I don't own Half-life or any of the characters, as you may have guessed.
Half-life
Unforeseen Consequences
The dust was choking, thick black and brown plumes rising through the darkness in front of me and swirling down my thought. It was the first thing I noticed when I regained consciousness, and just seconds after the dust had clogged my vision I could hear, well more feel, the thud of the strider's gun still above me.
The pounding of the cannon added to the pounding in my head as I tried to heave myself upright, I couldn't have been out more than a few minutes or it would have moved on. Around me I could see through the haze that the room was black and scorched, a vast hole had been punched through the wall farthest from the street were the thing had detonated, and two faceless, burnt corpses lay strewn on the floor, destroyed beyond recognition from the blast.
I would probably have thrown up if I hadn't been so full of adrenaline, I barely noticed the ringing in my ears or the pain in my head as I grabbed my assault rifle from the floor were it had landed.
I couldn't hear the gunshots over that ringing as I fired when they came round the door, two of them. The first was bathed in blood as the collapsed to the floor, the second was hit in the leg as the pulled out of the way of his friends limp body. He collapsed as his dead partners weight pressed down on him. And I just kept firing until the clip fell with a dull thud to the ground.
Only then did I rest.
It must have been a few hours and I still cant remember what was going through my mind. After a couple of minutes i started to ache all over, I remember that. I noticed the pain in my skull and how bitter the burnt air tasted. I noticed that the ringing was subsiding and I could smell burnt flesh all around. And i noticed were the shrapnel from the grenade had left a thin red line on my leg.
But it didn't matter, I was still alive, and after a while back on my feet. I stumbled from the room and poked around over the corpses of the two I'd killed. The strider had fallen silent and the sound of battle was far off now.
I silently striped them of anything I could use. Ammunition mostly but one carried a roll of bandages, thicker and tougher than the ones we had carried in with us. I wondered vaguely how many were dead of those that had re-entered the city.
It had only been a few hours ago but it felt like a lifetime. There had been fourteen people at supply seven, most had chosen to return to City 17 to take part in the uprising. I remembered Philip, the self appointed sergeant cracking a rare smile on the trip, and William joking about how they'd arrive and Freeman would have already won back the city, and Tom boasting about how many Metro-Cops he was going to kill.
And I remembered the look on Philip's face when the Man-Hack had taken him in the stomach, and the last glance I had of William before a strider had shot him as he tried to run, and Tom's screams when he had lain dying on the ground.
I shook myself from my thoughts and took a long look at my leg. The cut wasn't deep but I was bleeding plenty none the less. I bit back the pain as I doused it with the methanol from the pack in the room, mercifully undamaged, and bound with the bandage from the Metro-Cop. It wasn't until then I took another look at the bodies.
I hadn't known either of them. They had just been here when I ran in from the street when the strider attacked. I couldn't bear to see if they had any identification on them, and now the smell was overbearing, and the dust was making my lungs hurt. As I left I remember thinking, rather morbidly, at least we were two for two.
The street was barren and pockmarked with craters and burns, a car lay wrecked at the far end were a strider had smashed it with its leg. Several of the buildings were crumbling were they had been hit by god-knows what. And there wasn't a person in sight.
I could still hear the gun fire and explosions, but they were coming from further in, deeper in the city. Closer to the Citadel. We were winning.
I was alone and I knew I wouldn't do much good like that, but I still felt I had to fight, to do something, I owed Overwatch that much at least.
It was a long walk from the crumbling street to the inner city, and even slower with my limp, but there was no-one to be found for the first hour. I walked through streets were the dead still lay in the road were they had been gunned down, were wreckage's and make shift barricades still stood and were rats gnawed on flesh from both sides. For every human body I saw I quickened pace a little more, determined to somehow make a difference.
It helped not to think of the CP as human. The humanity had long ago vanished from there minds, or at least all the redeeming qualities. All that remained was the hate and the malice. That was what drove them, the Combine had taken all the rest from them.
It was noticeably darker when I reached the front, and my leg was stinging. In a large courtyard a small group was sitting on and around one of the Overwatch's barricades, all armed. They had thrown up sand bag barricades were they could, as the gates defences were arrayed away from the Citadel and out toward the city. And in the centre of the courtyard, in the fountain that had long since dried up, bodies were being burnt. The smell of flesh burning was in the air again. Its a smell I don't think I'll ever forget.
I was approached toward the vast metallic gate which stood wide open and one of them spotted me. He seemed to panic at the sight of me and waved his gun a bit over zealously for my liking.
