Oh. It is you. How have you been? I have been really busy working my handles off attempting to catch up with my writing schedule.

…In all seriousness, yes, I am posting another story here. And yes, it does follow the series I have on this account. But this one-shot is different—the plot of this actually goes along with the original ending I had planned out for A Few Repairs, before GLaDOS decided to change my story around on me. And, as it is, this will probably be the last one-shot I will be posting for this series. (Though feel free to either mock me or throw me in the incinerator if I try to write more of it.)

Hah, well, enough stalling. Please enjoy.

Chell woke up to the feeling of something shuddering against her side, and turned her head.

"AGH—! I-I mean, um, g'morning! …A-actually, no, not… not good morning. Bad morning, m-more like it. A-absolutely terrible."

The shivering blue pinprick at her right and the red LEDs blaring "5:55" at her left were the only things lighting her room, but she didn't need much light to navigate the familiar path to her dresser and to her personal bathroom anyway. The alarm clock remained stationary aside from the last five flicking into a six, but the optic followed her closely.

"A-ah, no, y-you don't need to get up. D-don't need to, at all. Might want to stay in bed, actually. It, it seems like the kind of day t-to just, um, wh-what's the term—sleep out? …S-sleep in! Yeah—sleeping in s-sounds great. N-no need to—to get up. I-I mean, y-you have the day off, don't you?"

She ignored him, shutting the door to her bathroom as she started to get ready.

Outside, the voice hiked up in pitch. "L-l-l-lady, didn't you hear me? Y-you don't need to—to get up yet, right? W-we're all p-perfectly fine s-staying in bed. Y-you're probably still tired, a-aren't you? …W-well no you went to bed early, and… uh… a-actually got your eight hours of sleep and all—n-not that I was keeping track! Um…"

So he hadn't slept—she'd figured. He'd been high-strung—more so than usual—since last night, and his anxiety didn't seem to be easing up.

He stayed silent for a while—quite a feat for him—and it wasn't until she was pulling on a thick sweatshirt that she heard him speak again: "Y-you know what? I've got an idea: You g-go on outside, a-and… and leave me a-at home, right? I-I mean, I'd only slow you down, a-and… um… be… annoying? Y-yeah, I can be—I can be really annoying if, if I want."

Chell opened the door and gave him a look that blatantly said don't even try it, and Wheatley's already-tiny optic nearly disappeared in the blackness.

"I've—I've just decided I don't w-want to be annoying right now, though, s-so you w-won't have that to worry about."

Good. With a slight nod, Chell went back to finishing up, tying her hair into a ponytail before marching back into the bedroom. She saw Wheatley's attempt to scoot himself backward with his handles, but all he managed to do was shift the blankets around and tilt himself onto his side. He then clamped his handles around his body, but gave them up when Chell gave him another look. Heaving him up by his handles, she carried him out into the kitchen and set him on the table before she started packing.

"Ah—" His voice had gone up even higher at this point, and Chell was a little surprised it hadn't glitched into static. "H-here's an idea: Why d-don't you have a great, big b-breakfast, eh? Y-you deserve it, you know? B-been working hard! Quite hard, really. Worked an extra d-day this week, and—and all."

She ate an energy bar as she packed.

Once again he went silent, and she heard a few grinding noise coming from him as he tilted his faceplate. "Oooh," he moaned. "N-not… not feeling good. Th-the ol' poles a-are really aching today… I-I mean, they always hurt—been for, for a little over a month, now, b-but—um—th-they really hurt today. I-I should… p-probably stay behind… M-might not be good for me, n-not at all."

Chell shoved her freshly-made sandwiches into a large backpack and made her way to the closet.

"…A-and actually you're not l-looking too good, either—er, l-looking a bit… pale. And, um. You—I think… m-maybe you might… b-be sick…?"

The desperation in his voice was palpable, but she continued to ignore him as she pulled on her winter gear.

As she slid her backpack over her shoulders, she noticed that his voice had dropped out, and was replaced by a noisy rattling—his entire body was shaking, making the table shudder beneath him. But upon approaching him, she realized that this wasn't entirely true—his vocal processor was making noises: barely-suppressed whimpers.

"…W-we really are doing it, a-aren't we?"

She nodded.

"Wh-why?!" he cried, voice cracking. "L-look there's—there's no point, and we're going to get killed—so that's less than a point—negative points—a-and, lady, I-I was created t-to… to make… b-bloody—you know wh-what I am! I-I was created t-to make them—and… and I think I can properly i-identify one wh-when—when I see it—and… n-no offense, lady, but this is a very bad idea!"

"Wheatley," she said, and he flinched and turned away. "It's time to go."

His upper lid drooped, and he didn't try to suppress the next whimper that escaped his vocal processor.

She grabbed him by the handles and carried him outside, locking the door behind her.

It was time for her monthly trek.

Wheatley did not like being outside.

It wasn't like it was for no reason. No, he usually had a good reason to dislike things. He disliked disengaging from his management rail because he was told he would die if he did so, and even if he didn't, it still meant a painful bump when he hit the ground. He disliked the dark because his flashlight was broken. He disliked a certain AI because… because of things he didn't want to think about.

And he disliked being outside because nearly every experience he had had with the outside had been a bad one.

He'd first been dumped outside after something he didn't want to remember, and was nearly blind from the sunlight, and then he ran into the lady. He liked the lady now of course, but back then he hadn't, and she hadn't really like him much, either. She'd threatened to hurt him a few times, and—well, she wouldn't do that now, but the fact remained that she'd handled him pretty roughly as she carried him around unfamiliar, scary places.

The next time he'd been outside was because he had been forcibly dragged out there by two robots and that bird and no no no he was not going to think about that again.

