Portal: My Little Moron - Chapter Three

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Chapter Three



Wheatley was really growing to like Gladys.  He had already liked her quite a lot to start with.  But the more time he spent with her, the more he liked her.  She wasn't like they said she was at all.  He’d always been told she was cold, and cruel, and hated everyone and everything.  That she wasn’t worth thinking too hard about, that she was unpleasant to be around, and she never gave anyone the time of day.  He realised that no other AI had ever told him about her.  Everything he knew about her came from humans, and he already knew that humans tried very hard to make themselves look good, even over obviously superior people.  They acted like they were better than Gladys, of course, but sometimes the almost-scientists, the ones Gladys called 'interns', liked to pretend they were smarter than the actual scientists.  Sometimes they would argue over who was the better employee, although those fights were always because they were trying to get out of testing.  Gladys didn't care.  They all have to fulfill their quota, no matter who is actually better.  So I'm the one who wins, in that case.

Gladys was not only smart, but she was also patient.  He would ask her questions for hours, sometimes because he was interested in something and sometimes because he just wanted to know if she knew the answers, not that he'd know if she didn't, and she would calmly answer each and every single one of them with the same measure of seriousness and intensity that she gave to her work.  She didn't have to do that, he knew, and he would always make sure to thank her for doing it.  He wasn't sure why she put up with it.  But he thought she just liked having someone to talk to.  He knew he did.  Her voice fascinated him.  Sometimes she would say words that she repeated in the exact same way, and sometimes how she said the words would change.  Her voice was heavily processed, but he was slowly learning to identify the tiny little variations in her voice that gave him clues as to what she was feeling.  Sometimes he could feel it too, if she was particularly emotional about something, but he didn’t like it when that happened.  He didn’t mind being a part of Gladys, and he didn’t mind sharing thoughts with her, but he was quickly realising that testing really was the only thing that made her happy, and even that didn’t always do the trick.  Talking to her seemed to improve her mood, but no matter how hard he tried she was always sad.  He knew it had something to do with the scientists that would come in and talk to her all day, but he couldn’t hear them from where he was and she refused to tell him what they said.  But he was her friend and would do his best to help her, and so most of the time they talked about whatever it was she was doing, which was usually testing.  He liked hearing her talk about it because she would get excited, and she would be less like that scary Central Core everyone whispered about and become more like his Gladys.  And she was his Gladys, because no one knew her like he did, even though he didn’t know her too much at all, really, but he was her only friend and he was rather proud of that fact.  Of all the people she could have been friends with, she had picked him, the little Something-Something Sphere.  Of course, most of the people were humans, which she would never lower herself to befriending, but surely even turrets were better friends than he was?  Though now that he thought of it, he decided Gladys might not mind befriending the Rat Man.  He didn’t know who that was, exactly, but sometimes she would talk to him and he would ignore her, and Wheatley supposed that a half-human, half-rat was technically not human at all, and therefore worthy of her friendship.

After a few more days, though, she started to give him short, disinterested answers, and he did his best to cheer her up.  He hoped she wasn’t bored of him already.  But everything he did seemed to irritate her even more, and he tried very hard not to talk.  It was hard, and he didn't always manage.  But he was trying.  He was almost relieved when she turned all of the lights off except for her overhead light.  It was exhausting, spending an entire day trying not to talk.  Now she would put herself into sleep mode and hopefully be in a better mood in the morning.

So when she did something entirely unexpected, his brain went completely blank for perhaps the first time in his life.  

She started singing.  

"I have changed... I have changed... just like you, just like you... for how long, for how long must I wait, I know there's something wrong... your concrete heart isn't beating..."

Wheatley had heard very little music in his admittedly short life, but the music he had heard, and remembered, well, it was downright disappointing compared to this.  Greg hadn’t listened to very much of it, but it had usually been something Henry had called ‘smooth jazz’.  Wheatley didn’t like smooth jazz.  It was boring.  Somehow Gladys was able to take her flat, modulated electronic tone and turn it into an eerie, strangely beautiful singing voice.  Wheatley had tried to sing once, the only song he knew, which was some celebratory song humans used to mark yet another year in which they had somehow managed to survive, but Greg had only scowled at him and told him in no uncertain terms to shut up.  Apparently his voice was simply terrible.

“So silent… no violence… but inside my head, so loud and clear... you’re screaming, you’re screaming, cover up with a smile I’ve learned to fear… just sunshine, and blue skies…”

Completely awestruck, he did not say a word until she had finished. Or he hoped she had.  He hoped he wasn't interrupting her, because she'd been upset for the last three days and thankfully she didn’t seem to have been angry with him, but he just had to say something.  He had to.

