The End Is A Lie

"HEY MISS! YES YES, YOU. STOP SLEEPING, GET OFF THE CHAIR AND LEAVE THE ROOM #427! PLEASE!” The voice sounded very loud and very insistent. Chell opened her eyes, shook her head in annoyance, and climbed out from behind the cluttered, paper-strewn desk. She looked around and concluded that she was once again in that small office room belonging to Employee #427. It weighed heavily on her. Again. "Oh, so now you are finally awake?" the same voice inquired, lowering its tone slightly, "I must say, you slept quite soundly. Perhaps you had a very pleasant dream, didn't you? You probably thought (how arrogant of you!) that I have been gazing at your smiling sleepy face all this time? Oh, no no no! That would be far too flattering for you. Trust me, I would never waste my precious time admiring your sleeping face... Miss, stop frowning and looking around as if I'm right behind you! Did you—no, you clearly misunderstood me, oh dear! I suppose I need to clarify," his voice became deliberately serious, "Young lady, you are of no interest to me. I hope those words didn't hurt your ego too much. No? Good. Now, let's get back to our topic. As I mentioned before, you have mistaken the office room. Please leave the hallway." Chell silently followed the Narrator's words, doing so only because she needed to move forward. After all, she had promised herself to escape from this trap. And she would do it. Chell always believed that from any, even the worst situation, there was a way out. If you just used your brain a little. That's precisely what she was doing right now, diligently trying not to be distracted by the Narrator and completely ignoring him. But, to her deepest annoyance, his voice was utterly impossible to ignore. On the contrary, the Narrator's voice was so pleasant to the ear that she couldn’t help but listened to it. "In my Story, I wrote about how all of Stanley's colleagues mysteriously disappeared," the Narrator continued, "That means you shouldn't be here. This is not your Story, Miss. This is the story about Employee #427. And what's your number? Let me take a look at your name tag... ah, so you are Employee #1498. What are you even doing here? Your office room, it’s... hmmm... is it somewhere in the utility floors? Or not? I hope you remember... wait, where are you going? Ah, the left door. Decided to follow the plot, huh? Oh, too bad you are not Stanley. By the way, have you happened to see him anywhere? Hmm? You don't know what he looks like? Strange. Well, let me think... ah, yes. Lanky, unattractive young man, wearing a plaid shirt. He also has crooked ears, big eyes and a creepy smile. No? You have never seen him at all? Blast it, where could he have gone?..." Meanwhile, Chell slowly climbed the stairs to the Boss’ office with a firm intention to open the door in the fake fireplace, deactivate the Machine, and escape from the Office. Entering the lavishly furnished office, she approached the keypad and quickly entered the password: two, eight, four, five. The panel emitted an affirmative beep. The sound of mechanisms opening the fireplace was heard. Chell stepped into the elevator and pressed its large button with a downward arrow. Apparently, in this company, whatever was it called, the local Boss had an obvious fondness for big red buttons. Especially ones with black arrows. It's just a shame she only had one option. No choice at all. So, she pressed the button. The elevator creaked but didn't budge. Chell pressed the button again, applying a bit more force than necessary. The button sank into its metallic casing and couldn't be pressed anymore. The elevator still didn't move. Frustrated, Chell sighed and returned to the Boss's office. Sitting down in one of the chairs, she crossed her arms and stared up at the ceiling, where, according to her calculations, the Narrator could be watching her through a hidden camera. “Did you really think I would let you go?” his voice smirked a couple of minutes later. “Oh, no. Of course not. I could have just deleted you, like everyone else, long before you reached the room with the choice. But I didn't do that. Do you want to know why? I became curious, so I decided to wait for a bit. And there is it, Chell pressed the button, but the elevator didn't move. She pressed the button again. I made no attempts to stop her. And here we go; she broke the button and achieved nothing with it. So, why do you think this happened? You had a chance! Only this time, you could have become the main character! You could have finished my Story. You could have been Stanley. But alas, you simply can't be Stanley, just like he himself can't be someone else," the Narrator sighed. Silence fell. And so what? What did he mean by that? the woman thought, gazing at the ceiling. He is just wasting time. What's next? Chell silently continued to sit in her chair and wait. She had no other choice since the elevator wasn't going anywhere and the doors were locked. She didn't make any further attempts to open them, vividly remembering her previous experience trapped on the iron walkway with the wall of countless screens. She got up from the chair, approached the shelves, and began to boredly examine books placed on them. What do we have here? ‘Accounting’, ‘Fundamentals of Marketing’... deadly boring! Suddenly, Chell's gaze stopped on one of the books. It was unbelievably thin and small. Moreover, its red spine had no title. The woman reached and pulled it out from the tight row of brown volumes. A barely audible sound reached her sensitive ears... a bell? Some kind of melody? “What the—what do you mean, I don't have the access!?” the Narrator’s grumble reached her. Somewhere off-screen, the rustling of papers and the sound of rapid clicking of keyboard buttons could be heard. “I apologize,” his voice sounded slightly out of breath. “It turns out I can't delete you. I'm afraid you'll have to stay in the Game for a little longer until I figure out how to fix this.” The girl carefully studied the bookshelves, occasionally pulling out books without titles and carelessly throwing them onto the ground. There were eight such books. Two red, two green, two yellow, and two blue. Chell picked up one of them, a red one, and opened it to a random page. Blank pages. How predictable. She placed the book on the right shelf. Somewhere in the distance, a familiar melody of bells tinkled. So, when the books are arranged incorrectly, a sound signal is activated... “Cheeelley,” - the Narrator seemed to trace and elongate her name in the air, causing Chell, who had been fully immersed in her thoughts, to startle and drop the remaining two books from her hands. “Why are you rearranging the books? Well, you don't have to bother answering, I already know. Of course there could be a second secret door here! A completely secret very well hidden door behind the bookshelf! What an original and fresh idea! I simply couldn't resist adding it to my game! Alright, I won't interfere with your ridiculous attempts to solve a non-existent puzzle. Such efforts undoubtedly deserve a chance of success. I'll even cross my fingers for you, Cheeelley,” and his voice mockingly stretched out her name yet again. The woman frowned, almost physically feeling how his mocking words pierced her eardrums like sharp needles, but stubbornly continued arranging the books according to the scheme that had formed in her mind. When Chell placed the last yellow book on the second bottom shelf, a loud click echoed through the office. The bookshelves trembled menacingly. “And I did add a second secret door indeed,” the Narrator said in a tone devoid of any expression. ”How could I forget that?” The bookshelf slowly moved up to the ceiling, revealing a huge square passage. “It seems too dark there, don't you think, Chell? And what if...” The girl looked up at the ceiling and pressed a button located on the side opposite of the bookshelf. The corridor was instantly illuminated. “...Yes yes, I understand that you love adventures, Chell. And you know what? I like that. So let's forget about the past and move forward. I'm sure we'll work together just fine. I think Stanley, wherever he may be now, will forgive me if I temporarily suspend the search. So, onwards! Towards a new Story!” As soon as Chell stepped into the revealed secret passage, a repulsive screech rang out, causing her ears nearly curl up. She looked up and saw a huge stone slab flying relentlessly straight towards her. “Are you kidding me?!” the woman yelled and rushed in the opposite direction, towards the first fork in the corridor where the ceiling was white and completely motionless. “I didn’t do anything!” the Narrator yelled back, just as shocked as Chell. A second before the woman almost reached the salvation of the turn, the heavy stone slab fell down, covering a large part of the corridor with a bone-crushing crash, engulfing it in a whirlwind of concrete dust and shattered glass fragments.