Unlikeliest of Friends
“Hello”
Gordon Freeman carefully stalked down yet another long grey corridor buried deep within the Black Mesa facility. In his hand he uncertainly held an M4 rifle he had pilfered from the body of one of the dead soldiers he had killed.
Yes, soldiers that he had killed. Gordon Freeman, PhD in Theoretical Physics from MIT, was now Public Enemy Number One, assuming the public was a government cover-up unit sent in to silence the entire bloody Black Mesa team. And frankly, Gordon wasn’t so sure that they all didn’t deserve it. Seriously, had no one thought of putting guard rails on catwalks crossing twenty story drops?
But he was right now more concerned with staying alive and getting away than anything else.
So therefore, M4 tightly clutched in his hands, he walked down the long grey dirty concrete corridor, turned a corner, and came face-to-face with a head crab. Presuming they had faces of course.
Moving faster than he had ever imagined just a few hours ago, he dodged suddenly to the left and with a swing of the rifle butt, smashed the screeching alien parasite to the ground. Dazed, the blobby little thing didn’t have time to jump up again before a hail of bullets ripped it to shreds, spraying the grimy floor with thick yellow blood.
Ok, that was close, again.
Breathing heavily, Gordon stood there for a moment, frozen in a shooting position, before slowly retracting himself back into a walking position. Then, he carefully wheeled around and began walking back down the corridor towards a door about twenty feet away.
Of all the days to leave my helmet behind, this has got to be the worst He mentally despaired. Normally he took it with him to every test he was involved in, but this one seemed so routine that he just left it behind. They weren’t testing any deadly radiation or chemicals, just analyzing a sample.
Gordon would have preferred testing deadly radiation or chemicals.
Letting a flood of alien monsters pour in through spontaneous teleporting events after you royally screwed an experiment was not the best time to leave your helmet behind.
Oh well, what’s done is done.
The scientists boots made a dull clomping noise as they stepped down on the drab dirty concrete. Reaching the end of the corridor, Gordon opened the small door at the end slowly and carefully, recent experiences had taught him that slow and steady really wins after all.
Peeking in through a crack, Gordon saw his subtlety had payed off. Just two feet in from the back of the door, Gordon saw the familiar sight of a thin ghostly blue beam sticking before him. A quick glance to the right confirmed the presence of an army trip mine.
With a smile, Gordon slid inside the hall and ducked down under the pale blue band flickering before his eyes. Simple work after some experience.
Passing under it, Gordon popped back up with a smile and slinging his rifle confidently over his shoulders, he sauntered around the corner.
Well, where there’s smoke there’s fire.
Gordon waltzed around and practically ran into a group of big and mean looking soldiers standing around and talking into a radio. As his heart leaped, he swung his rifle forward as he fell to the floor on account of the three soldiers seeing him immediately and snapping their weapons forward. But Gordon was already firing.
The room exploded into an incoherent hail of thunder claps as four automatics went off all at once in an enclosed hall. Gordon could feel the wind of the bullets ruffle his hair as he fell to his back, shooting as he went.
The first two took about half a dozen bullets per leg and dropped like rocks with agonized screams. The third seemed about ready to fire on the prone Gordon, when the oddest thing happened. Just as the physicist was about to put a hole through the soldiers head, the man’s own weapon lowered and with two loud cracks, finished the pair of wounded soldiers off.
Gordon’s gun and jaw lowered at the odd site as the soldier finished the favor off by dropping the rifle on the floor and kicking it over to the stunned scientist. The weapon skidded over to his bloody HEV clad feet as the soldier slowly raised his hands in the air.
Gordon wasn’t quite sure what to do. Part of him, a darker part that had come alive in the last day, urged him to take advantage of this turn of events and gun the helpless man down. But another part of him, his natural curiosity, urged him to see why this man had turned on his own? He was obviously fidgeting in his choice, for the marine held his hands high and tried to calm him down.
“Hey don’t shoot, don’t shoot. I’m on your side.” He spoke in the way one would calm a high-strung tiger. It worked, Gordon wasn’t a natural killer. He lowered the gun to his side and spoke the only words that were in his mind.
“Why aren’t you- Why did yo- what are you-?” The man held up a muscular arm in a silencing gesture before sticking it out in an aggressive greeting. He was clearly aware that Gordon wouldn’t shoot him now.
“Fisher, Corporal Jonathan Fisher. I’m not with those guys,” He jerked a thumb towards the crumpled bodies on the floor behind him. “At least not anymore I ain’t.” Gordon automatically thought to correct him about using not and ain’t together, but thought better of it. Instead, he timidly offered his own hand to this Corporal Fisher who grabbed it and gave it a hearty shake.
