Peaces Like Us: Fiction.

Years ago, after writing the walk-through for Koumei Satou's Half-Life mod' Peaces Like Us, I wrote the fictionalized version.

You can still download the game, but you need to have Half-Life 1 installed before you can play it.
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Peaces Like Us: The Story.
4:30 Am. Gordon Freeman is woken by the sound of his alarm clock, he sits up in bed for a moment before climbing down the ladder and going to work. Time has very little meaning to Gordon, since choosing to work with the Xen science team. A sun may rise and a sun may set, but it isn't the same sun that shines on Earth.

4:30 Am is not so bad here, time has simplified itself into number.

Freeman opens the door to the HEV suit locker. The 'Mark 4' hazardous environment suit fits him like a glove, he takes a deep breath as slender, micro-filaments pierce his skin and then relaxes as the suit automatically adjusts his pain threshold, injecting minuscule quantities of powerful drugs to improve his mood and to soothe stress. Once the suit is well and truly on, Freeman continues through the corridors towards the teleportation development lab. Freeman loved the idea of teleportation all his life. Perhaps it was from years of watching Star Trek? What ever, there was nothing that Freeman wanted to study more than teleportation. When scientists made contact with Xen and the theoretical possibility of instant time-space travel became real, Freeman chose to go to Xen.

Communication with the aliens wasn't easy, yet there seemed to be enough friendship and mutual respect for the work to make good progress.

As Freeman waited for the security guard to open the final doors to the teleport labs a familiar sound that seemed so odd drew Freeman to look through the window. A helicopter was circling, dropping what looked like soldiers, onto the surface of Xen. There were explosions and gun shots but it all looked so unreal...........Suddenly Freeman realised that everything and everyone was now a target for these intruders, that this could not be a peaceful mission, not some sort of training exercise. For some reason someone wanted to take control of all the information he and all his colleagues had worked so hard for, and that they were willing to kill. The only thing that Freeman could think of to do was to get the teleportation unit working, so that as many members of the Xen science team could get away before the soldiers got to them.

He was the one in the suit, it was time to go!

Freeman ran down the dark corridor to get to the generator room, he heard gun shots and began to sweat with fear, once more the suit pumped a cocktail of soothing drugs into his blood-stream and Freeman, taking a deep breath, ran into the control room. Lying on the floor was a crowbar, he picked it up and then turned to see a soldier. Freeman ran at the soldier and beat him mercilessly with the crowbar only stopping when the man looked dead. Freeman felt sick. Bits of brain and fragments of bone clung to the crowbar, but he had heard shots, "Surely the soldier would have killed me first"? Yet Freeman wasn't sure, he cursed the suit as he bent down to pick up the soldiers machine gun. He took the lift to the next level where the teleportation unit could be activated. The room in front of him was dark, the light switch didn't work and so Freeman crept carefully towards the back wall where the switches were. Suddenly Freeman tripped, something soft was in his way as he felt around he realised with horror that he was in the room with a corpse. The scientist had been shot, a gaping black wound in his chest. Freeman felt an almost overwhelming surge of pity and anger followed by elation for hadn't he just killed the man responsible? There was nothing more that he could do other than to help those left alive and so Freeman turned and headed over to where the switch was. Another corpse was now blocking his way, this not not human, an alien 'slave' Freeman looked at it's poor body and felt ashamed, ashamed for being a member of the human race and involving the beings of Xen in this stupid war. Freeman flicked the switch and nothing happened.

The generator hadn't been switched on as Freeman had hoped, or else someone had switched it off. The generator needed to be working before the teleporter could be used, so Freeman headed over to the generator room. Pausing outside the door to listen, he examined the machine gun, he had only seen these things on TV or in the movies. Freeman tried not to remember or to think too hard, he put his hands in what felt like the right place and kicked the door open. Soldiers shot at him and soldiers tried to kick, Freeman fired the gun in a frenzy of rage only stopping when he knew that everyone else was dead. He too had been hurt, but the suit can take an awful lot of damage and he was still standing. Once the generator was working Freeman switched on the teleport system and entered the room to activate the final switch way up over head, on a cat-walk. The Xen teleporter was vast and not unlike a Christmas tree, holographic representations of other worlds circled around the top which was open to the sky and long streamers of energy played around the room. There were some boxes in this room and Freeman hoped that they would contain power for his suit and perhaps a health kit, one battery was on the floor and Freeman grabbed it to restore the suits energy, just as he started to smash the boxes more soldiers started firing. Shocked, Freeman looked up to see soldiers sliding down ropes into the room, Freeman ran for the door and out of the room. One more soldier was standing in the corridor, Freeman shot him and then waited for the other soldiers to open the door. It wasn't easy, because the grunts were used to combat, but Freeman had all the advantages...eventually the soldiers were dead. Freeman returned to the room and then climbed the long ladder up to the cat-walk, just as he turned on the final switch more soldiers started firing, Freeman turned and seeing a grate on the wall, smashed it and jumped in to an air-vent. It was dark inside the vent and large enough for a man to crawl through easily enough, Freeman had no idea where it would take him. As he crawled around he saw a side vent leading to another room, quietly Freeman crawled up to the vent to see more clearly what was happening below. A man in a dark suit was talking to a scientist, to Peters, soldiers were standing around Peters, who seemed to be arguing with the man in the suit. At last Freeman heard the dark suited man say "Well, I guess that we wont be working together" as he left the room the soldiers simply shot Peters. Again Freeman felt sick and shaken, the sight of people killing his friends and the way that they did it without any emotion revolted Freeman. Freeman had killed out of anger, fear, and rage and because he had to save innocent others, he wondered how these men could justify their action, how they could sleep at night. Cautiously, Freeman crawled back along the vent and then continued to follow it until it came to a dead end. Below him there was another vent and a drop into a deep pool of water. At the bottom of the pool a fan was turning, it looked very sharp and fast. Freeman belly-flopped into the water and then got to the surface as quickly as he could to avoid the fan, he hated water and his heart sank as he saw that the only way out would be through a vent just below the water's surface. It would be impossible to know if the vent would narrow or for how long he would have to hold his breath once his air ran out. It was dark and he didn't want to do this. Taking a deep breath of air, Freeman sank under the water and entered the pipe.

