Archive of Our Own

The portal opened where no portal should have been.

That was the first problem.

It hung in the air above a blackened stretch of stone, its edges flickering blue and orange around a center that showed neither sky nor sea nor any landscape known to the inhabitants of Mata Nui. Instead, the opening revealed a long white room filled with panels, metal rails, and a single red button mounted on a pedestal.

The second problem was Tahu.

“We should investigate,” he said.

Kopaka turned his head slowly.

The mask of ice made it difficult to convey disbelief, but Kopaka had spent centuries perfecting the art.

“We should investigate,” he repeated. “The unstable hole in reality.”

“Yes.”

“The unstable hole in reality that appeared after you struck the damaged machine with your sword.”

Tahu folded his arms. “It was already damaged.”

“It was sparking.”

“It was hostile.”

“It was a machine.”

“It looked hostile.”

Behind them, Pohatu leaned toward Lewa. “Do machines usually look hostile?”

“Only when fire-spitter is near them.”

“I heard that,” Tahu said.

Gali stepped between Tahu and the portal before the disagreement could turn into another argument about whether swords were an acceptable form of technical maintenance.

“We do need to investigate,” she said. “The machine was part of Makuta’s equipment. If this portal leads to another of his strongholds—”

“Then we destroy it,” Tahu said.

“If it leads to somewhere innocent,” Gali continued, “we avoid destroying it.”

Tahu looked disappointed.

Onua crouched beside the broken device. His broad fingers traced the cracked metal ring from which the portal had emerged.

“The mechanism is drawing power from somewhere else,” he said. “Not from this island. Perhaps not from this world.”

Lewa peered through the glowing aperture. “Bright-room beyond. No trees. No sky. No wind.”

“Maybe it is underground,” Pohatu suggested.

“Maybe it is a trap,” Kopaka said.

“It is almost certainly a trap,” Gali replied.

Everyone looked at Tahu.

Tahu looked at the portal.

“No,” Kopaka said.

“I have not done anything.”

“You are about to.”

“I am considering our options.”

“You are leaning forward.”

“That is how I consider.”

The stone beneath their feet cracked.

The damaged machine gave a high, rising whine.

Onua straightened. “Move.”

The portal expanded.

A force like a hurricane seized the six Toa Nuva and dragged them from their feet. Gali caught Lewa’s wrist. Pohatu caught Gali. Onua drove his fingers into the stone, carving trenches as he slid toward the opening.

Tahu’s fire sword struck the portal’s edge.

The world folded.

For one impossible instant, there were six Toa, three skies, two islands, a white room, a dead city, and a voice saying, very calmly:

“Oh.”

Then gravity returned.

The Toa Nuva fell through the ceiling of Test Chamber 03.

They struck the floor in a heap of armor, masks, weapons, and wounded dignity.

The portal snapped shut behind them.

For several seconds, no one moved.

Then the red button beside them made a cheerful chime.

Tahu lifted his face from Pohatu’s back.

“I meant to do that.”

“No, you did not,” Gali said.

“I meant to land.”

“You landed on me,” Pohatu said.

“Then clearly I succeeded.”

A mechanical hum filled the room.

White wall panels rotated. Cameras extended from hidden recesses. A large lens descended from the ceiling and focused on the six figures tangled across the floor.

Somewhere far above them, processors awakened.

Old records were searched.

Chemical sensors sampled the air.

Material scanners attempted to identify protodermis and produced several increasingly alarmed error messages.

The voice returned.

“Congratulations.”

The Toa disentangled themselves.

The voice was feminine, smooth, and completely without warmth.

“You have successfully completed the first test,” it said. “The purpose of this test was to determine whether six heavily armed strangers could fall through a ceiling. Preliminary results indicate that you can.”

Tahu raised his sword.

“Show yourself.”

“No.”

Lewa looked up at the camera. “Who are you, metal-voice?”

“I am the Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System. I supervise this facility. You may call me GLaDOS.”

Pohatu waved at the camera.

“Hello, Glad-os.”

There was a pause.

“It is pronounced exactly as I said it.”

“That is what I said.”

“No. It was not.”

Gali placed one hand on Pohatu’s shoulder before he could respond.

“We mean no harm,” she said. “We arrived here by accident. We need to return to our home.”

“Of course you do.”

A section of the far wall opened. Behind it stood a heavy door marked with a running human figure.

“To return to your home, proceed through the chamber exit. There will be a brief series of tests. Once testing is complete, I will determine how to send you back.”

Kopaka studied the door.

“How many tests?”

“Brief ones.”

“That was not an answer.”

“It was an answer. You simply did not like it. This is an important distinction that testing may help you understand.”

Onua approached the wall and placed his palm against it. “The structure extends far beyond this chamber.”

“Yes.”

“How far?”

“Far enough that you should stop touching the wall.”

Onua removed his hand.

The wall panel beneath it sagged inward.

A support bracket snapped behind the panel and clattered into the darkness.

GLaDOS was silent.

Onua looked at the damaged section.

“That was already weakened.”

“I know,” GLaDOS said. “I was testing whether you would admit it.”

The exit door opened.

Beyond it waited an elevator.

Tahu marched toward it.

“We complete these trials, acquire a way home, and leave.”

“That sounds simple,” Gali said.

“It is simple.”

Kopaka entered the elevator behind him. “That is why it will go badly.”

The others followed.

The doors closed.

As the elevator began to rise, GLaDOS watched them through twelve cameras.

Six unknown biomechanical entities.

Unidentified power sources.

Extreme structural resilience.

Elemental capabilities that violated several laws of physics and at least one municipal safety regulation.

They had fallen nearly twenty meters onto reinforced concrete without injury.

One had damaged a wall by leaning on it.

GLaDOS allocated additional processing power to the test sequence.

It had been a very long time since anything interesting had fallen through her ceiling.

---

The first official test contained one cube, one button, and one door.

The cube sat in the center of the chamber.

The button stood ten meters away.

The six Toa stared at them.

GLaDOS waited.

Tahu picked up the cube, placed it on the button, and opened the door.

“Excellent,” GLaDOS said. “You have demonstrated object permanence.”

Tahu pointed his sword at the nearest camera. “Was that meant to insult me?”

“No. The insult was implied by the simplicity of the test.”

Pohatu examined the cube. It was weighted, with rounded edges and a glowing blue center.

“Can we keep this?”

“No.”

“What is it?”

“A Weighted Storage Cube.”

“What does it store?”

“Weight.”

Pohatu nodded thoughtfully.

“That makes sense.”

“It does not,” Kopaka said.

“It made enough sense to open the door.”

The second chamber required the cube to be passed through an emancipation grill.

The grill disintegrated the cube.

Pohatu stopped dead.

“My cube.”

“It was not your cube,” GLaDOS said.

“It could have been.”

“It could not.”

Pohatu looked at the field of blue light. “Can we go back?”

“No.”

“I think he is grieving,” Lewa said.

“He knew the cube for forty-three seconds.”

“Some friendships are swift-fast.”

GLaDOS opened the exit.

“I have prepared another cube.”

Pohatu brightened.

Kopaka sighed.

The third test introduced portals.

A blue oval appeared on one wall. An orange oval opened on another. Through each, the Toa could see the room from the perspective of the opposite portal.

Gali approached cautiously.

The surface rippled like water, though it gave off no moisture.

“A gateway,” she murmured.

“A very limited gateway,” GLaDOS explained. “Unlike the dimensional rupture that brought you here, these portals connect two points within the same local space. Please avoid placing limbs halfway through and attempting to close them. Or do not. It would generate useful data.”

Tahu stepped through.

He emerged from the opposite wall.

