Chapter 3 - Unforeseen Consequences

The faint wail of sirens slowly began to get louder as Gordon regained consciousness, he laid on his back staring up at the anti-mass spectrometer. The rotors were still spinning, though visibly slowing down. The test chamber was destroyed, metal panels were scattered across the ground, one panel had fallen uncomfortably close to Gordon whilst he was unconscious. Once Freeman fully took in what had just happened, his heart started to pound in his chest, his breathing coming out of control. Grabbing his helmet he ripped it off his head tossing it aside as he gasped for air. After he started to control his breathing, he wiped his glass lenses which had become extremely foggy. Adjusting the lenses he slowly stood up.

Gordon didn't really know where to go, as long as it wasn't in that test chamber anymore. He quickly realized that the labs were no better when he saw the first corpse. It was one of the bickering scientists, the younger one. His body had been crushed from a piece of paneling on the ceiling. The still-fresh blood painting the floor around him, his head completely flattened from the metal. Gordon didn't know how to react, what to do. He thought to get help but as he progressed away from the chamber there were more and more corpses. His heart almost stopped when he considered that Eli and Kleiner may have suffered the same fate, he was put at ease when the elevator arrived at the plasma cell room.

Kleiner and Eli were in the same place Gordon had left them, Kleiner sat staring at the ground in defeat. Whilst Eli rested his head on the fried computer terminal "We tried to warn them" Eli groaned

"I never thought I'd see a resonance cascade, let alone create one" Kleiner frowned, his eyes darted up as he felt Freeman's presence in the room. "By Schrodinger's cat he's alive!" Kleiner had a sudden burst of energy as he shot up. Eli turned around with a look of relief in his eyes, "Gordon! Thank god for that suit. Look I don't think we have much-" there was a short and sudden burst of green light in the room, accompanied by a large electrical crack. The three scientists turned their heads to face the three plasma cells, occupying one of the cells was a creature, which three seconds ago was nowhere near the Black Mesa Research Facility. Kleiner raced over to examine the creature, Gordon and Eli tagged along in curiosity.

The only way Gordon could describe the creature was as a fleshy crab. Its front two legs had large sharp claws, with two small hind legs. It screeched as it scratched the thick glass of the plasma cell. Gordon was repulsed, however, Kleiner was almost in a trance. "Fascinating!" was the only word he spoke as he examined the creature. "Look Gordon, we haven't any time. All the phones are out and I can't get in contact with anyone else. You have the hazard suit. You need to get to the surface, and let someone know we're stranded down here." Eli said this less as a colleague and more as a superior, giving Gordon his explicit order, "I can't just leave you two here" Gordon pleaded but Eli just waved his hand in dismissal as he made his way to the retinal scanner at the end of the room. "I can look after myself Gordon, don't worry. They'll have this sector under control, so it'll just be a waiting game for me and Izzy. But I need you to let them know we're stranded down here" Gordon still looked concerned, but Eli had a look in his eyes, there was no persuading him. Gordon nodded and shook Eli's hand. "Stay safe Gordon"

Exiting the plasma cell room, Gordon entered the control panel, the room was completely scorched, one of the scientists at the far end of the room was banging on the locked door, trying to break the glass. He shouted in fear begging for the door to open. Before Gordon could speak or react, there was an ear-piercing boom as a beam of energy struck the researcher shattering the glass. The researcher was entirely vaporized as Gordon looked on in horror. The door was now open, Gordon made his way quickly past the window and exited the control room. Just how bad it was. Gordon passed through corridors scattered with corpses of fellow researchers. It was a lot for someone to take in, to see so many people dead. There was another energy crackle with a green blast of light as another one of those crab things materialized in front of Gordon, it turned to face Freeman as it screeched and leaped towards his head. Gordon swung his arms knocking the crab to the side. The creature fell on its head, kicking its legs around like a cockroach. Gordon took note of the head-size cavity where a stomach would be. He rushed over to the door but it didn't open, something had broken. Looking around for something to help he noted a crowbar lying on the ground. Snatching the crowbar he used it to break the glass and climb through.

Quickly making his way through some more corridors He arrived at the elevator. "Help!" a male researcher screamed "Someone help us!"

"Oh my god, oh my god" a woman repeated frantically

"Someone get us out of here" Gordon could hear the man banging on the elevator, which was on the floor above, out of his view. There was a loud creaking noise as the elevator slightly lowered "Oh shit!"

"I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die!" the woman continued to repeat.

"Help-" the man was cut off as the elevator went into a freefall, Gordon saw the elevator quickly drop past him as the occupants screamed, the force of the crash shattering the elevator door glass. Got stepped into the shaft, looking down to see the wreckage of the elevator. Everything felt so surreal.

