A
Amhil
Guest
Author's note:
I recently discovered the joys of the game that is called half life (and all it's follow ups, especially half life 2) and I couldn't resist the urge to write my own take on things that might have happened between the Black Mesa incident, and the return of Gordon Freeman in Half Life 2. Let's see what our beloved characters have been up to in the mean time.
I actually started this fan fiction to write a scene that I've had in my mind for quite a long time, but, as not to barge into the story in mid action I wanted to write a beginning to the story.
However, it seems the introduction to the story got quite out of control and I'm now at the beginning of a story I wasn't even planning on telling at all!
I guess I just have to go where my writing takes me, because there isn't much I can do about it. I hope you like it, and I know this first chapter is quite long and may seem a bit slow paced, but I hope to change that in future chapters and explain a few things that might have happened between half life and half life 2.
Also please note that English is not my native language, and I'm trying my hardest to make it look all right. I'm 16, and picked up English mostly with the help of television, films, and later the internet. I'm sure this story is full of mistakes, so feel free to point out wrong choices of words, spelling mistakes and I'd love to get some critique on my writing, too. Help me improve! =)
Well, on with the story!
The city lay dormant, almost waiting for something to happen. It was quiet, but not the still, lifeless quietness of a city that was sleeping. It was a fearful expectant quietness. Of a city that was afraid to make a sound. Even though it seemed the city was at rest, nothing was further from the truth. There were small sounds everywhere, and it was highly unlikely that the majority of the city´s population, human or otherwise, was asleep. There were the sounds normally associated with the city; The endless droning voice of the city's own human puppet leader coming out of every TV that happened to be on, there were the shuffling noises of civil protection squads patrolling the streets, the endless buzzing of city scanners and of course the klaxons near the train station, which seemed to indicate the coming and going of an endless amount of trains, though most trains that were arriving never seemed to carry much, if any, passengers. Especially when coming back from the coastal regions.
And for very good and patient listeners there were other noises beside these normal sounds which were usually associated with the city. Noises that seemed to try their hardest to not be noises at all. Small, creeping noises of whispered conversations between tired citizens, the soft tapping of feet through the sewers of a couple that's trying to get out of the city and take their changes with the outside world, a woman crying in one of the many gray, depressing apartment blocks, and of course the tapping of Barney Calhoun's fingers on a Combine console located in a desolated apartment building, trying to hack into the system with his low civil protection clearance.
His hands flew over the console, tapping away as alien information scrolled across the screen in front of him. Working feverishly, Barney tried to take in the information and keep an eye on the door at the same time. He only had a little while before one of the others on duty was bound to step in the small office room and notice what he was doing.
Though the civil protection consisted almost entirely of humans who willingly signed up for the job themselves, most of the CP's working in city 17 could be called anything but human. A lot of the people who signed up did it because of the privileges they were given, better food rest en freedom, but quickly became hungry for more. Additional privileges were given to CP's who voluntarily have their memory replaced, and that seemed to happen a lot around here. Even when a officer had not gone through the process yet willingly, they were often stressed to do so, and most gave in to so much pressure.
But even then there were people who did not like the idea of having their memories replaced, Barney knew, as he was one of them. But somehow after a while those were the soldiers that quietly disappeared, taken to Nova Prospect or the citadel and they often never came back to work in the civil protection. It was never said what happened to them in the lower ranks of the civil protection, but everyone could guess. It was just a fact that anybody signing up to become a metro cop didn't last long. Not as human anyway.
Thanks to Barney's own inventiveness, and a lot of luck, he had not yet been confronted with direct assimilation and memory replacement by the Combine, and still had his own light-hearted, good old personality. This wasn't only lucky for the Black Mesa survivor himself, but also a lot of other people, mainly oppressed, unfortunate citizens that had survived the seven hour war, but had now come in direct contact with other horrors, and wanted to get away or do something about it.
It had now been nine years since the first invasion of the Combine, and three years since the absolute control of city 17, the human race has suffered terrible losses and had come under the direct rule of the Combine Empire, who tried their hardest to make the Earth as inhospitable as possible. Any surviving members of the human race had been gathered together in suburban cities, while others were left to die in the rapidly changing ecosystem of the planet.
Normal earthly wildlife was scarce, and Barney couldn't for the life of him remember the last time he had seen something as simple as a cow in the past few years, though there did seemed to be other surviving earth creatures beside humans here and there. Occasionally one could observe a cat roaming the streets of City 17, but Barney believed that most species were either extinct or dangerously close to it. In stead the Xen wildlife had taken over the planet, forcing the surviving humans to keep together in cities under the close watch and tight rule of the Combine empire. To be honest, Barney sometimes thought that those that were left behind in the wastelands were luckier than those trapped in the cities. He knew what horrors took place here.
