Chapter Text
Neo was a normal person, somewhat unremarkable from an outside perspective.
Gordon Freeman was a glitched final boss, appearing in the game as an otherworldly being mimicking a guard.
Neo was alive, and lived in a tiny house in the real world.
Gordon Freeman was none of those things.
...
As of right now, all Gordon could really do was... slowly chip away at the void that he’d come to know as the “game-over plane”- his little skeleton stint at Dave & Busters was just him piloting another vessel... the REAL Gordon, or at least what was left of him, was considered dead.
That wasn’t very good for what he had in mind.
What Gordon wanted most of all was... WAS it revenge? It’s not like he was MAD at Benrey- Well, not angrier than he usually was at that smug little troublemaker.
Gordon wanted to really give that guy a scare. But... how?
He supposed once he made it out of the game-over plane, he could have free access to Benrey’s computer. Oh, maybe he could delete some of his PRECIOUS video games that guy loved so much...
Maybe he could even appear in another game! Make Benrey play as him... crash the game...
Oh, or open his paint program and paint threats.
Gordon rubbed his hands together, laughing. He didn’t really notice that every last one of his plans sounded INCREDIBLY stupid, considering he had been alone with his thoughts for... he didn’t even KNOW how long.
It had been long, though, and Gordon just KNEW he was about done recharging. He concentrated, focusing on his old power.
Focus, Gordon... Focus. You’re the single most powerful entity in... This game. You have the power to break out of the confines of it. You have the power to...!
Gordon felt his body tremble, as parts of him got ripped into code, bit by bit. Pixels of him all assembled, one by one, as Gordon looked around, observing his new surroundings...
It was dark.
Benrey must have his computer turned off. On one hand, that made sneaking around all the more easier... on the other hand, he couldn’t see shit.
He tried Sweet Voicing a few times, but their lighting was weak, and it didn’t really help him navigate when his path forward now looked like a shitty rave.
Gordon collided with something large, and rectangular-
Ahh. This must be the start menu. Gordon thought long and hard. Where was the rest of the desktop in relation to this again...?
Left, probably.
Yeah.
Definitely left.
Gordon inched to the left, dipping his foot over the start bar and feeling a wire. Benrey was a gamer, right? If he did enough recon, then he was right that gamers usually have two monitors. This must connect to the other side.
Gordon slipped into the wire, the wire crackling with electricity as it gave away where he was. It was a loooong wire, but he kept going. The spark of electricity eventually sputtered out at the outlet the wire was connected to, and the plug slowly started to lift itself out of its socket, hanging in the air.
A final crackle spat itself out of the outlet, as it started glowing a neon blue. Light pooled out of it, forming the shape of one foot- then another. A humanoid shape formed out of the light, tendrils slowly emerging from around their head.
The light faded, and there, standing in the game room, was Gordon Freeman.
It was... still dark, so he sighed, feeling his way around.
“Come on, Benrey, you’ve got to have a file SOMEWHERE...” Gordon grunted, his hand brushing over a surface that wasn’t.. entirely flat. He played with it some more, flicking what he eventually discovered was a switch.
A soft, yellow light filled the room, and Gordon found out the thing he had just flipped was, in fact, a lamp with a leg in fishnets and heels as a stand.
“Benrey, why the fuck do you have this...” Gordon muttered.
Wait- a lamp?
Gordon did a quick spin once more.
This... this was not a desktop.
This was a house.
...Maybe he should have turned right.
Gordon started to panic, looking around for where Benrey was. Was he even home? It was dark, so maybe not. He headed out to check.
Gordon nearly tripped over an air mattress.
He looked down at his feet, and on the air mattress, was someone who looked like they might be dead. Pale, unkempt, and with dark circles that could match a raccoon’s face mask... The only indication Gordon had they were still alive was the slow rising and falling of their chest.
Gordon crouched, positioning himself near the mystery person’s face. He thought hard- why would this person be lying on the ground?
