Disclaimer: I don't own Half-Life.
(A/N: Many thanks to hhgbh for beta work. Not just for this chapter, but for a huge amount of stories I've sent your way and you've made just that extra bit better with your advice. Have a good time on your travels, man. From all the spare time you've devoted to my sometimes less than coherent scribblings, you've definitely earned it. J Thanks again.)
The Black Mesa Incident
Chapter Thirty Three: Foxtrot Uniform
Much to Shephard's pleasant surprise, the sparking lever opened the door beside it without a fuss, allowing him through into the dark, dank area beyond. The walkway on which he now stood overlooked a pool of murky water just a few inches below it. The rusted brown metal of the tunnel didn't really help with the visual side of things. With a quick tap on his gasmask, he activated his IR lenses and continued on, following the walkway forward and then off to the left into a small corridor.
There were no doors on either side, just crates. A quick glance upwards gave Shephard his way out, however. The ceiling of the corridor stretched out far above him, and allowing him a view of a metal walkway overlooking the corridor. Several of the green 'zits' grew out of the wall beside the walkway, and Shephard pulled himself up with the Barnacle without incident.
Without incident, that is, until he reached the top, at which point the Barnacle refused to detach from the green plant. Shephard tugged at it a few times, propping his leg up on the wall and giving it a severe yank when it stubbornly held on. But, to no avail. For whatever reason, the Barnacle was determined to stay.
Scowling at being beaten by living harpoon gun, Shephard looked around. A red ladder in the middle of the walkway extended up through a tunnel in the ceiling. Sunlight shone down like some ethereal saviour, leaving Shephard only too happy to abandon the Barnacle to whatever attractive feast it had found. He flipped off his IR lenses before continuing on. If there was to be sunlight beating down on him, he wanted to see it properly.
Alien grenade launcher in one hand, he climbed the ladder with the other, the pink clouds of the sky turning the weapon a paler shade of green as he ascended. Shephard climbed out of the hatch and up into the open air after what had felt like a lifetime of confined spaces and alien territory. Never had a concrete road looked so beautiful, and he had to kneel and run his fingertips over the surface to assure himself he was really there.
The road ran along in front of him before bending off to the left. A metal door filled the archway behind him, and an intimidating rock face on his left prevented him from seeing what awaited him around the corner. The pale grey wall on his right was littered with large shipment containers. A parked military green van sat in front of him, although it had long since been vacated by any soldiers.
Everything looked abandoned, in fact. The scorched roads, the worn containers… it was like the whole place was simply fading away. The sun was setting on the Black Mesa Facility.
Shephard started walking down the road when the sound of another van approaching echoed quietly down to him. From around the corner, a black van mirroring the one that sat beside him came to a halt. A Black Ops soldier hopped out of the back, and as Shephard instinctively took aim with his alien death machine, another leapt out. Shephard aimed for the cab of the van, hoping he would hit the engine.
He fired.
And the engine exploded in a brilliant combination of luminescent green and angry yellow, the grey mushroom billowing upwards gracefully. The explosion engulfed one Black Ops and threw the other out of sight around the corner, although Shephard had little doubt that he was dead. Even with a PCV, being that close to an explosion would rip a man's head clean off.
With a sudden admiration for alien technology, Shephard made his way around the corner. Three high powered bullets hit him in the chest within a second, punching the oxygen from his lungs and knocking him onto his back. With a grunt, Shephard rolled back to safety, listening as dozens of bullets thumped against the rock face.
Shephard didn't give himself the time to catch his breath, since he knew the enemy wouldn't. Still panting, Shephard slowly poked his head around the corner. One glance was all he needed before a shower of bullets rained down on him and he tucked himself back behind cover. Three crates full of explosives (marked by triangular orange symbol) were sat behind the mounted machinegun his enemies were using. Hoping his memory was as good as he thought it was, Shephard edged the launcher around the corner, the creature squirming in his arms as though fully aware of the danger. Pointing it in the right direction, he fired.
With a wet launching noise, the creature recoiled in his hands, the awkward angle at which he held it almost ejecting it from his hands. A few seconds later, he heard the explosion and saw the flash on the road in front of him. He stood with his back pressed to the wall for a few moments more, listening to the crackle of the fire and for any other dangers.
Still not satisfied, Shephard whirled around the corner. Nothing. Just some human shaped scorch marks in the far corner of the road where the Black Ops had been burnt into the wall. He continued on, strafing against the rock face with his launcher firmly aimed at the fire.
A stack of containers blocked a canyon coming up on his left, but a fallen container with a shattered door offered Shephard a way through. After a few more steps, he was through and walking up the dark tunnel. At the top of the container a hole had been blasted in the left-hand side, leading out into the sandy arena beyond. Shephard poked his head around cautiously. His eye instantly went to the Black Ops in the watchtower growing out of the wall on his right.
