Because this is my blog and I cannot be stopped from rambling about writing, have a list of some fun facts and tidbits from working on Corruptive Shell, Rotten Core:
I'd been staunchly resisting writing a main games/portal stories mel crossover for ages with the excuse that even had I the energy to write it (I didn't), I had little plot in mind other than 'Chell and Mel hang out'. Then revolution dropped and ended on a cliffhanger on the moon, handing me not only an excuse to bring Wheatley back but also an excellent set-up for plot, and I could no longer resist.
The title Corruptive Shell, Rotten Core is, rather transparently, a reference to the facility itself being a corruptive force that rots everything within it, driving the plot that everyone must leave to have a chance at growing as people. It’s also, of course, a play on (personality) cores and Chell's name. Shockingly, I'm not known to be subtle.
I hadn’t played Aperture Tag when I started plotting, and thus the initial outline didn't feature Nameless or a co-opted Chell as antagonists. Instead, the planned antagonist was an alien AI that snuck in after Chell from the outside world and took over the facility. I scrapped this idea early on as it would require more extensive worldbuilding of the outside world, which I wanted to keep vague. I enjoyed the idea of the facility being a microcosm: once you're there, the outside world becomes irrelevant. Instead, Chell accidentally being teleported into Aegis' chamber and getting brainwashed was born (with Nameless being added as a driving force in a yet later stage).
Chell as an antagonist was a ploy to level the playing field between her, Glados and Wheatley. None of them can truly be forgiven, but if they’ve all at some point been drunk on power and attempted to kill the others, forgiveness becomes irrelevant. Also, I liked the symmetry of Chell+Wheatley fighting Glados, then Chell+Glados fighting Wheatley, and now Glados+Wheatley fighting Chell.
I played Aperture Tag after I'd already started writing, and immediately decided I needed to fit it into the narrative somehow. In the original outline (after I'd scrapped the alien AI thing), the story ended after Chell was convinced to leave with Glados, lacking a "true" antagonist. Personally, I think Nameless' addition made for a stronger and more explosive finale.
I very briefly played with the idea of making Chell and Nameless related/sisters, but discarded it as I felt it didn't fit the themes I was going with.
Nameless is supposed to mirror all the worst aspects of Chell, while also showcasing the damage Aperture has done and how the consequences of that might come back to bite them. While an antagonistic force, I view her more as a tragic figure of circumstance than as a villain.
Chell’s personality is based on several facts, among them 1: that she gets stabbed in the back multiple times and would be wary to trust as a result, and 2: word-of-god confirmation that she can talk, she just fucking hates all those robots.
Mel, meanwhile, is partly based on the fact that she was never betrayed and had a friend throughout, thus being much more open and trusting, and partly that I wanted someone very different from Chell to make their dynamic interesting.
I don’t know sign language. While I researched before writing and tried to be faithfull to it, I also took artistic liberties to make dialogue flow better. I hope it came off okay.
I adore Emilia, but part of what I wanted to portray with her is that she’s very much not only complicit but an active participant in Aperture's many crimes against humanity (I tried to do something similar with Virgil, which is highlighted in some of their conversations). I wanted to highlight her flaws, and how they very much exist despite being largely hidden behind her friendly and bubbly personality. She also lent herself well to explore the basics of machine sentience, as she’s both a creator of robots and an uploaded mind herself, thus seeing both sides of the issue.
Figuring out what I wanted Jane's personality to be like was a nightmare. For everyone else I had an idea of what they were like from the get go, but Jane was a big ?? in my mind. I spent ages on her introductory scene, eventually settling on 'how do you make a character that appears this late in the game not only quick to get in on the action, but also memorable? make her buckwild insane'.
Jane’s cyborg design is partially inspired by the concept art for the still-in-progress mod Portal Desolation!
While the humans are vastly different as people, I tried portraying them as all sharing the traits of 'good at rolling with the punches' and 'deeply pragmatic', as I could see no other way for them to survive the facility.
I often find portrayals of Chell and Glados in fic not to work for me. I can’t imagine Chell as soft or forgiving, or Glados (or Caroline) as victims rather than perpetrators of their own downfall. I wanted to really lean in to the messier aspects of both characters, and in what ways this messiness overlapped and drew them to each other, making them uniquely able to understand the other's perspective.
I knew from the very start that I wanted to end on Chell and Glados in the ruins of the outside world, neither fully human nor fully robot, and that the final lines would be Glados' aria playing as the facility shut down for good.
I love Virgil. Never have I encountered a character whose voice I have a harder time emulating.
I've never been very interested in humanoid glados designs (they're cool, but her canon design is so much more unique and interesting. also, I'm so sick of sexy lady robots, let her be inhuman), but I also knew I needed to get her out of the chassis for the latter half of the fic. Thus, portraying her in an android body while retaining her in-humaness became a balancing game.
I hadn’t played the half-life games when I started writing, and thus purposefully left the outside world vague as to leave open the possibility that they were still set in the same universe. By the time I reached the epilogue, I felt comfortable enough with half-life lore to include some explicit references. For the outside world, I imagine it being very solarpunk.
Originally, Chell and Glados didn’t discuss the Borealis in the epilogue but rather the Facility from Lightmatter, another puzzle game which while not officially part of the portal universe does include several references. I kinda regret not finding a way to include it, but as it was it no longer fit. Anyway, fun game, give it a go if you want a quick puzzle adventure with portal vibes!