A little too hardy maybe, Gordon tried not to wince. Retrieving his hand, Gordon took a cautious step backwards meanwhile giving the odd soldier a more cautious look.
“So, why aren’t you trying to kill me? And the rest of us?” He asked warily. Fisher answered the question without a moment of hesitation.
“Because I don’t believe in this whole cover-up bull ****. If it is our government ordering this whole fiasco, then I’m out. That’s not the government I signed up to serve.” His gaze drifted up to the roof, then back down towards Gordon.
Gordon then realized how tall the man was. Fisher looked back down at the physicist and kept talking. “But personally, I think some shmuck in a suit lined the CO’s pockets to help keep his own record clean. Politicians, never trust ‘em.” He said with disgust. Then, as if noticing Gordon for the first time, he inquired curiously. “Hey, you’re that Freeman fellah aren’t you? You were at ground zero when this crap began?
Gordon’s heart began to beat, they knew his name? How the hell would he ever live through this now? Even if he got out in one piece he was still on the most wanted list. Fearfully, he nodded his head, expecting the man to rip him apart then and there.
However he just let out a slight chuckle. He thought this was funny? “You’ve sure stirred up the hornets’ nest up there! They’ve assigned two platoons to take you down!” Two platoons? Gordon didn’t know what a platoon was or how many med it had, but it didn’t sound good. He felt the blood drain from his face, paling him significantly. This brought another amused response from his new companion. “Ah Don’tcha worry, we stick together and there’s nothing that can stop us!”
Stick together? Gordon hadn’t really thought about it, pairing up with this marine. But it didn’t seem like the worst idea. After all, what’s the worst that could happen?
He could be back stabbed, back shot, left for dead or taken to the military base for ‘questioning.’ So it was not without risks. But what were his other options? Plow on alone and try to fight his way through the nightmares around him? He had been pretty lucky so far, and he was getting pretty sure his luck was almost out.
He pushed his glasses up his nose; he should have gotten the damned things fixed before coming to work today, or was it yesterday this had all started?
“You comin’ Freeman?” Fisher’s inquisitive voice broke through his mental tangent. Looking up, Gordon found himself nodding rapidly to the big soldier.
“Yeah, yeah I’ll come.” This just made the man’s day; he gave Gordon a hearty slap on the back which actually triggered his HEV suit.
Warning. Impact detected. “Great! Then let’s strip these guys for clips and go!” He immediately bent down and attended to the gruesome task of stripping the dead soldiers for ammunition, leaving Gordon just standing there speechless. Not that being speechless was uncommon for the naturally quiet physicist. Trying to think of something to say, he pushed up his glasses out of habit and managed to stutter out something.
“Um, so are you, um, well I mean, do you uh-uh.” This bought him a confused look from behind the gas mask of Fisher.
“Freeman?” He addressed.
“Yes?”
“Are you trying to say something?”
“Um, yes.”
“Then say it for god’s sake man!” He then went back to patting down the bloody corpse before him while Gordon looked around uncertainly for something to say something about. His searching eyes drifted to the floor and lit up.
“Ok, do you uh, do you, you know, want your gun back?” Fisher looked back up from his pilfering to see the unsure scientist awkwardly holding his M4 in his left hand. He took it without hesitation and checked it over for any damage. Satisfied there was none, he gave Gordon a friendly nod.
“Thanks Freeman, thank you very much. See, talking ain’t too hard. Oh, catch.” He flicked his hand abruptly sending a pair of small metal thing flying at Gordon’s face. His hand’s shot up and snatched them to his chest immediately. He checked his catch and found them to be ammunition clips for his rifle; he quickly clipped these onto the magnetic belt around his HEV suit next to his crowbar. He looked up to see Fisher nodding his approval.
“Nice reflexes, and by the way do you want this? This guy sure won’t be needing it.” Gordon saw him holding a very sharp and cruel looking knife in his hand. Pulling his crowbar from the magnetic belt at his side Gordon waved the tool at his new companion with a grin.
“Nope, I’m good. Got this right here.” He referred to the tool/weapon clutched in his gloves. However this bought him a strange look from Fisher.
“A crowbar? Really?” The tone in which he said it made Gordon suddenly question the efficiency of the chunk of iron that he sustained him through thick and thin. He looked at it, then at Fisher with a worried look.
“Yeah, you know, to hit stuff with.” He explained half-heartedly. But Fisher didn’t pursue the topic and just let it drop with shrug, like Gordon was mentally unbalanced. He slid the knife into a sheath on his belt before standing up and pulling off the gas mask.
