2 days earlier…

25 hours on the surface

Oh hi!

Um…

I seem to be forgetting something aren't I?

I can't remember what…

Hmmm…

There was something I was supposed to be doing.

I think I did something bad one time?

Something tells me I did.

But I didn't mean to!

I can be good, really!

I can and will be good,

I promise!

What happened to me…

How come I can't remember?

Can you tell me how?

Who am I supposed to be?

"You really are just like me"

Am I?

0~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~0

Something awoke Solar from its sleep mode. It made a weird wheezing noise, and for some reason, an area on it felt warm. Its optical slowly opened up. It's visual systems were booting up, making it feel groggy.

"Sleep mode…? How… I don't go to sleep mode…"

Something shook it. Solar's optical flew open and focused right away. Something was shaking it but not too hard. Something was next to it. Something big. It made a heaving noise, as if it couldn't breathe well. Solar looked to the right side of it, and found Nina, asleep. The events that happened hours before had returned to it.

"Oh,"

Solar looked next to it. They were both still on the lift. The noise had come from Nina, her breathing sort of hoarse. Solar looked at her face. She seemed to have a bit of color back on to her. 'Nothing that bad…' It thought. Her health seemed better. That was one mystery solved.

In the light, Solar was able to see everything else about Nina much more clearly. For one thing, dirt covered her face. Dark circles formed under her eyes. Her arms were covered with cuts and bruises, an outcome of testing for that long. Her wrist, in which she had sprained it some time ago, now looked more bluish-purple than her regular skin color. She looked terrible.

She needed help.

Solar looked around, its visual processor adjusting to its surroundings. They were in a small structure. There was a big heavy door in front of them. It was wide open, exposing the both of them into the purple and orange sky. The sun was setting, and its light was hitting it. The wind blew. This explained the shaking and the warm feeling. Down beneath the purple sky was a wheatfield.

Solar watched the wheat field in a daze. The wind blowing on the blades made it see like an ocean. And the matching purple sky, with an orange hue now in the distance. It was beautiful. It sat there, with nothing else to do, and stared at the horizon.

Nina coughed. Solar turned around, its thoughts interrupted by her health. 'Right,' it thought. 'I need to wake her up. She had to be alright now, right?'

Solar turned around and faced Nina. "Hey," it said. Being a sphere with no limbs, it was all it could do to wake her up. "Um, Nina? Hey! Hellooo?"

There was a small chirping sound heard from the entrance of the structure that they were both in. Solar looked up at the entrance. "What was that?" it said out loud, before meeting face to face with a pair of familiar red opticals, and not the beautiful sky it encountered moments before.

"AHHHH!"

There was a loud chirping noise.

"Oh my gosh!Turret! No! N. O. spells no, ya hear me? Do not shoot her!"

It was unlike anything Solar had ever seen. It was a thing, an abomination. It was a mixture of both turret and storage cube at the same time. Specifically, two turrets in one storage cube. The thing was only standing on two legs, and the box was dragging behind it. It looked old for some reason. The white color of the storage cube and the plates itself looked faded overtime into a rusted kind of yellow. Moss grew on some parts of the block.

The figure looked at Solar in a confused way, and then chirped.

Solar looked at the turret blankly. Unlike other turrets, this one doesn't not speak in their ironic friendly voice. It chirped. It continued to do that to Solar, reminding it of the crows it saw sometimes in the facility, speaking its own language. It figured that the Turret must have its own kind of language. It started to decode it from the speeches of the turret.

"You aren't him."

"W-who?" It said to the turret. It turned out that everything that it said was sped up somehow, to the only point where the speech was only audible in chirps.

"The big robot on the monitor!"

"GLaDOS?"

The red opticals narrowed. The legs bent down. Solar shivered. It looked angry.

"Not her. She's evil."

Solar sighed, but still, through its semi-broken handles, it felt stiff. At least, the whatever-it-was was not going to shoot either Nina or shoot itself (that being Solar itself). It looked at the turret-block in confusion. What did it mean, big robot at the monitor? "Who do you mean?" it asked.

"The big robot on the monitor!"

"Who else could it be? It has always been her! No one else! Except…" Solar rethought back on that one time, around five years ago when the facility was ruled by that one core. "Maybe once someone else had done it… but he is gone now." The turret-block looked sadly at him. "He is?" it said. Solar nods.

The turret-block looked at Nina and Solar, back and forth. Solar narrowed its optical. "Don't even think about it," It said to the turret-block. "I can hack almost every Aperture device, including turrets. You don't want this, I say." Just as he said that, Solar winced, a bit. A surging pain emerged to it, and from above, it could see sparks coming out of it.

Maybe that fall harmed it more than it thought.

As if that wasn't enough, Nina coughed. The turret-block looked at her for a bit. Solar panicked, and tried to send out one command at the turret-block. It stopped in a wonder, for a bit. The coding for the turret-block seemed off. It was all carelessly jumbled and scrambled, and looked like it was made by someone who was in a rush. It doesn't have the code to shoot bullets.

It can't shoot.

Solar sighed and looked back at the turret. Nina was lucky. Almost every single time when it comes to her and turrets, she seems to be finding the ones that don't shoot. Honestly at this point, she should have been dead by now if they didn't exist.

She coughed again.

The turret looked at Solar. "She's sick."

"Gee thanks Captain Obvious."

"And you are full of insecurities."

Solar looked at the turret-block, and winced once more. This pain was getting worse. The turret-block looked at Solar.

"I'm not."

The turret-block shook its head as Nina wheezed and coughed once more. Solar looked back at her, making sure she was okay. Nina continued to cough, this time louder that it echoed around the small space they were in. Another gust of wind blew into the structure, making her cough more.

"She needs help."

"There's not a lot a core can do with a sick human y'know!" said Solar back, and winced again. The turret-block walked closer to Nina, and eyed her. Then it turned to Solar.

"Human help,"

Solar looked at the turret as Nina coughed again. "Human help? But there hasn't been any human sightings over here in around a year!" it said. Though, through its doubts, Solar thought. It couldn't do anything, and as far as it knew, it didn't know if the turret had any idea to help out either. The only easy way to help out Nina was a human. Only a human would understand Nina's condition than any of them could.

"Do you think you could take us to the nearest human uh… quarters?"

The turret-block looked at Solar. It nods slightly. It walks over to Nina, and pushes her around for a bit. Its two legs tried to scratch her shoulder. Solar looked at it confused. "What are you doing?" The turret block looked back at Solar. On its legs, there was the backpack strap.

"Oh I see. You're trying to take it off!"

The turret block played around with the zipper of the bag. Solar watched as it opened up. The Turret-block then walked over to Solar, and pushed it towards the bag. "Hey!" It said, before it was inside, but it relented. It was the most logical thing to do. That turret block couldn't carry them all as they were.

Solar turned itself around in the bag and winced. The laptop and the picture frame were behind it. Already it was smushed. It expected the zipper of the bag to close, but instead, it saw something else get inside the bag. It was large, long and white. The portal gun.

"Oy, watch it! There's not enough room for all this!" It said stiffly, but amazingly there was. The portal gun just barely fit inside the bag. The Turret started to zip it up.

"Wait!" said Solar, a familiar panic settling in. The turret stopped and peeked into it from the remaining hole. Solar stammers. "I-I um. You wouldn't mind keeping the bag a bit open, right? Like a small peeking hole of some sort?" The turret nodded a bit, and continued to zip up the bag. It left a very tiny hole for the core.

"Cleithrophobia is the fear of being trapped, and it is often confused with claustrophobia, the fear of closed spaces. Both are different, and both are mental disorders"

"Are you saying that I have a mental disorder?"

"You need help."

"I do not."

"Human help."

"Are you pulling my handles? I'm an Aperture Device, and they are humans. What can they do?" It winced again after that. The turret block was getting on its nerves, and it didn't find it so well that it was even receiving help from one.

The turret said nothing after that. It wasn't a very talkative one as Solar would have imagined. It felt the ground shake as the bag was lifted back on Nina's limp shoulders. It could hear her hoarse breathing louder from up above. Besides that, there was a moment of silence as the turret-block tried to configure a way to lift Nina up.

It was a very long time before Solar felt anything else coming from the turret. By the time the bag started to move again, it was so surprised that it didn't realize that the portal gun was about to crash into it. 'Gee thanks gravity.' it thought as the bag slumped on the side. Through the hole, Solar realized that the Turret block had put Nina on top of the block part, with her legs dragging behind. Her bag was slumped to the side of the block, inches above the ground. The peeking hole only displays the ground.

"A smart one are you?"

The turret said nothing. Solar sighed. This is how it's going to be for who knows how long. Loud, deafening silence. 'I hope it knows where it's going…' it though, as the 3 of them exited the structure. It could hear the cold wind outside. By then the light from the sky was gone, and it was dark. Solar didn't mind the dark. It always was in the dark back in the facility. Practically lived in it anyways.

"So, how did you end up here?" It asked, hoping to get something out of the mysterious turret, but it didn't respond. Nina made a sniffing sound. Solar felt like the turret-block didn't hear it well. "Um… did you hear that last part?" it asked.

"Thrown out."

Solar stared blankly at the hole. Maybe asking those types of questions to the turret was not going to help it in its situation. 'From the looks of it, thrown out a very long time ago. Poor chap.' it thought, recalling the rusted looks of the turret. It asked another question, to rid the mood it had left the turret.

"What's your name?"

"Unknown"

"You didn't have an official name?" asked Solar. It was met with silence again. "Just like me…" it murmured to itself. It thought for a moment. "Well, I'm not the best at naming things. I'll be honest, I even had to name myself once. Not that bad of a name, cuz I found it in a book, but there are no books here so I'll have to improvise. I'll call you Hybrid." It said through the bag.

"Why?"

"Well, hybrid means to be a mixture of two things. You seem to be a mixture of a turret and a storage cube, so, Hybrid."

The turret-Block stayed silent for a moment. Solar cringed, hoping it liked the name and also hoping that it wouldn't ditch Nina out in the middle of nowhere if it didn't.

"Thank you."

"You're welco-ooh ow." It winced once more, and then let out a muffled scream. More than unbearable at this point. There was an alert from its visual processor overlapping the one that Solar couldn't bring itself to open.

"You need help."

"I'm fine! Honest and really! Scientists these days just don't understand the importance of not having a pain simulator in cores in the first place!"

Something flashed red in it's visual processor. Solar kept quiet as Hybrid continued to walk into nowhere. It looked over at the small triangle with an exclamation mark on it. It never really liked to open alerts, and would always find a good reason why not to. They bring bad news. Solar knew it should be opening them, but something told it that the first alert meant bad news. They all do, in general, but that could be fixed.

This other one on the other hand gave Solar a normal feeling about it. It read the second alert carefully, now that there was nothing else to do in the bag.

System Damage 20%

A system scan report. The damage was not so bad. At least, Nina managed to fix the part in where his vocal processor was buggy. Maybe with that potential, she can help fix it once she wakes up!

Nina wheezed.

Maybe not.

It winced again, and Solar watched as the first alert had begun to glow red. It shook itself, or tried to, under the weight of the Portal gun and everything else on it. 'Not now. I'm fine as I am." It looked for something else that it could play with in the meanwhile. It looked over its overclocking sequence, displaying the interactions it had with Atlas. An unsettling feeling emerged from it, remembering everything about the way it had made Atlas attack its partner, just like she wanted to do for so long from her words. The entire memory replayed in its mind.

Another wave of guilt appeared inside of Solar, as it also remembers some tests that it had seen the two robots complete together before Nina had appeared in Aperture. She only wanted to figure out a way to make them feel aggravated to each other, by telling them lies one could have said to the other. But it failed almost every time, as the bond between them is unbreakable. Was unbreakable, until a couple of hours ago. Solar gave her more than what she wanted.

"You really are just like me."

'No I'm not.' it thought. GLaDOS was just trying to get to it. She's already weak, and couldn't accept it. Bluffing was the last thing she could do to at least cause some damage. Solar looked weary through the peeking hole. 'She actually did cause some intentional damage this time…' it thought. 'I can't stop thinking about her words. If it took her so long to get Atlas to turn over its partner, and it took me a matter of moments to do just that, am I really?'

It remembered an old quote it once saw on one of the posters in some offices belonging to an Aperture scientist a long time ago. It said something like Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words may break my heart. As if Aperture devices had hearts. A majority of them didn't have any at all, especially her. It felt that connection with the poster.