But right now the former security guard's attention was not on those outside the city, but those inside. To be specific; those contained by the civil protection (had there ever been a more ironic title for such a group of soldiers?), those that were unlucky enough to have been located inside or near the sewers when the Combine suddenly organized an unexpected 'search, find, contain and cure' mission in the old canals and sewers near the centre of the city a couple of days ago.
Barney had been on duty that day, but had been completely surprised by the sudden deploy of troops and the swift end they made to a part of the underground canal network of small groups of 'resistance' that were trying to smuggle people out into the industrial canals, after which they could safely reach the city of Ravenholm. Barney had been horrified when he saw how many exactly had been contained by the Overwatch, but luckily it didn't seem to be a precise attack on the whole network of resistance in the canals. Rather it seemed a random attack on unauthorized citizens who were behaving suspiciously. Barney didn't think they actually knew much, if anything, about the attempts the resistance were making to get people out of the city.
The underground resistance, if they could really call it that, was relatively new and very small still. Though Barney would never admit it, the group was disorganized and had very little equipment. The seemingly random attack and containment of people in such a small area of the city had still been a major blow to the underground network, leaving very little people to coordinate the escape of any other humans out of the area.
In the dimly lit room of the department building, block C11, of city 17, Barney was now trying to find out where exactly the prisoners were being kept and when the next full shipment of handy new personnel for the combine was going to leave to Nova Prospect, because that was undoubtedly going to happen to the captured citizens. He hoped he could save them from the nightmare they would have to endure in Nova Prospect, and was planning to hinder the Overwatch in any way possible to prevent them from succeeding in transporting the captured citizens to the former prison.
Every time Barney tried to read any information regarding the raid, he would be denied access with his limited security clearance, which frustrated him immensely. It would have been easier if Barney had held a higher rank within the Civil Protection, he had served them long enough. But promotion were only for those who had gone through the Combine method of 'enhancement'; memory wiping, genetic engineering, organ transplants...every time you wanted to climb the ranks you had to give away more of your humanity, and Barney would never be prepared to do that. What was the point anyway? After being promoted he wouldn't remember what he needed the higher security clearance for, since he would have had his memory replaced! The Overwatch couldn't be called humans. They were regarded as Combine, treated as Combine and would follow any command without questions. Super Soldiers some would call them. Absolute Terrors was a more appropriate name according to Barney.
I recently discovered the joys of the game that is called half life (and all it's follow ups, especially half life 2) and I couldn't resist the urge to write my own take on things that might have happened between the Black Mesa incident, and the return of Gordon Freeman in Half Life 2. Let's see what our beloved characters have been up to in the mean time.
I actually started this fan fiction to write a scene that I've had in my mind for quite a long time, but, as not to barge into the story in mid action I wanted to write a beginning to the story.
However, it seems the introduction to the story got quite out of control and I'm now at the beginning of a story I wasn't even planning on telling at all!
I guess I just have to go where my writing takes me, because there isn't much I can do about it. I hope you like it, and I know this first chapter is quite long and may seem a bit slow paced, but I hope to change that in future chapters and explain a few things that might have happened between half life and half life 2.
Also please note that English is not my native language, and I'm trying my hardest to make it look all right. I'm 16, and picked up English mostly with the help of television, films, and later the internet. I'm sure this story is full of mistakes, so feel free to point out wrong choices of words, spelling mistakes and I'd love to get some critique on my writing, too. Help me improve! =)
Well, on with the story!
Prologue
The city lay dormant, almost waiting for something to happen. It was quiet, but not the still, lifeless quietness of a city that was sleeping. It was a fearful expectant quietness. Of a city that was afraid to make a sound. Even though it seemed the city was at rest, nothing was further from the truth. There were small sounds everywhere, and it was highly unlikely that the majority of the city´s population, human or otherwise, was asleep. There were the sounds normally associated with the city; The endless droning voice of the city's own human puppet leader coming out of every TV that happened to be on, there were the shuffling noises of civil protection squads patrolling the streets, the endless buzzing of city scanners and of course the klaxons near the train station, which seemed to indicate the coming and going of an endless amount of trains, though most trains that were arriving never seemed to carry much, if any, passengers. Especially when coming back from the coastal regions.
And for very good and patient listeners there were other noises beside these normal sounds which were usually associated with the city. Noises that seemed to try their hardest to not be noises at all. Small, creeping noises of whispered conversations between tired citizens, the soft tapping of feet through the sewers of a couple that's trying to get out of the city and take their changes with the outside world, a woman crying in one of the many gray, depressing apartment blocks, and of course the tapping of Barney Calhoun's fingers on a Combine console located in a desolated apartment building, trying to hack into the system with his low civil protection clearance.