“I’m not with ‘em any longer, no point dressing like them.” He said, voice sounding much less garbled without it before tossing the mask to the gritty concrete. Gordon noticed his face, square-ish and almost seeming too big for his helmet. Piercing blue eyes were embedded beneath his forehead and above them tufts of blonde hair stuck out from beneath his helmet. He gave Gordon a confident smile before turning down the hallway, gun in his hands. “Come on Freeman, let’s go!”
Gordon smiled, maybe this wasn’t so bad after all. He seemed like a nice guy, and he seemed like he knew what he was doing. But then,
“And ditch that crowbar, take a real weapon!” Gordon’s smile vanished as he walked off after him, affectionately patting the crowbar at his side. That idiot could keep his stupid knives, they’d see who had the best choice soon enough.
(Review, reviews please)
“No, you can’t”
“No, you can’t have it. Now please leave me alone about it!” Gordon Freeman’s voice was rarely this aggravated; usually when someone was getting on his nerves he could just tune them out or due something else. This was a skill he had mastered quickly and perfected while working under Doctor Magnusson.
But in this case it wasn’t as simple as merely going to work on some sub-atomic relationship equations. Nor could he just quietly edge out of the room or wait for Doctor Kleiner of Eli Vance to come to his aid.
And he doubted either of them would be able to do much against Fisher anyway.
“Come on Freeman, I’m the trained professional here and I think I should be the best equipped of us. And I know you’ve done well enough alone-”
“That’s stating the obvious.” Gordon muttered under his breath.
“-but there’s no need for you to be the hero now, I’m here! Me, Corporal Fisher of the United States Marine Corps. And I’m saying you really should give me that gun!”
Gordon sighed at the futility of the situation. He had known Fisher for just ten minutes and already the man was envious of Gordon, or to be more precise, envious of his gun.
It was just a grimy silver revolver he had found on a deceased security guard, hardly worth a second look. Gordon was about to pass it over when he saw Fisher’s eyes light up when they saw it. Taking that as a good sign, Gordon had snatched it up before the marine could take it, replacing the Glock pistol with it.
It’s usefulness cam into play about two seconds later when one of the head crab zombies came ambling out of a room, moaning like the damned. Leveling his new gun, Gordon took careful aim for the head and fired.
Two things unexpected happened. One was that the gun exploded in his hands and flew backwards, smacking him on the forehead with the barrel. The second thing was the head of the zombie exploded. The bullet was apparently a lot better than the pistol he’s used previously and had taken the entire headcrab off along with a significant portion of the head itself.
This had done little to satisfy Fisher’s desire for the overpowered handgun. So Gordon had been enduring these endless pleads to get his new toy.
Sweet mercy, he was calling a gun a toy now.
“Bottom line is, I’m better with it than you.” Gordon blew at his hair in frustration; there was really no end to this guy! But he kept silent and kept moving. This did nothing, and Fisher wheeled around in front of his scientist friend like a salesmen chasing a disinterested customer. Gordon was amused at the desperation evident in his voice as he sunk to lower and lower levels of pathetic trying to strike a bargain.
“Come on, look I’ll buy it off yah, what do you want for it? Here, I’ll give you…” His voice trailed off as his hand darted towards his pants pocket for a non-existent wallet. Fisher realized this was a pained look.
Acting like a starving orphan asking for another piece of bread, he pleaded. “Ok so I don’t have any money on me now, but I’ll pay ya back for it I will! I always fulfill my debts!”
Gordon rolled his eyes at this. “That’s what Barney said.” He muttered.
Fisher was aiming for new levels of low as he grabbed Gordon’s armored hand, despair evident in his blue eyes.
“Look man, I swear to God I will-” He never finished his sentence for at that moment Gordon suddenly grabbed him and shoved him to the left while he kneeled, aimed and fired the revolver twice.
The gun’s twin thunder claps broke Fisher’s mood thankfully as he grabbed his own rifle in a blur to aim for the threat.
Nothing was there except for a bullsquid with half of its head splattered on the wall. It’s toxic, corrosive spit bubbled out of its mouth and reacted with the drab concrete floor, hissing as it dissolved the cement at an atomic level.
Fisher was white faced in shaky as he cast a look first to the dead alien, then to Gordon, then to the dead alien, and then to Gordon’s gun.
The Physicist merely smiled at his friend.
“Did you want something?” Fisher continued to stare at him and the smoking pistol before casting the scientist an evil glare. Then standing up, he dusted himself off, a useless gesture due to the blood stains on his combat fatigues, and marched off in a dignified manner despite his obvious embarrassment.
Gordon had and showed no sympathy for his humiliated companion, letting out only the slightest of chuckle before snapping the heavy pistol to his side and strolling off after his friend.
Besides, he’d always hated salesmen.
