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Jan. 16th, 2009 02:24 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
acts_of_gordThe tunnel's ceiling was a little higher than Gordon liked, seeing as he had to drop through it directly onto a set of mine-cart tracks just begging to snag his feet and twist his ankles, but it had this going for it: it was well-lit. And not by antlion grubs, either, but by the cold blue-white light of some kind of floodlamp. At least he could see where he fell.
"Sheckley!" cried a man's voice from up ahead, its tone strained almost beyond endurance. "We've got antlions!!"
Gordon turned sharply to look over his shoulder, but there was nothing. By the time he turned back there were two humans visible: one pale, wearing a medic's armband, and one bearded, hatted, and darker-skinned. The one in the hat was shaking his head in mild disgust. "Griggs, you idiot," he said to his companion, "that's Gordon Freeman. The Vortigaunt said he was on the way... Dr. Freeman, Alyx Vance is over here. The Vort's trying to patch her up."
He'd been traveling in the right direction after all. The rush of silent gratitude almost knocked his knees out from under him.
Sheckley jerked his head towards the wide equipment ramp behind him. Gordon followed, booted feet clanging against the metal slope as they made their way down to the bottom of the shaft. The Vortigaunt stood hunched over Alyx's prone, bent form, both its hands crackling with energy as it worked. Gordon's eyes couldn't help but stray to the dark, ruddy puddle surrounding Alyx on the table; he swallowed...
"Ah, Freeman," the Vortigaunt said. Gordon jerked his gaze away from the puddle. "It is well. The Alyx Vance clings to the margins. My kin are still some distance away." It fixed him with one baleful red eye and added, "For now, we must not be disturbed."
"Yeah, well, about that..." That was Sheckley, from behind Gordon. "That's gonna be tougher than it sounds. As long as you're down here, Freeman, maybe you can give us a hand."
He led the way back up to where Griggs was waiting, next to a tunnel labeled '36'. "We get a lot of antlions down here no matter what we do. Damn things want to turn this area into the next room in their warren. Griggs and me've rigged up some sensors on each of the tunnels so we've got a little warning where they're coming from and just how bad it's gonna get."
"Hey, Doc," said Griggs nervously. "On your way here, you weren't... followed, were you?"
"Don't listen to him, Doc." Sheckley snorted. "We're on edge because it's spawning season. They're always worse this time of year."
"The Vort says-" Griggs hesitated. "As long as we don't step on their grubs, they shouldn't hear us this far from the main nest."
Gordon's eyes flicked involuntarily downwards to the layer of goo that covered his feet and lower legs. Sheckley must've picked up on it, because the darker man hastily said, "Yeah, well, that's a theory I'd rather not test myself. We're down to our last two turrets-" He indicated the familiar form of a Combine gun turret to his left, painted instead in yellow and black and with the circled-lambda logo of the Resistance on one side. "And even these are held together by baling wire and duct tape at this point. Nice to have 'em in a pinch, but I wouldn't exactly trust 'em with my life."
"Ammo's over there," said Griggs, pointing to a huge, hefty crate near one of the tunnels. "And over on the other side, too. And medkits, everything you need for doctoring-"
One of the red lights behind Sheckley flared, and a siren began to sound. "Let's move," he said. "We have to defend the Vort."
Gordon, frankly, was glad for anything that took his mind off what was going on at the bottom of the pit. And after what he'd just had to slog through, well... he didn't trust the Combine-made submachine guns to do him any good at all. It was shotgun time.
The bugs came up from somewhere back in the dark parts of the tunnel, screeching like mad things. They charged the humans alone or in pairs, wings flaring. After the first few fell Gordon privately decided that the lone turret aiding them could probably hold off such an invasion by itself or with a little assistance- but it didn't stop him from firing, reloading, and firing again. These bugs and their kin owed him a lot of blood.
As the flood of antlions ebbed and the turret fell silent, Sheckley shook his head. "Hey, Doc," he said. "You came through the caves, right? Did you see any of their guardians?"
Gordon glanced at him curiously, wondering if he meant the spitters. Before Sheckley could elaborate, though, another siren began to sound- and another, from the tunnel labeled '24' opposite side of the pit. "We got the breech!" Sheckley said. He pointed towards a previously-overlooked hole in the wall. "Dr. Freeman, you grab the turrets and take care of 24. No offense, but it was pretty quiet until you showed up..."