They both drew on each other at the same time, but Shephard managed to squeeze of a green, liquid-y shot before his enemy could retaliate in kind. It exploded in the watchtower with a distant pop, and Shephard looked around. Green liquid was splattered over the frame of the watchtower and the ceiling, dripping down to the unseen floor high above him. The ground below looked sandy and soft, so Shephard just let himself fall down into the confined little canyon beyond.
Shephard's eye was drawn to a gap in the ground beneath the wall on his right, in the very far corner. It looked akin to how a dog would dig beneath a garden fence. There was just enough room for him to squeeze through by pushing the alien launcher through first, although the constant squirming and writhing of his erstwhile companion didn't make it particularly easy.
From what Shephard could see, the hole led into a small storage area of a room, judging by the sparse metal shelves and wooden crates dotted around randomly. Just as Shephard pushed the creature through, the explosive noise of gunfire coming from the room made Shephard quickly back up, forcing him to leave the creature. It let out a pained cry as it was torn to shreds by the bullets. Shephard held out a futile hand towards it, the pathetic noise it made somehow pulling some amount of sympathy from him. After all, the thing had been keeping him alive for some time now.
"Fucking aliens," a low voice muttered, and Shephard watched as two grey, well worn boots clomped into view, tentatively poking the dead creature with a toe. Shephard recognised the white and green camo of the uniform and smiled.
"Hey there."
The idle boots instantly froze, and the soldier ducked down, rifle at the ready. He paused as he saw Shephard, and then broke out in a relieved grin, greying brown beard wrinkling on his face.
"Hey man, good to see you." He backed up and waved Shephard in. As he crawled through the hole, the soldier kept on talking with a groan. "I can't believe you made it past those masked freaks."
Another voice from his right started talking, sounding rather aggravated and more than a little jumpy.
"Those snipers have pinned us down in here pretty good. We tried makin' a break for it, but they know we're here. They're just waitin' for their shots. And those bastards are patient."
Shephard got to his feet and dusted himself off, realising what a futile gesture it was when he saw that his hands were caked in dust themselves.
The bearded soldier nodded in agreement with his fellow soldier. "Yeah, I'd love to turn the tables on those guys. Get my hands on one of those rifles; show them a thing or two about patience."
His comrade stepped forward, removing his black beret to scratch his short cropped black hair. "Hey, with you here now we have the element of surprise on our side. They're not expecting three of us."
The two soldiers stared at him hopefully. Shephard simply nodded, prompting eager grins from the pair, who instantly ran to the open doorway on the right and took up positions on either side. Still feeling bruised where the mounted machinegun bullets had hit his chest, Shephard walked over slowly. The beret wearing soldier backed up to allow him a view out. Shephard considered asking them their names, but he stopped himself. If he didn't know their names, then he couldn't mourn them like real people. He couldn't feel their deaths weighing down on him.
Fully aware of how full of shit he was, Shephard looked out the doorway, being sure not to expose himself.
Some stacked containers blocked his view immediately ahead. There was a big enough gap between the doorway and the containers for a rather wide 'corridor', however, leading around to both sides. They were in some sort of courtyard. Looking around to the right, Shephard spotted a black form crumpled on the floor, and on further inspection, it turned out to be a Black Ops soldier, green slime spread of his back.
He looked up and smiled. It was the same watchtower he had blasted with his alien rocket launcher. The guy probably had no idea what hit him. The body was just past the edge of the container, and Shephard was fairly sure another sniper would be waiting for him. The sniper rifle lying limply in the soldier's arms drew Shephard's attention, and he looked to the bearded soldier opposite him.
"Cover me."
Looking confused, the soldier nodded anyway, and, after plucking one of the grenades from Beard's PCV vest, Shephard carefully moved out into the open, keeping his head down. When he reached the corner of the container, he pulled the pin and tossed the grenade around.
He waited until the resounding bang and flash of the explosion before darting out to the sniper rifle and quickly scooping it up. As he picked up the rifle and backed up to get to cover, he noticed the recognisable silhouette of another watchtower through the billowing grey cloud. Shephard pressed his back to the container. Beard and Beret were making a move to come out, but Shephard halted them with a raise of his palm.
He took a few moments to catch his breath and try to ignore the pain in his chest before whirling around the corner, sniper rifle touching the edge of the container as he tried to stay as much behind cover as he could. The figure of the Black Ops was easy enough to make out, and Shephard took him out with one shot as his enemy's bullet grazed his shoulder and lodged itself in the wall behind him.
Shephard grunted and put himself back behind cover, dropping the sniper rifle and putting a tentative hand over the wound. Beard and Beret quickly joined him.
"That's one down," Beret breathlessly enthused. He was definitely the younger of the two.
"One? You mean there's more?"