For those of you who are noticing, yes I am adding in some stuff in between levels and scenes in the levels, namely for some character development which is otherwise bloody difficult to fit in Half- Life.Unlikeliest of Friends
“Watcha doing?”
The last ten minutes had been rather uneventful, as uneventful as an alien apocalypse could be of course. They had only run across a few of the alien creatures which had been swiftly dealt with although a pair of zappers, those electricity-shooting aliens, had given them a few tense moments.
Fisher was leading now, confident that he knew the way to the surface. He was claiming that he and his squad had traveled down here by the means of a big cargo elevator which should be capable of carting them up to the surface, granted they didn’t die en-route.
Gordon still had no idea what on earth he was going to do if they ever reached the surface though. When your own government wants to silence you, though Fisher still stubbornly clung to the idea that this was the result of some rich bureaucrat, you didn’t exactly have a lot of options.
As he paced down the concrete hall, Fisher in front or as he put it, “on point,” Gordon really just couldn’t help but wonder how the rest of his life was going to turn out. Would he really be on the run for the rest of his life, evading a shadowy government figure?
He had no idea, but he probably wouldn’t get out of here in one piece so it probably didn’t really matter anyway. First things first Gordon, get out alive and then worry about staying alive. He mentally reprimanded himself.
Of course you probably won’t get out of here, especially with this gun-totting lunatic! In fact I’ll probably end up getting killed when he does something stupid and masculine like-Oof!The oof was the direct result of a mentally of track Gordon walking right into the tankish mass of man that composed Fisher. That man in particular had stopped in dead stride, kneeled and with his rifle held in one hand while his left was raised in a halting signal.
Jeepers, even
kneeling Gordon was just barely taller than him! What on earth were they feeding these guys back at their camps?
“Gordon, I said be quiet!” Fisher hissed in irritation. Gordon suddenly realized he must have gotten so far off course in his head that he had accidently tuned out his friend.
Magnusson had trained him well.
Silently cursing his ignorance, Gordon backed up and kneeled down while trying to peek over the big marines shoulder. That turned out to be a lost cause, so he tried looking around him instead.
He didn’t see anything, just another drab concrete wall that signified yet another turn down yet another corridor. Then he noticed Fisher craning his head to one side, as if trying to hear something. Gordon was quick to copy that and leaned forward, ear’s straining to hear something.
Nothing, just the sounds of his breathing and the humming of his HEV suit, all magnified in the silence of the corridor. He frowned, was his friend starting to hear things-
“Man, this job sucks.” The garbled, crackling voice of a soldier broke the silence like bomb and nearly gave Gordon a start. Fisher held up silencing hand, waiting for them to continue.
“Yeah, killing a bunch of stupid scientists ain’t what I signed up for.” Gordon’s hoped raised a bit, was there someone like Fisher ahead?
“Tell me ‘bout it, though some of those security guards can fight.”
“Nah, they’re still too easy. I could take on ten of ‘em in my sleep, like shooting babies.”
“It’s good target practice though; I’ve never seen the targets at the range squirm like that.”
“Heh, yeah those little pukes couldn’t shoot a gun if their lives depended on it. Poor them huh?”
Gordon’s hopes were smashed as if with a crowbar as they laughed callously at the cruel joke. How many of these soldiers were so heartless, and if so what was the chance Fisher was as genuine as he seemed? He cast his marine companion an uncertain look.
All he saw was cold disgust for the heartless men, and the physicist cringed at the fearful sight. Ice-blue eyes narrowed in contempt and mouth gritted, he suddenly made a flurry of hand signals to Gordon which would have made sense to any other trained marine.
Gordon opened his mouth in a silent
uh for a moment before tapping his friend on the shoulder. Fisher was already tensed up and whipped around like a striking cobra, gun raised. Gordon suddenly felt the cold metal barrel pressing into his exposed neck and gave the marine a frantic look.
Fisher realized his mistake and his eyes immediately spoke apology. He quickly withdrew his gun, cringing like the scientist might strike him dead. It really struck Gordon how quickly the man could change from cold killer to an apologetic offender or a carefree hooligan.
Hooligan? He had definitely spent too much time around Doctor Kleiner.
“What is it?” Fisher was barely whispering and Gordon had to really listen hard to catch it before explaining himself.
“Oh, um I don’t get the hand signals, what are you trying to say?” Fisher sighed and rephrased his idea in am ore vocal manner.
“Ok, I’m going to walk down there like I am, they’ll think I’m one of them and leave me alone. I’ll try to get them to look the other way and when they do, I’ll need you to pop ‘em in the back. Got it?”