In any case, outside. Yes. No. He did not like the outside. Two out of three experiences he had with being outside were bad ones, and that was not a very good track record.

But he had no rails out here or in the lady's house, so he had little choice in the matter. Chell was outside and she was taking him with her, and that was all there was to it.

"A-ah, are… are you sure you can't just… l-leave me home?" Wheatley stammered, looking up at the lady from his position—she was carrying him by both handles. "I mean, you leave me home all the time wh-when you're working… So… wh-what's the harm in doing it now?"

"I work eight hours," she replied, glancing down at him. "This will take three days."

"Right, and that's—what—four more hours?"

"Seventy-two hours."

"…Oh." He simulated a gulping noise. "I'm… s-sure I'd be fine."

"I'm not."

His upper lid drooped. "…You're p-probably right, luv," he said with a sigh. "Yes, right… you're… usually right."

Crunch, crunch, crunch.

With some work, he turned in his casing—a little easier now that said casing was round again, but still a little difficult because of the cracked and broken poles within him—and looked down at the ground beneath them. The lady's thick boots were stomping through the deep, cold, powdery stuff on the ground. Snow—that's what it was called. Apparently it was a form of water, even though it looked nothing like it. He didn't like it either way. It was white—too much like that place.

He shuddered, swinging himself back upward and cringing at the grinding noises his poles made in protest. "Ugh. Too much of that… snow here. I-is it like this all the time?"

"In the winter."

"Winter. Right. I-I don't think I like this winter. M-makes you cold all the time... though then you build those fires in that box in the house, and that's nice. Nice and… cozy, I guess. Yeah."

"I'll be building one tonight."

"Oh, really?" Wheatley blinked up at her, optic widening in surprise. "Tremendous! But—wait, we don't a have a box to put it in! Or did you bring one in that bloody massive bag of yours?"

She shook her head.

"Oh. W-well yeah, I guess even with how big that thing is, it'd… be sorta impossible t-to carry, wouldn't it? Still, how're you gonna b-build a fire without a box? …U-unless we're heading t-to a whole room to put it in, like… like the incinerator…" His optic shrunk a little at the thought, but he felt her squeeze his handles reassuringly.

"Just a campfire."

"O-oh. Campfire. Right. K-knew that. Absolutely. Know everything there is to know a-about fires."

Chell adjusted her grip on him, shifting one of her arms to wrap behind his lower handle and holding him against her side. She then patted him on the top of his hull.

Quiet down now, Wheatley.

The core looked up at her, and his handles drooped. "…Y-yes."

Giving his upper handle a squeeze, the lady adjusted her grip on him to carrying him by the handles again.

Wheatley turned in his casing again, this time to watch what he could see of the path ahead in the dark. …Or what was supposed to be a path, anyway—it didn't look like much to him. There were a few houses, a lot of dead-looking trees, a few tall posts with deactivated lights hanging from them… but there wasn't any real path from what he could see. Not like back there. At least there, there were management rails and catwalks and test chambers lined up in a definite track. It was pretty hard to wander around aimlessly with no sort of path to follow, but that was not the case here, outside. What sort of confusing place was this, anyway, if it had no tracks to follow?

He chalked that up to another bad thing about the outside: no paths whatsoever. Just lots and lots of snow. Far, far too much snow.

And speaking of snow, there was another thing about snow he disliked: It made the lady move more slowly. Around the house she could walk around pretty fast, and he definitely remembered her running a lot back there. But outside the house, she had to trudge through this snow. It was like… a mobility gel. Or rather the opposite of a mobility gel, because it made her move slower. …And it wasn't really gel, either, since it was powder and not… gel, but even so. Really, was there anything good about snow?

No, there wasn't. It was cold, it was related to water in some strange abstract way, and it made things move slowly. What a horrible thing. Who invented this stuff? And why were they even bothering with it anyway? Why weren't he and Chell just saying home, sitting on the couch, reading books by the fire and chatting?

…Oh, right.

Wheatley shivered, nudging himself a little closer to the lady's form. "Y—you know," he said, voice taking on a higher pitch, "i-it's not too late to just… y'know… turn around. I mean, we left early enough—sun's still not quite up yet—and… j-just…"

"No."

He tried to curl his handles inward, but stopped when he remembered she was holding them. "B-but—"

"Shhhh."

She squeezed his handles, and he felt the artificial comfort rippling through him, forcing him to calm a little. So she didn't want him to talk right now—fair enough, she was busy. Busy trudging through this snow, busy trying to find her way without a path of any sort… busy going back to the place he never, ever wanted to see again.

Wheatley shut his optic.

This really was happening, wasn't it?

Subconsciously he nudged himself even closer to her, to hide his face in her side. In response, she rubbed her thumbs on his handles gently as she continued to carry him through the snow.

It was about an hour or so before the sun came out, but even then, Wheatley didn't want to look around. He didn't want to know just how close they were to there again. He didn't want to think about it. He just wanted to stay nuzzled into the lady's side and forget the rest of the world around him.

Unfortunately, that was very boring.

Reluctantly he turned his face plate, opening his optic to look at the world around them again. There was still snow, yes, definitely snow all around, but he noticed now how it weighed down on the trees, bending their bare branches closer to the earth. He also noticed that there were some strange trees that weren't all brown and stick-y looking—some of them were green, though they were weighed down by snow too.

"Evergreens," he heard the lady say—she must have caught his curious look. "They stay green all year round."

"S-so these other trees actually turn green later?" Wheatley muttered, looking back at the brown, stick-y trees. He imagined their brown branches turning a dark green color, and blinked a few times. "That's strange. Why d-do they have to change? Wh-why can't they… stay the same, you know?" He glanced over at one of those evergreen trees as they passed it. "L-like those ones. I think those other trees c-could learn a thing or two f-from those evergreens."

