Disclaimer: I don't own Half-Life.
Welcome to City 17
Chapter Eleven: Entanglement
It did hurt.
A fine, dusty mist rose from around him as he stared up at the high ceiling, his right foot barely aware of the small fire crackling away beside it. He closed his eyes, took a breath, and heaved himself up into a sitting position. The HEV suit beeped and told him he was in pain.
"Thank you," he muttered, marvelling at the wonders of modern science.
Getting to his feet, Gordon swayed uncertainly before shaking it off and moving onwards, one hand resting on the crowbar at his thigh. He climbed down another hole in the ground and into a dilapidated corridor, the entire wall on his left side collapsing in on itself. A chunk of rock tumbled to the floor beside him as he walked.
The horn of a Combine train blasted through, and Gordon's pace slowed a little. As he moved to the mouth of the corridor, which ended rather abruptly, Alyx Vance caught his eye.
She was stood at a control panel at the end of a walkway in front of him, just far enough away that he went unnoticed by her. Combine radios chattered out of Gordon's vision, and gunshots rang through the air. Her scowl set in stone, Alyx slipped a handgun from a holster and whirled around, charging as she fired. It sounded like a machinegun going off.
Gordon silently dropped to the ground below. The path took him underneath the walkway Alyx had been walking on. Shadows moved and flashed as another train shot along the rails beside the walkway. The gunfire stopped, and a Combine soldier tumbled down through a gap and onto the ground in front of him.
He saw the glint of a pulse rifle, and knelt to scoop it up.
"Hold it there."
He froze, though he wasn't sure why. He knew it was Alyx, since there weren't female Combines. Were there? Looking up, he saw Alyx soften immediately from where she stood on a stone platform next to the walkway.
It made him realise just how long it had been since he'd seen a familiar face.
"Gordon, you made it. Boy, am I glad to see you."
He smiled and waved weakly. "Hi."
She looked around warily, slipping her gun away. "We'd better hurry, Gordon."
Alyx shot off out of sight to the left, and Gordon walked along the path, coming around the corner in time to see her leap to the ground.
"I'm glad you made it here in one piece," she said, her voice rather quiet.
He smiled. "You too."
Alyx returned the smile, but it melted away when her eyes slowly drifted upwards. Gordon followed her gaze, and tried not to gasp. The walls extended up like a skyscraper, a network of thick metal poles weaving their way from wall to wall and up and down the area. Tall, human sized metal pods were attached to the walls, clamped onto the metal poles and using them as rails to move about.
They were the same pods he had seen… that he had been shown by Him. Was this the place he had seen? But then… it was far too quiet and slow. What he had seen was busy, hellishly so.
"My dad's up there somewhere, in that holding area. It's going to take some doing to get him out. "
She sounded as haunted as he felt. There were people in those things?
"Let's get out of here."
Alyx moved to a big control panel next to some heavy looking metal doors. Yanking something out of her belt, she held it out in front of her, putting a protective hand over her face. Gordon peered over her shoulder as closely as he dared, watching as she pressed a button on the flashlight-sized device. The top of the stick opened up, electricity buzzing away. It flashed suddenly, and so did the control panel, sparks flying wildly before the lights dimmed.
The doors opened, thin and thick sections shooting up into the ceiling. It was like watching Tetris in reverse. They walked through and into an old corridor, the lights barely giving off enough illumination to show them where to go. Alyx seemed to know what was going on, however, and moved to an elevator on the right.
"What is that?" he said, nodding to the device she was slipping away.
Alyx looked at him curiously, and Gordon suddenly became aware that he had barely spoken to her the last two times they had met. Not that he talked much anyway.
"It's something my Dad and Barney cooked up," she said, stabbing a finger at the elevator button. "It shorts out the security for a little bit, although Dad keeps on telling me it's more complicated than…" she trailed off, and her face tightened up.
Gordon left her alone, although it was more out of awkwardness than any kind of respect for her privacy.
Her eyes closed, she took a deep breath. Boy, she was pretty.
Gordon frowned. Probably best to ignore that last thought.
The elevator doors opened, and they stepped inside. It was surprisingly old.
"I'm afraid I'm flying blind here," Alyx said, her voice almost lost by the rumbling of the elevator as it ascended. "Every once in a while a Vortigaunt gets captured and sends back information, but we don't have a complete picture of the place. The little we do know is all bad."
He wasn't sure what to say, but he logged the bit of information about the Vortigaunt in the back of his mind. Probably telepathy of some kind.
Without warning, Alyx slipped out her gun. "Get ready."
Gordon hefted up the pulse rifle, enjoying and loathing the feeling of having a gun again. The doors clattered open, and Combine radios chattered. A corridor stretched out in front and off to the right of them. A small open doorway was in the wall just in front of Gordon, the darkness inside making the yellow lenses of the Combine soldiers' helmet all the more visible.
He shoved himself back into the elevator as the soldier opened fire, and two more sprang out from behind some crates in the corridor directly in front of them.
Alyx leapt out of the elevator and to the right, firing off a rapid burst from her oddly machinegun-like handgun. The soldier in the small room went down.
Gordon switched walls in the elevator, letting off a barrage of gunfire as he went. He only hit wooden crates. From where he stood, his back pressed to the left wall, he could see that Alyx had taken cover in the room the soldier had been in. She snuck out and towards the crates.
He shot her a warning glare, which she must have seen because she just frowned and shook her head before continuing on.
Huh. No-one had said no to him today. At least, no-one on his side.
Pulse rifle clenched in his hands, Gordon stormed around the corner and towards the crates. Alyx gave him a look of surprise and outrage as he leapt into the crates, tumbling through them and knocking the two soldiers on the other side all over the place. He ended up lying on his back, a crate on his belly.
They managed to scramble to their feet faster than him, and Gordon started to reach for his crowbar, the pulse rifle lost in the tumble.
Bloody bullet holes exploded onto them with little red puffs of mist, and they collapsed to the ground.
He looked up at Alyx.
"That… was pretty stupid, Gordon."
Gordon thought about it. "Not really."
"They could have shot you, you know."
He pushed the crate off and sat up, tapping the Lambda symbol on his chest. "HEV suit."
"They could have shot you in the head."
He frowned, confused. "But… they never aim for my head."
"Well, someone might someday, Gordon." She put out a hand, and he took it.
"Good point," he grunted, getting to his feet. "I, uh… thank you. I'm not used to people shooting soldiers for me."
Alyx frowned.
"It's nice," he added quickly. "It's… it's not a bad thing."
She smiled a little, though Gordon could feel the confusion in the air.
"Over here," she said slowly, nodding to a tall metal door. Alyx went to a little red lens in a panel beside the door, and pulled out the lock picking device. It did its magic, and they were inside. It was a rather small room, with a wide control panel taking up the wall on the left and a tall window in front of them allowing a view of the pods outside.
"This should get me into their security system," she murmured as she started typing, although it was more to herself. "Now to find my father."
Gordon moved to the doorway and scanned the corridor, flexing his cramped hands around the pulse rifle.
"Oh, my God."
He turned to Alyx, who was entranced by the monitor in front of her. Profile shots of people either asleep or unconscious. Vital signs bobbing up and down on each of the faces seemed to indicate they were alive. Gordon wasn't sure if dead would be better or worse for them.
"These poor people."
Moving up beside her, he let the rifle drop down to his side. "Where… are they?"
Alyx nodded to the window. "Ready for augmentation," she noted bitterly.
"What? What does that mean?"
She gave him a look which indicated he should know this, but told him anyway. "The soldiers you've been fighting. They're not human. Not completely. They've been augmented by Combine technology. Some more than others."
"Wait… Barney's a CP. Does that mean that he-"
"No, CPs are all human," she said distastefully. "Just volunteers who want to be on the winning team."
A familiar face appeared on the screen, and Gordon pointed. "There. Eli."
She jabbed a panicked finger onto the control panel, stopping the horror slideshow. "All right. I think I can bring him in."
While she worked, Gordon checked the doorway again. No-one yet. Was it hot in here? It felt hot.
"There! He's on the way."
Checking back with Alyx, he saw she had moved to the window, and was intently watching one of the pods slide along a metal rail and go towards a room directly above them. She only turned to him once the pod was completely out of view.
"Let's go meet him."
He nodded, and she shot past him and out the corridor. She seemed to know where she was going, so Gordon didn't say anything to disturb her. Damn, she was fast. Yet another thing he wasn't used to; keeping up.