Beard shook his head. "Only one sniper, but there are more Black Ops around for sure."
Shephard nodded while checking his wound. The PCV had managed to stop the bleeding, but the scar was still fairly raw. He would have to be gentle with it for a little bit. He picked up the sniper rifle and checked through the scope as he spoke. "I suppose we'd better get moving, then."
More Black Ops awaited them through the maze of a courtyard, various warehouses, containers and stacks of crates providing them with ample cover. But Shephard's sniper training certainly paid off, and the soldiers soon had precisely aimed high powered bullets blasting through them, frequently knocking them rolling backwards from the force of the shot.
As they made their way through, Shephard couldn't help but notice the explosive laser mines that had been placed down certain alleyways and passages, usually linked to explosive crates and barrels to deter anyone. He was curious as to what they could be guarding, but the knowledge that they were in what once used to be a missile silo got Shephard thinking that a huge chain of explosions probably wouldn't benefit anyone.
After half a dozen or so Black Ops tried without success to take them down - the closest they got was a bullet grazing Beard's thigh - they reached a warehouse entrance that wasn't sealed tight, instead appearing as though it had been forced open. Shephard instantly slowed and waved a hand for his comrades to do the same.
"Do they look like claw marks to you guys, too?" Beret asked, his gaze firmly set on the red metal door.
"What would you rather fight against?" Beard responded.
"Good point."
Shephard nodded to the dented entrance. "Let's go."
The lights had gone out inside, the wall of containers in front of them not exactly making it any easier.
"Can you two see me?"
Beard grunted. "Barely."
"Then just follow me." Shephard flicked on his IR lenses and led the way, navigating his way through the maze on guesswork rather than any natural sense of direction.
Machinegun fire instantly pressed their backs to the wall, but after only a few seconds it became obvious that whoever it was wasn't firing at them. In fact, they weren't even in their immediate area. The light was getting better as they approached a corner of the nearest container, so Shephard switched off his IR lenses and gave a wave to his comrades to stop behind him.
"What's goin' on?" Beard asked, doing his best to try and see around Shephard.
Slowly, the Corporal edged his head around the corner. Inside was a loading area, with two raised platforms on either side with gaps for trucks to be driven into and unloaded. Crates were scattered randomly over the floor and the platforms, indicating some kind of hurried supply check recently. But that wasn't really what attracted Shephard's attention.
What interested him most was the titanic battle occurring before his eyes between the Black Ops and Race X. Shephard's two most deadly enemies, and they were at each others' throats. There was something gratifying about that. He turned back to Beard and Beret.
"Internal politics."
"What?" Dissatisfied with Shephard's deadpan reply, he edged his own head around to see what was going on. He laughed so loud Shephard almost told him to shut up. But the roaring noise of machinegun fire, electricity blasts and random explosions told him to stop being so stupid.
Beard slid down to sit between Shephard and Beret, the latter of whom was still looking rather tense and confused. "So we wait it out, right?"
Shephard nodded, and rested his head back. It would be nice to get some rest. But something in the back of his head urged him to keep an eye on the corner beside him, just in case either of the two sides decided to take cover. As it happened, nothing of the sort occurred, and the three soldiers had a relatively peaceful wait while the gunfire and explosions slowly petered down until there was just one gun, and just one alien. The pair periodically exchanged fire and then silenced themselves in order to take cover and reload. Eventually this pattern disappeared when the Black Ops ran out of ammunition.
A small alien snarl was followed by another electricity blast, and Shephard winced as he heard the thump of the human body against a wall.
He looked over to Beard and Beret, who were now squatting beside him, ready to go. Shephard got to his feet, grasping his sniper rifle, and nodded for them to go in ahead of him. With no less than a cursory glance at one another, they launched themselves around the corner, quickly followed by Shephard who stayed back by the container, quickly surveying the area before training the sniper rifle on the silvery-blue Race X creature. It was kneeling over the dead body of the Black Ops soldiers, although it didn't seem to be taking anything. It just knelt and stared.
It's attention was quickly drawn to Beard and Beret as they opened fire, lodging several bullets in its' back with their M4 rifles before it whipped around, electricity alien at the ready. Shephard took aim at the yellow cat-like eye of the creature and fired. A massive spurt of yellow accompanied the falling creature as it was blown back, turning as it fell and landing on its' front.
While Beard and Beret got to their feet, congratulating each other on a killing well done, Shephard walked to the Race X creature and knelt down beside it, much like the alien itself had been doing some time ago. What had it been doing? All appearances so far had shown that, while they were sentient, these things were vicious killing machines. So why the apparent regret over the death of an enemy? Or maybe it was just curiosity. Shephard could understand that to an extent. But still…
"Watch it!"