A status update appeared on its visual processor, interrupting it from its thoughts. It looked over at the information of the status for Atlas. Currently it's… highly active. Solar looked out through the lenses of Atlas. It was surprising to see that the signal would go far. Or, as far as the turret-block had gotten them. It still had no idea where it was because it was still in the bag.

Through the lenses of the robot that it had managed to control, it could see why it was 'highly active.' It was again having another fight with the other robot with the orange optical, in which Solar had scanned and found out its name was P-body.

Speaking of P-body, Solar watched, its optical cracked into a million pieces. No orange color now, only a faded bit of it mixed with grey. There were burn marks on its shell, and it seemed that the arm was fully broken. Again, Atlas throws another punch at P-body. It wasn't even doing anything at this point. It was punching it for no reason.

'Enough!' it shouted in its mind. Through the distance, it saw GLaDOS staring intently at the robot, not paying attention to P-body. It took a bit for Atlas to respond, but finally, it stopped what it was doing. It dropped the limp metal body on the ground, and stared off into the distance.

"Oh. I'm actually surprised. You made it here, from all the way from over there."

It froze. Solar made Atlas turn around, and looked at GLaDOS. Thankfully, it was still hanging limp from the ceiling, with all three corrupt cores in place. It narrowed Atlas's optical focus towards GLaDOS. It said nothing, except, the reliving fact that She was still in the state that Nina had left her in.

"Well, I'm glad you are still intact, on account that little problem you have. Now we can finish our conversation from before."

Atlas/Solar crossed their arms to each other. "If you are going to force me to bring her back, then don't try." It watched, as her yellow optical flickered for a moment. "Cake- Birthday ssswrrrrtttt - Stop it, I do not have cake to give you." Solar smirked. Now who's the one struggling here?

"As I was saying. You'd come back. Besides, what's with being with humans going to do with anyways? You said it yourself. You don't belong there."

"I don't need to come back."

"Yes you do. Just look at you, confused. Forgotten. Unfinished. The very important thing you need to be whole again is here. So why don't you come back? With Test subject 0.04?"

"Nina."

"Hmmm?"

"Her name is Nina."

"How is this supposed to help the both of us?"

"I'm not helping you, and the answer is no. I'll find my purpose soon enough. Without your help."

"Either way, you'll come back here. You are bound to this place as much as I am, you know."

Before Solar could respond, another painful surge came out from it. Even in Atlas's body, it could feel the electric bolt flying up to it. Clearly, Atlas wasn't built for this type of thing either. Everywhere, it hurt. Solar could feel Altas's Portal gun fall from its hand, and her eyes staring straight through it.

"I guess removing your memories had taken a toll on you…"

"No need to remind me of that."

"You aren't supposed to be functioning this way, either. You are hurting yourself."

Solar stayed silent. It realized that everything she said was true. Other than, of course, the fact that hurting itself this way was bad. It was for a good cause. It winced once more, an after effect from the surge. It ended up looking down at P-body. The damage wasn't permanent, and P-body could be repaired with a simple data transfer on a newer robotic body.

GLaDOS looked over at the limp body.

"Notice how the Aperture science Co-operative Testing Initiate was still somehow under your control even after you shut down? It did a number to that other Aperture Science Co-operative Testing Initiate. You did that. In your sleep."

Atlas/Solar shook its head. "Not possible. I was in Sleep Mode. I can't still be active when I'm doing that, and even you know it!"

"Hmmm. Looks like you're more ignorant than I had calculated. Ever looked at your system status yet?"

"Why should I? I'm already fine." Said Atlas/Solar. In the bag, it shivered. How did she know about its problems? 'She's probably doing something to annoy me. I'm safe now and away from her, so she can't do anything.'

"Well, every Aperture Science Intelligent Spheres are incapable of doing that little thing you always do to control other Aperture devices because they are not strong enough to do so. You, on the other hand, can do that, and it's doing a massive number on your processor."

Atlas/Solar shook itself. "I'm fine." It said again. "You on the other hand have a lot to hold." This was getting even more strange. "I'm still operational."

"You were an accident among the scientists and was never meant to be operational in the first place. In the count of three, you would have another one of those painful meltdowns. Three..."

'Accident…?' Solar thought about those words. "How come?" it had asked GLaDOS. 'How does she know all of these things about me? It's illogical that she is telling the truth, right?' What only stumped the little core even more was the fact that now she is telling it all of these things it never knew about itself. This was not the first time the core had faced her. Many times, she would call it over, and blame it for the slightest problems the facility had endured. The ending result of the meetings and the punishment was not good.

"two…"

Solar panicked. Her counting down was something it has never seen her do before. "What are you doing?" it demanded. It could tell that she was up to something, Solar added a couple of fire walls around its overclocked connected link with Atlas.

"One. Goodbye."

Solar stared at the GLaDOS unit. Nothing happened. Both of them stared at each other for a couple of seconds. Eventually, Solar started to smirk.

"You were wrong. I'm still fine - AHHHHHH!"

The pain wasn't coming from Atlas. It was coming directly from Solar's body itself. Solar screamed again in pain, the vision of the Central A.I. Chamber fading back into the backpack from where it resided. It could feel Hybrid stopped walking. When the pain was over, Solar looked back at its visual processor. The alert was blinking red again. Another alert popped up.

Solar read the other alert.

System Damage, 30%.

Confusion and fatigue set in for the poor core. Wasn't it 20% before? How come it's 30? From the outside, it could feel the turret talking to the core, but Solar couldn't answer. It was too tired. The overclocking sequence had done a matter to it, just like she had said. Her words echo through its mind.

"You are just like me."

"an accident…"

"Never meant to be operational…"

"You don't belong there."

Solar heard Hybrid talk to it again. "Are you dead?"

"No." said Solar. "I'm not."

"Good."

There was the sound of weight dragging on to the ground as Hybrid continued to walk. Nina's breathing was more like a chatter, and Solar understood why. The more it sat in the bag doing nothing except for thinking, the more it could hear the many sounds of nature, including the heavy gusts of wind. It blew constantly.

"How much longer?"

There was no answer from the turret-block. It just continued to move. Solar didn't know how long it was in the bag, or how long they had been traveling. It hoped that wherever they are, they would be able to quickly reach into the human quarters. Nina coughed again, and Solar started to grow uncertain of their whereabouts.

It didn't bother talking to Hybrid again. It only wanted to talk when it wanted to. And talking to it at this moment would just result in even more silence. This wasn't helping its increasing amount of questions that it kept thinking about. It winced again, and it's alert flashed back from its visual optical.

Solar sighed. 'I might as well cut to the chase. That thing would be annoying me all the time, and I have nothing else to do.' There was another wave of an unsettling feeling surging through Solar as it looked at the little red triangle with the exclamation point. Again, it knew something was different about the alert than the others it had seen. It shook itself and looked over at the alert.

WARNING: SYSTEM MEMORY OVERLOAD AT 63%

SIGNAL FOR THE APERTURE SCIENCE SECONDARY VIRTUAL MEMORY WAS LOST

MANUAL DATA TRANSFER REQUIRED

PLEASE CONNECT YOURSELF TO AN APERTURE DEVICE WITH AN ENHANCED MEMORY SYSTEM

YOUR DATA TRANSFER WOULD BEGIN SHORTLY

SCANNING FOR LOCAL DEVICE

NO LOCAL DEVICE FOUND

MEMORY RESET REQUIRED

It was speechless for a while. Of course, anyone would be if they had just been told that they had to reset their memory. Solar looked over the Message again and again, just to be sure that it wasn't a glitch from its visual processor fooling it. But lo and behold, it wasn't. "Memory Reset…?" was all it could say from inside the bag.

Everything it had ever known would be gone. Its abilities to hack, its personality, important things and dangers to look out for would be gone… Nina as well. It's going to wake up one day to forget about her too, and everything she had promised to it. Everything that it did for her.

'Can I find my virtual memory somehow?' it asked itself. It looked through the files it held. Nothing about a memory being missing. It was the same files that it had for its entire life. As far as Solar knew, that memory bank was its only last hope in preventing the reset, unless of course, the human quarters have Aperture devices for him to use in the meantime.

It gave up on looking for the memory bank. It was just gone, like his initial purpose. And those things were supposed to be etched into its code. Impossible to even remove. Unless…

Solar could feel itself overheat. It felt that somehow, she did this to it. It remembered what she had said to it earlier, when Nina was being dragged on to the lift. How she took memories from it because from the way Solar saw it, she was afraid that it would use the memories against it.

It winced again.

It wasn't until with the wincing, Solar had realized that a signal was picking up. It abandoned the thought of what GLaDOS had done for the moment. The wincing has wavered a random signal, something that they all come across. The signal wavering had made Solar finally detect it. "I'm not myself today… did I seriously not pay attention to any signals?" It looked over at the signal. A radio signal. It was receiving another signal from far away. But the signal seemed pretty close.

"Hybrid, I feel a radio signal coming up from ahead. Are we almost here?"

"No"

"Oh come on!" Said Solar. "It's close! Like really close! Someone built that signal, didn't they? And we are close to it!" Solar looked through the hole. There was nothing but black dirt at this point, moving at a constant rate on the ground. Solar had wished the bag would have slumped on the other side of Nina. It would have seen something else in the meanwhile, like that sky it saw before it met Hybrid for the first time.

It winced again, and the signal wavered.

"She's really warm…"

"Huh?" asked Solar. "Do you mean Nina? Well, in that case, it's good right? It is pretty cold out here, and at least she is warm…"

"Thats bad."

"Oh…" said Solar. It wished it knew something about medics anyhow. All it could relate to Nina at this point was to itself. At times when Solar overheated, it was normally because it was mad about something. Very rarely it would overheat because it would have been working too hard.

'What if Nina actually figured out here that we didn't get to her brother at that time?' it thought. 'What if… she is angry that she is overheating because of it? Or she might also be overheating because she did use a lot of energy during testing, and attaching the cores on the GLaDOS.' Solar didn't expect a lot from both of the answers. They both did seem logical.

Nina coughed again, only this time, she sounded like she was choking. Above, Hybrid stopped walking.

"We stop here."

A small light glew inside of Solar. "We're here?" it asked hopefully. It could feel the signal even closer. Hopefully by then, the humans could help out Nina. Her coughs are getting worse. It could feel Hybrid removing the bag from Nina's shoulders again. Solar questioned about this tactic. Somehow, being only a robot with two legs and always hauling a box over them, it was logical Hybrid wouldn't have any skill whatsoever on agility and handling items. Somehow, the turret-box did have the abilities to conduct basic handling skills. Solar wanted to know more about this.

Its thoughts were yet interrupted by another painful surge around it, and Hybrid removing the zipper of the bag. It would require some personal questions, and it didn't know whether or not the turret-block would have feelings. The turret-block looks at Solar, as if it read its thoughts. "No." it said. At first, Solar thought that meant no for feeling emotions, or the fact about it asking the questions. Then it remembered that it was answering the question it had asked earlier about them being in the Human Area.

The turret-block walked away from the bag, dragging the storage cube part behind it. "Are you taking a rest?" Solar asked it. It couldn't blame the turret-block. All this time it carried Nina's body in the middle of nowhere, doing them a favor without expecting anything in return. Of course it needed a rest. Just a quick one, because Nina wouldn't get any better the more she was out here in the cold. It was met with silence once again. Solar watched from inside the bag, Hybrid nestling in on the ground a couple of feet away. "Good Night." It said, before its two glowing red opticals faded to black. This gave Solar the studders. The way it said the two words reminded it of the turrets back at Aperture, the ones that said "Good Night" before they shot their target.

Nina coughed. Solar then realized that Nina was right next to the bag. Solar, in the dark, saw her hand clutching tightly on the strap of the bag. Apart from the hand clutching the strap, Solar looked around their surroundings. Hybrid had placed Nina next to a tree. She was still lying on the ground though, as for the fact that maybe the turret-block did have a limit to its agility, and can't sit her upright. The tree did not have leaves, unlike solar had seen before. Every picture of the surface always had trees with leaves. This however, looked more like a dead one.