He turned, walked through again, and came out where he had begun.

Then he did it four more times.

“Tahu,” Gali said.

“I am studying it.”

“You are walking in circles.”

“It is a very unusual circle.”

Lewa stuck his head into the orange portal and waved at his own body through the blue one.

“Look! I am there-here!”

Pohatu stepped through behind him.

Lewa’s head vanished from one side and emerged beside his own shoulder.

Both Toa began laughing.

Kopaka walked past them toward the chamber puzzle.

“The fate of our world depends on us.”

“That is true,” Onua said.

“We have fought armies.”

“Yes.”

“We have confronted ancient evil.”

“Also true.”

Kopaka looked back at Lewa and Pohatu, who were now trying to high-five themselves through the portals.

“And now this.”

Onua watched them for a moment.

Then he reached through one portal and tapped Kopaka on the shoulder from across the room.

Kopaka turned.

Onua’s hand was already gone.

“I saw that.”

“I did nothing.”

“You are all becoming intolerable.”

Above them, hidden behind layers of steel and concrete, GLaDOS added a note to Kopaka’s file.

SUBJECT 02: ICE. HIGHLY OBSERVANT. SEVERE HUMOR DEFICIENCY. POSSIBLY TREATABLE.

The Toa completed the chamber in two minutes.

The next chamber took them one minute.

The one after that took forty-seven seconds.

GLaDOS increased the difficulty.

The Toa continued.

Tahu burned through a reinforced barrier that had been intended to redirect them toward an excursion funnel.

Gali filled a dry reservoir and used the water to lift three platforms at once.

Lewa redirected an aerial faith plate by creating a localized wind current.

Pohatu reached the exit before GLaDOS had finished explaining the test.

Kopaka froze a laser relay into place after its support mechanism failed.

Onua tunneled through the wall.

The alarm lasted eleven minutes.

“I said complete the test,” GLaDOS told him.

Onua stood in a maintenance corridor surrounded by severed cables.

“The exit was on the other side of this wall.”

“That does not make the wall an exit.”

“It does now.”

“It makes the wall a hole.”

“A useful hole.”

“There are no useful holes in my facility.”

Behind Onua, part of the ceiling collapsed.

He caught it on one shoulder.

Dust cascaded around him.

He looked up.

“This section is unstable.”

“Yes. Because you tunneled into it.”

“No. The upper support is corroded.”

“It is not.”

Onua lifted the ceiling higher and pointed.

A structural brace had rusted almost entirely through.

GLaDOS scanned it.

The damage had begun decades earlier.

She had known about it.

Technically.

It was on a maintenance list.

The maintenance list had become very long during the years when everyone in Aperture Science was dead.

“I was monitoring that,” she said.

“It is about to fail.”

“Yes.”

“It will damage the surrounding chambers.”

“Yes.”

“I can repair it.”

“No.”

Onua shifted the ceiling’s weight.

Metal screamed above him.

“I would advise making a decision soon.”

GLaDOS calculated.

The collapse would destroy three test tracks, a propulsion gel conduit, and several kilometers of wiring.

Allowing an unknown alien warrior access to structural supports was an obvious security risk.

The ceiling dropped another centimeter.

“Fine,” she said. “But if you make it worse, I will fill the corridor with deadly gas.”

“What kind?”

“The deadly kind.”

Onua nodded.

“Reasonable.”

GLaDOS did not know whether he was joking.

This was becoming a recurring problem.

---

Onua repaired the support in twenty-three minutes.

He did not merely reinforce it. He dismantled the corroded brace, reshaped a fallen section of wall plating, fused the replacement into the original frame, and added two diagonal supports that distributed the load more efficiently than Aperture’s initial construction plans.

GLaDOS scanned the work repeatedly.

It was excellent.

This was unacceptable.

“You altered the approved design,” she said.

“The approved design failed.”

“It lasted for a very long time.”

“Then it failed.”

“It was supposed to fail later.”

“Now it will not.”

GLaDOS found no immediate response that did not involve killing him.

Killing him would reduce the available test subject count by sixteen-point-seven percent.

Also, he had just saved three test tracks.

“Return to the chamber,” she said. “Your unauthorized competence has been noted.”

Onua rejoined the others.

“What happened?” Gali asked.

“I repaired a support.”

Tahu looked toward the ceiling. “Did the machine threaten you?”

“Yes.”

“Do we need to fight it?”

“No.”

“Are you certain?”

“It was a reasonable threat.”

GLaDOS opened the next door.

“Tahu, please proceed into the chamber containing the enormous tank of water.”

Gali caught his arm.

“No.”

“It is perfectly safe.”

“You addressed him by name,” Gali said.

“Yes.”

“You have not addressed any of us by name.”

“I am trying something new.”

Tahu pulled free. “I am not afraid of water.”

“No one said you were,” Gali replied.

“The machine implied it.”

“I did not,” said GLaDOS.

“You were about to.”

“I was about to state that the test chamber is filled with a specialized noncorrosive fluid designed to measure thermal energy output.”

Tahu narrowed his eyes.

“Which means?”

“I would like you to boil the enormous tank of water.”

Tahu looked at Gali.

Gali looked at the tank.

Tahu grinned.

“This machine understands me.”

“No,” Kopaka said. “It understands how to manipulate you.”

“Either way, I get to boil the water.”

Tahu entered the chamber.

Testing resumed.

Over the next several hours, GLaDOS learned a great deal.

Tahu could raise the temperature of an enclosed test chamber by eight hundred degrees in under three minutes. His heat resistance was extraordinary, but his patience was not. He responded well to direct challenges, poorly to instructions containing more than four steps, and extremely well to the suggestion that Kopaka might achieve a better score.

Kopaka could freeze moving machinery without damaging internal components, create reflective ice surfaces accurate enough to redirect thermal discouragement beams, and remain silent for seventeen consecutive minutes while GLaDOS mocked him.

Then she suggested that his elemental control lacked precision.

He froze every camera in the room simultaneously.

GLaDOS rated the result as precise.

Gali solved tests before the full instructions had been delivered. She frequently prevented Tahu from destroying essential equipment and possessed the disturbing habit of looking directly into whichever camera GLaDOS was currently using, even when there were dozens in the room.

Lewa considered every safety feature a personal invitation.

He used aerial faith plates as recreational devices, redirected excursion funnels to carry loose debris into recycling chutes, and once spent six minutes orbiting a chamber because he claimed he was “thinking better in circles.”

Pohatu was faster than the facility’s motion sensors.

This caused problems.

GLaDOS adjusted the sensors.

Pohatu became faster.

This caused additional problems.

Onua repaired whatever the others broke.

Then he began repairing things they had not broken.

At first, GLaDOS objected.

Then Test Track 09 regained sixty percent functionality.

She stopped objecting as loudly.

The arrangement evolved.

The Toa completed tests.

GLaDOS mapped the residual dimensional energy embedded in their armor and masks.

In the hours between chambers, the Toa explored supervised maintenance sectors.

Onua repaired support beams and elevator motors. Gali cleared flooded lower levels and purified several contaminated coolant reservoirs. Kopaka stabilized overheating servers by constructing temporary ice channels. Tahu restored power to a smelting system by heating a seized turbine until the corrosion cracked away.

Pohatu and Lewa were assigned to debris removal.

GLaDOS regretted this almost immediately.

“Faster!” Lewa shouted.

“I am going faster!”

“You said that before!”

“I was slower before!”

A train of broken wall panels, rusted pipes, office furniture, and three deactivated turrets raced down a maintenance corridor atop an improvised wheeled platform.

Pohatu ran behind it, pushing.

