mewtwowarrior (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
mewtwowarrior) wrote2010-11-21 06:09 pm
mewtwowarrior) wrote2010-11-21 06:09 pm
Entry tags:
NaNoWriMo: Chapter 17
Finally finished level 16/Chapter 17 of my Portal novelization! Huzzah! Took me half of forever, and it ended up being a super-long chapter, but it's finally done! :D
Next is Companion Cube level, whoo!
I'm gonna have to work super-hard early this week in order to build up a decent word count to survive the holidays. XD
Please give any crit or advice for this chapter! Thank you!
Chapter notes:
16
-IT'S THE TURRET LEVEL YAY :D
-Though, it's going to be a little bit of a pain, because the captions don't display the right turret calls. >: I'll try to play with the options and see if the other captions show it right. I also have that game script that I think has them all, and the sound file if need be.
-This one is hard to screenshot, so much action going on.
-:D I just figured out how to ninja past the one in the hallway, usually it shoots me up. XD
-Also ninja'd past another one that usually gives me trouble.
-Then got shot to pieces at the first two you drop cubes on. XD
-Very few screenshots, I'll just do a live run and fill in the details with the screenshots I did take later.
-Does the sarcasm work? Or just come off odd?
-Still working through how the last bit of the level is going to work, I've figured out how to ninja a few things, and if one plays out the way I want it to, Chell will drop from the ceiling behind two turrets, which would be awesome. :D
-Describing the turret shooting from afar sounds so terrible. :|
-I know the "correct" method is to knock over the turrets, but I didn't know this on my first playthrough. I dumped them out of portals and caused a mess until I hit the part that showed dropping boxes on them, then obsessed over that method. XD
-I am so sorry, this chapter is going to be absolutely huge.
-A lot of the action feels wonky. :|
-If you see any instances of the word "turret" please let me know, Chell wouldn't know that's what they're called. :|
-Descriptions of bizarre things feel weird. :|
-The screenshots I took were all nearly useless. XD
-Might split this one into two chapters. :| What do you think?
-I didn't write down every time the turrets looked around or shut down. Does anybody want me to add them all in?
-Also, I don't think all turret calls were represented and some were repeated. I was doing this live, though sometimes I had to go back and listen again to see what they said, and it changes every time.
-Also, for Chell's healing, I don't know what happened to the bullets that enter her body, so I'm just making it up.
-Punctuation might be a bit wonky with all the quotes. :|
-Outside Resources
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thigh
http://half-life.wikia.com/wiki/Doug_Rattmann
http://www.gamefaqs.com/pc/934386-portal/faqs - Ayelis' Game Script
Chell sat in the floor for a few minutes after the elevator doors open. Her eyes were closed, she didn't want to think about what was next, just for a short period of time, she just wanted to relax and recover.
After a while, she opened her eyes and got to her feet. It was time to get serious. She felt a bit refreshed after her break, so she'd be sharper for the more difficult tasks ahead.
She looked out to see what she could find out about this test.
The elevator let out to an enclosed grey hallway. At the very end was a dark, unactivated information board. On the left wall, close to the board, was a closed door.
Maybe it'd open once she got close, and besides, she wanted to see what the information board had to say.
Chell walked down the hallway, when she got close to the door, the voice spoke, in an odd-sounding tone, "Due to mandatory scheduled maintenance, the appropriate chamber for this testing sequence is currently unavailable. It has been replaced with a live-fire course designed for military androids. The Enrichment Center apologizes for the inconvenience and wishes you the best of luck."
As soon as the voice was done speaking, the door opened.
A LIVE-FIRE course for ANDROIDS? This was insane! The portal gun wasn't designed for combat; you couldn't just shoot somebody with it. She wasn't trained in fighting, either. Would this be the end of the road for her? No, she'd get through this and beat it.
The information board only had three squares highlighted. The first two on the top row were lit, the ones featuring the cubes. The other square was a new one; it was the middle square in the bottom row. This square showed a stick figure being shot by lasers from an odd looking thing. Just great. Lasers. Exactly what she wanted to encounter.
Chell sighed and ran a hand through her hair. This wasn't going to be a fun test. She thought the last one was bad, just for the fact that it was so long and kind of tricky. This one was out and out going to be fatal.
Well, she should get to facing the firing squad; this test wasn't going to complete itself. No matter how bad it was, she had come too far to just turn back now. Only a few more chambers until the end, that's it. Though, if they progressively got worse, her chances of survival would start dwindling.
She turned and looked through the doorway. The room was made of concrete with a window across from her. Through the window, Chell could see two odd white ovals on legs. Each of the ovals had a red laser shooting out from it to the right.
In the room Chell was about to enter, she saw to the left one metal leg. One of the laser ovals was in there, but she didn't see the red beam of light. It must be facing another direction, so it should be safe to enter the room.
Chell walked forward into the room, there was a burst of sound that kept repeating. It took her a moment to find the source. There was a room past the room behind the window. This room was also covered by a window that was now scored with cracks and more kept appearing. Chell walked closer to try and get a better idea of what it was.
As she got close to the window, she heard a voice say, "Deploying." All of a sudden, there was a second, closer blast of sound. The glass in front of her was cracking, but seemed to hold.
Chell peered through the fractured window; it looked like one of the ovals was shooting at her. She hadn't been in front of its laser, though. And that other one, it was quite a distance away. It seemed as if they had a pretty good range and could shoot at more than what it touched with its laser.
There was one good thing about all of this, though. That was the fact that they didn't fire lasers. It looked like ordinary bullets. It wouldn't be any fun to be shot either way, but at least it wasn't some kind of crazy laser thing. Bullets she could deal with.
She put her hand to one of the areas where the glass had been shot. She couldn't feel any warmth from the bullets slamming into it, but she could feel it shake slightly under the attack. The glass seemed sturdy and bulletproof, but she didn't want to test that, so she backed up until it stopped firing.
The gun robot said, "Are you still there?" Then, she saw it looking around, swinging its laser in several directions. It appeared to be confused and couldn't find her, even though she had only taken a few steps away from the window.
After several moments of searching, it paused, staring straight ahead. It spoke one simple phrase, "Target lost."
Chell then turned around to see what she could do about getting out of here.
With her back to the window, there was two points of interest to her right.
One was an exit to the next part of the test.
The other was one of the killer robots. From here, it looked like the thing was tall enough to come up to her shoulder. She had seen what the other ones did to the glass and didn't want to end up like that.
She carefully walked around the robot, staying several feet away at all times. Maybe she could use the portals to avoid it completely. As she did so, a robot in the other room started firing again, making noise against the glass.
Ignoring the obnoxious noise, she looked out over the robot in this room's head, trying to see if she could sneak through the hallway with portals.
No such luck. All Chell could see of the previous room was that it was made of metal. She was going to have to deal with the robot before she could continue, but how?
Maybe if she dropped it from a portal. If she placed one below it and one somewhere on the ceiling, it'd fall through. If the height was enough, it could damage the robot and maybe put it out of commission.
Well, the only thing she could do was try it and hope she didn't get killed.
Chell walked back towards the entrance, as she did so, more of the robots started firing on the glass. This was getting old; they were making quite a racket. The quicker she got out of this room, the better.
She found that if she stood in the right corner of the smaller section in front of the door, she'd have a clear view of the robot and be as far away as possible from it.
With a deep breath, she first placed a portal on the ceiling, close to directly above the menacing robot. Next, she placed a portal below it.
Mayhem instantly erupted. As soon as the robot fell through the portal, it started firing wildly, yelling "Ow ow ow!" It flew through both portals twice, then landed sideways on the ground, still shooting. It stopped as soon as it began, stating an almost-sad "I don't blame you."
Chell waiting a few moments to see if it'd come back to life. It was silent and there was no laser emitting from it.
She walked over to examine the thing. There were bullet holes all around the room, mostly on the wall in front of where it landed and fired until it shut down.
The bullets had made craters in the grey walls, in the stuff she had assumed was solid concrete. She couldn't see the bullets, just a small dark hole surrounded by an impact ring. These things meant serious business.
However, it looked as if they'd malfunction as soon as they lost their balance. Could they simply be tipped over to stop them? She wasn't sure if she wanted to try it, it could be dangerous. But, she'd keep that fact in mind, in case things came to that. Who knew what could happen in this place.
Now that the crazy robot was out of the way, she could continue. Chell turned around and walked to the doorway, first, moving the portal out of her way, and then peeking around to see if there were any more of the things lurking around.
All she could see was that the room was made of metal and that it lead to the right.
Chell pressed her back to the right wall of the small hallway and walked to the corner, peeking around slightly to see if there was a robot down that direction.
The metal gave way to concrete and a small, square room. There were no robots in the room, but there was a red laser down the middle of it. There was a doorway on the left wall of this room.
There were two options, there was either a robot down the left hallway with its laser coming through the door or there was a robot to the right, possibly down another hallway.
Either way, it couldn't see her, so she walked cautiously around the corner and to the doorway to see if the robot was in the room.
The laser ended on the right wall, so the robot had to be down the hallway. That was good to know.
There were pieces of wall on both sides of the square doorway that lead to the robot. If she used a portal to get on the other side of the laser, perhaps she could find a way around the robot without it finding her.
