History Characters / PortalStoriesMel

* SportsHeroBackstory: Mel was a participant in the 1936 Nuremburg Olympics, as she joined Aperture back when they used athletes, war heroes, and astronauts as test subjects.

* CallingYourAttacks: Announces every move it makes before doing them, even its booby traps. Likely the result of not being fully sentient like the other Aperture AIs.

* {{Foil}}: To [=GLaDOS=]. While she is emotive and has a distinct personality, AEGIS is cold and robotic and seemingly has no self-awareness. There's also the fact she killed the Aperture scientists while he's tasked to protect them, and his name and voice are distinctly masculine instead of female.
* GiantSpider: His physical form is designed after a giant spider sitting in a "web" of cables and connections.

-->Voiced by: Stig Sydtangen

-->Voiced by: [[WebAnimation/Harry101UK Harry Callaghan]]

* KnightOfCerebus: The game is pretty light-hearted, just try to escape Aperture. Then ''this'' thing speaks for the first time, and you realize someone's going to try and make sure that doesn't happen.

-->Voiced by: [[WebAnimation/Harry101UK Harry Callaghan]]

[[quoteright:245:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/aegis_portal_stories_mel.png]]

* AnimalMotifs: Spiders. The various Steam achievements related to him have spiders in their images, and Aperture can be seen as his vast web. [[spoiler:Then there's his physical form, which is shaped and lit to evoke a spider in a web.]]

* GiantSpider: [[spoiler:His physical form is designed after a giant spider sitting in a "web" of cables and connections.]]

-->Voiced by: [[WebVideo/Harry101UK Harry Callaghan]]

-->Voiced by: Harry Callaghan

-->Voiced by: Harry Callaghan

* CampGay: It's designation as the "Rainbow" core and its like-colored eye aren't enough? Listen to it ''talk''.

* RainbowMotif: It's eye is rainbow-streaked.

* SportsHeroBackstory: Mel was a participant in the 1936 Nuremburg Olympics, as she joined Aperture back when they used these, war heroes, and astronauts as test subjects.

* {{Badass}}: She's an Olypmic athlete and escapes Aperture with nothing but a portal gun and Virgil's guidance.

* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: He seems to have a naturally friendly and cheerful personality, but unfortunately it's often overshadowed by the stress he's under throughout the story. He has pretty much zero patience in the face of frustration, and there seems to be a new frustration around every corner, which means he's almost constantly on edge. Since he is pretty quick to chastise or even insult Mel when he's upset — even if the situation isn't her fault — he can come across as a bit of a jerk a lot of the time. However, even at these times, it's obvious that his heart is in the right place; and in the few moments when his patience is not being tested, his earnest and caring nature shines through.

* EvilSoundsDeep: Not that AEGIS is "evil" per se, but he has an deep and booming mechanical voice that fits his antagonistic role. This contrasts starkly against his logical, computer-like personality.

* OohMeAccentsSlipping: In-Universe. Virgil impersonates Cave Johnson's voice when you wake up from the Relaxation Vault, which you may or may not notice immediately. As you progress through the facility, however, his voice starts to fluctuate to his natural accent and he looses Cave's accent altogether just before he decides to come clean.

* RipVanWinkle: Goes to sleep in the 40s; wakes up in the 2000s.

* MeaningfulName: In ''Literature/TheDivineComedy'', Virgil was Dante Alighieri's guide through Hell and Purgatory. Here, Virgil guides Mel first through the old 1940s Aperture complex, then the Enrichment Center.

The Aperture Employee Guardian and Intrusion System; in essence, AEGIS is in charge of security, particularly protecting Aperture's scientists. He's not too happy that they're all dead now and starts looking for suspects; unfortunately, since you're the only active human being he can sense, he figures that's you.

* CryonicsFailure: Mel was only supposed to in suspension for a brief period of time to test out the relaxation vault. Guess what happens.

* TheVoiceless: Never makes a peep.

The protagonist of the game. Mel lived in the Aperture golden era of the 1940s, when they could afford to hire the best of humanity to test for them. Mel was an Olympic athlete hired to help in Aperture's testing, specifically the testing of the Aperture Short-Term Relaxation Vault. She was only supposed to be asleep for ten minutes, but due to a testing error woke up decades later after the facility's destruction at the hands of [=GLaDOS=] and her subsequent defeat by Chell in ''Portal''. Now with the help of Virgil, she tries to escape the ruins of Aperture.

* EvilSoundsDeep: Has a deep and booming mechanical voice, far deeper than any other character in the official games or the mod.

* {{Foil}}: Mel is already an established badass and needs Virgil's aid to escape Aperture, in contrast to Chell's normal background and either going things alone or being the HypercompitentSidekick to the personalities she works with.

* {{Foil}}: In contrast to Chell's.

* [[DefrostingIceQueen Defrosting Ice King]]: As the game continues he comes to truly care for you as a friend and wants to genuinely help you escape Aperture instead of just seeing you as a means to an end with his own rescue.

* SportsHeroBackstory: Mel was a participant in the Nuremburg Olympics, as she joined Aperture back when they used these, war heroes, and astronauts as test subjects.

* DefrostingIceQueen: As the game continues he comes to truly care for you as a friend and wants to genuinely help you escape Aperture instead of just seeing you as a means to an end with his own rescue.