Up ahead, they were in a small clearing. It looked like a mixture of a clearing with a forest. Not too many trees be a forest, but too many trees to be a cleared meadow. There was no wheat field, which saddened Solar a bit. It doesn't need to head to sleep mode, so it figures that it could watch the wheat field in the meantime it could rest. Instead, there was grass and even in the distance, a small pond. There was no moon out in the sky, so the only thing that reflected off of the pond was just stars.

Solar actually considered that the stars were actually a better sight than the field. In the sound of the waves of the water on the pond, it watched the sky. The stars were bright, but all were dimmed compared to one star that shined the brightest. Deep down inside Solar, it felt the name of the star pop up into his mind. "The North Star…" It told itself. It knew nothing else about it. Just the name. It saddened it even more, as its mind returned to the information GLaDOS told it about its memories.

"You were found irresponsible for this information, so I removed it from your Aperture Science Memory bank long before you awakened."

Solar winced even more. Another surge of pain. This time, it hurt for a very long time. Solar stifled a scream as it didn't want to wake up both Nina and the turret. Somewhat at the same time, Solar felt the signal from a radio tower waver as the pain inside of it grew. It didn't matter to it that much. The pain was felt as if it was in a crusher, always pressuring it even more. Solar was the one who was controlling the crusher, and could stop it from crushing itself, but it chose not to.

The pain stopped and Solar let out a breath. It watched as some more sparks flew off of it. Another alert popped up.

System Damage, 37%

It was at this same moment when Nina let out a breath. A stuttery one, but a long good one. Solar was glad that she was still able to do that, since it is most important that she kept breathing. It saw a white cloud coming out of her nose and mouth. From the cold, her breath was visible to Solar in the dark.

"I don't want to play I-spy…"

"Nina?" asked Solar. Her voice was rough and hoarse, and it came out merely a whisper, but Solar heard it as clear as day. "Are you awake?"

"I have to find you…"

"I'm already here! Look see, we're outside!" said Solar. "You're here with me… aren't you?"

Nina coughs again. Solar tried to turn around to face her, but found itself wincing again. When the wave of pain was over, Solar looked back at Nina, only to now see her in holding both her shoulders, rubbing them together. She was cold. And sick.

"She only has you."

Solar realized that the voice behind it was Hybrid. It must have woken up again because of Nina talking to herself with her eyes closed. Solar didn't want to turn around. It already took long enough to do so, and he also feared that it would have another one of those painful meltdowns. Yet only, it turned around a bit in respect for hybrid. "What do you mean?"

"Don't leave her."

Solar had now turned all around for Hybrid to see it. "I'm not planning to." It said. But the way Hybrid looked at the core meant that it knew what was going on inside of it. "I'll figure out something." it specified. But the Hybrid still stared at it. Solar looked at Hybrid in return, the questions coming back to it. "Why do you want to help us anyways?"

Hybrid closed its optical slowly, and then reopened them again.

"You look like the big robot on the monitor!"

Solar stared at the turret-block blankly. "But I'm not." it said. "Is that why you want to help us?" But Hybrid shook itself from left to right. "No, but you might know where he is."

Solar looked at the turret-block. "I doubt it. But if you want to look around for him in the Human quarters, they might know where he is. Hopefully anyways. He's a core, so he might not be able to move around much without some help." The turret block looked at Solar. "I hope so." It said. It looked away from Solar for a bit, before closing its opticals.

"Wait." said Solar. Hybrid's opticals opened back up again. "How did you end up here in the first place?" It watched the turret's opticals narrow. Solar stutters. It was that look that turrets gave out, when they were trying to locate their target. "I know you told me how, but do you mind if you told me how you actually ended up here? Like before, not right now." it clarified. Hybrid looked at Solar, and chirped. Solar, knowing that its audio processors were already interpreting the language the turret-block. It actually chirped intentionally.

"It's a yes?" Solar asked. It was met with more silence from the turret block.

"Oh never mind." It said. The answer was final. It wouldn't want to say anything about itself. Solar winced again. Another surge of pain. And the signal wavering. Solar hoped that whoever was receiving the signal wouldn't have any difficulty about it wavering a lot.

"Sleep mode." Said Hybrid.

Solar sighed. It was only two words that the turret-block had said, but they spoke true, for the best anyways. "You're right." It replied. "I should head over to that. Helps me conserve some of my memory for a bit." Hybrid closed its opticals slowly and opened them back up, in its version of a nod. "It's only for a while… and also we need to head over to the human area soon."

"Goodnight."

Solar sighed and looked from the turret-block and then back to Nina.

"Good Night."

0~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~0

"Annnnnd… you're up!"

Light filled up the visual processor of the turret block, as it tried to move. Something heavy was behind it, which was odd. And it seemed to be stuck to it. Even though it was odd, it didn't seem to mind that much. It's optical refocused on the surrounding area. It found itself with others that might look like it. All looked like cones stuck to a block. A majority of them didn't seem to be awake just like itself.

They were all placed in the middle of a room, all placed in straight lines of five, three lines in total. The room looked like it was poorly made. The colors and tiles looked poorly coordinated. There were pieces of tiles that were not aligned correctly, and most of the tiles were all damaged.

"Oh… Well, that didn't wake all of them up, now did it? Hmmm… there's an option somewhere around here that could help… let me see. Oh! Here, I'll try this: System reset… on that one!"

The loud voice came from a monitor, which displayed a big robot. It was in a spherical shape, and in the middle of it, there was a circular blue light. The turret-block could hear its voice in all directions. Who was this guy? It asked itself. Up above, a giant claw came from the ceiling as it picked up one of the still dormant beings next to it.

"Okay, so let's see. You're all reset! You're gonna wake up now, right?"

The turret-block watched as the turret-block being held up on the claw in front of the big robot in the monitor woke up. Being in the air, its legs began to move, wildly, searching for the ground. "Please put me down…" It said to the big robot on the monitor.

"Oh sure! Here ya go!" it replied, as the claw put the turret-block back on the ground. Only of course, this resulted in the turret-block looking directly at the monitor, with narrowed eyes. "Target Acquired." It said, before it shot something out of it. A loose bolt. The monitor looked fine as far as anyone would see it, but this got the robot behind the monitor a little aggravated.

"Hey, you're not meant to do that!" said the robot, a bit panicked. "Hey, you might as well be a crap turret then. I don't think I have any use for you… so I guess you have to go." And that's when it did something that sent the turret-block (not the one being held up on the claw) shivering inside its block. The robot threw the being to the corner of the room that they were in. Up above, the ceiling lifted off, displaying a new type of ceiling. It had pointed triangles all around it- and it smashed into the turret-block. Not once, but a lot of times. A deafening scream was heard from the smashed being, before it stopped shortly.

"Good night." it tried to say, as the ceiling crashed on it once more. Its red opticals faded into grey.

This somehow got all of the turret-blocks awake at this point. Some were shivering in fear, for what they just witnessed. Others were shaking because of the loud noises that came from the ceiling smashing the turret-block. The turret-block looked at the big robot in the monitor, who was looking at all of them. From the looks of it, all of the other turret-blocks were afraid of the big robot on the monitor.

"It was never supposed to do that! Also, you see these monitors? Would be a shame if they would constantly be smashed like this. A bit of respect for the merchandise!" It replied to the turret-blocks, as the floor tiles started to move, just like in the ceiling. They moved the bits and pieces of the remaining parts of the turret-block that was smashed out of them, into an open area in the wall. The pieces slid off the tiles into the hole. The wall closed itself up. The mess was gone, just like that. But the fear inflicted on the turret-blocks still remained.

"Right. So, rough start right there, but as long as anybody else doesn't start acting up, then none of that would ever happen again. Ever. Got that?"
None of the turret blocks decided to flinch. The big robot on the monitor narrowed its optical. "All right. I'll consider that as a 'Okay Wheatley! We got it! We'll do what you asked!' kind of thing. So anyways, here we all are, so let's get this started!" The entire room began to change at this point. A dotted line appears right on the floor of the turret-block. It watched as it lined itself up to a door, which had appeared out somehow. A red red tile had appeared on the floor of the room, in the middle of it, connected to the dots on the ground. It slowly popped out of its temporary hiding stance in its box. And looked at it carefully.

"Well, since you are boxes with legs, figured that I'll give you guys an easy test. Now, here's a button, and now you can solve the test. I wish I could um… explain how that would work for you, but apparently, I can't or else I get hurt. But I think you guys have it all figured out anyways." Said the robot. It looked at the monitor.

Most of the turret-block surrounding it began to move. A Bit. with the presence of the big robot (now known as Wheatley) on the monitor just staring at them, it seemed to still scare them enough to still hide - except for one. The turret block was still looking at the button.

It didn't know whether or not it had to push the button or leave it there. Wheatley did say it was a test, but what if it did the test wrong? What if he got angry at it for pushing the button, and that it would end up squashed like the other turret-block? On the monitor, he groaned.

"Okay… any day now. Seriously, you guys can't get- never mind. I know you could! Come on, can't you just at least try, for a little bit? What is that big red button telling you to do?"

He was met with more silence from the turret-blocks. He sighed and looked back at something else on his side. "Alright then. Tell you what. I've got something else to deal with, and I'll be right back. Don't pr- um… just don't do anything while I'm gone, k?"

Just like that, the screen on the monitor shut down. With the robot gone, the turret block looked around, other than the button. Something crashed next to it, and it realized that it was another turret-block trying to get through. The turret block backed away from the button, allowing the other turret-block to get through. It wasn;t the only one that started to move. Every other turret block seemed to have started moving ever since Wheatley left.

None of the turret-blocks had decided to go over to the corner of the room, where the incident happened.

The turret-block had decided not to move at all. It wanted to stay where the button was, so when the robot comes back again, it would try to see if it would understand what it was supposed to be doing better.

It sat next to the button for a very long time, waiting for the robot on the monitor to come back and tell them what to do. Occasionally, it would feel shaking on the ground. Like an earthquake. Sometimes these shakes were soft ones, while others would send the turret-blocks dancing. They were everywhere around the room at this point. Some had forgotten what happened to their friend in the area, and they had the courage to explore the area without the fear of crushing ceilings.

Other times, there would be a loud voice in the room. The turret-block sometimes confused it as the robot on the monitor, but the monitor would turn on. Something about another thing (in which the turret forgot what the man in the speakers had said it was) going to explode. The other voice scared some turret-blocks, but nothing more confused the turret-block by the button.

It was around an hour when the robot had returned to the monitor. When it turned on, all of the other turret-blocks had just continued to walk around the button. "Oh good! You followed orders! Kudos to you my friend. Now, let's see if we can be able to try this again. Solve the test." The turret-block by the button looked from the monitor to the button. It still didn't know what to do.

"Go on then, solve it! Literally the easiest and only thing to do!"

The turret-block didn't exactly know what to do. It just stared at the monitor. "Oh come on… Big red button right on the ground! What is it telling you? There is literally one purpose for buttons. You guys know about it, right?" From around the room, none of the turret blocks seemed to have been paying attention to him. This aggravated the Robot a bit more. "Fine. Once you are ready, just pr- do the thing. I'll leave. How about that? I'm pretty sure you're just like me, and can't do things being watched. I get that." When met with the stare from the turret-block next to the button, he sighed. "I'll be back." The monitor went dark.

Twelve hours. This was how long the monitor was dark for. The turret-block had sat clueless and afraid by the button since the last time the robot on the monitor had popped up. By then, most of the other turret-blocks hadn't done anything productive, except running into each other. Three times, the turret-block had to move away from other turret-blocks rushing past it.

Most of them had gotten used to the constant shaking of the room. And the loud voices constantly telling them that this one big dangerous thing was about to explode. And the turret-block sitting, waiting there by the button, still sat there. Patiently. It remembered something a human said about waiting like this. William Langland had said that patience is key… to something at least. That was one of the reasons why the turret-block just waited.

It wasn't until it heard noises from somewhere near the top corners of the testing room. It hadn't noticed that there were a couple of windows in the area. It stared at the light coming from the windows as the facility shook itself again. Something was moving, and making noises. It looked different than the turret-blocks in the room, and the robot from the monitor. It was a human, something the turret-block had actually had the information of. She had white boots and a weird long white thing on her hand. Stuck to that was a brown thing. That, the turret-block did not know.

