Geez, it's about time I get around to this. I've been spending the past month planning this story out in my head and trying to get it to be compatible with the game's storyline. Now, Barney continues! It'd help to read Barney Begins first, but I'll try to make it newcomer friendly. This takes place right before Dog digs Gordon out of the rubble at the beginning of Episode One.
The explosion at the crown of the Citadel had long since dissipated. The sadness that clouded my heart had not. I walked to Dr. Kleiner's lab with a slouch, my gun being held lazily with one hand.
"Hey, that ain't good for your posture." The medic I was traveling with looked at me with worry.
"What would you know about posture?" I snapped back at him. DOG, walking on the other side of me, glanced at me with concern.
"Well, I'm a medic..."
"Oh, really? I thought all you needed to be a medic was a jacket full of medkits and a red cross stitched over it."
"Look, Barney, you near had a hole cut clean through you. I wouldn't push myself too hard."
"I'll walk how I want." I clenched my jaw and kept walking.
"Why you so depressed anyway?"
"Only because Eli, Gordon, and Alyx have all been incinerated up...up there!" I pointed to the top of the citadel.
"Oh." The medic went silent.
We needed to get to Dr. Kleiner's lab as soon as we could. The wall of the citadel was creeping steadily outward like a glacier, ever extending the borders of the Citadel. Soon enough, it would reach the lab and crush it.
–
All of a sudden, DOG stiffened. Upon seeing him, I did the same. I grasped my weapon with two hands and stopped walking. I scanned the rooftops of the surrounding buildings.
"What's wrong, boy?" DOG whimpered softly and ran back the way we came.
"The hell is he going?" The medic clutched his SMG nervously.
"I don't know. But it looks like we have one less companion." I watched DOG disappear around a corner. "We need to hurry up." I started walking briskly again. "If we make it in time, we might be able to save Dr. Kleiner."
–
We finally turned onto the street where Dr. Kleiner's lab was situated.
"Huh. No Combine. I wonder where they all went." The medic looked around. Indeed, we had encountered nothing on the way to the lab. No rebels to be found, even.
We turned into an alley off of the street, where a fire escape would lead us to the top of the building it was attached to. From there, it was just a short walk into the lab. There was just one problem. The fire escape had been torn off the side of the building and lay in a heap in the alley. Bullet holes covered the wall it had been affixed to.
"Oh, no. No no no." I craned my neck to see the top of the building.
"What went on here?" The medic asked.
"I don't know, but we need to get into the lab and see what's going-"
"What the hell was that?"
"What the hell was what?"
"That pile of fire escape just moved."
"What are you talking about? There's nothing-" The pile of bent metal indeed shifted slightly.
"What's under there?"
Suddenly, a deafening scream rang out. Out of the debris came a creature so strange, I instinctively opened fire. With lighting quickness, it jumped at my gun and grabbed it right out of my hands.
"No!" I punched the creature in the face as the medic shot it further with his SMG. The bullets did little to suppress the thing. To my horror, it began to bend my AR2. I pulled out my pistol and shot it further. It screamed again, dropped my useless AR2, and ran out of the alley.
"What was that?" The medic leaned against the building.
"I don't know." From what I had observed, the creatures stood an inch or so shorter than me. It wasn't a zombie, as there was no headcrab over it. In its mouth, it appeared to be holding a limb that I couldn't identify. There were spots on its skin where the flesh and muscle was falling away.
"I'm going after it." I jogged out of the alley.
"You're what? Hold on, Barney!" The medic hesitated for a moment. "You hardly have any bullets!"
"I have enough!" I scanned the street for any signs of the creature. The cellar door to the building which contained Dr. Kleiner's lab had been torn apart. The creature must have ripped the Combine lock from the door and broken through. I gulped. It was no wonder it was able to bend my AR2.
"I might need your help!" I called the medic from the alley. He cautiously walked out. "He went down there." I pointed to the cellar and took the first step down. I pulled a flashlight from my jacket, one that I had when I took my suit from a metrocop what seemed like months ago.
"Where the hell did he go?" I pointed my flashlight around the dark basement, pistol in my other hand. My pistol had half a clip left and I was pretty sure I had used my last full clip in the ambush.
"Whatever it was, I don't wanna see it again. Did you see what it was carrying in its mouth? It looked like a freakin' arm!" The medic said.
"Stay quiet. I think I hear something."
And I did hear something. Heavy, irregular breathing. I just couldn't find the source. I swept my flashlight all around me until I felt something sharp scrape the top of my head. There it was, clinging to the ceiling. As soon as I saw it, it dropped down on me, bringing me to the floor. It stank something awful. I heard the medic screaming, and then he ran up the stairs into the street again.
It began to rip off its own arms. I lay there, petrified. I couldn't move. Long, bloody, sharp claws began to slide out of its torso. Its arms hung onto it with a strand of muscle.
For a split second, I wasn't hypnotized. I grabbed my pistol as fast as I could and fired at the thing until I rendered my pistol useless. The thing, merely enraged, raised its claws. It seemed to laugh as it slowly lowered them towards my chest, through my shirt When the claws came in contact with my skin, I winced. It brought its claws across my chest, letting blood flow out of my stomach. It laughed hysterically. I couldn't take it anymore. I grabbed its head with my own two hands, not ready to die so soon. I twisted its head until I heard a satisfying "CRACK". It dropped dead on top of me, the rotting flesh scent giving me terrible nausea.
I shoved it off of me and got up after a bit of struggling. I coughed. Wet liquid spurted from my mouth. I needed to find that medic. I staggered up the stairs and out of the basement, sweeping the street, searching for the medic. I found him, dead, leaning against the side of the building. His neck had been slit so deeply that he was halfway decapitated.