Gordon rolled his eyes at that, but grabbed the nearest turret and ran. He'd only barely set it down when the first wave of screaming horrors surged towards him. Then there was no time for anything but tearing into the vile things by any means necessary- shotgun, grenade, or turret, it scarcely mattered. The end of the antlion flood in one tunnel meant nothing at all beyond reload now and get ready to run; as soon as he'd drawn breath the lights would flare at another tunnel, and another. They just.
"Two lights! We've got 36- move those turrets, Freeman!"
Kept.
"Why are there so many???"
Coming, to the point where he found himself wondering if they couldn't partially defend the tunnels by shoving the piles of antlion corpses into some form of makeshift barricade-
"Three lights- I think we misunderestimated-" Griggs was shaking visibly. "Get ready! Oh, God, get ready! This is gonna be bad..."
Gordon ducked behind a heap of the dead bugs long enough to count over his shotgun shells; he'd run out of grenades long ago. Down the tunnel marked 12, there was a crashing sound and a sudden sharp smell of-
Ozone? Was that ozone?
He poked his head up over the corpse in time to see a bolt of green lightning sunder an antlion into its component parts, and the forms of Vortigaunts dropping into the tunnel from above one after another. "They made it!" Sheckley yelled. "It's the Vorts!"
The first of the three red-eyed aliens came forward, tucking its right fist into its left hand. "Ah," it said. "Freeman. Our delay... regrettable. We killed many antlions, yet many more remain."
"We must attend to the Alyx Vance," the Vort just behind it noted.
"There is no time," the first Vortigaunt said. "More antlions approach. We shall... quiet them." With that nicely ominous statement the lead Vort trotted down to take up a defensive position beside Alyx's table. The others split, one following Sheckley, one Griggs- and none too soon.
"Ah, shit! The whole place is lit up!" yelled Griggs. "Grab a tunnel!"
No more warnings after that. Only screaming, and Vortigaunt battle cries, and the smell of lightning and blood and gunfire. Bugs, Mr. Rico, he thought erratically as he spun to blast apart an antlion trying to savage him from behind. Zillions of 'em! But even that was more thought than he had time to spare. Wave after wave of the things came screaming at him, at the Vortigaunts, at Griggs and Sheckley, at Alyx-
No. Not at Alyx. Not as long as he could still prop himself up and pull a trigger.
One of the turrets blew, and then the other, and still they kept coming. Gordon swore and reloaded. He didn't dare take his eyes off the breach, now, it was down to him and maybe one of the Vortigaunts on that opening, the corpse pile wasn't even slowing the damn bugs down-
"Eat the Vortessence, you ant bastards!" screamed somebody. Sheckley, maybe. Didn't matter who. Lightning tore into the tunnel from three pairs of hands at once, and a stink like nothing Gordon had known since Black Mesa filled the air. Irrationally, he found himself thinking it a sign that they would survive... and sure enough, a strike or two later, the antlion assault ceased.
"We have exhausted their immediate number," rumbled the Vortigaunt just behind him. "Now to the next matter of urgency."
Gordon was already halfway down the ramp before the alien could finish saying Alyx's name.
"Her injuries are grave," said the Vortigaunt who had been there from the start, looking to the three new arrivals as they lifted their own glowing hands over Alyx's form. "This will necessitate deep submersion in the Vortessence."
A rumble of agreement went up from the others. Gordon dared a brief, shivering glance at Alyx's much too pale face.
"We require the larval extract," said the first Vortigaunt. "I will make the journey to seek the extract, deep within the nest in the sacred nectarium. But I cannot hope to bring it back alone."
"We must remain, to keep the Alyx Vance alive," said one of the others. The first nodded, and turned Gordon's way.
"Please, Freeman," it said. "Join me."
( "Enough to know that if you don't wipe it out, there won't be much for you to come home to..." )
"Yes! Take the Freeman!" "There is no finer companion!" "Just so!" echoed the others in a weird, overlapping chorus. The skin on the back of Gordon's neck prickled at the sound; but he nodded. There was never any question. Not with what was at stake.
