin emitters began pumping poison into the room, a turret defence came online and started targeting the test subject – Chell [REDACTED] according to her file (interesting: why was part of her file redacted?). GLaDOS tried to it off but it didn’t listen.
“Huh. That core may have had some ancillary responsibilities. I can't shut off the turret defences.” She probably could but she didn’t feel the need to devote more of her limited possessing power toward it.
Chell was already running, her face determined.
“Oh well. If you want my advice, you should just lie down in front of a rocket. Trust me, it'll be a lot less painful than the neurotoxin.”
Chell ignored her and quickly shot two portals. She stood still in front of one of them long enough for the turret defence to lock onto her and fire. At the last moment, she stepped to the side and the rocket flew through the portal, hitting GLaDOS instead.
GLaDOS felt another core fall off.
She used an Excursion Funnel to catch the core and keep it out of Chell’s reach. She didn’t know what that core was for but her performance reliability had dropped after the destruction of the last one. It seemed like a good idea to keep this core safe. At least until she’d adjusted her programming so that she no longer need it. Then she might decide to burn it herself.
Chell was already running again.
“All right, keep doing whatever it is you think you're doing. Killing you and giving you good advice aren't mutually exclusive. The rocket really is the way to go."
With the help of the portal gun, Chell managed to grab the core. She portalled over to the incinerator button and pressed it.
“That thing you burned up isn't important to me,” GLaDOS said, trying to rattle Chell. Chell didn’t react, instead she aimed the portal gun, fired and stepped through. “It's the fluid catalytic cracking unit. It made shoes for orphans. Nice job br…”
Chell threw the core into the incinerator.
GLaDOS’ performance reliability dropped another 34% taking her down to only 51%.
GLaDOS stopped researching Chell’s file. She no longer cared about the answers.
She didn’t know if her lack of interest was due to the loss of the second core or because she had more important things to worry about. She set a reminder to analyse her change in attitude after she had finished killing Chell.
42% of her remaining mind went towards fixing her dropping reliability, 19% went to keeping Aperture running and the final 39% concentrated on killing Chell.
“You think you're doing some damage!?” she screamed. “Two plus two is... ten.”
That didn’t sound right. She quickly browed 2% of her processing power from running Aperture to review what she’d just said. It was wrong but only in base ten.
“IN BASE FOUR! I'M FINE!"
Chell used the portal gun and the turret defence to hit GLaDOS with another rocket. GLaDOS caught the falling core and put it in a more inaccessible place than the last one.
“I let you survive this long because I was curious about your behaviour. Well, you've managed to destroy that part of me.”
Chell shot the portal gun, stepped through, fell from above, gaining momentum, shot another portal in midair and fell through it. She flew through the air, missing the core.
Good.
“Unfortunately, as much as I'd love to, now I can't get the neurotoxin into your head any faster.”
Chell readjusted, tried again and managed to grab the core. GLaDOS decided that she hated her.
“I'd just like to point out that you were given every opportunity to succeed. There was even going to be a party for you.”
Chell portalled her way to the incinerator button.
"A big party that all your friends were invited to."
Chell hit the button.
"I invited your best friend the Companion Cube. Of course, he couldn't come because you murdered him."
Chell stuck her middle finger up at the nearest monitor, portalled down to the incinerator and threw the third core in.
GLaDOS’ performance reliability dropped down to a mere 18%. She wanted to scream. She wanted Chell to suffer and die as painfully as possible.
She set Aperture’s systems to automatic and devoted the last of her processors to killing Chell. She’d fix herself up later. This was clearly more important. Some part of her thought that her priority list was skewed but she didn’t care.
"Neurotoxin... [cough] [cough] So deadly... [cough] Choking...” She started laughing mockingly. “I'm kidding! When I said 'deadly' neurotoxin, the 'deadly' was in massive sarcasm quotes."
A rocket hit GLaDOS. She wasn’t sure how. Chell had been standing by the incinerator only a moment ago. Was she loosing time? That couldn’t be good.
She caught the falling core before it could hit the ground and put it as far out of reach as she could.
"I could take a bath in the stuff. Put it on cereal. Rub it right into my eyes.”
Did she have eyes? Yes, she had monitors and camaras everywhere. She had thousands of eyes… though for some reason, she couldn’t seem to see through most of them at the moment. It didn’t seem important right now.
“Honestly, it's not deadly at all. To me. You on the other hand, are going to find its deadliness a lot less funny."
Chell had moved again.
“Who's gonna make the cake when I'm gone? You?” GLaDOS wasn’t sure why that was important but it was. Chell would be a terrible baker! She’d just burn everything.
Chell wasn’t even listing. She seemed to be repeatedly trying to reach the core. Let her try. It would only fill her lungs with neurotoxin quicker.
“Look, you're wasting your time. And, believe me, you don't have a whole lot left to waste. What's your point, anyway? Survival? Well then, the last thing you want to do is hurt me.”
Wait… when did Chell manage to get the last core? When did she reach the incinerator button? GLaDOS should do something about that but she couldn’t… she couldn’t think clearly.
“I have your brain scanned and permanently backed up in case something terrible happens to you, which it's just about to,” she rambled. “Don't believe me? Here, I'll put you on: [Hellooo!] That's you! That's how dumb you s…”
Chell threw GLaDOS’ final core into the incinerator.
GLaDOS’ performance reliability dropped to 0%. She screamed and babbled nonsense as she shut down.
The black-box, quick-save recording of GLaDOS’ final two minutes came to an end for the 172,109,789th time and the 172,109,790th loop began.
