Mission 025: Live Weapons Testing

[super_astute]

Just after the contaiment breach was sealed and half of the surviving personnel were back on duty, Wheatley stopped down to check on Chelldon.  The morning's water cool chatter had been boring and besides, today he had something important to do.  Something that would make his name stand out!  Oh, sure, it helped that lots of people that might have stood in front of him got eaten or committed suicide when it looked like some evil other-dimension monster was going to poke their eyes out and use their skulls for planters...

But Wheatley didn't let that get him down!

Quite chuffed in fact, he arrived at Chelldon's room quite early with his morning rations and beamed at the Test Subject.  "Oh, have we got plans today!  You are going to LOVE this!"

Comments

[stubbornsubject.livejournal.com]

Chelldon didn't share the enthusiasm, he never did, Wheatley was not a bunny rabbit and therefore didn't get any sort of smile from him. Snagging his rations, he dropped on the bed and ripped into the packet to have breakfast. He had decorate his room, in a way, and hung up the shirt from his bunny run in with filed down toothbrush. Hopefully they'd take the hint that he needed a new one.

And hey, impromptu weapon is needed!

"Testing?" Chelldon asked simply once the breakfast was half eaten and he was on his feet. He was always eager to get going, the sooner he did it, the sooner he got home, the sooner the next day came. It sounded boring. And it was.

But it was the little victory of being alive that he liked. The tally on the wall across from the shirt showed jkst how long he'd been here. It was certainly not a small one.

[super-astute.livejournal.com]

"Oh, and look at that, very nice. Curtains? I'll bring you crayons or a picture of a field to pretend it's a window." Wheatley liked giving Chelldon compliments. It said in his programing manual that humans enjoyed a proverbial head patting. He'd tried actual head patting until he accidentally bruised one too many people and was thus banned from such a thing. Unfortunate. Chelldon seemed to appreciate it. Oh, all right, he hadn't, but the boy had brain damage so he probably didn't know how to appreciate anything.

Maybe Wheatley should bring him some art so he could figure out that slashmarks were absolutely not it. He filed it in his memory banks for tomorrow and sat on the floor, watching Chelldon eat.

"And yes, quite right, testing. And very important testing today. Managed to get a whole floor available for today! Not so many tests going on. Mostly rebuilding. But that works out for us!"

[stubbornsubject.livejournal.com]

As annoying as it was to be spoken down to, he kind of wanted to get crayons. Wheatley may have been accidentally offensive and a bit daft but he meant well... though Chelldon doubted he was doing it to be nice, he probably thought rewards would get him to work harder, like offering a donkey a carrot.

He finished up the rather revolting protein and energy bar, washing it down with a high caffeine drink. It improved brain function, prevented sluggishness and apparently it may contain traces of people.

Sometimes he wondered exactly what he was eating.

He didn't get how they got a whole floor and he did have a funny feeling but who was he to protest. He just nodded and tossed the wrappers over his shoulder.

[super-astute.livejournal.com]

Wheatley wasn't programmed to be nice. Yes, he had a high functioning AI, all personality cores did even if they were insane like Curiosity Core, but that didn't mean that he chose to grow in anyway linked to compassion. What idioicy! He was here to do a job, little more.

Literally little more. Shame. He could run this place if they let him. And likely better than that other AI they were trying out to do the job.

Boring.

After they left the room, the Aperture Science Wrapper and Waste Product Cleaning Apperatus cleaned up the floor. Wheatley checked Chelldon's long fall boots. Handed over his gun, and led him passed unusuable, blocked off hallways with techs hard at work in repairs.

"Testing Chamber 25!" he declared once their doors opened to a massive space covered in turrets. "My own design!"

[stubbornsubject.livejournal.com]

Oh dear god, what fresh hell was this?!