The electricity alien's weapon leapt out of him, squealing angrily at the one responsible for its' master's death. Shephard swung the butt of the sniper rifle around, knocking it across the room and to the feet of Beard and Beret, who wasted no time blasting holes through it and into the concrete.
The two blew out a simultaneous breath of relief, looking to Shephard with tired smiles.
"How the hell have you survived this long paying that much attention?" Beard said, making Beret laugh.
"So, uh," Beret asked, scratching the side of his head with the nozzle of his rifle, "where to?"
Shephard got to his feet with a grunt. The pain in his chest hadn't subsided much, and although the bleeding had been stopped in his shoulder, it still stung bitterly. The PCV was running low on power. He looked around the loading bay, and seeing only a thoroughly locked door at the bottom of a ramp at the far end of the room, he couldn't see much of an exit. But a curved shape sticking out of the ground on one of the platforms got his attention, and he made his way quickly past the soldiers, hopping up onto the platform with little effort.
"What?"
He couldn't tell who had asked the question, but it didn't matter. He wasn't really in the mood to explain himself, especially if this turned out to be nothing.
But nothing it most certainly wasn't, for between some fallen metal crates, a ladder protruded from a sizeable hole in the ground, leading into the pitch black darkness below. Now behind him, Beard whistled appreciatively. "Now that's dark."
Shephard just nodded quietly before jumping down, landing on the concrete ground with an echoing thud.
"You sure about this?"
He looked up to the two silhouetted heads looking down at him. "I can guide you."
"I-" Beard groaned. "Fine."
The high pitched whine of a falling bomb made all three soldiers look up. And then the warehouse exploded, sending rocks and debris tumbling down through the hole and knocking Shephard back several feet onto his rear. He quickly heaved himself to his feet, futilely swiping at the cloud of dust that had formed.
"Are you okay?" Shephard yelled, flicking on his IR goggles.
A pained groan was all he got.
"Hello? Answer me!"
"We're okay!" He wasn't sure who it was. Beret, maybe. "Managed to avoid the worst of it. But…"
Shephard could see. The entire entrance to the tunnel was blocked off. "I know."
"What should we do?"
"Find some other way out of here."
"Screw that." That was definitely beard. "What about you?"
"I'm fine. I'll make my way through here and, hopefully, I'll meet you somewhere else."
"You're gonna rely on 'hopefully'?"
"'Hopefully' is all I've got."
The silence from the other end was far too long.
"Okay. But I'm gonna hold you to that. Good luck."
Shephard turned and looked down the black tunnel, turned a very alien shade of green by the his IR lenses.
"Thanks."
He gripped the sniper rifle tighter in his gloved hands, and waded into velvety blackness.
Although suddenly alone again, Shephard felt somewhat vindicated in his train of thought that if he didn't learn the names of those he came across, they didn't seem to die. At least, they didn't die as a consequence of his being there. So from now on, he would just dispose of names and label them from any discerning physical attributes.
It made sense to him, anyway.
The sound of light dripping echoed from around the corner. Moss grew in the corners of the wall where it met the curved ceiling. Tendrils of long green seaweed-like flora dangled from the roof, brushing lightly against the gash on his arm. He hissed unconsciously from the stinging sensation, the noise echoing down the tunnel.
And that's when he heard the growl. A slow gallop began from somewhere down the tunnel, punctuated from the occasional pig like grunt. Shephard knew that grunt. It was that purple striped creature that he had fought in the habitat. The thing he remembered most about it was how damn big it was. Oddly, the galloping stopped. Then he was reminded of something else about the creatures.
Purple electricity suddenly lit the tunnel, casting its' villainous hue over the pig like creature as it gathered between its' stumpy claws. It finally considered the blast ready for launch at let it go free, like someone releasing a small bird. Shephard barely had time to launch backwards and flatten himself to the ground before it flashed over him, hitting the wall at the far end of the tunnel with a resounding bang.
He sat up, sniper at the ready. The creature was charging again.
Just giving me a target, freak.
Shephard let his instincts take over. Fire, reload. Fire, reload. Fire-
With a groan, the creature suddenly flopped to the ground, looking unbalanced. Shephard had reloaded, and was about to fire again when the monster exploded in a flash of purple, forcing him to shield his eyes.
For a few minutes, he simply sat where he was, content to listen to his own breathing and for any other creatures that might want to start something with him. All he heard was the dripping of an unseen water pipe. He got to his feet and moved forward, his IR lenses doing little to show him anything more than a few feet in front of him. Right now he would have preferred a flashlight. Or even an old fashioned flame torch. Anything would be better than this green haze he was being forced to survive through.
On top of that, he had no idea how much ammunition he had left. He didn't relish the thought of going against these huge monstrous things with only a wrench and a knife.