The pipe wasn't too bad, Freeman made the short distance easily, he climbed a ladder out of the water and carried on into an old and rusty looking corridor, he could hear more soldiers so he checked his weapons, re-loaded and ran into the next room.

Freeman picked up the weapons and ammunition. he tried not to look at the faces of the men scattered around because he could see how young some of them were, he thought about their mothers, their girl-friends and it all seemed so stupid and unbelievable.......but he knew for sure that this was the only way to go, there was no point in talking. Freeman cautiously opened another door, inside there was a vautigaunt weeping and throwing itself down on the ground over and over again. Its grief was awful to see. Lying on the floor was the body of a security guard, again Freeman felt relieved that he had killed the killers. Freeman was getting the hang of being practical, he searched the room methodically and found health kits and lots of ammunition. There was nothing that he could think of to do for the vautigaunt............so he patted it on the back and whispered "sorry"

The lift doors were sparking, damaged by explosions and would not open and so Freeman looked at the canal. He pressed a button at the side of the canal, a recording of Dr Siegler saying "Hup" came from a loud speaker, to his amazement a pair of massive ichthyosaurs jumped up like dolphins. Freeman felt uneasy about ichthyosaurs, but there was no other way to go so Freeman jumped into the canal and swam. The canal led to a massive machine, two great wheels turned and Freeman could see that if he could just make it to the top of the wheels, then he could get across to a balcony and continue. Luckily there were slots in the wheels and so he swam forwards and let himself be carried upwards. Eventually he made it across the wheels and stood on the balcony, he looked back at the massive machine and wondered whose technology it was? It reminded him of an old mill he had once visited in England many years ago........Freeman's memories were cut short as the sound of soldiers shocked him back to the here and now. Once more, Freeman went through what was becoming a ritual, he checked his weapons and re-loaded. This time he fought the soldiers one by one, running into a room full of soldiers is a bad strategy. Freeman fought them from the safety of the corridor until all of them were dead. The room was full of strange pillars, it was green and dark and very warm, it contained health and HEV chargers. Freeman could hear the sound of a gargantua near by, carefully he pushed the next door open. As Freeman entered, Dr Bennett ran towards him only to be shot down by a hail of bullets. Freeman ran across the room to where some sound-dogs were cowering in a corner. Freeman noticed a button on the wall and remembering the sound of the gargantua, he prayed that button would let it out. Freeman dived across the room and hit the button. A large door slowly opened and the gargantua came forwards, stamping its foot. A blast of heat surged across the floor completely destroying the row of automatic guns. Freeman ran forwards and shot any soldiers left alive. As Freeman tried to work out where to go next the gargantua made its way over to the boxes. Bending down, it used its strength to push the boxes. Now Freeman could see that it would be possible to use them to jump up onto the next balcony.

Scientists thought of ways to use the new things that they found on Xen. The push-pod is a sort of transport system that uses bounce pads to provide the energy for movement. As Gordon Freeman climbs over the balcony towards the push-pod, a man in a suit stops to adjust his tie......Gordon pushed at the door, he could see the man and he wanted to grab him, drag him kicking and screaming to the gargantua. While Freeman kicked at the door, the man turned and walked away. Freeman ran to the next door, it flew open. Inside, the old scientist inside told Freeman about the push-pod and showed him how to use it, shaking his head sadly he told Freeman that the soldiers were killing scientists. The situation was grim, both men knew that.

Freeman climbed in to the push-pod train, he knew that the suit man had used the train before him and he wanted to get to that man quickly. If he could get past the soldiers, get to him and put a bullet through his brain then this would all stop. The creatures of Xen weren't defenceless, they would be able to take care of the remaining soldiers. The thought of being killed was no longer enough to cool the anger and fear was gone, perhaps the suit had some sort of over ride or had run out of tranquillisers because Freeman knew that he wasn't being rational, yet killing the suit man was the only thing that made sense.