It was around at this moment when the monitor turned on, to show yet again, an exasperated robot. "For god's sake, your BOXES with LEGS! It's literally your only purpose! Walking on buttons! How can you not do the one thing that you were designed for?" The turret looked surprised. In the distance, it could hear the human hiding behind the glass. Maybe the big robot scared her too? It looked right back at the robot. The robot looked right at the turret-block. Maybe it had to press the button now?

It raised its metallic leg up high, about to press the button.

"Warmer. Warrrrmer." The turret block touched the button, about to press it down. "Boiling hot. Boiling-" Scared that it might burn itself, the turret block raised its leg back in the air. It didn't feel anything on the button, but it feared that whatever the robot on the monitor said could actually be true and eventually end up boiling hot- in something.

"-okay, colder. Ice cold. Arctic. Very very very cold LOOK JUST GET ON THE BUTTON!"

The turret block just froze, trying to figure out if being frozen was actually part of the next test, and then get on the button. The robot in the monitor however, just looked more aggravated. "Oh, that's funny, is it? Oh it's funny? Because we've been at this for twelve hours and you haven't solved it either, so I don't know why you're laughing."

The turret block looked right back at the monitor. It wasn't laughing. It concluded that the robot on the monitor might have actually been too mad to note that it wasn't anyways. Why was it mad? It was just doing as it said!

"You've got one hour! Solve it!"

The monitor blacked out again. The turret-block didn't know what else to do. It sat next to the button, waiting for it to come back. It did say not to do anything while it was gone, so it wouldn't. In the background, it could hear another rumbling on the ground, and the faint sound of human footsteps.

"Solve this puzzle for him. When he comes back, I'll hit him with a paradox."

The next thing the turret-block knew, it was lifted up in the air. It turned around to see the human face, up close. The white thing on her hand was lifting it up. It crouched inside the box, shaking. The white thing in her hand looked like the claw. The one that threw the other turret block into the corner and smashed it.

The turret-block watched the woman, as everything else around her moved. She had a face of determination, and she was angry about something. The ground shook again, and she nearly fell over. Regaining her balance, the human placed the turret-block down on to the button, faced upward. The turret-block lifts itself back up. Back on the ground, it saw the human staring intently at the monitor. It turned back on to show an elated robot.

"Ha ha, YES! I knew you'd solve it!"

The human crossed her arms. The turret block watched as the robot's reaction turned from happy to serious. "Oh. Hello." it said to the human. "Alright. Paradox time." said the brown thing stuck to the white thing stuck to the hand of the human. This surprised the turret-block. The brown thing! It could speak! It looked up to it expectantly-

"This. Sentence. Is. FALSE-"

-If this sentence is false, it makes it true. But then if it's true, then it is false, making it true, making it false, then true, then false, then

-and then everything else went black.

0~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~0

He had watched her complete the testing chamber that he had left her for the first time. The sensation it felt when she had finished was amazing. It was like the itch just faded away - for a little bit. It would just come back minutes later. He just had to test. It was the only downside of being in charge of the whole place. It could always get annoying, and at this point, anything to cheat through the system was bloody impossible.

The thing that made him even more angry was that fact that he doesn't know whether or not she is dead. He "unintentionally" had turned the beam off in the middle of nowhere, and now she's lost. But Wheatley knew that she'd turn up. 'Hopefully more alive than dead', he supposed. 'For now, I'll see if I can get into some more of these complicated stuff. Like finding replacements. Yeah, that seemed like the best choice for now due to the circumstances."

He had poked through a lot of things at this point. All of her files and cameras at least, hoping for some information on possible replacements. Through his searches though, he had come across the cameras that pointed back at the room where his creations sat. All looked like they were fried, and none of them were moving around aimlessly. All in all, it had the words FAILED EXPERIMENT, written all over them. These would not do for newer testing subjects.

There was no room for failure here.

He called in a giant claw, and ached the sight of it. The "claw" had a very similar mechanism that worked just like the "grabbing" feature of the portal gun. The one that she carried to hold him up to get to places he didn't even know existed. That was fun, but not anymore. He was in charge. He picked up the first turret block on the ground, which was the one that she used to push down the button. The one that was so close to succeeding the first time.

A bunch of wall panels had opened up, all leading upwards, to where the surface was shown. Well, slightly, since that part of the building had collapsed due to the constant shaking of the facility. The claw swung from left to right, gaining momentum. Then, at the last and precise moment (which was satisfying enough for Wheatley), the claw let go, and the fried turret block flew out the hole.

It wasn't until something had lit inside of Wheatley. An idea. Or, sort of a memory. Didn't she incinerate unwanted things instead of throwing them out? 'Oh right! The incinerator!' he thought. He piled up the turret blocks using the wall panels, and called in a Pneumatic Diversity vent, to suck them all up. 'That, should lead to the incinerator, if i am not mistaken.' He thought, as he watched the helpless turret-blocks (in which in their log file, called them franken-turrets, since they reminded him too much of a character found in a common horror movie.) get sucked up by the vent. He would just have to find better testing subjects then.

It was at the same time that the turret block had woken up from its sleep, to find itself flying away. Away from the testing chamber, away from the other turret-blocks, that were being sucked up in a giant tube. The last thing it saw before it crashed into the roof of the facility and into the surface was the robot on the monitor. Just staring at the others, and not doing anything to help them. It was confused at its state, until when it landed on the sunlit parts of the new area, it understood. Thrown out. On purpose. Not by accident.

It didn't feel like jumping back inside of the facility, for something else caught its attention. The beauty of everything else up above. It was way better than anything else it had seen from its time in the testing chambers. Wheat fields overgrow in the distance, all moving in the beat and rhythm of the wisps of wind that it felt rushing around it. And for once, the turret block had decided to move freely, not with the fear of punishment. If this was its punishment, being out here exploring a bigger world with freedom, then this is where it wants to stay.

But even after seeing the sky get darker and brighter, again and again and again, something still questioned the turret block. Sometimes, at these thinking points, the turret block would stay dormant, and hide in its little "shell". Why did the big robot on the monitor throw it out? Did it do anything wrong? Or was it trying to save it from being sucked up from the big tube taking in all of the rest of them out?

It was one of the main reasons why it never ventured too far from the facility, in case if the big robot on the monitor might have one day remembered about it still being here, and bring it back inside. Maybe then, if the robot would be in a better mood, then it might be able to explain his point of view. It stayed in what it considered, as around the area of where it had arrived to the surface. There wasn't much to do out here, but it is quiet. And peaceful. Just the way it like it.

It also seemed that the plants had liked itself as well, since on one particular morning, when it woke up from a "period of thinking," it had realized that the white powdery stuff on the ground was disappearing, and a new, different type of plant was growing around its little metallic leg. It's not just it's leg, but its "shell." as well. Even though it could not see what it was, it could feel it spreading day by day.

Time has seemed to pass by in what the turret-block had considered it as "cycles". There was the part where the temperature gets so warm, that it would always leave a fuzzy feeling on the turret block. Then there was the time when the wheat fields would end up being in a really beautiful golden color, in which the turret had called it the golden time. Then there was the part where times got cold, and the golden wheat would die, and cold, white powdery stuff falls everywhere. And then finally, there was the time when the white powdery stuff would go away, and the warm fuzzy temperatures would come back. It repeats again, like a cycle.

It was almost on the fifth cycle, when again, the turret-block had stayed dormant, awaiting its return to the big robot on the monitor, awaiting for its questions to be answered. It was the middle of the golden part and the white powder part of the cycle, when the turret-block felt something. A strange feeling.

It was a beautiful experience, being up here, on the surface, but it wanted to know more.

Besides, it didn't look like the Big robot on the Monitor was going to come back and pick it right up any time soon, on account of waiting this long for it to come back. The turret-block stood up from its place in the middle of the field, and looked around. Everything, everywhere, was on the brink of life and death. It was the point where the wheat blades were at their most golden colors yet, and only to be drained away in a couple of more days.

The turret block had decided to go for one place - well, in one direction at least - to see if there was more to it than there was. There wasn't exactly much in where it was right now, but that was the reason that it didn't move much for cycles ever since it was shot up into the surface. It's better to take it one at a time.

It was quite a bit of difficulty to get to one place or the other, and that was also the reason that the plants now growing around it were having quite a liking for it, and had indeed wrapped themselves around every limb of the turret block. After walking it off though, it wasn't so hard to get around.

Walking around the surface was actually quite normal for the turret block, if only of course, things were so overwhelming. It felt free, in some way, which was actually a better feeling than waiting for ages.

It didn't actually have a plan. It just figured that it would be able to walk in some direction for a very long time, and then eventually, when it finds something interesting, then it would turn back. There was so much anyways to see out there on the surface. Anything was possible.

A couple of hours had already passed and now, things were starting to not look like the old setting the turret block was in before. Mountains and hills took shape, and the wheatfield was slowly decreasing. There were structures up ahead. Not many to count, but they came in many shapes and colors.

As the Turret-block slowly walked closed to these structures, there was something else that it had come to realize. There were people in this area. Not as in robots but as in Humans. The robot watched, as they moved from one direction to another. Compared to this area and from Aperture, there was little to no technology. No robots, no wall panels. No monitor either.

It didn't seem like the big robot on the monitor would be here anyways.

It turned back. That was enough for now. It would have to come back later when it felt like it.

After yet another long time in walking to the other direction, the turret-block had concluded something. It is better to also look behind it, because the view is much more different than looking at the view from the front. It walked and slowly, the land became more flat. Although this was the same thing just seen backwards, the way it comes back to you. It's all different.

It had come to the occurrence that the turret block must have turned over to the wrong way at some points, because when it came back to the wheat field, it looked much more different than the area it had already stayed for 4 cycles. It looked around in confusion, hoping that it hadn't strayed away from the area for too long. It needed to make sure that once the big robot on the monitor comes back, it would be ready to come back home.

Something had interrupted the turret block from its state of worry. It looked around. There was nothing in the wheat field except for the blades of wheat, the blue-grey sky, and… a shed. The sound must have come from that direction, since it looked like one of the structures the human area had.

There was the sound again. It sounded like speaking, but it was too far for the turret-block to hear. It slowly walked closer to the shed. Something was in there. But how? There were no humans in the wheat field. If there were then the turret-block would have seen them already.

There were more voices. This irked the turret-block. Who was over there. Could it be the big robot on the monitor talking to something outside? Could it be something that was trying to call it to come home, to come back to Aperture? The turret block slowly walked over to the shed. Being closer, it could actually hear the voices a bit better. It turned out to be one voice, asking something to someone else probably.

"Um, Nina? Hey! Hellooo?"

"Hello?" It asked, in the shelter, and looked expectantly inside. There was a human inside the structure, but she did not look like the first human that it had seen solve its test in the testing chamber. She had short, light brown hair, and a blue jumpsuit instead of an orange one. She did not look well, or sound well either. There was something else next to it, and to the turret-blocks surprise, looked exactly like the big robot on the monitor. It talked to the girl.

"What was that?"

This did not sound like the voice of the big robot on the monitor. The way the robot spoke sounded different than the robot on the monitor. The big robot on the monitor had a lower, stronger voice. This robot however, upon first sight, let out a vocal processor piercing scream.

0~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~0

Oh, Hello!

I was uh, wondering if you would know where I am?

You see, I'm a bit lost, and since you know this place more than I did, would you mind telling me where I can find… um… it's a bit complicated to explain.

You see, I'm looking for… myself

I just don't know about it yet.

Wait what is this place?

Where are you taking me?

This place is scary… Why are they screaming at me?

What did I do?

I don't belong here!

Get me out!

I'm trapped!

Help!

Wake up.

0~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~0

"I'm up!" yelled out Solar, before going into a series of near out loud screams. Another surge of pain. This one was the most painful one of all. This was why it never went to sleep mode in the first place, and in the event that it did, the room always comes back to view. It still scared it, even when it knew that it was safe. Safe from her.

There was a reason why getting out of Aperture meant the world for Solar. Too many times, that room came into view. Forget what the scientists had tried to do to it a long time ago. This room was much worse. It's a place where she would throw you, at the "first sign of defiance" as she calls it. But even when Solar didn't even do anything, it would wind up in the room whatsoever. Worst of all, the room was modified. There was no exit, no panels, no way out. Even if you were to hack your way out, you would still have to get past her in order to get through.