Using the maintenance ladder in the elevator shaft he was able to climb up to the next floor. Immediately he was greeted with one of the guards being attacked by...Gordon paused briefly. It wasn't a coworker, but It must've been, the lab coats the pants. But on its head was one of those crabs. Before he could think any longer a bullet pierced through the flesh of the crab, the body quickly dropped to the floor. "That thing latched onto his head.." the guard lowered his weapon as he looked at Gordon, he was clearly in a state of shock. The two stuck together for a while as they progressed through sector C towards the tram platform. However, they were met with an unfortunate sight. The entire platform was gone, it had completely collapsed and fallen into the dark pit below. "Well, shit." the guard looked at the mess, he thought to himself for a minute, then turned to Gordon. "The only other way I can think of. Is if we go through Sector B. Gordon wasn't familiar with any of these places so the guard led the way. They backtracked through the facility towards the entrance to Sector B, as they waited for the airlock doors to slide open they were ambushed by another, the only name Gordon could think of was a zombie. With a swipe of its mutated fingers, the guard's stomach was completely sliced, gore immediately sliding out onto the floor. The zombie turned to Gordon, taking another swipe with his claws. Gordon stepped back avoiding the slash, returning with a thwack from his crowbar. It stunned the parasitic creature briefly staggering backward. Gordon caught sight of the Glock the guard had dropped, he picked it up off the floor, quickly taking aim at the zombie which had gotten balance and was now approaching once again. Squeezing the trigger; Gordon fired three shots. The crab unlatched from the body flinging itself away from Gordon as the host body collapsed to the ground dead. The head of the poor man was painted in blood.

He was alone now, but not unarmed. That was a good thing at the least. The hallways felt colder in sector B. Briefly reflecting on his induction into anomalous materials, he did remember something about this being a coolant reserve. So that probably had something to do with that. As he walked he scanned the area checking for any surprises, that was when he heard a chirp. Not the chirp from a bird, but similar. Looking around he didn't see anything directly near him. There was silence for a moment, followed by a running sound. Gordon aimed his gun at the bend in the corridor up ahead preparing to fire at what came around that corner. What did come was quite unexpected. It was about the size of a dog, four legs as well. But it's face, nothing but eyes. It looked at Gordon, chirped, and then ran towards him. Gordon opened fire, putting half a mag into the creature, it didn't get too close to him before it keeled over. Maybe it was friendly, Gordon wasn't gonna wait around and find out. As he was about to take a step forward, there were suddenly multiple chirping sounds. "Shit" Gordon mumbled to himself, he just got the attention of a lot of them.

There must have been about six of them, they all rushed around the corner towards Gordon. Spinning around on his heel Gordon ran away. There were just too many. But he couldn't just keep running. So he stopped, turned around, and fired. He took out one with the bullets remaining in his mag, quickly reloading he took out another three. One final reload and the last two were gone. Gordon thought it was silly that they taught him how to use a gun in the hazard course. Look who was silly now.

It was in the coolant reserve room that he saw the man again. He was standing on the walkway overhead. Looking down at Gordon, all he did was fix his tie and walk away. It was such an out-of-place moment. Gordon felt the chill again, and not because he was in a colder room. Anway, he needn't dawdle about a mysterious man, there were bigger fish to fry. He progressed through the uncomfortably empty and quiet sector. Where was everyone? The sudden bashing sound of metal startled Freeman. The door in front of him was now dented. There was an electronic sound that seemed like something was charging up, then a crackling sound as the door imploded open, dropping to the floor. Gordon was greeted by another alien. It was more humanoid than the other creatures, although it had some very significant features, a third arm attached to its chest and only having one red eye were some noticeable things.

The creature looked at Gordon and conducted a green charge of energy with its hands. Before Gordon could react the charge was sent straight towards him striking him in the chest. He was flung backward landing on the cold floor. There was a chime from the speaker in his suit "Warning electrical damage detected" the female voice in his suit alerted him, 'Not much of a warning' Standing back up he looked at the creature who began to charge again. Gordon took aim and fired at the creature with his Glock. It took about five bullets to take it down.

Gordon wasn't sure where to go, so instead, he just continued down the main hallway. Which eventually led to a large angled elevator. It slowly descended towards the 'canal system' according to the sign. A few headcrabs slid down to join him but he was able to swat them away with a crowbar. Gone with the futuristic lab environment, the canals were noticeably older, with tan concrete walls. He followed the wide hallway which would have led to a bridge, but due to the resonance cascade, there was now just a large gap. Down below Gordon met another creature, it was quite big, just a bit smaller than a cow. It had a long tail, with lots of tentacles at its mouth. It seemed quite busy on the other side of the canal, spitting out what looked like acid, and attacking those headcrabs Gordon had settled on that as a name for those things.

There was another place to go but down. Gordon stared down at the large drop into the sewage water. He hesitated for a moment, then jumped. He swam across to the other side and heaved himself out of the water. As he stood up he noticed the large creature running towards him. "Oh shit!" Gordon yelled, fumbling for his Glock which he had holstered. Drawing the Glock he saw the red markings of a flammable barrel. He aimed at it, fired three shots and the barrel exploded, turning the bull thing into giblets. Gordon sighed. Making his way to the door which he assumed would lead him back on track. He was correct, climbing a ladder and opening a door. He was now on the other side of the canal, he saw an elevator. 'Well, got to go up I suppose' he shrugged to himself. Pressing the button and entering the elevator.