45 : ITS MY LIFE – Chapters Eleven and Twelve

Title: ITS MY LIFE!
Author: MarissaTheWriter
Media: Video game
Topic: Portal
Genre: Listed as Adventure/Drama…
URL: ITS MY LIFE! : Chapter Eleven
URL: ITS MY LIFE! : Chapter Twelve
Critiqued by Ghostcat

Howdy-do folks and welcome back to ITS MY LIFE, that miserable waste of digital paper that has proven to have more incomprehensible twists and turns than a soap opera family’s genealogical chart.

Once again I have combined two chapters; they are both short and incoherent, but I think I have managed to locate a few nuggets of snarkilicious gold in the dense streams of comically misspelled words.

Seriously, folks – spell-check is your friend. It will not laugh at you, or call you names, or wish fervently for your painful ritual dismemberment and lingering death.

Speaking of which – on to the riffing!

After you pay the five dollar cover charge, of course. Unless you’d like to have a word with Mr. Crowbar?

But first, a quick review – :reads notes: Insert tip of toothpick into space between teeth …

Oops. Wrong notes. :shuffles papers: Okay, here we go.

Marissa the Super-Sue went back in time and met her parents in high school, there were characters from another game, some evil clones of the same characters, a black hole that was never sealed up, and her mother died before she was born. Multiple time paradoxes were created with absolutely no consequences. Now she’s on her way back to her present with a past version of Wheatley. GLaDOS survived the death-punch and has now become Chell’s ass.

There, that was quick.

CHAPTER ELEVEN: RIES OF CHELLGADOS

:sigh:

There is, of course, an Author’s Note that is in ALL CAPS and chock-full of failure.

OK I WAS RONG ABOUT CAVE JONSON I THOT HIS NAME WAS GABE SO TO FIX THE PLOT HOLE, AFTER MARRISSA WENT TO FUTURE GABE JONSON CHANGED NAMED TO CAVE IN ONOR OF HIS DED BROTHER.

:headdesk:

To fix a simple misspelling the author decided to write in an evil twin rather than go back and change a character’s name. Said evil twin was then jump kicked so hard in the head by the good twin that his skull exploded, and then the good twin changed his name to the bad twin’s to honor him – the man who killed his girlfriend and attacked his daughter from the future.

I don’t believe the author is familiar with what constitutes a plot hole.

Marissa and Past-Wheatly arrive in Marissa’s time period and Past-Wheatly expresses himself in his usual faux-British fashion.

“Oh thank bloody god were finally back in the sodding present Marrissa!”

Okay, I’ve had enough of this.

:gets out baseball bat:

People, even idiotic robot-ball people, don’t talk like that. Stop it or I’ll hit you so hard upside your head you will swallow your own eyeballs.

Past-Wheatly isn’t from this time period, he belongs in the Near Past. If he stays in Marissa’s time period it will create a paradox – he will not be a part of the sequence of events that leads to his eventual death-punching, the destruction all nearly all the characters, and the little trip through time that allows him to be there in the first place.  There wouldn’t be a mutant robot ball/human baby hybrid to worry about, so there is an up side as well.

Marissa and Past-Wheatly are happy to be in Marissa’s time period, since it is nice and quiet now that all the bad guys are dead. Since Marissa did not offer Chell any kind of medical help and there was no one left after she jumped in the time machine, it could be assumed that Marissa is expecting to find her sister lying dead in a pool of her own ass-blood but sadly Chell is still alive and trapped in this wreck of a fic.

…some weerd noises started to come out of the walls lick something was climbin in im. The wall boomed up an a the scarryest thing ever came out it was… CHELL AN GLaDOS FUSIONED.

If your walls are booming you might have the bass turned too high. Try adjusting the treble instead. And I think the word you are groping for like a couple of teenagers in the backseat of a car is “fused” – Chell and GLaDOS are fused together.

