Chapter Fourteen: Lost City
The ragtag group of City 12 refugees rolled up to the guarded gates of Hunter's Fall begging for entry. They were tired, they were out of supplies entirely, and the road had been a perilous one. Although they'd made the entire trek without once coming into conflict with Combine forces they had been forced on more than one occasion to take a round-about route to avoid being seen. And so, hungry and fatigued, Julian and his group entered Hunter's Fall hoping to find Theta Prime's hospitality just as welcoming as it had been during their first visit here.
Alyx stood as rear guard of the group watching for any signs of trouble. She wasn't all that worried about any Combine assaulting them during entry, she was more concerned about the Templars. Her attention was divided however. Her olive eyes kept darting toward the gate hoping she might catch a glimpse of Theta. The two had forged a fledgling relationship during their last visit to Hunter's Fall which Alyx had every intention of continuing. There was something about Theta, something eerily arousing and also something familiar.
Darkness was falling as they entered the base. Many of the soldiers of Hunter's fall were astounded by what the group brought with them. Children. It had been decades since any of their eyes had witnessed the miracle of human life. Cheers rose up as they entered that seemed to echo throughout the fortified base, in every building and barracks, in every dorm and civilian housing there was a moment of awestruck silence followed by happy cheers.
Julian, who was leading the way on horseback, dismounted and looked at the faces of the soldiers. Most of them were in their fifties, some even older and the older they were the louder they cheered at the sight of children. As Julian walked forward to meet Theta and her fellow Officers Allison joined him and the place fell into a sudden reverent silence at the sight of a pregnant woman. A group of female Resistance soldier's passed by flashing a smile in Allison's direction that was not without a hint of jealousy.
"Welcome back Julian," Theta said shaking his hand warmly, "You too Allison, my how you've grown."
"Any word from City 12?" Julian asked shaking hands in turn with each of the Officers.
"Scattered radio transmissions mostly," one of the Lieutenants replied, "None of it good."
"Shephard," Allison whispered beneath her breath just loud enough for Julian to hear, he put a hand on her shoulder.
"We'll get the civi's some food and lodgings," a man marked as a sergeant said approaching the group proper.
"There you are," Theta said with a smile a mile wide as Alyx approached. Theta opened her arms wide and accepted the woman into a warm embrace, "Come on, we'll go inside, we have much to discuss and much to do."
Emil Nemico approached the South side of City 12 just as the sun was setting. The road had been a long one and one that had given him time to think; time to brood. He'd considered for a brief moment turning entirely against the Templars and joining the assassins. Julian's anger about his Father would subside sooner or later, Emil knew the young assassin wasn't stupid and would take allies where he needed them. The idea had seemed quite attractive at the start of his journey back but now it was the farthest thing from his mind. A mind now indwelled almost exclusively by smoldering embers of vengeance. He wanted what was rightfully his, not just the City but the prestige, the power. If the Templars and the Assassins could not grant it to him, he decided, than perhaps the Combine Empire could.
The former Templar could see the Combine Overwatch out-post up ahead. The Empire had drop-ships bringing in reinforcements almost constantly but in the last few hours they had stopped. Emil thought that perhaps they would begin retreating, that Shephard and his tenacious forces had been too dug in to be defeated. That idea fled when he saw the troops ahead camped comfortably enjoying a meal. It was his first glimpse of the Combine with their helmets removed. Their gaunt visages were only visible by the flickering light of campfires and bombs bursting over the besieged city. Sickly and pale, with eyes that seemed devoid of the fire of life and even worse their heads seemed permanently embedded in those helmets. Their meals were some sort of paste slurped through a clear plastic tube.
Emil had no time to stop and shed a tear for the soldiers. He could make out the outline ahead of him, the command bunker for the Combine forces. With adrenaline coursing through him he stood up in the brush and raised his hands in surrender. The eating soldiers paused during their meal and brought up their AR2 rifles. One soldier opened fire, pulse rounds whizzed past Emil who shouted out that he surrendered as the firing continued. Finally it stopped and Emil looked down at himself breathing a sigh of relief to find his body lacking holes.
"I surrender," he repeatedly breathlessly as one of the soldiers drew close, his dead-eyed stare and grotesque inhuman seeming flesh leaving Emil weak at the knees.
"Citizen," another soldier, this one masked, called "Come with me."