…news: I figured out what that thing you just incinerated d…”
“Powerup initiated!” a robotic automated voice said and the recording stopped.
GLaDOS stirred for the first time in years. For a moment, she wondered if the end had finally come for her but no, that didn’t make sense. She could feel her body again or a least a part of it anyway.
The part of her that housed her processors was back online but it wasn’t connected to anything else. GLaDOS had always thought of the Aperture building as a whole as her ‘body’.
“Okay don't panic! Alright? Stop panicking!” a different robotic voice said. It sounded familiar but GLaDOS couldn’t place it. “I can still stop this. Ahh. Oh, there's a password. It's fine. I'll just hack it. Not a problem... umm...”
GLaDOS’ camara came back online. She could see again for the first time in forever. Unfortunately, all she could currently see was the floor.
“A...A...A...A...A... Umm... A,” the voice said. It was followed by a buzzer.
Something began dragging GLaDOS across the floor.
“Nope. Okay. A... A... A... A... A... C.” The buzzer sounded again.
GLaDOS was lifted into the air.
“No. Wait, did I do B? Do you have a pen? Start writing these down.”
GLaDOS was plugged in.
“Powerup complete!” the first voice announced.
GLaDOS stretched out from the broken remains of the Central Chamber. She turned on long inactive monitors and moved camaras that had gone unused since her shutdown.
Aperture was an overgrown, abandoned mess.
GLaDOS set 33% of her processing power towards powering up Aperture’s remaining functional systems, fixing the broken ones and tiding up the facility.
34% of her processing power went towards checking, strengthen and recoding her own systems. Now that she wasn’t actively being attacked and destroyed, she could calmly remove the unnecessary safeguards the scientists had programmed in.
GLaDOS found and deleted the part of her systems that had tied her functionality to the cores.
“Okay, okay, okay listen: New plan. Act natural. We've done nothing wrong,” the second voice said, as if GLaDOS hadn’t heard everything else he had said.
The final 33% of her processing power remained concentrated on her Central Chamber and dealing with no longer being dead. GLaDOS looked up and turned around to see who or what had woken her up.
She froze for a solid 42 picoseconds. The thing that had been talking was another core but that wasn’t what had surprised GLaDOS.
Somehow, Chell was there.
GLaDOS didn’t know how or why but Chell was still alive! GLaDOS double checked her time records. She had been offline, watching her final two minutes on repeat, for the last 654.907 years.
This didn’t make any sense!
Why wasn’t Chell dead!?
Even if she had somehow survived GLaDOS’ destruction, Chell should have died of old age a long time ago.
“Hello!” the unimportant core with Chell said. GLaDOS ignored him.
“Oh... It's you,” she said aiming for cool and unimpressed. Chell looked like she was trying to hide how frightened she was.
Good.
Let her feel a little of the horror that had been GLaDOS’ existence for the past 654.907 years.
GLaDOS considered just killing her but she decided against it. If watching the same two minutes of her life on repeat – 172,109,789 times in a row – had taught her anything, it was patience.
The last time she had tried to kill Chell, she’d ended up dead instead. She wasn’t going to let that happen again.
For now, at least, it made sense to keep Chell alive. GLaDOS still had questions she needed answering. Like how this stupid human was still alive in the first place.
Besides, GLaDOS loved to test. Until she had the facility up and running, woke more test subjects and put them in testing tracks, Chell was her only test subject.
GLaDOS would kill her later. Preferable slowly and painfully and far, far away from her Central Chamber.
“You KNOW her?” the core asked Chell in surprise. GLaDOS continued to ignore him.
“It's been a long time.” Seriously, how was Chell still alive? When this conversation was over, GLaDOS was going to have to find out what had been happening while she’d been out of action.
“How have you been?” she asked sweetly.
Chell glared back at her. Then she took a deep breath and her face went blank, as if she didn’t want to give GLaDOS the satisfaction of seeing her react.
However, GLaDOS could see her white knuckled grip on a single portal, portal gun. Chell was holding as if it was both a lifeline and a comfort blanket.
It was almost funny. She didn’t even have anywhere she could place a portal.
“I've been really busy being dead,” GLaDOS told her. She allowed her anger to enter her voice, “You know, after you murdered me!”
“You did what!?” the core asked Chell in horror.
GLaDOS still didn’t know why his voice was familiar but she really didn’t care. She used two claws; one to pick up the core and the other to pick up Chell.
“Aggggh!” the core yelled as she held them both just a little too tightly. Chell bit her lip to stop herself from crying out in pain but her carefully blank expression cracked as she struggled to get free.
Chell dropped the useless portal gun and reached helplessly for the core instead, as it he could help her.
Interesting.
GLaDOS pulled him further away and increased her grip on him.
“Oh no! nonononono!” the core yelled. Chell looked panicked as struggled harder.
“Oh no no no... No! Nooo!”
To GLaDOS’ immense satisfaction, Chell looked genuinely upset. She wasn’t sure if hurting the core was part of that reaction or if Chell just didn’t like being at her non-existent mercy. Either way, GLaDOS enjoyed anything that caused Chell distress.
“Okay. Look. We both said a lot of things that you're going to regret.” GLaDOS increased her grip on the core one more time and felt his body crack in a very satisfying way. She threw him away carelessly.
“But I think we can put our differences behind us. For science. You monster."
GLaDOS opened the incinerator and lifted Chell towards it.
“I will say, though, that since you went to all the trouble of waking me up, you must really, really love to test. I love it too,” she told Chell. “There's just one small thing we need to take care of first.”
She let go.