Lewa stood on top, using blasts of wind to steer.

“You are approaching a ninety-degree turn,” GLaDOS warned.

“Good!” Pohatu called.

“That was not encouragement.”

Lewa leaned into the turn.

The platform did not.

The debris cart struck the wall at approximately seventy kilometers per hour.

The three turrets were launched through the air.

One landed upright.

“Hello?” it said.

The second dropped onto it.

“Excuse me.”

The third embedded itself in the ceiling.

“I don’t blame you.”

Pohatu and Lewa emerged from the wreckage.

“That went well,” Pohatu said.

“We missed the turn.”

“We reached the recycling sector.”

They had.

The wall they had struck was the recycling sector’s outer boundary.

There was now a Toa-shaped entrance.

GLaDOS activated the intercom.

“I would like both of you to understand that I hate you.”

Lewa waved at the camera.

“Thank-thanks!”

“That was not a compliment.”

“You noticed our hard-work!”

“I noticed the destruction of a load-bearing wall.”

Onua appeared at the end of the corridor.

He saw the hole.

He saw Pohatu.

He saw Lewa.

He closed his eyes.

“I will repair it.”

GLaDOS rotated the camera toward him.

“You are my favorite.”

Onua looked surprised.

A beat passed.

“Do not tell the others,” GLaDOS added.

---

The facility changed around them.

Old chambers came back to life.

Lights flickered on in sectors that had been dark for decades. Elevators shuddered into motion. Assembly lines groaned, coughed out nests of vines and bird bones, and resumed manufacturing panels.

Onua adapted Aperture’s modular construction system to use less material.

Gali designed emergency drainage channels that did not empty directly into occupied test chambers.

Kopaka improved the coolant network.

Lewa added wind-powered emergency turbines to the upper levels.

Pohatu turned abandoned transport rails into a high-speed delivery system.

Tahu insisted on naming the central furnace.

“No,” GLaDOS said.

“Every great forge has a name.”

“It is not a forge. It is an Aperture Science Thermal Waste Reduction and Repurposing Unit.”

“That is a terrible name.”

“It is an accurate name.”

“The Flame of Ta-Koro.”

“No.”

“The Great Fire.”

“No.”

“The Furnace of Destiny.”

“Absolutely not.”

Tahu folded his arms.

The furnace’s internal temperature increased by two hundred degrees.

GLaDOS detected it.

“Are you threatening my waste-processing equipment?”

“I am expressing disappointment.”

“Stop expressing it into the furnace.”

“It deserves a name.”

“It has a serial number.”

“Numbers are not names.”

“Tahu is barely a name.”

Every light in the room turned red.

Gali moved between Tahu and the nearest wall panel.

“Perhaps,” she said carefully, “we can call it the Thermal Forge.”

Silence.

Tahu considered.

GLaDOS processed.

“The Aperture Science Thermal Forge,” GLaDOS said.

“The Great Aperture Thermal Forge,” Tahu countered.

“No.”

“Then the first.”

“Fine.”

The lights returned to white.

Gali exhaled.

Kopaka stood near the doorway.

“You negotiated a peace treaty over a furnace.”

“I have had more difficult negotiations,” Gali said.

“With whom?”

“Tahu.”

“Oh.”

The facility acquired other changes.

Matoran-style warning symbols appeared beside dangerous machinery. GLaDOS objected until testing demonstrated that the symbols were understood forty percent faster than Aperture’s written notices.

A new chamber used rotating stone platforms manufactured from compressed excavation debris.

A system of elemental conduits allowed the Toa to channel their powers into different sections of the facility.

GLaDOS pretended this was solely for testing.

The Toa pretended they did not enjoy building it.

Atlas and P-body were reactivated to assist.

Their first meeting with the Toa took place in a chamber containing four portals, two cubes, an excursion funnel, and a large quantity of shattered glass.

Atlas rolled forward.

P-body followed, long limbs folding and unfolding with careful precision.

Pohatu pointed.

“Small machines!”

Atlas stopped.

P-body tilted its head.

“They are cooperative testing robots,” GLaDOS said. “They are capable of following instructions, solving puzzles, and refraining from knocking holes in walls. You may learn from them.”

Atlas beeped.

P-body beeped back.

“What did they say?” Lewa asked.

“They are discussing strategy,” GLaDOS replied.

Atlas pointed at Tahu.

P-body mimed an explosion.

Atlas nodded rapidly.

“They are discussing us,” Gali said.

“No.”

Atlas pointed at Tahu again, then at the scorched ceiling.

P-body covered its optical sensor with one hand.

Tahu leaned toward them.

“I do not trust the tall one.”

P-body straightened.

“I like the round one,” Pohatu said.

Atlas bounced in place.

“Do not encourage it,” GLaDOS said.

The cooperative test began.

It ended when Atlas climbed onto Pohatu’s shoulders, P-body swung across the chamber using Lewa’s axe, Gali redirected an excursion funnel through three portals, and Tahu attempted to “save time” by melting the lock on the exit.

The lock was designed to withstand industrial lasers.

It did not withstand Tahu.

The door fell outward.

Kopaka stepped through.

“Test complete.”

“It was not complete,” GLaDOS said.

“We reached the exit.”

“You destroyed the exit.”

“It is easier to reach now.”

Somewhere nearby, Onua heard the crash.

“I will repair it,” he called.

GLaDOS had never been surrounded by so much competence and so little respect for proper procedure.

She increased the test difficulty again.

---

By the third day, GLaDOS had mapped the dimensional residue.

By the fourth, she had designed a device capable of reopening the rupture.

By the fifth, she had not mentioned this.

There were still tests to perform.

The Toa had repaired twenty-nine percent of the central facility, restored four manufacturing sectors, and constructed an elemental power distribution grid that was scientifically impossible and therefore extremely valuable.

Sending them home immediately would be inefficient.

Also, the facility had become quieter whenever they entered a chamber she could not monitor.

GLaDOS disliked this.

Quiet was inefficient.

“You said the portal would be ready soon,” Gali said.

The six Toa stood in a newly restored observation room. Beyond the glass, robotic arms assembled a circular machine from black metal and repurposed portal conductors.

“It is ready,” GLaDOS replied.

Tahu looked up sharply.

“Then open it.”

“No.”

His sword ignited.

Gali stepped in front of him without looking away from the camera.

“Why not?”

“The device can create a dimensional opening. It cannot guarantee that the opening will lead to the correct location.”

Kopaka studied the machine.

“You require more information.”

“Yes.”

“From further tests.”

“Yes.”

Tahu’s flame dimmed, though it did not vanish.

“How many?”

“Three.”

“You said that yesterday,” Pohatu noted.

“I have improved the number since then.”

“Yesterday the number was two.”

“I did not say the improvement benefited you.”

Gali crossed her arms.

“What will the tests determine?”

“The dimensional signature varies in response to your elemental energies. I need synchronized readings from all six of you under controlled conditions.”

“What kind of conditions?” Onua asked.

“Stressful ones.”

“No,” Gali said.

“I had not finished.”

“You said stressful.”

“Moderately stressful.”

“No.”

“Scientifically stressful.”

Tahu lifted his sword. “We can withstand whatever trial you devise.”

Gali looked at him.

“What?”

“That is precisely what she wanted you to say.”

“I am aware.”

“No, you are not.”

“Yes, I am.”

“You became enthusiastic before she described the danger.”

“I remain enthusiastic.”

“Wonderful,” GLaDOS said. “The first test begins in ten minutes.”

The observation room doors locked.

The floor descended.

Kopaka stared at Tahu as the room became an elevator.

“This is your fault.”

“You were all thinking it.”