After sprinting through a few corridors and locked doors that looked the same, Alyx darted into a doorway that went up some stairs. Gordon, just a few paces behind her, watched from the foot of the stairs as she darted off to the left at the top. He ran up and saw a soldier come out of the corridor on the right, shotgun cocked and ready.
Gordon charged headlong into him and slammed him into the wall. Lodging the pulse rifle against the Combine's neck, he fired, spattering the wall with blood.
He heard gunfire coming from the next room over. After a quick check around for more sneaky Combines, he moved quickly down the corridor and bolted through the doorway. The dead body of a soldier lay at his feet. A sudden smack against a window beside him made him jump a little, and he looked over into the small office on his right. The body of a Combine soldier slowly slid down the window, squeaking as it went.
Alyx emerged from the office, brushing flecks of dust and drywall from her hair and shoulder.
"You okay?"
He ducked his head a little. "Am I… Are you okay?"
"Yeah, fine," she said simply, frowning, smiling and looking a little put out. "Why?"
Gordon wasn't understanding this conversation. "Why? A… soldier almost shot you in the back."
"What? That one?" she asked, nodding to the dead soldier at the doorway.
"No, a different one, in the corridor."
Alyx seemed a little fearful at the implication, but covered it quickly. "But you got him, right?"
He just nodded.
"Good. Let's go."
Conversation apparently over, Alyx slinked off into the office. Gordon felt as though he should say more, but Alyx was moving too quickly for him to stand around thinking of something relevant to say. So, frustration twisting his mouth a little, Gordon followed along.
By the time he caught up with her, she was standing in front another very big metallic door with a terminal beside it.
"He should be in here. Let me just get this open."
After a few failed attempts at trying to hack in with the keyboard, Alyx just yanked out the lock pick and blasted the thing. After a tense pause from the machine, the doors moved outwards before sliding open on their hinges.
This room was very similar to the observation room from earlier, although the view from the window was blocked by one of the pods. The window, while tall, curved inwards, allowing pods to rest in it. Probably for interrogations and the like.
"There he is. All right, let me see if I can get this open."
She moved to the terminal in the corner of the room, and succeeded after only a few seconds of button pushing. A complicated series of latches levers worked away on the pod, swinging it forward and into the gap afforded by the curved window. Two more arms moved around and opened the now loose front of the pod, revealing the bound Eli inside. Metal bars kept him in place. Trying to grab him now would have been useless anyway, the glass looked incredibly solid.
Eli blinked and looked around blearily. Finally, his vision settled on Alyx, and lucidity returned sharply.
His voice echoed a little, not in the least muffled, which made Gordon a little curious.
"Alyx? Gordon! Is that really you? I can't believe you found me."
Alyx rested her hands on the window between herself and her father. "Dad, are you all right?"
"I'm fine, but you? You've got to get out of here."
Determination set her features. "We're here to get you out, Dad."
"Never mind me," he said, sounding so very desperate. "Save yourselves."
As much as Gordon appreciated the words, he knew they were mostly directed at Alyx. The target of said sentiment, however, wasn't having any of it.
"No. We're not leaving you. I think I can recalibrate the Combine portal to get us out of here."
Gordon had never seen Eli on the verge of panic before. It was uncomfortable. What made it worse was that none of this panic was for his own sake; it was on their behalf.
Eli swallowed visibly before speaking again. "But where will you go?"
"I talked to Dr Kleiner. His portal was almost working again. If he's managed to repair it, we'll end up there. If he hasn't, well…" She looked to Gordon, smiling a little desperately. "…we couldn't be any worse off."
"It's not worth the risk, Alyx," Eli pleaded. "I can't lose you." Some words went unspoken, but Gordon knew already.
She was all Eli had left.
"Get out while you can."
Alyx took a deep breath, as if dealing with a stubborn child. "We're not leaving here without you. That's final."
Suitably taken aback by the scolding, Eli just nodded before looking up with something else on his mind.
"We can't leave Judith here, either."
Satisfied that she had won the argument, Alyx nodded the statement away. "Don't worry, Dad. We'll find her." She wrung her gloved hands a little. "For now… I'm going to send you to the teleport chamber."
She glanced over at Gordon awkwardly. He moved to the doorway and turned his back to them, giving them some room. He was feeling enough of a third wheel as it was.
"I'm not saying goodbye, Dad," she said quietly. "We'll meet you there."
"I know you will. I'll see you there, baby." Gordon could see Eli's proud smile in his mind's-eye, although it was still the younger Eli he imagined. He wondered how long it would take to get used to thinking of him as an old man.
There was a silence, and Gordon turned to see Alyx heading for the terminal. His gaze caught Eli's, and the elder man called him over with a gesture of his head.
"How are you?" Gordon asked quietly, surprised at how casual he made it sound.
A gentle smile graced Eli's features. "Uncomfortable. Makes me long for a Black Mesa Transit System bench."
"Ouch."
They shared a smile before Eli looked over at Alyx, diligently working. "Gordon… look after her."
He smirked and shook his head. "Eli, she seriously doesn't need-"
"Damn it, Gordon," he hissed, and Gordon's smile disappeared. The older man looked him eye to eye.
Gordon's throat felt very dry.
"She's my daughter." His eyes were glassy, but still intense. "You make sure I see her again."
Legs suddenly very wobbly, Gordon nodded. "I will. I promise."
Keeping his gaze a while longer, Eli blew out a tired breath. "Thank you."
Alyx turned to face her father, and then exchanged a silent goodbye before she pressed the final button that closed up the pod and whisked it away, sending it to the teleport chamber.
They both stood at the window and watched the pod until it became lost in a sea of others.
Gordon looked over at Alyx. "You okay?"
Her eyes were slightly pink from tears, but she nodded anyway, her voice uneven as she spoke. "Let's get out of here."
She rushed on out the doorway, and Gordon followed sombrely behind, doing his best not to disturb her. He liked to think this was because he knew she wanted to work through these feelings by herself. But he was fairly sure he was just afraid to talk to her.
She stopped at a doorway at the end of the hall, and blasted the control panel beside to let him through. The rickety looking door opened without a complaint, revealing a dank, cramped little corridor with pipes on either side tucked away behind fencing. When she didn't make a move to go through, Gordon looked to her questioningly.
"Are we going?" he asked quietly, trying not to sound too obnoxious.
Alyx shook her head, and hooked a thumb back to the room they had just come from. "I'm going to head back to the security station and try to patch into your suit radio. Wait until you hear from me."
Her gaze travelled to the dim corridor, yellow light bulbs barely leading the way. "Hey, take care of yourself."
She didn't look at him as she said it, only looking him in the eyes for a brief moment before darting off back down the corridor.
Gordon watched her go but tried to stop himself from really watching her. She was Eli's daughter, after all. Annoyingly, that was becoming somewhat of a mantra in his head.
Blinking away such thoughts, he proceeded through the corridor and through the door at the other end, boots clomping with surprising noise as he went. Having just spent so long by himself, it was nice to have had the company, at least for a little while. Now that it was gone again… well, he supposed everything was going to seem a little louder when there was no-one to talk to.
He came out into another cell block, a gate on his left preventing him from going any further inside. Gordon tugged at it half-heartedly with one hand before backing up a few steps to look at it more completely. He considered shooting at it, but that technique only ever seemed to work when he was in some desperate hurry.
The decision was taken out of his hands when a monitor in the top corner of the room burst noisily into life, static fizzling away for a few moments before Alyx's face filled the screen.
"Hey, it worked," she muttered, concentrating on the controls beneath the screen. "Let's see what I can do to clear the way for you. Keep an eye out for Mossman. I'll get my dad as far through the prison as I can, then I'll catch up with you."
Gordon nodded. It sounded reasonably enough. He tapped the gate in front of him, looking to her. "Can you, uh…?"
She glanced up from her work. "Hm? Oh. Hang on, I'll see if I can figure out how to get that gate open."
He heard her tap away diligently before looking up unsurely at the gate. "There you… go?"
Nothing happened. Just in case, Gordon pulled at the gate in an attempt to slide it.
"Nope," he said, looking up at her again.
Then the gate opened.
"Oh, ye of little faith."
Gordon smiled before slipping through into the next corridor.
And so on it went, a clueless Gordon wandering the halls of Nova Prospekt while Alyx redirected him at every junction, usually with some amusement in her voice. He tried to keep his irritation to himself as he headed into a thrumming generator room, the two turbines sat on the right hand side of the room.