This wasn't a test, it was a death sentence! It was just a load of turrets and they were all pin pointing at Chelldon and Wheatley, ready to kill, chirping hello at him. His eyes widened and he rushed out of the way of their bullets, hurling Wheatley along with him. AI or not, he didn't want to be shot to pieces did he? Oh Lord, did Wheatley actually think anything through?

Well, of course not.

Fortunately they were sort of domino'd so by knocking one over, the others tumbled, wailing in protest as they fell. It didn't get all of them but it seemed to save his ass, he had to knock them down.

Fantastic, this would require a lot of portal travel.

[super-astute.livejournal.com]

"Brilliant! Haha! Show that nepotistic idiot that my Test Subject is far better than his little turrent template machines after all!" Wheatley was fantastically pleased by the results. Sure, he'd almost gotten shot, but this body was bullet proof, more or less. Had to be, if he was to be maintained in good condition. He could survive everything but incineration and even then, his AI could just be redownloaded and the doctor in charge docked the appropriate amount from his neck paycheck(s).

Hiding behind a mountain of fallen turrets, Wheatley gave Chelldon two thumbs up as a reward for being so bright today for a man suffering brain damage. Maybe he'd get him another shirt since the one from yesterday seemed to have motivated him to this level of magnificence!

"Now, you just need to survive to the other side. That means don't let them shoot you. One or two might be all right, but that would skew the scoring don't you think? Oh, I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to tease you about your poor damaged brain!"

[stubbornsubject.livejournal.com]

This was insane, had Wheatley lost it or was this another overly ambitious showing off stunt like the time he tried to pit Chelldon against Adventure Cores subjects?... Poor guy was still trapped in that never ending loop but that was hardly his problem. Nope, his problem was somehow getting out of here.

Heading further down, he dragged himself, and Wheatley, behind a nearby pile of fallen useless turrets that whirred and whined and cried for help. But they were polite enough, he always did like turrets, evil but sweet and childish.

They were useless on their side too and pointing the wrong way to do any damage but they made a fantastic wall.

Chelldons idea was easy, basically shoot a portal under one group and end the portal above another group so they all crashed into one another and keep on repeating, t was easy to do from a distance and he managed it fairly easily, it was going very well.

Until one of the bullets whipped across the room, narrowly dodged Wheatley and whacked right into Chelldons upper arm. He dropped the gun and hissed in pain. Damn it!

He was going to lose points now.

[super-astute.livejournal.com]

"You really have trouble listening somethings," Wheatley said with a sigh, not seemingly over concerned by the problem. He knew that Test Subjects could cease to function but he also knew that Chelldon probably wouldn't let that happen. Why worry?

A moment later, when Chelldon didn't pick up the gun and quite a lot of red, sticky blood appeared on his skin, Wheatley remembered about human pain receptors and how damaging it was to continued testing.

Maybe he ought to be a little bit more careful? If Chelldon died, he'd have to start over from Test Chamber 1! Oh, that would be awful!

So, grabbing the portal gun, Wheatley pressed it into Chelldon's other hand. "Good chap, almost done, almost there, and cake if you survive! Saw some yesterday in the break room. Might not have been demolished, hopefully."

[stubbornsubject.livejournal.com]

Chelldon was in a lot of pain and the blood was gushing out and he didn't get why, it wasn't like normal wounds. Gritting his teeth, he nodded and grabbed the gun, firing another two portals and demolishing the rest of the nearby turrets. With them down, he staggered to his feet, one arm hanging uselessly at the side as he tried not to move it.

He gestured for Wheatley to follow, he had to get himself and the AI out safe. It was just a war wound, nothing serious.

It would be fixed and he would be fine, no cause to worry or panic, was it? As they headed further through, Chelldon stepped on one of the bigger buttons, dripping blood down it as he watched the door open. Right, he needed a cube.

Looking around, he tried to spot one. The faster they left, the quicker he'd heal. And the quicker he'd get that cake!