" Who the hell are you?" he asked, voice ringing with hysteria. He couldn't have been more than fourteen, perhaps only a baby when the Combine took hold, perhaps one of the youngest people alive. I was tired and I didn't want to have to deal with him, so it was lucky someone else stepped in. He was older and looked far more level headed, perhaps in his forties.
" Calm down kid, get some rest." he ordered, his voice brooked no argument and the kid slumped back onto the ground, holding his head. A few more had noticed me and some looked revolted, strangely. The man turned to me.
" Shit, son, what happened to you?" did I look that bad. Glancing down I noticed for the first time that I really did look that bad. I was coated in a thick layer of dust and blood, not just from myself. My hair had become thick with it and my face was coated in it. These guys looked battle worn, but I looked like a mirage of blood. " Well, it doesn't matter son, if you can fight then we could use your help."
I opened my mouth to reply and fought back a coughing fit, " Gladly," I said hoarsely. " Just don't call me son." I was nineteen, but I had been fighting now for five years, nothing like this though.
" Fine by me, get up on that wall, we're holding here while we get everyone out of the area nearer the Citadel" He held out his hand but then thought better of it, and tried to cover it up " I'm Matterson, you got a name?"
" If I give you my name it'll just make it harder to see me die," It was morbid, but the truth all the same. His eyes went so wide I thought they would pop out of his head " Blake, I'm Blake"
An hour passed by on that wall, I sat for the most part on my own, trying not to think about what had happened in my time in the city. We were winning, pushing them further and further toward there stronghold, and that was all that mattered.
I took my mind off it by cleaning my gun with what little supplies we had, eating for the first time in six hours and listening to reports over the radio. It was dull for the most part, other than when a tremendous bang issued from the top of the Citadel. We all looked up to see that at the very top of the vast, ominous tower, a ball of fire grew, sputtered and died out. We were too low down to see what happened, but it must have been good. The Citadel had always been an impenetrable fortress, issuing forth it's alien armies, but it seemed that we must have done something to it.
I tried to get some sleep after that, but the adrenaline was still pumping through me and it was hopeless. As another band of survivors, most wearing the blue clothes of the citizens here, headed through on there way toward the trains and cars, a girl approached me.
She had been tending the wounded, two more bodies had been added to the fire in the hour I had been there. She was only a little older than the kid who had nearly shot me, and still wore the citizens clothes. She had obviously chosen to stay behind and fight, a lot had, but I had a feeling she was regretting it, her eyes were wide and though she tried to hide it I could see her shaking.
Her voice cracked slightly as she spoke.
" The...the doctor thought I should take a look at you." apparently my appearance wasn't doing anything for her nerves. I doubted that that sawbones was a real doctor, she certainly wasn't at any rate.
" A cut, nothing more, but I saw too it myself." I coughed, my lungs still stung from the dust I had inhaled.
" That's it?" she asked, slightly doubtful, maybe she thought all the blood was mine, none the less she kneeled done next to were I sat and used a torch to check pupil dilation, that seemed pretty pointless, but telling her wouldn't help much.
" Were is it?" I gestured to my right leg.
" Bandaged and disinfected, I'll be fine." she checked it anyway.
" Your cough sounded pretty bad," she remarked " Drink plenty of water." I could have worked that out myself, but I smiled all the same, this was her way of helping I supposed, but she could have been helping more with the doctor.
It was night by the time the combine attacked, half of us were asleep, I was still checking the sights on my rifle behind one of the sand bag covers, and a small group had gathered playing cards in one of the guards posts on the metallic wall.
The first shot was a sniper, I heard the bullet and a scream from just above me, and then chaos ensued. Everyone began to return fire, but they were closer than we thought. I remember taking out a few as they ran forward, but there was a whole column of them, perhaps fifty by what little I could see in the torch light. Combine soldiers could be quiet when they wanted to.
I knew the wall was lost, but most fought anyway, I crawled from behind the barricade and made it to the opposite side of the wall, and started shouting for a retreat. My dust choked voice was barely audible over the noise, and they were getting closer.
Some seemed to have the same idea as me though, and we were soon running from the wall, I tried to guide us to one of the underground entrances that I had memorised on the wall.
A few more were dead when we slipped into a small housing building for cover, a few kept running, but didn't get far. As some cowered and some fired I screamed to be heard over the din.
" We have to get to the underground," I found Matterson by a window " There's an elevator not far from here, we can cut through this building and then cross the street to the west, there's a warehouse, it's just inside." Another burst of fire and the jumpy kid from the gate fell dead next to me. Matterson just nodded.
It was hard to gather everyone over the noise but Matterson could shout for his country, we were soon through the buildings were the noise had died down and back out into the street, and quickly into the large stone warehouse.