“Hahaha Marrissa you didt make sure I was realy dead. Now I have fused with Chell an she is the body an I am the brane an butt (Becos shes a a**!)” Chell was all covered with robothings an wiers with GlaDOSs head were her booty was an sum tubes in Chell face

See – fused. That’s the word you need to use. Because it’s an actual word, not something you just made up.

I do agree with one thing – she is an ass. And by “she” I mean the author. It’s not clear if Chell is speaking for GLaDOS, or if the roborump talks and Chell just stands there quietly looking like a bargain-basement Borg. “CHELLGAODS” laughs and opens a door, revealing the two testing robots looking remarkably fit considering they had exploded when Marissa had her tantrum not long ago. There does seem to be something different with P-Body, though …

She had a big bumpy thing in her robot place.

Oh, hell.

Not again. You didn’t even know she was supposedly female until a little while ago, and now the robot is knocked up?

Actually, it makes slightly more sense for two robots to have an offspring than it does for a human and a robot to have one. I’m not sure why they didn’t just build a full-sized robot instead of implanting a small one in P-Body.

“Atlas you b**** you madded me preganent now I cant drink or smoke drugs!” P-Body was soo mad soundin but Atlas said “Well you sholda thot about that befour we-” “SHUT UP YOU TO AN KILL MARRISSA!” CHELLGaDOS interoperated, they looked mean at me but I was fed up with all this an just shot my power blast at them an Atlas an P-Body bloomed up.

Thank you, CHELLGaDOS. I did not want to hear about what Atlas and P-Body did to make a bumpy thing in her robot place.

So now the robots are dead (again) and Marissa can death-punch her sister’s roborump and everyone will live happily ever after, right?

Um … Yeah. Sure. If that means the exact opposite of what it says.

“Oh dear god save the queen its some bloody toobs!” Wheatly pointed up with eye an I look up an saw that toobs made Atlas an P-Body a gain!

Excuse me for a second.

:drives to author’s house:

:THWACK!:

I warned you.

The tubes are something that is kind of in-canon. During the two-person game, when the robots are in certain portions of the facility, the only way for them to get back to the testing areas if for GLaDOS to fizzle them (make them explode) and build them new bodies elsewhere in cylindrical bays that can move between the testing tracks like elevators. It does seem to be an effective way to abort a robofetus, since P-Body’s pregnancy isn’t mentioned again in this chapter.

Marissa does a “doble jump” (I assume this is supposed to be “double jump”  – where a video game character can jump a second time while in midair, something you can’t do in the Portal world.)  and grabs the tube, stuffing Past-Wheatly down the front of her jumpsuit at the same time. That’s a neat trick if you can manage it. Past-Wheatly is happy because he’s pressed against Marissa’s squishy jumpsuit hams as she climbs up the tube and “entered the walls behind.”

Huh.

That sounds very … kinky.

Unfortunately it’s also impossible, unless they are all in a test chamber. In the testing areas, the walls are made of individual panels held in place by robotic arms so that the area can be easily reconfigured. (You can watch a video of them in action here.) The only way to leave the self-contained testing tracks is either by successfully completing a puzzle (which allows you to move to the next testing chamber via an elevator) or by getting behind the wall panels somehow, usually via a broken panel.  The only way that Marissa could get into “the walls behind” would be if they were in the testing tracks the entire time. The areas behind these panels are the “behind-the-scenes” areas; manufacturing lines, maintenance areas, administration offices, that sort of thing. I had assumed that Marissa was already in these areas, since she makes no mention of having to solve puzzles to move from room to room, but I guess she has been in the testing track the entire time.

Of course, the author has neglected to describe anything regarding the physical space they occupy, so they could be in the testing tracks. It’s equally possible that they are at Disneyland.

Marissa sees strange writing while in the walls behind, including the infamous “the cake is a lie” and instantly knows that the only person who can stop CHELLGaDOS is … Ratman!

