Blue Sky

Blue Sky is a popular 2011 novel-length fanfic by Wafflestories, based on the Portal video game (2007). The story is divided into 15 chapters, each of considerable length, and includes a wide cast of original characters. While there are hints of romance and a sub-plot involving Wheatley/Chell (Chelley), the bulk of the work revolves around an original plot and character backstory. 
Blue Sky was posted to fanfiction.net between 2011 and 2012. As of May 2022, it had 1,200+ reviews, 3,700 favorites, and 1,200+ follows. It was also posted on Wafflestories's Livejournal.wafflestories, Livejournal. (Accessed 8/3/2021) (Archived 8/4/2021) 
The story is well-known in Portal fandom, and has inspired numerous accounts of visual fanart and spin-off fanfiction. 
==Plot Summary==
Blue Sky is set four years after the end of Portal 2. Wheatley (an AI) falls back to Earth and is rescued from GLaDOS by Chell. During the rescue mission, Wheatley's consciousness is transferred into a small cigar-shaped device which projects a hard light hologram of a human’s body, which Wheatley can now control. Chell takes Wheatley to a nearby human town where she'd been living for some time, called Eaden. The original character Garret Rickey and his communication tower Foxglove also live there.
Wheatley begins having dreams of a human man who looks like his hard light hologram and a woman who looks like Chell. While Wheatley sleeps, Chell views some of his memories, using a laptop, and she begins remembering her past life. Eventually, Wheatley is upset that he may have been human and, even more, that she has been viewing his memories. 
Wheatley helps the OC Garret with Foxglove, but that also allows GLaDOS to spot the tower’s signal. GLaDOS sends testing bots, who capture everyone while Wheatley and Chell are away. Chell goes on a rescue mission, but Wheatley stays in Eaden thinking the mission is a “bad” idea but eventually realizing he has code that reverses “good” with “bad”. He uses the tower Foxglove to download himself into Aperture Science’s mainframe to free the humans and put GLaDOS to sleep, but he loses signal & appears dead. 
Wheatley's code meets Caroline's code (a human connected with GLaDOS), and she puts him into his old human body which was in a long-term relaxation pod. Wheatley wakes up, Chell finds him and tells him he’s human, and they kiss. 
==Response==
Blue Sky became popular enough to have its own Tumblr tag. "Blue Sky," while containing numerous images of sky photography, also has a handful of fanfic fanart and pictures of Wheatley. Narrowing it down to "Blue Sky Portal" comes up with dozens upon dozens of fanwork. One user made a Blue Sky themed quilt. Archive of Our Own also has a "Blue Sky (Portal)" tag, though Blue Sky is not on AO3. As of June 2020 Blue Sky has 16 spin-off fanfics on AO3 using this tag, some of them having been written in 2020, seven years after the original fanfic was completed. There is also a Blue Sky fan made web comic.Blue Sky: the web comic, Tumblr. (Accessed 6/20/2020) (Archived 8/3/2021)
Some fans of Blue Sky have had the fanfiction printed as a hard back or paper back book.ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh-look-what-came-in-the-mail, Tumblr. 2018 (Accessed 6/20/2020) (Archived 8/3/2021)Its Been Years Since I First Read this Amazing..., Tumblr. Sept 16, 2019 (Accessed 6/20/2020) (Deadlink)
There is a reference to Blue Sky in the Geekender's Portal, the (Unauthorized) Musical.He capitalized it, Tumblr. Apr 3, 2018 (Accessed 6/20/2020) (Archived 8/3/2021) The Geekenders acted out some scenes from the fanfic, using the author as a consultant. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YACn0Tudg1E
Harry101UK, a popular Portal YouTuber who continues to make Portal videos in 2020, voiced a handful of scenes from Blue Sky.Portal 2 - Blue Sky|Oracle Turret Scene, YouTube. Jan 23, 2012 (Archived 7/27/2021) Fans often use these to make animatics and animations. Though there isn't a full podfic version of Blue Sky, the one that exists has Harry101UK voicing Wheatley.Blue Sky- The Podfic, Podbay. Apr 5, 2014 (Accessed 6/20/2020) (Archived 8/3/2021)
===Influence on Humanization===
The Portal fandom has a high level of fan humanization of the game's robot characters, including Wheatley. In Blue Sky Wheatley is six feet tall, wears a tie, has short blonde hair, blue eyes, and glasses. His color scheme is mainly white and blue. This humanization design resembles his voice actor Stephen Merchant.
It is possible that Blue Sky's immense popularity also influenced the popularity of this specific type of Wheatley humanization design. There are some references online that suggest a humanization of Wheatley that was around before Blue Sky gave Wheatley brown or white hair and a more sci-fi looking outfit/body.Human Wheatley, Portal Fanon Wiki. (Accessed 6/28/2020) (Archived 8/3/2021) Blue Sky, having revealed Wheatley's human appearance roughly between Oct 2011 and Apr 11, would have had to begin its influence around that period. However, there is evidence that Wheatley's design from Blue Sky was based on a popular interpretation of human Wheatley, meaning that his humanization design came before Blue Sky. This can be seen in a collaborative art work from Aug 1, 2011, two months before Blue Sky.Wheatley collab, Aug 1, 2011 (Accessed 8/3/2021) (Archived 8/3/2021) This art piece depicts exactly 87 interpretations of human Wheatley, and many of them are similar to the design in Blue Sky. While Blue Sky certainly did not start the trend of drawing human Wheatley blonde, with glasses, and a tie, it no doubt made it even more popular, solidifying it as one of the most popular design for human Wheatley.
===Reviews===
==Fanworks==
===Visual===
File:Orblover2020 BlueSky.png| (2020)
File:Kasarawolf Bluesky.jpg| (2017)
File:Elvenwhovian Bluesky.jpg| (2020)
File:Salatushka Bluesky.jpg| (2018)
File:Blandpaper Bluesky.jpg| (2013)
===Fanfiction===
* - A list of fanmade Blue Sky AU fanfics posted on Tumblr
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===Music===
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* -Referenced on TV Tropes, but the song is deleted
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==Meta and Further Reading==
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==Links and Resources==
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==References==
Category:Fanfiction
Category:2011 Fanfiction‎
Category:2022 Featured Articles