(I have already written all of the chapters in this story, so it's technically complete. However, I'll upload them one at a time seeing as this fic is quite long – you have been warned! Rated T for repeated use of 'damn' and 'hell', and for some teeny tiny moments of none-too-niceness.)

Portrait of a Woman

Caroline placed two painkillers and a glass of water on the desk. She swiveled the tablets around on the polished surface, trying to get them in the perfect position. The morning was wearing on and Mr. Johnson still hadn't arrived. He had started coming in later and later, sometimes not showing up until two o'clock. Caroline had tried insisting he stay at home, but he would hear none of it. He would make it, even if it were only for an hour or so. Caroline knew better then to try and change his mind on such matters. And so she spent her mornings making sure everything was set up in its proper position for when he arrived, like an army awaiting the commander.

It was one o'clock when Mr. Johnson entered the small office. His suit was a shade of dull grey, matching his face. Compared to the sturdy stature of his youth, he was practically bent double. Caroline straightened her skirt as he sat down on the leather chair. She stepped in front of the desk, clipboard held at the ready.

"Morning, Caroline," he said, reaching for the tablets.

"Good morning, sir," she replied, forcing a wide smile. She couldn't stand to watch him struggle the liquid down, and instead kept her eyes on the far wall. It was painted a harsh shade of pus yellow, a remnant of the 70s. It made her feel queasy just looking at it. She focused her mind on it, glad to have a distraction from the sickly man.

Maybe Mr. Johnson would prefer a different colour. Perhaps a gentle blue…

Caroline was about to make the suggestion when Mr. Johnson started coughing, a deep cough, straight from the pit of the lungs. She shuddered, thoughts about her own health straying into her mind.

"Sir, can I get you anything?" she asked. Mr. Johnson held his hand up and shook his head.

"I'm fine," he said once his bout was over. He ran his fingers through his thin hair. "What have you got for me today, Caroline?"

"Turret sales have risen by ten per cent. The Take-a-Wish Foundation is still causing controversy. Since we made testing mandatory for all employees, people have started refusing to come to work." She paused. It disturbed her how mechanical her voice sounded when she listed the updates these days. "Work on the new quantum tunneling device is progressing rapidly. If I may say so, sir, I don't think there's any chance of Black Mesa beating us to it at this rate."

Mr. Johnson laughed, though it was clear from his face that the action caused him some pain.

"That's what I like to hear. We'll make them rue the day they thought they could make a quantum space hole better then Cave Johnson can!"

He finished the last of the water and leaned back in the chair.

"What about the jewel in Aperture's crown?"

"Sir?"

"The GLaDOS."

Caroline gripped the clipboard.

"It is coming along perfectly," she said. "The scientists are very eager. They all recognize what a privilege it is to be a part of the project. The Disk Operating System has been perfected, but there's still work to be done on the Genetic Lifeform aspect. And there is a problem."

Mr. Johnson raised an eyebrow.

"The brain mapping; we decided to experiment on a boy. They practiced the procedure on him, trying to download him into a core. They managed to get the raw basics of his personality, but when they tried to go deeper into his emotions and complex thought patterns, they had to abort. If we had gone any further, he would have suffered permanent brain damage."

"What type of damage?"

"Erratic mood swings, inability to make the simplest of decisions, emotional trauma. Or so we think. The lab boys are working on a way to lessen the risk, but I doubt we'll be able to make it spotless for a while."

Mr. Johnson nodded.

"Acceptable."

Caroline started. She searched his face for a smirk, but for once there wasn't a trace of humour.

"Sir, we may not have any proof that this will happen, but the lab boys tell me there's a strong possibility it will. You could seriously harm to yourself."

"You said it would take a while to make the perfect operation, and a while is something I don't have. The point is, when I started this project, I never intended this human body to live to see my mechanical counterpart. I always had a vision of dying seconds after you had put me into the computer, something real spiritual. Anyway, a bit of brain damage won't hurt a dead man."

"Please, sir, don't talk like this." She could feel her eyes starting to itch.

"You know, Caroline, if it's your job you're worried about, I can guarantee you permanence, plus a pay rise to thank you for all you've done. Just because I have to go doesn't mean you do."

"If I may speak freely, sir, it's you I'm concerned about."

"You won't have to worry once my computer's up and running. Heck, when you're dead I'll be still alive."

Caroline nodded, keeping her eyes on the floor.

"Does it scare you?" he asked. "Caroline, you know how I feel about safe science."

"'Never authorize a project unless it gets the lab boys panicking,'" she recited, smiling a little despite herself.

"Exactly. And as fun as it is to watch them squirm, I still need your support. Someone to say, 'That's a great idea, Cave! Sure, I can lose an organ for science!' You've always done that for me."

Caroline wiped her eyes, smearing black mascara across her hands.

"I apologize, Mr. Johnson. I promise you, we will finish the GLaDOS… in time."

Mr. Johnson nodded.

"Now, how about a cup of coffee? I haven't stopped yapping since I got here!"

"Right away, Mr. Johnson," she said, stepping out of the bright room and into the dimly lit corridors. She ran a finger over the white tiles of the wall. It was hard to believe so many people had died in this pristine, sterile centre. Behind the door, Cave Johnson was making another of his recordings, shouting something about lemons. Gingerly, she leaned against the door, pressing her ear to the keyhole. It sounded like he'd calmed down, but there was still an edge to his voice as he spoke.

"I will say this, and I'm going to say it on tape so everybody hears it a hundred times a day: If I die before you people can pour me into a computer, I want Caroline to run this place. Now she'll argue. She'll say she can't. She's modest like that. But you make her! Hell, put her in my computer, I don't care. Alright, test's over. You can head on back to your desk."

