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They always said that for everything you gained, you had to pay a price. Equivalent exchange, or something like that. Wheatley knew this ideology far too well, since almost his entire life had been a series of losses and gains. He  was transferred from an old sphere body to a  new, highly sophisticated humanoid android one, so of course he had to be clumsy and trip over his own two feet once in a while. He complained about his eyes going on the fritz, so of course they "fixed" his eyes and made it a requirement to wear glasses if he didn't want to see the world in an incomprehensible blur. He was given the chance to live forever, so of course he had to be in charge of maintaining the life support of the humans in cryo-sleep. He actually made a friend... so of course something had to take her from him.

Wheatley drew his legs closer to his body, placing his chin on his knees as he looked blankly at the emancipation grill that shimmered before him, half blurred because of his cracked and bent glasses. In an uncharacteristic act of humanity, GLaDOS had pulled him out of the abyss of space. Although this would-be kind act was quickly destroyed when She explained that drifting in space for the rest of eternity wasn't nearly suitable enough a fate for him, that She was planning a much worse demise for him.

Wheatley had asked about the other her, but the supercomputer only looked at him coldly, crimson eyes glinting with an emotion that the android didn't quite understand before that was dashed away.  It was none of his concern, She told him before he was lifted away and dropped (none too softly, mind you) into this holding cell.

Wheatley hadn't heard anything from GlaDOS since, leaving him with nothing but his thoughts and his guilt. If only he had listened to the other her when she said she had a bad feeling about plugging him into the mainframe. If only he had taken into consideration just how desperately she had called his name when he was pushing her and potato-GLaDOS down that pit. They probably could have figured out another way to take Her down, to avoid everything that happened after they had put Wheatley in charge.

He only hoped the best for her, maybe she re-joined society and went back to an art school like the one she told him about once or twice. Maybe she had a simple life where she could draw whenever she wanted to. She loved to draw, as Wheatley soon found out. When they weren't constantly ducking away from GLaDOS' line of sight she wandered off to find something to draw with: an old piece of charcoal, a pen, crayons she got from God knows where; anything that would make a mark on the walls or floors or a clean piece of paper she found.

Could she properly re-join society after everything she went though? She was rather young, only about eighteen or nineteen; he wouldn't be surprised if she was put into solitary confinement somewhere if she ever told her story to anyone.

Wheatley shuddered at the idea, how could he even think something like that about her? She was fine, probably got some new friends (ones that wouldn't betray her as soon as they were put in a seat of power), maybe even a boyfriend. A nice human boyfriend.

An unknown emotion shot through the ginger  at the idea of that girl having a boyfriend. A boyfriend that wasn't him. He had gotten attached to her, allowed himself to become attached to her on an emotional level; a dangerous thing for an android like him. All it would do was set him up for heartbreak, she was a human after all. She would age, eventually die, and -on the off chance GLaDOS decided to let Wheatley live- he would outlive her by years, decades, centuries.

He uncurled himself enough and placed a finger on the cold floor of his holding cell, slowly tracing her name on the concrete.

"Fil..." Wheatley whispered carefully, like it was a magic word that would make her appear right before his eyes and whisk him away from this place. He sighed heavily and leaned back, resting his head against the wall.

He sat there in silence for who knew how long, and contemplated "love."