"Some things change. Trees are no different."

He tilted his optic at her, then looked back at the brown, stick-y trees. "B-but… they look fine as they are, I-I guess. Don't need to be changing color. Y-you don't see me up and deciding to change the color of m-my optic once uh—once winter's over."

Chell gave a quiet laugh, immediately grabbing his attention. "Don't be so scared of change, Wheatley."

He narrowed his optic. "I-I never said that! Never—never once said I was s-scared of change! Only talkin' about how things could stand to stay the same every once n' a while, yeah? Don't have to be doin' a different thing, don't have to—have to change colors, or anything like that. It's too much effort, you know? It'd be just as easy for them—th-the trees, I mean—to just stay all brown and stick-y like they are, yeah? Don't need to change."

The lady sighed, her breath turning to fog in the cold air. "If they didn't change, they would die."

Wheatley's optic contracted, and he turned to look out at the trees again. "…Right. Dying. N-not the best thing to do. In that case, um, I guess—I guess they could go on doing what they like. What—what they're supposed to do." He huddled a bit closer to her again, glancing at one of the evergreens as a bit of snow drifted off of one of its branches. "…B-but not everything needs to change."

Chell shook her head, but said nothing more.

Wheatley continued to watch their surroundings as they walked, talking about anything that came to mind. Occasionally the lady would gently shush him when she was trying to figure out her way, and sometimes he would see her draw a circular object out of her pocket, studying it for a moment before putting it back. He would remain obediently quiet during those times, but the second he felt she was finding her way just fine, he would begin babbling again.

"…and then he just rolls his optic at me, like I didn't have a clue what he was talking about. Imagine! Me not knowing a thing about stories! Well, I'll tell you, I know lots a' things about stories—tell 'em all the time! Just ask—well, no, y-you'd already know that, wouldn't you? I mean, I tell 'em to you all the time… and… and they're not made-up stories, like the ones he makes, they're real stories—a-actual ones—though I dunno why you'd wanna m-make up stories, y'know? Must have a p-pretty dull life if you c-can't have stories of your o-own to tell, and—wait, wait, are you stopping now?"

Indeed, the lady had stopped in the middle of a field and was glancing around. Wheatley looked with her, but he couldn't see anything of any importance around. "Wh-what's all this for?" he stammered, optic contracting. "W-we're not… we're not…?"

"No," Chell said, adjusting her grip on him so she could slide her backpack off. "Just resting."

"Oh. R-resting," he repeated, though his optic remained at the same aperture. "O-only resting… right. We're not—we're not there yet, of course. You said it'd be two—no, th-th-three days, and… it… h-hasn't been th-three days yet, no, s-so of course we're not there yet… Ah—!"

He yelped when the lady set him down on a sheet and took a seat next to him, pulling a sandwich out of her bag. Tilting his faceplate, he watched her eat for a moment before continuing to look around, his optic darting this way and that. The more he looked around the snowy field, the more he expected to see a shed suddenly rising up out in the distance, and its door opening, and—

Wheatley suddenly found himself huddled up next to Chell and shivering visibly. When he felt her curious gaze on him, he shook his face, forcing himself to pull his lower lid upward in a smile. "I-it's nothin'. I-I'm only c-cold, luv."

She gave him a funny look, but wrapped her arm around him all the same. He took the opportunity to snuggle closer to her, burying his optic into her side once again. No, it wasn't the most interesting thing to do, but it was better than looking around out there and seeing—or thinking he was seeing—something he never, ever wanted to see again.

But it wasn't long before they were moving again, and once again, Wheatley found himself looking around a dense, snowy forest.

"Y-y-y'know what," he said, turning to look up at her suddenly. "I—I think I'm… w-well, I didn't go i-into sleep mode last night, and I'm… I'm s-sort of, well, tired. S-so—I th-think I'll do that now, yeah? N-not have to look at the… er… I-I'll just go to sleep."

The lady gave a slight smile, rubbing his upper handle. "Go ahead."

He stared up at her for a moment. "…G'night, luv," he said, closing his optic.

"Goodnight, Wheatley."

Something shook him, and he blinked out of sleep mode. "Huh…?" he muttered wearily. He only vaguely remembered dreaming, but it didn't really matter. What mattered was where they were now, and he suddenly opened his optic wide, looking around in fear. "Wh-where?"

His pupil shrank at the sight of dying wheat plants poking their ugly brown blades through the snow. "W-we're…! How long was I asleep?! D-did I really sleep for—"

"We got there quickly," Chell replied, and he swiveled his optic to look at her, only to wince at the grinding sounds from within him. They seemed to hurt a lot more now, and he narrowed his optic in the pain.

"Oh…" he groaned, trying to focus on the lady's face in spite of how awful he felt. Much to his surprise, she looked rather… emotionless. She stared ahead blankly, not looking at him. Maybe coming back here was hard on her, too. "S-so, we're here… C-can we go back, now?"

"No."

Optic widening again, he tried to turn his faceplate, but cringed as his broken poles ground against each other, causing pain to flare throughout him. Eventually he managed to turn himself, and jumped when he found that they were already halfway through the wheat field. The lady was pushing on ahead, plowing through the snow far more quickly than she should have. And the shed—the shed to that place was getting closer and closer and he didn't want to be here he didn't want to be here get out get out get out—

They were suddenly in front of the shed, and the door swung open with a bang.

He tried to say her name, but his voice was glitching, stuttering badly and warping between high and low pitches and choking with static. "Ch-ch-che—e-e—e-e—ellLLllll…"He tried to struggle against her, but his movements were suddenly sluggish, and he couldn't move his faceplate at all anymore. Yet his processor was racing—he had to get away from here, why wasn't she running away, why couldn't he move, what was wrong with him—

She dropped him.

