Author's note: Well, first fan-fic. I've read a lot of the Half-Life fan fictions, and it's very possible that I outright plagiarized an idea without realizing it. If you see any idea or concept that feel you deserve credit for, just let me know. I've got chapters 2 and 3 done right now and I'm uploading them ASAP. Please, enjoy.

--

Sobbing. All I could hear was sobbing, interspersed with short moments of silence and dull, unintelligible muttering. It continued on for what seemed like ages until it was interrupted by a voice that began filled with joy and pulled a 180 into shock. Then there were footsteps, small and far-away, then a stomp, followed by more footsteps that grew louder until it seemed as if a pair of boots were noisily sprinting up my ear canal.

There was some loud speech I couldn't make out, directed at me, it would seem. I felt the sensation of fingers on my neck, and then some otherworldly force lifted me up and began spinning me violently, as if I were on a personal centrifuge.

The voices suddenly started to come into focus. I could make out one near me and one further away- the latter was sobbing again, while the one near me seemed panicked. I heard a word peek through the garbled speech- Gordon. It stuck out for some reason, as if the despair in the voice was all compounded into that single word.

Gordon. Gordon. There was something significant in it, as if it were the key to everything. Gordon…

Freeman.

Suddenly my brain raced itself to recollect my thoughts- all that had transpired was nearly impossible to process. I had gone from a physicist to a revolutionary in what was, for me, a few days. Everyone was counting on me to save the planet when all I had ever tried to do was survive. I came back after a short 20 year nap and suddenly I was being idolized by people I didn't even know.

I flung my eyes open as the realization of what had just happened hit me. Barney was above me, a worried look on his face. I could see the beginnings of a smile grow on his lips, but the relief vanished from his face as Alyx sobbed again. She lay partially on Eli's body, letting her tears soak his shirt. Dog was laying next to her, his head a mere inch from her's, studying the strange emotion she was displaying.

"Gordon." Barney said solemnly, offering me a hand, which I gladly accepted. He effortlessly pulled me up, and made a gesture with his head toward Alyx. I wasn't sure how I was supposed to comfort her, so I clumsily shuffled towards her and put a hand on her shoulder. She didn't respond, so I pulled a little. She pulled herself up and buried herself in my shoulder and kept sobbing.

The door on the raised platform opened again, and my eyes shot there. Doctor Kleiner came in, followed by Doctor Magnusson, mid-conversation.

"Well I'm sure if we didn't have the Magnusson device we still could have ma- Oh my god, Eli!" Doctor Kleiner said, running forward. He disappeared behind the elevator for a moment before his head poked out again from the side. There was a loud noise of machinery grinding against itself as the elevator slowly descended. Kleiner rushed forward and bent over Eli's prostrate form as I pulled Alyx, who had begun to slide down my arm, back up.

We made a sad procession, walking in a line behind Barney, carrying Eli's body, until we reached the medical wing of White Forest. Doctor Kleiner said he would make sure Eli had a proper burial; Alyx and I would have to take his word for it, though. We had to find the Borealis, and time was the last thing we had now. The Combine knew where White Forest was, and every minute there the risk of a second attack grew.

I hadn't ever ridden in a helicopter, so my nerves weren't completely about me as the rotors warmed up. The pilot was a roughly middle-aged man, with gray sideburns and stubble on his chin.

I was surprised when a squad of Combine climbed into the back with us. One took his mask off, and I saw it was Barney. Alyx gave him a look in protest, which he acknowledged.

"We don't know what's gonna' be on that boat- you guys aren't goin' in alone." He said.

"But they'll know in a second that you aren't Combine, Barney." Alyx said. "You'll be in more danger than us."

Barney gestured toward the side of the helicopter- outside, the ground was getting further away; I hadn't even noticed the helicopter taking off.

"It's too late, Alyx. We're going with you. Now once we get on the bo-" he began, but he froze halfway in. Outside, the trees stopped shaking in the wind- the wind had stopped. Time, it seemed had stopped. When a blue-suited figure appeared just outside the cabin, I knew it really had.

"Your… friends were quite… troublesome, Mr. Freeman, but they… won't be bothering us again. No intervention…. is currently required, but our benefactors desired… I inform you that your friends… have no control over you." He said, still standing on thin air.