Shoot them in the back? Gordon got an uneasy feeling, killing them was bad enough for him but to kill them while they were unaware just seemed wrong. Fisher apparently had no such qualms for he gave the ethically challenged physicist a friendly nod, like a teenager about to TP a house, before preparing to slip around the corner.
A weight tugging as his side though suddenly brought an idea to life. Gently grabbing the marines shoulder to stay him, he reached down to his side and picked off an all-too familiar metal sphere and held it up to Fisher’s face with a ‘Would this work’ expression.
Fisher’s eye lit up with shock and then joy at the sight of the grenade, and he quickly snatched it from Gordon’s hands. Quivering with anticipation, he pulled the pin with a metallic ring and waited two seconds before dodging out of cover and lobbing it down the hall before diving back to safety.
The soldiers never saw him, and only the metallic clink notified them of their dooms presence. Gordon heard a confused “What the hell?” Followed by a thunderous explosion as the device detonated in a flash of heat, light and shrapnel, all magnified by the enclosed concrete room. The explosion died away quickly while the ringing in his ears not so much.
Fisher was unaffected by it, for he let out a slight whoop of victory and an air-punch before jumping to his feet, completely lacking any remorse for the two people he had just killed. He quickly swung around the corner to check out their success.
Gordon also got up, not as enthusiastically as the marine, and simply pushed his glassed up before almost trudging around the corner.
The hall was short, leading into a medium sized concrete room full of crates and crate remains.
And a pair of burning and mangled corpses.
Gordon fought an urge to vomit over the atrocity; he had to get out of there. Tying his best to not look at the people he had killed, he speed-walked to the end of the room while holding his breathe, the stench of burnt flesh was one he never wanted to smell again.
He was out in the opposing hall now; he collapsed back against a corner, breathing heavily. He couldn’t help but feel such awful despair, and why not? His friends were either dead or going to die. Eli and Doctor Kleiner both still stuck down in Anomalous Materials, Barney probably doing god-knows what.
And Gordon? Gordon was no longer a scientist, he was a killer. A murderer. Those soldiers he’d killed, they’d all have families. Parents, brothers, sisters, wives, girlfriends, friends who would never see them again because they dead and they were dead because Gordon had killed them. Had killed them all.
“Come on Freeman, no time to drag your heels, let’s go!” The ever gung-ho voice of Fisher rang out behind him as he strode quickly beside him, obviously he was finished his pillaging. Gordon immediately straightened up, pushed up his glasses out of habit and headed off behind the marine. Time for self-despair would come, and when he stopped moving enough for it all to hit him he would probably need a psychiatrist
Rifle clung tightly in his hands; Gordon cautiously tailed the big marine who was keeping a careful eye on all the possible threats about him. It was definitely nice to have Fisher around, both for the help and for the company. Maybe it was just him, but Gordon wasn’t very particular about meandering aimlessly around this gigantic alien-infested facility alone.
Speaking of which, Gordon suddenly found himself with his gun up and pointed ahead of him as Fisher’s rifle thundered off several rounds at a pair of houndeyes which had just appeared in front of them. Wide-eyed, Gordon kept his rifle trained at the corpses ahead of him, waiting for any more.
None came, so Gordon saw it fit to run ahead and check out an abandoned office up ahead. He cautiously opened the door, stepped inside and braced for the worst.
Nothing was dead, nothing jumped at him. No danger at all, good. Gordon smiled and checked the place out.
The whole place was pretty trashed, understandable in these circumstances. The desk was covered in a mess of administrative papers, pencils and other office material. A shelf was tipped over on one side, spilling its content of books all over the floor. Gordon naturally tried to avoid stepping on these articles of literature although it was the least of his worries right now.
He began investigating the desk, pulling out drawers and looking for anything useful.
“Freeman, watcha doing there?” Gordon looked up to see Fisher looking at him inquisitively through the shattered window before explaining his purpose.
“Oh, I’m just looking for anything useful.” This brought an amused look to the marines face.
“Like what, a stapler to replace your crowbar?” He smirked as he nodded toward the battered tool on Gordon’s waist. The physicist in question merely rolled his eyes at this and pulled open another drawer. To his surprise and utter delight, he discovered a pair of luminous blue batteries, Black Mesa All-Purpose Batteries to be exact, made essentially as an all-around handy device for powering anything involving electricity for the convenience of Black Mesa’s employees.
This included Gordon and his HEV suit. With a smile, he snapped open a small port on his chest and snaked out a small cord from inside its compartment. With a wordless grin at the now irked Fisher, he plugged it into the battery and turned around to fully face Fisher as he began to charge his suit.
There was a pleasant humming sound coming from his suit as it filled up with energy. Gordon closed his eyes and breathed out a relaxed sigh, it just felt good to get a good charge. The first battery ran out of juice pretty fast, as did the second. His suit beeped affirmatively as the tinny female voice flatly announced the power surge.
