Chell set the bottle on the countertop. Her day had been long and made especially unpleasant by the sudden panic attack brought on by the smell of ammonia in the grocery market, that smell not so different from the unnatural sterilized smell of Aperture. Her chest had constricted and her breathing became deep and measured and quick and she was so sure she could hear the innocent, child-like "I see you," from the isle next to her. She nearly took down three shelves trying to crush the imaginary turret without the help of the Aperture Science Handheld Dual Portal Gun, and the knot of embarrassment and anxiety still resided in her chest. The deep red liquid poured gracefully from the slim glass bottle. She hadn't truly intended to ever drink it – she'd found it in the cellar when they'd moved into the quickly abandoned home – but some days, she decided, it was more than called for.

It wasn't anything fancy. A generous amount of wine in a red plastic cup, to calm her nerves and maybe even help her to fall asleep that night – God knew she would lie awake for hours after one of those episodes. She took a sip of the wine, almost unpleasantly strong and biting, and threw open the front screen door to sit under the night sky. The porch light was off, which was why she didn't notice Wheatley at first. When she did, it sent a jolt through her. She hadn't even heard him leave. She sat down next to him, in turn startling him, though he settled down easily enough. He shrugged his jacket a little closer as a crisp wind blew across the pair. It was summer, and the air was warm, a pleasant breeze that rustled the miles of wheat that stretched before the tiny home like a golden ocean, constantly moving and alive, so unlike how things were always moving back at the facility. This was natural; right, not cold and mechanical like the way the walls moved, or the short, jerky movements of the turrets, who's heads twitched like birds' at the slightest sound.

This was organic, real, though the android still seemed to have difficulty grasping that concept. Having spent his entire artificial life in the facility under fluorescent lights and temperature-regulated atmosphere, he found it so unnerving that things actually moved on their own, without any lunatic woman bending them to her will. He relaxed a little when the wind died down, grip loosening on the brown fabric that he relied on to survive in such a volatile environment. He found it maddening at first, because he'd come from such a constant environment, to be dropped into the middle of a place where the sky could never make up its mind about whether it wanted clouds or not, or – God forbid – rain. Rain was the worst, and he refused to go anywhere near the doors or windows in the house when the sky decided it wanted to try to short circuit him. But tonight wasn't one of those terrifying night when the entire earth seemed to shake from some mad power that reminded him so much of Her fury and the darkness was lit up in a fantastic and terrible surge of electricity. Tonight was cold and crisp and clear and he could still see the stars and the tiny sliver or moon that provided just enough light to their small wooden porch. Enough light so that, when he looked at Chell, he could see her looking up at the stars too. They'd both been so close to the stars, once. Granted, the stars they saw in the night sky were literally millions and millions of miles outside of the very edge of the solar system, but in any case, they had been far too close to enjoy them as peacefully as they could here on Earth.

"They're so beautiful from a safe distance, aren't they?" she asked, giving a voice to his thoughts.

That was another thing he was still getting used to. Her voice, withheld for so long during her stay in that madhouse he once called home, he hadn't thought it even existed. But there it was, clear as the sky that stretched forever before them, dipping down to meet the horizon. He nodded sagely, though everything he had told him he would never love the night sky like he hoped he would, back in the days when he dreamed of escaping Aperture. They were too familiar, and they brought back memories he'd tried so hard to delete from his hard drive.

With another curious glance over to his friend, he spied the red plastic cup that she held between her knees. "What's there, luv?" he asked, gesturing to the odd drink. He honestly hadn't seen anything like it before. It was thick and dark and gave off such a pungent odor, he found himself recoiling slightly as the breeze wafted it in his direction. Whatever it was, it was highly unpleasant, though that didn't seem to register with Chell.

She shrugged off his question. "Cup of wine. Found a bottle in the cellar yesterday." Her voice was slow and soft, hard and breathy at the same time, and he felt he would never get used to it.

"Wine. I know about that. In fact, I think I have an information file on it. Should be in here somewhere…" his voice trailed off as he concentrated on digging through the numerous information files stored in his system. "Alcohol! The engineers were, ah, very fond of that, I recall. Never understood it, though, with you humans. Stuff is lethal, easy enough to understand. Mess you up right, won't it?" he peered into the cup curiously, nervously wondering if Chell had damaged herself with it.

She shook her head, the wine beginning to mellow her out. She took another swig from the cup. "Frankly, it's worth it." She said. "You'd think after two years outside of that Hell, I would stop hallucinating."

"Must be the brain damage," he said under his breath, though it was intended for her to hear, as it was a bit of a joke. He knew she would get like this at times, mentally beating herself up for not being able to let go of her time at Aperture as if it had been a tea party. He always tried to cheer her up as much as he could, but it seemed like everything he said to her was funnier in his head. He received no response, no soft chuckle or even a smile from her; she only took another sip from the cup. He drew he knees closer to his chest, which wasn't a difficult task, given how absurdly long they were. His whole body was absurd. Excessive limbs and a height that, he imagined, would be considered monstrous among other humans, if they ever encountered any. He was a towering six foot seven inches and was constantly looking down on his companion, in a strictly figurative sense, of course, since he thought the world of Chell. "I just don't get it." He reasserted. "If you know it damages your system, why consume it? That's like me saying I'd fancy a nighttime walk in one of those loud rain storms that happen out here."