I saw another thing, similar to the thing I had fought in the basement, walking slowly down the street. Another one jumped down from a rooftop while a three more came crashing from a second story window. And they were all heading for me.
--
I tore open the medic's jacket. Medical vials were clipped to the inside. I unclipped a few and poured them all over my stomach. The wound stopped bleeding, but did not close.
"Come on, come on!" I put the medic's jacket over my body and took his SMG. The creatures began running towards me. One was carrying a lead pipe. He threw it at me and then charged. The pipe slammed into the building behind me. I shot the creature in the feet. As it fell over, I kicked its head repeatedly. It lay still, at least for the time being.
"Don't come any closer!" I pointed the SMG at the creatures. They behaved like any other rabid zombie and didn't listen. They walked closer.
"No!" I shot at one, but of course it did nothing.
But off in the distance, I heard yelling and a motor. Far down the street was a blue car rushing my way. I saw a gun light up from the passenger seat.
The creatures realized that if they delayed further, they'd be run over. They started for me at the same time.
I transferred my SMG to my left hand and picked up the lead pipe that had been hurled at me earlier with my right hand. As the first creature reached me, I slammed it in the face. It screamed and fell down. I smacked another down and shot at both grounded creatures.
I dropped the pipe and the gun as I began to get faint. The final thing ran at me. It was about to take its final leap when the car finally barreled onto the scene and brutally ran over it. The car kept driving, even with the creature pinned under its front bumper. As the creature was being dragged, it left a sickening trail of blood behind the car.
Finally, the vehicle came to a stop by running into a tree. Two men hopped out of the car. One was armed with a wrench and another with an AR2. The man with the AR2 ran towards me.
"You need help?" He asked. I coughed and nodded. He looked back to his friend and yelled, "Louie! You got any medkits in the back?"
Louie was beating away at the pinned creature with his wrench.
He kept swinging as he answered, "Yeah!"
"Well, can you get one out? That guy isn't going anywhere!" Louie stopped the beating and walked to the rear of the car. He stuck his wrench between the trunk's lid and the rear bumper. He pried away until the trunk opened.
Louie took out two medical kits and threw them to the person standing over me. He opened one and poured its contents over my wounds. I regained my strength and stood up.
"What the hell is-what was that?"
"Oh, the Minuteman? We call 'em Minutemen. It's cause you think you killed them, and there they are the next minute screamin' at you again. I doubt any of these guys are still dead. We need to get going. You can sit in the back."
We walked back to the car. "Where's Dr. Kleiner?"
"Oh, Alyx handed him over to a rebel base. He's in good hands." I breathed a tremendous sigh of relief.
"What, you thought he was dead?"
"Yes!"
"Well, he isn't. He's being guarded 24/7, with Eli too."
"Eli?"
"Don't tell me you thought he was dead too!"
"Well..."
"Ah, I see why. Being captured and all. Well, that Mossman lady got him out of there. We're still not sure about Alyx or Gordon though. We're arranging some search teams-oh, no."
"What?"
"That Minuteman just twitched. We need to get out now. Come on!" I hurried back to the car as Louie was delivering his final blows to the Minuteman pinned under the car. He pushed the car back from the tree. The other man ran to the front of the car as well and pushed.
"Give us a hand?" Louie called. I hurried next to him and pushed too. The car slowly rolled back until the Minuteman slumped to the ground.
"Okay, hop in." Louie gestured to the back seat, which was completely ruined. Stuffing was coming out of the cushions and the upholstery was torn. I crawled into the back as Louie took the driver's seat. The other man claimed shotgun.
Louie threw the car into reverse, then put it into drive, steered past the tree, and rushed down the road.
"So what's your name?" I yelled over the wind rushing through the windowless car.
"Howard! I know you, though, you're Barney!"
"Yeah!"
Howard was a very average sized balding man. His hair was graying and wrinkles were starting to form around his eyes and mouth. He was not the kind of person that I would expect to be very good at fighting. Then again, if you were human, you were handed a gun, given basic training, armor, and put out into the city.
Louie was a giant. He had to keep his head down to prevent hitting the roof of the car. His shoulders were very broad while his waist was relatively small, giving his torso the shape of a downward-pointing triangle. He held his wrench in his right hand while steering with both.
"This car has no brakes, so we need to crash into stuff to stop it!" Howard yelled.
"I'm surprised you found a car that works at all!"
"I found this clunker in a parking garage! It was the only one with wheels! All I did was tune up the engine and transmission in some abandoned APC maintenance place!"
--
We drove on in silence. Because the car had no brakes, Louie could not slow down to turn corners. Every turn made the tires squeal and the car skid. I plugged my nose every time he turned, as burning rubber was possibly the worst smell in the world to me.
As the car neared what Howard described as their base, two Combine smashed the glass of a cafe and ran out. Howard leaned out of the car and shot each soldier once in the head with an AR2. Both were killed instantly.
Howard looked back and laughed at my stunned expression. "I may have been an auto mechanic, but riflery was my hobby!" Howard laughed again heartily as the car neared the base. Two rebels standing on the roof of the building gave the car a thumbs up.
"Brace yourself!" Louie yelled. He released the gas pedal and the car ran into the building. Howard and Louie leaped out of the vehicle. I followed with shaky legs.
"Well, here we are!" Howard gestured to the building. "Nestled on the edge of the Minuteman Jungle, and right on the threshold of death and destruction, with scenic views of destruction and death, Point Charlie!"
Howard's physical description was inspired by the man sitting next to me in the lobby of my community cemter. Just thought you'd want to know.