Power at fifty percent. Gordon then tossed both spent batteries into a nearby trash basket and snuck the little cord back into place before sliding out the door to rejoin his comrade. He gave Fisher an innocent smile.
“Sorry, did you say something?” Fisher was good, his facial expression didn’t falter as he casually responded.
“Yeah, get rid of that crowbar. Now come on, let’s go.” With that he wheeled around and set off down the hall at a much faster pace than before. Struggling to keep up with the marine, Gordon shook his head. It was worth it.
OK for all of those of you who don’t know, this takes place roughly one third or so of the way through ‘We’ve Got Hostiles!’ And don’t worry, the next chapter is going to have them actually get back in the game with a big in-game fight and ending with the freight elevator ride to the surface.
Reviews are always welcome BTW.
I should start putting copyrights into my chapters now so here it goes.
Half-Life and its affiliated characters and affiliated everything else all belong to Valve Corporation who can have Fisher too if they want. Unlikeliest of Friends
“We’ve got hostiles!”
Well, it was bound to happen again sooner or later. When one was trapped inside an underground science facility being overrun by hostile aliens while at the same time military cleanup crews tried to kill everyone involved in the project, you were bound to get into a really big fight sooner or later.
And seeing as how fate had allowed the last fifteen minutes of going down and back-tracking through various hallways generally unmolested, it was only fair that Gordon and Fisher were about to enter a world of really painful bullets.
Gordon had always made himself use a treadmill at least five times a week for awhile so he wasn’t so unprepared for trying to move up against the flow of a conveyor belt. Well, he hadn’t been crouching on the treadmill, but it still wasn’t so bad.
However once he had emerged from the tunnels and found himself in a small room split down the middle by canyon of some sort, he suddenly found himself wishing he had just stayed on. Or ever better, just stayed home in general.
But as it all played out, Gordon Freeman suddenly found himself tumbling off the black moving surface and landing hard on the concrete surface. He really needed to work on his landings. But as he pushed himself off the dirty floor, pushing his glasses up, he suddenly realized that clumsiness was not the greatest worry present.
Looking up, the bespectacled MIT graduate found himself looking at a very tough, very mean looking marine cradling a submachine gun in his burly arms. Gulping, Gordon lay still and desperately hoped he maybe hadn’t been seen.
But to well-trained marines it appeared that stupid misplaced physicists falling off of conveyor belts were easy to spot. For Gordon found the gasmask covered face looking straight at him.
“Uh-oh.” The soldier reacted quickly enough, raising his gun and preparing to open fire. Gordon scrambled up and jumped behind a metal storage contained muttering, “Uh-oh!”
“Squad, we’ve got Freeman!” He heard the muffled voice shouting to some comrades.
“Double uh-oh!” He said again as he raised his rifle. Something in the back of his head told him that it wasn’t good to be so calm in this situation but he ignored it as he pulled himself around the opposite side of the storage container, rifle up.
The marine was behind a sandbag, gun still pointed at the side Gordon had hid behind. Apparently he thought all scientists were tactically stupid. Gordon felt a little insulted, he hadn’t earned a PhD in Theoretical Physics by being stupid thank you very much!
Admitted his PhD didn’t require tactical combat thinking, but still. Gordon took a deep breath, steadied himself and leaped around the corner, aiming down the menacing rifle. The marine saw him immediately, and with what must have been an annoyed look, brought his own gun around to fire.
Except Gordon did first.
The gun roared in his hands and sprayed tongues of fire as it said a hail of lead thudding into the soldier. The man’s own gun dropped as he collapsed to the ground, white puffs indicating where his bullet-proof vest had taken bullets, and red splashes were his unprotected self was hit. He died without a sound.
Swallowing hard, Gordon shakily stood up with his rifle still held out before him. He licked his lips, where was Fisher? He had been right behind him when he-
“Freeman, what the heck just happened?” Gordon snapped around to see the big marine sliding professionally off of the conveyor belt, landing on his feet like a cat. He gave Gordon a questioning look, then his smoking gun barrel, and then his eyes traveled to the dead soldier across the gap. Eyebrows shot up and eyeballs widened. Then he looked back at Gordon and gave him an affirming nod. “Nice work Freeman.”
Gordon shot him a slightly annoyed look. It wasn’t like he was completely incompetent at this; he had being doing well enough before Fisher came along thank you very much. It seemed like Fisher just couldn’t get over the fact that a scientist could do such acts of violence. Come to think of it, Gordon had a hard time with that very fact himself.