Chell shook her head again. Concepts like wine had been ingrained in Human culture since saner, ancient times. How was she supposed to explain it to him? She sipped her drink pensively and stared up at the stars. The waving wheat in front of her brought the nostalgia of her first day above the surface, her first day of freedom from Aperture. He cheeks were slightly flushed from the wine. The words tumbled out before she even knew she'd said them. "It's sort of the like the Euphoric Solution."

She stopped. The knot in her chest returned, immediately sobering her from her slight tipsy. Those words tasted like pure poison, and she could feel them carving a hallow inside her chest as she remembered things best left forgotten. She sloshed the remainder of her drink – about half the cup – around uncertainly. The time she had spent in Aperture had scarred her deeply, but she managed, day by day, and things became easier over time. But Wheatley… He told her that he was right as rain, it was all in the past, but she could still see it in him, the way he would come out on nights like tonight and stare at the stars, the way he was so very jumpy when he talked to her, too eager to please. Chell knew that he remembered everything just as painfully as she did. She looked sheepishly up at her friend.

His eyes were closed, a slight crease between his brow and his hands clenched on the hem of his jacket. The synthetic skin of his knuckles was white with tension and a higher-pressure grip than anything any human could ever dream to possess. His lips traced unintelligible words, silently, but she had seen him do this enough times to know that he was attempting another memory dump. It never worked, but he had always been blindly optimistic and, frankly, desperate enough to need the optimism.

She raised the cup to her lips again, feeling guilty for causing his android body's interpretation of a panic attack and wanting to explain to him how completely different the two were. It had been a poor analogy. All she had meant was that the depressant qualities of alcohol in the human body produce a slight giddiness, enough to ease someone of the day's tensions. It, in comparison, really wasn't anything like the Solution…

Her mind stopped the thought, her body froze mid sip.

That wasn't true.

It was the same, in all its practicality, as the Euphoric Solution. Both created a chemical reaction in the body – albeit, hers a human body – to promote feelings of bliss. The wine did relax her, but she knew it was only short lived. The knot in her chest returned not long after her drink, leaving a longing for the almost carefree serenity she had felt while tipsy. She had spent since she could remember in a state of panic and hyperarousal, and she found herself craving that feeling. Her chest tightened in a slight fear; he was just as frightened now as she had been when he had turned on her. It was possible to build an addiction to alcohol, just as Wheatley had to the Solution, and over time, become numb to its effects. It wasn't even a matter of mental capacity, it was proven. And after that point, what would stand between you and that feeling?

That sickeningly perfect feeling.

Wheatley remembered it all too well and imagined, only briefly, that he could still feel the burning itch in the back of his systems as he recalled how bloody happy he'd been. The files he had accessed told him of something called alcoholism, an addiction to the feeling that the substance would produce. It was so close to him, that overpowering addiction, the desperate need to feel good, so desperate that you would do anything, not thinking straight, anything that might make you feel better.

Murder wasn't out of the question.

And there she was, sitting right next to him, a sweetly painful reminder of just how deep he'd been pulled under, that he had actively tried to murder the one sentient being who hadn't patronized him, who had treated him with respect, who had been his friend.

She lowered the cup, resting it on her knee as she looked at him again. He was trembling, curled in on himself and hardly even producing real words anymore. His eyes were screwed tighter and his fingers twitched as he let go of his jacket and ran a shaky hand through his honey colored hair and over his forehead, knocking his glasses slightly askew.

She reached up and caught his hand as he made to grab at his jacket again. His eyes flew open in shock at the unexpected contact, immediately looking away from her upturned face. His lips still traced the useless attempts for the memory dump, but slower, less frantic, and as his gaze came to rest on the hem of the jacket he was twisting between his fingers, she smiled gently at him and lifted the cup for him to see. He recoiled, shying away from the ghost of that gnawing, burning itch that had driven him to insanity once upon a time. He looked at her in terrified wonder, half begging her not to drink any more of that poison, half begging her to keep it as far away from him as possible.

With a quick movement of the wrist, Chell tossed the contents of the cup, the wine soaring through the air, collected in little globules like a blood red Conversion Gel, across the porch and into a small patch of grass right before the wheat with a satisfying plap!

Wheatley's body relaxed when she placed the cup at her feet and attached herself to his arm, scooting closer and rubbing his shoulder in small circles, a reassuring gesture that he had often shown to her, on those nights where their memories got the better of them.

After a moment, his quiet mutterings had ceased, and the two mused together over thoughts of the future, the endless possibilities, like the endless stars that twinkled against an inky sky, like the endless miles of wheat with a small house sitting in the middle, with an odd pair sitting on the porch, and a red cup sitting, forgotten, at their feet.