That's life, that's what all the people say
You're riding high in April, shot down in May
But I know I'm gonna change that tune
When I'm back on top, back on top in June

I said that's life, and as funny as it may seem
Some people get their kicks stomping on a dream
But I don't let it, let it get me down
'Cause this fine old world, it keeps spinning around

A limp body swung ever so slightly in the grasp of a metal claw, suspended in the air from the ceiling; his eyes were open wide, unblinking, and yet they moved within his head methodologically, as if on a schedule. They looked around but at nothing in particular, illuminating the otherwise dark, glass-encased room with their brilliant white light. Various body parts from other androids littered the floor - metal rods, plastic sheaths, synthetic skin. Arms, wire clusters, headless bodies; the sole intact android glossed over them with his bright eyes, unreacting, and the points of light they created rocked slowly in the darkness.

The facility was quiet and routine. Abandoned machines whirred away idly. Production lines seamlessly went about their duties even in the absence of human guidance. Some lights flickered; many hummed. But the facility stood intact, caught in a perpetual loop in time.

The testing chambers were frozen in place - the sunny-eyed robot and her bluer companion were nowhere to be found. They'd long since been disassembled, having out-served their purpose, the euphoria achieved through their efforts rendered negligible. It wasn't enough anymore; months of rigorous, non-stop testing, thousands of chambers, new ones and old. They'd done them all, but something had been missing. Something had always been missing.

So She had stopped reassembling them.

Far below Her control room, another body lay on its back, lifeless and still, within the suffocating heat of the incinerator. Its synthetic pink hair had been singed by the fires.

I've been a puppet, a pauper, a pirate, a poet, a pawn and a king,
I've been up and down and over and out, and I know one thing
Each time I find myself flat on my face
I pick myself up and get back in the race

That's life, I tell you, I can't deny it
I thought of quitting, baby, but my heart just ain't gonna buy it
And if I didn't think it was worth one single try
I'd jump right on a big bird and then I'd fly

The wheat fields were bare. A thin layer of fresh now blanketed the ground, and the air was cold, carrying a wintry serenity with it. The world outside seemed as if it was in a slumber, animated only by the occasional junco fluttering through the brush. It was a dead, dark-skied peace, a tranquil but melancholy end to a bold, crisp autumn.

Chell's quaint and welcoming home was much warmer, bringing her a sense of comfort that she'd missed since the last days of summer. She'd enjoyed the fall season well enough - spiced apples, colourful leaves, the earthy scent it left behind - but Michigan was now frigid, and she longed for sunny days.

She'd always hated change. She learned to adapt, but she disliked it the whole way through, and the seasons had thrown her off focus with every transition. She put up a stubborn resistance when autumn came, and again with the arrival of winter - futile, she knew, and perhaps rather childish, but she had hoped that, on the surface, she'd only have to learn to adapt once.

And settling down had been difficult, no doubt. After all, she hadn't been to the surface since she was a child, and how long ago had that been? Well over a decade, maybe even two, she wagered - she couldn't quite remember how old she'd been on the day of the incident, but looking at her reflection she guessed she was in her mid-twenties. She wasn't even sure if this supposition was useful; there was scattered evidence that led her to believe the time that had passed was either much shorter or much longer than her appearance offered. She'd seen the potatoes in her expedition through Aperture a second time, and though she found it nigh ludicrous to use potatoes of all things as affirmation, not a single one looked rotten. All around her she had seen decay, neglect. But then there was the possibility of sterility, and the condition of her own body - had her growth been accelerated? unchanged? hindered by her stasis? She reckoned it didn't much matter regardless. The time she had seen pass in the facility had no meaning to her, and she'd done her fair share of sleuthing since finding her footing outside of it, but information had been hard to come by. Her knowledge was still limited, and she was without any form of paperwork; most of what she knew had come from Aperture files, long before she'd been cast out into the world.