The train ride was over in a second, Freeman dodged the automatic guns and just avoided the laser trip-mines just before running blindly into them. Someone with a cruel sense of humour had put trip mines along the passageway and trapped a vautigaunt. Freeman could not explode the mines from a safe distance and so he would have to jump the first and then crawl under the next two. Freeman wished that he could talk to the vautiagaunt which was stood at the far end of the passageway, he knew that it understood exactly how dangerous the trip mines were. Perhaps not saying anything, actions 'speaking louder than words' was true.........Freeman jumped, ducked and crawled safely under the laser beams. There was a door, but it was blocked and would not open, but a vent at floor level was big enough for Freeman to crawl through. It led to a lift shaft. A long ladder was fixed to the wall and a pipe hissed super-heated steam across the ladder. Freeman climbed fast. The heat from the steam seemed to cut through his suit and he could feel his skin burning. From the top of the ladder he could see a second passageway on his right over the sickening gap. The shaft was dark and it was hard to see exactly how to make it across. Freeman jumped, and missed the ledge, he fell through the dark and landed heavily. There was a sickening crack sound and a searing pain shot from the base of his spine right through the top of his skull. The suit reported "Major fracture detected, morphine administered" as morphine flooded his pain-receptors, Freeman pulled himself back up the ladder. This time as Freeman jumped, he pulled his legs up and ducked down in time to make it into the slot like gap, he sat in the gloom almost weeping because for the first time since this day began Freeman could see that he could fail. The narrow passageway was dark, and some sections of it carried high voltage, Freeman noticed just in time and got up onto a pipe that ran along the wall. Freeman smashed the grille on the floor and lowered himself gently down to some large boxes stacked in a corridor below. His leg was worrying him, he wasn't sure where the fracture was but he knew that if it his femur was broken then he would have to be extremely careful. If the bone should snap it would shears through the femoral artery, and death would certainly follow.

Freeman was now on the other side of the door to the vautigaunt, a wooden crate blocked the door and Freeman started to smash the box. The familiar whine of an automatic gun made Freeman smash the box with more ferocity. He got to the gun and destroyed it but the gun had done it's work.Everything seemed to be getting very bright and very far away. Freeman started to weep, it would be impossible for him to prevent the massacre of Xen, he knew that it would all be over for him very soon and that he had failed. He was dying.............it was hard for him to give in, hard to let go, knowing that he could have done more, should have done better..........anger washed over him again and he wiped the tears away, if his last act was to release the vautigaunt, so be it.

The vautigaunt ran through the door and quickly set about opening a second door. When the door was open it did not go through, it just looked at Freeman. Freeman felt that he was loosing consciousness yet he stumbled through the door and saw on his left something like a blue shower, he threw himself into it and marvelled as all his strength and health slowly returned

When health had been restored, Freeman returned to the room. Around the corner was a spill of extremely toxic 'bio-hazard' there was a trip mine and a laser..........the trip mine was easy to get rid of, one shot from a safe distance solved that problem but the bio-hazard would need some careful work. Freeman pushed a small trolley from the side of the room out into the middle of the spill. as some of the toxic waste touched his suit he felt it start to sting and an 'ill' sensation washed over him. He returned to the health shower before running and jumping across the green poison. To his left was a corridor with automatic guns and steps leading up, Freeman threw grenades and heard the guns 'die' before running up the steps into the gman's trap.

The man in the suit was watching Freeman. There was a window, high up and Freeman could see the gman and a soldier looking down. Freeman ran around the room, trying the doors with increasing desperation. Explosive barrels were placed in each corner of the room and as Freeman pulled at a door, the barrels exploded. Freeman fell as the floor caved in, below him was Xen sky, a beautiful and lethal abyss. Freeman fell with the floor but landed on a splinter of Xen rock, it was just possible to make it to the inner edge of the rock and to walk around with some hope of getting back to the labs. Once Freeman reached the ledge around the gapping hole, he ran. Suddenly he stopped, he could hear the sound of a helicopter and suddenly the scream of a Xen master. Freeman waited until he heard the helicopter turn and fly in the opposite direction and then he ran after it, quickly ducking into a crack in the rock. The helicopter turned slowly, it's nose pointing at Freeman, bullets hit the ground at Freeman's feet but the Apache kept turning, he hadn't been seen. As it flew away he turned and ran, leaping the abyss and landing by a light plant, the Apache turned at the same time and Freeman tried to take cover behind a rock, mercifully many of the bullets missed . Again Freeman had to look carefully and take time in planing the jump.....some boxes had trip mines attached, but the Apache wouldn't give him time, Freeman had to jump before he was ready or sure. Grunts were also 'dropping in'. Freeman had run out of time. He jumped and jumped again, the reduced gravity of Xen meant that he could go further than he thought but each jump was terrifying. One jump took him to some boxes, a dead grunt lay by a health kit and a rocket propelled grenade launcher. Freeman picked up the RPG and aimed at the Apache. The Apache was close when the rocket hit, Freeman could almost see the pilot, yet it felt curiously satisfying to see the Apache fall through the opal sky of Xen. No remorse.

Freeman walked through the dark tunnel, once again he heard the whine of an automatic gun. It was hard to spot, it was too dark, but blasting in broadly the right direction with the double barrelled shot gun solved that problem. This part of the island was similar to the first, there was a ledge of rock to walk on around a gap. Every so often he would have to jump across the gap to continue, but at least there was now time to think. Strange blue bat-birds hovered in the air around here and an immense red, machine that had two big fans filled the upper part of the island.