His spherical body crashed onto the cement with a bang, but he didn't feel it—he only rolled forward into the shed, trying in vain to call out to her, to look for her, but she was already making her way back through the field, back where she'd come from.

"D-don't… l-l-l-l-leave… m…"

He rolled into the lift, which started to go down, and immediately he was there. There in that dark, dark chamber, lit by only a single yellow light—no, no, not a light, an optic, ten times bigger than he remembered it, glaring down at him, staring at him so intensely that he felt she could see straight through his twisted innards. He felt so tiny compared to this machine, this AI, this god of Aperture—her head alone seemed ten times larger than his mangled core.

He waited for her to speak, to insult him, to tear apart his hopes, to tell him about all the nasty things she would do to break him apart again, to say anything, but she remained deathly silent, only staring at him, the light from her optic casting a sickly yellow glow all around him.

The floor was arms.

Hundreds of mechanical arms, twisting and squirming around where the floor should have been, several of them suddenly reaching up all at once, grabbing at parts of his casing, his handles, his innards, and pulling, threatening to rip him to pieces. He wanted to cry, but no sounds came—he couldn't even tremble under the grip of the dozens of soulless mechanics. And still they continued to pull.

His handles went first, forcibly ripped out of their sockets, then shoved inwards against the inside of his hull. Next the arms grabbed his poles, roughly snapping them back together, sending spikes of pain throughout his tiny frame—he was so small, so small, and she was enormous, staring down at him as she wordlessly controlled the arms. He felt sick as she ripped out his wiring, restringing it throughout his core and through something else—he wanted to scream but he couldn't make a sound—nothing was working, he couldn't even turn his optic away from her—what had the lady done? Why had she left him to her again? Why had she—

—she hated him. She hated him. That was the reason for everything—why she'd pretended to be his friend, repaired him before letting him be torn apart again, put him through all those painful procedures only to have him broken again, given him hope again only for it to be ripped away, betrayed him and didn't want to stay, didn't want to share his success, didn't even want to catch him—she wouldn't even test for him—and his panels flared and his optic contracted and his body twisted and contorted in rage and he was going to kill her, he was going to rip her limb from limb as his handles had been ripped out, tear her insides out as his wires had been torn, smash her with the spike plates and crush her pretty little head like his hull had been crushed because she hated him, and he hated her—

—and he swung from the ceiling from the force of the explosion ahead of him, watching her body crash through the metal grating, spreading his panels and shouting in triumph that his trap had worked—but she was still alive—why was she still alive, why had she survived that, he hated her he hated her he hated her—

The spike plate crashed down from above, and one slammed upward from below, and he only regretted that he couldn't hear the crunching of her bones above the screeching protest of metal panels. But she was finally gone—he could see the blood leaking out from between the spike plates, dripping down to the floor below, but with every drip, drip, drip he could feel a surge of pain throughout his twisting body, as though it were his oil dripping down, as though it were him that had been crushed between the spike plates—

—and it tore through him, the shock that he'd killed her. He hated her, and he'd killed her, just as he'd wanted, but he'd killed her and he couldn't undo it, and no what was he doing she hadn't hated him he'd been horrible, he'd been wrong, he'd tried to control her when all she wanted was to leave this awful place, as they had planned—and he'd tried to kill her, and he'd done it, and he couldn't undo it—

The fire was all around him, most of the floor had given out, and he couldn't move from where he was—he wasn't on a rail, he was suspended from the ceiling, which was starting to collapse, but the two spike plates were still there, and he tried to move them but it was so hard now—"Lady I didn't mean to—to—please come back, please—I'm—" The flames swirled around him, scorching his casing, burning his wires, melting his cables, but his vocal processor was still working, barely—he felt like he was choking, as though something were pulling at the delicate wires of the mechanism. "Please get up, I never wanted this, I never—y-you—I'm sor—"

The cables gave way, and he crashed through the floor, his enormous frame twisting downwards, only to be slammed back upward from the force of the explosion—

Wheatley jolted awake with a gasp, flailing around in panic in a vain attempt to stop himself from ramming into what was left of the floors above, only to realize that his vision was overtaken mostly by white—what was—

"Wheatley."

Her voice was accompanied by a strong squeeze to his handles, and his processor snapped back to reality—Chell was still carrying him.

He swiveled his optic to look at her, flinching at the grinding inside—but it wasn't as bad as that—as that hallucination. "L-lady, you're…" he stammered, and she looked down at him, rubbing her thumbs on his handles.

"Another nightmare?" she asked, her brow furrowing.

He hated that term—humans had nightmares, not robots—but his optic narrowed in worry, and he nodded his face. "Y… yes," he said, trying to move himself closer to her side, to feel her, to remember what was real and what wasn't.

"What happened?"

Eye aperture contracting, Wheatley shook his face. "N-no, that's all right, l-lady—I'm… I'm all s-situated, now. Know wh-what's real and—and what's not. It's all fine. N-nothing… nothing's wrong now. A-absolutely tremendous."

Chell raised an eyebrow at him. "It's been a week."

It took him a moment to piece together what she meant—he wished she wouldn't speak like that, using the fewest number of words necessary—but he remembered. Yes, he'd gone for a week without bad sleep-hallucinations, and this was his first one since then. But… despite his function—what kind of core he was—even he could figure out just why he was having those awful sleep-hallucinations again. "I… well, y-you're smart, luv. I-I know you know wh-why."

"Tell me."

Bloody—he hated it when she did this, but he shut his optic for a moment before opening it and looking away, ashamed of himself. "…I-I'm scared," he said, twitching guiltily at his own admission. "It's… I don't w-want to go back there. I-I was there just… j-just a month or so ago, yeah? I-I try to forget it, b-but it's still in my head, and—I don't want to go back. I-I can't… L-lady—Ch-Chell, I..."

