Hahahaha! I discovered the best thing EVER! It's plans to make all sorts of half life stuff out of paper. I already made myself a rollermine. Next I will make Gordon's Half Life 2 HEV suit. Best thing ever. Until I find the next best thing ever that is.

Anyway, wow, this story is now my most read story. Cool.

So, this chapter was supposed to be somewhat different, Gordon was going to leave the base, instead now he's climbing in the vents again. And now you get lots and lots of Gordon's thoughts. Hopefully he isn't too out of character.

Chapter 7: Of Scientists and Air Ducts

Gordon was unsurprised at the revelation of headcrabs in the air ducts. He had been expecting them after all. True, he wasn't expecting the one he found, he was expecting the harmless Lamarr, but a headcrab was a headcrab. Ignoring both Alyx and Barney, he started to return the grate to its original position. He briefly considered screwing it back on, but he would probably have to reenter the ventilation system soon, probably within the next couple of minutes, so he didn't bother.

Even if he had wanted to screw the grate back into the wall, he couldn't. He didn't have the screwdriver anymore. He couldn't screw in the screws without a screwdriver, which, if he remembered correctly, Barney had. Gordon narrowed his eyes; Barney also had his crowbar. And Barney was using it to poke the headcrab. That was not the proper use of a crowbar. He needed to use more force.

Gordon silently grabbed the crowbar from Barney's hands. Barney looked a little surprised then took on an expression of mock anger.

"Hey, that's mine you know. If you remember I was the one who gave it to you."

Gordon merely glared at Barney, daring him to take it back.

Sighing heavily Barney said, "Well, I suppose you can keep it a little longer. You'll probably need it."

Alyx suddenly burst out, "There's an open grate in Isaac's lab!" She then took off down the hall.

Barney blinked, puzzled at Alyx's sudden outburst. "What the hell?" He said. "Oh, that's right, there was an open vent in the lab." He took a deep breath, thinking. "Well, I guess I'll go outside and look for the point where the headcrab entered the air system. You can crawl around looking for any still inside, and um, Alyx can warn her dad."

"Great," Gordon said with a sigh. He knew it. Five minutes later and he was going back into the air ducts.

"I'd offer to take your place, but it probably wouldn't be smart to have you wander around outside in that bright orange suit. Plus I don't got a flashlight."

Nodding, Gordon removed the grate that he had just put back. Thinking it over, he probably didn't need his shotgun, it had been quite cumbersome the last time he was in these ducts. He handed his shotgun over to Barney who took it.

"Hey, thanks. Now I won't have to go to the armory for a weapon." Barney grinned and waved, and started to walk off. He called back, "Have fun!"

Gordon shook his head. He was not going to have fun. While he used to enjoy crawling through the air ducts, it wasn't nearly as fun after the five hundredth and fifty third time. What was it with the air ducts anyway? Was there some sort of force pulling him to them? He always seemed to be crawling in them. He remembered racing Barney to retrieve Dr. Kleiner's office key through the air ducts. That was fun. The only things that he had to worry about were the occasional black widow spiders. Now he had to worry about being attacked by small crawling creatures that wanted to eat his brains.

There was one good thing about these air vent crawls; he didn't have to listen to anyone talk. Even worse was when they didn't talk. It always bugged him when people would just stand there staring at him. It made him wonder if there was something on his suit. Then he would realize that it was his suit; that was what they were staring at. He knew, because he had experimented, walking around with his suit on verses walking around without it. People noticed him a lot more when he wore it.

Since he was always wearing his suit, did that mean that he actually wanted people to stare at him? That couldn't be. He wore it for protection, that's all. Most definitely not because he wanted people to stare at him. You never knew when the Combine would attack, and he just knew that the one time he didn't wear his suit he'd need it. Perhaps he'd have to convince Dr. Kleiner to make him a stealthier suit or a less cumbersome one that he could wear under his clothes. Then again, people might start noticing him instead of his suit and then he'd never get away from their annoying stares.

As he crawled noisily through the cramped air ducts, he wondered what people thought when they heard him crawling around. While this was one of the more private ways to get from one end of the base to the other, it certainly wasn't the quietest. Not that he used air ducts to travel all that often in populated areas, but there were times he did so to avoid certain people. He'd ever admit it to anyone though. If asked, he'd claim to be inspecting the air vents for headcrabs. It was a perfectly logical reason to be in the air ducts.

But, what did people think? Did they think it was an invasion? Would some of the more trigger happy start shooting at the ceiling? He hoped not, he'd rather not get shot. While his suit could take it, the bruises could be painful. And whenever he got shot, his suit injected morphine into him, and he was trying to cut back on the amount of morphine he used. It couldn't be healthy and he had noticed that it seemed to be losing its effectiveness.

Did they make morphine you don't get addicted to? He knew that morphine was highly addictive, yet he didn't think he was addicted. Gordon considered for a couple of seconds. Perhaps he was addicted, but didn't notice because he was always being shot at so he never got to the point where he went through withdrawals. He would definitely have to talk to Dr. Kleiner about it.

Reaching an intersection, Gordon sat down and listened. Sound traveled well through the air ducts, and with luck, he should be able to hear any nearby headcrabs. He didn't hear anything that was definitely a headcrab, but he had heard an odd noise coming from the right hand branch. It was possible that noise might be a headcrab. He also heard talking. That confirmed it, if there was a headcrab that way, it would be best to get to it before it got to whoever was talking.