There was an entrance to another corridor on Gordon's right, but an old office sat in front of him attracted his attention. Gordon ventured inside, looking for any supplies.
"Be careful Gordon, I'm picking up a lot of Combine sensors in the area ahead."
He froze in the doorway at that, but then just nodded his agreement and stepped inside. There was a metal crate of grenades inside, along with a sparse table and a flickering monitor in the top corner of the room.
"Gordon?"
"Yes?"
"Did you hear me?"
He frowned. "Uh… yes. I nodded."
"Gordon," she sighed, "I can't see you nodding if there's no camera."
Readjusting his glasses, Gordon leant back out of the doorway and looked down the corridor he had just come from.
"Oh. Sorry."
"Never mind," she laughed, which in turn made Gordon smile. The laugh abruptly stopped. "Uh-oh. Look at the monitor."
Gordon did so, and spied four soldiers stomping down a corridor, at the end of which he could see the generators that rested right next to him.
He snatched up two grenades and ran to the corner of the entrance to the corridor. Pulling the pin on the grenade, he slammed it down onto the floor upright before shooting off back to the earlier corridor for cover.
Two soldiers burst onto the scene, one only just noticing the grenade in time for it to explode in his face. The blast killed him and sent the other soldier crashing headfirst into the wall behind him.
Gordon dashed out from the cover and ran past the entrance to the corridor, tossing the second grenade inside. A garbled 'shit!' echoed out from one of the soldiers, and they both ran out into the open to avoid the blast. As the grenade exploded, Gordon fired a spread of bullets, managing to hit both of them in the head and dropping them like stones.
Catching his breath, Gordon looked around for a camera. Finding none, he just settled for tilting his head up.
"Any more?"
No response. He probably wasn't near a camera. Although… wasn't Alyx patched into his suit radio? That was what she had said, anyway. He made his way back to the office just in case, poking his head through the doorway and looking to the monitor.
"Alyx?"
"Uh, no, no. I can't see any more soldiers." She cleared her throat loudly before quickly continuing on with, "but that doesn't mean more aren't on the way. You'd better keep moving."
A little befuddled by what had gotten into Alyx, Gordon just nodded. "Right. Good point."
He trundled on through the bleak corridors and hallways, lights flickering and passages blocked by collapsed ceilings. Only the occasional squawk of a Combine radio kept him on his toes, but he trusted Alyx to warn him of any incoming soldiers. It was strange to rely on someone like that. Scary, too.
"Alyx?" he murmured, not sure if there was a microphone hidden in his suit he should be talking into.
She sounded like she wasn't expecting him to speak. "…yeah?"
"Um… you will… warn me, if… you know, soldiers are coming."
"Yes…"
"Good. Just checking."
He reached the end of a corridor that branched off in two directions.
"Left," she added helpfully.
Gordon went left.
It took Alyx a few moments to speak again. "Gordon?"
"Mm?"
"Why would you think I wouldn't tell you?" she asked curiously, her voice cautiously tilting between offended and amused.
Realising just how that question could have been interpreted, Gordon stopped and looked for a camera. Finding none, he just settled for standing still.
"Sorry, it's nothing like…" He sighed. "Sorry."
She didn't reply for awhile, so Gordon just kept on going. He felt like a jerk. He hadn't felt that way before. At least, not since he started running and fighting for his life. He had killed and watched people die, sure… but this was the first time he felt like he had offended someone, and actually cared.
Strange how all these different kinds of pain could co-exist. Horrible, too.
"You're coming up to another control room," Alyx blurted out, making him duck his head a little. "Looks like it's still occupied."
There were some stairs in front of Gordon which in turn led to another set of stairs on the left. Peering around the corner, Gordon saw into a rather large observation room, with a large computer terminal on the left and some metallic alcoves on the right. At the far end of the room was a long, semi-circular window that overlooked… whatever it was it overlooked - Gordon couldn't tell from this far away.
A soldier was stood at the terminal, checking some readouts. Another was staring out the window, head scanning from left to right robotically.
Gordon paced up the stairs as quietly as he could, sliding out the crowbar as he went. He snuck up behind the soldier at the computer.
Aiming his rifle at the window soldier, Gordon blasted him through the back and head before swinging the crowbar through the mask of the suitably alarmed computer soldier. Both of their radios flatlined, quickly replaced by that same female voice that had echoed throughout City 17, this time wittering on about incursions and cell blocks.
"My guess is there's a bunch more soldiers heading your way."
Gordon grunted and nodded, half-listening as he dropped his current rifle and picked up the one the computer soldier had been using.
"Quick, search the room. There should be some Combine turrets nearby."
Hazel eyes flickering around the room, Gordon finally settled on the metal alcoves on the wall opposite the computer. In both were the same turrets that had given him hell while he had wandered the halls with his Antlions. Force fields prevented him from getting at them, but they switched off as he approached. He assumed that was Alyx's work.
"I can reprogram the turrets to attack the enemy. You set them up to defend the control room."
There were three sets of stairs leading into the room. One was the set he had used to get in. The other two were on opposite sides, nestled in the corners beside the computer and the alcoves respectively. He set the turrets up at the top of the two new staircases, reasoning that he could defend the entrance he had come through.
Slowly creeping to the window, he peeked his head over and saw a block of cells on the floor below, all of them closed. Gordon didn't want to think about what kind of prisoners could be trapped inside. Force fields blocked all exits down below, cutting off corridors that went to the left and the right.
A frustrated groan escaped Alyx. "I can't shut down those fields from here. I'll have to catch up with you to get access to them."
He heard the steady thumping of Combine boots. And, surely enough, there they were, passing through the force fields like they weren't even there.
"I'm picking up a lot of incoming soldiers…" Alyx said, not sounding the least bit concerned. In fact, she sounded positively indifferent.
"Hold the fort 'til I get there."
"Okay…"
Gordon checked the rifle, but gave up with a floundering motion of his hand when he realised he had no idea what the hell he was doing.
The turrets bleeped angrily and with a very high pitch that seemed to tweak Gordon's eardrums a little. Then they opened fire, which was an entirely different kind of overwhelming noise.
They did their job, though. Gordon had half expected them to break down; it would have been exactly his luck for turrets to be highly efficient killing machine when they were against him and then suddenly become useless as soon as they were on his side.
Alyx, however, seemed to have the magic touch, because the turrets didn't miss a beat. Gordon wondered where they got all their ammunition from. From where Gordon was crouched, he only occasionally caught a glimpse of a soldier almost reaching the turrets before they collapsed in a heap.
It went on like this for what must have been ten minutes, and still the turrets tirelessly mowed down every single soldier that dared come around the corner.
Finally, finally, the gunfire started to die down, and the turrets went into what Gordon assumed was standby mode. He slowly got to his feet, gripping the rifle intently as he crept to the corner beside the computer. Giving himself a mental count up to three, he swung around, rifle at the ready.
A heap of Combine bodies awaited him, the stairs barely visible beneath them. A cursory check of the other stairway brought pretty much the same prognosis; Combine soldiers were deadly, but a little bit stupid.
"Be there in a second, Gordon."
The suddenness of her announcement made Gordon jump a little, although it was nothing compared to the shock of an air vent cover slamming to the ground behind him. A small yelp escaped him as he whirled around, rifle at the ready.
And Alyx dropped to the ground.
"Sorry it took me so long," she said pleasantly. She looked around the room, and, seeing no obvious signs of a fight, looked a little confused. But she shook it off and smiled.
"Glad to see you're okay." Her eyes settled on the computer behind Gordon, and she nodded to it as she walked by. "Let's see if we can find Mossman. It looks like this station might give me better access."
Alyx tapped away diligently on the keyboard while Gordon checked the exits. It felt a little odd that they would send so many soldiers and then suddenly just stop. Maybe they were waiting to catch him out later. Catch them. Gordon wasn't used to thinking in plurals. If Alyx was sticking around, he would have to get used to it.
"There she is."
He turned around, his patrol forgotten for the moment. There she was, all right. But it was just her stood around working at a computer station.
Gordon and Alyx looked at each other, and he pointed a confused finger at the screen.
"Uh…"
"Wait a minute, how'd she…" Impatiently mashing away at the keyboard, she hit pay dirt when Dr Breen's off-screen voice echoed out from the screen.
"-from your area."
Mossman shook her head. "I'm not calling about that."
"What's she up to?"Alyx whispered, more to herself than Gordon.
"You promised me you weren't going to touch Eli."
Gordon felt like his stomach had just dropped to his toes. Alyx too, judging by the look she had on her face.