The inhuman lines of the Vortigaunt's five-eyed face bent in a way that suggested approval. It set off at a run without any further ado, leading Gordon up the ramp and out of the pit, into the tunnel from whence the others had come.
"Sheckley!" cried a man's voice from up ahead, its tone strained almost beyond endurance. "We've got antlions!!"
Gordon turned sharply to look over his shoulder, but there was nothing. By the time he turned back there were two humans visible: one pale, wearing a medic's armband, and one bearded, hatted, and darker-skinned. The one in the hat was shaking his head in mild disgust. "Griggs, you idiot," he said to his companion, "that's Gordon Freeman. The Vortigaunt said he was on the way... Dr. Freeman, Alyx Vance is over here. The Vort's trying to patch her up."
He'd been traveling in the right direction after all. The rush of silent gratitude almost knocked his knees out from under him.
Sheckley jerked his head towards the wide equipment ramp behind him. Gordon followed, booted feet clanging against the metal slope as they made their way down to the bottom of the shaft. The Vortigaunt stood hunched over Alyx's prone, bent form, both its hands crackling with energy as it worked. Gordon's eyes couldn't help but stray to the dark, ruddy puddle surrounding Alyx on the table; he swallowed...
"Ah, Freeman," the Vortigaunt said. Gordon jerked his gaze away from the puddle. "It is well. The Alyx Vance clings to the margins. My kin are still some distance away." It fixed him with one baleful red eye and added, "For now, we must not be disturbed."
"Yeah, well, about that..." That was Sheckley, from behind Gordon. "That's gonna be tougher than it sounds. As long as you're down here, Freeman, maybe you can give us a hand."
He led the way back up to where Griggs was waiting, next to a tunnel labeled '36'. "We get a lot of antlions down here no matter what we do. Damn things want to turn this area into the next room in their warren. Griggs and me've rigged up some sensors on each of the tunnels so we've got a little warning where they're coming from and just how bad it's gonna get."
"Hey, Doc," said Griggs nervously. "On your way here, you weren't... followed, were you?"
"Don't listen to him, Doc." Sheckley snorted. "We're on edge because it's spawning season. They're always worse this time of year."
"The Vort says-" Griggs hesitated. "As long as we don't step on their grubs, they shouldn't hear us this far from the main nest."
Gordon's eyes flicked involuntarily downwards to the layer of goo that covered his feet and lower legs. Sheckley must've picked up on it, because the darker man hastily said, "Yeah, well, that's a theory I'd rather not test myself. We're down to our last two turrets-" He indicated the familiar form of a Combine gun turret to his left, painted instead in yellow and black and with the circled-lambda logo of the Resistance on one side. "And even these are held together by baling wire and duct tape at this point. Nice to have 'em in a pinch, but I wouldn't exactly trust 'em with my life."
"Ammo's over there," said Griggs, pointing to a huge, hefty crate near one of the tunnels. "And over on the other side, too. And medkits, everything you need for doctoring-"
One of the red lights behind Sheckley flared, and a siren began to sound. "Let's move," he said. "We have to defend the Vort."
Gordon, frankly, was glad for anything that took his mind off what was going on at the bottom of the pit. And after what he'd just had to slog through, well... he didn't trust the Combine-made submachine guns to do him any good at all. It was shotgun time.
The bugs came up from somewhere back in the dark parts of the tunnel, screeching like mad things. They charged the humans alone or in pairs, wings flaring. After the first few fell Gordon privately decided that the lone turret aiding them could probably hold off such an invasion by itself or with a little assistance- but it didn't stop him from firing, reloading, and firing again. These bugs and their kin owed him a lot of blood.
As the flood of antlions ebbed and the turret fell silent, Sheckley shook his head. "Hey, Doc," he said. "You came through the caves, right? Did you see any of their guardians?"
Gordon glanced at him curiously, wondering if he meant the spitters. Before Sheckley could elaborate, though, another siren began to sound- and another, from the tunnel labeled '24' opposite side of the pit. "We got the breech!" Sheckley said. He pointed towards a previously-overlooked hole in the wall. "Dr. Freeman, you grab the turrets and take care of 24. No offense, but it was pretty quiet until you showed up..."