"I know." She breathed out a sigh, adjusting her grip on him so she could reach out and rub part of his faceplate again, turning it slightly toward her. "I'm scared too."

What.

"I—what—you—no, no—scared? B-bloody—how the—" His optic swiveled as he turned to look up at her, trying to discern if she was just making fun of him. She had to be. "Y-you're kidding! You're j-joking! A-and it's not funny, lady! Not funny a-at all! Wh—what kind of a cruel joke is that, anyway?! What—"

"I'm not joking."

His processor was reeling again—she wasn't joking? But that would mean she—"L-lady you can't be serious! B-because if you're serious… then… then you're—you're s-sc… no! Y-you can't be scared! L-lady, you stood up to her! Y-you stood up to…" His optic narrowed and his vocal processor choked with static for a moment—he couldn't finish the sentence. "Y-you're never—lady, you're never s-scared!"

"I am," she replied, heaving a sigh. She glanced over to the side for a moment before taking a seat on a fallen log, and tilting him upright in her lap. "I'm scared every time I come back here."

Wheatley stared. He had learned to trust her again after so long, but he couldn't bring himself to believe that the lady that had always seemed so brave, so strong from the first time he'd known her, could possibly be scared of anything. There was a time when… when he'd wanted her to be scared of him, but he didn't want to think about it. He shut his optic and shook his face. "N-no, b-but… then… i-if you're scared, then why…?" He opened his optic again, giving her a questioning look.

"You should know," Chell said, rubbing one of his handles again. "You came back after GLaDOS crushed you."

Blinking, he tilted in his casing, thinking back to that time—back when she had crushed him and tossed him, unknowingly, into the midst of a nanobot work crew site. They had been repairing parts of the facility, and, since he was relatively broken, had quickly fixed up his vitals before re-attaching him to a rail. While he could have very well run away at that point, he hadn't. Even though GLaDOS wasn't focused on him, and even though the facility wasn't on the verge of getting blown up, he'd put himself in danger again, because… "I… I wanted to save you, then," he muttered. "I was still sorta broken and it bloody hurt, b-but… I wanted to save you."

"Were you scared?"

"W-well, yeah! You'd have to be crazy n-not to be. I was… I was g-going against her, and if she caught me, she'd bloody—" His pupil contracted sharply, and his vocal processor simulated a sharp, too-high-pitched gasp as he suddenly saw flashes of a darkened chamber, feathered wings, talons, mechanical claws and arms, and that yellow optic—

She squeezed both of his handles and began to rub them, bringing him back. "I know," she said. "But you were scared, and you came back."

"Y-y-yes… I did… But…" He tilted his face one way, then another, glancing away from her. "Th-that was different, lady. I-I was… I was trying t-to rescue you… to g-get you out of there. That's all. I-I was doing something, you know? N-not just… going somewhere… d-doing something dangerous f-for no reason." His optic quickly turned to meet her eyes, giving her an almost accusing look. "B-but here, n-now—this… this bloody trek… Wh-what's the point? Y-you're doing something that makes you scared and all—not that I could tell, really—w-wouldn't… wouldn't have known if you h-hadn't told me—b-but there's no point to it! A-all we're doing is going far too bloody close to there and… and no-one wants to be back there! You don't! I-I don't! S-so, so wh-what's the point?"

Adjusting her seat on the log, she bent down, looking him in the optic. "To prove that GLaDOS does not control us."

Wheatley's optic contracted halfway as he stared at her, eye shields narrowed in utter confusion. "C… control…?" he repeated.

But Chell did not elaborate, instead standing up and continuing through the deep snow.

It was bothering Wheatley. It bothered him a lot, what Chell had said. He couldn't understand what she meant—how could going back to there prove that GLaDOS didn't control them anymore? It didn't sound like that. It… it sounded more like mind control, or something—like she was controlling her, and taking her back there, and… he shuddered visibly, looking up into her face to make sure her eyes didn't suddenly turn yellow or something, but they were the same icy blue as always.

Still, it made him nervous—or more nervous than he had been—and he tried to cover for his nervousness by babbling on and on about nothing. The lady had to quiet him a few times as she checked that odd flat round thing that told her where to go, but whenever he could, he went back to talking about absolutely anything that came to his mind—just so he could keep his mind off of there.

But it was getting late, and eventually the lady was setting up camp, building a fire and setting up a sleeping bag with a funny covering over it. She ate her dinner before slipping into the bag and pulling him in, zipping up the top so that their forms were only lit from the filtered firelight and his optic.

"I… I g-guess this is wh-where we're sleeping, then?"

She nodded.

"That's… um, a-all right, then," Wheatley murmured as she pulled him down toward her side, away from her face. There wasn't much room in the sleeping bag, so he wound up pressed against her stomach. Not that he minded; he readily nuzzled his face into her side, content to stay like that for the night. "G'night, then, luv."

"Goodnight, Wheatley."

Wheatley stole a quick glance at her through narrowed eyelids—not in any particular expression, but more to keep the light from his optic from shining in her face—before turning back to her side again. Part of him wanted to initiate his sleep mode processes right now, but another part of him worried, as it had worried for the entire trip.

When he woke up from sleep mode, they would be traveling again and getting close to there. Having no desire whatsoever to get there sooner, he toyed with the idea of keeping himself awake for the entire night. He'd done it before last night, but that hadn't been a pleasant experience. It had been a rather boring one, in fact, and… well… not the best for his mental state. Keeping himself online for eight hours in a constant state of nervousness and anxiousness, well… No, not the best idea. Not that that was a surprise.