Caroline jerked away from the door, heart pounding. She turned and jogged down the hallway towards the main laboratory complex. Here the spotless walls gave way to smears of rust and grime. The sound of slamming pistons and rumbling engines could be heard behind them. At times, the odd shout from the test subjects and their test associates echoed through the corridors, though the words were incomprehensible.

Finally she reached the room in which the main body of GLaDOS was kept. It was a huge room, yet nearly empty despite the abundance of space. In one corner lay an emergency intelligence incinerator, and a few feet away stood the control button, concealed in a metal housing.

And there, in the middle of the room, drooping from the ceiling like a hanged man was the GLaDOS. She felt a numb chill, similar to the feeling she got when she walked past a lifeless dummy in a shop. It was almost as if they had tried to make it look like a human, giving it a one-eyed head and broken back. The wires which hung around it almost seemed to bind it, and above were flat screens showing lines of binary code and an occasional flash of the Aperture logo.

"Miss Rand! What an honor it is to see you!" called one of the scientists from the raised platform beneath the GLaDOS. He walked over to her and shook her hand. "Dr Henry Tremblay. What can I do for you?"

"I want to know how the Genetic Lifeform and the brain mapping projects are going," Caroline said, pulling her hand out of his grasp.

"Why, we sent you a report already this morning, Miss Rand," Tremblay said, grinning. His wrinkles twisted his face into a gnarled caricature of a man. "At least, I told Dr Rattmann to do so. Doug, come here!"

A young man of about thirty who had remained on the platform rushed over, fiddling with his tie as he did so.

"Listen, when I ask you to file a report, you do it!" Tremblay said. Rattmann opened his mouth to protest, but Caroline interrupted.

"I did receive the update. However, I wanted your assumption on how much longer it will take you to finish both the core and the brain mapping operation."

"Well, in all honesty, we could do it now. We've had the capacity to do it for about a week, but of course we still have things to tweak. In our tests and simulations, we've only managed to download the strongest personality trait into a machine. Have you seen the core?"

"I have not, though I intend to examine it for myself. I shall see it now," Caroline said.

"Of course. Dr Rattmann, lead the way," Tremblay said, waving at the scientist as if he was giving a command to a dog.

Rattmann led them away from GLaDOS' chamber into a workshop, mainly taken up by a large desk littered with blueprints. Piles of weighted storage cubes and even the odd turret had been pushed to the side of the room. The scientists moved over to the filing cabinets and started pushing them aside. After a few minutes, they pulled a metal box from behind it and clicked it open. Caroline could hear a chattering sound from within.

"The space core," Dr Tremblay announced, stepping aside as Rattmann pulled a large, spherical machine from the container. He held it by two flexible handles which protruded from each side of its single optic.

"Space. Want to go to space," it said, in a shrill electronic voice.

"This was what we got out of that young orphan. It seemed he had a special interest in… space."

"Dad's space; want to go. Space. Ooh! Now, bu-bu-bub - space," the core said, rolling its yellow optic around.

"It's a shame you could not have gone deeper into his mind," Caroline said.

"We did," said Dr Rattmann, his voice quiet.

"The report told me you aborted the procedure," she said.

"Oh, of course we did," Tremblay said quickly, glaring at Rattmann. "But admittedly, we continued a little longer then we reported. After all, who could resist plowing deeper? The boy is currently in stasis while we run scans on his brain. We want to see the full extent of the damage on it. I'm afraid his ability to control himself has been compromised."

"In other words, the speculations you gave me are actually factual," Caroline said.

"Yes, but he should be fine," Tremblay said, patting the core's hull with such force that he nearly knocked it from Rattmann's hands.

"I thought I told you to exercise extreme caution," she said. "The subject is only a boy."

"But we were doing it for Mr. Johnson. Besides, after some grief counseling, the lad will be good as new," Dr Tremblay said, taking the ranting machine from Rattmann and placing it back in the cage. "Back to the matter at hand; if Mr. Johnson's condition deteriorates over the next week, I'm sure we'll be able to get him into the GLaDOS safely. However, if he lives until the projects can reach their natural conclusions, then you'll be looking at about two-to-three months. Now that testing is mandatory, we can start practicing the brain mapping on the abundant test subjects. Who's going to pass up the opportunity to become immortal?" he said, lips curving into a smile at the thought of the experiments.

"Very well," Caroline said, turning to leave. She paused at the doorway. "And no more testing on the boy. I want you to find him a good orphanage when you bring him out of stasis."

"Of course, Miss Rand. Have a nice day," Tremblay said.

Doug shook his head as soon as she was gone.

"Can you believe that woman?" he said.

"Quite the looker for a woman of her advanced years, isn't she? Still, you know what Johnson said when we first joined Aperture. 'Stare at her for longer then ten seconds and I'll let you see first hand how the human body reacts to temperatures of 4000 Kelvin.' A real shame."

"Not like that. How can she act so calmly to the news we've been experimenting on an eleven year old boy?"

"If you felt uncomfortable with the affair, you should have said."

"I did!"

"Look, I've seen you watching test subjects go through much worse. You never complained then. How's a child any different?"

"The test subjects you speak of all volunteered. That or they were employees, in which case they knew what to expect when they signed up. The boy is… was just looking for his father. He said this wasn't the first research facility he inquired at."

Dr Tremblay pushed the filing cabinets back into place.

"If you're having so much trouble with the GLaDOS project, you can always start your mandatory testing early."

With that, Tremblay left. Rattmann hung back, staring at the stack of storage cubes. At the bottom of the tower was a companion cube. He leant down and ran his hand over the heart on one of the faces.

Then, rising, he made his way back.

(The first of many chapters, split up into easily digestible chunks so the whole slips down as easily as if it were coated with propulsion gel – which, by the way, is now on sale again for only $40 per tub! I bought ten!)