Everything began to turn black, and soon I could make out faint lights in the distance, shooting towards me- stars. We were flying through space at unfathomable speeds, hurtling towards into the unknown.

"You may continue… on your way, Mr. Freeman." He said, and walked away from the rapidly re-appearing helicopter. The darkness dissipated and I could hear Barney talking again. I wasn't sure how much time had passed, but to me it felt like it couldn't have been more than 10 minutes.

"… 'a there, okay?" he said, directing it at everyone in the back. "Gordon? You listening?"

"Gordon?" Alyx said, nudging me. Her eyes widened when she saw my face. "It was… it was him, wasn't it?"

I tried to answer, but the whole helicopter shook as it collided with some small, unseen object. I looked outside and saw we were flying over the ice-covered ocean, and little flurries of snow were drifting into the cabin only to melt when they hit the floor. Alyx, in a winter-jacket, was leaning on me, taking advantage of the HEV suit's warmth, while Barney was sweating. It hadn't ever occurred to me how stifling that Combine armor must be.

"We're hitting an ice storm." The pilot shouted from the cockpit. "I can't go in any further. The Borealis is just North of here, you shouldn't miss it."

With what seemed like a reckless amount of speed, we floated down and hovered just over the ice. Barney put a foot down and tested to make sure it was stable. It was, so we carefully piled out and began trudging toward the Borealis atop the gallant white chunks of ice.

"Gordon", she said, turning her head, "if something happens-"

"Don't start talkin' like that." Barney interrupted from ahead, turning around to face her. "We'll all be back at White Forest in no time, and that's it. End of discussion."

He turned back and put his mask on. Alyx turned back to me and grinned a little, which surprised me. For the sake of the mission she had forced Eli out of her mind. I couldn't, though. The grim scene replayed itself over and over, and every time I felt less and less confident about what we were getting into. If we ran into another of those things, we would be helpless.

I ran into Barney's back in my absence-of-mind; ahead of us, embedded deep in the ice was the biggest ship I'd ever seen. The top was stacked full of freight containers, and on the side of each, in worn white print, were the words 'Aperture Laboratories'. Barney and the other rebels put their masks on, and I instinctively began scanning what I could see of the ship for a possible entrance, or any sign of the combine. I didn't see any obvious entrance, of course. That would have made it too easy. The ship appeared lifeless, though, which was probably a good thing.

"Alright." Barney said, out of the blue, in an attempt to organize his thoughts. "Okay."

We all stood silent, waiting to hear whatever plan he might have concocted. He hadn't thought of any idea, of course, because there wasn't any obvious way onto the deck. It was so high that I would have sworn it had been lifted out of the water; it just couldn't sit that tall in the water. It seemed that any ship that colossal would just sink.

"Any ideas?" he asked, pulling his mask back off.

Silence, again.

"Let's circle around and see if there's another way up." One of the rebels suggested.

"That would take days." Alyx said quietly, gazing up towards the ship's deck. I could see she was coming up with a plan, and while Barney and the fake Combine argued about blowing a hole in the wall, the gears in her head were grinding.

"I can climb it."

My eyes widened so far that my eyeballs nearly fell out. The hull was coated in slick sheets of ice, and even if it were clear, there was no visible protrusion for her to grip. Barney agreed.

"Oh, no. No, no, no, no, no." he said, shaking his head. "You're crazy. Look, there's gotta'… I'm sure…"

He trailed off, obviously unable to think of any other way up.

"Well how the hell are the rest of us supposed to get up there?" he asked. One of the rebels chimed in to answer.

"There was a crane on top in Mossman's transmission. She could lower a freight box and pull us up.

No one said anything. As much as I wanted Alyx to stay there and just help us find a way up with less a chance of her getting killed, I wasn't sure we could last the cold trying to find a different way up, and if she was going to have to climb, it was better that she do it now, while she had the energy. Still, there had to be another way up.

"Gordon, give me your ice-pick." She said, interrupting my train of thought, and rather than wait for me to hand it to her, snatched it from my belt. At the same time, she reached under her coat and pulled out another. Without waiting for anyone's approval, she ran toward the hull of the ship, jumped, and buried the picks as deep into the ice as she could and held on. Then she pulled out the left pick, pulled herself up a bit and plunged it back into the ice.