Chell placed a portal on the right side of the doorway. Since the room she was in was made out of metal, she stepped forward until she had a clear shot of the left side of the doorway, then fired one on that part of the wall.
She slowly walked towards the portal, taking care to stick close to the wall. She entered the left portal and came out of the right safely. The robot hadn't noticed her presence.
Chell turned to look out of the doorway. There was an alcove out of the robot's laser's range behind the left wall. It'd be simple to get there.
She fired a portal into the alcove on the wall, next to the corner, and walked back through the portal next to her.
Chell walked forward, close to the opposite wall and came as close to the edge and the robot's laser as she dared.
From there, she could see a clear patch of wall somewhere to the right of the robot. It looked far enough away from the laser so that she wouldn't get shot.
She aimed a portal at this space and fired, then walked over to the alcove portal and made her way through.
Chell came out of the portal slightly behind and to the left of the robot. It stared blankly down the hallway. It wouldn't notice her if she was careful.
To her right was another hallway, though this one had an open area in the left wall that had stairs. Raised several feet up was another robot's laser.
However, since it was in the middle of the hallway, it'd be a simple deal to just use a portal at the end of the hallway where it curved to the right.
Chell fired a portal at this spot and walked back the one she had just come through.
As she walked out of the other portal, she was undetected by the robot in the hallway, but, one in front of her started firing, saying calmly, "There you are." Luckily, it was behind a window, so she was safe for now.
The hallway branched out; there was a section to the left that ran along the window that was currently between her and the violent robot. The part in front of her went straight ahead, pausing at a metal wall, then going to both the left and right.
Down the left path was where the robot that was currently trying to shoot her was. There was a laser that was coming from the right, so there must be another robot that direction.
First, she'd check out the apparently safe path to the left, before tackling the area between two insane robots bent on gunning her down.
Chell turned the corner; the robot was still trained on her, shooting as fiercely as it could at the window that was the only thing keeping her alive. She desperately hoped it would keep up under the heavy fire and not shatter to free the robot to shoot her as much as it pleased.
As she turned the corner, she saw a bizarre sight. Part of the wall was sticking out, held in place by two cubes stacked on top of each other.
Even stranger was that on the ground in front of the lower cube was the word 'Help', scrawled in red letters. On the wall next to the cubes was a smudgy black handprint.
Somebody had been here! The first sign of any sort of life besides the voice. Were they still here? They needed help, had they died before they received it? Had they been able to get around the robots?
There seemed to be a sort of room behind the wall. Would it stay in place if she removed the cubes?
First, she walked closer to the cubes. She'd take the top one first. Chell hit the button on the portal gun that would allow her to lift it up.
Once the cube was up in the air, the wall twitched slightly, sparking and humming. It came to rest pretty much where it had been propped up. She placed the cube off to the side, then went back for the other.
The higher cube had been keeping the section stable, the lower cube wasn't even touching it. She flicked the button to pick up the cube and set it over next to the other.
Now that the way was clear, she could walk into the secret room.
The concrete floor here was more brown than grey, close to the entrance was the world 'Help' again scrawled in red. The room was split into two parts by the metal pillars sticking horizontally out of the back wall.
The wall behind where the pillars were sticking out was the usual orange with the metal grill over it. However, the rest of the back wall was different colors. To the left of the pillar section, it was metal grey covered with red rust. Also over on the left was a hanging lantern light. It was the only light in the room, besides that which was coming out of the fan and the room she had just left.
To the right was a larger space, the wall that direction had four brown flat squares that were of equal sizes. To the right of that was a large fan in the wall that had light coming from behind it. Did it lead to the outside? Unfortunately, it was covered by a fence, and the walls around it were cluttered. Too bad.
She couldn't see much of the right, because of the silver pillars in the way. But, there were some large grey rectangles on the floor. They came up about halfway up her thigh. There was one rectangle in front of her. Behind it were two more, with another one placed on top of them. She could use those to climb over the pillar.
But, she needed to look over this side better, before investigating the right.
On the left wall, beside the rectangles was a series of odd designs that were next to each other and repeated all the way up the wall. They looked sort of like computer chips that were designed to have something plugged into them. Whatever it was had three prongs that together made a shape like an upside down 'Y'.
While all this stuff was good and interesting, the most intriguing parts were the two pieces of concrete wall in between the wall she had entered from and the section of computer chips.
Whoever had been here before had decorated these walls in a peculiar style.
The leftmost concrete section was quite interesting. Near the top was another dirty black handprint. Underneath this was written:
'the cake is a lie.
the cake is a lie.
the cake is a lie.
the cake is a lie.
the cake is a lie'
The last period of the last line went off in a squiggle. While the previous four lines were fairly neat, the fifth slowly sloped downwards.
The cake is a lie? There wouldn't be any cake after all she had been through? Well, obviously, the person that was responsible for these scribblings hadn't gotten to the end; there were still test chambers after this one.
But, what if the cake was a lie? What if there was no way out of here.
No, she mustn't think like that. Chell shook her head to clear it. Cake or no cake, she was going to get out of this crazy place alive. If she found the person that had lived here before, all the better.
Underneath the proclamation of the cake were two things. One was a hand-drawn cube falling out of a portal and heading towards one of the killer robots that was saying 'Hello? Can I Help You?'
So, the person that owned this room had used cubes to knock out the robots. Pretty clever. Though, she had only seen the two that had kept this room open so far. She'd use them as best she could, there were still quite a few robots she knew about and probably even more she wasn't aware of. Would the cubes hold up to the robots fire? Well, she'd find out soon enough.
Beside this drawing was a tattered poster that had two stick figures with their arms around each other's shoulders. Their free hands were giving a thumbs up. Below them was the phrase 'A Trusted Friend In Science'.
Was this poster for the people that ran this place? She wasn't sure how trustworthy they were if they sent people on death robot courses and if they were lying about the cake. Was there even anyone here besides the person behind the voice and the person that drew on the wall?
The second concrete section of wall had a series of tally marks that continued over from the first. In all, they counted to ninety. Ninety? Had the person been here for ninety days? How had they calculated those days? Did the area behind that fan really lead to the outside and they had watched it turn dark? Or had they owned a watch? Or, did they just write marks randomly? Well, it was easier to assume that they had somehow been aware of the proper amount of time passing, instead of dwelling on it too much.
Underneath the tally marks were two red arrows pointing down.
Next to the marks was a poster that had a red and pink background. The red section said 'Tasty' in white letters. The pink background had a triple-layer yellow cake with chocolate frosting on a tall white cake platter. A piece of cake had been cut out; this section was resting a few inches away on a white plate.
The cake did look tasty. She was getting pretty hungry after all she had been through. Even if there wasn't any cake, hopefully there'd be some kind of food she could find.
Underneath the arrows and the poster was a hand-drawn picture in red. It looked to be of a Pellet flying slightly diagonal to the left and into a collector, but it was hard to tell. Pellets had been the only round things she had seen that even looked anywhere close to that.
Next to the Pellet picture, on the very right of the section of concrete was another black handprint.
Underneath the drawing of the Pellet were two red arrows pointing upwards at it.
To the left and below the sketch was another grimy handprint.
And, finally, next to that was another set of tally marks, these also counted to ninety. Had this person stayed in this room for a total of one hundred and eighty days? That was almost half a year! Why had they stayed here that long? Why didn't they just continue, no matter how hard the test was? Could they not figure it out until then?
Chell wasn't sure what to make all of this, but it was a little reassuring that somebody else was around here somewhere. Unless they had died, that is. But, at least the place wasn't totally abandoned. There could be quite a few more people here, if there was one, maybe there were more.
What would the other side of the room have? She clambered onto the single rectangle, then walked over and stepped onto the one next to it. Then, she climbed up on top of the one stacked on the others. She was nearly level with the pillar from here.
Chell carefully stepped onto the sideways pillar with a single foot and tested it. Once she was certain that it would hold her weight, she stepped with the other, then jumped down to the other side.
There were two steel support beams that were several feet away from the pillar and out in the middle of the floor.
Straight ahead was the part of the wall with the fan. As she got closer to it, the ground turned from concrete into metal.
Close to the fan, there was a bucket on the ground, nearly in the corner. Chell guessed what it had been possibly used for and avoided getting too close. It didn't smell, so either her guess was wrong or it had been such a long time since the previous occupant had used it.
Chell looked up at the fan, she could almost see beyond it, but not quite. She aimed the portal gun at the tiny spaces between the rotating blades and fired several times. All times were met with failure. Too bad. It'd be nice to be outside.
She turned to her right to see what was left in the room.
Close to where she was standing were two flat cardboard boxes and what appeared to be some kind of cushion. Had this been a bed the person had slept on? It was a far cry from the pod she had woken up in. It was clever; they used what they had to make the best of their situation.
In front of her were several more of the dark grey rectangles. There was one to the left that didn't have anything on it. However, the one right in front of her had something on it that appeared to be part of a computer with a frying pan on top of it. Had the computer part generated enough heat to cook things?
There was another rectangle behind that, this one had an empty carton of milk lying on its side and two empty cans of beans to the right of that. It was too bad they were all empty, though, who knows how long they had been there. They might have gone bad, if they had still been there.
In front of the rectangle was an empty water jug. Some water would have been really nice, even if she didn't have anything to eat.
But, if this person was able to find food and water, then it stood to reason that she could too. She'd just have to keep her eyes open.