:headdesk:

Okay, there are hints of a character known as the Ratman in both games. At several points you can get behind the panels and find what are called Rat Dens, where the walls are covered in strange graffiti, and there are occasionally hints (like Xs drawn on test chamber walls where portals should be placed to solve the puzzle) but he is never actually seen or mentioned by any of the game characters. The only canon mention of him is in the Lab Rat comic, which reveals that he is an unmedicated schizophrenic named Doug Rattmann who hears voices.

Yes, that’s who I’d pick to defeat a brain-damaged woman with an evil roborump.

Marissa uses her Super Detective power to discover that “Rtaman” wrote the graffiti at around 10AM, which means that the “trale” is still hot. This is despite a complete lack of time references throughout the entire fic. I should also mention that the “the cake is a lie” Rat Den is discovered during the first game and Marissa’s time period is supposedly after the second game, which is separated by a very long but unspecified length of time. Long enough that the facility has fallen into utter ruin. The Lab Rat comic also implies that Ratman is either dead or in stasis by this time.

Marrisa runs off to find the Ratman, plowing through some waterfowl on her way.

I ran thru the air ducks dodgin fans an cleaner robots that keeped sayin I was soo pretty an asking me to date them so Wheatly said “F*** OFF YOU BLOODY BURGERS!” An they stopped makin words. There was a crumbly sound an I looked back, CHELLGaDOS was followin me thru the ducks!

“Bloody Burgers!” is my new favorite insult/curse.

Those poor, poor ducks. They are going to be so sore after this. And once again the terrible curse of the Mary-Sues, awesome beauty, strikes again. Marissa can’t even flee in terror without looking so damned gorgeous that random robots ask her out.

In the tradition of Awesome McEvils everywhere, CHELLGaDOS chooses this moment to shout out her motivations for everything she has done up until now.

“YOU CANNOT ESKAPE ME THIS TIME MARRISSA YOU WILL FINALLY DYE FOR STOPING ME FROM SEWISIDING AN BREAKIN MY TESTS!”

Wait, that’s what all of this has been about?

GLaDOS is still pissed that Marissa reanimated her after her first successful suicide? Hell, she’s died at least three times since then!

 If you want to commit suicide so badly stop coming back from the dead!

She was soo mad that she punched alls the way thrur part of the air duck an made Chells hand all bloody an bone. “YEOOUCH!” CHELLGaDOS yelled forgettin she was Chell an GlaDOS now so both feeled the same hurt.

CHELLGaDOS is a evil, duck-punching monstrosity who can’t even remember that they are two entities fused together. Chell’s brain damage must be contagious.

The air duck collapsed so it was a good thing my long boobs cold brake the fall.

I’ve heard things start to sag once you get older, but exactly how long was she running through the flocks of ducks?

When the duck collapses and she falls … somewhere, who do you think happens to be standing around under this unstable duck just waiting for someone to fall on him? The very person she was looking for!

Wow, that was lucky. Or bad writing. Probably the latter.

“Its a good thing we finally meet at last, Marrissa.” A strange lookin guy with thin an labcoat that was like cape say.

I’m not skipping anything, it goes right from her falling out of the ceiling to him double-talking. What I’d like to know is how they have never met, but she knew exactly who he was and where he was. She must have used her Super Detective power.

 “I am Ratman I fight a gainst the bad robots lick CHELLGaDOS an now we can teem up. Heer take this weapon its like GLaDOSs diskourage lazer beams but a gun.”

In the games there are lasers that are called Thermal Discouragement Beams; a device that has a Discouragement Beam and a laser has two of the same thing.

I’m somewhat curious as to how Ratman knows about CHELLGaDOS since they just fused together and he was nowhere near them when it happened. ( I assume it just happened, since Marissa-Sue seems to be queen of the Land of Eternally Now.) He was just standing around, waiting for Mary-Sues with long boobs to fall out of a duck.

Marissa declines the use of the double gun, possibly because she has run out of hands to hold things with, and shows off her powers by glowing and shooting off some electric stuff.