"Please," Emil explained as he approached, "I am Emil Nemico, I'm a Templar, I can give you information. Please, I-"
Emil felt the words flee from his lips as the butt of the soldier's rifle impacted the side of his skull. Dizzied he staggered forward imagining in his head all the ways he could take down the soldier if he chose to. Emil Nemico was no weakling, but he was also smarter than that.
"I can tell you where to find the Piece of Eden," he said, the soldier lifted his rifle as if to strike, "I can tell you how to defeat General Shephard!"
The soldier stopped and grabbed Nemico by the collar. He pushed Emil forward toward a bunker. The former Templar turned attempting to escape but before he could a blue energy shield materialized before the opening to the bunker. Emil knew it would be useless to try to escape. The Combine energy fields were stronger than any truly solid door ever could be. He slumped to the floor of his would-be holding cell and waited.
Ressian hauled herself over the ledge and pulled her sword out from it's sheath. The dark blue steel soared end over end cutting the soldier's AT-4 laser guided rocket it half as it left the barrel. The rocket fell to the Earth un-detonated. The rocket squad turned their attention on their newfound enemy, the black insectoid alien rushing toward them. Ressian was unarmed and outnumbered but for a Maldragon that was hardly a serious disadvantage, especially against human adversaries. She cleared the distance between her and the soldiers in the time it took them to switch to their side-arms. She stood waiting for them to attack with a knowing smirk on her mandibles, though no human would have perceived it as a smirk. Down came War Hound from the roof above the men crashing amongst their ranks. Two of them were crushed beneath its steel-pad feet, another was soon scooped up in its grasp and torn in two pieces by War Hound's devastating metallic grip.
Ressian enjoyed having the metal monster around to do her dirty work. She had been assigned to escort it, to defend it even, but now most of what she did was guiding it to each new target. They'd steered clear of truly strategic targets thus far preferring to take out ground resistance. While it may have seemed an odd strategy for such a prolific war machine it had worked out nicely. Dog had devastated most of the rocket wielding Resistance members in the city.
"Ressian, do you read me?" The voice of a Combine Elite blared over Ressian's radio-com device.
"Ressian here," the Maldragon responded collecting her sword and leaping from the roof.
"General Urwel wants you back at HQ," the Elite demanded, "And bring the Hound in."
Ressian hurried through the city. She didn't like working under Yvolslog and she was hopping that her work here was done. The center of City 12 was almost Resistance free now and those that remained were being shelled. Soon zombies would begin to devour the city from the inside out. Ressian questioned the decision to turn them all into zombies. She was no fan of the human race but even slave labor was a preferable fate to being devoured by a Xenian head-crab. Ressian also knew that the Combine were in need of new Combine soldiers.
The alien assassin guided War Hound through an area of heavy Resistance taking down a slew of soldiers on their way through the city. Dog had taken several direct rocket impacts and sustained only mild damage during the entire siege leaving Ressian quite surprised at the resilience of the human-built technology on top of which she and her team had built.
The night was just beginning to deepen, the last of the sun's rays vanished behind the horizon, as Ressian and War Hound reached the bunker where the General was holed up. She shook the dust of war from her exoskeleton and stepped into the shadowy room. It was moist inside, humid, the room acclimated to the ideal conditions for one of Yvolslog's species. The General leaned his slime-covered appendages against a control panel some distance away before turning with his beady black eyes, all six of them arranged seemingly randomly in his thick moist chalky white skin, to regard Ressian.
"I trust the beast is fine," Yvolslog remarked in a broken and hardly understandable attempt at speaking the native language of Ressian's people, the Maldragon.
"A few scratches, but still functional," Ressian announced proudly, "I counted four hundred and sixty three dead, another fifty three wounded."
"Truly a thing of beauty," the General whispered, this time in his native tongue, a form of Xenian, as he caressed the scorched panels of War Hounds armor, "The City will be taken before dawn."
"Sir?"
"Ressian, we have received word that the Piece of Eden has been taken from City 12."
"The assassins," Ressian nodded.
"You knew of this?" The General exploded as if he would charge his impressive and grotesque girth across the room to strangle her. He calmed immediately, "They left in a small convoy. The assassin, Julian Miles, along with Alyx Vance, a known fugitive. They have the Piece. Take War Hound, bring back the Apple, kill the assassin, and bring Alyx Vance back alive."
"Yes sir," Ressian said turning for the door.
"And Ressian," the General grunted, once again in the tongue of the Maldragon, "Do not fail me."