Freeman climbed a long ladder that led up to the fan-machine, he was hoping that there would be a way inside the machine that would lead back to the labs. A metal pipe ran between the two massive blocks, when he saw a vent, Freeman smashed through it and crawled inside only to find that the vent stopped abruptly. Freeman walked further along the pipe. The fans were on either side of him now, suddenly he saw a ladder, he jumped on to it and climbed high enough to get onto one of the bars that ran in front of the fan. then very carefully Freeman slipped through the bars to get to a floor-space behind the fan and from there he could see a door. The fan was very, very, close, just one tiny mistake or a slip would mean a horrible death. Freeman opened the door, there was a Marine inside standing over the body of a scientist, Freeman simply aimed and shot the marine. The man fell to the floor, but was still alive Freeman would have left it at that, but the man shot back. Freeman shot him again and again until he was sure that the man was dead and then looked over at the scientist. The scientist was badly hurt, the marine had been 'interrogating him and now he lay crumpled on the floor......Freeman knelt down and asked the man gently if there was a way back to the labs from this room. The scientist shook his head and explained that when he had locked himself in to this room for safety and that he had thrown the key to the door out into the void to stop the soldier getting back into the main building. The scientist told Freeman how to shut down the fan and once the fan stopped spinning Freeman climbed back out and made his way around the machine. It started to look impossible to find a way out, Freeman could not see a way to go, he had to examine every side of the machines before he found a vent that led to a ladder.

This next area was a mixture of human and Xen, a concrete floor complete with a bounce pad and a sort of mountain of Xen rock. Above Freeman there were three Xen rock floaters spinning through the air and a man-made cat-walk. The only way to the cat-walk would be to climb the rock and jump across the floaters. Freeman ran at the jump pad and was thrown violently up into the air, he had enough time to turn and ready himself before landing on a wide ledge. There was a small house on this ledge, someone had built a kennel! Freeman laughed for the first time today, the kennel had a snoozing occupant and a bowl of fresh water had been left for the bullsquid. The scientists were quite sentimental, many of them had taken Xen creatures as pets, especially hound-eyes. Freeman briefly remembered a dog he had when he was a boy and then ran onto the next bounce pad.

At the top of the rock Freeman could see a cave, he walked in past a Xen master and made his way onto a curious lift. The lift descended rapidly taking Freeman down into beautiful cave, there was a pool of healing water inside and small stripy leech like creatures swam around. Freeman lay for a while in the water. The sensation of being healed was almost impossible to describe, like flying, like drinking ice-cold beer on a red-hot day, like falling in love, like food when you are starving. It was like all of those things but more so! Freeman climbed out of the water, he could make out the shape of a spiral structure and he could hear another helicopter near by. Cautiously Freeman edged forwards and saw a soldier. The HEV suit stood out bright orange against the blues and greens of the Xen world and the soldier ran towards Freeman. Freeman dodged and ran up the spiral. More soldiers were there, Freeman shot wildly until he got to the top, killing anyone who stood in his way. The soldiers had been loading hound-eyes into cages, a vautigaunt was standing by the cages and Freeman watched in disbelief as he heard the creature start to charge up. Freeman thought that the vautigaunt must have seen a soldier, and then the lightning bolts hit him! Freeman thought that the creature must be confused, yet again it started to re-charge, there were no soldiers left alive and so Freeman shot it quickly before the second discharge.Freeman was upset, taking out his crow bar, he smashed the cages letting the hound-eyes go free, but he couldn't understand why the vortigaunt had attacked him.

Freeman returned to the edge of the rock and watched the circling floaters as they wound around and around each other. He didn't like heights, but at least he knew where to find a health pool should he misjudge the jumps. Each floater rotated as it circled around and so Freeman jumped before he became too dizzy.

Freeman ran across the cat walk and opened the door, the body of an alien grunt lay in the corridor in front of him and he could hear the unmistakable sound of more soldiers. It isn't easy to kill alien grunts, cautiously he edged forwards. The body lay in a cross-road, Freeman ran across the junction just missing the rocket. The soldiers were around the next corner and he almost ran head long into them, their puny 'Personnel Combat vests weren't a match for the protection of the mark 4........and Freeman. He knew that he had almost reached the teleport labs, it was just a matter of getting through these corridors. He came to an area where the loaders were kept and took the lift down, passing the massive Gonarch on the way. She was stood on a second lift and Freeman chuckled as he thought of a way to let her out. The soldiers would have a tough time with her, he thought, just her size alone is scary, her hairy legs and that ear-splitting scream. When he reached the ground level Freeman pushed the button and Gonarch came slowly down. Freeman edged away with his back to the wall and ducked through an open door. There was the sound of gun shots and the crack of vautigaunt lightning, the creatures of Xen were definitely fighting back now and Freeman started to feel a bit more hope. The only way out of this area was up a ladder, so Freeman climbed. The room was bright and full of boxes and machinery, when the first assassin appeared Freeman was taken completely by suprise. The girl was so fast, she was dressed in black and seemed to vanish if you looked directly at her. Four assassins were waiting, Freeman was heavy and slow yet the assassins had little, if any protection and Freeman killed each one. A hatch opened in the far corner of the room and Freeman looked down to see the now dead security guard slumped on the floor at the bottom of the ladder. There was a sort of control panel here, Freeman pushed the button and watched as the big metal doors at the back of the hanger opened. Gonarch galloped through and smashed her way through some big metal boxes at the other end of the room. There was now a way out. Freeman followed Gonarch.

