First Words

First Words Chapter 2

Chell sighed, even though he had tried to kill her, she knew that it wasn't him that was trying to do it, it was Her mainframe that he was in, the coding in it wasn't made for a personality sphere as low intelligence as him. Her long trek through the wheat fields hadn't been as easy as she thought, the long fall boots started to make her feet hurt again. She had only been walking again for only about 2 hours, but the boots weren't made to be comfy, just able to protect you from extremely long falls. She dropped the large, heavy cube, and lay down on it . Only her well-deserved rest was interrupted by a distant, but familiar voice. She bolted upright, scanning the area where she had heard it. It was him. She temporarily forgot the pain in her legs and the cube, and ran towards the round sphere calling her name. "Chell! Look! It's your 'ol pal! Wheatley!" Wheatley said happily. Chell felt a wad of happiness well up in her throat as she ran towards him. Chell was directly below him now, waiting for him to slowly drift down into her arms. Snap. The string holding Wheatley to the chute had finally snapped. "Catchmecatchmecatchmecatchme! Oh, you caught me? Ugh, never mind that, this is bloody brilliant! Two old friends, not enemies, meeting up again!" Friend? She hardly considered him a friend, he did try to kill her MANY times while he was in control at the facility, but all his traps failed, she paid too much attention to details, having been in that dreaded place even since she was little, GLaDOS had kept her after Bring Your Daughter To Work Day. "Hello? You still there? Chell?" Chell snapped back to reality, her crystal eyes darting back to the happy core in her arms. Wheatley narrowed his optic, she really was kind of scary. "Oh, and uh, about where we left off of, well, I'm sor-" He was cut off by the force of Chell's arms, pulling him closer to her in a tight hug. His optic narrowed again, startled by the sudden movement. "Uh, what are we doing, exactly? Oh! This is called a hug! Isn't it!" He partially closed his optic shutters, forming a smile. She held on to his partially melted rubber handles, carrying him back to the Companion Cube, with him babbling away, as usual. She stifled a small giggle, and smiled, she sat down on the cube, placing Wheatley next to her, who was now chatting away about how lonely he was in space. Chell took off the white wrist-band, and strung it through Wheatley's top handle and tied a knot at the end, slinging it over her shoulder. Wheatley looked up at the now pinkish-red sky. "Uh, luv, I think something's wrong with the sky." Chell glanced up, and immediately started walking a bit faster. Wheatley's optic narrowed again. "There's something wrong, isn't there?!" He nervously said. Chell shook her head, smiling. "Why don't you ever talk? I mean, why? I thought all humans could talk, but not you, are you paranoid? Scared? Nervous?" She shrugged. "AH! Now it's even darker!" Wheatley cried. Chell rolled her eyes. After a while, there was a kind of screeching sound, as if someone was dragging their nails across glass. "What is that bloody awful noise?" Wheatley whined. Chell shrugged, again. She spotted a small flame way above the horizon. It made it's way closer to the ground. She could have sworn she heard it say "SPAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACE!!!" As it neared the ground. She heard Wheatley gasp softly. The core hit the ground, resulting in screams somewhere off in the distance, off the horizon. "Oh! I have a really good feeling that there's more humans over there! Isn't there!" He chimed, rolling his optic in a circle excitedly. He noticed Chell's tired expression, he lowered his handles. "Oh, you're tired, I forgot humans do that. I bet that cube's bloody heavy. If I had arms, I would carry that for you!" He said, nodding. Chell smiled. After a while, the sky turned dark, stars coming out everywhere. "Ah, stars, love 'em! Bloody fascinating too." Wheatley said, starting yet another one-sided conversation. "Saw TONS of them in space. Not as interesting to watch as you, of course." Chell stopped abruptly, looking down at Wheatley, who was glancing around nervously, the small twitch running through his shell every once in a while. Chell was used to this, him saying something awkward, her just ignoring it and carrying on. She smiled and pulled the sphere close to her once again, fingers running along his handle. "Uh, what.. are you doing exactly?" He said. Chell continued walking along, occasionally sitting down to take a small rest. After about another hour, she reached a small town, near where Space Core had crash-landed. A man, around his mid-20's, saw Chell, tired, dirty, and the little core with his optic closed on her side. He had taken her to a motel that was well known to be well kept and comfy to stay in. Chell took off the strap, that had kept Wheatley by her side, untied him from it, and took a throw pillow and placed him on the bed. She then walked off to the bathroom to shower off all the dirt and grime. While she was in the shower, Wheatley had woken up, confused and convinced she had left him. "Chell?! Chell?! Chell, where are you? This isn't funny. You can come out now!" He cried. Chell heard him, rolled her eyes, and tried to hurry washing herself. When she finally came out, wrapped in a fluffy light blue towel, Wheatley let out a sigh of relief. "Oh, good, good, you're still here, but, in the future, tell me before you leave, just, just, cough or something! You know? That bloody scared me!" Chell giggled, putting her dark hair up into a ponytail. She put on sweatpants and the tank top that had the Aperture Science logo on it. She flopped down on the bed, making the little sphere bounce a little on the pillow. "I mean, it's just fine if you go somewhere, just peachy! But really, cough or something!" Chell closed her eyes, trying to go to sleep while he was babbling on about how Someone said something to Someone else. By the time she had fallen asleep, he was about to go into sleep mode himself. "Hello again, Moron. It's seems you found that mute, dangerous, lunatic. I'm surprised she didn't kill you yet." Wheatley closed his optic shutters, shaking his optic plate as if denying what he heard was real. "No, not again. Please, just leave me alone." He whined, clearly not wanting to talk with Her. "Well, judging how horrible you treated her, I would be even more surprised if she forgave you." "Um, well, she forgave me because she knew it was your mainframe that had done that, that thing to me, it's, uh-" "Enough. You obviously are a moron if you though she really did forgive you. She hates you. She wants to kill you, toss you away and never look back." "NO, you're lying, you're lying." "No, I'm not. She hates you." "No. I'm not listening, I'm not listening!" "Yes you are, I can tell. Oh, and by the way, I feel horrible for telling you about the parachute, you deserved to die a horrible, flaming death. You put me in a potato! By the way, thanks for that." "You're welcome!" Wheatley chirped happily. "I was being sarcastic you moron." She coldly muttered. "I AM NOT A MORON!!" Wheatley yelled, pushing his vocal processors to the point where they cut out into static, waking up Chell. The twitching metal sphere shut his optic shutters, and preformed a full reboot on his system. Chell sat up, gently grabbing the metal ball, a small electric shock ran through her fingers, telling her about a buildup of electric charge. Once Wheatley came back online, Chell asked with her own weird version of sign language what had happened. "It's Her, she somehow gained access to my sound receptors, She has been talking to me, telling me that you..." He started, not sure how to tell her what he had heard. Chell looked unsure of how to respond, she wanted to know what She had told him. "Well, She said that you... you... hated me! There! I said it! Don'thurtmeI'msorry!" Wheatley spoke quickly, as if he wanted to get the situation over with already. Chell's eyes widened, shaking her head at the wincing core in front of her. "You, you don't hate me?" He asked, surprised. Chell pulled him close to her body again. "Uh, I take that as a yes." He nervously muffled into her chest. His optic shutters opened in surprise. "Oh! I have something brilliant to tell you about! I though, because you're so smart, I though you could work somewhere, like, uhhh, the library! You could rent Machiavelli! I could actually read it this time! Instead of just playing the page turning audio in my files, and you could hold it up for me!" Wheatley suggested, nodding his optic. Chell shuddered, remembering what Wheatley had done while he was in charge of the facility.