He got two of the lazer guns an put them on an said “Alrite Marrissa lets get ready to fight an kill CHELLGaDOS once an four all!” But I got kinna nervos becos then I wold have to kill my retorded sister an mom together too…

Why is she nervous? She has killed her both her mother/computer and her sister before and had few compunctions about either one dying. Is it because you’re not sure if you should count it as one murder-point or two?

Chapter Eleven ends with those ellipses and a short Author’s Note apologizing for the Chapter being so short (not short enough in my opinion) and promising something big in the next chapter:

THE NEXT ONE IS THE BIG FINAL BATTLE BETWEEN MARRISSA AN CHELLGADOS OR IS IT?

Considering there are six chapters after the next one, I’m sad to say that it’s not. But let’s find out together, shall we?

CHAPTER TWELF: THE FINAL BATTLE

Twelf? Seriously? That sounds like the name of one of Santa’s little helpers.

There is, of course, another Author’s Note at the beginning of the chapter. The author seems utterly baffled at the bad reviews she is getting – I’ve read a few and by this point they are getting increasingly more violent in their suggestions on what they would like to do to the author. One advocated removing her skin with a cheese grater and tossing her into a pool of alcohol, while another wants to set her feet on fire and throw her off a cliff. Both options are starting to sound pretty good.

The author also defends her choice of calling Chell and her ass-bot GLaDOS CHELLGaDOS;

I NO THAT GLADOS IS SPELLED GLADOS I CALLED HER FUSION CHELLGADOS BECOS CHELL ALREADY HAS THE LS AN IT SOUNDED MORE COOLER!

:sigh: Look, moron – GLaDOS in an acronym for Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System. Removing a letter, and therefore a word, from the middle of an acronym renders it fairly incomprehensible.

You know what would have made slightly more sense? Calling the unholy abomination ChellaDOS. If I were being forced at gunpoint to write a story like this, that’s what I would do.

The chapter picks up where the last one ends – with Ratman and Super Sue running through flocks of waterfowl. Past-Wheatly, being generally useless as he is a large metal ball stuffed down the front of of his baby-momma’s jumpsuit, can only growl in a threatening manner. (Marissa calls him a cheerleader, which seems like an insult to cheerleaders.) Within seconds they are in CHELLGaDOS’ “layer” where she is building special turrets;

 We intered the layer an saw CHELLGADOS buildin turrents but these ones was speshal becos they cold walk a round an shoot an stuff!

The turrets in the game are pretty useless; they can’t move, there is a clearly visible red beam shining out of each that helps you pinpoint where they are, and you can defeat them by simply knocking them over. Frankenturrets, designed by Wheatley when he is in charge of GLaDOS’ body, are able to move a little but cannot shoot. Turrets that can shoot and walk would be a definite improvement.

“INTURDER!” One of the turrents called to CHELLGADOS. CHELLGADOS looked at me with all the angry she ever had.

First it’s feces all the time and now there’s an inturder. I think the author has some latent coprophilia issues.

That’s a lot of angry, but somehow when she sees Ratman she manages to get even angrier. She takes out a portal gun that has been modified to “shoot bullets lick a reel gun but cold shoot portals to just in case” and shoots either a portal or a bullet at him, possibly both.

The impact of whatever it was that hit him was apparently enough to knock Ratman down, since the next paragraph begins with him getting up from … somewhere.

This is a problem I’ve run into over and over again – the author never describes any of the settings. I know most people who read fanfics are fans of that particular work and therefore familiar with the various settings in that universe, but that shouldn’t matter. It is the duty of the writer to engage the reader, to draw them in, not to cast them adrift in a formless void to wander about like a literary hobo.

Anyhoo – CHELLGaDOS and Marissa are both shocked when Ratman stands up and doesn’t just lay there bleeding to death like a good little minor character.