To Chell's right was another stack of rectangles, two made the bottom row with one on top. Though, these weren't as close to the horizontal pillar as the others were.
Finally, the last piece of interest in the room was another red 'Help' written on the floor. The person must have been really desperate to write it three times, with two of those times being in their own little secret compartment.
Well, it was time to go back out and face the robots.
She climbed up on top of the pyramid of rectangles. She thought she might be able to make the jump to the pillar.
Chell took a leap and barely cleared the horizontal pillar; she landed on it, then slid off of it smoothly. That had gone pretty well.
She turned back to the entranceway, this time noticing that the grid that the section of wall was sticking out of was broken. It had a clear, glasslike substance around it that was broken unevenly to make the doorway to the hidden room.
How had the other person accomplished this? They had been able to somehow open the wall, if it hadn't already been that way, and break the glass-reinforced grill. Had they other weapons besides the portal gun? Had they found other things they brought with them. They'd be a very good ally to have around here.
Chell walked through the makeshift opening and back out into the test chamber.
She still had to deal with the robot behind the glass and its friend across the way. It didn't notice her as she came out of the room behind the walls, it had forgotten completely about her.
It must only be able to see things in a diagonal cone. She was directly looking at its right side, and it didn't pay her any attention.
How was she going to get rid of the robots? The section the one in front of her was standing in looked to be completely made out of metal, except for the window. She couldn't see the ceiling, so maybe she could try the cube-dropping trick pictured in the strange room she had just exited.
But, she only had two cubes. If she messed up, it'd be hard to retrieve them, as at least one of the robots would be able to see her at any time. And if she made a really nasty mistake, both would have her in their sights.
Chell took a few steps forward and around the cubes she had placed on the floor, trying to see if she could see the ceiling above the robot. The section of the ceiling before the robot's alcove was metal, so she didn't have her hopes up. As she walked closer to the robot, it said, "Activated" and fired off a few shots.
She kept moving, and the robot lost sight of her when she reached the metal corner of its little room. With a "Target Lost," it looked around, trying to find her.
She had to take a few more steps before she could see that the ceiling in the alcove was concrete instead of metal. But, she'd have to get even closer to see above the robot.
Well, from this side, she'd be in range of the one on the other side, so she'd have to go across this room to get a better and safer viewpoint.
Chell walked over to the opposite wall and placed her back up against it. She inched to her right, keeping her eyes focused on the robot and the ceiling above it.
She didn't move very far before she noticed there was a red diagonal line on the ceiling, close to what she thought could be right above the robot. What was that? She crept a few more inches to try and get a better look.
She was close to the robot's range; she just had to hope it wouldn't detect her.
Just as she got a clear look at the thing on the ceiling, the robot said, "Who's there" and fired at her.
Chell yelled in pain as the bullet hit. She then scooted away quickly, hoping it wouldn't be able to follow her movements.
This worked, the robot searched for her once more with a "Target lost."
Once safe, she plopped onto the ground, still wincing in pain. Her shoulder had been hit; the bullet had torn through her clothes.
Gradually, the pain started going away and the bleeding stopped. The bullet fell out of her shoulder. Chell looked in puzzlement as her flesh healed and the pain vanished completely.
The only remainders left of her being shot was her ripped and bloodstained clothes and the bloodstain that had splattered the wall she had been standing against.
How had she healed? Chell was pretty certain that wasn't normal. She was completely better, and the hole that the bullet had made in her clothes wasn't that big.
This was getting too weird. But, this did explain why her headaches from being flung into things went away so quickly.
What was the extent of this healing? Obviously, it took a moment or two to start, so she probably wasn't immortal. Would it only heal wounds inflicted on her? What about if something went wrong in her insides? Would it keep her from getting sick?
Wait, she really didn't have time for this. These questions were good and all, but most of them didn't apply here. Maybe the voice would know.
How many bullet wounds could she sustain? Probably a couple, as long as they didn't hit anything vital and instantly fatal.
She had seen that there was a red 'X' over the robot, indicating where to put a portal to drop a cube on top of it. Seemed like whoever had been here before was trying to be helpful. Or, they had been forced to do the test more than once and had been making notes for themself.
Chell would have to go back and fire a portal at the 'X'. The robot would most likely get in a few shots, but if she fired, then fell backwards, she should be safe from its watchful gaze.
She picked herself up and walked back to the wall where she had been shot. Unless her blood had dried, she'd probably pick some up on her clothes when she scooted across it to get closer. There were also a couple of bullet holes in the wall, it had fired several times, she had been lucky to have been just hit once.
Just because she could survive bullet wounds didn't mean that she really wanted to get shot again. But, if it meant getting out alive, she'd take a couple.
As soon as she could see the 'X', Chell fired a portal. However, at the exact same time, the robot fired off several shots, with a "Sentry mode activated."
She stumbled sideways, out of range. The robot lost sight of her; it said "Searching" as it looked for her. After several moments, it said "Resting" and grew still.
Chell stood there for a moment, breathing heavily. She had been hit twice. The wounds closed up, the bullets plinking onto the floor.
She then walked over a bit and placed a portal onto the wall to check her handiwork. Sure enough, the robot was straight down below.
Satisfied with that, Chell then fired a portal under a cube, so it could drop onto the robot's head.
The cube hit the robot, knocking it over. The robot exclaimed "Self-test error" then fired wildly. After several moments of this, it shut down with a final "I don't blame you."
One down, one to go. Like before, there was a good chance she was going to get shot. Chell wasn't looking forward to that, but she had no choice if she wanted to get out of here alive.
There was one section of concrete that she could back up against, across from the robot somewhere on the other side.
Chell stood against it, sidling to the left, looking to see if there was another helpful 'X' on the ceiling.
After a few scoots, she saw what looked to be the middle of the 'X' without alerting the robot. She aimed carefully and fired a portal at the center section of the red 'X'.
She walked back to the main area and placed a portal on the wall to make sure she had lined it up correctly. It looked like the robot was right in range, so she fired a portal under the cube.
The cube fell through and she heard a clank as it hit the robot. It said "Malfunctioning" and she could hear it firing wildly.
Once the gunshots faded, she heard it murmur something and then there was silence.
She waited a minute or two more, then walked over to look down the corridor.
The robot was lying sideways on the ground. To the left, in front of the robot's alcove, was an opening in the wall, leading to the next room.
She could see from the window to her left that it held two robots, both looking to the right, their lasers pointing at the wall to the right of the entryway. One was even positioned to fire on a spot a few feet away from the entrance. She'd be blasted as soon as she got near the doorway. She'd have to come up with another plan of attack.
As Chell walked down the small hallway, the closer robot saw her through the window, and with a "Deploying" it started shooting at the window. Like the others, this one held, so all it was doing was wasting its ammo and cracking the window.
How much ammo did they have? Probably a lot, they were pretty tall and the bullets were small. It'd take too much time to force it to run out from here. Too bad, though.
The other room was made of concrete. The two robots had their backs to the wall. If she could put a portal behind and above them, she could drop down and hit them from the back with a cube.
First, she had to put a portal in the ceiling, and that meant looking through the doorway. She was probably going to have to take some more bullets. At least she healed quickly.
She carefully made her way to the corner. The robot couldn't see her there, it said "Searching" and she could see the laser moving around.
Chell got a little closer, just enough to put a portal where she needed. Unfortunately, this let the robot see her, so it fired off several shots with a "Hellooo."
She fell backwards, and the robot couldn't see her any more. She sat there for several minutes as her newest wounds healed up neatly, dropping the bullets on the ground.
Once she was feeling better, Chell stood up and turned around; firing a portal at the wall behind her so she could make sure she'd drop safely behind the two robots.
Her positioning looked good, so she walked over to where she had dropped the first cube. By this time, the robot had noticed her through the window again, so it was shooting at her. She ignored it.
On her way to the cube, she fired a portal onto the ground.
Chell hit the button to pick up the cube, then walked out of the metal section. Everything was in place, walked over to the portal on the floor and fell through it and behind the two white robots.
Once she was steady on her feet, Chell whacked the first robot with the cube. It fell over with an "Ow ow ow" and fired crazily at the wall. Once it was done, it said "Shutting down."
Then, she turned and smacked the other one with the metal cube. It fell over and started firing as well, saying, "Self-test error" and ended with an "I don't blame you."
The room was now secure, so Chell hit the button and dropped the cube to get a better idea of what this room actually was like.
She had her back to what had been the left wall when she had looked in through the window. To her right was the opening and damaged window.
On the other side of the room, close to where she was standing was a doorway. Several feet down to the left of that was another doorway. The left wall had a straight area for the half of the room she was standing at, then it sloped and became straight again when it hit the other wall. How strange.
As she was looking the room over, she thought she heard a familiar tune playing faintly. Was there a radio nearby?
She decided to check the closest room first. There didn't appear to be any robots in it from where she was standing.
As she got closer, she saw that it had a window with a large number of bullet holes on the edge around it. That second robot she had knocked over with the cube must have been firing at it. Was it the first robot she had heard?
Also in the room, to the right of the bullet-riddled window was a handprint on the wall. The person that had made the secret room had done something in there! There also seemed to be a cube on the ground, to the right of the doorway.
When Chell walked into the room, she heard a robot chatter, then start firing, cracking the window on the left wall from the next room over. There were a total of three robots in the other room.