Gordon rolled his eyes at that, but grabbed the nearest turret and ran. He'd only barely set it down when the first wave of screaming horrors surged towards him. Then there was no time for anything but tearing into the vile things by any means necessary- shotgun, grenade, or turret, it scarcely mattered. The end of the antlion flood in one tunnel meant nothing at all beyond reload now and get ready to run; as soon as he'd drawn breath the lights would flare at another tunnel, and another. They just.
"Two lights! We've got 36- move those turrets, Freeman!"
Kept.
"Why are there so many???"
Coming, to the point where he found himself wondering if they couldn't partially defend the tunnels by shoving the piles of antlion corpses into some form of makeshift barricade-
"Three lights- I think we misunderestimated-" Griggs was shaking visibly. "Get ready! Oh, God, get ready! This is gonna be bad..."
Gordon ducked behind a heap of the dead bugs long enough to count over his shotgun shells; he'd run out of grenades long ago. Down the tunnel marked 12, there was a crashing sound and a sudden sharp smell of-
Ozone? Was that ozone?
He poked his head up over the corpse in time to see a bolt of green lightning sunder an antlion into its component parts, and the forms of Vortigaunts dropping into the tunnel from above one after another. "They made it!" Sheckley yelled. "It's the Vorts!"
The first of the three red-eyed aliens came forward, tucking its right fist into its left hand. "Ah," it said. "Freeman. Our delay... regrettable. We killed many antlions, yet many more remain."
"We must attend to the Alyx Vance," the Vort just behind it noted.
"There is no time," the first Vortigaunt said. "More antlions approach. We shall... quiet them." With that nicely ominous statement the lead Vort trotted down to take up a defensive position beside Alyx's table. The others split, one following Sheckley, one Griggs- and none too soon.
"Ah, shit! The whole place is lit up!" yelled Griggs. "Grab a tunnel!"
No more warnings after that. Only screaming, and Vortigaunt battle cries, and the smell of lightning and blood and gunfire. Bugs, Mr. Rico, he thought erratically as he spun to blast apart an antlion trying to savage him from behind. Zillions of 'em! But even that was more thought than he had time to spare. Wave after wave of the things came screaming at him, at the Vortigaunts, at Griggs and Sheckley, at Alyx-
No. Not at Alyx. Not as long as he could still prop himself up and pull a trigger.
One of the turrets blew, and then the other, and still they kept coming. Gordon swore and reloaded. He didn't dare take his eyes off the breach, now, it was down to him and maybe one of the Vortigaunts on that opening, the corpse pile wasn't even slowing the damn bugs down-
"Eat the Vortessence, you ant bastards!" screamed somebody. Sheckley, maybe. Didn't matter who. Lightning tore into the tunnel from three pairs of hands at once, and a stink like nothing Gordon had known since Black Mesa filled the air. Irrationally, he found himself thinking it a sign that they would survive... and sure enough, a strike or two later, the antlion assault ceased.
"We have exhausted their immediate number," rumbled the Vortigaunt just behind him. "Now to the next matter of urgency."
Gordon was already halfway down the ramp before the alien could finish saying Alyx's name.
"Her injuries are grave," said the Vortigaunt who had been there from the start, looking to the three new arrivals as they lifted their own glowing hands over Alyx's form. "This will necessitate deep submersion in the Vortessence."
A rumble of agreement went up from the others. Gordon dared a brief, shivering glance at Alyx's much too pale face.
"We require the larval extract," said the first Vortigaunt. "I will make the journey to seek the extract, deep within the nest in the sacred nectarium. But I cannot hope to bring it back alone."
"We must remain, to keep the Alyx Vance alive," said one of the others. The first nodded, and turned Gordon's way.
"Please, Freeman," it said. "Join me."
( "Enough to know that if you don't wipe it out, there won't be much for you to come home to..." )
"Yes! Take the Freeman!" "There is no finer companion!" "Just so!" echoed the others in a weird, overlapping chorus. The skin on the back of Gordon's neck prickled at the sound; but he nodded. There was never any question. Not with what was at stake.
The inhuman lines of the Vortigaunt's five-eyed face bent in a way that suggested approval. It set off at a run without any further ado, leading Gordon up the ramp and out of the pit, into the tunnel from whence the others had come.