Slowly she pulled herself up this way. It was almost painful to watch- if I let a few snowflakes stay on my face for more than a moment, they started to sting, and she didn't have the luxury of wiping her face off every few seconds.. At every moment I was waiting for a sickening creek as the ice cracked and fell from the hull, then having to dig through the snow and pull her dead body and wonder why I had let her do it.

Suddenly it seemed as if I had just had a premonition. There was a low groan, as if the ship was vibrating- Alyx took a quick glance down and suddenly I could see her panicking. Or at least I thought she was panicking, when she was forming another plan in her head.

Then she jumped. I gasped and ran forward, preparing to break her fall with my body or something. It wasn't the sort of thing you really thought about. Then she stopped falling and sort of swung around in the air. I looked around, wondering if the suited man had decided to show up again, but everyone was still breathing, looks of confusion etched on their faces.

I looked up too, and I could faintly make out a thin line falling from the deck- a wayward cable that happened to fall in just the right place. She was able to climb the cable much faster, using the hull of the Borealis as footing. It wasn't long before she disappeared over the top.

It was a good 10 minutes before we heard anything. I began to get worried- the Combine could've beaten us here. Waiting on top of the ship for the rebels to come to them. From this distance we just couldn't here the short gunfight.

My fears were put to rest when we heard a groan from the deck- shortly after, a red freight container swung around the side and started to descend towards us.

It didn't lower quite low enough- I had been worried that the crane's length of cable wouldn't be long enough for us to reach, but it hovered around 4 feet in the air. Barney tried to pry open the end, but it was locked. He seemed at a lost as to what to do, so I pulled my crowbar from my back and jabbed at a small bar near the center of the door. There was a soft click, and the doors swung open.

The container was full of pure white machines. They looked heavy, but we were able to pull a few out so we could all fit, leaving the majority of the container filled with the equipment. I fired a few shots into the air to signal the crane, and soon we were slowly being pulled up. Barney locked the door behind us just in case anyone slipped.

I turned the HEV's flashlight on so that we could see. We didn't have anything we really needed to see, but ever since Black Mesa I didn't enjoy the dark all that much. I heard a groan, almost inhuman, and looked around for the source.

"Shut up Dale. We're hot too." Barney said, and I shined the light on him to see him pulling at the neck of the Combine uniform to try and let some of the cold air in.

"That wasn't me." One of the Rebels, Dale I would assume, replied.

There was another groan, and I shined the flashlight towards the other end of the container to see a rotting hand attached to a rotting arm fall onto the top of one of the machines, leaving a sticky mess there. Then it fell, and there was a small thump. I raised my pistol towards the back, and let out a few shots as a headcrab jumped onto the machinery. It slumped over, dead.

We didn't have long to relax, however. Within moments more headcrabs were crawling across the machinery. All the fake Combine let loose with their SMGs, gunning them down, but in the cramped space it was hard to aim, and a few managed to crawl past the hail of bullets. One jumped towards me, but I deflected him with my crowbar with not a moment to spare before he connected with my face. I heard a panic to my left and shined the flashlight on one of the Rebels, wrestling with another headcrab.

He backed up and, by some misfortune, managed to his the door mechanism, releasing the lock, and he fell from the container. I noticed the machinery begin to shift as the balance of the whole container moved from the center. The machines were slowly inching towards us, and the gradient of the Container was increasing every second. We were just below the rim when the machines began to push us.

Time seemed to slow down as Barney haphazardly jumped from the container and hit the deck with a roll, shouting that we weren't gonna' make it.. The Rebels followed his lead, barely clearing the gap, and I waited for them so as not disrupt their jumps. Suddenly the machines completely lost their friction and pushed me out- I managed to push off the rim of the container and my upper body cleared the rim of the Borealis, but the rest of me was dangling over the edge. I grabbed at thin air as I started to slide from the railing, when something caught my hand- it was Barney.

"You're not goin' anywhere, Gordon." He said, smiling, and I couldn't help but do the same as I let the breath escape from my lungs.