This room, however, was a different story. There was a constant hiss of air as a cube cylinder opened and closed, but nothing came out. Every now and then, it would spark slightly. On the floor below, there was a mess of seven cubes. Six of them were on the ground, with a seventh that was resting on two of the others.
The cube that was closest to the middle of the room contained a radio playing the same tune the one in the relaxation vault was, a coffee cup, and some miscellaneous tools.
Had the handprint person used the tools to mess with the cylinder? Why had they? Did they want more cubes? Or were they just rebelling? The tools would be nice to take, but they'd just be in the way and probably disintegrate when they passed through a Grid.
So, she could use these cubes to knock out the ones in the next room. To see what lied ahead, Chell went to the windows and peered through, looking around the bullet cracks and paying no attention to the mindless robot blasting away.
Looking up at the ceiling, Chell could see that the two robots on the right side of the room had red 'X's above them. It didn't look like the one on the right did, however, so she'd have to stop it another way.
There was a window in the other room across from the window on the back side of this room. Chell could make out a round doorway behind it. That must be the room she had entered this painful test from. Did that mean she was getting close to the end? Or was it a taunt?
Through the window on the left wall, Chell could see an exit door close to the robot that was trying to shoot her. To the left of the door was a red button on the ground. The ceiling above the button was metal, so she couldn't just drop one in on it. Too bad.
One of the robots could probably see her if she looked in the doorway, so she'd have to be careful about aiming her shot.
Chell walked out of the room and fired a portal onto the wall to the left of the doorway she had just exited. She then turned and placed a portal on the left wall, close to the other doorway. She walked through the first portal and exited out the other.
She made her way close to the doorway, peeking around the corner. She couldn't see much of the other room, just part of the robot closest to her and a good view of one across. If she wasn't careful, the one across the way could see her.
Chell edged forward and realized that she could be in danger. She took a quick step back and heard the robot fire, followed by a "Don't shoot!" Had the farthest one shot the one in between her and it? Could it take out that one closest to the door?
She scooted up again. The robot started shooting with a "Hello friend." The other robot cried out, "Stop shooting!" But, the firing didn't cease. After a bullet clipped her arm, Chell stepped backwards to let it heal.
The robot that was getting shot only wobbled a little; this game wasn't going to work. Once her arm was better, Chell peered through the doorway again, this time to get the red 'X' above the robot in her sights.
She easily found the 'X' and placed a portal on it. Another bullet got her arm and she backed up.
After her arm healed again, Chell put a portal on the wall next to her to check its place. The robot was down below, just like she needed.
Chell turned around and quickly walked in front of the doorway and back to where she had dropped her cube that she had used to smack over the two robots. She moved the cube out from the metal part of the floor and dropped it on a concrete section. She then placed a portal underneath it.
The cube fell through and there was a satisfying metal thunk as it hit its target. The robot said, "Malfunctioning" as it shot randomly. Once its death throes were complete, it said, "I don't blame you" and grew still.
There were still two robots in that room left. She'd have to look through the doorway again to see how she could defeat them.
Chell made her way over to the open doorway, as she got closer, she heard one of the robots say "Deploying" but she didn't hear any gunfire. It must have almost been able to see her, but not quite. She stood to the right of the doorway. From here, the robots couldn't see her, and she heard the robot mumble something. She could see that one of the robots was pointing to the left, its laser was pointing close to the closed exit door.
Since it sounded like the one robot could see her if she stepped in front of the doorway, Chell placed a portal on the wall to the left of the doorway and then put another portal on the wall she was standing next to.
She walked into the closest portal and came out the other side. The robots hadn't been able to see her from here, except for that one she had already dropped a cube on.
There wasn't an 'X' above the robot closest to her. She had two options, either guess where to place a portal above it and drop a cube onto the robot, or she could do what she did to the first one and drop it out of a portal.
She'd try the cube first; it wouldn't hurt anything since there were plenty of cubes in the next room over. If she needed more later, they'd be closer, being in the room she had dropped them into.
Chell aimed for a spot she thought was right above the nasty little robot. She wouldn't be able to use the portals to safely cross the door, but if she moved fast enough, she figured they wouldn't be able to shoot her.
Once she had that portal in place, she darted in front of the door. The one robot said, "Who's there?" but didn't fire. She looked through the portal to the right of the door; it looked like it'd be close to hit the robot. She'd just have to try it and readjust if necessary.
Chell walked into the room with the cubes and picked one behind the cube with all the stuff on it. If the person who had been here before was still around, they probably wouldn't take kindly to their stuff being messed with. She'd rather have them as a possible ally. Though, if it came to needing the cube, she would use it without hesitation and apologize later.
She took the cube back into the bigger room and set it on the ground. Then, she fired a portal underneath it. It would have been just as easy to push it through the portal on the wall, but, this way, she could be sure that it fell properly.
The cube fell with a clank on the floor. She had missed the robot. Well, she would just have to try again.
Chell darted across the doorway again, the robot saying, "Deploying" as she crossed, but once again, didn't fire.
She cautiously peeked around the doorway, looking to see how she could line the shot up. She was thankful that the person before had placed 'X's above some of the robots, it made things much easier.
The cube was to the robot's right, so she moved the portal up closer to the doorway. Then, Chell ran across, the robot said "Hello" but didn't do anything. She then looked down in the portal on the floor, once again, it was going to be close, but the robot looked more like it was in the middle of the portal.
Chell went back into the room and grabbed another cube behind the others, then took it out and dropped it into the portal on the floor.
This time, the cube fell on the robot. It exclaimed "Ow ow ow" as it shot rapidly, then gave a sad-sounding "Whyyy?" and grew silent.
One robot left in this room. She was probably going to have to get shot again in order to place a portal on the 'X' above it. Chell wasn't looking forward to that. But, she had to do what was necessary to get out of here alive.
She quickly made her way back to the left side of the doorway. The robot seemed to not see her as well on that side, so she'd use that to her advantage.
Chell slowly eased around the doorway, keeping her eyes on the ceiling for the moment she spotted the red 'X' above the oval robot.
As soon as she saw the middle of the 'X', she fired a portal at the ceiling. At that exact moment, the robot said, "There you are." Chell backed up quickly, before it could shoot her. She couldn't see where she had placed the portal, but she had kept from being shot.
The robot said, "Are you still there?" and went back to waiting patiently.
Chell made her way over to the portal in the floor to check her handiwork. The robot looked to be close to the middle of the portal, so Chell went to the nearby room and grabbed another cube from the back. She walked over to the portal and dumped the cube into it.
The cube hit the robot with a satisfying clank. The robot said "Malfunctioning" and fired off quite a few shots. Chell saw a couple fly through the door and was thankful she wasn't too close. The robot said "Shutting down" and went silent.
The room was finally secure. Chell gave a sigh of relief and walked into it to figure out her next move.
The button on the floor would activate the door. Before placing a cube on it to keep it open, Chell stood on top of it.
She was glad she did, for when the door opened, a robot's laser shined through. There was one guarding the doorway for an unsuspecting test subject.
Now, how was she going to get around it?
Most of the room she could see was close to the laser, if she placed portals there, she'd get shot in an instant.
However, there was a little dark area she could see that could possibly be another room. Chell fired a portal at this section and it stuck to the wall.
She then turned around and placed a portal on the wall to the right of the doorway, so she could see if she was going into danger.
There was another robot looking off to Chell's left. It was standing on metal ground. That didn't matter, though; she could grab a cube and go through with it, then smack the robot over. It'd be a simple matter, and there were several cubes she had dropped into this room.
Chell walked over and grabbed the cube that she had used to knock over the robot that was closest to the doorway.
With it in her portal gun's grasp, she turned around and walked over to the portal, then through it.
It was only a few steps to the robot, even less for the cube that was lifted several feet away from her. She poked the robot with the cube, it fell over and said "Self-test error" and fired a few rapid rounds. Once it was done, it said "I don't blame you."
With that, Chell glanced around the room. To her right was a metal grill on the wall that separated her from the robot that was guarding the door. It didn't notice her.
The room was small; it had nothing else of note, except for the exit doorway next to where she had placed the portal.
Once she saw the Grid and elevator at the end, Chell gave a sigh of relief. This particular nightmare was over; however, the elevator would probably take her off to someplace much, much worse. But, for now, she was safe.
Chell dropped the cube on the floor, no need to waste it by destroying it with the Grid.
She made her way down the short hallway. As she neared the Grid, the voice spoke, "Well done, android. The Enrichment Center once again reminds you that android hell is a real place where you will be sent at the first sign of defiance."
Chell gave a snort at this. They were still pretending that this was a chamber designed for androids. Unless androids could write and place notes for other people, that was a blatant lie.
Why did they feel the need to lie about this chamber? Why couldn't they just come out and say that they were going to test you against robots with guns? It didn't matter which way you said it, it still was dangerous. People would have to go through this chamber no matter what. Why pretend otherwise?
Well, it didn't matter now, she had made it through. Though a little more battered than she had come in, her wounds had healed and she had only gotten a few holes and a bit of blood on her clothes. Not too bad for taking out a good deal of robots and avoiding others. She was pretty pleased with what she had accomplished.
Chell walked through the Grid and onto the elevator. She flopped onto the ground, ready for some rest.