[super-astute.livejournal.com]

"Oh, I knew I forgot something!" Wheatley replied when he realized what Chelldon was looking for. A Weighted Storage Cube. Nope, nothing like that in here. Darn it! "I was so excited I didn't leave one. There's been one but it was in the middle of my turret design and... Well, turrets are just as good. Ought to be. Enough could be heavy enough..."

He was mostly rambling to himself.

"And you were doing so well too! A little drippy, but look have amazing you're doing! In the face of adversary, Chelldon, Test Subject of the great and noble Wheatley, has managed to get through almost as many chambers as a monkey."

He was ready to give a eulogy!

[stubbornsubject.livejournal.com]

He wanted to kill him, he really wanted to kill him. Groaning he spun around and aimed his gun at the nearby fallen turret, lifting the robot up. It chirped as Chelldon struggled to move it, even with the gun, he was not as sharp with hisleft as his right.

Dropping the robot down, it thanks Chelldon for the lift and managed to keep the button weighed down.

Stepping off the button, he tested it and thank God it stayed open. Exhaling, he turned his head to door and struggled over to it, this time he didn't drag Wheatley with him. The bumbling fool could make his own way out!

No eulogy today, save it for another day perhaps?

[super-astute.livejournal.com]

Chelldon might be upset but Wheatley was ecstatic! "Oh-ho-ho! Brilliant! Perfect! Well, almost perfect, you did leak on the test floor but other than that?! High marks across the board!" Wheatley jumped around once he was through the door and pulled Chelldon through the Aperture Science Emancipation Grill, effectively dissolving the bullet and cauterizing Chelldon's wound so that it would no longer bleed.

"Now how about we get that cake? And tea! Double tea. Dr. Stable isn't around to check us negatively on the bleeding so how about we keep that to ourselves, all right?"

He skipped and twirled and walked backwards into a large android consisting of just a personality core with legs. Very primitive.

"Hello Gary!" Wheatley said, good naturely, until the robot passed. "Horrible manners," he whispered to Chelldon. "Never smiles!"

[stubbornsubject.livejournal.com]

Chelldon had no idea what to think, he may no longer be bleeding but he was in pain still and their was promises of cake and Wheatley was skipping... it was all very jarring. He stuck beside the man was they navigated the hallway and passed the man/robot/core that Wheatley named Gary. He was sure that no matter how primitive Gary was, he was probably smarter than the Wheatley.

Everyone was smarter than Wheatley. Well, almost everything. Not the very bright yellowly dressed young man/android, in what seemed to be a astronaut helmet, that flew through the halls almost knocking Wheatley and himself over as he cried 'spaaaaaaace' loudly, whipping down the hallway.

Oh and there went the complimentary team of doctor. Ah the joys of a corrupted core, he really hoped Wheatley never got corrupted.

Or maybe he already was? Chelldon couldn't help giving Wheatley a sideways look.

[super-astute.livejournal.com]

"You'd never believe it," Wheatley chatted on, "but Space Core use to absolutely hate space! I think someone told him that he'd never be allowed to go to space and he just got obsessed. Sort of like how you are with that wallpaper design you have going on in your Relaxation Center room." Pain was not a concept that Wheatley had because Wheatley had never experienced the potential of being lost due to corruption or the lack of bodies to be downloaded into.

It never occured to him to be afraid or to avoid risks. He just didn't quite understand death other than that the person would not be able to run tests or mark grades on his report sheets for filing.

When Chelldon stumbled, Wheatley blinked at him. Not in concern, just in a bit of awe. "Your long fall boots must be malfunctioning! Oh, they'll have my head if they're damaged! To the medic with you!"

[stubbornsubject.livejournal.com]

He knew little of the other cores and despite Wheatley always telling him the ins and outs, he didn't believe half of what the man said because it made no sense half the time and when it did, he still doubted it because Wheatley didn't seem to get things like a normal person. Or even a corrupted core.

He was somewhere inbetween and instead of doing the rational, he always did the awkward.

Chelldon just wanted to lie down, now he had to trek all the way to the medics because he might accidentally harm the boots?-- Oh yeah, right, the equipment cost more than test subjects, he was entirely disposable.