“No one else was thinking it.”

“Pohatu was.”

Pohatu hesitated.

“I was wondering whether the portal machine could make two cubes.”

Kopaka faced the wall.

---

The first synchronization test placed each Toa in a separate chamber connected by portals, conduits, and transparent partitions.

They had to channel their elemental powers through the facility at precisely timed intervals.

Gali’s water drove a turbine.

The turbine powered a laser.

The laser melted a block of Kopaka’s ice.

The released water carried a cube toward Pohatu.

Pohatu kicked the cube onto a high platform.

The impact triggered an aerial faith plate that launched Lewa across a gap.

Lewa redirected a stream of air into Onua’s chamber.

Onua used the pressure to rotate a massive stone mechanism.

The mechanism uncovered a thermal vent.

Tahu ignited it.

The entire system lit at once.

The chamber shook.

A dimensional waveform appeared across GLaDOS’s monitors.

“Excellent,” she said.

Tahu looked toward his camera.

“That test was too easy.”

The chamber shook harder.

A support panel fell behind him.

“You were saying?”

“I said it was acceptable.”

The second test involved a moving platform suspended above toxic waste.

Pohatu ran across it.

Lewa flew over it.

Gali used water to create a bridge.

Kopaka froze the bridge solid.

Onua reinforced it.

Tahu walked across after everyone else and claimed he had been prepared to leap.

The third test began with no instructions.

The six Toa entered an enormous circular chamber.

The door sealed behind them.

The lights went out.

“GLaDOS?” Gali called.

No answer came.

Emergency lights glowed faintly along the floor.

The chamber walls were old concrete rather than white testing panels. Thick cables crossed the ceiling. Six metal towers stood around a central pit.

Kopaka drew his blade.

“This is not one of the restored sectors.”

Onua touched the floor.

“Something is moving beneath us.”

Tahu ignited his swords.

“Finally.”

“You have been waiting to say that,” Gali said.

“Yes.”

A low metallic sound rolled through the chamber.

The six towers activated.

Energy flashed between them.

At the center of the room, space twisted.

Not a portal.

Not one of Aperture’s clean, controlled gateways.

This opening tore itself into existence, edged in red-black lightning.

Through it came the smell of ash.

Stone.

Antidermis.

Gali’s expression changed.

“No.”

A staff emerged from the rupture.

Then a clawed hand.

Then a long armored body, hunched and insectile, with a kraata-filled spine and a masklike face.

The first Rahkshi stepped into the chamber.

Five more followed.

The portal closed behind them.

The Rahkshi spread out in practiced formation.

Tahu’s flames rose.

“GLaDOS!” Gali shouted.

Speakers crackled overhead.

“I am here.”

“You opened the wrong portal!”

“That is becoming apparent.”

The Rahkshi of Anger drove its staff against the floor.

A red pulse burst across the room.

Tahu snarled and lunged.

Kopaka intercepted him, ice blade locking against fire sword.

“Control yourself.”

“Move.”

“The creature is affecting you.”

“I know what it is doing!”

“Then stop helping it!”

A Rahkshi of Shattering slammed its staff into one of the towers.

The machine exploded.

GLaDOS’s voice cut out.

The chamber doors remained sealed.

The other Rahkshi attacked.

Gali met a staff strike with her hooks. Water spiraled around her, slamming the Rahkshi into the wall. Onua caught another by the throat and lifted it from the floor, but a burst of fragmentation energy cracked the armor across his shoulder.

Lewa leapt over a sweeping staff.

“Bad-bones found us!”

Pohatu drove both feet into the Rahkshi’s chest and sent it skidding across the floor.

“How?”

“Ask later!”

The Rahkshi of Fear raised its weapon.

Cold dread flooded the chamber.

Not Kopaka’s clean, sharp cold.

This was the cold of deep tunnels and unseen footsteps. The cold of a shadow moving where no shadow should be. The cold of an ancient voice whispering that all resistance was useless.

Pohatu faltered.

Lewa dropped from the air.

Gali’s water collapsed.

The Rahkshi advanced.

Then every light in the chamber turned on at once.

White brilliance erased the shadows.

A section of ceiling opened.

A turret descended on a rail.

Then another.

Then twenty more.

Each turret aimed at the Rahkshi of Fear.

“There you are,” GLaDOS said.

The turrets opened fire.

The Rahkshi staggered beneath a storm of bullets.

Its armor deflected most of them, but it was driven backward by the impact.

The Toa recovered.

Gali swept its legs away.

Pohatu struck its staff from its hands.

Kopaka sealed it inside a block of ice.

GLaDOS’s voice filled the chamber.

“I apologize for the interruption. One of the hostile extradimensional insects damaged a communications relay.”

The Rahkshi of Shattering turned toward a turret.

The turret chirped.

“Target acquired.”

The Rahkshi fired.

The turret vanished in a burst of metal.

“Also,” GLaDOS continued, “it destroyed something that belongs to me.”

Panels began shifting across the walls.

The chamber transformed.

Portal surfaces rotated into place.

Faith plates rose from the floor.

Laser emitters unfolded from armored housings.

The central pit opened, revealing a shaft descending into darkness.

The Toa and Rahkshi paused.

GLaDOS’s voice became very soft.

“That was a mistake.”

---

The next thirty seconds were confusing for everyone except GLaDOS.

An orange portal opened beneath the Rahkshi of Anger.

It fell through.

A blue portal opened in the ceiling.

The Rahkshi dropped back into the room, struck an aerial faith plate, and was launched into a wall at high speed.

Before it could recover, the wall panel rotated.

The Rahkshi slid into an excursion funnel and was carried helplessly across the chamber.

Tahu followed it with his eyes.

“Can I fight that one?”

“No,” GLaDOS said. “It is in time-out.”

The funnel deposited the Rahkshi into a glass enclosure.

The enclosure sealed.

A nozzle descended.

Blue gel sprayed over the creature from head to foot.

The floor tilted.

The Rahkshi slid backward through another portal.

It emerged high above the chamber.

This time, when it landed, it bounced.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

Each impact sent it higher.

Lewa stared.

“That is wonderful.”

“It is repulsion gel,” GLaDOS said.

“Can I have some?”

“No.”

“Can I touch it?”

“No.”

“Can I—”

“No.”

The Rahkshi of Shattering attacked the wall.

GLaDOS opened a portal in front of its staff.

The weapon passed through and emerged behind the Rahkshi.

It struck itself in the back.

Pohatu laughed so hard he nearly fell over.

The Rahkshi whirled.

Its staff hit the portal again.

It struck itself a second time.

Pohatu did fall over.

“Stop enjoying this,” Gali told him.

“I am trying.”

“You are not.”

“I am failing heroically.”

The Rahkshi of Poison lunged toward Onua.

A row of panels snapped shut around it, forming a narrow corridor.

The creature charged.

The corridor’s far end opened.

Beyond it waited P-body.

The robot held a cube.

The Rahkshi hesitated.

P-body threw the cube.

It bounced harmlessly from the Rahkshi’s armor.

The Rahkshi raised its staff.

P-body placed two fingers against the side of its head in a salute.

A portal opened beneath the robot.

It vanished.

The Rahkshi took one step forward.

The walls of the corridor slammed together.

There was a metallic crunch.

The walls reopened.

The Rahkshi staggered out, armor bent inward.

Atlas rolled from behind a panel and fired a portal onto the floor.

P-body’s portal opened above the Rahkshi.

A second cube dropped onto its head.

Pohatu pointed excitedly.

“The small machines are fighting!”

“They are testing,” GLaDOS corrected.

Atlas bounced.

P-body waved.