As she closed her eyes, so did the elevator doors. Then the machine hummed as she was taken to the next chamber.
Chapter Word Count: 8,592
Total Word Count: 35,954
Next is Companion Cube level, whoo!
I'm gonna have to work super-hard early this week in order to build up a decent word count to survive the holidays. XD
Please give any crit or advice for this chapter! Thank you!
Chapter notes:
16
-IT'S THE TURRET LEVEL YAY :D
-Though, it's going to be a little bit of a pain, because the captions don't display the right turret calls. >: I'll try to play with the options and see if the other captions show it right. I also have that game script that I think has them all, and the sound file if need be.
-This one is hard to screenshot, so much action going on.
-:D I just figured out how to ninja past the one in the hallway, usually it shoots me up. XD
-Also ninja'd past another one that usually gives me trouble.
-Then got shot to pieces at the first two you drop cubes on. XD
-Very few screenshots, I'll just do a live run and fill in the details with the screenshots I did take later.
-Does the sarcasm work? Or just come off odd?
-Still working through how the last bit of the level is going to work, I've figured out how to ninja a few things, and if one plays out the way I want it to, Chell will drop from the ceiling behind two turrets, which would be awesome. :D
-Describing the turret shooting from afar sounds so terrible. :|
-I know the "correct" method is to knock over the turrets, but I didn't know this on my first playthrough. I dumped them out of portals and caused a mess until I hit the part that showed dropping boxes on them, then obsessed over that method. XD
-I am so sorry, this chapter is going to be absolutely huge.
-A lot of the action feels wonky. :|
-If you see any instances of the word "turret" please let me know, Chell wouldn't know that's what they're called. :|
-Descriptions of bizarre things feel weird. :|
-The screenshots I took were all nearly useless. XD
-Might split this one into two chapters. :| What do you think?
-I didn't write down every time the turrets looked around or shut down. Does anybody want me to add them all in?
-Also, I don't think all turret calls were represented and some were repeated. I was doing this live, though sometimes I had to go back and listen again to see what they said, and it changes every time.
-Also, for Chell's healing, I don't know what happened to the bullets that enter her body, so I'm just making it up.
-Punctuation might be a bit wonky with all the quotes. :|
-Outside Resources
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thigh
http://half-life.wikia.com/wiki/Doug_Rattmann
http://www.gamefaqs.com/pc/934386-portal/faqs - Ayelis' Game Script
Chell sat in the floor for a few minutes after the elevator doors open. Her eyes were closed, she didn't want to think about what was next, just for a short period of time, she just wanted to relax and recover.
After a while, she opened her eyes and got to her feet. It was time to get serious. She felt a bit refreshed after her break, so she'd be sharper for the more difficult tasks ahead.
She looked out to see what she could find out about this test.
The elevator let out to an enclosed grey hallway. At the very end was a dark, unactivated information board. On the left wall, close to the board, was a closed door.
Maybe it'd open once she got close, and besides, she wanted to see what the information board had to say.
Chell walked down the hallway, when she got close to the door, the voice spoke, in an odd-sounding tone, "Due to mandatory scheduled maintenance, the appropriate chamber for this testing sequence is currently unavailable. It has been replaced with a live-fire course designed for military androids. The Enrichment Center apologizes for the inconvenience and wishes you the best of luck."
As soon as the voice was done speaking, the door opened.
A LIVE-FIRE course for ANDROIDS? This was insane! The portal gun wasn't designed for combat; you couldn't just shoot somebody with it. She wasn't trained in fighting, either. Would this be the end of the road for her? No, she'd get through this and beat it.
The information board only had three squares highlighted. The first two on the top row were lit, the ones featuring the cubes. The other square was a new one; it was the middle square in the bottom row. This square showed a stick figure being shot by lasers from an odd looking thing. Just great. Lasers. Exactly what she wanted to encounter.
Chell sighed and ran a hand through her hair. This wasn't going to be a fun test. She thought the last one was bad, just for the fact that it was so long and kind of tricky. This one was out and out going to be fatal.
Well, she should get to facing the firing squad; this test wasn't going to complete itself. No matter how bad it was, she had come too far to just turn back now. Only a few more chambers until the end, that's it. Though, if they progressively got worse, her chances of survival would start dwindling.
She turned and looked through the doorway. The room was made of concrete with a window across from her. Through the window, Chell could see two odd white ovals on legs. Each of the ovals had a red laser shooting out from it to the right.
In the room Chell was about to enter, she saw to the left one metal leg. One of the laser ovals was in there, but she didn't see the red beam of light. It must be facing another direction, so it should be safe to enter the room.
Chell walked forward into the room, there was a burst of sound that kept repeating. It took her a moment to find the source. There was a room past the room behind the window. This room was also covered by a window that was now scored with cracks and more kept appearing. Chell walked closer to try and get a better idea of what it was.
As she got close to the window, she heard a voice say, "Deploying." All of a sudden, there was a second, closer blast of sound. The glass in front of her was cracking, but seemed to hold.
Chell peered through the fractured window; it looked like one of the ovals was shooting at her. She hadn't been in front of its laser, though. And that other one, it was quite a distance away. It seemed as if they had a pretty good range and could shoot at more than what it touched with its laser.
There was one good thing about all of this, though. That was the fact that they didn't fire lasers. It looked like ordinary bullets. It wouldn't be any fun to be shot either way, but at least it wasn't some kind of crazy laser thing. Bullets she could deal with.
She put her hand to one of the areas where the glass had been shot. She couldn't feel any warmth from the bullets slamming into it, but she could feel it shake slightly under the attack. The glass seemed sturdy and bulletproof, but she didn't want to test that, so she backed up until it stopped firing.
The gun robot said, "Are you still there?" Then, she saw it looking around, swinging its laser in several directions. It appeared to be confused and couldn't find her, even though she had only taken a few steps away from the window.
After several moments of searching, it paused, staring straight ahead. It spoke one simple phrase, "Target lost."
Chell then turned around to see what she could do about getting out of here.
With her back to the window, there was two points of interest to her right.
One was an exit to the next part of the test.
The other was one of the killer robots. From here, it looked like the thing was tall enough to come up to her shoulder. She had seen what the other ones did to the glass and didn't want to end up like that.
She carefully walked around the robot, staying several feet away at all times. Maybe she could use the portals to avoid it completely. As she did so, a robot in the other room started firing again, making noise against the glass.
Ignoring the obnoxious noise, she looked out over the robot in this room's head, trying to see if she could sneak through the hallway with portals.
No such luck. All Chell could see of the previous room was that it was made of metal. She was going to have to deal with the robot before she could continue, but how?
Maybe if she dropped it from a portal. If she placed one below it and one somewhere on the ceiling, it'd fall through. If the height was enough, it could damage the robot and maybe put it out of commission.
Well, the only thing she could do was try it and hope she didn't get killed.
Chell walked back towards the entrance, as she did so, more of the robots started firing on the glass. This was getting old; they were making quite a racket. The quicker she got out of this room, the better.
She found that if she stood in the right corner of the smaller section in front of the door, she'd have a clear view of the robot and be as far away as possible from it.
With a deep breath, she first placed a portal on the ceiling, close to directly above the menacing robot. Next, she placed a portal below it.
Mayhem instantly erupted. As soon as the robot fell through the portal, it started firing wildly, yelling "Ow ow ow!" It flew through both portals twice, then landed sideways on the ground, still shooting. It stopped as soon as it began, stating an almost-sad "I don't blame you."
Chell waiting a few moments to see if it'd come back to life. It was silent and there was no laser emitting from it.
She walked over to examine the thing. There were bullet holes all around the room, mostly on the wall in front of where it landed and fired until it shut down.
The bullets had made craters in the grey walls, in the stuff she had assumed was solid concrete. She couldn't see the bullets, just a small dark hole surrounded by an impact ring. These things meant serious business.
However, it looked as if they'd malfunction as soon as they lost their balance. Could they simply be tipped over to stop them? She wasn't sure if she wanted to try it, it could be dangerous. But, she'd keep that fact in mind, in case things came to that. Who knew what could happen in this place.
Now that the crazy robot was out of the way, she could continue. Chell turned around and walked to the doorway, first, moving the portal out of her way, and then peeking around to see if there were any more of the things lurking around.
All she could see was that the room was made of metal and that it lead to the right.
Chell pressed her back to the right wall of the small hallway and walked to the corner, peeking around slightly to see if there was a robot down that direction.
The metal gave way to concrete and a small, square room. There were no robots in the room, but there was a red laser down the middle of it. There was a doorway on the left wall of this room.
There were two options, there was either a robot down the left hallway with its laser coming through the door or there was a robot to the right, possibly down another hallway.
Either way, it couldn't see her, so she walked cautiously around the corner and to the doorway to see if the robot was in the room.
The laser ended on the right wall, so the robot had to be down the hallway. That was good to know.
There were pieces of wall on both sides of the square doorway that lead to the robot. If she used a portal to get on the other side of the laser, perhaps she could find a way around the robot without it finding her.
Chell placed a portal on the right side of the doorway. Since the room she was in was made out of metal, she stepped forward until she had a clear shot of the left side of the doorway, then fired one on that part of the wall.
She slowly walked towards the portal, taking care to stick close to the wall. She entered the left portal and came out of the right safely. The robot hadn't noticed her presence.