Ressian Malil was rarely worried but as she walked out of that godforsaken chamber she felt a shudder throughout her exoskeleton. That last warning hadn't been a hollow one. Along with being a well-known Combine General Urwel was also in charge of Off-World assignments. He could send you to any far flung corner of the cosmos and leave you there to rot. For someone like Ressian, someone hoping to one day be free to choose her own path, the idea of being forced off-world, to Xen, or any of the other Combine outposts scattered across the dimensions, was a frightening one indeed. At least for now she was free of his influence, free to find Julian by her own means and get the Apple.
Emil Nemico stepped smirking into the General's chamber as Ressian exited. He felt a sense of smug superiority even as the stench and humidity of the room overwhelmed him. The grotesque General turned to regard him. Emil averted his eyes as best he could but the sheer girth of the monstrous military leader made it almost impossible.
"You have done well," the General said in halted guttural English, "The Combine Empire thanks you for your generous donation of information."
"Donation?" Emil burst with his tone bordering on anger, "You promised me power. You promised me I could be an Officer, a commander in the Combine army."
"All in good time," the General said before offering a horrifying utterance that seemed half belch half cackle. Emil turned as soldiers rushed in with stun batons swinging. He grabbed the first one and drove the soldier against the sticky wall of the bunker bashing the man's head against the wall. There were too many though and soon Emil found himself face down on the floor subject to a barrage of baton blows, "Take him," the General cooed cruelly, "Make him one of us."
Allison stepped out of the shower and dried herself off noticing how her once flat stomach was protruding more and more. She was still a ways off from giving birth but already she was showing. She reflected on the flashes of hope in the eyes of those she passed here in Hunter's Fall. Despite being off the beaten path the base here was still under the power of a Combine suppression field some forty miles to the South. Allison felt a sudden sadness sweep over her as she got dressed. City 12 and the surrounding area were the only places on Earth, other than small pockets in Europe, where the Combine suppression field had been taken down. Now City 12 was falling back into the hands of the Combine.
She left the bathroom and put on a smile for Julian hoping he wouldn't see the unsure sadness beneath. She grabbed him by the arm and guided him out of the room. They'd been invited to a feast in their honor hosted by Theta and catered by the soldiers of Hunter's Fall to celebrate their safe arrival.
As they approached the table, with the feast all laid out before them - fresh fruits, vegetables, not the military rations they were used to - Allison felt a wave of guilt. She looked to Julian whose face wore a similarly guilty expression. They knew that Shephard and his men and women were in City 12 being laid low by the Combine Empire while Julian and Allison sat selfishly at a feast in their honor.
"Before this feast begins," Julian said tapping his tin cup and waiting as the soldiers quieted down, "We must drink a toast to the fallen. To all those lost since the Combine arrived, to all those we are losing right now in City 12. We will not forget, and we WILL repay."
Allison swallowed down the barely drinkable water served at their feast and took her seat with a lump in her throat. She felt dizzy as she sat down and grabbed her fork. Her head felt light as a feather. She remembered this feeling, this dark calm forcing her from one person to another. It had haunted it for years after her escape from Coldwind. Even now that she had ascended so far she wasn't immune. She looked to Theta across the table and stretched out her palm finding herself suddenly sitting in a hospital.
"Mister Eisley, it's time," a nurse said, but soon she too faded from sight and Allison was back at the table.
"I'm fine," she whispered to the soldiers who surrounded her, and to Julian who cradled with a worried expression on his young face.
"Another vision?" Julian asked sitting beside her and holding his hand to her forehead as if checking for fever.
"You've been having them too?" Theta asked nearly dropping her fork.
"I've always had them," Allison said, "They used to be entire personalities, memories of my ancestors."
"They had her in the Animus day and night," Julian explained, "The bleeding effect became so strong she nearly lost her mind forever."
"The visions," Theta said, "What do you see?"
"I used to see a lot of things," Allison admitted taking a drink of water and taking a deep relieving breath, "But mostly now I see that damned Jungle. I see Nam. I see-"
"A temple?" Theta asked and when Allison's eyes went wide she continued, "Have you ever been to a place called Black Mesa?"
"How did you know?"
"I've had visions, memories of Black Mesa," Theta said taking a bite of her food finally, "and I have seen the Temple."
"The Piece of Eden was there I think," Allison said closing her eyes as if concentrating on remembering, "I can't remember."
"That's what I'm here for," Cheng said chomping away on his dinner.
"What does he mean?" Theta asked.
"His Father helped design the first Animus," Julian explained, "And with any luck we'll be able to recreate it and figure out what the hell this temple is and what is has to do with the Pieces of Eden."