 “Silly CHELLGADOS you cannt hurt me becos…” He pulled down his pants an I saw that he had replased his man thingys with… the space an rick cores! “IVE GOT BALLS OF STEEL!” (Thats from a game called Duke Nukum Forever its funny) The space core was still thing he was in space but Rick was mad at been one off Ratmans tentacles.

His “man thingys” are now two sentient metal spheres the size of basketballs. And there are  tentacles down there as well.

:headdesk:

Someone please bring me several gallons of Brain Bleach, a large bottle of peach brandy, and a bendy straw.

The Space Core and Adventure Core (also known as Rick) are two of the three corrupt Personality Cores that are installed on Wheatley while he is in GLaDOS’ body during the final boss battle to force a core transfer and get GLaDOS reinstalled in her body before the facility explodes. When Wheatley is portalled to the Moon, at least one of the cores (the Space Core) is drawn out by the vacuum of space and should still be drifting somewhere in lunar orbit (If it wasn’t hit by that asteroid a few chapters back.) not crowded into some scientist’s pants.

How would he…

Why would he…

You know what? I don’t want to know.

This whole scene also implies that CHELLGaDOS shot Ratman in his man-thingys, which makes her kind of a bitch. My kind of bitch, but still – that’s a low blow.

Since her portal/bullet has no effect on Ratman, CHELLGaDOS decides to portal him into space and shoots another portal/bullet at him. (Again, that’s not how portals work.) The portal/bullet opens up directly under his feet and he is sucked into space.

Only he isn’t.

As the bullet-portal opens he cries out that Chell is his daughter and is sucked into space. Somehow he manages to cling to the edge of the portal/bullet and deliver some exposition to his shocked audience.

“OMG HOW?” CHELLGADOS an me said at the same time to gether. “It all storted a long time ago…” Ratman gave us the down lo as he was just barely hanging on to the portal. “I used to work for Gabe Jonson affer he changed his name to Cave in onor of his dead brother.

Repeating an asinine thing over and over doesn’t make it sound any less stupid.

Caroline was got shot as you no Marrissa an was put in a robot body that was called… GLaDOS!” CHELLGADOS o-mouthed at his shockin words. “Gabe new he wold have to dotters named Marrissa an Chell but since GLaDOS was a prototip she an Cave coldnt make baby normal way an instead used the artificial enseamanation an grew test toob babys.

That would be the “normal way” a man and a sentient computer system would have children. I’m picturing a very awkward “the birds and the bees” talk once the girls got old enough to want to know where babies come from.

“You see, honey – when a man loves his computer very, very much, they interface in a very special way…”

But there was a miksup an my dna got used instead of Gabes for tne of the toobs that toob was… CHELL!”

There was a mix-up with the baby-juice. And that happened … how, exactly? Did he trip over the edge of the rug in the lab and accidentally masturbate into the collection cup?

None of that explains where the eggs came from – since Whatshername died before being installed in GLaDOS, she would lack the equipment to produce  viable ova (super-powered or not).

Then Rutman coldnt hold on any longer an fell into space an died.

At least Space Core/Testicle/Tentacle will be happy that it’s back in space.

During this entire exchange none of the characters make an attempt to rescue Ratman, who is clinging to the edge of a portal and fighting the vacuum of space so he can deliver a few confusing sentences of conflicting back story. None of the other characters are affected by the vacuum; they just stand there looking shocked as a pants-less man with giant steel testicles gets sucked into space. The portal remains open until a few paragraphs later, when it is replaced by a black hole.

Because apparently this story doesn’t suck enough.

After her father is sucked into the vastness of space to die a horrible and painful death, CHELLGaDOS starts shaking. It’s Chell, fighting against GLaDOS’ control. She begs Marissa to kill her, but Marissa sees this as a sign that Chell’s brain damage is gone so she can’t kill her.

So brain damage and Booty Quaking = multiple headshots, while no brain damage and evil roborump = beloved sister worth saving?

