Portal: Love as a Construct

Part Seventy-Five. The Return

Part Seventy-Five. The Return

He missed her even more now than he had when he had killed her.

It was worse, somehow, being away from someone who was alive than someone who was dead. And he was terrified that the facility had gone dark because she had shut herself down. He was so afraid that he would never see her again.

He had no energy. All he wanted to do was stay there against the wall until she brought him back. And then he would press himself into her beautiful chassis and tell her he was sorry and that he loved her and ask her to never send him away again. He missed her so much it hurt.

Caroline would try to talk to him every now and again, but he did his best to head her off. He knew that she was angry with GLaDOS for sending her away a second time, and that she got angry every time he said something about taking the blame for what happened. She got angry so fast, sometimes. Just like her mum. But he wasn't angry. He'd been angry, but it'd burned out quickly enough. He had learned from GLaDOS all these years that being angry only hurt you, and so he'd done his best to let it out and be done with it. But he'd been stupid enough to bang himself on a panel, for God's sake, and of course the panels would tell her about that, and she would have asked them to let her see what was going on... not a wall, or the table, or a bloody chair, no, he'd had to go and choose the panel. Even a camera would've been a better choice, because he'd probably have knocked it on the floor and been done with it.

Chell came to talk to him as well, who he preferred to Caroline. This sent a nasty worm of guilt twisting through him every time he thought of it. He knew Caroline was trying. But she had way too much of her mum in her to really be any help.

Chell wouldn't say a word about what was going on. She would tell him about her sons, who drove her mad, or her husband, who also drove her mad. Hearing about Richard made him very grateful for Caroline. She would never dare take shelter in GLaDOS's reputation like Richard did in Gordon's. He wouldn't say much when Chell came to see him, mostly just listening and appreciating the distraction. He never stopped missing GLaDOS, but it was a little easier when Chell came.

Sleeping was the most difficult part of it. As always when he didn't get to snuggle with her for the night, he woke up cold and lonely after a few hours, except now he was sad as well as cold and lonely. He honestly didn't know which was worse: staring into the darkness and wanting to cry but being unable to because Caroline was six feet away, or going back to sleep and having one of the dreams that'd begun to crop up. Now that he was back in a Traumatic Situation, he was dreaming again, but he had no clue what about. Just that he woke up scared and upset. Sometimes he would close his optic again and imagine that he'd told GLaDOS about it, and that she'd said something nice and given him a nudge. Sometimes that would make him feel better, but other times it would make the pain twist inside of him and become even worse. He prayed every day that she was all right and she would bring him home soon. He had no idea how long this had gone on for, but he hoped it was coming to an end. He would check his calendar every now and again, but all he really knew for sure was that a lot of days had gone by. Too many. He was afraid that he was going to miss their anniversary. It was important to him to never, ever miss an anniversary, and if he recalled correctly their tenth one was coming up. It made him terribly sad to think that he might miss marking an entire decade together. That was a long time. He hoped desperately every time he checked his calendar that she would finish up whatever she was doing over there and bring him home soon.

When he woke up that night, something felt a bit off. He looked confusedly into the blackness, trying to figure out what it was, when he suddenly recognised the loud noise behind him and turned around as fast as he could. And there she was, watching him steadily from her wonderful yellow optic, and he jumped forwards almost by mistake. "Gladys!"