Chapter 1 : Introduction.
It's the year 2008, sometime in the month of April. The snow is starting to melt, and the birds are returning. The air is much clearer, and nature has been restored. To think that the Citadel had been destroyed only 6 months ago. Gordon Freemen, and Alyx Vance had taken on the citadel, and won. Gordon disappeared, but Alyx miraculously made it out. If only the rest of my family was around to see this. Pretty soon, we will have combined forces numbering in the hundreds of thousands. I feel very optimistic, and I feel that we can actually stand a fight against the combine.
Six months earlier.
The rebel forces pushed towards the citadel. They were a few kilometers away from the main walls. The decrepit streets, strewn with the bodies of soldiers, and rebels alike, were surprisingly quiet, with gunshots ringing through the air only sparingly. Then it happened. A flash of light, a sonic boom. Windows shattered, people cringed, Combine soldiers screamed in their radios. The very point of the citadel, the metal object that tore the sky in half, had vaporized. The sight was an awesome one, and a huge inferno erupted from the top of the citadel. Then something the rebels never expected happened. The combine soldiers, with their menacing gasmasks, and powerful weapons, retreated. Thousands of soldiers could be seen rushing towards the Citadel. Apparently something had happened, and all of the forces were needed. The rebels were exhausted. Even though morale was high, the commanders made the decision to set up fort , wait, and rest. This decision saved countless lives. An hour later, the citadel disappeared from the skyline in a blast of mammoth proportions. The shockwave was much larger than the first one. It knocked over houses, threw cars down streets, lifted Kiosks and lobbed them into buildings. The blast zone caused immediate death within 1/4 of a kilometer. Within 2 kilometers, there was severe to moderate damage. Everything past that, seemed to go almost unscathed. Why the explosion dissipated so easily, nobody knew. The following period after the explosion of the citadel was jubilation. People cried in the streets, and shouted in praise of the resistance. Parades in the honor of Eli, Alyx, and the now MIA Gordon freeman were held in the streets. The weather after the explosion was insanity. It rained for a month straight, all over the world it seemed. The air, had become fresh again, the water pure. There was a crisp fresh, smell in the air. Rations tasted better, colors became brighter. The animals returned, birds could be seen flying in the sky. Fish were spotted darting through the rivers. Plants could be seen growing everywhere. It seemed as though the earth was given another chance at life.
There were survivors of the blast, an estimated 250,0000 humans, and 6,000 combine soldiers. The soldiers, were squashed with a ferocity never imagined. With the terraformation of the earth put back 10 years, the human race had another chance at survival.. Dr. Eli Vance and Dr. Kleiner set up a local Government for the former city17. The city was named surprisingly, New Terra. Even the native Czechs were pleased with the name. The name symbolized the Human Races triumph over the combine. In the months ahead, life was hard, but happy. The government salvaged combine technology all over the city. The base levels of the combine citadel were still miraculously intact, and the underground storage was also, which ensured food and weapons all over the city. The humans began salvaging parts from the combine citadel. 1,000 Apc's were recovered, 200 striders were recovered, and 170 Gunship were also. Only around 100 Drop ships remained, but weapons, were plentiful. Generator cores numbered in the billion, each generator core could power 10 city blocks for 2 years. Electricity was guaranteed for Hundreds, if not thousands of years to come for New Terra. Immediately, an armed forces was created. The United Earth Forces were established, counting in at 102,000 strong. The UEF had a combined Air Force, Navy, and General transport Division, named the United Forces Transport. All of the combine vehicles were repainted from the combine silver, to a sleek black and light blue motif. The blue matching the color of the Former United Nations security forces. Nothing was left of the human military technology, except a few firearms, and Anti Aircraft weapons, some of which were advanced, even for the combine. In the next 6 months, hundreds of acres inside the city were cleared to create farm land. The combine munitions factories reopened under new names, and for a new purpose, destroying the combine A few vehicle factories remained salvageable near the citadel, and were being repaired for human use. Dr. Vance and Kleiner were both hard at work building new weapons that were effective against the combine. The regional commanders were busy creating the cities main defenses and strengthening the walls. The military lacked what it had in numbers by what it had gained in skill. In fighting the combine, the rebels had learned the combines advanced tactics, and how to counter them. Soldiers had huge amounts of ammunition, as the combine plants could produce around 1,000 rounds per soldier, per day, of any weapon imaginable. Soldiers were all trained marksman, and trained in the skill of preserving ammunition, even though the thought of conserving ammunition seemed trivial.
The combine, having never experienced a revolt like this, were completely caught off guard. Cities 14, and 15, both succumbed to the resistance, with the aid of the vortigaunts. The cities made immediate contact with New Terra, and pledged allegiance to them. The names of City15 and City 14 were both dubbed after their old names. New Warsaw, and New Frankfurt. New Frankfurt is roughly 415 km to the northwest of New Terra, located in the former republic of Germany. New Warsaw is roughly 375 km to the northeast of New terra in the former republic of Poland. According to the geography, the combine placed a citadel every 400-1,000 km, at a city with a surrounding population of around 5 million. They exterminated around 50-75 of the humans they encountered. 10 went to slavery, and the rest to the slums.
The outlook for the humans looked good, with the only neighboring Combine strong points of City 13, and city 18. City 13, located in Paris, France. City 18 is located in the Former country of Ukraine, in Kiev. Kiev is located around 1,000 km from New Terra. In all, the resistance had a lot of space from the nearest attackers.
Three weeks passed before a single recon ship was spotted within 100 km of Either three cities. The first recon ship to reach New Terra arrived around 8 weeks after the citadel fell. It was blasted out of the air by the UEF within seconds of reaching the 7 km limit zone. This is where Filips Story starts.
Chapter 2: A new life