He turned a corner, and suddenly found himself in a open area. At least, more open than the confines of the tunnels. Another snort, this one much higher in pitch, came to his ears, and he instantly brought his rifle to bear. The snorting got closer and closer, each one making his grip on the rifle tighten considerably.
Then a miniature version of the tiger-pig creature emerged, barely the height of his knee. Shephard lowered his weapon, blowing out a breath of relief. With a disparaging shake of his head at the slow, small creature, Shephard continued past it, only too aware of how much power his IR goggles had left. Irritated at being dismissed in such a way, the creature sliced out with on of its' stubby, pointed front claws. It cut into the back of his calf, sending him crying out and kneeling to the wet, stinking floor.
Shephard looked back to the creature with a scowl, reaching for his machete and whipping it around at the head. It dislocated on impact, sending the alien whirling around and limply onto its' back. More snorting instantly began around him, and three more of the slow creatures lumbered out of the darkness. Shephard gripped the wrench and quickly disposed of them, either knocking them back into the pitch blackness they came from or crushing them into the ground with his boot.
Breathing heavily and now limping, Shephard struggled on down a tunnel in front of him. A light source from around the corner gave him hope, and his pace increased considerably despite the pain shooting up his leg. As he went, he saw several small craters in the sewer water at his feet, at the centre of which small, cracked eggs were littered.
I'm in a nest…
Rather than tempt any retribution from another parent, Shephard continued on into the open area around the corner. The light was coming from a grate in the ceiling on the far side of the room. A ladder led up to it, and it couldn't get to Shephard fast enough as he limped over. Finally, he climbed up and stopped at the grate when he saw two sturdy boots standing on top.
"I bet you could get lost in this place real easy."
"We are lost, dipshit."
He figured that Black Ops probably didn't talk to each other that much while out in the field, so Shephard went out on a limb and cleared his throat. The soldier standing on the grate looked down on him. His cigarette fell from his lips and sparked against the grate as it fell through and past Shephard's face.
"It's a soldier! Hey, stand back and I'll cut it! We're gonna need your help!"
Shephard did as he was told and slid down the ladder, backing up to give the grate plenty of room to fall. Paranoid, he continually checked around him for anymore pig things while he heard the engineer blowtorch his way through the metal grate. Finally, the shower of sparks coming down the passageway of light stopped, and with a loud creak and a clang, Shephard assumed the grate was now opened.
He climbed up and into the small storage room above. Two soldiers stood on either side of him. The engineer, already lighting another cigarette with some oddly clean looking matches, looked down at Shephard's nametag.
"A Corporal? Hell, we thought you would have made evac already!"
"Things… didn't go as planned."
The engineer grinned, and although his eyes were hidden by the blackened goggles, Shephard got the feeling it was genuine. The soldier on his left, a medic, clapped a steady hand down on Shephard's shoulder, wringing it for good measure.
"It's good to see you sir. It's a real mess out there. I mean these… things are comin' outta the damn walls. Ain't no way around 'em either; they just keep coming!"
Nodding down at the sniper rifle in Shephard's hands, the engineer blew out a leisurely cloud of smoke away from the faces of his comrades. "We may just have enough firepower to push through now. At the very least, we can give it our best shot."
The medic nodded in agreement, his intense blue eyes burning into Shephard's as he spoke. "We heard about some kind of big standoff at the dam up ahead. I say we make our break for it now. It ain't gonna get any better, that's for sure. And I bet they could use our help."
Shephard cocked the sniper rifle. "Sounds like a plan."
Laughing, the engineer slapped him around the back. "I like this guy!"
And with that, the engineer prepared his Desert Eagle, the medic his standard Glock, and they head out of the open doorway in front of them, Shephard leading by instinct more than anything else. The doorway led out into a broken down part of a warehouse. The ceiling was all but gone, lumps of debris scattered all along the ground like inconvenient molehills. On the left, shattered windows and a bare doorway led out into the open. Stacked containers were all Shephard could see under the pinkish light of the setting sun. Two, side by side, had a small gap in-between them.
Inside, Shephard saw movement, and instantly knelt, his eye lens pressed to the scope. An electricity alien darted into view, making a break for the open. The sniper bullet hit it with enough power to blow back head over heels. Engineer whistled appreciatively.
The now familiar sound of alien speech echoed from around the left corner, and Engineer leapt into action, Desert Eagle at the ready.
"Come get some!"
Shephard barely had time to shout a warning before the silvery-blue form of an electricity alien appeared from around the corner, intercepting Engineer before he could even get outside. Undeterred, Engineer shoved the Desert Eagle into the creature's tentacled mouth and fired twice. A third bullet blew through the alien's electricity weapon as it fell. Obviously they had been fighting these aliens for awhile.