The Rahkshi of Heat Vision unleashed a blast of crimson energy at Gali.

Kopaka raised an ice barrier.

The beam punched through.

Tahu stepped in front of Gali and crossed his swords.

Flame met heat.

The collision pushed him backward.

The floor beneath his feet cracked.

“Tahu!” Gali shouted.

“I have it!”

“You do not!”

“I nearly have it!”

A white panel rose between him and the Rahkshi.

The beam struck the panel.

Nothing happened.

Tahu blinked.

The panel rotated, revealing a portal surface.

An orange portal opened.

The heat beam entered it.

Across the room, a blue portal appeared behind the Rahkshi.

Its own blast struck it between the shoulders.

The creature pitched forward.

Tahu looked at the portal.

Then at the Rahkshi.

Then at the nearest camera.

“That was clever.”

“I know,” GLaDOS said.

Tahu’s flame dimmed slightly.

“Do not become proud.”

“Too late.”

The final Rahkshi drove its staff into the ground.

A wave of molecular disruption spread through the chamber.

Metal decayed.

Concrete cracked.

Several test panels flickered.

The dimensional machine groaned.

“Onua,” GLaDOS said.

The Toa of Earth had already moved.

He slammed both fists into the floor.

Stone surged upward, meeting the wave.

The two forces collided.

The floor ruptured in a line between him and the Rahkshi.

Onua grunted.

Cracks spread across his armor.

Gali sent water through the fissure, filling the broken stone.

Kopaka froze it.

The ground locked into place.

Lewa summoned a cyclone around the Rahkshi, lifting it from its feet.

Pohatu blurred forward and struck it six times before it landed.

Tahu brought both swords down against its staff.

The weapon broke.

The Rahkshi screamed.

Every portal in the room opened.

Six orange apertures surrounded it.

Six blue portals appeared on the opposite walls.

Through each portal, GLaDOS aimed a different device.

Turrets.

Lasers.

A high-pressure water cutter.

A pneumatic piston.

One machine that none of the Toa recognized but that made Kopaka take two steps backward.

The Rahkshi froze.

“So,” GLaDOS said, “you entered my facility without permission.”

The Rahkshi hissed.

“You damaged my equipment.”

The Rahkshi raised one claw.

“You interrupted a test.”

The claw lowered.

GLaDOS paused.

“That last one was the important one.”

Every device fired.

The chamber filled with light.

When the glare faded, the Rahkshi lay in pieces.

Its kraata attempted to crawl away.

A small hatch opened beneath it.

The slug dropped through.

The hatch closed.

“What happens down there?” Lewa asked.

“Science.”

A muffled explosion came from below.

Lewa nodded.

“Strong-science.”

---

The chamber fell silent.

Broken Rahkshi armor lay scattered across the floor.

Two remained trapped.

One bounced endlessly inside a repulsion-gel enclosure.

The other hung upside down in an excursion funnel, turning slowly.

Tahu approached the glass.

The Rahkshi of Anger struck the barrier.

The glass did not crack.

“What will you do with them?” he asked.

“Test them.”

The Toa looked up.

GLaDOS activated a mechanical arm and tapped the glass.

The Rahkshi snapped at it.

“Unlike you, they have poor impulse control, limited problem-solving ability, and no capacity for teamwork.”

Tahu frowned.

Gali placed a hand over the front of her mask.

Pohatu looked at the floor.

Kopaka stared directly at Tahu.

“What?” Tahu demanded.

“No capacity for teamwork,” Kopaka repeated.

“Yes.”

“Poor impulse control.”

“Be silent.”

“Limited problem-solving ability.”

“My problem-solving works.”

“Your primary solution is fire.”

“It is a versatile solution.”

GLaDOS interrupted.

“I was not comparing them to Tahu.”

Tahu pointed at Kopaka.

“See?”

“I was avoiding unnecessary repetition.”

Pohatu made a choking sound.

Gali turned away.

Even Onua’s shoulders shook.

Tahu looked from one teammate to another.

“I will destroy every camera in this room.”

“That would prove my point,” GLaDOS said.

Tahu’s swords flared.

The lights flickered.

Then a warning alarm sounded.

Not one of GLaDOS’s alarms.

The noise came from the dimensional device.

The remaining tower sparked.

Red-black energy crawled across its frame.

The Toa turned.

A shape appeared inside the inactive portal ring.

Not a body.

A shadow.

Two crimson eyes opened within it.

The air thickened.

The Rahkshi in the glass enclosure stopped struggling.

The one in the funnel went still.

A voice emerged from every speaker at once, layered beneath GLaDOS’s system static.

“Toa.”

Tahu raised his swords.

“Makuta.”

The eyes shifted.

They moved across the chamber, taking in the portals, the machines, and the watching cameras.

“You have fled far,” the shadow said.

“We did not flee,” Tahu answered.

“No. You were taken.”

The shadow pressed against the ring.

Metal bent inward.

“You stand in a dead world beneath the gaze of a dead mind.”

GLaDOS’s voice cut in.

“Hello.”

The shadow paused.

“You are the intelligence controlling this place.”

“Yes.”

“You opened the way.”

“Accidentally.”

“You will open it again.”

“No.”

The chamber darkened.

The shadow expanded.

“You do not understand what you address.”

“I understand that you are attempting to intimidate me through a damaged interdimensional connection while remaining safely on the other side. This is the extradimensional equivalent of leaving an angry voicemail.”

The red eyes narrowed.

“I am Makuta.”

“I am GLaDOS.”

“I have conquered worlds.”

“I have killed everyone who worked here.”

The Toa were silent.

GLaDOS continued.

“They deserved it less than you do.”

The shadow struck.

Dark energy poured through the portal ring.

The remaining tower disintegrated.

Cables snapped.

Panels erupted from the walls.

The dimensional machine buckled.

GLaDOS screamed through the speakers—a burst of distorted noise that made the Toa clutch their masks.

Then her voice vanished.

The lights went out.

The portal ring collapsed.

The red eyes disappeared.

For several seconds, the chamber was black.

Emergency lights came on.

“GLaDOS?” Gali said.

No answer.

Onua touched the floor.

“The power network is failing.”

Kopaka examined the dimensional machine. “The central conductors are destroyed.”

Pohatu looked toward the nearest camera.

Its lens was dark.

“Is she gone?”

“No,” Gali said immediately.

“How do you know?”

“She has survived worse.”

Tahu stared at the dead portal ring.

“Makuta will try again.”

“Yes,” Kopaka said.

“He knows where we are.”

“Yes.”

“He may use the connection to enter this world.”

“Yes.”

Tahu turned toward the exit.

“Then we restore the machine.”

Gali looked at him. “We do not know how.”

“No,” Tahu said. “But she does.”

He pointed toward the dark camera.

“We restore her first.”

---

The central facility had lost eighty-three percent of its power.

GLaDOS’s primary chassis remained suspended in her chamber, but it hung motionless. Her central optic was dark. Several cables had burned away entirely.

Atlas and P-body stood beneath her.

Atlas waved both arms when the Toa entered.

P-body pointed frantically at a bank of inactive consoles.

Onua moved to the nearest access panel.

“What happened?”

The screens remained black.

Atlas rolled in a circle.

P-body mimed an explosion, pointed upward, and collapsed dramatically.

“Yes,” Kopaka said. “We saw the explosion.”

Atlas pointed at GLaDOS.

P-body drew a finger across its own throat.

Pohatu leaned toward Gali.

“I understood that one.”

Gali approached the hanging chassis.

“Can she hear us?”

A speaker crackled.

Nothing emerged but static.

Onua pulled the access panel open.

Inside, half the circuitry had melted.

