Escape from Black Mesa
Prologue
"The right man in the wrong place can make all the difference in the world"- G-man
"John, John. Wake up!" he felt the bony hand of Nina, his lab assistant make contact with the back of his round head. He bolted upright and found himself still in his lab.
His desk had been smothered underneath a mass of reports and papers. The formula of relativity and many other assorted equations and formulas were scribbled messily in blue marker on his whiteboard.
"Why don't we go get some coffee" suggested Nina.
"Yes" he agreed. He needed something to wake himself up fully. This was the big day in his division. After three and a half years and 600 million dollars worth of research, the Anomalous Materials Lab -part of the Sector C test labs and control facilities- was ready to test their brand new, state of the art, anti-masspectrometer. He had been up all the previous night preparing for today's big experiment.
He immediately walked over to the coffee machine and poured the hot liquid into his thermal-blanket heated Black Mesa coffee mug. He rejoined Nina at one of the many cafeteria tables.
"Well I hope that this experiment goes well" he said.
"John, you mustn't worry so much, everything will be fine" replied Nina.
"I don't know how you could say that" he retorted.
"This new crystal may be the purest sample we've seen yet" stated Nina in a positive tone.
"Yes, but also, potentially the most unstable sample as well. I have no idea why Wallace would put his faith in that man with the briefcase, I don't trust him Nina".
"The administrator knows what he's doing, Eli trusts him as well. The man after all gave the specimen directly to Eli just this morning" Nina indicated.
"Well, I'm sure Izzy would have agreed with me if he hadn't been transferred to the Lambda division" replied John.
"He would have seen the rare opportunity this has given us and supported the project. John, the possibility of a resonance cascade scenario is extremely unlikely, under one percent even" informed Nina, assuredly.
"Who is going in with an HEV suit to conduct the experiment?" asked John. "It's Gordon, he volunteered" answered Nina.
John glanced at his watch and began to have a slight panic attack. His watch told him that it was 8:45 am. The experiment was set to begin at 9:00 sharp. He quickly gulped down the last of his coffee and ran towards the test chamber. He didn't even say goodbye to Nina, who he would now see again for a long time.