A loud, pig-like snort sounded, and both Shephard and Medic ran for the doorway. All three of them headed outside, lining up in a row as they aimed their weapon at the oncoming storm. Without any prompting, they unleashed a simultaneous volley of hot metal hell on the creature, tearing into it with almost no difficulty. With a moan, it tumbled to the ground, and exploded in a purple flash, bits and pieces of the body flying through the air and landing around them with a squelch.
"Holy… crap." Engineer turned to Shephard, grinning inanely. "That's the first time I've seen one of those sons of bitches explode!"
"Never gets old…" Shephard admitted, getting to his feet and leading the way around another tower of containers. Around the right corner, one of the containers was open on both sides, allowing entrance into the alleyway beyond. At the far end, Shephard could see two of the electricity aliens approaching. One pulled out a green blob and tossed it into the air, the considerable muscle behind the throw sending it over the containers and down just beside them.
"Move!" Medic yelled pointlessly as they scattered. The explosion knocked Shephard across the courtyard and into the wall opposite, sliding down before hitting the floor with a solid thud.
One of the aliens made a comment that almost sounded like an insult. Shephard picked up the sniper rifle as Medic and Engineer joined him, weapons at the ready.
Suddenly, Shephard remembered what it was like to be in the army. Between the three of them, they managed to work their way through four of the electricity creatures as they proceeded through the 'corridor' and around the corner, eventually bringing them to a small abandoned warehouse sat in the middle of another courtyard area. Around the right hand side, a black soldier wearing a bandana crouched against the wall, his SAW rifle recognisable even from the distance Shephard found himself at.
His eyes glistened with hope when he noticed them emerging from the corner, and he waved them over quickly, indicating that they should keep their heads down. Keeping an eye out in every direction he could through the scope of the snipe rifle, Shephard took up the rear while Engineer led the way.
"Holy shit, I can't believe anyone else made it," Bandana whispered fiercely through grinning teeth.
Medic leaned forward. "What's going on?"
The smile faded from the new soldiers' face, and he nodded to the warehouse. "There're some scientists inside. They're workin' on a weapon. I didn't want to go in there myself, even with this baby," he said, patting the SAW appreciatively. Then he grinned again. "But now we've got no problem. Doesn't matter what they've got in there now; four of us can tear those shits apart!"
Shephard crawled around Medic and Engineer and put out a calming hand. "Wait a minute. How do you know they're building a weapon?"
"Wouldn't you be?"
"Probably, but I'm not a scientist. We should go in peacefully. They might be able to help us."
Scowling, Bandana shook his head. "Fuck that, man."
Engineer nodded. "Yeah, I've seen some of the experiments these scientists have worked on. Some pretty nasty stuff. Ain't no way I want to be on the receiving end of that shit."
"But-"
Bandana straightened his back. "You with us or not, Corporal?"
"I-" Shephard's words became lodged in his throat as he looked at the three soldiers in front of him, all of them eager to kill something that wouldn't fight back. Even Medic was showing some enthusiasm for the idea.
He sighed and looked into Bandana's eyes. "Just wait until they make a move before you start shooting, all right?"
"Man, what the fuck is wrong with-?"
Shephard latched onto his throat. "I don't think I heard you right, soldier. I asked you a question, and you had better fucking answer."
A vein began to appear on the side of his head as he struggled against Shephard's grip. Both Engineer and Medic watched with morbid fascination at the exchange, either unwilling or unable to interfere.
Realising he was trapped, Bandana just nodded. Slowly, but not enough to show Bandana he was giving up, Shephard released his grip on the soldier and nodded gently to the others. All four of them rose. Bandana attempted to lead the way, but Shephard nudged his way in front of him.
"You stay at the back. No-one shoots until I order it."
Together, with Shephard leading the way and Bandana taking up the back, they walked to the front door. All of his boot camp training quickly coming back to him, Shephard counted silently to his comrades before kicking the rusted green doors off their hinges and bursting into the room, his fellow soldiers following him with an intimidating volley of yells and shouts.
The room was all but bare except for some green metal crates piled up here and there. In the far right corner, three scientists stood hunched over a small metallic object.
"See? A fucking weapon," Bandana spat.
The lead scientist, with frizzy black hair and glasses, stepped forward from the group, visibly shaking. "A-actually… it's not a weapon at all, it's-"
One of the scientists behind him scrabbled for the object and pointed it at the soldiers. With a roar, Bandana opened fire. With little encouragement, and despite Shephard's protests, Medic and Engineer quickly joined in.
And Shephard remembered what made the SAW such a deadly weapon. All the power of a mounted machinegun in a portable rifle. The bullets tore through the scientists like paper, spreading blood and flesh all over the walls in a horrific mosaic.
The gunfire stopped, the last bang echoing out of the shattered windows and around the courtyard beyond, mixing with the tinkling of the bullets as they dropped to the floor. Bandana slowly walked over to the eviscerated bodies, gun still trained on them as though they would pop back to life at any moment. With a cautious strike of his boot, he hit the object they had been working on.