"Oh my God-"
"The soldiers were a bit overzealous, I admit," Breen said, "but he was too tempting a prize to simply turn loose…"
Alyx's face knotted in anger.
"…especially in the absence of Gordon Freeman."
Although he could feel her eyes on him for just a moment, Gordon couldn't look at her. He was just enraptured by what was happening on the screen.
Sounding frustrated, Mossman sharply said, "You would have had Freeman if you'd just been patient and waited for my signal."
His throat suddenly dry, Gordon swallowed. He couldn't believe this.
"We weren't entirely sure you were ever going to get around to that. Human loyalties being what there are."
"Dr Breen-" Mossman dropped her head. She took a breath, and started again, slowly. "As I have stated before, you have got to let Eli come around on his own, you can't just-"
"I have known Dr Vance far longer than you, my dear. I'm afraid your feelings for him may have blinded you-"
She looked offended by the very word. "Feelings? This has nothing to do with feelings."
Gordon's grip on the rifle tightened. Obviously not.
Mossman continued on. "It's a simple fact that when Eli believes in our-"
"This is not open for debate, Dr Mossman."
"Dr Breen, please-"
"So sorry Judith, I'm all out of time."
And that was the end of the conversation. Alyx slammed a fist down on the keyboard, blanking out the monitor.
"Damn her, I don't believe this!" Hands shaking almost imperceptibly, she buried her face in them.
Not feeling particularly steady himself, Gordon looked to her concernedly. "You okay?"
"I'm…" she sighed, and let her hands drop. "I just didn't see this coming. I mean, I know we had our disagreements, but… I figured that just meant she was even more likely to be on our side. Being an asshole isn't the greatest cover, y'know?"
A desperate laugh escaped her, and Gordon smiled, which was the only thing he felt like he could offer at the moment.
Quickly enough, Alyx shook it off. "Come on Gordon, now we've really got to hurry."
And just like that, everything was back to business. Alyx at the computer, guiding him on.
"Go on ahead," she said, nodding to the body-filled stairway. "I'll disrupt the next level of security and catch up with you when I can."
He nodded and took a step before pausing and looking back to her.
"Alyx."
Looking for all the world like a surprised animal, Alyx stared at him.
"Don't worry," he said slowly, "we'll find Eli. Then we'll find her." That didn't sound satisfactory to him, so he thought about something Barney might say. "And then, uh… we'll kick her ass?"
Disbelief was the overriding emotion on her face. Then she smiled, which quickly gave way to a laugh. She came up shaking her head, focusing on the computer.
"Go on, get going."
Smiling at what he hoped was a job well done, Gordon moved on down the stairway of dead Combine bodies. None of them even grunted as he stomped down on them. Turrets did nice work.
The force field was off, and Gordon carefully slipped through, ears perked for the sound of Combine boots or radios.
Truth be told, he wasn't sure how to feel. He hadn't really known Mossman for that long, so really, any judgements he made about her were the fact that she was an awkward person to be around in the first place, which she had only made worse by her now betraying him.
On the other hand, a part of him was relieved that it wasn't the Combine tracking him that got Eli captured. The Combine had attacked before Mossman could send them a signal, which means, really, it was all her fault for giving them a back door to Black Mesa East.
He shook his head. Eli was captured, Mossman had betrayed them, and he was in an insanely frightening stronghold of an alien superpower. And what was he doing? Patting himself on the back for not screwing up.
After navigating his way through some old rickety doors and down through an old basement area, Gordon found himself clambering out of a rusty stairwell and into another cell block. D8, according to the sign.
There were two entrances; one directly on Gordon's left, and another much further down, also on the left. Peeking around the corner, he saw a row of cells on the ground floor, and some storage rooms on the floor above that.
On the right Gordon saw a wall dividing the block into two sections, two passageways leading to another set of cells mirroring those closest to him.
A soldier had his back to him, and Gordon slowly moved in behind him before giving him a swift blow to the head with the back of his rifle. He crumpled to the floor. Blue light bathed him from behind, and Gordon looked around in alarm to see his exit blocked by a force-field. Looking to the other end of the block, he saw another field in place there.
He dashed through the passageway and checked the other half of the block. More force-fields. Combine radios chattered away. Confused, he wandered back to the other side, feeling a little lost.
"Oh, an ambush…" he announced to no-one, realisation dawning.
"Gordon?"
Resigned to the upcoming violence, Gordon sighed, "Yes?"
"I'm picking up more incoming soldiers. See if there are any turrets nearby."
Ah, there was an idea. Blinking himself back to reality, Gordon got searching. As he went through the passageways, he noted storage boxes strewn about the place, most of them unopened. Something else that caught his eye was a balcony on the first floor that led into some hallway up above. A hallway that seemed to go quite far back…
He started to put together a little strategy.
On the ground floor was another gate, control panel beside it. Through the bars he could make out some stairs going down. That would be the way out, then.
Putting that aside for the moment, he moved into the other passageway and found four of the metal alcoves he had come across in the security station earlier. Only three were occupied, but for what he had in mind, three would be just fine.
A red button in the middle of the alcoves indicated something important, so he gave it a healthy slam with his palm. The force-fields in the alcoves switched off. Tossing his (for the moment) useless rifle to the ground, Gordon hefted the Gravity Gun around and picked up one of the turrets.
He moved out into the main cell block area and blasted it up into the hallway on the first floor. Going back, he repeated the process with the others.
"Gordon, you might want to hurry up with those turrets."
Concentration a must at the present moment, Gordon just waved away Alyx's concern. "Don't worry, I'm…"
He aimed the last turret.
"Gordon?"
"Sorry, just… give me a minute…"
He fired, and the last turret was up there. More Combine radio chatter, this sounding much closer by.
He swiftly moved to the crates and scooped them up with the Gravity Gun, carefully moving them into makeshift stairs. He only needed two tiers before he clambered up and latched onto the guardrail of the balcony above. Arms slightly weaker than his manly pride would ever let him admit to Alyx, Gordon struggled for a moment to pull himself up and over, legs kicking wildly. On the plus side, this knocked over the crates, so the soldiers would have to look around first before figuring out where he was.
With a final 'whoof' Gordon yanked himself over, landing in a heap on balcony floor.
"Here they come."
"Right, right," he breathed, scrambling to the turrets strewn about all over the long hallway. Forgoing the Gravity Gun this time, Gordon just picked them up himself and positioned all three along the balcony, pointing outwards.
The gates opened with a loud metallic clang, and Combine boots thundered in, their radios squawking angrily.
There was a corridor on his right, so Gordon ducked inside there rather than moving all the way to the back of the hall. A door at the other end of the corridor was locked, and there wasn't much light, but it didn't really matter. Gordon rested against the wall and slid to the ground, allowing himself a smile as the turrets wailed to life and started their onslaught.
Within a few minutes, there seemed to be a lull, and Gordon started to get up.
"More soldiers are coming, Gordon."
He sat back down.
Again, the soldiers fired hopelessly at the turrets. Some even threw grenades, but Gordon just rolled out of the corridor for a moment to punt them right back with the Gravity Gun. They didn't try the grenade thing again after that.
"We must have hit the mother load of soldiers, they're coming in from everywhere."
"Really?" he murmured, concentrating on a patch of dirt on the back of his glove that was unlike any other stain on the suit. Purple, shiny, yet not sticky? Where was that from? Ant-Lions? Did he fall in something purple and slimy? He did fall a lot, and it was usually something sticky. But purple? Purple wasn't really an overriding colour in his travels. Just depressing beiges and greens. So much green. And so many different shades, too.
Gordon smiled. Ah, morphine. How I have missed you.
"Okay Gordon, I'm going to leave off here and catch up with you. Be there as soon as I can."
"Okey-dokey," he managed, stretching. Wow, it really had been a long time since he had rested like this. It was just that five minutes sleep at New Little Odessa, and that was interrupted by a very strange dream.
Wait, hold on. Frowning, Gordon tilted his head so his ear was turned up to the sky. The shooting had stopped. No boots, not Combine radios. Just nothing. A little disappointed that he would have to get up again, Gordon heaved himself to his feet and slowly shifted along the wall until he could poke his head around the corner.
Nothing. Two of the turrets were still standing, while one of them had toppled back.
"Gordon!"
Wow, that radio link sounded better.
Wait…
He moved to the balcony and looked out. Alyx, gun in hand, was cautiously wading through the ridiculous amount of bodies gathered around the balcony. It looked like they had all come to watch him make a speech. Before they all spontaneously died, of course.