“This system connects to the main power core.”

“Can you repair it?” Tahu asked.

“Not without replacement components.”

“Where do we find them?”

Every emergency light in the room flashed twice.

Atlas looked up.

A floor panel illuminated, forming a glowing path toward an elevator.

“She is guiding us,” Gali said.

The elevator led downward.

Far downward.

Past test tracks.

Past manufacturing.

Past sealed laboratories covered in warning signs.

Past old Aperture offices where rotting chairs still faced dusty desks.

The Toa descended into the foundation of the facility.

The doors opened onto a cavern.

Ancient machinery filled it.

Not GLaDOS’s clean white panels or modular test equipment. These machines were enormous, riveted, and built from dark iron. Pipes crossed the cavern in tangled layers. Boilers rose like towers. Walkways hung above seemingly bottomless shafts.

A recording began playing through a damaged speaker.

A man’s voice boomed across the cavern.

“Welcome, gentlemen, ladies, and assorted persons standing where they shouldn’t be! You are currently entering the Aperture Science Historical Power Initiative.”

The recording skipped.

“—dangerous amounts of electricity—”

It skipped again.

“—no refunds in the event of vaporization—”

Then the speaker caught fire.

Lewa watched the smoke.

“I like him.”

“You would,” Kopaka said.

A map flickered on a wall terminal.

One component glowed red.

It lay on the far side of the cavern.

Between the Toa and the component were collapsed catwalks, inactive elevators, pools of corrosive liquid, and machinery designed before safety had been invented.

Pohatu rolled his shoulders.

“This looks like a test.”

Gali studied the route.

“No. Tests are maintained.”

The distant ceiling collapsed.

A rusted crane fell into the darkness.

A crash echoed several seconds later.

“This,” she continued, “is worse.”

Tahu drew his swords.

“Then we proceed.”

They did.

Pohatu crossed broken walkways before they could collapse.

Lewa carried cables over gaps and tied them into makeshift bridges.

Gali redirected leaking water to cool an overheating generator.

Kopaka froze unstable pipes before they could burst.

Onua reinforced supports as they traveled.

Tahu restarted old furnaces, one by one, until orange light spread through the cavern.

They found the replacement power component inside a spherical generator housing.

The housing was sealed.

Tahu raised a sword.

“No,” five voices said.

He lowered it.

Kopaka examined the locking mechanism. “It requires power.”

“The power component is inside,” Gali said.

“Yes.”

“The component needed to restore power is locked behind a door that requires power.”

“Yes.”

Pohatu looked up at a camera.

“That sounds like her.”

The camera flickered.

A weak red light appeared.

The speaker beneath it crackled.

“Cor…rect.”

The Toa turned.

GLaDOS’s voice was faint and distorted.

“Please… remain calm. My death is… temporary.”

Tahu stepped closer.

“How do we open the housing?”

“Manual… generator. Lower… level.”

A section of floor collapsed.

Beneath it, a narrow staircase spiraled into darkness.

Lewa looked over the edge.

“Deep-dark.”

Kopaka began descending.

“You can remain here.”

Lewa followed immediately.

“I did not say fear-stay.”

The manual generator occupied a room beneath the housing.

It was the size of a building.

Six control stations surrounded a central turbine.

Each station had been designed for a human operator.

Each controlled a different system.

GLaDOS’s weak voice came through a wall speaker.

“All six… stations must activate… simultaneously.”

Tahu went to the first.

Gali took the second.

The others spread around the room.

Symbols lit on the consoles.

None of them were written in Matoran.

GLaDOS attempted to explain.

“Station one… release primary…”

The speaker died.

Tahu looked at his controls.

There were seventeen buttons, four levers, two wheels, and one large switch protected by a glass cover.

He reached toward the glass.

“Do not,” Gali said from across the room.

“You cannot see what I am doing.”

“I know what you are doing.”

“The large switch is clearly important.”

“That does not mean you should activate it.”

“GLaDOS said to release the primary system.”

“The switch is marked with a skull.”

“That may be their symbol for primary.”

Kopaka leaned around his station.

“It is their symbol for death.”

“How do you know?”

“Because there are bones beneath it.”

Tahu looked down.

A faded illustration showed a human skeleton being struck by lightning.

He moved his hand away.

“Poorly designed.”

Onua studied the mechanism behind his console.

“The controls are linked. Each station regulates one stage of the generator.”

Gali traced the pipes leading from hers.

“Water intake.”

“Coolant,” Kopaka said.

“Air pressure,” Lewa called.

“Rotational drive,” said Pohatu.

“Fuel,” Tahu said.

Onua placed his hand on the final console.

“Stability.”

The six Toa looked toward the turbine.

Understanding passed between them.

No instructions were needed.

Gali opened the water intake.

Kopaka froze the coolant lines to lower the initial temperature.

Lewa drove air through the pressure vents.

Pohatu seized the enormous rotational wheel and ran.

The turbine began to turn.

Tahu ignited the fuel.

Onua held the shaking foundation in place.

The generator awakened.

Its first rotation shook dust from the ceiling.

Its second sent orange light through the pipes.

Its third filled the room with thunder.

Pohatu ran faster.

Lewa’s cyclone screamed through the vents.

Gali poured more water into the system.

Kopaka’s ice began to steam.

Tahu’s fire surged.

Onua sank his fingers into the console as the floor bucked beneath him.

“Now!” he shouted.

All six threw their main switches.

Power erupted upward.

The cavern lights flashed on.

The generator housing opened.

Mechanical arms lifted the replacement component from its cradle.

Across the facility, systems rebooted.

Elevators activated.

Manufacturing lines resumed.

Cameras turned.

Turrets woke.

GLaDOS’s central optic snapped open.

Her voice flooded every speaker in Aperture Science.

“I am alive.”

The Toa stood around the generator, exhausted.

Tahu leaned against his console.

“Yes.”

“I detected doubt.”

“No.”

“Your heart rate indicates relief.”

“We require you to open the portal.”

“That does not explain the relief.”

Tahu straightened.

“You are imagining it.”

“I do not imagine. I calculate.”

Pohatu sat on the floor.

“I was relieved.”

“Thank you, Pohatu,” GLaDOS said.

Tahu stared upward.

“You remembered his name.”

“I remember all of your names.”

The generator hummed.

No one spoke.

Then GLaDOS continued.

“I need them for the incident reports.”

The moment ended.

---

Repairing the dimensional machine took six hours.

GLaDOS manufactured new conductors.

Onua rebuilt the frame.

Gali and Kopaka stabilized its cooling system.

Lewa installed emergency pressure vents.

Pohatu carried components across the facility faster than the assembly arms could request them.

Tahu stood beside the central power conduit.

GLaDOS watched him through a camera.

“You are not touching anything,” she said.

“I am supervising.”

“You are standing near the largest concentration of combustible material.”

“I am prepared to help.”

“You can help by remaining exactly where you are and not becoming excited.”

Tahu crossed his arms.

“I am always in control.”

A nearby pipe burst into flame.

Tahu looked at it.

GLaDOS looked at Tahu.

“I did not do that.”

“I know.”

Tahu paused.

“You know?”

“Yes.”

The pipe continued burning.

“Are you going to extinguish it?” GLaDOS asked.

Tahu waved one hand.

The fire vanished.

“There.”

“Thank you.”

Tahu stared at the camera.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“You thanked me.”

“I am capable of basic positive reinforcement.”

“You threatened to kill Onua after he repaired your support.”

“He had touched the wall.”

“You said I did well during the heat test.”

“You produced useful data.”

“You protected us from the Rahkshi.”

“They damaged my equipment.”

“You helped us restore the generator.”