The sign on the wall read "Lab.Xen Teleport system". Freeman ran into the lab not too sure what to do. His plan had been to get the teleporter working and then to help get as many of the scientists and guards out and back to earth as possible. One lone scientist stood in the lab. The teleporter seemed to be on the verge of breakdown, it was making odd noises and obviously needed re-calibrating. Freeman ran up the steps to get across to the control room, if he could take a look at the computers in there and get some readings, he knew that he could get the thing working properly. As Freeman ran over the metal bridge above the teleporter there was a massive surge of energy, the whole room shook and Freeman fell into the glowing orange ball.

Another World.
The room was big, it was spacious, white and cold. Light streamed in from windows high above Freeman. He wondered if this was death. He felt as if he was in church, it sort of looked like a church........but then again it was so empty and bleak, no cross, no alter, no shrine just white walls and a chequered floor, black and white like a chess board. Freeman still had his weapons, so this couldn't be death he thought unless it was his own personal hell. He made his way over to some large grey doors that opened out into a corridor. More of the same architecture, cold white corridors led left and right. Now it sort of reminded Freeman of a shopping mall, a bleak, deserted shopping mall. Freeman turned right and walked around the corner, he thought that he could see odd patches of colour, transparent forms hazy and incomplete like ghosts..........Freeman turned and went the other way. As he came around the corner he heard the sound of vautigaunts charging, remembering the one that had attacked him before, Freeman took cover by jumping behind a wall and took out the shot gun. As the lightning crackled past the walls, Freeman jumped out and blasted something that seemed to move, the vautigaunts were like ghosts, transparent. Freeman didn't have time to think, there were other things moving. The ghostly forms were horrific, semi-human with hands formed into murderous talons. Hideous crab-like forms scuttled across the floor and then leaped at his face, Freeman ran into the room and dodged the attacks. As Freeman ran across the centre of the room there was a loud crash as a solid block the size of a car slammed down to the ground, missing Freeman by a hairs breadth. Freeman turned and ran up the ramp, he quickly turned and jumped on to the block just as it started to rise. Looking up, Freeman saw a yellow button, he stretched up to push it and as he did so a door at the top of the ramp opened. Freeman jumped back to the ramp and crept forwards to see what lay beyond the door. The screech of a Xen master made him withdraw. Freeman re-loaded his Magnum and got the 'master' with one shot. Looking carefully through the door, Freeman saw a spiral stair turning around and around. The long tongues of the barnacle creatures hung down into the middle of these spinning steps and right at the bottom of the steps a lone vautigaunt was re-charging. Freeman quickly took a grenade from his belt, pulled the pin and dropped it into the centre of the steps...........Next he tried shooting the barnacles, yet they didn't seem to die. He hated the barnacles, when he and the rest of the science team were new to Xen they lost several good men to these carnivorous animals. He had never examined one, but he knew how they lived. Freeman crawled forwards and gently fell onto the spinning steps then he made his way slowly down. He jumped onto the ground inside the spiral steps and almost instantly the floor started to rise, taking Freeman up to the barnacles, Freeman leapt off and back on to the steps. He could now see a hole in the floor, he ran forwards and ducked down into the hole before the platform could squash him. The hole led to a narrow room, Freeman jumped down and looked through the only window. There was a room spinning around and around, complete with settee, and clock, floor and ceiling even a painting on the wall, simply rotating in space.....there was no other way to go so Freeman crawled into the room. The room buffeted his body as Freeman crawled through it. In the middle of the room there was a window and through that yet another room spinning just as madly as the first. Freeman made it through, now there was no way out..........except for through a small hole that was first on the ceiling, then on the wall, now on the floor now on the wall and now on the ceiling again. Freeman shut his eyes and guessed where the hole would be, he made himself as small as possible and inched his way along praying that he would fall through and out of this madness.

He fell suddenly and was inside a large room with the two rooms spinning above his head. He had to sit for a while to get over the dizziness. As he stood up, Freeman heard the grunt of a bullsquid, the thing came charging at him and Freeman had a split second to shoot it before it could sink it's razor sharp teeth into his leg.

The narrow corridor led up to a grey door, the door opened as Freeman touched it and inside numerous hound-eyes bounded forwards. The door slid shut. Reluctantly, Freeman reached into his ruck-sac for a grenade, as the door slid open a second time, he pulled the pin and hurled it into the room, after one more grenade Freeman went forwards into the room. It had the same white walls as everywhere else in this weird place, Xen sky shone through long windows high above him. There were shelves in here and it was still cold, the light streaming down had no power to warm. Another door was at the far end, Freeman opened it and jumped back as a headcrab leaped, reaching for his face. Once through the door Freeman marvelled at the confusion of this parallel world, boxes were hanging from the roof and a health charger was upside down, he tried to smash the crates with the crowbar, but even though Freeman was tall he couldn't quite reach them. A door was also too high to reach, "Ah well nothing for it" Freeman went back into the previous room and returned with a small trolley. Now he could reach up, the box contained a battery and health kits.