Alyx spotted him up above, and although confused, she seemed happy to see him.
"Sorry to take so long, Gordon. Looks like you could have used some help," she said, fretting a little as she slipped her gun away. "I won't leave you again, though. Now let's track down Mossman."
Unsure of what to say, Gordon just shrugged before awkwardly swinging his legs over he guardrail of the balcony. He jumped off like he was landing on a bouncy castle, the Combine bodies providing a surprisingly soft cushion.
Looking a little amused by that display of supreme agility, Alyx did her best to cover it as she moved to the computer beside the gate.
"Gordon?" she asked, trying to sound nonchalant.
A little distracted, Gordon offered her a small glance as he searched for a new gun amongst the bodies. "Hm?"
"Before… when I said I was on my way… did you say 'okey-dokey'?"
He paused in the middle of rolling over a soldier that was strewn across a shotgun. "That… is a possibility, yes."
"Uh-huh…"
"Morphine," he offered half-heartedly. "It… has more of an effect when I'm resting."
Alyx stopped typing, and looked to the sea of bodies around Gordon. "Resting?"
Gordon looked down at the bodies for just a moment. He shrugged and adjusted his glasses.
Smiling and shaking her head, Alyx turned back to the computer and hit one final button, opening the gates.
"Come on, Gordon," she said offhandedly, as if this were something they did all the time.
Strangely, it felt everyday to Gordon as well.
He nodded and followed her down the stairs, backing up and checking the area behind them before turning and chasing after her. They raced down a corridor with some double doors at the end. Through those doors, they entered another long corridor going off to the right. As it went further, it branched off to the right, separated by a fence.
Then the lights went out. Combine radios bleeped and grumbled away.
"Uh-oh."
She heard Alyx pull her gun from its holster. Gordon pumped the shotgun.
A Combine voice counted down incomprehensibly before brilliant red flares tumbled through the air, some rolling to a stop in front of them while others were content to take a position at the far end of the corridor. Yellow-eyed masks moved in the distance, and Alyx opened fire, moving forward and ducking behind a crate on the left for cover.
Gordon started running for the fenced area, ignoring Alyx shouting out her name.
He jumped and rolled to the other side of the fence, where a lot of crates waited for him. Bullets thunked loudly against the boxes, wood splintering. Looking over through the fence, Gordon saw that Alyx had moved in parallel with him. She glanced over at him and opened fire at something just behind him. He heard a grunt, and, peering around the crate, saw a soldier topple to the ground.
Nodding thanks, he rose quickly and bent over the crate with the shotgun, taking a few blind shots down the corridor.
Alyx stood and fired when he crouched down again, and he made a charge to get further down the corridor. As he went he spotted two soldiers heading for Alyx. He took them down with an ease he was used to now. Ricochets above his head made him duck down further, and a bullet or two managed to hit him sharply in the ribs. The breath knocked out of him, Gordon dove for a metal ammo crate and slid to momentary safety.
He looked over the top and saw he was near the end of the corridor. There were about eight of them, three further back down the corridor and moving in on Alyx. The other five had spotted him. He hopped up into a squatting position and threw himself forward, blasting one of the soldiers through the shoulder and neck as he went.
Pumping the shotgun as he rolled, he took aim and came up empty. He spared the quickest of angry glares at the weapon before staring helplessly up at the soldiers.
A bullet burst through the head of the lead soldier, and Gordon looked over in surprise to see a scuffed and slightly bloodied Alyx coming up the corridor, gun blazing before she kicked over a table and ducked behind it.
Gordon dropped the shotgun and charged into the four remaining soldiers, crowbar slashing through the mask of one before another smashed him in the face with the butt of his rifle. He went with the force of the impact and whirled around to face another soldier, suddenly ducking down and sweeping the crowbar through his legs. The soldier hit the ground hard.
Another soldier fell from Alyx's gun, blood spattering on Gordon's back as he turned into soldier that had hit him, stabbing into his belly with the long end of the crowbar. He grabbed his rifle as the last soldier brought his own weapon up to Gordon. In response, the scientist brought the rifle up in an awkward uppercut, sending his opponent's bullets into the ceiling. Gordon fired and blasted three holes in his face just as Alyx did the same to the soldier Gordon had tripped up earlier on.
Breathing heavily, Gordon only then became aware of the thick layer of sweat on his forehead. He wiped it off and closed his eyes, giving himself a moment.
Good God, that was fast.
"Well," Alyx breathed, checking her gun before slipping it away. "That was… fast."
He nodded, an exhausted laugh escaping him. "Thanks for… all that."
"You too," she said, smiling before her eyes caught on something on the floor behind him. "You going to get that?"
Following her gaze, he saw the crowbar protruding out of the belly of the soldier.
He nodded and yanked it out.
Not wasting anymore time, Alyx led the way as Gordon followed along, checking for anyone following. Like clockwork.
They ended up in a small booth of a room overlooking a larger chamber. A massive door awaited them.
"Great, another security station. All right Mossman, where are you…?"
Alyx got to work on the terminal.
"Combine portal?" he guessed, checking the chamber over for any threats while Alyx worked.
"Could be… ah! Found her," she said, glaring up at footage of a rather calm Mossman working away in her lab.
A large door was behind her, although it looked quite different from the one Gordon was looking at through the window. Alyx tapped away at the keyboard, and red lights began to flash in Mossman's lab. Alarmed, she started doing something or other at her computer.
Alyx grinned triumphantly. "Ha! Got you now!"
She checked the other cameras. The image changed. More soldiers, coming up the corridor they had just painted red.
"Uh-oh."
Working with renewed vigour, she quickly got the huge door down below to open. Sections of the metal door slowly slid into the ceiling like an avalanche in reverse, metal creaking and roaring like an animal.
"Well," Alyx smirked, "come on, Gordon. We don't want to keep her waiting."
They moved quickly down the stairs and into the chamber, sprinting with newfound energy into the room beyond.
Gordon could see soldiers storming down the stairs as the door came slamming down in front of him.
"Let me seal this door," Alyx said quietly, blasting the control panel beside the door. She looked to him, trepidation lining her face. "No turning back now."
They moved down to a small window beside a familiar looking door; the one that had been behind Mossman. Peering inside, Alyx smiled.
"There she is." She continued staring at Mossman as she spoke. "Let me do the talking, Gordon. We may need her to get out of here."
He just nodded dismissively. He didn't have the history with Mossman that Alyx did and had no desire to interfere with that. And on top of that, quite frankly, the teleportation technology they talked about was above his head at this point. Not that it would always be that way, but right now everyone seemed to need him more as a clumsy, accidental killing machine than a clumsy, accidental scientist.
Mossman's frightened, echoing voice brought him back to reality. "Hello? Oh, thank God someone…" Her words predictably died in her throat when she got to the window. "Alyx? Gordon! How did you get in here?"
"Save it," Alyx spat, "we know all about you and Breen."
"What?"
Gordon, who up to this point had been happy to act as lookout, couldn't help the scowl that he directed at Mossman. The innocence she put into the performance… it didn't bring out nice feelings in him.
Alyx jabbed a deserving finger at Mossman. "You've been a spy for the Combine the whole time."
The older woman seemed genuinely confused by what Alyx was saying, which really only made it worse for her. "What? What are you talking about?"
A loud metallic bang thundered through the chamber, and everyone looked to the door. Gordon could hear Combine radios from the other side.
"Inside, please," Gordon urged over his shoulder.
"Damn it," Alyx muttered. "Move back Mossman, we're coming in."
With a zap of her lock pick, the door slid up. They moved in quickly, Gordon backing in with rifle pointed at the main door. Alyx blasted the control panel on the other side, locking the door.
Then she stalked over to Mossman, who wisely backed up, her hands up in a manner she probably hoped would be calming.
"Alyx, whatever you may think, I assure you I've worked to protect your father."
Alyx brought back her hand, looking for all the world like she was going to punch Mossman's lights out, but then settled for just pointing a finger in her face.
"Shut up, and be glad you're still some use to us!" Looking unsatisfied with just shouting at Mossman, Alyx moved to the massive computer that took up the wall and started working. "We're going to reconfigure this teleport and get the hell out of here."
"You see?" the older woman pleaded, moving up beside her. "We're working to the same end. I've already reprogrammed the modulator to emulate a Xen relay!"
Alyx shot her a disgusted glare. "That's my father's work you stole."
"It's my work too!" Mossman cried, looking to Gordon for some kind of approval. He didn't give any.