They weren’t bleeding out, he was... PRETTY sure they weren’t poisoned or anything...
Gordon curiously lifted the person’s hand up, dropping it and watching it bounce on the mattress before landing, the person grunting in their sleep.
Maybe... they were working really hard. He remembered whenever Benrey had decided they had gone on far enough, him and the rest of the science team would lie on the ground and close their eyes for a few hours.
That was the same as this, right? Had this person gone to a journey all the way to Benrey’s house?
Gordon leaned in closer, wanting to get a closer look. The stranger had a messy mop of hair that... well, it looked like it was SUPPOSED to be shaved off on one side, but their hair was so long that some of it ended up resting back over there anyways.
Gordon brushed their hair out of their face, watching them closely for any signs of-
The person’s eyes fluttered open, and they whined softly.
-Movement.
“C’mon, man, five more minutes...” They croaked, eyes shutting again.
Why did that voice sound like-?
“...Benrey??”
This time, the person’s eyes SNAPPED open, and they stared at Gordon like a deer in headlights.
“Gordon???”
They looked terrified- like, genuinely terrified.
“Please don’t kill me,” he squeaked.
“Wh- No, I’m not gonna kill you!” Gordon said with a huff, folding his arms and leaning back.
“Dude... you’re real,” they said quietly.
“You’re real, and you’re here to kill me, because that’s what you always do,” He said, retracting their hands quickly as they spiralled.
“Come on, man, don’t- snap out of it,” Gordon said quickly.
“No!” The person yelled, tugging his hoodie over his head. “You’re gonna- gonna do SOMETHING to me, cos you’re WEIRD and SCARY an’ always YELLING AT ME...”
Gordon sighed, looking away. “Look. I won’t-“
“That was at Black Mesa. Things are... different now.”
He glanced back up at them, lowering his arms. “I’ll... see, I’ll even let you feel how... real I am? And the entire time, I won’t kill you.”
“That’s, um... one of your human trust exercises, right?”
Benrey sat there for a while, but eventually moved to look at Gordon, studying him from head to toe curiously. He moved his hand forward in a silent request to touch, and Gordon obliged. Benrey adjusted his helmet, squished his face, and let his tendrils run through their hands.
It seemed like that terror was slowly melting away, and Benrey opened his mouth to say the first thing he could after regaining his composure.
“Were you watching me sleep? Kinda gay of you,” Benrey said with a smirk Gordon had seen one too many times.
“I wasn’t!” Gordon spluttered. “I was just... waiting for you to wake up. That’s all.”
“To tell me what you’re doing in my house and room?” Benrey leaned forward, his tired eyes fixated on Gordon.
“Ugh... Okay. But you’re not gonna like it.”
Gordon sighed. “I broke out of the game to get revenge and, I don’t fucking know, mess with your files or something. And I took a wrong turn at the desktop, and... went down the outlet plug. I guess.”
“Duuuuude,” Benrey said with a laugh, patting his hands on his knees rapidly. “That’s AWESOME. Up top.”
He lifted his hand for a high-five, and Gordon did so awkwardly.
“I thought you’d be a lot more mad... for a lot longer,” Gordon grumbled.
“I mean...” Benrey said, playing with their foot-shaped necklace.
...Why did he have these things.
“Getting my hand cut off was a bit of a dick move, and I think your god power gave me a little shock in my VR gear, but, um- I DID get a bit too into character n’ stuff. I have both hands, see?” Benrey stuck his hands in front of Gordon’s face.
“...Yeah. I see that, Benrey,” Gordon replied.
“You can call me Neo,” Ben- er, Neo...? said with a grin. “That’s my real name.”
“Your REAL name?” Gordon said, his voice ascending three pitches. “Your name ISN’T Benrey?! You LIED to me, you miscreant! Do you have ANY idea how stupid that is? Running around and saying you’re NOT dangerous when you don’t even have the RIGHT NAME??”
Neo shrugged. “Umm, usually people don’t use... their real name? Not in games like this.”