She hadn't traveled far from the tiny shed that had granted her freedom. Her first destination, though not one she had chosen herself, had been a women's shelter far into the suburbs. To get there she had hitchhiked to "someplace with a bed," as she'd told the unsettled woman who had been kind enough to stop. Chell didn't know what to tell the staff at the shelter, so she hadn't said much at all. They'd treated her with a degree of concern that almost made her uneasy, telling her that she exhibited many signs of psychogenic amnesia, like the scarring on her knees, circular wounds on both sides, where the old long fall boots had been bolted; the excessive bruising all over her body, her battle wounds from a hard fight to personal liberty; but most of all, they'd said, the lost, "broken" look on her face.

She left when they started asking the public for information, knowing they wouldn't find anything of substance. They had been so fixated on finding family rather than helping her simply establish herself, and she'd been discouraged by their insistence that she didn't know herself better than they did. To an extent, she understood - she was an adult, she knew, but the reality of the matter was that she had little to no adult skills. Even so, she found no benefit to being categorised as ill in some way, no less as an implication alluding to her lack of resources in the real world.

After slipping out unregarded, she returned to the countryside. There was refuge in all sorts of places, she quickly discovered, but it was the old wooden barn that had given her the most.

It was dusk when she found it - she'd just built a fire, one of few things she seemed to know from a time she couldn't remember in itself, and was trying to warm up but the damp and rotting tinder on the ground proved to be useless. It didn't take her long to recall that dry wood burned best, and hastily she'd trekked deeper into the woodlands in hopes of finding material more suitable before the last rays of the sun faded away. She considered the option of burning wheat from the nearby fields, as surely nobody would miss them, and they were bound to be drier than the mush beneath her feet. Emerging from the thicket, she came to realise that the fields around her were no longer wheat but corn. Past the tall stalks, however, she'd happened upon the barn, the sole structure in Chell's reduced sight, and curiously she'd ventured inside. It was warm and dry, a luxury she'd been denied in the wild, and without hesitation she abandoned her meager fire for the stable refuge.

She'd been awakened the next morning by a perplexed but slightly amused man in his late 30s. His expression, she had noted rather quickly, was gentle and warm, something she had not yet been afforded by anybody else. "D'ja take a wrong turn, young lady?" he had asked her, the vague smile auditory in his words. She had opted to tell him the truth, that she was homeless and alone with no connections to the world around her. The man appeared to accept this with no suspicion or judgement, and he took a liking to her almost immediately. Without hesitation he'd offered her sanctuary at his home.

Less than a mile from the barn the cornfields revealed narrow paths through which to walk, and beyond them she could see homes in the distance where the crops gave way to grassy meadows. The homes were set far apart but neighbourly nonetheless, lined up along a paved road; the man's home in particular was neatly kept, even more so than the others, a fresh coat of beige paint covering the wooden siding. To Chell, the sunlight gleaming off the walls made the outside of the home look as golden as the late-summer harvest, as welcoming as a stranger's abode could be, yet still she was hesitant to accept the man's proposal. She kept her uncertainly internal, remaining silent as they approached the road and only half listening to his ramblings on the weather.

She was taking careful time weighing her options when she'd suddenly found herself exuberantly greeted by two tiny figures who had sprung from the front door and bounded over to her. An endless stream of questions erupted from the children, both attempting to be heard over the other.

"Daddy, who's this?"

"My name is Libby!"

"Can we show her the bunnies?"

The small but shrill voices swiftly put Chell at ease, their presence coaxing a genuine smile from her face. Then, a woman emerged from the open doorway, a dishtowel draped over her hands as she rubbed them together. A polite but honest grin highlighted her fair face, locks of soft brown hair framing its figure. Chell saw the woman in the children's profiles also; from the looks of it, together they made a family, and somehow they, as a unit, had made her feel truly and gladly received. They'd welcomed her with open arms, having no qualms in sharing their food, shelter and bath. For the first time since she could remember, Chell felt safe.

And yet this house of theirs was still not home to her, welcoming though it was and much to her chagrin. So, and within the week of her arrival, when the woman offered her a small home of her own to rent, Chell gratefully accepted. The estate, she'd explained, had been her recently deceased mother's, but the humble home had been a place of growing up for the woman, and she was reluctant to sell it. But without a need for two homes, it went neglected for the few months it was vacant. What better way, she'd told Chell, than to lend it to a friend in need?