Frustrated, she went back to Alyx, who was still working diligently on the computer. "And I had to prove to Dr Breen that your father would be the most valuable member of any research effort going forward from here-"
Alyx slammed her hand down onto the computer before spitting, "Enough of your bullshit!"
Gordon gave Mossman a warning look. "I think you should move back."
"What a good idea," Alyx agreed, hitting Mossman with rage-filled glare. Slowly, the doctor moved back, eventually backing up so she was stood next to Gordon. He watched her carefully.
An image of the pods from earlier came up on the screen. She glanced back at him. "Look Gordon, there's my Dad, I'm going to bring him in."
A smile crept onto Mossman's face, her hand going to her chest. "You found Eli?"
"No thanks to you," Alyx tossed back. "Just enter the coordinates for Dr Kleiner's lab and let's get moving."
Shaking her head, Mossman said, "But we need access to the teleport platform, and we're locked out."
"I'll take care of that," Alyx dismissed, quickly moving to the door and blasting the keypad next to it with the lock pick. It opened without complaint.
Gordon nudged Mossman with his elbow. "After you."
Unreadable, Mossman did as she was told and walked through the doorway with head bowed, trying to ignore Alyx's piercing stare as she went.
Alyx still didn't move from the doorway as Gordon passed, and he stopped. Hesitantly, he put a hand on her arm.
"Let's get going," he urged as gently as he could.
Her head moved up, and their eyes met. And just for a few seconds, Gordon saw a very scared little girl. But then she blinked and it was gone.
"Right. Let's go."
They moved through into the chamber, and Alyx zapped the door lock, sealing it behind them. They had to walk through a smaller storage area before getting into the main chamber. Inside were three turrets, tucked away in their alcoves. Gordon noted them for later.
But his attention was quickly grabbed by the main teleport chamber. A long tunnel of complicated machinery lay beneath them, visible through clean blue glass that led all the way to a raised platform at the other end of the room. There were two control panels on either side of the platform.
And at the far end was a teleport pad just like the one in Dr Kleiner's lab, except this one looked like it would raise you up several stories instead of several feet. Far above his head and perpendicular to where the teleport pad would eventually rise to was a piece of equipment very similar to Dr Kleiner's.
As a scientist, this was magnificent. Wonderful. Fascinating. He knelt down and pressed a gloved hand to the blue glass, trying to get a better look at the equipment. It looked like they used lenses to amplify the teleportation energy and redirect it into a higher focus beam that…
He blinked the scientist thoughts away. They weren't needed right now, Alyx had that handled.
Instead, he took a more tactical view. There were two entrances on the left-hand side of the room, both at the end of long corridors and closed at the moment. Framing the corridors were glass windows that seemed to be more for decoration than anything else. A third exit was visible, tucked away in the corner of the room behind the teleport control platform. Three entrances, three turrets.
"Oh… my God," Alyx gasped. "And you've been working with this thing? For how long?"
She slowly moved to the platform, eyes on the teleport pad as she went. Gordon went with her, continually keeping one eye on Mossman.
Mossman shook her head, a little aghast. "Never, until now. I did have a fairly good idea of what to expect-"
"I'll bet you did," Alyx shot at her. Calming down, she looked back to the pad. "It looks like it's waiting for us," she noted, a certain scientist-like curiosity about her.
"The Combine use a peculiar pulse-forming network with a very long rise-time," Mossman rattled off, sounding like nothing was amiss here. "It takes quite a while to recharge."
Slowly nodding, Alyx turned around. "So you've warmed it up for us. Good." Her eyes flitted to something above Gordon's head. "And just in time."
He turned and saw one of the Combine pods hanging from a track above their head. Strange how he hadn't noticed that before. Scientific curiosity overrides everything else, he supposed.
Alyx rushed up and stood beside him as the pod opened, revealing the slightly drowsy looking Eli inside.
Sounding a little desperate, Alyx shouted up to him. "Dad, down here! Sorry that took so long, I hope it wasn't too bad for you."
He smiled warmly, and Gordon's heart ached a little. Suddenly he wasn't looking forward to the truth getting out. "Don't worry about me, sweetheart."
Gentle eyes flitted up to Mossman, and his smile grew. Gordon exchanged a glance with Alyx as Eli spoke.
"Judith! I see they set you free!"
"Not exactly…" Alyx commented, moving to a control panel.
Mossman moved over to him, hands clasped together nervously. "Eli! I was so worried about you-"
"The coordinates, Doctor Mossman," Alyx cut in, eyes on the controls.
The metal sheet that Eli was strapped to separated from the pod, and he started moving across a separate rail to the teleport pad as he spoke. "So, this is the Combine portal. It's smaller than I imagined."
He was slowly turned around as he slid over until eventually he was facing outwards, watching everything with a clueless scientific curiosity. Gordon walked over to Eli, glancing at Mossman as she worked on a different terminal.
"How are you doing?"
Eli gave him his full attention and smiled. "Fine, fine." His eyes moved to Alyx. "You kept her safe."
"Well, she did most of that."
"I don't doubt it," he laughed, though it didn't last long. "But thank you, Gordon."
Alyx's sharp tones interrupted. "Hurry up, Mossman. Dr Kleiner!"
"Yes, Alyx," Kleiner said, tinny voice ringing out from a speaker on the panel Alyx was working on. Gordon had never been happier to hear that man's voice. "Where are you?"
"We're in Nova Prospekt, and we're running the Xen emulation for the first time. Are you ready for us?"
"Ready, willing, and fully enabled!"
"Good," Alyx said, nodding and looking like she was working on three things at once. All business. "We'll send my Dad through first. He's in position for-"
Sudden alarms and the flash of red lights made everyone freeze for a moment.
After one last glance at Eli, Gordon ran over to stand beside Alyx, who was urgently looking over the controls. "What's that?"
"What's-" he stopped when he noticed Mossman making a move for the teleport pad. Gordon started after her.
"Security protocol," an oblivious Alyx murmured, though more to herself. "Hold on, gotta bring this back down."
Mossman reached the pad before Gordon, and he instinctually brought his pulse rifle up to bear. A force field buzzed into existence between them, catching the muzzle of the gun. Eli just watched on in horror. Gordon still held the gun steady.
Alyx caught on and raced over. "No, stop! What are you doing?"
With a sadness in her eyes that made Gordon falter for a moment, Mossman looked to Alyx. "I'm sorry, Alyx. It's the only way."
"No…" Alyx had a desperation in her voice he had never heard before as she slammed a fist against the force field. "Dad!"
"What's going on, Alyx?" Eli looked to Mossman. "Judith! What's happening?"
As Alyx raced back to the terminal, Gordon still held the rifle, force-field making it quiver slightly.
"All right, let me think. Think, Alyx, think!"
Gordon looked Mossman in the eyes. That sadness was still there, something that was almost begging him to pull the trigger. Something that also said she felt remorse for what she was doing. That she was human.
And humans make mistakes.
Gordon had killed a lot of people over the past few days, and only one of those had been premeditated. And that one had concerned the survival of the human race.
Mossman had betrayed them, was taking Eli away again. But killing her wouldn't help. And Eli didn't need to see one of the few people he cared about murdering another in front of him. Gordon wouldn't… couldn't do that to him.
He brought the rifle back, and let it drop to his side.
The look in Mossman's eyes wasn't quite relief. It was almost disappointment. The platform rose up, Eli looking desperately to Alyx as she worked at the console with terrible urgency.
But then there was a flash, and they were gone. Alyx looked up to where the now empty teleport pad stood, and exchanged a wild glance with Gordon before returning to the terminal.
"Dr Kleiner, you have to stop them!"
"Stop who, my dear?"
"Oh my God. What coordinates are these?" She slammed her fists onto the controls. "Where the hell did she take him?!"
One of the locked doors clanged loudly. Then another.
Alyx's head whipped up. "No…"
The final door clanged, and seemed to knock the young Vance out of her funk.
"Cover me Gordon, I've gotta reset the portal."
She tapped diligently at the controls.
"Gordon, use the turrets."
He did as he was told, racing over and setting them up at the respective three entrances.
As he went, he noticed Alyx peering over at the apparatus underneath the glass beneath his feet. "Okay, it's resetting."
He walked over and looked down after setting up the last turret. There were four groups of five lenses, each of those rotating in an attempt to reach the correct calibration. Blue-green energy flickered at the far end of the equipment, practically bursting to get through. Only once the energy was transferred through all the different lenses would it be ready to power the teleporter.