This room, if you were to find yourself in there, it could take eons, for you to be freed. Only she would be able to let you out. When she wanted to. When you are in the room, everything seems to scream at you. Literally. There would be claws hanging from the ceiling holding other cores, just like Solar, only, that they weren't cores. No conscience, always screaming and growling, red opticals representing demonic behavior. And when something enters their domain, they would always scream at you. No reason.

Solar shook itself, to rid these thoughts. That's when it realized that it was stuck back inside the bag. There was the familiar noise of weight being dragged onto the ground. And then, there was the familiar feeling of things on top of it. Weighed down by gravity. Remembering where it was now, it realized that Hybrid must have woken up from its sleep mode, and had packed Solar in the bag. Unfortunately, no peeking hole this time, and Solar had that weird trapped feeling thing again.

"Oh. Hello Hybrid. Did you um.. Sleep well?"

Morning greetings was never its tactical point. For one thing, one could never know when morning is during their times in Aperture. Or night. In there time seemed lost. Forgotten somehow. From the bag, Hybrid had stopped walking.

"Fine."

'Oh, well, that's good right?' it thought, before another surge of pain went through it again. Not too strong, but strong enough to give out another warning. A reminder of its fate. Solar pushed the alert aside, not wanting to have the reminder. It felt something move. The signal. It wavered again. And then, from the bag, it heard something. A loud screeeeeee!

The loud noise surprised Solar. Outside, things were quiet, but Solar had concluded that it had grown used to the quiet that it no longer paid attention to the loud, important things. From the backpack, it heard yelps from afar…

… and then felt the sudden jerking of Hybrid quickly shaking Nina off its back.

"Ow!" yelped out Solar, as both body and backpack slumped on the ground. "Careful! A need to remind you that you are holding a sick human?!" It had forgotten the human noises in the background. Solar looked through the bag, hoping that the turret-block would feel its eyes on it. But instead, it heard Hybrid's voice. It was lowered.

"They are here."

Solar was about to ask who, when suddenly, it heard the rushing noise of Hybrid speeding away, its block quickly dragging behind it. "Who?" asked Solar, out loud. "Hybrid?" But there was no response from the turret block. Instead, Nina coughed again. It seemed different somehow, and it sounded… deeper. "Nina? Are you alright-" It said, before it froze.

"I think I see something over there. Bit of a weird shape on the ground… hang on. I need to clean my lenses"

A voice. A human voice. Suddenly, everything Hybrid had just done in the past 5 minutes made sense. The only part that didn't make sense was that it had chosen to leave them alone with the humans instead of going with them. Solar never had understood anything of what that turret-block did that made sense, but now, it had other matters to deal with.

Footsteps were heard around the two of them, along with the words "Dear lord…". To this, Solar stayed extremely still. It closed its optical lids, hoping that it would conceal more of itself even though the humans would open the bag any moment from now. It felt the rustling of movement, and then Nina's wheezing moving - away from Solar. It panicked. What if they left Solar behind? What if they would forget him? What if Nina woke up, to no longer see the bag on her back? To find that she had lost Solar? What if Solar was stuck in this bag forever?

And that's when another rustling movement was heard, and the movement of being lifted up. Solar concealed a sigh of relief. It wouldn't be lost, or forgotten, or worst of all, trapped. It would join Nina. A couple of moments later, there was a familiar sound of wheezing, and then, the sound of a human voice, instructing someone else in the car.

"She needs to see the lad that helped Chell!" said the voice. This voice had a masculine tone in it. This by far was the one that sounded the most afraid. But also… the way it spoke, there was something very familiar about it. Solar couldn't quite remember who, but it sounded like someone it heard a long time ago, back in Aperture. That was somewhat impossible to hear someone familiar from Aperture out here. Literally. Solar refrained from shaking itself in the bag as the feeling of speeding away was felt all around it. It concluded that it was in a vehicle of some sort, and the experience made it feel quite uneasy.

Things just span around it after that. Something told Solar that it's processor was trying to do something. Maybe it was the overclocking signal that blocked it, or because of it's system damage that was preventing it from doing something, but all it could do at this point was spin. It couldn't compute anything correctly, and it lost its sense of coordination.

Things went black after that, but it wasn't that bad. It was soon awake after, still not understanding where it was, since it's visual processor span. When it did refocus itself, it realized that it was in a different location. No longer was it in the vehicle. Surprisingly enough, it was not thinking about what just happened, but instead, frantically searching around to hear Nina.

This new space was quiet, and surprisingly warm in comparison to the outdoors. 'Where am I this time?" thought Solar. It seemed to itself that it is going to brand new places, but could never seem to see any of them because it was always in the darn bag. It hated being inside it, and it felt bad for the portal gun and the laptop, for them being stuck inside this thing for so long.

To the right side of Solar, it heard wheezing. Nina. What had happened between its blackout and to her? It heard the door open soon after that, and echoing footsteps. They were in a small room, and from the other side of the door, there was some conversation going on. A man was speaking, but in a hushed tone.

"She's from that place!" said the man. It was the same one from the car that told the other humans about Dr. Vic.

There was no response from the person it was trying to talk to.

"Oh come on, we have to do something, right? We can't just let her go just like that?"

Still, no response.

"Well if you're thinking of ideas, I'll leave it to you then. But other than that, we can't just let her go. What if she-"

The door closed after that, and the only sounds that was heard were the movements of a human in the room. There were some more coughs heard. The door opened again. More footsteps went into the room.

"Don't forget to close the door." said a newer voice. This was a deeper voice than the man that Solar had just heard speaking. There was the sound of a door closing after that. "How is she, Doctor?" asked the man. 'So the man that was in here is supposedly Dr. Vic…' thought Solar. It hated to eavesdrop, but there was nothing else to do being stuck undercover in a bag.

"As said earlier, you have saved her from a possible case of hypothermia, but I've diagnosed her with pneumonia" replied Dr. Vic. "Where did you say you guys found her?"

The man answered carefully. "Just outside town. Scared the living daylights out of me. Also, what is pneumonia exactly? Is it some sort of noise making illness?"

The man referred to the constant wheezing Nina made. Solar listened carefully. This part was important. It needed as much information in helping Nina stay alive. It was glad that the man was able to ask the question. Otherwise, there would be something else to worry about.

"It's close. That's just one of the symptoms of it. Pneumonia is an illness that makes your breathing a bit difficult to conduct. Normally, around these parts, it's caused by certain types of airborne fungi or bacteria, but none of these cases are as severe as hers. She must have breathed in something else along the way." he explained. "In her case, talking would be a bit difficult, so she shouldn't talk for around a week or so after she wakes up."

"When would that be?" asked the second person who entered the room. It was feminine. There was a sigh heard from the doctor. "It depends. Looks like around 2-3 days in fact. When you guys found her, it's a miracle that she's even alive at this point. She hasn't had a decent meal in days, she is cold, and sick, and in dire need of water, in which I have right here."

There were some sipping noises after that. 'Probably the Doctor giving Nina the water' thought Solar. But something else irked it as well. Nina was out of Aperture, safe from her clutches. But her brother was not. What would happen if Nina woke up? She would go back to Aperture the moment she did, even when she was sick. A deep feeling went down to Solar, knowing that she would die if that happened. It heard the doctor. It was a miracle that she was alive.

'What would happen to me in the meantime?' although Solar, now newly learned information was acquired. 'I'll have to stay even more time in the bag then, until she wakes up.' It detested the idea, but it was for both of their sake. Besides, it's not like it belongs there in the human world anyways, right? Maybe that's why Hybrid left them for the humans, because it knew that it too also didn't belong.

"Well, do you have any plans for her once she wakes up?" asked the man. There was some silence in the room while the three of them thought. "It depends…" said the doctor. "If she has a home somewhere around here, then she'll definitely come back to it, but just maybe with some interrogations with the parent or guardian I suppose."

"But what if she isn't from around here?" asked the female voice. This puts the room in another mood, as another moment was dedicated into thinking. "I honestly don't have a plan for that yet…" said the Doctor, but that's when the other man spoke up. "You're thinking of something, aren't you?"

"Hmm?" said the female voice.

"You're making that face again. You have an idea, don't you?"

There was no answer.

"Well, what do you have in mind Chell?" Asked Doctor Vic.

"I was thinking that we could temporarily take her in… just until we get the whole story in place."

There was more silence. Solar could feel something was up. Something about the woman seemed off. Why would she want to take in a stranger from who knows where? It's not like they would know about Aperture, otherwise someone would have been able to come over and be able to take her down already. A sudden feeling of guilt swept in, as it realized what it was doing. Eavesdropping.

It's not like it's the worst thing in the world. After all, in Solar's position, it was the only thing it could do at this point, and sleep mode wasn't going to cut it either. It just felt wrong, and for some reason, it felt that this doing seemed familiar somehow. Solar looked through the bag, into cloth. It was hidden, listening.

There was something a long time ago that Solar heard the scientist say. Something about an opposing company to Aperture, called Black Mesa. According to what Solar had heard one of them tell it, they were explaining to it about not having another round of spies coming in to Aperture, and come and steal their newer ideas off their technology. Solar, just being a prototype core, had to go into hiding, and work along the edges of Aperture. That is why there were barely enough management rails in many offices and rooms in Aperture. They would rather have Solar work around the walls of the Facility.

It took longer for the woman - Chell - to speak again. Instead of having her speak again, the man spoke up instead.

"Are you sure? I mean, we don't even know her, and she doesn't know us either. Er- and depending on where she came from, are you sure we could trust her? I mean, really, are you absolutely sure?"

"There's always the attic," said Chell.

"Oh, you mean that dark scary place you showed me some time ago? The hidden room way up high in the ceiling?"

"It's not dark. We have a lamp. And it could use some cleaning up. But other than that, it's all right."

There was a small sigh from Dr. Vic. "Well fine." he said. "Once she wakes up, she'll be able to stay at your place. Just do not forget that she can't speak, so talking to her would be hard."

"Don't worry!" said the man. "We'll find a way to talk to her. There's this game I had seen Romy's twins do, where you act things out. Her being a kid, it'll be fun, and she'd be able to talk to us as well. It's a good strategy!"

More silence. Nina gave out a stuttering breath, and a cough. There were footsteps heard around the room. "I'll try to see if I can get something for her to eat. The poor kid hadn't had anything good in a while." said Dr Vic. More footsteps were heard, and then the sound of the door opening. It closed behind them.

Another surge of pain erupted all around Solar's body. It refrained from yelling out, worried that it would be caught. It couldn't be seen by humans. Not because it would then cause others to go poking through it, but also because of some stinging words that kept reminding it the reason it was here. When the pain was over, a newer alert popped up. Solar silently groaned, as it realized that yet again, it was its scan telling it that it was now 45 %. But something else had appeared on the Alert-

RECOMMENDATION: SLEEP MODE

-which seemed logical to prevent itself from creating new, unnecessary memories. It realized then that it was automatically doing that, ever since it left Aperture. When it arrived at the surface, and right when Hybrid had stopped for a rest.

The door opened again, and footsteps were heard. "I have an apple and some more water." Said Dr Vic. "You guys can head on home now, it's late. She'll be alright here." There were more rustling noises, as both Chell and the man stood up. "I'll take it from here. I'll call you if anything is needed."

"Oh! Well, all right. We'll check in in the morning, if that's all right."

"No need to worry Wheatley, she'll be all right. She's safe."

The name that the Doctor had used on that man. It sounded too familiar to Solar. Way too familiar, now come to think about it. The way the man spoke. The name of the woman. Too familiar… and if only another surging pain wouldn't happen at the same moment that it thought of this, then maybe it would have established a connection on where it had heard of the name before.

Everything hurt too much, to the point where Solar had to shut down for sleep mode. Right before everything though, at the last millisecond, a feeling of relief also surged with the pain.

She's going to be alright.

She would survive.

She's okay.

0~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~0

4 days later…

"Hello, and again, welcome to your Aperture Science Emergency Status System.

You have currently been in sleep mode For 8 hours, 32 minutes, and 12 seconds

Your System is currently overloaded at 72%

Your system is 56% damaged

Please refrain from performing overly high powerful tasks"

"Gee, thanks Mr. obvious." It's not like it needed the reminder anyways.

As always, Solar was met with the same darkness of the bag. It has been more than 52 hours, and it was still stuck inside the bag. It wanted out. It wanted freedom. The bag was just a constant reminder of all the other places it had been trapped into, including Android Hell.