“Thanks.” He quietly responded to Fisher who took no note of this before carrying on, leaping the gap in one jump. Gordon considered doing likewise, thought better of it and instead just crossed a small metal bridge. Trying not to look at the slumped soldier, Gordon briskly snatched away a pair of ammunition clips from him before quickly moving on.
Except he couldn’t move on, this room was a dead end. Gordon frowned at this, before noticing a ladder descending into the diving gap at the bisected room’s center. He nodded towards it to Fisher who gave him thumbs up before descending down it. Gordon followed, his HEV suit clanging against the metal rungs.
Dropping the last two feet, he raised his gun and took a step forward before stopping in midstride. Just two feet ahead of him was the ghostly blue light of a laser trip mine. Eyes tracking the thin beam, he followed it to the source, a camera-like projector stuck to the grey wall.
Looking up, he then saw a turrey tucked cozily into a corner just in front of him. Gordon’s heart leaped as he saw the lethal muzzle aiming right for his face, but it didn’t fire. So it was laser-activated, and there wasn’t one in front of him meaning that-
“Fisher don’t move.” He blurted out as he realized where the laser trip was. Glancing back, he saw Fisher fixed on the hair thin red laser just an inch behind his left leg. His face grew white, his eyes widened and his mouth dropped as he realized how close to death he was.
Very carefully, he slowly stretched his leg forward, followed quicker by the other one. A foot from the laser now, Fisher looked at Gordon, his face awash in adrenaline and thanks as he thanked him.
“Thanks, that was close.” Gordon simply nodded before pointing to the trip mine. Fisher saw it and nodded. Gordon nodded back, took a deep breath, and with a huge step, he crossed it. With a sigh of relief, he beckoned to his friend who copied him without trouble. That hurdle passed, they made their way down the hall to whatever challenge faced them next.
They rounded the corner leading into a large storage room, packed with crates just as a pair of relieved scientists rushed out, pleading to an unseen person.
“Take me with you!”
“I’m on the science team, help us!” Gordon realized who they were talking to too late, and before a word of warning could breach his lips, machine guns rattled and the two dropped dead into rapidly forming pools of blood.
Shock stood Gordon still for a moment, but only a moment. It was quickly being replaced by a brew of adrenaline and fear, the ideal mixture for a combat situation. Gordon found himself charging out with Fisher, gun raised high.
A pair of soldier were on the catwalk above; Gordon took aim and fired, sending the one on the left into a slumped pile, part of his head gone. Gordon didn’t stop to think as he methodically turned on the other who had seen him and fired back.
Sharp smacks of pain on his side, like really fast paintballs, gave Gordon reason for a pained grunt. But he just ducked and dodged behind cover in the form of a large crate before rolling out like a movie commando and firing again, a spray of bullets sparking on the metal walkway.
Warning. Impact detected, morphine administered. Out of the corner of his eye, Gordon saw the numbers indicating his suits power level drop as the electrically hardened suit absorbed the high-velocity rounds. He ignored it, adjusted his aim and fired again.
The marine slumped over the guard rails, a hole in place of his eye. He heard Fisher exclaim, “Holy crap” before Gordon was running forward again, hunched down to make himself a smaller target. At the end of the room another soldier popped out of cover, his gun crackling as he sent bullets speeding towards Gordon who had dived into cover at first sight of the soldier.
Dashing back out, he brought his gun to aim when another rifle, much closer and louder, boomed by his ear and sent the distant man down in a red spray. Fisher leaped beside him, not stopping to check his work as he quickly scanned the area. His eyes hit the end of the room again as two more marines dived off the descending stairs and behind some sandbags, squirting off bursts of fire as they went. Fisher opened up immediately while screaming seemingly to no one.
“We’ve got hostiles!” This brought an immediate Well no duh to Gordon’s mind as he joined the marine, holding the trigger down until it was empty. This hail of lead forced the soldiers heads down for a moment, enough time for Gordon to sprint to the next group of crates.
As the soldiers and Fisher began to trade fire again, Gordon quickly ran towards them, protected by the stacks of wooden crates all around him. A scream ahead signified Fisher’s accuracy, doubly proven as the scream abruptly stopped.
Taking a deep breath, Gordon hit the switch to drop the empty clip in his gun and snatched a new one from his magnetic belt and slid it into place with a metallic click. Remembering Fisher’s instruction, he pulled back the charging lever and chambered the first bullet. Thus ready to take on the enemy, Gordon sprinted out from cover to face the enemy.
Only the soldier wasn’t there. He was waiting for Gordon, and suddenly the physicist had the rifle brutally knocked out of his arms as the marine jumped out from behind the crate, a vicious smile lighting up his eyes. He must have been out of bullets, for he had his very large knife out instead of his gun. Yay.