And that was when Shephard recognised it. They were working on a Displacer.
"They were trying to escape."
"Yeah, fucking through us," Bandana snorted over his shoulder.
"No," Shephard uttered slowly, his voice shaking, "they were just trying to escape. And with that thing they might have been able to take us with them."
"Or leave us behind. They're fuckin' scum, all of them."
Shephard put down his sniper rifle and walked over to Bandana, whose back was still to him. He waited until he was just behind the soldier before he spoke again.
"Soldier… give me your weapon."
Bandana turned around with a scowl. "What?"
Slowly, Shephard extended opened up his hand in front of Bandana. "Give me your weapon."
"What the fuck are you talking about?"
Suddenly, his jaw was clenched as he grabbed onto the rifle, holding it crossways between them. "I said-" he delivered two elbows to the face, "-GIVE ME-" followed by a boot to the crotch, "-YOUR WEAPON!" He finished with a double handed strike to the face, his fingers knotted together to make an extra thick fist. Bandana whirled around as he fell backwards, landing limply on his front.
Medic and Engineer were on him instantly, the former on his left, the latter on his right.
"Fuck, Corporal, calm down!"
Shephard looked over to their desperate faces. They were no better. They didn't object. Fuck, they probably enjoyed it just as much as Bandana. He turned to medic and delivered a head butt to his face, the rim of his helmet hitting just across the bridge of his nose. A solid crunch followed by a burst of crimson blood made him release his grip on Shephard's arm and stumble back.
Turning to Engineer, Shephard whirled his left fist around, which the other soldier blocked easily, grabbing onto it with his hand. Lifting his leg, Shephard stamped down on the soldier's kneecap. With a resounding pop, it dislocated from its' socket, sending the Engineer screaming to his knees, cradling the injured one while resting on the other. Shephard grabbed him by the sides of the head and pulled him towards him as he struck out with his knee, hitting him clear in the face. The screams were silenced as Engineer fell on his back, unconscious.
Shephard turned to the form of Bandana when Medic leapt up on his back, making him stumble a few steps this way and that before he managed to reach back and latch onto the soldier's clothing. With a mighty tug, he brought Medic whirling over his soldier and down onto the body of Engineer. Medic tried to get back up, but a swift kick to the crotch stopped him. Shephard kicked the soldier again and again, his voice becoming more desperate and disjointed as he spoke.
"They… were fucking… CIVILIANS!"
Suddenly, Shephard stopped, stumbling back from the carnage he had wrought on his own people. But they weren't his people. Not really. These people took pleasure in killing innocents. Relished it. This was not what Shephard signed up for. He wanted to help the very people he had been sent here to kill. Shephard had been many things while wearing his uniform. He had been scared, tired, enraged, desperate and weak. But he had never been ashamed.
He walked to the sniper rifle and silently slung it over his shoulder, concentrating on some dead point of the floor in front of him. He didn't want to look at anything in this room. Not the dead scientists, or the beaten… monsters lying on the floor… nothing.
Shephard walked to the SAW where it had fallen beside Bandana. As he lifted it, a limp gloved hand held onto it, stubbornly grasping the grip. He looked down at the bleeding soldier with dull eyes.
"We're the army. We don't kill civilians."
He swung the butt of the gun around, clipping it against the side of Bandana's head and knocking him unconscious. Without pause, he turned and left the warehouse, unsure of where he was going but not caring. With eyes that were now running completely on instinct instead of any will to continue, Shephard looked around the courtyard. In the distance, he could see another wrecked metal fire door allowing him passage into some other area the Godforsaken Black Mesa Facility. He started walking, sniper rifle hanging off one soldier while he rested the SAW on the other.
Three quarters of the way to the door, one of the big tiger striped pig creatures seemingly appeared from nowhere, bursting out from behind a broken container. Shephard turned the SAW on it and fired. Within a few seconds, the creature was dead in a burst of purple light. He looked down to the smoking weapon in amazement.
And that bastard had used this on innocent people.
Shephard continued on under the dented door and into the darkened warehouse beyond. Using his IR goggles, he managed to negotiate a complicated path through all of the collapsed debris inside, eventually coming to a huge open door. Well, it wasn't technically open. It looked more like it been cut open by something far hotter than the blowtorch an engineer could manage. On the wall beside him, Shephard could see a HEV charging station. If his trainers had put him in good stead, that would work for his PCV as well.
He took the cable and plugged it into the relevant socket. With an affirmative drone, it started charging. Outside, Shephard could hear the faint noise of machinegun fire rattling away and hitting something that was clearly bullet-proof. The charger groaned when it was done, and Shephard began to feel the effects of the PCV healing his system almost instantly.