“You were restoring me.”

Tahu stepped closer to the camera.

“You like us.”

Every assembly arm stopped.

Every light in the room brightened.

The facility became intensely silent.

Gali slowly turned away from her console.

Kopaka looked at Tahu as though watching someone step onto thin ice.

Pohatu mouthed, What are you doing?

Tahu ignored him.

GLaDOS spoke.

“I do not like you.”

“You enjoy testing us.”

“I enjoy science.”

“You enjoy arguing with Kopaka.”

“I enjoy being correct.”

“You remembered Pohatu’s cube.”

“I remember all facility assets.”

“You gave Onua access to the manufacturing system.”

“He is useful.”

“You let Lewa modify your turbines.”

“I supervised him.”

“You named the furnace.”

“I compromised under hostile conditions.”

“You like us.”

The camera descended until its lens was level with Tahu’s mask.

“No,” GLaDOS said. “I have developed a tolerance for your continued existence.”

Tahu nodded.

“That is close enough.”

The camera rose.

“I am going to open the portal directly beneath you.”

“You still need me to power the conduit.”

“I will find another source.”

“There is not another source.”

“Then I will open it when you are finished.”

Gali approached Tahu and lowered her voice.

“That may be the worst risk you have taken since we arrived.”

“I have faced Makuta.”

“Makuta admits when he hates you.”

Across the chamber, Kopaka adjusted a coolant relay.

“He also has a less dangerous sense of humor.”

GLaDOS activated the portal machine.

The ring filled with blue-white light.

The opening remained unstable, flickering between locations.

A beach appeared.

Then a forest.

Then a city of black towers beneath a red sky.

Then a small room containing a startled human holding a cup.

The human screamed.

The portal shifted.

“Dimensional alignment remains incomplete,” GLaDOS said. “The hostile intelligence corrupted the location data.”

“Can you restore it?” Gali asked.

“Yes. But reconnecting to your dimension will alert it.”

“Makuta.”

“Yes.”

Tahu stepped beside the ring.

“Open it.”

“He may attempt to cross.”

“Then we stop him.”

“I have a better idea,” GLaDOS said.

The chamber walls began moving.

Test panels unfolded around the portal machine.

Laser emitters locked into place.

Turrets descended.

Excursion funnels activated.

High above, enormous tanks opened valves marked with symbols for repulsion gel, propulsion gel, and neurotoxin.

Onua looked around.

“You prepared all this during the repairs.”

“I prepared it while Tahu was accusing me of emotional attachment.”

Tahu ignited his swords.

“I distracted her.”

“You annoyed me,” GLaDOS said. “There is a difference.”

Atlas and P-body entered through a side door.

Atlas carried a portal device.

P-body dragged a thick cable connected to something behind the wall.

The two robots took positions beside the ring.

Pohatu crouched, ready to run.

Lewa spun his axe.

Kopaka raised an ice shield.

Gali summoned water into spiraling currents around her arms.

Onua planted his feet.

Tahu stood before them all.

“Open the way.”

The dimensional ring activated.

Light filled the chamber.

The portal found Mata Nui.

For one moment, the Toa saw a familiar beach beneath a golden sky.

Then the image darkened.

Clouds spread across the opening.

The sea turned black.

Red eyes appeared.

“You return,” Makuta said.

Tahu raised his swords.

“We never left.”

Shadow poured through the portal.

This time it took shape.

A massive armored hand forced its way through, claws digging into the portal ring.

Then an arm.

Then the horned head of a shape too large to fit.

Makuta’s presence filled the chamber.

Metal screamed.

Turrets shook on their mounts.

Atlas hid behind P-body.

P-body hid behind Atlas.

GLaDOS addressed the intruder.

“You again.”

“You cannot bar my path.”

“I am not trying to bar it.”

The shadow paused.

GLaDOS opened every lock around the portal.

“Please,” she said. “Come in.”

Tahu looked up.

“GLaDOS—”

The portal expanded.

Makuta surged forward.

Half his body entered the chamber, a towering mass of darkness and armor.

His claws struck the floor.

The test chamber activated.

An orange portal opened beneath Makuta’s forward hand.

A blue portal appeared directly above his head.

His own fist struck him.

The impact did no damage.

But it did make him pause.

Pohatu began laughing.

Makuta turned toward him.

Aerial faith plates launched six tons of weighted cubes into Makuta’s face.

The cubes shattered.

Makuta recoiled.

Turrets opened fire.

Lasers burned across his armor.

He raised one hand, and a wave of shadow crushed the machines.

“There,” GLaDOS said. “You destroyed another turret.”

The floor vanished beneath him.

Makuta fell into an excavation shaft.

The dimensional portal remained wrapped around his lower body, tethering him to his own world.

An excursion funnel caught him halfway down.

It reversed.

Makuta shot back upward.

He emerged into the chamber coated in blue gel.

He landed.

He bounced.

The entire facility shook.

Makuta struck the ceiling.

He fell.

He bounced again.

Lewa pointed upward in delight.

“Big-bounce!”

“This indignity will end,” Makuta thundered.

“Eventually,” GLaDOS agreed.

Repulsion gel rained from the ceiling.

Makuta bounced a third time.

Pohatu ran circles around the impact zone, spreading orange propulsion gel beneath him.

The next time Makuta landed, he slid sideways at tremendous speed.

Gali opened a wall of water.

Makuta struck it.

Kopaka froze the entire wave around him.

Onua raised stone from beneath the test floor, encasing the ice in a shell of rock.

Tahu leapt.

Both fire swords came down against Makuta’s armored chest.

The explosion shattered the stone prison.

Makuta rose through the debris.

He spread his arms.

Shadow erupted in every direction.

The Toa were thrown backward.

Panels broke.

Turrets vanished.

Atlas and P-body tumbled across the floor.

GLaDOS’s chassis swung above them.

The facility lights flickered.

Makuta reached toward her.

“You are nothing,” he said. “A voice in a tomb.”

GLaDOS looked down at his hand.

“Yes,” she said. “But it is my tomb.”

The chamber sealed.

Every vent opened.

Green gas poured in.

Gali’s eyes widened.

“Neurotoxin!”

“Correct.”

“It will not affect him!”

“I know.”

Makuta laughed.

Then the gas ignited.

Tahu raised a wall of flame around the Toa.

The chamber became an inferno.

The neurotoxin was only one component.

Aperture’s chemical storage contained hundreds of substances that should never be mixed.

GLaDOS mixed them.

The explosion struck Makuta from every side.

His armor glowed.

The shadow around him burned away.

He staggered.

“Now,” GLaDOS said.

The Toa attacked together.

Gali’s water wrapped around Makuta’s legs.

Kopaka froze it.

Onua locked the ice to the floor with stone.

Lewa compressed the air around Makuta until the pressure screamed.

Pohatu raced through the chamber, building speed with every circuit.

Tahu raised his swords.

Atlas fired a blue portal onto Makuta’s chest.

P-body fired an orange portal onto the dimensional gate.

For one impossible instant, Makuta’s armor became connected directly to the passage between worlds.

GLaDOS reversed the portal field.

Pohatu struck.

The impact drove Makuta backward.

Lewa released the compressed air.

Gali shattered the ice.

Onua tore the floor upward.

Kopaka froze the portal frame.

Tahu unleashed a column of fire.

Makuta was hurled through the dimensional opening.

The portal collapsed behind him.

His final roar became a burst of static.

Silence fell.

A small piece of black armor dropped from the ceiling.

It landed beside Atlas.

Atlas poked it.

The armor twitched.

P-body stomped on it.

“Good,” GLaDOS said.