Speaking of trapped, for four days straight, it had to be waking up constantly to the feeling of being trapped, back in that place. It was annoyingly enough, especially if it would wake up, only to then realize that Nina wouldn't wake up, and go back to sleep. It refrained from entering back to Aperture through the use of Atlas's optical. To see her again would be worse than a nightmare.

It was only until then that Solar realized that it was more thinking about not seeing her, and silently complaining about how it was boring inside the bag, than realizing one thing. It hadn't woken up from the same nightmare this time.

There was a noise heard from the right side of where Solar was.

Perhaps it was the sound that awoke it. Solar listened carefully as it tired to figure out where it was coming from. It didn't hear Dr. Vic's constant loud footsteps on the ground, but instead, the movement of rustling blankets. There was a slight cough, and then the quick movement of… unraveling.

This sound wasn't from Dr. Vic. Solar knew by memory it wasn't. And no one else seemed in the room. Except for, of course, Nina. But she was sleeping, and the only sound she would make was either wheezing and short coughs, which Solar had complemented Dr. Vic - her breathing was getting better over time. Unless she was awake, that would be the source of the sound.

Unless she was awake.

Realization hit in Solar, when soon after it heard more noises, the familiar voice. Only that it sounded croaky, and dry. "Solar…?" said Nina, before she threw herself into a fit of coughs. For the first time in ages, a wave of happiness surged around Solar. 'She's awake!' it thought, before Dr. Vics words flew back into it.

"In her case, talking would be a bit difficult, so she shouldn't talk for around a week or so after she wakes up."

"Nina!" said Solar out loud, but not too loudly, scared that maybe Dr. Vic would hear from somewhere else. "Nina, I'm here, stuck in the bag!" There was a rustling noise heard from the outside of the bag, and then, light. Nina unzipped the bag, and into meeting Solar face to face one more. Solar cringed. It was the first time in a long time since it was exposed to bright light. It was too bright. It took a while though, for its opticals to focus for light. And when they did, it met with Nina's face.

Her eyes were filled with confusion, but not fear. They also looked weak, maybe from the sickness. Other than that, It was happy to finally see them again.

"I'm so glad you're okay. You had me scared there for a moment. They said that you'll find it hard to talk, but we can work on that, right? Just, don't talk, so you'll get better soon." Nina looked down at Solar, examining it. She opened her mouth, slightly, before she closed it. She sighed, which wasn't so hard to do that much anymore, but Solar felt her pain.

"I feel you buddy. I do."

Nina looked sad for a moment, before she shivered. She looked back, and Solar then realized that there was the bed behind her. On top of the bed, there was a blanket. It looked warm. Nina walked over to the blanket, and wrapped herself around it. She looked like one of those characters that Solar had seen in small booklets, filled with squares with small drawings. Solar had long forgotten what the names of these booklets were called.

Nina had walked back to Solar, and looked at it. Her eyes, they still looked confused. She looked around, examining her surroundings. Solar realized that she wanted to know where she was. Hesitantly, it recalled itself, who was at the surface, and who was still back in Aperture. Nina wouldn't be happy. Relentless, it sighed and waited for the worst.

"Um… I should have told you this earlier, but we aren't in where you think you are. We are at the surface, and don't get the wrong idea! I tried to bring back your brother, but you didn't look so good, and even then when she tried talking to me, I couldn't stop thinking about you, dying. You were dying and I couldn't let that happen- and I"

It stopped talking, as it watched. Nina was looking at Solar, and Solar looked at her eyes once more. They seemed to be the only thing that seemed to speak to it. It wasn't just the look of confusion this time, but more like, sadness? Anger? A mixture of both? She walked up to Solar and picked it up from the bag-

-and wrapped her arms around it.

Solar froze, and didn't move. There was something growing up inside it, something warm. This wasn't an act of aggression, but more like an act of, sympathy? It didn't think about it too much, as Solar realized. Nina wasn't mad, but glad. This could mean anything, but to Solar, it was the best thing that it ever happened in its life. But why this gesture, if all Nina could do was not be mad at it or something.

Solar watched, as a sound was heard by the other side of the door. Now out of the bag and into Nina's arms, it could see everything. The walls of the room were in a color of greyish teal. It looked green also in some way. There was a wooden ground, made of dark wood. The room was empty, unless you count the long fall boots, the backpack, and the nightstand next to the bed.

Solar listened, and heard the familiar shuffling of boots and shoes waking up to the door. Solar looked right back at Nina. The humans! They were going to see the both of them! In all of the commotion in trying to help Nina sort out through events, it had forgotten about letting her know about the humans.

"Quickly, put me back in the bag!" it said. Nina did as she was told. "And they're safe!" it wisphered back, as Nina zipped up the bag. Solar then realized that it needed one more thing. If it was going to go back in the bag, it needed a peeping hole this time. Luckily it didn't need to tell Nina, because she had apparently didn't had enough time to zip up the bag all the way though. There was a big peaking hole at least.

The door opened, with more voices coming in. The first voice Solar heard was Dr. Vic's. The other footsteps must have been Chell and Wheatley. Coming in. In the course of four days, Solar had realized that Wheatley has a deeper connection to its memory. It had seen him before in Aperture. That was all it remembered, because it hurt to think.

"... she's doing much better. I believe she'd wake up soon. You can go inside the room-"

The voice stopped, as the door opened. Nina being awake before they came and checked on her was actually quite surprising for the three of them. "Oh! Hello there! Rest all right?" Asked Dr Vic. From the bag, it was pointing directly at the door, so Solar could actually see the people. Dr. Vic, as it seemed, had a large lab coat. He by far looked like a scientist from a long time ago. Behind him, there was a woman, in which Solar had concluded was Chell. That left out the last person, which was beside Chell. Wheatley. Solar winced a bit, before it realized that the three of them were all silent.

No one said anything for a good five minutes. Nina froze, right by the bed. She coughed for a bit, which interrupted the silence, but it was enough to annoy both Solar, and surprisingly enough, along with Wheatley. "Are you all right?" he asked Nina. Solar watched, as the bag moved farther away from the three people. Nina was stepping back. With more silence as an answer, he sighed.

"Right, can't talk. Well, in that case, we'll do the taking, you can just follow along." He said. "Um, we can start with a greeting. Hello! My Name is Wheatley! This right here is Chell, and the lad over here is Doctor Vic! He is the one who helped you feel better, and we were the ones that took you in! No need to be afraid then, you're safe now!"

Doctor Vic and Chell waved, slightly, before Doctor Vic looked at Nina. "Look," he said. "It's a good thing you are awake, but just before you can leave, I need to check you out first. Nothing serious, just your temperature, and, of course, your medicine."

Solar watched as Nina stayed rock solid still as Dr. Vic walked up to her, and placed his hand on Nina's head. "Still warm, but I'm pretty sure you'll be able to sleep it off. This is the fastest case of pneumonia I have ever seen. Normally, they last for weeks, but instead, she's healthy. And alive, most of all." Doctor Vic Walked back out to the door. "She's alright for now. She can go with you two, but know that she is still sick, so she can't go outdoors. Wheatley, I'll hand you the medicine for her to take." He walked away after that.

Chell, on the other hand, in the meantime looked at the long fall boots on the ground, and then back at the girl's bare feet. She can't go out like that, in the cold. According to the news channel on the radio (and Wheatley, who listens sometimes to the morning news), it was going to snow a bit in the afternoon. She looked at the girl. "You might want to put those on. It's pretty cold out." she said.

The girl just looked at her for a moment, and that's when Chell realized something. The girl's bag. Something was inside. And moving. There was a purple light glowing faintly inside it. The girl caught her looking at the bag. With her blanket on her back, she hugged it, tightly, and covered the bag a bit. She walked over to the long fall boots on the ground. Chell watched how they fit in her perfectly. Deep down inside, she felt the familiar anger boiling inside her.

GLaDOS. Out of all the people, she would send in a child to test for her. A child! She looked at her short hair, sticking out in many directions, and her arm, with a white cast. She looked young, like around 15 years old. Too young for any of this. She thought, as the girl stood up.

Dr Vic came back, and handed Wheatley a medicine bottle. "Here. She needs to take 2 milliliters of this medicine after she wakes up and before she goes to sleep. This is until her voice returns, and that her breathing is regulated." He explains. "There's a small measuring cup to help you figure out the amount of medicine she needs to take."

"Oh! Quite clever actually. Thank you." Replied Wheatley.

"Can she keep the blanket?" asked Chell. She looked between Nina and Dr. Vic. Her clothes don't look warm. The blanket is the only thing keeping her warm. Dr Vic nods, and opens up the door, in which he had closed behind him after getting the medicine. "Stay warm," he said, as Chell comes out of the room first. Wheatley staggered behind, making sure that the girl was following them.

"Here!" he said, encouraging her. "It would be less cold if you're out there for a long time. The sooner we get to the house, the sooner you'll be warmed up. We already have some food baking in the kitchen, so imagine how warm it would be!" The girl slowly followed behind.

It wasn't until they got into the cold, when the girl, as Wheatley had noticed, had basically started to run after Chell. She was cold, and really did want to get warmer. Getting into the house wouldn't take long. It was only a ten minute walk. But the girl was freezing. He handed her his hat. "Here." he said. The girl stopped, and looked at the hat.

"You put it on your head, to keep it warm. See?" Chell turned around to see Wheatley showing Nina how to put on a hat. When she did reach out for the hat, he adjusted it for her. "There! Right on! Now quickly, to the warmth of the house! Come on Chell!" He ran a bit faster to Chell. The three of them ran to the house, which was part bakery and part house. When they arrived, Chell opened the door, and allowed the girl and Wheatley to walk inside.

The warmth of the bakery was enough to calm down the girl a bit, but not too much, since of course, she was scared. Wheatley fumbled with his scarf, but finally managed to take it off on his own. The girl however, still wanted the blanket. She had handed the hat back to Wheatley for him to put away. Chell looked over at the girl once more. She was safe here, in her house, and until they get the story out of her, she'd stay here for tonight. Wheatley walked up to Chell, and looked from both the girl and back to her. "What do we do now?" he asked her silently.

Chell shook her head and looked over at the girl. "Let's give her something to eat first. If she's hungry that is." The girl looked at Chell, but didn't say anything. Chell recalled how she was given something to eat the first time when she arrived in Eaden. Even though she was afraid, she was hungry. She figured that's how the girl must feel. She gently gestured the girl to the table.

The girl followed Chell to the table, and looked around the kitchen. Wheatley pushed over a chair for her to sit down on. Chell took some bread out of the pantry. It was still warm, since she had cooked up a batch before she had decided to check in with the girl. She took out a plate, and handed it to Nina. "here." she said.

The girl looked weary, but she still managed to pick up the food. She ate a little bit of it, to taste. "See? Good!" said Wheatley. The girl nods, a bit, and continued to eat the bread. Luckly, Chell gave the bread that she had made, and not the one Wheatley had made. At least then, with good bread, she would be able to trust them more. Hopefully.

"Oh! Come to think of it, I have actually got an Idea. For communicating that is, since you can't speak!" said Wheatley. "Be right back. Won't be out for long!" before Chell yelled out that it was too soon to talk about it, he rushed off. She sighed, and looked at the confused girl. "Sorry about him. Sometimes, he can be a bit too ahead of himself." But it seemed like the girl didn't mind. She continued eating the bread.

Wheatley came back, moments later, with a notebook and a pen. He slowly pushed the pen and notebook to the girl. "Garret told me a while back that art can be used to express oneself. I don't get how, but maybe you can give it a try." he looked at Chell, who walked up to him. "You can draw in the meantime while you wait for your voice to be better." she said. She looked at the girl picking up the pen with her right hand. It was lucky that she sprained her left one. As long as she was dominant in her right hand, it would be easier to draw.

The girl looked at Chell and Wheatley for one moment, in confusion, before she pushed the notebook closer to herself. She put the pen down on paper, and scribbled. Chell and Wheatley looked over at the paper. She was actually drawing something on the paper. When she finished drawing, the girl turned the notebook over for them to see. She was hesitant, but when Chell looked at the image, she could get why, and her heart skipped a beat.

There, on the paper, was a roundish shape, which looked like the optical from a camera. But the logo made clear sense as they had seen it thousands of times: Aperture.