He gripped his arm and wandered after Wheatley, not saying a word to him for once on purpose. He was not trusting that core if he said he designed somewhere again!

[super-astute.livejournal.com]

Luckily, Chelldon had no choice in the matter and also, Wheatley liked the silent treatment. If there were no complaints, he was doing his job. Even if there were complaints, he was still doing his job, just with a Test Subject prone to complaining. So, not an issue actually.

Humming to himself, some form of smooth jazz, Wheatley got Chelldon to the medics -- all mechanical, all trying desperately to repair turrets and wall panels and other equipment damaged in yesterday's attack.

"Oh," Wheatley said, suddenly freezing when he saw a fellow core and his Test Subject waiting in line. "Oh, on, not Tyler," Wheatley whined. "Just nod and smile, nod and smile, or we'll be caught up in protocol procedures all afternoon!"

[stubbornsubject.livejournal.com]

Chelldon blinked then turned his head, frowning in the direction of the name Wheatley named Tyler. He didn't know what protocol procedure was but he found when it came to cores and subjects, it was wisest to listen to Wheatley because, frankly, he didn't do that well in social situations himself.

And he liked to avoid chatting and socialising.

He just nodded as requested. And nodded. And nodded some more because Wheatley didn't really specify how long he was meant to nod for and part of him was tempted to jump. But that didn't seem needed because he'd accidentally drawn attention.

"Oh look, Wheatley got a weirdy-brained one!"

[super-astute.livejournal.com]

"Shh," Tyler said harshly. It wasn't usual for Test Subjects to know other cores unless they interacted but... Well Wheatley had accidentally tried to book Tyler's test chambers several times in the past and now Tyler's Test Subject happened to know his name. It was headache inducing.

"Hello," Wheatley said, sing songing. "He's not weirdy-brained. He's beat twenty-five test chambers! You probably haven't done more than one."

Oh. Oh... Oh Wheatley. He got a sudden feedback from inside the neural core of his network attachment. Oh, Tyler, why couldn't he had told him before he opened his mouth that the chubby human with him wasn't a Test Subject, but one of the security personnel?!

"I mean...looking good, chief. Very good. Slimmed down a bit-- In a good way!"

[stubbornsubject.livejournal.com]

And, just to back Wheatley up, Chelldon nodded. Again. Oh he was never sure when to stop, he gave it a few seconds before he was sure he had nodded enough but the look on the chiefs face made it kind of clear that he had done it for too long. He didn't seem like a pleasant man and Chelldon didn't see how this was at all helping his arm.

He was still in pain, you know, it seemed like Wheatley had forgotten in favour of trying to brag.

"Oh would you shut it, Wheatley? Just take the retard ahead to the medics if you must but don't touch anything. Understand? Just nothing! I know what you're like," Hunt ordered because Wheatley had a habit of cocking everything up and the sooner he'd been and gone, the happier he'd be.

Chelldon cocked his head to the side before turning to Wheatley. Why did everyone think he was brain damaged?

[super-astute.livejournal.com]

Wheatley linked arms with Chelldon -- he didn't usually like to touch the human, smells rubbed up far too easily -- and dragged him towards the front of the line. Oh, he really hadn't known that it had been Chief Hunt! The man was a legend, fearless and really good with androids. Maybe that was why Tyler was with him?

Ohh! Maybe Tyler was going to be decomissioned? Wheatley started to giggle...darkly. The other machines sort of ignored him.

It was always best just to ignore him.

"You're going to be fine, just fine. The botos will be fixed, no one will know. I think we should have your neck looked at next. It seems to be on a wrong way hinge."

[stubbornsubject.livejournal.com]

Wrong? What was wrong with him? He looked the same as everyone else though it wasn't really his fault if he had some sort of abnormality. As they entered the medical bay, he leaned his head to the side and gave Wheatley a pointed look because he knew that the man was probably worrying over Chief Hunt. Well, they would hardly be in trouble, they were useful. They were probably interesting the bosses at least.