Nothing could have prepared Freeman for what he saw next. The door slid open and Freeman jumped through and onto a ledge high above some murky looking water. A massive clock with it's hands running wildly, hung from the ceiling and it's pendulum swung back and forth across the water. Freeman edged his way around to a ledge at the side of the room, here he could see that there were three clocks and three pendulums and that the only way across to the next door would be via the pendulums. Looking down into the water, Gordon caught a glimpse of something, of movement. Using the scope on the crossbow, Freeman saw to his dismay a large ichytheosaur.Three precious bolts latter, the ichythosaur was still swimming around. Freeman cursed himself for being a lousy shot and decided to jump anyway. The first jump was fairly easy, Freeman grabbed hold of the pendulum and tried to concentrate on making the next jump. The pendulum moved fast and the second one moved at a different rate, Freeman jumped and fell. He allowed himself to sink to the bottom of the water and looked around for the fish and a way out. There seemed to be a small platform in the corner of the pool, so he made for that, all the time aware of the ichytheosaur. The shelf started to rise as soon as Freeman stepped onto it and so Freeman started his journey across the water one more time.

Eventually Freeman lay exhausted by the step up to the next door. He wished that he had some chocolate and dropped into a short but fitful sleep. When he awoke, he felt a little better, but still muzzy and hungry. Carefully he checked all his weapons and reloaded, he selected the magnum before opening the next door.

He saw the yellow plasma ball just before it hit. The door closed too slowly to protect Freeman. Two Xen masters were hovering in the air in the room ahead, there was a small passage way to creep through......and then what?

Freeman opened the door and crept close to the wall. There were not enough crossbow bolts left and he was getting low on ammo for the magnum, every shot had to count. When the two masters had fallen screeching to the floor, Freeman edged cautiously into the room. Two more masters were in here and Freeman fired wildly at the first before realising that there was a second master high above a block floating in the air. Freeman fought with the masters, one of his shots hit the blue disk high up on the wall and Freeman heard a door open. A gap led into a low passageway, Freeman ducked down quickly and followed it to one more room. There was a large painting on the wall and a seat made out of health chargers.......three rather horrible looking beings were sat along one wall with grenades and crossbow bolts between their long, spindly arms. The creatures were not ghost like and they didn't seem to be aggressive so Freeman walked towards them and took the stuff from between their waving arms, next he used the health kits and then returned to the room where just one master remained.

There was no way out of the room, Freeman thought he could see a yellow button above the block, but there was no way that he could climb onto that block, it was too high. He tried to jump onto one of the cubes that were around the edge of the room to get a better view and as he did so, more blocks pushed themselves out of the wall and joined together to make a stairway high enough to reach the block. From the top of the block Freeman reached out and pressed the button, another door opened and Freeman realised that he was stuck!

A pool of water had also opened under the block and this broke Freeman's fall. Freeman got out of the water and walked towards the door.

As the grey door opened in front of Freeman he threw a grenade, several hound-eyes were already charging up for their sonic blast and Freeman tried to take cover at the side of the wall. After the explosion, Freeman shot the remaining hound-eyes and entered what reminded him of monastery ruins. Pillars soared up to the sky........Freeman took a right turn and spotted an alien grunt just in time. More ammo was waiting for him upon what looked uncannily like an alter.......Another hound-eye came bounding towards Freeman, he shot it without even thinking.

After looking around, Freeman could not see an obvious way out. There was some nasty looking sludge where the floor should be, Freeman jumped on to the ledge beside the sludge and diagonally across to the other side where black and white cubes littered the floor. Yet again the way was blocked. A gush of acid hit the wall behind Freeman from a gap in the wall. A bullsquid had spotted Freeman, Gordon reached for his shotgun and killed it with one shot. He could see a lever sticking out of the wall on the other side which he stretched out to reach. The wall in front descended and Freeman was in to the next corridor.

Two barnacle tongues swayed lazily across the passageway, Freeman avoided them and was just about to reload his glock when the walls started to move. He was being pushed into another room, an alien grunt spotted him, two vautigaunts began to charge up......Freeman ran back into the barnacle tongue. He had dropped his gun but managed to reach the crowbar before his head got to the barnacles mouth, He felt the dull impact of metal against the ghostly flesh and then fell to the ground. Freeman crouched down and waited for the aliens to come to him, he had a good view of the narrow area ahead and they could only come one at a time.

Freeman ran across the room and through the doors. The only thing that looked like a way out was a small platform. Freeman pressed a black button and re-loaded his MP5 as he rode the platform upwards.......The rooms were so curious, were things getting stranger, is this death or is it worse than that.......Freeman didn't know where he was going or if there was ever a way out of this. "Why are things ghost like, why do they attack me........" ?

No one could answer.

The platform stopped, ahead was another platform reached by some steps, as Freeman stepped forwards he saw the alien grunt, he loosed a grenade from the MP5 and turned to see that there was now something like a Sedan chair hovering above the platform. Freeman climbed inside and crouched low as the chair began to speed through twists and turns, defying gravity. A vautigaunt fired lightning bolts as he hurtled past, but the chair protected him from a direct hit. The chair increased it's speed and Freeman shut his eyes, he felt ill, his health was low and he began to despair.

The chair came abruptly to a holt. Freeman opened his eyes and cautiously got out of the chair. There didn't seem to be any ghosts around.......just a large red cross, glowing as if lit from inside. He fell upon the cross and rested his forehead against it's warm surface. The cross spoke to him with the voice Freeman had heard years ago when he was learning how to use his HEV suit. "Nice job" said the cross, with the voice of the holographic assistant and it dispensed a hefty whack of 'health'.