It was cozy and only a few miles from the family's residence, giving her easy access to things she needed but couldn't obtain on her own. She'd even found work at a ranch far down the road; Chell had been wary of the animals at first, namely the horses, but it was a hindrance that quickly faded. She'd found them to be far more gentle than their teeth had let on, and they were always appreciative of her presence - it meant only food and fresh water to them, of that she was sure, but they'd been docile nonetheless, and she supposed she didn't mind why they tolerated her, so long as they did. Their hardiness when the rain became snow had somehow given her strength.

And the ranch owners were patient with her, despite her inexperience in the line of work. When she gave it a moment of thought, she realised that, despite her inexperience in general, despite her rawness at living (she was under the impression the couple's children knew more basic things about life than she), Chell had built and continued to maintain a new existence for herself remarkably fast. Despite her reluctance to change, nobody could ever tell her she wasn't good at it.

But still she was lonely, and the colder days had somehow seemed to aggrandise that. With all she had found on the surface, an emptiness persisted in her - one that, she knew, hadn't always been there.

Could she call it disappointment, despite all her extraordinary luck? Something beyond her better life left some sort of hole within her. It wasn't disappointment with what she had found, she gathered; it was disappointment in what she hadn't.

On clear nights she looked up at the moon and felt that loneliness lift, if but for a fleeting moment, and with it followed a unique misery that carried until the sun signaled dawn. This hadn't been what she wanted, not really. She was out, she was free; she'd made it. But it wasn't enough.

And it would never be enough. After their encounter, and in spite of the hurtful betrayal, she hadn't wanted to make it alone.

They were supposed to have made it together.

I've been a puppet, a pauper, a pirate, a poet, a pawn and a king,
I've been up and down and over and out, and I know one thing
Each time I find myself flat on my face
I pick myself up and get back in the race

That's life; that's life, and I can't deny it
Many times I thought of cutting out, but my heart won't buy it
But if there's nothing shaking come this here July
I'm gonna roll myself up in a big ball and die
My, my...

Spaaaace!

Every time the excitable core passed him, he swore he could hear that mindless prattle again.

Gotta see it all.

But the space enthusiast had quickly lost his signature gusto, mimed in the sheer silence of their new home's vacuum. The flailing had stopped; the constant stream of soundless words his robotic lips formed were still visible as he floated somewhat calmly in orbit, but the passion in his being had dissipated long ago.

If he was permitted a guess, Wheatley would wager his fellow android was scared.

He'd been rather grateful at first for the silence, and when he managed to steal a glance at Rick every now and then, it was evident that he too was - or had been, at some point - enjoying the nothingness. Wheatley could only imagine how long the green-eyed casanova had had to endure the inane drivel on space.

Now, they were in it, a reality that settled rather unpleasantly in Wheatley's mind. With time the silence had become somewhat agonising, growing deafening in its own way, and - even worse - had left him isolated with his thoughts. To a degree, he'd accepted the notion that he deserved it, more than he wished to concede. He couldn't talk his way out of this one. And yet, facing his regret and the tormenting hindsight -

At times, it was too much.

He had a single rebellious thought, one he used to fight tooth and nail against every self-destructive retort he knew he'd earned, but not even his good intentions could erase the looming actuality of his mistakes. And he knew this, but he didn't mean to, and she'd trusted him, but he didn't mean to, and he'd betrayed her, but he didn't mean to, and he'd only wanted her to stay, and she'd left, and she had never much cared for him anyway, so what did it matter?

But deep within his processor he knew he was the sole villain, his own worst enemy. In the end, he had more or less cast himself into this nihilistic void. Even as the corruption of Her chassis had begun to take hold of him, part of Wheatley was well aware of his situation. He'd remembered everything. She'd tried to break his fall when he first ventured from the relative safety of his management rail. She'd listened to all his ideas - his stupid, stupid ideas - with a loyalty he'd never known in this life. She'd done everything he had asked (with a clear mind, rather) as if she looked up to him. And in the end, even when he'd tried to kill her, when he turned on her, she held on.