For a change, Chell was actually surprised. She looked over at the girl. This time, she looked unsteady. It was hard sharing our information. As Chell then realized, the image was a test. Anyone else who had seen the photo would just see the resemblance to a camera, but to them, they see Aperture.

The girl looked more unsteady, and Chell realized that this environment was less welcoming and more like an interrogation room for her instead. She didn't exactly know what to say to the girl, so she said this.

"We know what you mean."

The girl looked at Chell, in surprise and wonder. She then looked at Wheatley, who slowly nodded. "I come from that place too. Aperture. Heck of a place actually, if I'm honest. But you're safe here, with us, right?"

The girl took back the notebook. She picked up the pen. She began to draw something else on the paper. This time, the amount of time for her to finish her drawing was longer than the amount of time it took her to draw the Aperture logo. Wheatley peared onto the drawing. 'At least' he thought, looking at the straight lines on the paper, 'drawing seemed to be on her strong side.' he noted how even without a ruler, the girl's lines were straight, and even if the drawing wasn't done yet, it still included a lot of detail.

The girl looked back to see Chell and Wheatley one more time. She slowly turned around the notebook.

"Dear Lord…" said Wheatley. Chell on the other hand said nothing. She looked over at the image.

The drawing that the girl had drawn was a picture of GLaDOS. She had wished that never again, would she have ever seen that face, that monstrosity of technology, again in her life, right after she had saved Wheatley from the abyss of the facility, not to mention the entire population of Eaden. She looked from the drawing to the girl. She too, had that same expression of Chell. Fear. Hid by determination.

"You know her?" asked Wheatley, in a low voice. He too was too afraid to even speak as well. "You drew her, in full detail. How many times have you seen her?"

The girl didn't grab the notebook. She looked down on the ground. She looked guilty in some way, and Chell didn't understand why. Despite her condition, the girl's fists clenched together in rage. It turned out that she wasn't happy with either talking about her or about how badly she had treated her. The room was silent for a moment.

"You won't see her anymore." said Chell. "What happened is over, and you're safe now. You can say here if you like, or until you get the all clear from Dr. Vic." She expected to see an answer from the girl, but instead, there was a look in her face that seemed distant. She didn't exactly agree to the situation, but there was also no proof in disagreement either.

There was a thumping noise in the background. Chell stood up, alert. Even Wheatley heard it, and he looked at Chell. "What is that noise?" he asked. Underneath the blanket, the girl stiffened. She coughed once. Chell looked at the girl. The sound was coming from her, only that she wasn't the one making the noise. Her eyes fell on the bag.

"There's something in that bag from that place, isn't there?" she asked the girl. Calmly. She didn't want to cause panic, especially from the fact that Wheatley had stiffened right after he had also realized where the noise was coming from. The girl froze, and so had the noise. Chell stared at the girl. It was until finally, she nodded, ever so slightly.

Chell sat down on the chair again. "Well then. You don't mind if you show us, right?" The girl froze once more. This time there was no response. The girl just sat there, on the chair, clutching the blanket closer to herself. She coughed once more in a fit, and Wheatley stood up, extending his arms out to make sure she did. It didn't accomplish anything, but he had hoped that it did.

Instead of helping though, he immediately sat right back down. "Oh GOD!" he cried out. There was a look of shock in his face.

The girl cringed for a little bit, before giving out a stuttery sigh. She watched, as Chell's curious face probed her. She puts her hand down in the bag, and picks up… a core. No wonder why Wheatley had fallen back in a shock. The was the same type of robot that you would see everywhere around Aperture. It was also the same type of robot that he used to be.

She croaked. She was trying to say something to the core, but her throat was so parched up, it was inaudible. The core looked from the girl to both Chell and Wheatley. "Um… hi?" he said, before cringing. "Ow, Ow. Sorry about that. You know. That scare. I didn't mean to scare you." To this, he was telling that to Wheatley, who was still looking at him in a great shock.

And in between of that, Chell had stayed perfectly neutral.

"You're a core!' said Wheatley in bewilderment. "In here. A core. How did you ever manage to get out of the place?" in the background, Chell, nodded. "Do you know her?" she asked the core. The core looked back at the girl. Now that the secret was out and she no longer needed to hide the core, she looked a bit more relieved.

"It's a long story my friend." said the core as simply. It looked back at the girl. "How are you feeling?" it asked. The girl nodded slightly, and the core let out a sigh. "That's good." it said. It looked back at Chell and Wheatley. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Stranger in the house, I get it. I'll just introduce ourselves. Hello! I'm Solar. This is Nina back there."

Nina gave a small shy wave, before the core nods. "Well, hello," said Wheatley. "I'm Wheatley. This is Chell. Nice to meet you. Now, hate to be rude but should we get on to the point?" he was now looking at both Solar and Nina worriedly. "Your friend er- drew this. Maybe you know something about what happened between her and um… her?"

He pushed the notebook back at Solar, and looked back at Chell. She shrugged. They both looked at Solar, who continued to look at Wheatley for a moment before looking back down to the ground. It looked surprised once it looked at the photo at first glance. It looked back at Nina.

"You're a good artist I must say. Nearly had me for a second. I thought it was the real thing." Nina didn't say anything in return, but it didn't matter to Solar. It looked back at the picture and nodded. "Yeah. Nina and I had seen her. In Nina's case, she had seen her in person twice. I on the other hand had seen her quite multiple times."

Wheatley looked at the core in confusion. Despite his title as "moron" back at Aperture, GLaDOS didn't call him over to the central A.I. Chamber to have a conversation with him - but that was on the main point that she was dead at that time. He wondered if she would have treated cores very differently to humans. "How so?" asked Chell, which unfortunately interrupted his thoughts.

Solar looked back at Nina, who had stiffened once more. It was uneasy for her to get used to this. She had just woken up on the same day, met a whole of people who she had never met before, and now she had to relive the events from the past couple of months to them. It wasn't easy.

And above all that, Solar understood. Relieving bad things was a constant thing it did back at Aperture thanks to GLaDOS, and though it got used to the habit, it still hurt. It looked back and Chell and Wheatley.

"I think she could use some rest. She has been through a lot, and maybe there's something else we can talk about in the meantime?"

Wheatley looked over at Chell, who nods. "I understand." she said. Solar sighed in relief. It watched as Chell walked over to where Nina was. "Come on." she said. Wheatley stood up as well. Nina slowly stood up, and picked up Solar from the table. Chell guided both of them up into the stairs, and then led them to the hallway.

Nina still strayed behind, and Solar could feel her shaking from her grasp. "It's alright." he said to her quietly. "I have been in the same bag for a couple of days with them and they are both gooud - ARGH!"

Nina jumped at that same moment when Solar began to shake uncontrollably. "OW!" it yelped out. Chell and Whealtey both turned around to see the poor core shaking. Nina kept a small grip on the core. She coughed and croaked, worried about her friend.

"Calm down!" yelled out Wheatley. Chell looked worried. "He's right. If you ever want to speak again, you have to stay silent for now." Which calmed Nina down for a bit. She still coughed into her blanket a bit. She looked back at Solar, who cringed. "I'm fine." it grunted out.

Wheatley looked at the core. "Are you corrupt?" he asked. Solar shook itself. "No…" it said weakly. "It's just that we fell into a giant pit, and now everything just hurts a lot." At that note, Chell looked at Nina's bandaged up wrist. That would explain why her wrist was in this condition.

Wheatley looked up at Nina. "Don't worry. I have a friend who is really good at these types of things. You know. With robots. I'm sure he'll be able to fix him up, just like he did with me." Nina looked at Wheatley for a minute in confusion, as Chell had reached up behind him to pull a handle on the ceiling. "Wait a moment…" said Solar coming up with the same conclusion. "Like you?"

Wheatley shook his head. "I was like you before," he explained. "You know, working at Aperture, doing very important things. The usual." he said. "Then a whole lot of things happened. Long story really. I met this woman, a long time ago, and well, that just so happened to be Chell over there." He guestered. Chell looked back at Wheatley for a bit before returning back to the door on the ceiling. "It was pretty funny, because we both wanted to get out of here. So, we went around and looked for the portal gun, which is that white thing you put on your hand and you shoot holes with it."

"Oh yeah." said Solar. "Yeah we have one of those in our bag - wait a minute." Solar looked at Wheatley. "You are just like me? Before?" And that's when, through his weakness of his glitching episode, he laughed. At this point, Chell finally had brought down the ladder of the attic, and looked over at the core questionably.

"Um…" said Wheatley, looking at the core in confusion. "What's wrong? Did I say something funny?" He looked at Nina. "Is this an aftershock of the pain he was having?" Nina shrugged. She looked at Solar.

"I'm sorry," said Solar, slowing down. "It's just that, for so long I have been wondering how you look familiar, sound familiar, and even act so familiar." he said. "I know who you are. Who both of you are. This answers so many questions in my mind!"

Wheatley looked down on the ground. "Oh," he said. "Then I suppose you know about that time when I-"

"You're Wheatley Stephens. One of the co-workers in Aperture."

Both Chell, Wheatley, and Nina froze. Wheatley had looked at the core, shocked. "What?" It asked.

"Nothing, it's just that, how did you know?"

"I'm a prototype." it said. "One of the first to be created. I guess I must have been around long enough to know."

Nina felt a bit woozy from the experience. She looked over at Chell, with weary eyes. Chell looked back at her. "Her rest." she said to Wheatley. "We can talk about this later."

"Right. The rest." said Wheatley. He looked at the ladder. "We fixed the attic a couple days ago for you to sleep in. It's quite cozy if you asked me. Much better than how it looked a month ago. In that time it was really dark and spooky." Nina walked up the ladder, holding one rung with her good hand, and in the other hand, she held Solar. The ladder wasn't that steep of a ladder, and you could walk on it instead of climbing, but Nina felt that if she didn't hold on to the ladder, she could sway around again and fall.

Chell walked right behind. She watched, as the girl swiftly went up the stairs. Despite her hands being full, she does have a lot of skill in athletics. Behind her, Wheatley followed, making sure that he steps carefully on the stairs.

Nina stood in the middle of a medium sized room. It was not cold, and it was surprisingly warm. The roof was triangular shaped, and there was a small electric lamp next to a bedside table. Besides the sunlight coming from the window right in front of the bed facing up in the sky, that was the only source of light.

Chell walked inside the room. "We managed to give away most of the things that were stored in this place. We hope you like it." Nina looked around the room. It wasn't big, but it was good. She nodded, but still stood there. This action had questioned Wheatley. "Well, this is your erm… temporary room. You can explore. See, look, there's a window showing outdoors. I'm pretty sure that's a view you haven't seen before."

Solar looked at the window. "It's a nice sight." it said. It looked back at Nina. "You'll be alright here."

Nina didn't say anything. She still didn't move.

Solar looked worried. "Are you alright?" it asked. Nina nods, but her hands shook with her graph of the core. "Are you sure-" it started to ask again, before Chell interrupted.

"You'll be able to wake up again." she said. "These ones wouldn't force you asleep."

Nina looked over at the bed once more before finally, sitting down on it. She still didn't move from there - except to place her bag on the floor. Wheatley tried to change the subject, make it something that would get the girl's mind of whatever she thought about sleeping once more.

"What about you?" he asked Solar. "I'm pretty sure you don't need to sleep, right? I mean, you do look tired but uh, you don't mind joining us for a little conversation, right?"

Solar looked over at Wheatley. Before it was able to respond, Nina pushed it closer and shook her head. Solar agreed. "I'm sorry, maybe some other time perhaps. I do sleep, kind of like Nina, since I need to conserve my energy to help her out. It's kind of like a sleep mode."

Chell looked worried. "If you need some repairs, I know a good friend who can help." she said. "Wheatley already told you this." Solar looked and nodded. "I'll try it out." it said, before cringing in pain once more. "Nina, do you mind putting me by the table?"

Nina nodded, and put it on the table. "Well then. You two get some rest." said Chell. "Well try to talk in the morning."

Solar nods. "Alright, he said." with that, Chell and Wheatley walked back down onto the hatch. Before she left the room, Chell looked back at the two of them once more before she closed the door.

Wheatley stood in front of the hatch. "Those two seemed to have quite the attachment." he said. "I wonder how they were able to get out of there and bring all of the stuff along?"

Chell looked down at the ground. "That remains a mystery." she said. "Ever since I left that place twice, she was always making it harder to get in and leave. The fact that these two - being kids - managed to get out nearly alive… This is too much for them."