Gordon stumbled back as the marine swung, the metal tip pinging as it glanced off his HEV suit chest plate, nicking the Lambda symbol. Grappling for his crowbar, Gordon managed to bring the tool up just in time as a second slash glanced off it. Swinging it in a wide arc, Gordon tried to aim for the soldiers head.
With a trained ease, the marine grabbed the crowbar in mid air before applying a vicious kick in the gut to Gordon, sending the stunned physicist back into a crate, the crowbar held limply in his hands.
Warning. Impact detected. His suit power dropped some more as the marine came at him like a cat, knife held out in front of him. Gordon found himself trying to scramble back against the crate uselessly as the marine suddenly bolted forward at his unprotected neck.
Gordon jerked his head to the left, sending the blade plunging past him into the wood. With a desperate swing, Gordon felt his crowbar connect solidly with the man’s leg with a resounding crack.
The soldier screamed in agony and nearly collapsed, but managed to stay on his feet while he jerked the knife out and retreated, limping badly. Scrambling to his feet Gordon held up his crowbar to attack.
“You stupid scientist piece of s---! Come here!” The man hissed murderously between clenched teeth as he swung madly at Gordon again, pain and hatred overcoming his training. Gordon swung his crowbar and knocked the knife out of the way, then jabbed forward with the pointed end. There was an agonized scream as the crowbar shoved into the marines gut.
Gordon jerked and the tool came out with more difficulty than he had thought. Quickly bringing it around, he saw the marine lunging at him in one last desperate attack. Sidestepping the clumsy jab, Gordon brought up his crowbar and slammed it down with all his adrenaline-fueled might.
There was a resounding crack as something broke, prompting another bone-cracking strike. The marine fell like a sack of potatoes, dead. As blood began to pool out of his head, Gordon just stood there, crowbar held in both hands before him, breathing heavily. And for awhile that was the only sounds he could hear. He just stood there, watching in a state of numb horror at the person he had just killed.
“Ho-lee crap Freeman, that’s some serious s--t you did there!” Fisher’s voice broke the silence, he sounded almost impressed. Gordon waited for the feeling of revulsion to come, to remind him that he was still human, but to his horror it never did.
He couldn’t even feel horror for killing someone now.
Fisher, ever oblivious to this, finally noticed his comrades deadpan staring. His shoulders dropped, his eyes dimmed and he let out a low sigh as he realized what was coursing through the poor mans mind.
Fisher had known more than a few guys who couldn’t take it and he envied them. Not being able to kill a person without caring, it reminded him of his humanity, that killing was just wrong. The first time was the worst of course; he’d thrown up, got dizzy, sick, the whole nine yards. But then he did it again. And then again, and again, and again until he just couldn’t feel anymore. He hated it, he knew he should hate it, but he just couldn’t.
Slowly walking over to Gordon, and skirting the dead body, until he was beside the stunned scientist Fisher leaned against the wall with him with a heavy sigh and, without turning to face him, addressed the poor scientist. “It never gets easy does it?” More of a statement than a question. Gordon stayed silent for a moment, and then turned to Fisher, his face a pained mixture of horror, shock and pleading.
“How? How do you ever get used to it?” He asked, his voice sounding broken and empty. Fisher sighed again and closed his eyes.
“You don’t. You never get used to killing someone, no matter how many times you do it. You just don’t think about it, look at their masks, their suits. Never their faces or their eyes. If you keep doing that, you just eventually stop feeling. You just do it and do it, and when it’s all over you scream into your pillow and try not to kill yourself. Never let yourself think about them, not their faces or their families or anything. They’re just masks, shoot them and they fall down. Don’t think about their screams or pleas for mercy.” His face suddenly went white and his eye widened, like he was reliving some terrible memory. “Never their pleas for mercy.” He repeated blankly.
Gordon stayed silent for a moment, they both did. Then, looking like a lost and hurt child, Gordon fixed his bespectacled gaze on Fisher once again and spoke, his voice sounding bent by the tone that signified he knew the ugly truth, despite what he wanted.
“I don’t want to do it.” Then he looked back down at the body for a moment and Fisher thought with concern he was going to break like so many of his friends did. They just gave up, quit, curled into a ball and refused to come out, and Fisher desperately hoped this wouldn’t happen to Gordon. But after a brief internal struggle, he stood up on wobbly legs, picked up his gun, and reloaded it before heading up the stairs without a word.
So I plan for the next chapter to be continuing through the level “We’ve got Hostiles’ and hopefully ending with the elevator to the surface followed by the descent back down into Black Mesa. I know I was going to have that in this chapter, but I felt this was a good place to end this chapter. So until next time, remember that I really love reviews.