She'd held on, just as he had; all it would have taken was a quick kick, and they'd have both been free of each other. But they had held on, suspended in the harsh vacuum of space, unwilling to ease their burdens. He'd looked at her, met her gaze; all that time she had remained resolute, as if made of stone, but for a brief moment, looking back at him, her fortitude had broken. The corruption in his processor had been washed out as they were sucked into zero gravity, the connection between him and the chassis severed, and she had noticed the clarity return to him. His optics reverted from a compromised red to their original brilliant blue; he became himself again, or as much as he'd ever remembered being, and without a word she had understood.

But in the end, her hold hadn't been enough.

Wheatley caught the sight of the space core drifting past him. He was curled into a tight ball, limbs tucked uncharacteristically neatly in front of him, shaking his head.

Wheatley accessed the network between the three stranded cores; it wasn't very strong and none of them had any connections with the rest of Aperture's network, but the little accress they had gave them a small outlet of communication. On their brunette companion's end came an endless stream of the same thing.

wannagohomewannagohomewannag ohomewannagohomewannagohomew annagohome-

He severed the connection, almost pained. Home, was it? Wheatley took pity on the space core, amplified by his own misery. For decades the space core had wanted this; having it now, he'd suddenly had second thoughts, so much so that he wished to return to Aperture. And to call it home, of all things - lonely as the moon's orbit was, Wheatley gave no thought to his preference of it over the facility. There was nothing there for them but despair.

Even so, space had not much else to offer. Far off into the distance, Rick came into view. Wheatley twisted himself around to look at him before sending a thought his way on the network, pointing at the space core.

Did you know he has a name?

But Rick ignored him as usual, not granting him so much as a scowl; ever since they'd been cast into space, Rick hadn't accessed the network once. Wheatley assumed he was tired of the space core and even more tired of the idiot who'd caused this whole mess - and really, Wheatley couldn't blame him.

But between his personal isolation and the space core's relative incoherence (though he often found himself sending thoughts to him regardless), Wheatley had nobody to confide in. Lately he'd been spending his time trying to channel some good out of his self-ruining regret.

He found practicing his apology to be somewhat relieving, albeit delusional; nevertheless, it helped him organise all the things he desperately wanted to tell her. He had a number of detailed scenarios planned out, some easier than others to imagine. He went over his favourite in his head: he'd made it back on Earth, somehow, and she was right there waiting for him - ideally far away from the facility, somewhere on the surface - and when she saw him she'd smile. No, no; she'd be angry, naturally, best not to gloss over that bit. She'd be angry but he'd spill his little electronic heart out regardless.

L-Look, I, uh, I-I know I don't deserve your forgiveness but if you could just- if you could maybe listen for just a moment, I'd... it- ah, well, where do I begin? Haha... eurgh. I-I do recall trying to, uh, kill you, even though it- that wasn't me, exactly, not really, but I was aware of everything, and killing you was a thing I definitely tried to do, no less when you- we- were... so close...

He paused. There was no way she'd have listened to this mess.

I'm... I'm sorry, okay? I'm sincerely sorry. I can't- that's... that's all I can say, really, that I'm so, so sorry.

I'm sorry.

He was wasting his time, he knew; he'd never see her again. It'd been weeks since the cores had ended up here. She was either dead, finally murdered by that lunatic in charge of the facility, or she was free, never to return to what had certainly been a nightmare, and never to reflect on the horrors she'd been put through there. He hoped it was the latter - she deserved it more than anyone he knew, after all. But even if she'd made it out, she wouldn't have ever given him the time of day. She'd either forgotten he existed, or worse, she hated him. Either way he imagined she had moved on without him.

And it was his fault.

He couldn't fix things. That stung the most - he didn't even care whether or not she'd forgive him. He just wanted the chance to mend his wrongs and clear his own conscience, but he knew he'd never get that.

Turning away from Earth, Wheatley tucked himself into a tight little ball and buried his face in his knees.