"Twenty-five."

That was all he needed to say, they had successfully managed to complete 25 tests and they'd had no hitches thus far, bullets hardly counted, that was all down to Wheatley being a bit useless.

When the medic finally came out, he groaned in dismay at yet another injure today. "Did this one lose his teeth when the guns backfired because we did put that disclaimer out through GLaDOS."

[super-astute.livejournal.com]

"Oh, no, no, he failed to dodge bullets properly," Wheatley said. "No backfiring-- Wait, why didn't I--" He fell silent, reading reports he'd not had time to earlier. "Oooh. Right, yes, labelled 'read immediately to prevent gun backfiring.' Clever title, really ought to have a tip off." He hummed lightly, being sure to commit it to memory when Chelldon spoke.

He'd learned long ago to listen to the man when he opened his mouth -- and then promptly dismiss him too because mostly it was nonsense. This time around, Chelldon's words made him smile.

"Twenty-five is a brilliant, fantastic number, Chelldon. You should be proud. And all of this despite the brain damage."

[stubbornsubject.livejournal.com]

Internally, Chelldon sighed and called Wheatley a moron. Externally, he just stared for a few moments before approaching the medic who had a look over the rather neatly sorted wound that just required a bit of tightening up, hence the swift and painful stitch job.

These people had clearly never taken the Hippocratic oath and didn't give a damn about human pain. But it could be worse, he remember the time he witness Doctor Handy stitching a test subjects arm up... and accidentally stitching his skin to his lab coat. It had not been pleasant to watch the separation when Handy made a swift run to answer the door.

"There we go, now all you need is some drugs. They'll help with the painkillers but not with... rest," the medic gestured at the whole of Chelldon and he could help but look confused because seriously? What the hell was wrong? He felt fine!

Being silent was clearly something they couldn't comprehend well.

[super-astute.livejournal.com]

When Chelldon was completely mended, Wheatley fell into step beside his Test Subject and rounded a few blown to bits corridors to get to the break room. "Oh, oh, no! Stupid alien attempted take over," he lamented and sighed rather painfully before turning on his heels and smacking right into Chelldon, almost as if he'd forgotten he was there.

"Oh, well, looks like we'll have to try the cafeteria. Test Subjects aren't allowed there so I need you to just keep your head down and follow me and don't do anything at all brain damaged. If anyone asks, you're my cousin Steve from Engineering."

Well, Wheatley never said that the majority of the people here were bright.

Smarts and genius didn't always match up.

[stubbornsubject.livejournal.com]

"Steve," Chelldon repeated as he followed along after Wheatley, he didn't care what he had to do, he hadn't had anything but protein bars, shakes and those weird unspecified sandwiches, frankly the sound of cake was like something from heaven and he had been fight for that for years.

He was starting to think it might be a lie.

The canteen was all nice and shiny, he'd ever been there before. Unable to hide his awe, he wandered behind Wheatley. His cores never let him into these sort of places before, it was definitely one of the highlights of having Wheatley as is guide.

It heightened the chances of cake!

[super-astute.livejournal.com]

Oh, and there would be cake. Gobs and gobs of it. Wheatley was pretty nonchalant abotu the whole thing, grabbing the chocolate monstrosity from the table along with a fork and just leaving the cafeteria with it.

"Defective," he murmured to the chocolate frosting. "Honestly, the people here, the chef robots should be fired. Trying to feed people this-- The sheer amount of calories-- Miserable! Unforgivable. Nearly as bad as the science fair during take your son to work day. Honest, potato batteries, the lot of them."

He kept muttering to himself until they got outside and then burst out a resounding: 'run!"

Everyone in the cafeteria just thought they were mental and went back to eating.