The metal gate into the elevator room was open and I shut it behind us, it wouldn't stop them, but it would slow them down. Another of us was hit as I threw open the elevator door and we all rushed to get it. Then we descended and all went dark, and the roar of gunfire was replaced by the screech of metal on metal.
The elevators into the sewers and other underground facilities had fallen into disrepair. But this one was really bad. Sparks flew all the way down with us, and it felt like we were in free fall most of the time, I began to wish I hadn't eaten those crapy rations.
But eventually we came to a sudden jolting stop, in the dark we stumbled into a stone passage, I heard someone throw up.
My torch light barely illuminated the freezing stone passage. The walls were cold and damp, and moss grew unhindered across them. There were five of us left, more than I dared hope. Matterson was standing quite still in the centre of the passage, white and pale, but his eyes were hard as steel as looked at me, another was standing further into the passage, gun in hand and jumping at shadows she thought she saw. There was a man on the floor with his back against the wall, head hanging low, he barely moved, and in the corner the girl who I had seen a few hours before was rocking slowly backward and forward, holding her knees and crying softly, she was the one who had been sick.
" Everyone listen," I shouted, voice brooking no argument. " We need to get back up to the surface, we need to get back and protect the rail lines, we aren't out of this yet. We rest only as long as it takes to work out the best route" I took the map I had been given of City 17 and the underground, and paused as I did. William had given me this map, he said it might save my life one day.
Silently I thanked him and sat with it on my lap. The guy on my left I recognised as Shrew, at least that's what they had called him, the woman I didn't know, but she seemed to have calmed down. Matterson still stood, eyes closed, and the girl was still crying to herself.
As I looked over the map I tried to remember how I had reacted to my first situation like this. For the life of me I couldn't remember. I couldn't feeling afraid or panicking, or anything. Maybe I had memory loss, perhaps it was brain damage, I had suffered quite a battering recently, and it was entirely plausible.
Maybe it was better if I didn't remember something like that. Shaking the thought from my mind I focused once again on the map, trying to absorb every nuance of the route we had to take, it wasn't likely the map was recent, and the underground paths may have been damaged since it was made.
After a few minutes of silence, a voice drew me from my work.
" That's fresh blood." the girl was starring at my leg, and looking down I noticed she was right, against the dried on gore that still covered my clothes a fresh patch of bright scarlet had spread out on my trouser leg. I had barely noticed the pain in my leg, by it was terrible now that it had my attention.
Before I could think to reply the girl was next to me, a roll of fresh bandages in one hand, she set about changing the dressing and cleaning the gouge in my shin. Normally I would have done it myself, but having something to do seemed to have stopped her crying.
We soon set off into the gloom, only myself and the girl had any means of illuminating the gloomy passages, and the going was slow. The floors were slick with moss and we were forced to backtrack several times were the tunnels had collapsed in on themselves.
The fighting was faint above us, an occasional explosion shaking the stone and brick and mortar, but despite that the tunnels held.
We had been walking for what seemed like hours when we entered a large, expansive, cave like tunnel. It looked like it had been some kind of road at some point, but now it was bathed in a thick, murky swamp of backwashed water, perhaps from the Citadel. The water came up around waist height at its deepest, and there was no way to avoid the tunnel for many miles. So we ventured forth.
The cold made my leg sting even more, and I realised that it would need yet another bandage after this. Yet the water was washing off most of the dust and some of the blood gathered on my clothes, looking back I saw I was leaving a red tinged trail on the surface behind me.
That was when I heard the scream. It was unearthly, like it was coming from a hundred feral voices all at the same time, and the fear cut threw me harder than any Combine shrapnel. I had heard it before.
I looked back in time to see the thing burst from the water, long claw like fingers clacking and bile dripping from the cracked ribs jutting out of it's distended belly. And were it's head should have been sat a leathery ball of orange tinged flesh, mouth clamped down and claws dug into it's host's shoulders and chest.
It gave another howl as it swung itself at Matterson before he could raise his rifle. It tore through his neck as he tried to dodge it, a fountain of violet burst from were it hit him and he landed in the pool with a mighty splash.
I forced myself to react, mind screaming at my arms to move as I shouldered the assault rifle and fired at the bulbous creature were the things head should be. As it was torn apart and fell from its' host I heard Shrew being dragged under to my left, but gunfire from my right grabbed my attention.
The woman, Ashley, was firing at another two of the horrors, one fell under the hail of shots, but as her clip ran out the other punched it's grotesque claws through her stomach, her eyes glazed over as it pulled away, and was torn apart as I put another burst of fire into it.
As it fell I heard another scream issuing forth from twisted lungs, it was closer than before, and I only had time to turn as I caught a flash of red and orange, and more crimson blood rained down on me. More alien bile.