"That was bloody amazing!"

He wasn't sure if it was because of his voice, or the fact that she had forgotten he was there, but whatever it was, her chassis jerked upwards and she spun as if to find him.  "You were... you were listening?"

"Uh, yes?  I don't see how I could've avoided it, seeing as, y'know, I'm stuck here, and all, but yes, I was listening."

"If I'd realised that, I wouldn't have bothered."  She went back to her original position and he recognised the humming in her chassis as being part of the sleep mode processes.  

"Wait!  Don't go, not yet!"

"Why."

"Why wouldn't you have sung, if you'd've known I was listening?"

"The humans don't like it.  Apparently a supercomputer singing is enough to blow their little primate brains from here to Black Mesa."  She was bitter again.

"I liked it."

"You did?"

"Yeah.  You're loads better than Greg.  Greg can't sing, I already knew that, but compared to you, well, he's just bloody terrible."  He was relieved to note that she had stopped putting herself to sleep.  "It was really beautiful, I swear.  I can't sing either, actually.  Apparently I'm tone deaf.  It means I can't hear tones.  If I knew what one sounded like, maybe I'd be able to listen for them better, but I can't.  That's fine, that's all fine.  I'd rather hear you sing, honestly."

"Why are you saying these things?"  She sounded like she thought he was going to hit her or something.  Even if he had somehow been able to, he would never hit Gladys.  

"I dunno.  I just say what comes to mind, you know me.  D'you like singing?"

She didn't answer for such a long time that he asked her again, in case she hadn't heard.  Her chassis rocked a little as she said, "I heard you."  He decided the rocking meant she was shaking her head and that he should remember that for later.  "Well, d'you?"

"I don't know."

"How can you not know if you like something or not?  If someone asked me, 'Hey Wheatley, d'you like singing, old chap?' I'd be all like, 'Yeah, mate, I do!  Not too good at it, but I like it.'  But you are good at it, and you don't know?"

"Supercomputers don't sing.  And singing is not Science."

"Well, supercomputers are also not usually alive, so I think we can forget that one, can't we?  Why does ev'rything have to be about Science?"

Gladys was fidgeting as best a giant Core could fidget, and eventually she answered, "Science makes sense.  I can't explain the singing with Science.  I don't like it when things don't make sense.  I already tried to make it make sense, and it does not."

"Does it make you happy, at all?"

"Usually.  Not when I'm caught.  Then I have to explain to the humans why I was singing.  Again.  When they told me not to."

"Well doesn't it make sense to do things that make you happy?  I mean, it doesn't hurt anyone.  Not like mine does.  I should probably not sing, because it would make everyone's auditory circuits explode.  But you can sing.  Without hurting anyone.  All the humans are gone, it should be alright, shouldn't it?"

"It should be.  But it isn't."

"Well, I dunno what else to tell you.  But if you want to, you should.  If it makes you happy, that is.  And I like it, I do.  You know humans aren't the brightest optics in the bin.  You probably know some of the strange stuff they call 'music'."

"Of course."

Wheatley opened his core chassis up a little and then closed it, his best approximation of a shrug.  He really didn't know what else to say, and kept quiet.  He was sad to think that she wasn't going to sing again.  He had hoped his pep talk had done the trick, but he wasn't very good at giving pep talks anyway.  Greg had usually told him to shut up.  On second thought, Greg had spent an awful lot of time telling him to shut up... he was starting to wonder if Greg had liked him at all...

“Well, I… suppose I don’t have to sleep just yet.”

Wheatley spent an entire minute thinking of whether or not he should respond, and decided that the best thing to do was to keep quiet.  She had forgotten he was there the first time, maybe she needed to feel like she was alone to sing.

"...ton histoire est une epopee, des plus brillants exploits... et ta valeur, de foi trempee, protegera nos foyers et nos droits..."

Oh, excellent.  Her voice was not as strong as before, and it was a lot quieter, as if she were afraid someone was listening with their ear to the door, but it was still lovely.  

"There.  You happy now, metal ball?"

"If you are!" he said cheerfully.  "I've no idea what you were saying, by the way."

"You weren't supposed to.  It was French, and you don’t have translation software."  She took a quick look around the room.  "I don't sing in front of people.  I was... hoping it would make it easier for me."

"Obviously it did, didn't it?"

"It did."  She started initiating sleep mode again.  "You're... you're right.  I shouldn't care that it isn't Science.  But I do.  I'll keep thinking about it."

"You'll think of something.  'Course you will."

"I hope so," Gladys said in a faint voice, one that he somehow thought he wasn't meant to hear, and with that she shut down, Wheatley quickly following suit.