Freeman walked to the edge of the platform in front of him and watched as another block spiralled down. Above him, rings and rings of familiar faces, scientists and aliens looked down at Freeman. The air seemed hazy and full of bubbles.......Freeman doubted his sanity and found it easier to believe that he was lying unconscious somewhere......probably dying whilst the army were bundling Xen creatures off to labs for vivisection and his fellow scientists were being murdered. Never the less, what options did he, Freeman have now? He had to treat this 'dream' as real.......

As he stepped back, the floor beneath him rose up, Freeman jumped onto the top of the block and just as he had hoped the block began to ascend. Freeman looked at the ghosts.....were they ghosts? could they see him? The block floated above the rings and took him across to a small roof. Freeman jumped down and felt more bewildered than ever. It was like being on a castle turret, incredibly high up. There were narrow walls and nothing except the ghost rings and a sheer drop.....Suddenly Freeman heard the sound of a portal and the voice of a security guard telling him to hurry up! A small green craft, piloted by a vautigaunt was in front of Freeman.....

The jump between worlds seemed over in seconds, Freeman hadn't time to think about where he had been. It was good to see 'Barney' and not to be attacked by anyone. The ship landed in the research facility, Freeman was relieved to hear the alarms and to see a fellow scientist who welcomed him back.........no more ghosts.

As Gordon followed the scientist Dr siegler down the corridor, he realised that nothing had changed, the base was still under attack. They entered a room and Dr William glanced at Freeman and possibly mistook him for someone else. The elderly doctor assumed that Freeman had been in weapons research and so would recognise the two odd looking guns that were stored inside the glass cases. Freeman didn't feel inclined to explain that he had never shot anything until this day and hurried over to get the guns. One fitted over his back and had something like a vacuum-cleaner pipe......."this is a Gluon gun, some people call it the 'Egon' after an old film.........'Ghostbusters' or some such" chuckled the doc "And this is our gauss weapon, it is a little temperamental and is rather unpredictable, but it fires lethal plasma bolts........ we have faith in you Dr Freeman.....but we know that the soldiers are very close and we are running out of time. Dr Bennett has succeeded in getting a teleporter system up and running and with the help of the Xenites we are transferring everyone and everything to a safer place........But we need more time, Dr Freeman. Use anything that you can to stop this madness".

Freeman examined the weapons and took the blocks of depleted uranium from the shelf, it was incredibly heavy. The HEV suit had run out of medication a long time ago, but its mechanism still allowed Freeman to handle heavy objects with ease. There were more weapons further on, 'snarks' and 'hive hands', alien weapons that Freeman didn't understand at all, Freeman took them anyway and waited whilst another scientist who seemed almost grey with fear and fatigue, opened the door. Freeman stepped into another corridor......."Be careful Gordon" shouted the scientist, and Freeman saw that someone or something was cutting through the metal of the final door that separated the scientists from the soldiers.

Gordon Freeman remembered films that he had seen. Films in which one man must stand alone to do 'what a man has to do'. He tried to remember if those men, those hero's, usually made it out alive? It didn't seem very likely that he, Freeman would get through this. The little blue flame cut further around the door, it wouldn't be long now. Freeman thought of the scientist still behind him, everyone was relying on him, the scientists were too old or too neurotic to fight............... and yet they were all fighting back. Simply by refusing to hand over the work and by refusing to help who ever it was in charge of this blood-bath, everyone was resisting. Gordon thought of all that he had seen, of all the men that he had killed and of all the men and Xen beings who would be killed if he, Freeman failed to buy enough time. The door fell open and five soldiers opened fire on Freeman as a crystal-blue coruscation of pure energy from the Gluon gun ripped them apart.

Freeman crept forwards and around the corner carefully, silently and used the crossbow to kill a man up on the tank before sending more ripples of blue flame spiralling through the room. A ladder led up to the console for the laser room, Freeman looked through the window and saw more soldiers waiting for him. there were two buttons..........without a second thought Freeman activated the laser equipment, and watched as the trapped men started to panic a second before they died......

Freeman began to feel as if he could win, he began to feel good as if he really was the hero. He crossed the laser room stepping over bits of body and round into another room. Two tanks were waiting for him. Freeman jumped back quickly and listened to hear if the soldiers had seen him.........he armed the crossbow with the last few poisoned tipped bolts and swiftly killed the man standing by the gun on the tank turret. Freeman crept into the room and made his way over to a control panel, a button brought down a gantry that controlled a similar laser device to the one in the other room. As the gantry came down the soldiers who had been waiting for Freeman ran forwards, Freeman ran to the controls and activated the laser just as he noticed the security guard running in from the next corridor. The soldiers were disintegrated by the beams from the laser equipment that sliced through the room. The security guard died too and Freeman suddenly felt very sick...........the soldiers had become people once more and Freeman had had enough of this war. There was no choice though, Freeman had killed a friend who was trying to help him but there was no option...he had to continue with this until it was over.