His hands flew over the console, tapping away as alien information scrolled across the screen in front of him. Working feverishly, Barney tried to take in the information and keep an eye on the door at the same time. He only had a little while before one of the others on duty was bound to step in the small office room and notice what he was doing.
Though the civil protection consisted almost entirely of humans who willingly signed up for the job themselves, most of the CP's working in city 17 could be called anything but human. A lot of the people who signed up did it because of the privileges they were given, better food rest en freedom, but quickly became hungry for more. Additional privileges were given to CP's who voluntarily have their memory replaced, and that seemed to happen a lot around here. Even when a officer had not gone through the process yet willingly, they were often stressed to do so, and most gave in to so much pressure.
But even then there were people who did not like the idea of having their memories replaced, Barney knew, as he was one of them. But somehow after a while those were the soldiers that quietly disappeared, taken to Nova Prospect or the citadel and they often never came back to work in the civil protection. It was never said what happened to them in the lower ranks of the civil protection, but everyone could guess. It was just a fact that anybody signing up to become a metro cop didn't last long. Not as human anyway.
Thanks to Barney's own inventiveness, and a lot of luck, he had not yet been confronted with direct assimilation and memory replacement by the Combine, and still had his own light-hearted, good old personality. This wasn't only lucky for the Black Mesa survivor himself, but also a lot of other people, mainly oppressed, unfortunate citizens that had survived the seven hour war, but had now come in direct contact with other horrors, and wanted to get away or do something about it.
It had now been nine years since the first invasion of the Combine, and three years since the absolute control of city 17, the human race has suffered terrible losses and had come under the direct rule of the Combine Empire, who tried their hardest to make the Earth as inhospitable as possible. Any surviving members of the human race had been gathered together in suburban cities, while others were left to die in the rapidly changing ecosystem of the planet.
Normal earthly wildlife was scarce, and Barney couldn't for the life of him remember the last time he had seen something as simple as a cow in the past few years, though there did seemed to be other surviving earth creatures beside humans here and there. Occasionally one could observe a cat roaming the streets of City 17, but Barney believed that most species were either extinct or dangerously close to it. In stead the Xen wildlife had taken over the planet, forcing the surviving humans to keep together in cities under the close watch and tight rule of the Combine empire. To be honest, Barney sometimes thought that those that were left behind in the wastelands were luckier than those trapped in the cities. He knew what horrors took place here.
But right now the former security guard's attention was not on those outside the city, but those inside. To be specific; those contained by the civil protection (had there ever been a more ironic title for such a group of soldiers?), those that were unlucky enough to have been located inside or near the sewers when the Combine suddenly organized an unexpected 'search, find, contain and cure' mission in the old canals and sewers near the centre of the city a couple of days ago.
Barney had been on duty that day, but had been completely surprised by the sudden deploy of troops and the swift end they made to a part of the underground canal network of small groups of 'resistance' that were trying to smuggle people out into the industrial canals, after which they could safely reach the city of Ravenholm. Barney had been horrified when he saw how many exactly had been contained by the Overwatch, but luckily it didn't seem to be a precise attack on the whole network of resistance in the canals. Rather it seemed a random attack on unauthorized citizens who were behaving suspiciously. Barney didn't think they actually knew much, if anything, about the attempts the resistance were making to get people out of the city.
The underground resistance, if they could really call it that, was relatively new and very small still. Though Barney would never admit it, the group was disorganized and had very little equipment. The seemingly random attack and containment of people in such a small area of the city had still been a major blow to the underground network, leaving very little people to coordinate the escape of any other humans out of the area.
In the dimly lit room of the department building, block C11, of city 17, Barney was now trying to find out where exactly the prisoners were being kept and when the next full shipment of handy new personnel for the combine was going to leave to Nova Prospect, because that was undoubtedly going to happen to the captured citizens. He hoped he could save them from the nightmare they would have to endure in Nova Prospect, and was planning to hinder the Overwatch in any way possible to prevent them from succeeding in transporting the captured citizens to the former prison.
Every time Barney tried to read any information regarding the raid, he would be denied access with his limited security clearance, which frustrated him immensely. It would have been easier if Barney had held a higher rank within the Civil Protection, he had served them long enough. But promotion were only for those who had gone through the Combine method of 'enhancement'; memory wiping, genetic engineering, organ transplants...every time you wanted to climb the ranks you had to give away more of your humanity, and Barney would never be prepared to do that. What was the point anyway? After being promoted he wouldn't remember what he needed the higher security clearance for, since he would have had his memory replaced! The Overwatch couldn't be called humans. They were regarded as Combine, treated as Combine and would follow any command without questions. Super Soldiers some would call them. Absolute Terrors was a more appropriate name according to Barney.
One thing, though - I'd say Ravenholm is more of a village/town than a city. :thumbs:
