#arguablyalive

Lights flickered on around Alan and he found himself lying on a strange bed in some sort of room. At least, it appeared to be a room. Much of it consisted of clear walls and there was no visible door. In the background, a radio played a peppy tune. How’d he even get here? Wherever here was? An automated greeting had begun welcoming him to an “Enrichment Center,” but he barely heard it over his shock and confusion.

The woman stared hard at the ledge ahead of her. Down out of sight, a blue-edged gateway beckoned. Although she’d practiced this particular maneuver dozens of times before, it always required a high level of accuracy. Focusing all of her energy on her goal, Chell charged toward the precipice and the portal below. There was a bright flash in the event horizon just as she passed through. The small figure that emerged screamed as she sailed through the air, landing hard against the far wall.

Stunned, she stood for a moment, blinking away tears, fighting the urge to cry. Everything was unfamiliar. Nothing made sense. Suddenly, she felt very alone. Even more alone than she usually did. Wiping her face on her shoulder, she looked around. The room was mostly empty and oddly-shaped with some strange shapes in it.

Chell picked her way carefully through a wrecked frame house. It was twisted and mangled, from years of decay and bombardment. The air fell thick with ashes and smoke and sizzling smells of burning metal. Far off, it hummed with the ominous rumble of engines. But it was the house that held the woman's attention. Charred and crumbling as it was, it was the first sign of humanity that had appeared on the bleak landscape beyond the confinement of the Aperture Laboratories compound.

           The sound of engines grew louder. The things that had hunted her every step were returning.

           Hurrying now, Chell climbed over the ruins. She found a door knocked sideways and pulled it aside, half of it splintering away into coals in her hands. Beneath it was a staircase leading down into a basement. Darkness again. But she descended.

           All was quiet in the dark, and Chell let out a deep, coughing sigh of relief.

           Static.

           Something crackled in the corner. An old radio?