There was a lift ahead and Freeman slid a satchel bomb onto it before sending the lift down. He waited a few seconds before detonating it and then rode the lift. A soldier opened fire, but Freeman took him out with one shot. The corridor was dark and seemed to be blocked at the end with metal boxes. Gordon stayed close to the wall and moved cautiously forwards. He could hear sounds of Xen creatures, he squinted through a gap between the boxes and watched as a soldier pushed a vautigaunt into a large cage. Freeman tried to move into a better spot to see how many soldiers were in the room. The room was full of cages, houndeyes and Xen masters were locked up. There was a crane above the roof where the cages could be lifted out.......Freeman reloaded his MP5 as he jumped over the boxes and into the room.

After the soldiers were dead Freeman was in a lot of pain. There was no morphine left in the suit and the health kits that he found contained only enough juice to stop him from dying if he sneezed too hard. He opened the cages to let the creatures out, Gordon wondered why they refused to fight back, he knew that even the houndeyes who looked so cute [in a freaky kind of way] could easily kill a man........he supposed that they had vowed not to kill any human, no matter what that cost them. The Xen creatures suddenly seemed noble.......and yet, in that realm of ghosts the Xen creatures had been full of hatred? Freeman did not understand where he had been or what he had seen. How could he have killed 'ghosts'?

Freeman noticed that a vautigaunt had opened a door. Gordon looked at all the creatures and wondered if they would follow him through the door. Everything was getting swimmy again........as Freeman went to step through the door the vautigaunt stopped him and pointed to the 'snark pod' Freeman had carried with him. The vautigaunt gestured a throwing movement and so Freeman, just for fun, opened up the snark pouch and threw all the snarks into the room, the door shut. Freeman had wondered if the vauitigaunt had just wanted him to give the creatures their freedom, the sounds of gun-shots coming from the room told him otherwise.

Freeman decided that speed would be the best defence. A staircase led down to the big room. It housed a massive teleportation machine that he and his team had worked on, one of the first of human rather than Xen design. There was a door at floor level that would lead back to the labs. Freeman didn't have a plan, he didn't know if he had slowed the soldiers down enough for the rest of the science team to escape........he just knew that he would feel better to get back to the labs and perhaps he could think about escaping too, he ran............But assassins were waiting. they were like black shadows, and very fast but Gordon had the better weapons. When they were all dead Freeman crossed the floor to the door

The dark corridor grew darker as Freeman walked back to 'home'. Suddenly there was a cage around Freeman, the lights came on and Freeman saw the bars of his prison.......a soldier was outside laughing as Gordon opened fire.....

When Freeman woke up he was still in the cage, he was now in a different room and all his weapons had gone, soldiers were guarding him. A door opened and the soldiers jumped to attention as the suit-man walked into the room "Ah Gordon Freeman in the Flesh" said the man. Freeman decided to ignore him, no questions, no answers, he would say nothing. "It's time to chose......" said the man. Freeman allowed his mind to remain blank, sure, thoughts were racing through his mind but he wasn't going to pay any attention. He was beyond hope and fear, there was simply nothing to say...................

The vautigaunt saw with dismay what had happened, it saw Gordon Freeman in a cage and it saw the soldiers and the suit-man. The vautigaunt was looking up at the window from the room with Gordon's teleporter and it knew a way to get rid of the suit-man. The vautigaunt ran to the machine and worked to set the co-ordinates to produce a small teleporter sphere that would send its target into a place of no-return. The machine charged up and moved around to face the room in which Gordon was concentrating hard on ignoring the suit-man.

End Game.
Green lightning played around the focus of the machine until suddenly a green and yellow ball of plasma was discharged directly at the suit-man and his soldiers. They were transported instantly to another world. A shock wave rippled out from the empty space where the men had once stood and through Freeman. If his suit had any charge left it may have been enough to save him........but the suit was damaged and Freeman had many injuries.

The cage lay shattered and Gordon was dead

It was all over.......... the soldiers had gone or been dealt with by the alien grunts and the vautigaunts. The vautigaunt who had operated the machine ran to see if Gordon had been hurt by the blast and was overwhelmed by remorse when it saw Gordon's corpse. One by one the remaining scientists and Xen beings stood around the body of Gordon Freeman, looking down at the man who had paid for their freedom with his life.

Dr Walter knelt at Freeman's side and felt for a pulse, but it was no good, Gordon was dead.

When the vautigaunt picked up Freeman's body, the scientists didn't understand what was happening.........yet there was too much to do to help the living, they would not worry about what the Xen beings were doing. Freeman was a Xen hero too and so the scientists watched as the vautigaunt accompanied by a Xen master, dissolved through another teleport sphere.

The vautigaunt lay Gordon Freeman down gently before the massive Nihalanth. The vautigaunt bowed down and begged the ancient ruler of Xen to restore the life of the man who had fought and died for his friends. Nihalanth was immensely old and wise and he respected the sincerity of the vauitigaunts plea.Spinning and pulling together the layers and layers of infinite possibilities, Nihalanth re-wove time and space drawing vast amounts of energy from the crystals within his cave. Xen masters helped him in his task and the sprites who are used as energy conduits to construct the gates that connect Earth to the border worlds danced as the Nihalanth poured life and healing into Gordon Freeman.

Gordon woke up and saw the eyeless face of the Nihalanth. The vautigaunt was still with him and Freeman remembered everything that had happened as if he had watched it all...............he knew that he had died and that the Nihalanth had restored him to the world and so he bowed in gratitude.

The vautigaunt opened up another portal and Freeman stepped through.