Chell turned to look out of the doorway. There was an alcove out of the robot's laser's range behind the left wall. It'd be simple to get there.
She fired a portal into the alcove on the wall, next to the corner, and walked back through the portal next to her.
Chell walked forward, close to the opposite wall and came as close to the edge and the robot's laser as she dared.
From there, she could see a clear patch of wall somewhere to the right of the robot. It looked far enough away from the laser so that she wouldn't get shot.
She aimed a portal at this space and fired, then walked over to the alcove portal and made her way through.
Chell came out of the portal slightly behind and to the left of the robot. It stared blankly down the hallway. It wouldn't notice her if she was careful.
To her right was another hallway, though this one had an open area in the left wall that had stairs. Raised several feet up was another robot's laser.
However, since it was in the middle of the hallway, it'd be a simple deal to just use a portal at the end of the hallway where it curved to the right.
Chell fired a portal at this spot and walked back the one she had just come through.
As she walked out of the other portal, she was undetected by the robot in the hallway, but, one in front of her started firing, saying calmly, "There you are." Luckily, it was behind a window, so she was safe for now.
The hallway branched out; there was a section to the left that ran along the window that was currently between her and the violent robot. The part in front of her went straight ahead, pausing at a metal wall, then going to both the left and right.
Down the left path was where the robot that was currently trying to shoot her was. There was a laser that was coming from the right, so there must be another robot that direction.
First, she'd check out the apparently safe path to the left, before tackling the area between two insane robots bent on gunning her down.
Chell turned the corner; the robot was still trained on her, shooting as fiercely as it could at the window that was the only thing keeping her alive. She desperately hoped it would keep up under the heavy fire and not shatter to free the robot to shoot her as much as it pleased.
As she turned the corner, she saw a bizarre sight. Part of the wall was sticking out, held in place by two cubes stacked on top of each other.
Even stranger was that on the ground in front of the lower cube was the word 'Help', scrawled in red letters. On the wall next to the cubes was a smudgy black handprint.
Somebody had been here! The first sign of any sort of life besides the voice. Were they still here? They needed help, had they died before they received it? Had they been able to get around the robots?
There seemed to be a sort of room behind the wall. Would it stay in place if she removed the cubes?
First, she walked closer to the cubes. She'd take the top one first. Chell hit the button on the portal gun that would allow her to lift it up.
Once the cube was up in the air, the wall twitched slightly, sparking and humming. It came to rest pretty much where it had been propped up. She placed the cube off to the side, then went back for the other.
The higher cube had been keeping the section stable, the lower cube wasn't even touching it. She flicked the button to pick up the cube and set it over next to the other.
Now that the way was clear, she could walk into the secret room.
The concrete floor here was more brown than grey, close to the entrance was the world 'Help' again scrawled in red. The room was split into two parts by the metal pillars sticking horizontally out of the back wall.
The wall behind where the pillars were sticking out was the usual orange with the metal grill over it. However, the rest of the back wall was different colors. To the left of the pillar section, it was metal grey covered with red rust. Also over on the left was a hanging lantern light. It was the only light in the room, besides that which was coming out of the fan and the room she had just left.
To the right was a larger space, the wall that direction had four brown flat squares that were of equal sizes. To the right of that was a large fan in the wall that had light coming from behind it. Did it lead to the outside? Unfortunately, it was covered by a fence, and the walls around it were cluttered. Too bad.
She couldn't see much of the right, because of the silver pillars in the way. But, there were some large grey rectangles on the floor. They came up about halfway up her thigh. There was one rectangle in front of her. Behind it were two more, with another one placed on top of them. She could use those to climb over the pillar.
But, she needed to look over this side better, before investigating the right.
On the left wall, beside the rectangles was a series of odd designs that were next to each other and repeated all the way up the wall. They looked sort of like computer chips that were designed to have something plugged into them. Whatever it was had three prongs that together made a shape like an upside down 'Y'.
While all this stuff was good and interesting, the most intriguing parts were the two pieces of concrete wall in between the wall she had entered from and the section of computer chips.
Whoever had been here before had decorated these walls in a peculiar style.
The leftmost concrete section was quite interesting. Near the top was another dirty black handprint. Underneath this was written:
'the cake is a lie.
the cake is a lie.
the cake is a lie.
the cake is a lie.
the cake is a lie'
The last period of the last line went off in a squiggle. While the previous four lines were fairly neat, the fifth slowly sloped downwards.
The cake is a lie? There wouldn't be any cake after all she had been through? Well, obviously, the person that was responsible for these scribblings hadn't gotten to the end; there were still test chambers after this one.
But, what if the cake was a lie? What if there was no way out of here.
No, she mustn't think like that. Chell shook her head to clear it. Cake or no cake, she was going to get out of this crazy place alive. If she found the person that had lived here before, all the better.
Underneath the proclamation of the cake were two things. One was a hand-drawn cube falling out of a portal and heading towards one of the killer robots that was saying 'Hello? Can I Help You?'
So, the person that owned this room had used cubes to knock out the robots. Pretty clever. Though, she had only seen the two that had kept this room open so far. She'd use them as best she could, there were still quite a few robots she knew about and probably even more she wasn't aware of. Would the cubes hold up to the robots fire? Well, she'd find out soon enough.
Beside this drawing was a tattered poster that had two stick figures with their arms around each other's shoulders. Their free hands were giving a thumbs up. Below them was the phrase 'A Trusted Friend In Science'.
Was this poster for the people that ran this place? She wasn't sure how trustworthy they were if they sent people on death robot courses and if they were lying about the cake. Was there even anyone here besides the person behind the voice and the person that drew on the wall?
The second concrete section of wall had a series of tally marks that continued over from the first. In all, they counted to ninety. Ninety? Had the person been here for ninety days? How had they calculated those days? Did the area behind that fan really lead to the outside and they had watched it turn dark? Or had they owned a watch? Or, did they just write marks randomly? Well, it was easier to assume that they had somehow been aware of the proper amount of time passing, instead of dwelling on it too much.
Underneath the tally marks were two red arrows pointing down.
Next to the marks was a poster that had a red and pink background. The red section said 'Tasty' in white letters. The pink background had a triple-layer yellow cake with chocolate frosting on a tall white cake platter. A piece of cake had been cut out; this section was resting a few inches away on a white plate.
The cake did look tasty. She was getting pretty hungry after all she had been through. Even if there wasn't any cake, hopefully there'd be some kind of food she could find.
Underneath the arrows and the poster was a hand-drawn picture in red. It looked to be of a Pellet flying slightly diagonal to the left and into a collector, but it was hard to tell. Pellets had been the only round things she had seen that even looked anywhere close to that.
Next to the Pellet picture, on the very right of the section of concrete was another black handprint.
Underneath the drawing of the Pellet were two red arrows pointing upwards at it.
To the left and below the sketch was another grimy handprint.
And, finally, next to that was another set of tally marks, these also counted to ninety. Had this person stayed in this room for a total of one hundred and eighty days? That was almost half a year! Why had they stayed here that long? Why didn't they just continue, no matter how hard the test was? Could they not figure it out until then?
Chell wasn't sure what to make all of this, but it was a little reassuring that somebody else was around here somewhere. Unless they had died, that is. But, at least the place wasn't totally abandoned. There could be quite a few more people here, if there was one, maybe there were more.
What would the other side of the room have? She clambered onto the single rectangle, then walked over and stepped onto the one next to it. Then, she climbed up on top of the one stacked on the others. She was nearly level with the pillar from here.
Chell carefully stepped onto the sideways pillar with a single foot and tested it. Once she was certain that it would hold her weight, she stepped with the other, then jumped down to the other side.
There were two steel support beams that were several feet away from the pillar and out in the middle of the floor.
Straight ahead was the part of the wall with the fan. As she got closer to it, the ground turned from concrete into metal.
Close to the fan, there was a bucket on the ground, nearly in the corner. Chell guessed what it had been possibly used for and avoided getting too close. It didn't smell, so either her guess was wrong or it had been such a long time since the previous occupant had used it.
Chell looked up at the fan, she could almost see beyond it, but not quite. She aimed the portal gun at the tiny spaces between the rotating blades and fired several times. All times were met with failure. Too bad. It'd be nice to be outside.
She turned to her right to see what was left in the room.
Close to where she was standing were two flat cardboard boxes and what appeared to be some kind of cushion. Had this been a bed the person had slept on? It was a far cry from the pod she had woken up in. It was clever; they used what they had to make the best of their situation.
In front of her were several more of the dark grey rectangles. There was one to the left that didn't have anything on it. However, the one right in front of her had something on it that appeared to be part of a computer with a frying pan on top of it. Had the computer part generated enough heat to cook things?
There was another rectangle behind that, this one had an empty carton of milk lying on its side and two empty cans of beans to the right of that. It was too bad they were all empty, though, who knows how long they had been there. They might have gone bad, if they had still been there.
In front of the rectangle was an empty water jug. Some water would have been really nice, even if she didn't have anything to eat.
But, if this person was able to find food and water, then it stood to reason that she could too. She'd just have to keep her eyes open.
To Chell's right was another stack of rectangles, two made the bottom row with one on top. Though, these weren't as close to the horizontal pillar as the others were.