Could always stay here forever, he mused, pulling his handles inward and snuggling a little closer. It's not bad here. Quiet… and… and cold… and lots of snow… and… well, no, it is bad here, but it's not as bad as… as there. As… oh…

Simulating a quiet sigh, he tried to tug his mind away from the subject. Control… I… I still don't understand… Why would—would coming back here prove that she didn't control us? She's… she's not controlling us now, is she? I—I hope not, anyway. She's not anywhere near us… n-not while we're at home. H-how can she…?

It was too confusing—too confusing to think about tonight.

He really should just go into sleep mode, but… that would mean risking another bad sleep hallucination. Another horrible vision, like the one he'd had earlier in the day—

Wheatley shuddered, and he winced at feeling the lady's placing a hand on his side. "S-sorry," he whispered. But it was hard to not think about that hallucination—it had been so vivid, so horrible, so full of rage and sadness to an extremity that was far too familiar. It was that chassis—that chassis that had magnified every aspect of him, from his suspicions to his ideas to his emotions, and it had been so easy to let himself get so enraged, to let himself act on his emotions before he could fully process what he was doing… and he'd done many things he regretted as a result.

But—but it was fine now, wasn't it? The lady had forgiven him, hadn't she? And he'd… he'd done his time, hadn't he? Paid his punishment for all the awful things he'd done, hadn't he? And he really hadn't killed her, so there was no point in thinking back on it, right?

…So why was he still having bad sleep-hallucinations about it?

He shook his face to rid himself of the thought, but blinked when he realized the lady was stirring.

"Wheatley," she said softly, "go to sleep."

"R… right," he stammered, optic contracting in embarrassment. "I-I will. J-just… just thinking, is all."

Chell felt around, gently grabbing one of his handles and rubbing it a little. "Don't think. Sleep."

"Y-yes… doing that… now." He heaved a sigh, leaning against her middle and trying to relax. He really couldn't stay awake—not without keeping the lady awake, too—so, simulating a gulp, he initiated his sleep mode, and was soon dead to the world.

For once, Chell began to question her actions.

Wheatley had been nothing but a bundle of anxiety from the time she'd announced her trek to him last night to now, when he'd finally shut himself into sleep mode. Though he'd tried—rather poorly—to hide it, she'd known from the beginning that he was terrified.

But as she'd told him, she was scared too. And if she could make this trek for the sixty-fifth time, he could make it through with her this time.

He is not you, part of her was saying. He is not someone that has been through this dozens of times. This is only his first time.

But she had made it her first time as well, and it had helped calm her worries more than anything.

You were not helpless then. He is.

She glanced down at the core in the darkness, his face pressed against her side. Though she'd repaired his wiring, fixed his vocal processor, returned his sleep mode, and hammered out the dents in his casing, he was still in rough shape. Not as rough as he had been, but he was not fully repaired. And even if he had been fully repaired, he was, at the moment, completely reliant on her. Should something bad happen, he would have nothing to defend himself.

He has more of a reason to be scared than you do. Besides, his wounds are much more recent.

Reaching out, she traced the welded scar on his right side, from one side of the panel to another. He did not react, but she knew that if he were awake, he would have jerked away from her touch. Though he had probably been developing walls against his memories, sometimes they would sneak back in the form of flashbacks and nightmares—like what had happened earlier today. She didn't know what he had been dreaming about, but apparently it had been bad enough for him to outright refuse to speak of it.

Was he really ready for what she was about to put him through?

Chell's brow furrowed. Whether he was ready or not, she had already determined to do this, and she was not turning back. He was going to have to do this at some point, and that point might as well be now.

But even so, she hoped she was doing the right thing.

"And you didn't catch me—didn't even try."

"No, you're lying—you're—you're lying—"

"And we could have talked our way out of it, except you forgot to tell me that you'd murdered her!"

"I AM NOT—A—MORON!"

"All you had to do was go through a couple of hundred simple tests over a few years—and you couldn't even let me have that, could you?!"

"You've done nothing but boss me around, well, now who's the boss? Who's the boss? It's me."

"Well now we're all gonna pay the price, because WE'RE ALL GONNA BLOODY D—"

Wheatley snapped awake to the feeling of something's squeezing his handles, and he struggled for a moment before finding himself in the lady's grip once again. It was still dark, but the sleeping bag and the fire were both gone. "L-lady—where—"

"I just finished packing," she said, rubbing one of his handles with her thumb.

"Oh." He blinked a few times, glancing around. "S-so we're, ah, sh-shoving off again, then, are we?"

She nodded.

"R-right… right, I… got it, right." Straining through his cracked optic and into the dark, he managed to see a rather dense forest of trees around him. "So, um… h-h-how about that forest, eh? It's all… all forest-y, and—and snow-y. And—oh, look at that!"

He'd meant to say it just as a means to distract her, only to note with surprise that there actually was something in the direction he was looking. It was a large quadruped that was suddenly raising its head to stare at them before darting away in a few quick leaps, disappearing into the dense forest.

"Wh… what the bloody heck was that, anyway?" Wheatley stammered, eye shields open fully in amazement. He couldn't help but feel he'd seen one of those things before, but where…?

"That was a deer," Chell replied, and he looked up to see her staring off after it. Vaguely, he wondered if she could still see it—he still had trouble seeing with his cracked optic sometimes. "You might have seen one before."

"Before? But—oh. Oh. B-back when you f-first… took me a-away from… from there. Right. I-I… I remember," he said, upper eye shield drooping as he glanced away. He remembered—though he'd rather not.

He could barely see her giving him a funny look out of the corner of his optic, and he turned back toward her accusingly. "I-it's not such a p-pleasant memory, you know? Like—like when you first got out of there," he said. She'd told him about it a few times, about the things that had happened back when she had first escaped, and how hard it had been. "Not so fun to th-think about."