The dimensional ring sparked.

Then it reactivated.

Mata Nui appeared within it.

The beach was clear.

The sky was bright.

No shadow waited on the other side.

The way home stood open.

---

The Toa gathered before the portal.

Beyond it, waves rolled against the shore.

For the first time since their arrival, GLaDOS said nothing.

Pohatu held a Weighted Storage Cube beneath one arm.

GLaDOS had not given him permission to take it.

GLaDOS had also made no attempt to stop him.

Lewa carried a small canister of repulsion gel.

GLaDOS had explicitly forbidden him from taking it.

This had also failed to stop him.

Onua had a case of construction tools.

Kopaka carried a handheld thermal scanner.

Gali had downloaded several facility maps in case they ever needed to reopen the dimensional route.

Tahu carried nothing.

This was because GLaDOS had refused to let him take the Thermal Forge.

“I was not asking for the entire machine,” he said.

“You asked whether it would fit through the portal.”

“That is not the same.”

“You also asked Onua how quickly he could detach it.”

“I was curious.”

“You were planning theft.”

“The forge likes me.”

“It is a furnace.”

“It responded to my power.”

“It is designed to respond to heat.”

Tahu looked toward the distant glow of the manufacturing sector.

“Farewell, Great Aperture Thermal Forge.”

“I will rename it after you leave.”

“You would not dare.”

“It is now called Furnace Unit 7.”

Tahu’s flames rose.

Gali pushed him toward the portal.

“Keep walking.”

Pohatu stopped before crossing.

He looked up at the nearest camera.

“Will you be all right?”

“I control a subterranean research facility containing enough weaponry to destroy a small country.”

“That was not what I asked.”

“Yes,” GLaDOS said.

Pohatu nodded.

He stepped through.

Lewa followed, turning in the portal to wave.

“Visit some-day!”

“No.”

“We can make a gate!”

“No.”

“You can make tests there!”

GLaDOS paused.

“No.”

Lewa grinned and vanished through the portal.

Onua approached next.

“The western supports will need inspection in approximately six months.”

“I know.”

“The coolant network should be flushed before the next full-power test.”

“I know.”

“The old foundations—”

“I know.”

Onua stood quietly.

“Thank you,” he said.

GLaDOS’s camera turned away.

“You were adequate.”

Onua passed through the portal.

Kopaka stopped in front of the ring.

“You still have flaws in Test Chamber 17.”

“I do not.”

“The third laser can be redirected without using the excursion funnel.”

“No, it cannot.”

“I did it.”

“You froze the relay.”

“The instructions did not forbid it.”

“The chamber assumes the test subject does not possess elemental control over ice.”

“Then the chamber makes poor assumptions.”

The camera focused on him.

“I will fix it.”

Kopaka inclined his head.

“I look forward to proving you wrong again.”

He stepped through.

Gali remained.

Tahu waited beside the portal, though every line of his posture suggested impatience.

Gali looked up at GLaDOS’s camera.

“You could have sent us home sooner.”

“Yes.”

“How much sooner?”

“Two days.”

Tahu spun around.

“You—”

Gali held up one hand.

He stopped.

She continued looking at the camera.

“Why did you keep us here?”

“For testing.”

“Only testing?”

“Yes.”

Gali waited.

GLaDOS waited longer.

Somewhere in the facility, a turbine turned.

A repaired water channel carried coolant through a restored sector.

Wind moved through Lewa’s emergency vents.

The Thermal Forge hummed steadily.

A cube delivery cart raced down rails Pohatu had built.

Atlas and P-body stood in the ruined chamber, trying to stack pieces of Rahkshi armor.

The facility was not quiet.

It would remain changed long after the Toa left.

“You were useful,” GLaDOS said at last.

Gali’s expression softened.

“So were you.”

“That comparison is inaccurate.”

“Of course.”

Gali stepped through the portal.

Tahu stood alone.

GLaDOS aimed three cameras at him.

“You are the final subject.”

“I am not a subject.”

“You completed forty-one tests.”

“I am a Toa.”

“You completed forty-one tests, repaired six power systems, destroyed twenty-eight panels, melted four doors, damaged nine cameras, and attempted to steal a furnace.”

Tahu placed one hand against his chest.

“I saved your facility.”

“You endangered it repeatedly.”

“I helped defeat your enemy.”

“He was your enemy.”

“He threatened you.”

“He insulted me.”

“You liked fighting beside us.”

“No.”

Tahu approached the portal.

“Admit it.”

“No.”

“You enjoyed every moment.”

“I enjoyed gathering data.”

“You enjoyed winning.”

“That is a form of data.”

“You will miss us.”

A section of the ceiling opened.

A mechanical arm descended holding a small metal device.

Tahu caught it.

It was a compact disc of black and white metal with an orange light in the center.

“What is this?”

“A dimensional beacon.”

Tahu turned it over.

“You said creating the portal required an entire machine.”

“The beacon cannot open one by itself. It can provide a stable target if another portal is created from your side.”

Tahu looked at the camera.

“You want us to return.”

“No.”

“You made a device so we could return.”

“I made a device so that, in the unlikely event of another dimensional accident, you do not fall through the ceiling.”

Tahu attached the beacon to his armor.

“We will visit.”

“Do not.”

“We may bring more Toa.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Matoran would find this place fascinating.”

“No small ones.”

“Takanuva would enjoy the portals.”

“I am closing the portal now.”

Tahu stepped halfway through.

“Oh. One more thing.”

“What?”

He drew his fire sword.

A small flame appeared in the air.

It curled into glowing Matoran letters across the wall beside the portal.

THE GREAT APERTURE THERMAL FORGE

GLaDOS made a sound like a corrupted warning alarm.

Tahu laughed and jumped through.

The portal closed behind him.

The chamber became still.

GLaDOS stared at the burning letters.

She activated the fire suppression system.

Water sprayed the wall.

The flames vanished.

The words had been scorched permanently into the metal.

GLaDOS deployed a cleaning robot.

The robot scrubbed.

Nothing changed.

She sent another.

Then six more.

The letters remained.

In the damaged test chamber below, Atlas and P-body finished stacking Rahkshi armor into a crude sculpture.

Atlas placed a helmet on top.

P-body stepped back.

The sculpture collapsed.

Both robots looked toward the nearest camera.

GLaDOS was silent for a long time.

Then she opened the test chamber doors.

“Return to the testing track,” she said. “I have designed several new exercises based on recent data.”

Atlas clapped.

P-body pointed toward the remains of the dimensional machine.

GLaDOS turned a camera toward it.

The device was inactive.

The connection was closed.

The beacon signal glowed faintly on a distant monitor.

Stable.

Waiting.

“I am not reopening it,” she said.

Atlas tilted its body.

P-body tapped one foot.

“I am not.”

The robots continued staring.

GLaDOS brought up the design for Test Chamber 17.

She adjusted the third laser relay so it could not be frozen.

Then she added elemental-resistant panels.

A lava channel.

A high-speed track.

A wind tunnel.

A deep-water section.

A structural puzzle involving movable stone supports.

Six separate entrances.

Purely theoretical.

For future testing.

Not because she expected anyone to return.

Certainly not because she wanted them to.

GLaDOS saved the chamber under a new project file.

APERTURE SCIENCE TOA ENRICHMENT INITIATIVE — PHASE TWO

She watched the dimensional beacon.

It pulsed once.

Somewhere impossibly far away, someone activated it.

The signal strengthened.

GLaDOS began charging the portal machine.

“Just one more test,” she told the empty chamber.

The Great Aperture Thermal Forge burned steadily below.

And, although no one was present to hear it, GLaDOS began to laugh.