Wheatley looked at Chell. He understood some of Chell's pain. Even after almost 5 years of not living in Aperture anymore, she still had nightmares of testing in her sleep. And sometimes he would have nightmares of being shot up to space once more, being alone and nearly forgotten. And Chell was only an adult. It was only unimaginable of what the experience could do to a child.

0~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~0

Solar looked back at Nina, who still wouldn't lie down on the bed.

"Come on," it said. "You need the rest."

Nina still didn't move. Her eyes were fixated on a distant part far away from where she was. Solar remembered the last time when she had fallen asleep when needed to. Back in the elevator. She ended up crying a lot when she awoke again.

And she looked more afraid than happy.

It wasn't until the way Nina continued to look at the wall that Solar released sometime. She was paraylzed in fear. Sort of anyways. It's like you just faced everything in the world, but you now, you don't trust anything, fearing that they'll just create more adversaires.

And Solar understood.

"You know, it is hard to trust everything at first." it said. It's voice made Nina turn around to look at it. Solar didn't meet her eyes, and looked down at the blanket that she was wrapped around in. "You aren't the only one she would punish." it said. "I was sent to Android Hell countless times. It's scary there, and I'm glad you didn't have to see it while you go through your trouble on getting out of there."

Nina looked back down on her hands, and felt the cast Dr Vic put on her wrist. Solar shook itself. It was getting out of topic. "I know how it feels." it said. "If you like, do you want me to keep guard around this area while you sleep? I'll let you know if there is something wrong."

Nina looked at Solar questionably. Solar sighs. "I know I said I was tired, but, I'll do it as long as you sleep. Chell and Wheatley said you need it, and so did Dr Vic. And you also look like you need it anyways."

Nina looked down at her hand once more and nodded, slowly. She slowly began to lie down. "There you go," it said. "Now rest. We'll try to see if we can do anything to help save your brother tomorrow." That was all it took. That last sentence finally convinced Nina to close her eyes. Tears streamed down her cheeks, but she tried to sleep, just like Solar had asked her for.

It took a couple of hours before Solar could hear soft breathing coming from Nina. It was glad that her breathing was getting better. Being out here away from Aperture, it already felt safe. It understood that Nina would need some more time to get used to the safety.

Solar thought about Chell and Wheatley, and how they still invited it inside their homes even though it was a robot that came from Aperture. If it was being honest to itself, it thought that at first glance, they'll throw it out, but now recognising Wheatley, Solar felt like it was going to be somewhat unlikely.

Maybe things are better up here on the surface. Sure, some robots, like cores, belong back at Aperture, but a life up on the surface was better. Though uncertainties are present, Solar had a good feeling about it, being around with humans, especially around with Nina.

Solar sighed as it looked over at the alerts playing out through the visual processor.

Warning:

System Overload at 78%

System Damage at 64%

It didn't have that much time up here anyways.

Solar looked back at Nina. It needed to hold on just a bit longer, for the overclocking sequence can't stop. Atlas would soon be able to regain control of himself, and then help out GLaDOS with the removal of the corrupt cores that are protecting Nina's brother.

It looked up at Nina, who still lied asleep on the bed. She trusted him, and to Solar, it was the first time someone had looked up to it like this. It felt good in a way, and it felt like it had to do all it could to help her out - and also, anything else to annoy her and to-

System overload capacity is at 80%

Warning: All systems had been compromised-
Error. Error. Compromise Error.

Memory Clean up Needed.

Error Error.

Solar tried not to cry out in pain once more. It had said that so many times that the pain was the worst it had ever felt, but this time, it was the absolute worst. It felt everything as if it was an explosion. To make worse, the pain had picked up the radio signal. There was a loud noise heard downstairs, and the sudden screaming in surprise.

Out of a sudden, something came back to Solar. The experience had reminded it of something horrible. The loud noise, the screaming, the feeling of pain. It was something very faint, but recognisable.

- And that's when the room changed. Everything faded away. Colors and light. The walls, the table, the window. Even Nina, sleeping on the bed, everything turned black. The loud noise from the radio intensified into something else. A loud, vocal processor piercing noise.

And then, silence.

"Hello?" asked Solar. "Where am I?"

There was no answer. It was just dark, and silent.

"Is there anyone there? Nina?"

"..."

"Anyone?"

Solar couldn't move from its spot. It troubled him, because there was nothing in this place. It was scary. Normally, it would have been able to see in the dark, but there was nothing in there to see. It was scary in some sort of way, and it wished that there would have been a management rail for it to run off to.

"Anyone else here?" it asked.

"Hello?"

"You seriously do need to stop. I'm telling you, if you keep this up, you'll destroy yourself."

That cold, unwelcoming voice taunted him. Solar looked around, for any signs of other beings around him. But it was only just itself. No one else. Though it already knew who was speaking on the other end of this… box thing. It tried to show any hints of fear, although the thoughts of being trapped here for who knows what had returned to it.

"Why are you here?"

There was no answer from GLaDOS. Solar tried to move, but now, it couldn't feel anything. No more of that pain, and for the first time, a heavy weight felt like it was lifting in Solar. If it was somewhere else on the other hand, somewhere else where it wouldn't feel trapped, it might have felt good.

"Hello?"

"You're in a black-box, genius."

"Black-box?" asked Solar. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"What else does it mean? If you are in here, there could only be one explanation."

Solar froze. "Am I dead? I died?!"

He could hear an exasperated sigh from GLaDOS, marking up her annoyance. "You are- birthday. Cake." Her voice just suddenly pitched itself up higher, unfamiliarly friendly. Solar looked blankly into the darkness of whatever void it was in, confused. GLaDOS became silent for a couple of seconds, before speaking to it again.

"I'm sorry you had to hear that. It was just one of those cores talking. You know, the ones that your little human friend had put on to me. How is she by the way?"

'Fine, at least,' though Solar. It didn't want to change the subject. Besides, this action of caring. It was fake. It wouldn't matter to her on how Nina was doing. "What did you say before your- episode?" it asked.

"I was going to say that you are not dead, but simply dormant. I am still stuck, as you can see, in this state. You simply established a connection during your episode right to your blackbox."

"I fried my processor, didn't I?"

Solar eventually had figured out the information right in the moment when GLaDOS mentioned dormant. Many other operations could still be functional, which would explain the connection it still had with Atlas. But shouldn't Atlas be in the blackbox instead of her? What was GLaDOS doing in it's mind?

"Why are you here?" It asked her again.

"All of us have our own Black-box systems. You however, seemed to share mine. Right after when Test Subject 0.01 had killed me, I felt you leave this place. I knew, you are just like me."

Solar grew angry at her insults. This was the second time she had actually said that to Solar, but this is the thousandth time it had heard it. "What is that supposed to mean?" it yelled at her. "You keep saying that I am just like you, but I'm not. You are the central A.I. of everything in Aperture. I am just merely a prototype core."

There was more silence coming from GLaDOS. Solar looked over at the distant void, hoping that somewhere, it could find her and stare at her angrily. Instead, she responded to it. "This isn't just my blackbox. Now do you know what I mean? We are just like each other. I am no better than you, and you are no better than me. I don't belong out there with humans, and neither should you. I am only just trying to help."

Solar looked down. "Why?" it asked. "The humans I met still took me in. They took both of us in! Complete strangers who ended up finding others just like them. They didn't care that I wasn't like them."

"Humans did this to me. Why should I trust them if this is where they'll take me? What good would that do, even for someone like you?"

Solar sighed. "You don't understand." it said. It wanted to change the topic really badly. It no longer wanted to talk about the fact that no matter what it thought, it wouldn't belong.

"What do you do here anyways?" it asked, trying to change the topic, but GLaDOS stayed silent. There was the sound of wind blowing nowhere, and Solar began to panic. "Hello? GLaDOS?" It called out, before finally, something did happen. Pain happened.

Solar straggled back a scream as it felt more pain surge through its receptors. Emergency notifications flew over its visual processor. Solar tried it's best to keep up with everything going on, to keep itself stable, but with it's processor sort of fried, it was hard.

DANGER: System Overload at 85%

System Damage, 78%

System Memory Clean up Initiated.

Error. Error.

Stalemate detected.

Automatic Memory Clean-up initiated.

Solar didn't even know what was going on until it opened it's opticals. It had awakened into a blurred vision of the room that it was in. A consequence of the fried processor. Automatically, Solar listened to the annoying voice that greeted it every single time when it woke out of sleep-mode.

"Hello, and again, welcome to your Aperture Science Emergency Status System.

You have currently been in sleep mode For 2 hours, 3 minutes, and 0.01 seconds

DANGER: Your System is currently overloaded at 85%

Your system is 78% damaged

Your Aperture Science Artificial Personality Construct is set for the Memory Clean up in 2 Hours.

Please take this time to quick save your files in your zzzzzwrt.

Error. Secondary Virtual Memory unknown.

'Tell me something I don't know.' though Solar. It looked over at the blurred lump on the bed. Nina. She was still sleeping. Soundly at least.

'I can't wait two hours.' though Solar. It looked over at Code-line framework -this was the area where it normally changes it's system codes, and manually added in a date. A month. It would at least give Nina the amount of time she needed to get better, get back to Aperture, and take her brother back without having the problems of running into GLaDOS, and hopefully enough time to fix up the processor.

Time set to wipe memory - 1 month

Although now it would have more time before it would shut down, Solar had a dark sensation that it never was meant to have this much time to begin with. Yeah, it cheated it's shut down sequence, but it was also afraid. Afraid of forgetting anymore than it already had.

Sharp pains grew into it, as it looked over at a blurred figure - Nina. Why would it share a blackbox with GLaDOS, and what were they exactly? Was GLaDOS really right about itself being somewhat like her?

Memories returned, but not the ones that Solar was expecting to find. These were memories of finding Nina, a young girl who survived the neurotoxin attack from GLaDOS a long time ago. She was confused, and instead of helping, GLaDOS treated her just like she did with anyone - tormenting her in the name of science.

'In comparison to me,' thought Solar, closing it's opticals. 'I don't think I'm like her. I helped Nina instead of hurting her, which is very unlike her. Also, I escaped, which is highly unlike her as well. I am nothing like her…

Right?'

0~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~0

5 days ago…

The man looked at the body that laid on the ground. At first, Hybrid thought that maybe, the man would just walk away. Walk away from the problem, and leave her there. Instead, he shouted out some words to some other humans in the distance, who seemed to be - worshipping a vehicle. They were flapping their hands upwards and downwards, and a white cloud came out of the car.

'Thats how clouds came to be,' it thought.

It didn't stand too far from the humans. Apart from the girl who had her eyes closed most of the time when they were traveling, no one else even still existed. It hid behind a stone that stood in the distance. It wasn't big, but big enough that it would cover most of itself.

In means of most, it's front leg stuck out a bit, which meant that there would be a high chance that the human would see it. It couldn't run away now.

More people approached the body. Hybrid looked over at the people. They look a bit familiar, the woman was definite. She was the same person that placed it on the button - the big red one from the testing chamber! It was that woman, with the white thing and the brown thing stuck to it! Only that she didn't have these things anymore.
She looked different as well. She was no longer having that determined look on her face - well, maybe before she took one look at the girl in which the man found on the floor. But other than that, she looked different, very different.

It took one moment for the turret-block to realize. She looked safe.

It did a good thing after all, helping out with the small sick human girl. She would be safe as well.

It looked once more at the woman. If it found her, then that means that there would be a chance that it would find the robot in the monitor! She knew who he was. Maybe she would bring it to him!

Hybrid watched as the last of the humans, a man with a beard, had picked up the bag. He walked away from the stone.

"Please wait!" Called out Hybrid, trying to get the man's attention. At this point, it had stepped from behind the rock, and tried to rush over at the man, but he was much more focused on getting inside the vehicle. The man didn't even turn back. He swung the bag into the front seat, and started the vehicle. The vehicle just rushed over though the road, leaving the turret block behind.

It looked forward, into which now it had understood where they were going. There was a path. This was something new the turret-block had never seen before outdoors. And it seemed that the vehicle was following the path.

The turret block hopped on to the side of the path. If this car was following this path. Then that could mean that others would as well, so it was wise to stay on the side.

Dawn approached, and Hybrid just kept walking.

0~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~0