Chell heaved a sigh, only rubbing his handles as she kept walking.

Well… it was fine, he supposed. Fine—he didn't really want to talk about it. Besides, he would rather like to move his attention away from where they were going. At least, he thought, it's still a few days before we get there. A few long, drudging days of walking through this… snow… water… stuff… and forest. Lots of forest. But at least it's not there. No, it's definitely not there.

"S-so, uh, what-all are you—are you reading right now?" he asked, eager to focus on something else.

"Watership Down," the lady replied, still keeping her eyes on the road ahead—metaphorically speaking, as, he had noted several times before, there were no actual roads in this forest.

"Aaah, Watership Down," he repeated, giving as sage-like of a nod as his busted innards would allow. "Right. Good, good. L-lots of—of ships, and battles on—uh, the water—and—and ships sinking, right?"

She chuckled softly, shaking her head. "It's about rabbits."

"Wh—what? What kind of story is that?" he blurted, pulling his faceplate back and narrowing his optic. "That's mental! Wh-who in their right mind would write about rabbits sailing bloody boats?"

The lady had to stop walking for a moment as she laughed, unable to cover her mouth without dropping Wheatley. He felt a little offended, but once her laughter subsided, she went onto explaining more about the book, giving him something to look forward to reading when they got back.

It was a good distraction; Wheatley happily talked about the book he'd been reading, and the lady listened and nodded along at his monologue. Even though they were out in the snowy forest, it almost felt like those times they would sit together by the fire back at the house as they read and talked, and for once, Wheatley was enjoying himself.

But as the morning dragged on and he continued to prattle off down one rabbit trail and up another, he happened to notice that the lady was growing quieter—or, well, more quiet than usual—and she didn't seem to be listening quite as well. In fact, she hadn't even looked at him in the past fifteen minutes or so, which was rather disconcerting. Still, he continued to talk, though the action was losing its comfort as he became increasingly aware of the fact that she was not paying attention.

"…and so then Jerry… he… he told me… ah… that… um." His monologue came to a none-too-graceful halt, and he cleared his non-existent throat. "Is—is something the matter?"

She didn't respond, only trudging ahead. If it hadn't been for that look of sheer determination in her eyes, he would have thought he was back in that sleep-hallucination from earlier. His aperture contracted in worry, and his eye shields narrowed. "Um—lady? Ch…Chell? A-are you… what's…"

When she still didn't respond, he shook his handles a little in her grasp, and she blinked, looking back down at him. Still she said nothing, only nodding her head slowly and looking up again.

A sick tension began to build within Wheatley, and, though he wasn't moving at the time, he swore he felt his innards twisting, his wires coiling around themselves in a nervous fear. Slowly he turned his faceplate to look around them, noting that the trees had become quite sparse off to either side. But when he looked back toward the lady's gaze, and followed it—

His body seized up in horror.

no

why

why were they here

they couldn't

it was

no

The field—it wasn't what he remembered, there was no wheat at all, just snow, bloody snow, but there—off in the distance—it was unmistakable, there was no way—it was that—he couldn't forget it—the shed—they were—

He didn't know when he had started trembling but he didn't care. His whole frame rattled, his insides bumping into his casing as he shook until it hurt, but he couldn't stop. His optic was contracted until he was nearly blind, his handles had gone tense, and he felt like the wires of his vocal processor were pulled so tight it would break them to even try to speak.

He felt a slight pressure on his handles, and snapped.

"GET AWAY!" he screamed, suddenly flailing and twisting in her grasp, causing her to stagger backward. "GET ME AWAY FROM HERE I CAN'T GO BACK I CAN'T DO IT YOU CAN'T MAKE ME GET ME OUT OF HERE GET ME OUT I CAN'T DO THIS SHE'S GOING TO KILL US AAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGH—"

His voice degenerated into hysterical screaming as the scenes flashed through his processor, one after the other, of her and the birds and the spike plates and the arms and the pain and the darkness and it wouldn't stop, he was trapped, he was back there and in her claws and she was going to kill him—

"WHEATLEY!"

His optic rolled in its socket, glitching as colors flashed around him before his vision finally came to a focus on the lady above him, her eyes wide in shock. He was suddenly aware that she was not carrying him, but rather sitting on the snow-covered ground, with him sitting on her lap, her hands in a vice-like grip on his handles.

He was confused—for a moment, he couldn't remember what had even happened, and when he swung his optic back toward the shed it all crashed over him again, and he would have slipped back into hysteria had not the lady squeezed his handles and pressed him close to her side.

"Wheatley, it's okay," she said, rubbing his handles, stroking his side, trying everything she knew to get him to calm down.

It wasn't okay.

The core hid his face in her side, too terrified to even look at anything around them. When he spoke, his vocal processor had glitched his voice up to a very high octave, nearly a squeak. "Wh-why are we back here I-I can't do this I can't I can't I thought you said we would t-take three days to get here…!"

"A day and a half to get here," she said, rubbing her hand in circles on his casing, "and a day and a half back."

"Wh-why didn't you tell me?!" he cried, still trembling visibly in her grasp. "I-I thought…"

"It doesn't matter." Chell moved on to rub his handles, and his shivering calmed a little, even if he didn't feel calm on the inside. "What matters is we're here."

"B-but I don't want to…!"

"Wheatley, you need to face this."