Finally, the last piece of interest in the room was another red 'Help' written on the floor. The person must have been really desperate to write it three times, with two of those times being in their own little secret compartment.
Well, it was time to go back out and face the robots.
She climbed up on top of the pyramid of rectangles. She thought she might be able to make the jump to the pillar.
Chell took a leap and barely cleared the horizontal pillar; she landed on it, then slid off of it smoothly. That had gone pretty well.
She turned back to the entranceway, this time noticing that the grid that the section of wall was sticking out of was broken. It had a clear, glasslike substance around it that was broken unevenly to make the doorway to the hidden room.
How had the other person accomplished this? They had been able to somehow open the wall, if it hadn't already been that way, and break the glass-reinforced grill. Had they other weapons besides the portal gun? Had they found other things they brought with them. They'd be a very good ally to have around here.
Chell walked through the makeshift opening and back out into the test chamber.
She still had to deal with the robot behind the glass and its friend across the way. It didn't notice her as she came out of the room behind the walls, it had forgotten completely about her.
It must only be able to see things in a diagonal cone. She was directly looking at its right side, and it didn't pay her any attention.
How was she going to get rid of the robots? The section the one in front of her was standing in looked to be completely made out of metal, except for the window. She couldn't see the ceiling, so maybe she could try the cube-dropping trick pictured in the strange room she had just exited.
But, she only had two cubes. If she messed up, it'd be hard to retrieve them, as at least one of the robots would be able to see her at any time. And if she made a really nasty mistake, both would have her in their sights.
Chell took a few steps forward and around the cubes she had placed on the floor, trying to see if she could see the ceiling above the robot. The section of the ceiling before the robot's alcove was metal, so she didn't have her hopes up. As she walked closer to the robot, it said, "Activated" and fired off a few shots.
She kept moving, and the robot lost sight of her when she reached the metal corner of its little room. With a "Target Lost," it looked around, trying to find her.
She had to take a few more steps before she could see that the ceiling in the alcove was concrete instead of metal. But, she'd have to get even closer to see above the robot.
Well, from this side, she'd be in range of the one on the other side, so she'd have to go across this room to get a better and safer viewpoint.
Chell walked over to the opposite wall and placed her back up against it. She inched to her right, keeping her eyes focused on the robot and the ceiling above it.
She didn't move very far before she noticed there was a red diagonal line on the ceiling, close to what she thought could be right above the robot. What was that? She crept a few more inches to try and get a better look.
She was close to the robot's range; she just had to hope it wouldn't detect her.
Just as she got a clear look at the thing on the ceiling, the robot said, "Who's there" and fired at her.
Chell yelled in pain as the bullet hit. She then scooted away quickly, hoping it wouldn't be able to follow her movements.
This worked, the robot searched for her once more with a "Target lost."
Once safe, she plopped onto the ground, still wincing in pain. Her shoulder had been hit; the bullet had torn through her clothes.
Gradually, the pain started going away and the bleeding stopped. The bullet fell out of her shoulder. Chell looked in puzzlement as her flesh healed and the pain vanished completely.
The only remainders left of her being shot was her ripped and bloodstained clothes and the bloodstain that had splattered the wall she had been standing against.
How had she healed? Chell was pretty certain that wasn't normal. She was completely better, and the hole that the bullet had made in her clothes wasn't that big.
This was getting too weird. But, this did explain why her headaches from being flung into things went away so quickly.
What was the extent of this healing? Obviously, it took a moment or two to start, so she probably wasn't immortal. Would it only heal wounds inflicted on her? What about if something went wrong in her insides? Would it keep her from getting sick?
Wait, she really didn't have time for this. These questions were good and all, but most of them didn't apply here. Maybe the voice would know.
How many bullet wounds could she sustain? Probably a couple, as long as they didn't hit anything vital and instantly fatal.
She had seen that there was a red 'X' over the robot, indicating where to put a portal to drop a cube on top of it. Seemed like whoever had been here before was trying to be helpful. Or, they had been forced to do the test more than once and had been making notes for themself.
Chell would have to go back and fire a portal at the 'X'. The robot would most likely get in a few shots, but if she fired, then fell backwards, she should be safe from its watchful gaze.
She picked herself up and walked back to the wall where she had been shot. Unless her blood had dried, she'd probably pick some up on her clothes when she scooted across it to get closer. There were also a couple of bullet holes in the wall, it had fired several times, she had been lucky to have been just hit once.
Just because she could survive bullet wounds didn't mean that she really wanted to get shot again. But, if it meant getting out alive, she'd take a couple.
As soon as she could see the 'X', Chell fired a portal. However, at the exact same time, the robot fired off several shots, with a "Sentry mode activated."
She stumbled sideways, out of range. The robot lost sight of her; it said "Searching" as it looked for her. After several moments, it said "Resting" and grew still.
Chell stood there for a moment, breathing heavily. She had been hit twice. The wounds closed up, the bullets plinking onto the floor.
She then walked over a bit and placed a portal onto the wall to check her handiwork. Sure enough, the robot was straight down below.
Satisfied with that, Chell then fired a portal under a cube, so it could drop onto the robot's head.
The cube hit the robot, knocking it over. The robot exclaimed "Self-test error" then fired wildly. After several moments of this, it shut down with a final "I don't blame you."
One down, one to go. Like before, there was a good chance she was going to get shot. Chell wasn't looking forward to that, but she had no choice if she wanted to get out of here alive.
There was one section of concrete that she could back up against, across from the robot somewhere on the other side.
Chell stood against it, sidling to the left, looking to see if there was another helpful 'X' on the ceiling.
After a few scoots, she saw what looked to be the middle of the 'X' without alerting the robot. She aimed carefully and fired a portal at the center section of the red 'X'.
She walked back to the main area and placed a portal on the wall to make sure she had lined it up correctly. It looked like the robot was right in range, so she fired a portal under the cube.
The cube fell through and she heard a clank as it hit the robot. It said "Malfunctioning" and she could hear it firing wildly.
Once the gunshots faded, she heard it murmur something and then there was silence.
She waited a minute or two more, then walked over to look down the corridor.
The robot was lying sideways on the ground. To the left, in front of the robot's alcove, was an opening in the wall, leading to the next room.
She could see from the window to her left that it held two robots, both looking to the right, their lasers pointing at the wall to the right of the entryway. One was even positioned to fire on a spot a few feet away from the entrance. She'd be blasted as soon as she got near the doorway. She'd have to come up with another plan of attack.
As Chell walked down the small hallway, the closer robot saw her through the window, and with a "Deploying" it started shooting at the window. Like the others, this one held, so all it was doing was wasting its ammo and cracking the window.
How much ammo did they have? Probably a lot, they were pretty tall and the bullets were small. It'd take too much time to force it to run out from here. Too bad, though.
The other room was made of concrete. The two robots had their backs to the wall. If she could put a portal behind and above them, she could drop down and hit them from the back with a cube.
First, she had to put a portal in the ceiling, and that meant looking through the doorway. She was probably going to have to take some more bullets. At least she healed quickly.
She carefully made her way to the corner. The robot couldn't see her there, it said "Searching" and she could see the laser moving around.
Chell got a little closer, just enough to put a portal where she needed. Unfortunately, this let the robot see her, so it fired off several shots with a "Hellooo."
She fell backwards, and the robot couldn't see her any more. She sat there for several minutes as her newest wounds healed up neatly, dropping the bullets on the ground.
Once she was feeling better, Chell stood up and turned around; firing a portal at the wall behind her so she could make sure she'd drop safely behind the two robots.
Her positioning looked good, so she walked over to where she had dropped the first cube. By this time, the robot had noticed her through the window again, so it was shooting at her. She ignored it.
On her way to the cube, she fired a portal onto the ground.
Chell hit the button to pick up the cube, then walked out of the metal section. Everything was in place, walked over to the portal on the floor and fell through it and behind the two white robots.
Once she was steady on her feet, Chell whacked the first robot with the cube. It fell over with an "Ow ow ow" and fired crazily at the wall. Once it was done, it said "Shutting down."
Then, she turned and smacked the other one with the metal cube. It fell over and started firing as well, saying, "Self-test error" and ended with an "I don't blame you."
The room was now secure, so Chell hit the button and dropped the cube to get a better idea of what this room actually was like.
She had her back to what had been the left wall when she had looked in through the window. To her right was the opening and damaged window.
On the other side of the room, close to where she was standing was a doorway. Several feet down to the left of that was another doorway. The left wall had a straight area for the half of the room she was standing at, then it sloped and became straight again when it hit the other wall. How strange.
As she was looking the room over, she thought she heard a familiar tune playing faintly. Was there a radio nearby?
She decided to check the closest room first. There didn't appear to be any robots in it from where she was standing.
As she got closer, she saw that it had a window with a large number of bullet holes on the edge around it. That second robot she had knocked over with the cube must have been firing at it. Was it the first robot she had heard?
Also in the room, to the right of the bullet-riddled window was a handprint on the wall. The person that had made the secret room had done something in there! There also seemed to be a cube on the ground, to the right of the doorway.
When Chell walked into the room, she heard a robot chatter, then start firing, cracking the window on the left wall from the next room over. There were a total of three robots in the other room.