"The key to the future is in the past, perhaps," Theta remarked with nod and a sip of her drink.
Shephard could barley pick himself up off the ground after the pulse blast from another Strider hit nearby turning a wall only a few feet away from him to dust. He grabbed at his gun, an AR2 specially mounted with an ordinary fragmentary grenade launcher. He slammed his back against the wall as the Strider came close punching with rapid pulses into the room. The pulses missed him however and the spry old General slipped down the stairs as the Strider walked passed the building and turned around apparently satisfied that it had killed him.
Shephard turned his eyes skyward as he emerged onto the street making sure to take down cam-bots. These small hovering nuisances were the Strider's mobile army of eyes. Shephard pummeled a nearby cam-bot with pulse fire before turning his grenade launcher on the Strider. The tripedal beast stumbled forward as grenade after grenade hit it's insect-like body. It tried to turn but the narrow street wouldn't allow it and it had to press forward far enough to turn around. By that time Shephard had already flanked around to the front of it. The General leapt at the nearest cam-bot and grabbed hold of it from beneath. He was lifted into the air, the bot's eye desperately trying to catch him on camera to free itself from his grasp as he hovered through the city streets. The General twisted and turned to get the fiesty bot to turn where he wanted it to and descend and ascend at his will.
He swung the bot back around and began firing on the Strider. It wouldn't be enough, he realized as the pulse cannon mounted on the metallic synth turned skyward in his direction. He reached down and grabbed a belt of grenades he was wearing. Having to keep one hand on the bot meant he couldn't pull the pin, he tossed the grenade belt down at the towering Strider and grabbed his AR2 waiting for the right moment to pull the grenade launcher trigger. The belt fell and smacked hard against the shell of the synthetic Strider, Shephard took aim and fired, his grenade erupted in a hail of fire and shrapnel just beneath the Strider's armored top and detonated the grenade belt. The grenades exploded right at level with the Strider's underbelly, the synthetic insect went down, synth parts flew in every direction and it's three legs separated in spectacular fashion from the torso.
Shephard brought the cam-bot down to a nearby roof-top and disembarked nearby several friendly Resistance soldiers. It was a small fireteam of rocket soldiers who had been targeting that particular Strider and each of them stood gob smacked by what they had just witnessed. Shephard shook them from their awe and lead them out of the building. He was late to his own meeting, over a thousand soldiers were gathering in a nearby playground readying a counter-strike against the invading Combine.
The night had been a long one and dawn was still several hours away but Shephard hoped to have the team gathered and ready by then. The Combine had moved most of their infantry out of the City leaving War Hound the Striders to break apart the Resistance. War Hound was gone now and rumors had it that Resistance rockets had brought it down boosting morale. Shephard doubted the rumors himself but their strategic value was not to be underestimated. They had to move and move before Overwatch re-entered the city.
Shephard could see the soldiers now, and through the smoke and darkness one figure stood out to him most of all, despite the fact that she was laying on a merry-go-round being tended by a medic.
"Amber," Shephard called out falling to his knees in front of her, "Holy shit, how the fuck are you alive."
"Don't cry on me soldier," General Cartwright protested.
"I thought you went down," Shephard replied half-laughing half-crying.
"I mean it," Amber growled, "I don't want these wounds to get infected."
"Will she be alright?" Shephard asked the medic tending her.
"She should be fine," the man replied.
"Tough old bitch," Shephard nodded.
The General's joy was short-lived as the unmistakable roar of drop-ships and gun-ships filled the air. He rushed for a nearby AT-4 nearly stealing it out of the hands of one of the rocket team he'd met on the roof. There must've been a dozen of them, they swooped in out of nowhere bombarding the gathering of troops with heavy pulse fire. Shephard felt tears returning to his eyes as he guided in a rocket to a direct hit on the nearest gunship. He rushed for cover as he aimed his next rocket, this time the gunship broke apart crashing amongst the ruins of the city.
The troops scattered too and fro. Shephard watched as the medic who'd been escorting General Cartwright was clipped by pulse fire. He dashed from cover to get the General as a drop-ship landed right in front of him. The General handed Amber a weapon and waited as the doors the drop-ship opened. Something stepped out, or rather slithered out.
"Drop the weapons," the grotesque creature said struggling to be understood over the din of battle still raging behind him, "We know where your children are. We know of the tunnels General Shephard."
"No!" Shephard shouted as Combine soldiers surrounded them, "You didn't!"
"I didn't, YET," the General emphasized, "But I will if you do not surrender. There are pockets of Resistance that will not surrender until you order it personally."