Marissa also remembers that Chell’s ass-bot GLaDOS was once Whatshername, who is her mother, and decides she can’t kill her either.

GLaDOS regains control of Chell’s body and begins to … power up.

Because now she has superpowers.

:sigh:

Of course she does.

I looked up an saw CHELLGADOS was floatin in air an electric stuff was comin out off her. “THANKS MARRISSA YUO REMINDED ME THAT I USED TO BE CARALIN SO I REMBERED THAT I HAVE POWERS TOO!” I o-mouthed, that dumb ingineer forgot to make it so only I gotted the powers!

:headdesk:

You are not in Whatshername’s body, you are in Chell’s body. Chell is never described as having any sort of superpower in any of the source materials or at any point in this fic before now. As one of Whatshername/GLaDOS’ daughters, Chell has the same potential for superpowers that Marissa does, unless the injection the Ingineer gave Whatshername was designed specifically to seek out the random zygote that would one day become our Super Sue. Although given the fact that Whatshername’s physical body died shortly after receiving the injection, neither one of them should have any sort of powers at all.

And now my head hurts.

Marissa is feeling helpless, even though she has demonstrated several powers that would be useful in this situation, including her death-punching MEGA PAWNCH and Super Explody Powers. I guess feeling conflicted about killing someone you’ve already killed could affect your superpowers. If it were me, I’d throw the useless robot-ball baby-daddy at the abomination and run as fast as my lung long fall boobs boots could carry me. The author feels differently.

Time to deploy the robots who conveniently appear from out of nowhere!

They call Marissa a b**** and tell her that they are there as back-up, when Marissa asks why they are helping her, this is how they explain it;

“Becos CHELLGADOS is half yur sister an we dont lick you so we dont lick Chell neither!” Atlas eksplained. “An I rembered that you gave us the drugs an beer in the first place so if it wasnt for you we woldnt have drugs an beer!” P-Body added an Atlas nodded like yeah!

What the what now?

You don’t like Chell because she’s Marissa’s sister, so you are going to help Marissa (the woman you hate) to defeat the woman you hate only because she is related to the woman you are helping defeat her? That would be like going to a restaurant and ordering steamed crab legs because you hate crab cakes.

All three shoot portals at CHELLGADOS and the portals join together to form a black hole. (Again, not how portals work.) The black hole, which has a gravity well sufficient to compress entire worlds down to the size of a soda can, does not affect anyone in the room with the exception of CHELLGADOS. The roborump and assorted bits of machinery sticking out of Chell are sucked out of her and into the black hole. The three close the black hole portal and Chell falls onto the floor.

I’m sorry, will you excuse me again?

:drives to author’s house:

:THWACK!:

As I’ve explained before, that is not how black holes work. Do your damned research.

And now I’ve broken a perfectly good bat.

Marissa is thrilled that her sister is now ass-less and no longer controlled by her computer/mother, but is strangely unaffected by the thought of her computer/mother being compressed into a grain of sand in the heart of a black hole.

 “Chell I safed you!” I rant to my sister an gave her hug. “Marrissa Im sorry, but the damaje from GLaDOS was to much…” An she dyed in my arms. “Nooooo Chell my sister you are died!” I cried soooo much an Whealty cried to becos they was frends even Atlas an P-Body looked kinna sad.

Aww… Super-Sue has a sad now.

Maybe you should shoot her corpse in the head, that’s always cheered you up in the past.

The next bit is my favorite.

:gets out popcorn:

I put down Chells body an stand up when there was a clikclak nose be hind me. “LOL we tricked you to get yur guard down Marrissa! Now die b****!” An Atlas an P-Body lolled an shot me in head. “Marrissa!” Wheatly screamed an ever thing got really black an I died.

WOOOO-HOOOO!!! SHE’S DEAD!

:does joyful happy dance:

I know it won’t last because she’s a Mary Sue and she will find some way to come back from the dead, but right now I’m just so happy!

:turns cartwheels:

Bendy straws for everyone!

---