It was a couple of seconds before I realised that I wasn't dead. The body of the last zombie drifted on top of the water, along with Shrew, his eyes wide and fearful, his chest caved in. The girl was in the corner, the rifle still in her hands were she had blown apart my would be killer.
We were both silent as we continued on. It had happened so fast and now three were dead. The look in her eyes told me all I needed to know, she kept jumping at the shadows after that, and when we found our way out of the water she was instantly violently sick. I was astonished she still had it in her to be honest.
There was nothing else to speak of in the sewers and passages that remained, just more dust and echoes, bodies of people and there killers. But it was quite above us for the first time in many hours.
The elevator up was in better condition than the one we used on the descent. On the way up I could see that she was shaking as she held the gun tight to her chest. I had no idea what to do, I had never been a very comforting sort, even less so spattered with alien gore.
My thoughts were cut short as the elevator came to a juddering halt and I was met with ten armed men and woman in a plethora of scarfs and jackets and patchwork coats.
But as I saw the man in the middle my hand flicked toward the safety on the assault rifle. It only took a few seconds before I saw who he really was. He was dressed in Civil Protection uniform, with the helmet removed, it was odd to see the armour moving on him, his entire gait was different, more natural. His black hair was swept back in the wind.
Barney Calhoun, we'd heard of him when we were still back doing supply raids on the roads. He'd left for City 17 to be nearer one of Black Mesa's old researchers, and had gone under cover with the CP. It had baffled me at the time, but it seemed to have worked out.
He smiled as he saw us emerge from the elevator door.
" Thank God, I was sure you'd be one of those things." he said, unduly cheerful. I just smiled.
" I'd sooner kill myself." it didn't stop his smile. The air was sharp and refreshing after the musty underground. I took a deep breath to fill my lungs as we stepped out, and saw the Citadel. It was all alight, the top were the explosion had been the night before was cracked and seemed, from this great distance, to be glowing. Now I smiled.
" Quite a sight isn't it?" one of the rebels started, " Pity it might kill all of us" I looked around.
" It's true," Barney explained, " It could go any minute now, we've been stepping up our efforts to pull everyone out of the city, but the Combine have been attacking the stations and the rail lines. Any help would be great, we can't leave right now, a group is due to come up soon. Just hope they made it through those things"
It was another half an hour hour while we waited for the elevator to kick back into action and a large group of blue clad refugees and rebels departed from it. The journey back was unhindered, luckily, but the sound of gun fire could be heard far off, and it was getting closer.
The trains had to be brought all the way around the Combine forces and were only coming in every hour, so we had no choice but to wait, something I had grown accustomed to. The girl fell asleep easily enough but I had too much on my mind, besides a wounded leg and my deteriorating cough.
The only thought on my mind was whether to stay and fight or to flee on the next train. The idea of running was sickening, it felt like turning my back on the fight against the Combine, but at the same time I worried that if I didn't turn around and leave soon I would never get out of City 17.
Maybe that's what I want and voice kept saying, maybe I want the Combine to kill me, to be a martyr. Maybe even if I did get out my leg would stop me fighting, perhaps enough damage had already been done, I might have been too hard on myself. The pain in my thigh reminded me of that harsh reality.
I would have passed a hole in the floor if my leg hadn't been hurting so much, but none the less when I heard shouts from the warehouse outside the station I heaved myself to my feet with a few others and made my way outside.
A group of survivors had made there way to the station, Barney was ushering them through the door with a few others, an from what I could gather they had been thought lost in the battles to the north, but had managed to make good their escape.
Barney smiled vaguely as he saw me leaning against the wall, and in a moment that seemed frozen in time I saw a single Combine soldier perched in the window of an adjacent building, assault rifle aimed straight for us.
I had to make a split second decision, grabbing Barney by the shoulder I threw him to the floor behind me, but before I could get behind the knee high concrete walls I found myself on my back, head against the cold pavement.
It was only once I was down I felt the pain in my chest, as if it was on fire. I saw flashes of gray and black as Barney and the others moved into position to return fire. The blood was pooling up around me, my own blood, from my own body. That felt strangely reassuring, as did the certainty that I was dying. There had never been many certainties in my life since I left City 17, and it was comforting to know that it was all over.
My head lay to one side as my chest started to numb, and I saw the girl standing just inside the doorway, staring back at me. She wasn't crying this time, just staring, mesmerised, as if surprised.
As my sight started to blur, my last thought was of how terrible it was I had never known her name.
I know that the death and the fact that it's in first person don't quite go, but it's a time to suspend your disbelief. Thanks for taking the time to read.