"You won't harm the children if I do this?" Shephard asked, though he knew better than to truly trust the worm.
"Let me put it this way General," Yvolslog gloated, "I WILL most certainly harm them if you DON'T."
Theta sat alone in her room staring at a closed-circuit monitor. On the screen was Cheng and several of her top engineers and scientists working eagerly, quickly, to assemble the Animus. She hoped it would only take a few days to assemble. She was eager to be done with the dark memories that had begun to plague her and even more eager to know her true identity. Yet amongst that desire their dwelt an unspoken fear, fear that the truth might be painful. Fear that it might bring with it a heavier price than she had imagined.
She turned her attention to another screen. Alyx was on the way back to her room. The graceful strides of Alyx's sexy figure brought a smile briefly to Theta's lips. She paused for a moment recognizing something truly familiar about Alyx though only vaguely. She quickly shut off the monitor and turned her attention back to the one where Cheng continued his work on the Animus. Alyx knocked a few seconds later.
"Come in," Theta said smiling at Alyx as she turned to regard her.
"You still awake?" Alyx asked finding Theta sitting in her quarters watching a surveillance screen.
"He's tireless," Theta remarked with a gentle yawn watching Cheng work on the Animus prototype.
"It will be dawn soon," Alyx said.
"I'm not tired," Theta said, "I don't know why. Maybe it's the chance to finally have my answers to who I am and where I came from. Or maybe it's having you back with me."
Alyx blushed at that but did not turn down a passionate kiss from the intriguingly beautiful Theta Prime.
"With everything that's been happening I've been thinking," Alyx said staring into Theta's seemingly white eyes with lust burning in her olive orbs, "All this time I've been afraid to indulge. I spent so much time with Gordon afraid to tell him how I felt. I won't make the same mistake with you."
"Let's go to bed," Theta said with an arousing inflection to her tone.
Shephard stood in front of the microphone and camera as the day dawned. The Combine had spent the remainder of the night setting up massive televisions to broadcast this message. Some had been taken down by remaining Resistance soldiers but most had remained intact. He never thought in all his years that he would be forced to surrender, that he would have to be responsible for the failure of his forces in this way. He would be the one to enslave the remaining citizens and soldiers in City 12. His failure, his mistakes, his weakness. He knew that it was the only way to preserve the future of humanity, the keep the children safe. Shephard knew that the General, a slug-like monster named Yvolslog Urwel likely had plans for the children as well.
With shaking hands, a bruised and battered body and a barely audible voice Shephard began his announcement.
"Soldiers of City 12, proud brave men and women. Those who fought beside me in the best and worst of times, from Black Mesa to this present crisis. This is General Adrian Shephard. It is hard for me to say this but you MUST lay down your arms. You must surrender to the Combine. I know that many of you would sooner die that surrender, but the fate of our children hangs in the balance. They will kill the children if you do not surrender. Many of you may lose you respect for me after this, I can understand that, but you must lay down your arms. I repeat, the battle is over, the city is fallen, the war is lost. Surrender is the only option."
Shephard slumped out of the camera's sight and felt his throat swell with bile. The taste of his vomit was made even stronger when the alien General's hulking globular form entered the room with what might be taken for a smile on his face. Shephard felt the urge to end the demonic thing's life then and there, to find some way, anyway, of delivering a killing blow. There was nothing in the climate-controlled bunker he could use to do such a thing and even his hidden blade had been confiscated.
"Commendable job General," Yvolslog goaded, "Do you think they will listen?"
"I don't know," Shephard said throwing his face into his palms in defeat, "some may remain hostile."
"I tell you this!" the alien General exploded in a sudden rage, "If so much as one of my Overwatch is scratched by one of your MEN I will raze this city to the ground and makes slaves of your children!"
"We're already broken," Shephard replied hopelessly, "How many more fragments can you break us into?"
"We will grind your pathetic race into dust if we have to," the General uttered in his unnatural pronunciation of the English language. Several soldiers entered then, "Take the General to our POW camp to be with the other dust."
Shephard felt broken in spirit but as he passed by other Resistance soldiers who'd been taken prisoner he felt the dark clouds lifting. They couldn't see him like this, their morale couldn't afford it. No matter how many decades it took they would see the Combine defeated and they would see every last suppression field and Citadel destroyed. He had lied to the men in that city. The war wasn't over, the war was far from over. The war wouldn't end until the last human being stopped breathing or the last remnant of the Combine Empire departed the surface of the Earth.