[stubbornsubject.livejournal.com]

Chelldon was more than happy to eat as he walked the moment after the cake was passed to him, he was practically shoving the cake in his mouth and he didn't care how 'special' that looked. Everyone thought he was damaged anyway, may as well make the most of what was offered instead of worrying too much about the little things.

And cake was amazing, frankly, he didn't want it to have to end.

He only slightly listened to Wheatley complain about the bring your son to work day. Oh he remembered that perfectly, a potato clock and then being told it was the perfect day to have him tested. And he'd never left. Or seen his battery clock again.

He didn't even realised what was happening beyond the cake hence he barely heard the run command, licking his fingers, he took off in a scamper, half a cake still in his hands.

He was living the dream here!

[super-astute.livejournal.com]

Yes, well, while Chelldon lived his dream, Wheatley was trying to be sure that no one got hurt. Luckily, he took some of his protocol even more seriously than Tyler did and there really was nothing against stealing a cake from the cafeteria when most of the staff had been eaten by or was trying to contain an incursion. In fact, having cake was systematically approved of in such an occasion to build up morale in case of an alien take over and it was the last thing anyone ever ate.

Wheatley, in his infinite wisdom, always failed to read the most urgent memos, mostly because he liked to take his time with things and urgent just seemed so urgent! Someone would likely fill him in.

That was his story at least.

Back in Chelldon's room, Wheatley wrinkled his nose to watch the other man eat.

"You'll vomit. Oh, please don't vomit! Try to swallow it if it happens!"

[stubbornsubject.livejournal.com]

He wouldn't vomit... well he might but he was happier doing things his own way. He crammed another handful into his mouth and smiled, the cake totally wasn't a lie, he may have been waiting for nearly a whole science fair ago for cake but it was finally here and he knew that this sort of goodness wouldn't last. Mostly because Aperture science didn't specialise in goodness and odds were it was poisoned or mutant cake.

Once he was done rather messily and horribly devouring the cake, he licked the chocolate off his hands and wiped the excess onto his sleeve. He was a bit like a toddle who had been giving a chocolate bar.

Looking at Wheatley, he half smiled. For a moron, he wasn't half bad.

"Thank you, scale of one to brilliant ... you rank brilliant," yes, he remembered the scale nonsense and credit where credit was due, he wasn't going to offer the moron much more than that.

[super-astute.livejournal.com]

Wheatley was flustered. He's never had anyone other than himself and all of the rest of the people he knew, but only in his head, call him brilliant before. If he could cry, he might have done so. Instead, he sort of shut down for a moment, a whirring noise coming from inside of his skull before he powered back up with a grin.

"Of course I am! But it's brilliant that you've just discovered this. Bit slow for a human but with the brain damage I suppose you might well be the best yet! Then again, you are covered in chocolate...right. Okay, to be expected, given the lack of sanitisation devices in this room..."

Wheatley sighed.

"Oh, it's going to just smell awful tomorrow, I know it. And now look at you, all hyped up on sugar!"

[stubbornsubject.livejournal.com]

Chelldon was not sure to sugar and there was a reason why they didn't usually give test subjects sugar because Chelldon was bouncing on the ground, face covered in chocolate as he hummed to himself, clearly very pleased. Hey, his childhood had been stolen and all he'd done for ages now is run tests and sleep, having fun was one of those great privileges he didn't get to have.

And yet Wheatley was offering him all these changes.

"Test?" he chirped, cocking his head to the side, going into a test now was not only wrong but very bad and even someone like Wheatley should know that a bouncing chocolate covered man would not do well against robots and death machines.

But he didn't know what to do with all that energy.

[super-astute.livejournal.com]

"I haven't had time to come up with a new test," Wheatley complained before going silent for almost two full minutes, eyes glazed over and streams of light bashing around across the lenses as he computed whatever interface with GLADoS he was currently working on. "Oh." Now that was worrying. "Well there are two specimen tests currently on lock down due to containment breach but--"

His eyebrows shot up and he got to his feet.

"What could it possibly hurt?"

Famous last words.