That done, Shephard stepped out into the open air. He was standing on one end of a dam, the water on the left far higher than that on the right. In the middle of the dam, blocking his path to the other side, a monstrous tank of a creature stood. It was blue, scaly, and had a single glowing red eye that seemed to stare straight at him. Thick ropes tied around its' arms and legs bonded it to the guardrails on either side of the dam's 'road', and it slothfully struggled against them, as if there was no rush. Another sparkling light like the one he had encountered in the habitat, quickly followed by two brothers that followed it up into the cloudy sky.
Shephard's gaze travelled over to the water on the left. A control tower was erected out of the water, level with the dam and allowing a good view inside from where Shephard was standing.
And there he was.
The G-Man, watching proceedings with a neutral eye as he talked on his cell phone. He caught a glimpse of Shephard and smiled almost imperceptibly. But Shephard knew that he was. That smug shit. He had done all of this.
"BASTARD!"
Shephard took aim with the SAW and was ready to fire when a huge explosion from the blue creature blinded, deafened and knocked him on his back. He bypassed the ringing in his ears as he stumbled to his feet and staggered to the guardrail. He was gone. Once again, the G-Man had smirked in his face, at all the pain he had gone through, and just vanished in a puff of smoke.
His gaze travelled to the smoking crater in the middle of the dam. Or, as the case may be, vanishing in a huge vast explosion. Shephard spotted the two soldiers on the other side waving him over through the smoke. With a somewhat pensive attitude, Shephard picked up his weapons and started making his way across. Somehow, he didn't really feel like talking with more soldiers, either military or Black Ops. They both seemed like enemies at the moment.
As he approached the soldiers, he saw a cable leading from the explosion site to a box beside the soldiers, the handle pressed firmly down. Sometimes the old ways were best, it seemed. The explosion had exposed the middle of the dam and cracked a huge pipe inside. Shephard couldn't see much in the darkness below, and had little desire to explore the stench that wafted out of it.
Shephard slid down into the crater and started clambering up the other side when he heard the roar of gunfire up ahead. Peeking his head up over the top of the crater, he saw two of the Race X electricity creatures firing point blank at the soldiers while their enemies did the same. Before long, the soldiers had been blown back to the walls, blood puffing from their bodies like smoke.
One of them spotted him, and Shephard quickly turned. Maybe shit-pipe wasn't so bad after all. One last glance over his shoulder confirmed that they were sprinting his way, so Shephard started crawling. It didn't take long for him to reach what his fingers told him was a grate. He flicked on his IR goggles. The muttered gurgles of the alien behind him gave him a much needed motive, and Shephard started futilely wrestling with the grate.
A low creaking echoed down the pipe. He smiled in desperation. Maybe the grate was coming loose.
And then the pipe below him gave way, sending him tumbling into the darkness. With a hard thud and a very light splash, Shephard landed in a steady stream of sewage water, the current slowly pushing him forward. He let the flow take him as he grasped for the SAW, unwilling to let it escape his grasp.
Then he started falling again, this time down a diagonal section of the pipe. He never did like water parks.
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(A/N: This is the chapter that I know will divide readers. I suppose it all depends on how you want to see Shephard and how he reacts to the incidents at Black Mesa. For me, I thought it was an interesting direction to take Shephard in, particularly for how it mirrors Gordon's emotional journey:
Gordon, someone who never really had strong views about anything except for his love for those close to him. He suddenly finds himself going from a hapless, slightly less than average guy to a killing machine. And yet, because of that lack of belief in anything bigger than himself, Gordon finds the impetus to move on because he's not expecting anyone to save him; he knows it's just him, and the different people and events he comes across just reinforce that view. So, while physically he may not be the hero (yet), he's already got the correct mindset of 'I don't want to, but no-one else can'.
Shephard, on the other hand, has been almost conditioned to believe in his country, and that the people in charge are looking out for his well-being and will pull his fat out of the fire if worse comes to worse. Only now, he finds that everything he believed in - everything he thought he was fighting for - was basically a big crock. And since he's come to rely on that support so much, his despair, naturally I think, consumes him. So Shephard, the soldier with years of training and a natural talent for combat, ends up going forth only on instinct, because that's what he's been 'programmed' to do. He has no purpose, and he has an almost all consuming self loathing for what he's seen and what (from his point of view) he has been a part of.
And, obviously, the G-Man pisses him off big time.
So, that's my (shortened, believe me) justification of why I've written Shephard the way I did. In the end, I did it because it's different. BlindAcquiescence already has a superb story of a stronger Shephard, and he gives the soldier the surviving members of his squad to live for, at least in the Black Mesa segments. My Shephard is very much on his own, with no familiar faces or beacons of hope. At least, not right now.
So anyway, that's enough of that. On to the reviews, please!
Next Chapter: 'The Package'