Chapter 1: Painful entry

"Good morning, Corporeal Shepard. It's been quite a while. It seems you have caused more damage than my employers expected. It seems, though, I have taken a liking to you and was able to convince them to reconsider keeping you here for you to rot. I'm sorry to keep you waiting. Your mission isn't complete. Your country needs you. Time to answer the call."

Adrian found himself running down a steep cliff. He landed squarely on a road, lucky enough that he didn't break his legs. He looked around and couldn't figure out where he was. This didn't look like anywhere in the States. Then again, he didn't travel much of the country. He realized he still had his PCV on. To his amazement it was at a hundred percent. After duking it out with that alien he thought his vest was scrap.

Then he heard a slight roar coming from behind. He turned and saw a buggy headed right for him. It hit him at full speed, sending him flying in the air and made a hard landing.

He woke up an hour later. There was a giant bug hardly three feet away from him. He opened his mouth to scream when it was shot away. He felt himself being picked up and dragged away. He went out cold again.

"Who is he?"

"He's Adrian Shepard, twenty-five years old. He was a Corporal of the U.S. Marines. He was in the Black Mesa incident, a major player in it, too. If it weren't for him, Dr. Breen wouldn't have escaped. We owe this man a lot."

"Ha-ha! The Commander will want to meet him, that's for sure!"

Adrian passed out again.

"Dude, for an uber marine, he sure faints a lot."

"He was hit a damn buggy! If you were hit it would've killed you!"

Adrian sat up, removed his helm and rubbed his eyes. He replaced the helmet back onto his head and looked around. There were six men in the vehicle plus the two drivers. All of them wore funny looking uniforms.

"Who are you?"

"To you I'm Lance Corporeal Hans Awn Focker. I was in the Marines with you. We once sat together after a brutal day of training at Boot Camp," the shortest man said, "But now I'm a Combine Elite and I plan to make you one, too."

"Combine? I heard you guys mention Dr. Breen and how I helped him escape. I don't remember a Dr. Breen at Black Mesa," Adrian replied.

"You two didn't actually meet. You cleared a path for the good doctor to escape. You did more damage than Gordon Freeman," Hans replied. One of the other soldiers laughed.

"Then Gordon did a bunch of damage to you!"

"What are you talking about?" Adrian asked.

"Gordon Freeman was driving the buggy that hit you. We've been assigned to tracking and stopping him, whether it means killing him or capturing him," Hans explained, "And after this…Incident…We're confident we can capture him before he reaches the Citadel."

"Hans, you are so paranoid. Gordon won't get anywhere close to the Citadel."

"Says you! He took on more aliens and Marines than Barney and Shepard combined, no offense Adrian."

"None taken."

"Anyways, the Commander will be real happy to know we got you, Adrian. You'll make an excellent addition to the Combine Elite. We'll get Freeman for all he's done to the Combine!"

"Okay, first of all, shut up. Right now there's no 'we'. I want to go back to base and find out what the hell is going on. Second of all, who the hell's the Combine?"

"Want the long or the sho-"

"I want a damn answer now before I kick your ass."

"After you destroyed half of Black Mesa and then it was nuked, those aliens-The Combine-attacked the rest of Earth. After seven hours of fighting, Dr. Breen was put in charge of Earth. He was the head guy or something at Black Mesa. Now the Combine rules Earth and most everyone's happy. Then Gordon Freeman shows up at a train station and starts killing people. We tried to contact and reason with him, but all in vain. He's intent of stopping the Combine from oppressing the people of Earth."

"That makes me want to jump out right now before you give me a job application."

"I'm not too impressed with Breen's methods, either. We're soldiers. I've arranged it so we are for hunt, capture, and kill only. We're not going to torture or kill innocent people."

"You lost me."

"Hey, David, are we out of range yet?"

"Yeah, it should be safe to tell him."

"We're not actually Combine Elite. We're mercenaries that Dr. Breen hired

personally. The rest of the Combine doesn't know, however. They think we're the best of the best of them. We plan on capturing Gordon Freeman, but some guy in a blue suit hired us to simply prevent casualties."

"He hired you?"

"Yeah he did, why?"

"I was whisked away by a man in a blue suit. That's why I disappeared."

"It seems he wanted us to really do our job then!"

"Indeed. Too bad for you I'm against oppression and dictatorships. I'm not signing up."

"I'm sorry you feel that way."

The next thing Adrian knew, he was getting whacked in the back of the head with an electric baton.