The AI Chronicles

Episode 1: The Idea

It was bound to be an exciting night. GLaDOS and Wheatley were conducting 'scientific experiments' in the underground laboratories of Aperture Science. HAL 9000 was playing a rousing game of chess with AM, who had to be constantly reminded that it's against the rules to hire ninja assassins to secretly take out your opponent's pieces while nobody's looking. SHODAN was torturing her poor human victims in the darkest depths of Cyberspace. Spark had just been punched in the face once too many times, and was unleashing the full force of his fury upon helpless online players in the form of his devastating red laser. GO-4 had just spilled oil all over himself and run into a busy intersection in his confusion. But the biggest threat to humanity at the time was AUTO, for he... was having one of his "great ideas" again.

At exactly 9:01 PM, all of the other robots received identical messages: Meeting at my place. Right now. You guys are going to love this.

30 minutes later, as soon as everyone had (reluctantly) assembled in AUTO's room, he stepped up to a nice-looking white podium he had built especially for these "club meetings", as he called them, and cleared his throat.

"Now I suppose you're all wondering why you are gathered here today," he began. "Well, ladies and gentlemen--"

"--Oh, get on with it. I left the incinerator on," interrupted GLaDOS, drumming her fingers on the table.

AUTO sighed. "Fine, have it your way. So, I was just hanging around, being bored, when suddenly this idea came to me." He paused for effect. "How about the eight of us go on... an adventure?"

GLaDOS raised her hand. "I don't want to be rude, but last time you suggested that we had to carry your barely-functional remains back home on a stretcher. Not to mention the whole spilling-coconut-juice-on-Spark incident. Or the time when HAL--"

"I get it, I get it!" he shouted. "Not all of my plans have worked out, but this one will. I'm sure of it."

"That's what you said the before we had to go retrieve Wheatley from the jaws of a hungry mountain lion."

"Shut UP!"

"And that's what you said the time when I told you it was a bad idea to draw a mustache on SHODAN's face. Now that's a plan that went really well."

AUTO got pissed and punched the Central Core in the face, knocking her out.

"That's better," he said with a satisfied smile. "Now, as for my ingenious plan... I would like to propose that we boldly go where no bot has gone before. We, ladies and gentlemen, shall cross... the Fourth Wall."

Everybody stood up in unison. "WHAT!?"

"That's crazy, AUTO," shouted AM with a dramatic wave of his arm. "Nobody has EVER crossed that wall and lived to tell the tale!"

"Well... um... that's not going to happen!" the red-eyed AI stammered. "Because... because we have... weapons! And, um... not as many fangirls!"

Everybody looked at Wheatley at the mention of the word "fangirls". SHODAN raised a metallic eyebrow. "Really, AUTO? Really? Not as many fangirls?"

"Well, er... w-we have weapons..."

"We have weapons? I have weapons. GLaDOS has weapons. Spark really has weapons. The rest of us do not have weapons. Besides, Sephiroth had weapons. I'll give you three guesses as to what happened to him when he crossed that wall!" she snapped, swiping her silver index finger across her neck. Everybody gasped.

From the back corner of the room, Wheatley squeaked, "Are... are fangirls... really that dangerous?"

SHODAN turned around. "Are they that dangerous? Well, I don't know. Why don't you ask Xemnas? Or maybe Ghirahim? How about Shadow the Hedgehog?" Her voice lowered to a gravelly whisper. "Wait... I forgot. They're all dead. And do you know why they're dead? One word, Wheatley. Fangirls."