A shudder wracked his casing as he pulled his handles away from her, wrapping them around his body. "I can't!" he cried, voice cracking. For a moment he pulled away from her so he could look into her face, giving her a pleading look. But he shivered at seeing her hard gaze, and buried his face into her side again. "I-I can't, I…"

"Just look," she said, and a bolt of panic shot through him as he felt her begin to pull him away—

"NO!" he cried, squirming until one of his poles banged against another, sending a jolt of pain through his frame. He cried out, and she let go. Since he was already pulled away, he took the opportunity to glare up at her, optic contracted in fury and pain. "Y-you don't understand a bloody thing! Y-you don't know a bloody thing I went through! Sh-she tried to k-kill—no, sh-she—she didn't try to kill me, she t-tried to keep me alive! She tried to k-keep me alive wh-while she did—did everything—she—" He went through a series of twitches, his vision glitching into colors and static and brief glimpses of the horrors he'd experienced what felt like ages ago and yet not long ago at the same time. The mounting feelings of panic and fear and anger and betrayal were clashing in his processor, nearly overwhelming him. "Sh—kkkkssshh—bloody—r-r-r-ripped me—a-a-a-a-apart—a-a-and I was—still—bloody—alive! I-I-I c-can't… I can't g-go… th-through…" His optic twitched once, then narrowed as he mentally collapsed under the weight of his own emotions, falling forward against her middle again as he finally broke down.

Chell just held him, saying nothing as she wrapped one arm around him and carefully stroked her fingers over his handles, occasionally rubbing them gently.

At first he only felt the artificial comfort from her actions as he cried against her, his frame wracking with the sobs, but eventually it sank in that the lady really was there, and she was there to protect him; she wasn't going to just throw him to the wolves—not like she had in his sleep hallucination. He latched onto that—the knowledge that she was on his side, in spite of everything he had done to her—and though he was still scared, he knew he could trust her.

Finally he quieted down, but continued keep his optic buried into her side, not quite ready to look away yet—not ready to look there.

"She can't touch you."

Wheatley blinked.

"GLaDOS has no control over me or you."

"I-I don't…?" He risked pulling himself away again, giving her a confused, frightened look.

She looked right back, nodding her head in the direction of that place. "Turn around, Wheatley."

His optic contracted nearly shut, and he shook his face repeatedly. "No no no no no no no…"

Chell drew in a breath, reaching underneath his frame and turning him around in her lap. He gasped, snapping his optic shut and turning his faceplate away until his innards groaned. "Nonononononono…!"

"Wheatley, look."

He tried—he opened his optic to a slit, and caught sight of the shed. The memories threatened to overwhelm him again, but he felt her grip on his handles. Shuddering, he tried to open his optic further, but he felt sick—all he could think about was what happened before, and…

"Don't let her control you."

"Wh—control?!" he spun around, or tried to, but his innards ground together in protest, so instead he fixed a tree off to the side with a glare. "Wh-why would I let her control me?! Wh-why would I do something like that?"

"You're doing it now."

"Lady!" he cried. "Y-you've gone bloody mental!"

Chell kept her voice even. "When I first got out of there," she said, "I couldn't look back at the shed. I ran."

"A-and I don't b-b-bloody blame you…!"

"I ran until I reached the bridge, and I ran across that." He remembered her mentioning the bridge before—some massive thing that connected two "peninsulas," whatever those were, like a catwalk would connect two testing tracks. "But then I stopped, and turned back."

Wheatley blinked. "Wh-why?"

"Because I was letting her control where I was going."

He blinked again, handles drooping. "I-I still don't… d-don't understand…"

Adjusting him in her lap and resting one arm on the top of his casing, she resumed: "I never liked being controlled—not by GLaDOS, not by a human, not by anyone. But by letting my fear of her get the better of me—by letting it dictate where I should go, be it close to Aperture or away from it—I was still under her control. So I came back."

The gears were slowly, slowly starting to click into place. "Why…?"

"Because whether I came back to Aperture or left it, I wanted it to be because I chose to, not because she—or my fear of her—made me."

Slowly his optic turned as he risked looking at the shed again. She… she was starting to make sense.

"If I move away, it will be because I chose to."

"I… I think I… understand," he said, aperture relaxing. "S-so... I'm coming back h-here, to prove… th-that I won't let her—w-won't let her do anything to me?"

Chell patted him on top of his hull.

"I-I… I think I get it." His optic widened and brightened at the thought—he understood it! He got something right! And… and now he was here to prove—"Y-you hear that?" he shouted, his voice echoing over the empty field ahead. "I get it now! I-I'll come back here a-as bloody often as I l-like, because y-you—you can't make me do anything, GLaDOS!"

If he could have, he would have puffed out his casing, he felt so proud. "Y-you can't make me do a bloody thing! I-I'm here, and you can't do a b-bloody thing about it—ah!"

He gave a start when he felt Chell rub his upper handle before wrapping her arms around him, pulling him close to her side. At first he was confused, wondering why she was doing this right now—normally she only did that when he was really upset, but he certainly wasn't now. But then it clicked—this was... this was what humans called a "hug," wasn't it?

Turning his optic up, he saw her smiling down at him.

"Good job."

Wheatley grinned back, optic glowing brightly.

"Come on." With that, she grabbed him by the handles and stood, finally turning away from the shed. "Let's go home."

"Right," he said with a nod, taking one last look at the hidden entrance to that place—to Aperture—before looking back up at her. "So… s-same time next month, then?"

Chell raised an eyebrow. "If you think you're up for it."

He narrowed his optic, trying to match that determined grin he'd seen on her face so many times before. "Abso-bloody-lutely," he said with a nod. "Of course I'm up for it. N-nothin's gonna hold me back. You hear? I-I'll come marching straight back here—or, well, no, you'll be doing the marching, but still, I-I'll be with you, and I don't care wh-what she thinks. She could be all, 'Oh, no, don't you come back, I'm bloody tired of seeing you,' but I'd—"

"Wheatley."

"Sh-shutting up."