And it was going slowly.
Another clang, and Alyx had her gun out and at the ready. Gordon positioned himself so he could reach any one of the turrets quickly if he needed to.
"They're coming, Gordon."
There were three more thunderous bangs before the doors came crashing down off their hinges. The turrets squealed and opened fire. Gordon glanced over his shoulder at Alyx, who was looking at something on the control panel.
He hoped she at least got out of here. He hated the idea of her dying in this place.
Or dying, period.
The turrets were doing their jobs for the moment; the Combine couldn't get far enough forward to take a shot at either of them. That didn't stop Gordon's heart from pounding in his ears.
He looked down through the blue glass. The first set of four lenses was aligned. He could see the energy pulsing through it far more cleanly now.
A grenade rolled to a stop beside the turret closest to Gordon. By the time he had reached the for the Gravity Gun and realised he was too far away to reach it, the grenade exploded, sending the turret hurtling through the air, frantic bullets firing off in every direction.
He rushed to the window at the corner of the corridor's entrance, and whirled around, taking the three soldiers coming up by surprise. Two were taken down in the initial spray, while the third managed to scramble his way back down to the other end of the corridor, taking cover behind the wall.
"Looks like it's about halfway!" Alyx announced, suddenly right behind him. Gordon didn't take the risk of checking.
Eyes on the corridor entrance, he shouted over his shoulder. "Cover me while I go for the turret."
She may have nodded, Gordon didn't know. He just launched himself across the corridor. The comforting sound of Alyx's pistol sparked behind him as he skid to a halt beside the turret, bringing it back upright.
A green light flashed positively, and the turret started up again. Gordon ran back to the control platform with Alyx. They stood side by side, wary eyes flitting to every entrance as the turrets did their work. The teleporter hummed louder beneath them.
"Is this what it was like?" Alyx asked, pulling out the clip on her handgun and checking it over.
Not knowing what he was doing, Gordon didn't bother to check his rifle. "What do you mean?"
"Black Mesa. Was it like this?"
Another grenade rolled in from the same entrance. This time, however, it didn't get far enough for the explosion to make much of a difference. The turret just wobbled a little.
He shook his head. "No."
"No?"
"No."
"How is it different?"
Another grenade rolled to a stop right beneath the turret.
"In Black Mesa, it was just me."
The grenade exploded, tossing the turret right at them. They dove for the ground, Gordon putting an unintentional hand on Alyx's shoulder. Both of them close to the ground, their faces inches apart, they froze for just a moment before launching themselves back to their feet and taking cover behind the control panels.
"Almost there…"
Gordon glanced down. Three of the sets were done, and the first lens of the fourth was locked.
The soldiers poured in, and they opened fire. Two of them managed to reach the small security section where the turrets had been housed. Gordon concentrated on them while Alyx took the corridor entrance. After the second volley of fire, his pulse rifle ran on empty, and he tossed it away angrily.
Alyx reloaded another clip. "God, this is taking forever!"
Jaw set, Gordon pulled out the crowbar and vaulted over the guardrail that ran around the platform, heading for the security station. The soldiers, concentrating on the other entrance, were rather surprised to see Gordon Freeman flailing a crowbar around wildly. Both were down in seconds, and Gordon snatched up a pulse rifle.
Taking up a position in the security station, he waved the crowbar around to show Alyx he was okay before opening fire on the soldiers coming down the corridor.
"Just a couple more seconds…"
Gordon ducked back and looked through the other entrance of the security station. Alyx slammed in another clip, the look on her face indicating that maybe it was her last.
When he returned to the other entrance, he spotted someone coming down the corridor. It was Victor, walking like a businessman in a hurry. He grabbed soldiers in his path, tossing them over his shoulder and crushing them into the walls as he went.
"It's done, thank God!" Alyx announced. "Let's get the hell out of here!"
The other soldiers had cleared out to make way for their secret weapon. Gordon picked up the other pulse rifle and stepped out into the open, wanting Victor distracted from Alyx. She was oblivious, working at the control panel again.
"These readings are scaring me!"
Gordon opened fire with both rifles as Victor leapt the rest of the distance. He ducked as the soldier rocketed over him, rolling on the floor and getting to his feet again as though nothing had happened.
He heard Alyx talking as he backed up from the oncoming Victor. "Okay, doc, we're locked on."
Kleiner's pleased voice echoed over from the intercom. "I await your arrival with great anticipation."
Rifles pointed at Victor's chest, he opened fire. Victor didn't even bother to move; he just kept walking as the bullets tore into his already tattered body armour. When he reached Gordon, he grabbed both rifles and slammed a boot into the scientist's chest, sending him hurtling back and into the corner of the corridor's entrance.
"Come on, Gordon! Get in!"
Alyx was stood on the pad. Only then did she notice what was going on.
"Gordon!"
Eyes on Victor, Gordon heaved himself to his feet and pulled out the crowbar. His HEV suit was beeping at him; the numbers were flickering in front of his eyes, like static. Running out of power.
So now he was just a normal scientist taking on whatever the hell Victor was. He ducked a high powered fist that sent chunks of cement flying. He couldn't avoid the second fist, this one hitting him in the belly. Victor grabbed him by the collar of the HEV suit and tossed him across the room and into the wall opposite. The impact created a miniature crater in the wall, bits of dust and cement raining down on him.
He struggled to his feet, and Victor snatched him by the neck. Gordon held the crowbar tight, ready to stab it through Victor's neck.
And then Alyx was on Victor's back, stuffing something into the chest of his body armour before leaping off again, shooting a few holes in his head with her handgun. Though Gordon wasn't sure they hurt him, they were enough to distract Victor so that his grip loosened.
Gordon slipped away, and Alyx rushed him over to the teleport pad. Looking over his shoulder, Gordon saw Victor explode. He smiled.
"Grenade?" he said, surprised at how hoarse his voice was.
She just smiled and bundled him onto the teleport pad. Alyx ran back to the control panel and hit one final control before rushing onto the pad with him. Gordon was finding it difficult to stand, and found himself forced to put a hand on Alyx's shoulder for support. He still had the strength to slip the crowbar away, though. Priorities.
"Hold on!"
The pad started to rise. Gordon couldn't make out what had happened to Victor; between the cloud of smoke around him and the flashing blue coming from the teleport energy around him, it was inscrutable.
What he could see were more soldier pouring out of the corridor, including some in uniforms he had never seen before. In the same basic style as Victor but all white and with a single red eye. Hefting up pulse rifles, they fired off the same orb of energy Victor had shot at him at St Olga's, heading straight for them.
He heard Alyx say 'oh shit' before light flashed around them, blinding him.
The last time he had teleported, he had seen so many different places. A beach, a monster under the water, Dr Breen…
This time, there was nothing. Just a flash, and then he was suddenly somewhere else. Somewhere darker. He had to blink to clear his vision. Judging from the sound of equipment powering down, though, he guessed they were back… well, he supposed 'home' was the closest description.
Alyx, a little breathless, spoke first. "My God… we made it."
She stepped off, and Gordon stumbled out after her, not feeling much better. He rested back against the frame of the teleporter, closing his eyes and just concentrating on his breathing.
"You okay?"
Gordon nodded and waved her off.
Her lips a thin line, Alyx nodded anyway and walked to the wall.
"But where's Dr Kleiner?" she murmured, moving to the right hand side of the wall that usually would slide aside. Alyx slammed an unsubtle fist against it. "Dr Kleiner, let us out!"
Nothing. Hands resting on his knees now, Gordon looked up with a worried frown, matching the look Alyx was giving him.
"Where-"
The wall slowly slid open, and the muzzle of a shotgun poked through. Alyx backed up a little, and Gordon's hand went to his crowbar.
Kleiner's quivering voice came from the other side of the wall, and Gordon relaxed. "Alyx?"
His head poked into the room, along with the pet headcrab at his feet. "Gordon? My God, how did you get here? And when?"
Gordon exchanged yet another frown with Alyx. He pushed himself away from the teleporter, feeling a little better. Even with next to no power, the HEV suit was still managing to send enough stimulants and painkillers around his body to keep him going.
Alyx, meanwhile, was following Kleiner into the lab, concerned. "What's wrong?"
"My dear, I…" Kleiner's voice cracked as Gordon moved around the corner, and he saw the older scientist adjusting his glasses nervously. "…I had given up hope of ever seeing you again."
"I was afraid we might not make it either," Alyx agreed. "I think the teleport blew just as we were 'porting out."