This room, however, was a different story. There was a constant hiss of air as a cube cylinder opened and closed, but nothing came out. Every now and then, it would spark slightly. On the floor below, there was a mess of seven cubes. Six of them were on the ground, with a seventh that was resting on two of the others.
The cube that was closest to the middle of the room contained a radio playing the same tune the one in the relaxation vault was, a coffee cup, and some miscellaneous tools.
Had the handprint person used the tools to mess with the cylinder? Why had they? Did they want more cubes? Or were they just rebelling? The tools would be nice to take, but they'd just be in the way and probably disintegrate when they passed through a Grid.
So, she could use these cubes to knock out the ones in the next room. To see what lied ahead, Chell went to the windows and peered through, looking around the bullet cracks and paying no attention to the mindless robot blasting away.
Looking up at the ceiling, Chell could see that the two robots on the right side of the room had red 'X's above them. It didn't look like the one on the right did, however, so she'd have to stop it another way.
There was a window in the other room across from the window on the back side of this room. Chell could make out a round doorway behind it. That must be the room she had entered this painful test from. Did that mean she was getting close to the end? Or was it a taunt?
Through the window on the left wall, Chell could see an exit door close to the robot that was trying to shoot her. To the left of the door was a red button on the ground. The ceiling above the button was metal, so she couldn't just drop one in on it. Too bad.
One of the robots could probably see her if she looked in the doorway, so she'd have to be careful about aiming her shot.
Chell walked out of the room and fired a portal onto the wall to the left of the doorway she had just exited. She then turned and placed a portal on the left wall, close to the other doorway. She walked through the first portal and exited out the other.
She made her way close to the doorway, peeking around the corner. She couldn't see much of the other room, just part of the robot closest to her and a good view of one across. If she wasn't careful, the one across the way could see her.
Chell edged forward and realized that she could be in danger. She took a quick step back and heard the robot fire, followed by a "Don't shoot!" Had the farthest one shot the one in between her and it? Could it take out that one closest to the door?
She scooted up again. The robot started shooting with a "Hello friend." The other robot cried out, "Stop shooting!" But, the firing didn't cease. After a bullet clipped her arm, Chell stepped backwards to let it heal.
The robot that was getting shot only wobbled a little; this game wasn't going to work. Once her arm was better, Chell peered through the doorway again, this time to get the red 'X' above the robot in her sights.
She easily found the 'X' and placed a portal on it. Another bullet got her arm and she backed up.
After her arm healed again, Chell put a portal on the wall next to her to check its place. The robot was down below, just like she needed.
Chell turned around and quickly walked in front of the doorway and back to where she had dropped her cube that she had used to smack over the two robots. She moved the cube out from the metal part of the floor and dropped it on a concrete section. She then placed a portal underneath it.
The cube fell through and there was a satisfying metal thunk as it hit its target. The robot said, "Malfunctioning" as it shot randomly. Once its death throes were complete, it said, "I don't blame you" and grew still.
There were still two robots in that room left. She'd have to look through the doorway again to see how she could defeat them.
Chell made her way over to the open doorway, as she got closer, she heard one of the robots say "Deploying" but she didn't hear any gunfire. It must have almost been able to see her, but not quite. She stood to the right of the doorway. From here, the robots couldn't see her, and she heard the robot mumble something. She could see that one of the robots was pointing to the left, its laser was pointing close to the closed exit door.
Since it sounded like the one robot could see her if she stepped in front of the doorway, Chell placed a portal on the wall to the left of the doorway and then put another portal on the wall she was standing next to.
She walked into the closest portal and came out the other side. The robots hadn't been able to see her from here, except for that one she had already dropped a cube on.
There wasn't an 'X' above the robot closest to her. She had two options, either guess where to place a portal above it and drop a cube onto the robot, or she could do what she did to the first one and drop it out of a portal.
She'd try the cube first; it wouldn't hurt anything since there were plenty of cubes in the next room over. If she needed more later, they'd be closer, being in the room she had dropped them into.
Chell aimed for a spot she thought was right above the nasty little robot. She wouldn't be able to use the portals to safely cross the door, but if she moved fast enough, she figured they wouldn't be able to shoot her.
Once she had that portal in place, she darted in front of the door. The one robot said, "Who's there?" but didn't fire. She looked through the portal to the right of the door; it looked like it'd be close to hit the robot. She'd just have to try it and readjust if necessary.
Chell walked into the room with the cubes and picked one behind the cube with all the stuff on it. If the person who had been here before was still around, they probably wouldn't take kindly to their stuff being messed with. She'd rather have them as a possible ally. Though, if it came to needing the cube, she would use it without hesitation and apologize later.
She took the cube back into the bigger room and set it on the ground. Then, she fired a portal underneath it. It would have been just as easy to push it through the portal on the wall, but, this way, she could be sure that it fell properly.
The cube fell with a clank on the floor. She had missed the robot. Well, she would just have to try again.
Chell darted across the doorway again, the robot saying, "Deploying" as she crossed, but once again, didn't fire.
She cautiously peeked around the doorway, looking to see how she could line the shot up. She was thankful that the person before had placed 'X's above some of the robots, it made things much easier.
The cube was to the robot's right, so she moved the portal up closer to the doorway. Then, Chell ran across, the robot said "Hello" but didn't do anything. She then looked down in the portal on the floor, once again, it was going to be close, but the robot looked more like it was in the middle of the portal.
Chell went back into the room and grabbed another cube behind the others, then took it out and dropped it into the portal on the floor.
This time, the cube fell on the robot. It exclaimed "Ow ow ow" as it shot rapidly, then gave a sad-sounding "Whyyy?" and grew silent.
One robot left in this room. She was probably going to have to get shot again in order to place a portal on the 'X' above it. Chell wasn't looking forward to that. But, she had to do what was necessary to get out of here alive.
She quickly made her way back to the left side of the doorway. The robot seemed to not see her as well on that side, so she'd use that to her advantage.
Chell slowly eased around the doorway, keeping her eyes on the ceiling for the moment she spotted the red 'X' above the oval robot.
As soon as she saw the middle of the 'X', she fired a portal at the ceiling. At that exact moment, the robot said, "There you are." Chell backed up quickly, before it could shoot her. She couldn't see where she had placed the portal, but she had kept from being shot.
The robot said, "Are you still there?" and went back to waiting patiently.
Chell made her way over to the portal in the floor to check her handiwork. The robot looked to be close to the middle of the portal, so Chell went to the nearby room and grabbed another cube from the back. She walked over to the portal and dumped the cube into it.
The cube hit the robot with a satisfying clank. The robot said "Malfunctioning" and fired off quite a few shots. Chell saw a couple fly through the door and was thankful she wasn't too close. The robot said "Shutting down" and went silent.
The room was finally secure. Chell gave a sigh of relief and walked into it to figure out her next move.
The button on the floor would activate the door. Before placing a cube on it to keep it open, Chell stood on top of it.
She was glad she did, for when the door opened, a robot's laser shined through. There was one guarding the doorway for an unsuspecting test subject.
Now, how was she going to get around it?
Most of the room she could see was close to the laser, if she placed portals there, she'd get shot in an instant.
However, there was a little dark area she could see that could possibly be another room. Chell fired a portal at this section and it stuck to the wall.
She then turned around and placed a portal on the wall to the right of the doorway, so she could see if she was going into danger.
There was another robot looking off to Chell's left. It was standing on metal ground. That didn't matter, though; she could grab a cube and go through with it, then smack the robot over. It'd be a simple matter, and there were several cubes she had dropped into this room.
Chell walked over and grabbed the cube that she had used to knock over the robot that was closest to the doorway.
With it in her portal gun's grasp, she turned around and walked over to the portal, then through it.
It was only a few steps to the robot, even less for the cube that was lifted several feet away from her. She poked the robot with the cube, it fell over and said "Self-test error" and fired a few rapid rounds. Once it was done, it said "I don't blame you."
With that, Chell glanced around the room. To her right was a metal grill on the wall that separated her from the robot that was guarding the door. It didn't notice her.
The room was small; it had nothing else of note, except for the exit doorway next to where she had placed the portal.
Once she saw the Grid and elevator at the end, Chell gave a sigh of relief. This particular nightmare was over; however, the elevator would probably take her off to someplace much, much worse. But, for now, she was safe.
Chell dropped the cube on the floor, no need to waste it by destroying it with the Grid.
She made her way down the short hallway. As she neared the Grid, the voice spoke, "Well done, android. The Enrichment Center once again reminds you that android hell is a real place where you will be sent at the first sign of defiance."
Chell gave a snort at this. They were still pretending that this was a chamber designed for androids. Unless androids could write and place notes for other people, that was a blatant lie.
Why did they feel the need to lie about this chamber? Why couldn't they just come out and say that they were going to test you against robots with guns? It didn't matter which way you said it, it still was dangerous. People would have to go through this chamber no matter what. Why pretend otherwise?
Well, it didn't matter now, she had made it through. Though a little more battered than she had come in, her wounds had healed and she had only gotten a few holes and a bit of blood on her clothes. Not too bad for taking out a good deal of robots and avoiding others. She was pretty pleased with what she had accomplished.
Chell walked through the Grid and onto the elevator. She flopped onto the ground, ready for some rest.
As she closed her eyes, so did the elevator doors. Then the machine hummed as she was taken to the next chamber.
Chapter Word Count: 8,592
Total Word Count: 35,954