An emphatic nod was the reply. "Indeed it did," Kleiner announced, "and the repercussions were felt far and wide, but… that was over a week ago."
Gordon tilted his head, feeling like he hadn't heard properly. "Sorry, what?"
Alyx spoke at the same time. "What do you mean? Gordon and I were just there a minute ago."
Everyone was silent as the implications of what was being said were taken in. Alyx looked frightened. Kleiner looked, well…
"Fascinating… we seem to have developed a very slow teleport." He moved off to his desk, head full of equations and energy differentials. "This suggests an entirely new line of investigation."
Looking at Gordon, Alyx's voice was barely a whisper. "A week…"
She looked like she was having a difficult time comprehending it. Gordon, however, wasn't. Because he had been through something similar, just on a far grander scale. A week in just a second… was it really that more difficult to adjust the process so that it lasted for two decades instead? Did this mean that He had access to teleport technology? From where?
Alyx, meanwhile, was beside Dr Kleiner. "…then what did we miss?"
"A great deal, my dear," he said, sounding inspired. "The blow you struck at Nova Prospekt was taken as a signal to begin the uprising." He threw an enthusiastic finger into the air to emphasise the point.
She waved her hand around, rushed. "But what about my father?"
The finger dropped, and Dr Kleiner sighed. "Well… that is the most troubling. According to the Vortigaunts, he is a prisoner in the Citadel."
A moment of despair was all that appeared before Alyx was back to business. "We've got to get my father out."
"Barney has been leading a push with that very aim in mind," Kleiner explained, moving over to the door that had once held Gordon's HEV suit. He tapped away on the keypad beside it, smiling. "And another of your friends arrived several days ago."
The metal door rolled up into the ceiling, revealing a small red eye that Gordon hadn't seen for some time.
Alyx grinned joyfully. "Dog, you made it! Good boy!"
As soon as he saw Alyx, Dog launched out of the storage room, enveloping Alyx in a monstrous hug that made her laugh in a way that Gordon couldn't help but smile at.
"So there, you see?" Kleiner soothed, adjusting his glasses again. "It's not all hopeless."
Released from Dog's hug, Alyx sidled underneath his arm, her previous joviality tempered a little. "I wish I shared your optimism, doctor."
The television screen beside Dr Kleiner burst to life, the only one of the selection that seemed to be working. Barney's scruffy visage filtered in and out of the static. Behind him, Gordon could see the Citadel towering in the distance, along with some flames that looked disturbingly close.
"Doc, come in, are you there? Hey, doc, are you there?"
Muscles stiff, Gordon limped over, and Dog once again made him smile by offering him a big hand for support. He smiled and patted the robot's head.
"Good to see you," he said quietly, and Dog made a grunting noise he assumed was reciprocal.
Kleiner had moved to the screen with Alyx. "Yes, Barney, and I'm no longer alone. Alyx and Gordon have just arrived."
The ex-security guard grinned, and for a moment, all was right with the world. "Well man, that's good news. I'd almost given you guys up for lost." He paused to glance at something off-screen. "We're planning to set up a staging area for attacking the Citadel."
Alyx nodded and moved forward, resting on the table. "Gordon and Dog can head your way. I want to get Dr Kleiner somewhere safer, than I'll meet up with you."
Barney shrugged. "I'll take all the help I can get."
Something up above grabbed his attention, and he scowled. "Aw, crap, INCOMING!"
He ducked, and the entire screen shook. Gordon could feel Alyx glancing at him, but he was just concentrating on the screen. He really didn't want that to be the last time he saw Barney.
As though answering his thoughts, Barney popped back up, clapped some dust out of his hair and shook his head. He waved an impatient hand at them. "Go on, get going!"
Then he dove off-screen, and the signal cut out.
Everyone was silent for a moment. Alyx broke it when she turned to him, taking a big breath before she spoke.
"Okay, Gordon, you heard him-"
Gordon put up a hand, and Alyx stopped.
"Sorry, first. Dr Kleiner?"
"Hm? Yes?"
"Do have somewhere I can recharge?"
"Certainly, just use the-"
He brought up the elbow that had been used for charging days ago.
Kleiner stared at it for a moment. "Ah." He shook it off, however, and moved to the tank of orange… stuff, talking as he went and Gordon hobbling after him. "No matter, I can charge you direct."
He rummaged around beside the tank before coming up with another thick power cable like the one Eli has used at Black Mesa East. Kleiner struggled to lift it, and Dog helped him place it on the Lambda symbol on Gordon's chest. The HEV suit beeped and groaned customarily, and Gordon blew out a grateful breath.
"There's not much in this lab anymore," Kleiner said, sadly looking around, "but it should get you to half-power, I should think."
Gordon shrugged. "I'm sure I'll make do."
He looked over at Alyx, who was smiling.
"What?"
She shook her head. "Nothing."
The charging finished, and he looked at his stats. Kleiner watched him hopefully, and Gordon smiled.
"Perfect." Gordon removed the cable and handed it back to Kleiner, then putting a hand on his arm. "See you soon."
Kleiner adjusted his glasses and smiled. "Where you are concerned, Gordon, perhaps a little late, hm? But I'm sure I will see you."
They laughed a little, and Alyx cleared her throat.
Gordon looked to her, nodding goodbye to Kleiner.
"You'd better get going. I'll catch up with you as soon as I get Dr Kleiner settled."
"Just a minute," the scientist announced quickly. "I can't leave without Lamarr."
Alyx seemed to visibly deflate, eyes rolling into her head. "Oh, no…"
"Now where did she get to?" And with that, he was off, stalking into the mess of crates shoved into the corners of the lab.
Shaking her head but still smiling, Alyx nodded to the metal door at the far end of the room. "Go on, Gordon, I'll take care of this."
They walked together to the door, and Alyx leaned closer and spoke quietly so as not to let Dr Kleiner overhear.
"Your suit isn't even at half power, is it?"
"Not even close," he sighed.
Alyx burst out laughing, but managed to cover it as a cough as they approached the door. She punched a code into the keypad beside the metal door, and it opened with a loud creak.
"You need my gun?"
He shook his head gently. "I'll find one."
She smiled and nodded. "Right." Trying to avoid looking at him for some reason, Alyx looked into the corridor through the doorway and down to the floor again, tucking some hair behind her ear absent-mindedly.
Her eyes gradually travelled back up to his. "Gordon… take care of yourself out there."
Gordon just nodded, reluctant to leave. "You too."
There was silence between them.
"Oh, dear." A crate came crashing to the ground near Dr Kleiner, and Alyx rolled her eyes.
"Dr Kleiner, there's really no time," she urged, giving one last smile to Gordon before heading off after the scientist.
Gordon watched her go, and noticed that Dog was watching him. For a robot with the mind of an attack dog, he could pull off a 'nudge, nudge, wink, wink,' look rather well.
"Don't know what you're talking about," he muttered, heading out into the corridor.
It was strange being here after so many days, this time heading in the other direction. He couldn't even remember which direction he was supposed to be going. Kleiner and Alyx argued in the lab as he searched for a doorway or something that would serve as a reminder.
"Now, now, she's around here someplace."
"We'll find you another pet headcrab, there are plenty to go around!"
"There's only one Heddy!"
Finally, Dog let out a quiet 'woof' noise and nodded to an open gate leading into an elevator shaft. Peering down, Gordon saw that it was just a few feet down to ground floor. He shrugged and leapt down, kicking up a little dust from the collection of rocks that had collected down there.
He stepped out into the remains of a large underground car park. At least, it would have been underground if an epic hole wasn't blasted in the top right corner, just above the ramp leading out into the city.
Overturned, skeletal cars littered the place, collapsed ceilings and fires prompting Gordon into leaving sharp-ish. Once he had moved a few steps into the area, Dog landed with a thunderous crash in the elevator shaft behind him, sending a massive cloud of dust billowing out as he rolled forward and onto his feet.
Dog looked to him faithfully, gorilla hands planted on the ground. Gordon looked out to the changed City 17.
Time to join the revolution.
(A/N: Well, this certainly took it's time, didn't it? Apologies, everyone. Just be assured that I am still working on this story - this close to the end, it would be a real waste to give up on it now, wouldn't it? I'd also like to give the heads-up that due to work issues (I'm travelling a lot at the moment) updates will be a bit more scarce until summer. Although I'm hoping to have 'Anti-Citizen One' up before then.
Anyway, your thoughts? Criticisms? Review!
Next Chapter: Anti-Citizen One)