Their eyes darted away from Gordon as they put the foot necklace in their mouth, chewing nervously.
“‘S video game characters... the player wuz Barney... n’ I wann’d to see if I could make NPCs say it a bit- a bit fucked up...”
Gordon tucked his tendrils down in embarrassment. “Oh... yeah. I guess that makes sense.”
He swallowed roughly, and found himself unable to look at Neo, who was...
He was the same old Benrey, right? But... this wasn’t Black Mesa.
Neo knew what he was. Gordon didn’t have to pretend. And even though there was this... itch that scurried down Gordon’s back whenever Neo was so nonchalant about everything... He wasn’t doing anything wrong, was he? No, this was Neo’s house.
Neo... isn’t a security breach.
Gordon stuck out his hand quietly.
“Howdy. My name’s Gordon Freeman.”
Neo cackled, that signature weird Benrey cackle. “What’s this about, man? Got amnesia?”
Gordon hissed, his hair flaring up before he breathed in, calming himself down.
“No, I mean- we got off on the wrong foot. I was trying to hide my identity... you were on a mission... I tried to kill you.. you DID kill me...”
“So let’s start again.”
Neo smiled, grabbing Gordon’s hand and shaking it. “Neo. What’s popping?”
Neo looked away for a moment, popping their lips awkwardly. “So, um... wanna play some... video games, or something?”
Gordon scratched his head awkwardly. “Yeah... yeah, sure.”
“No no wait!” Neo said excitedly, getting up. “I wanna show you what I’ve been working on, man! Come sit.”
Neo sat in a large, red gamer chair, and patted an empty blue one near him labelled ‘guest chair’ with a comic sans label maker. Gordon sat, making himself comfortable, as Neo switched open their monitor.
“Okay, so. Here’s my copy of Half-Life 1. That’s where you come from, bro,” Neo said, highlighting it.
Gordon nodded. “Yeah, I’m following.”
“So, um... I open it up, and I click my save-game, and it takes me to a black screen. Here- trade helmets,” Neo said, making grabby hands as he held out a VR headset.
Gordon took off his helmet, plopping it on Neo’s head and chuckling as it immediately sank down way too far. Wearing that helmet, Neo almost looked like he was always a bit angry, or serious.
... Why was he so focused on Neo??
He put the headset on quickly, and Neo continued. “Yeahhh, sooo... you see the screen’s black still, right?”
Gordon nodded.
“Wait for it... wait for it... THERE!”
“...What do you mean, ‘there’? There was nothing there, Neo,” Gordon complained.
Neo grunted, zooming in and blowing up the VR display.
“Now, watch it again,” they said. “THERE!”
Gordon saw it- a few pixels of cyan.
Then some green.
Then some blue.
“The science team...” he muttered.
“Yeah, man. They’re still in there,” Neo said, exiting the game and tapping on Gordon’s helmet, signalling for him to lift it up. He did, and they exchanged helmets once more. Neo turned back to the computer. “I’ve been working on getting them out for the past week... got the- the gamer setup here. The air mattress. Not sleeping for um... time. Time long.”
“I think you need some sleep,” Gordon said. He didn’t really KNOW that, but... the way Neo slurred those last few words didn’t sit right with him.
“Nah ‘s good. Neo donneed sleeb,” Neo said, blinking in succession. They shook their head, opening up the next part of their little tour. “Okay, ummmm... Here’s my cooode.”
“I think it’s... really close to being finished,” Neo said with a smile. “Um... I’m not very good at this, though. So I had to get some help.. um.”
A code box opened, which Gordon assumed was Neo’s first draft.
IF: SCIENCE TEAM
THEN: YES
Holy shit, they weren’t kidding about being bad.
Neo closed it with a blush. “Um... so yeah. That was kinda my plan. To bring- to bring ‘em out. I was gonna show you guys Gmod, and maybe we could rob that bank ‘n shit...”
“Robbing banks is illegal,” Gordon interrupted.
“C’mon, man,” Neo snorted, nudging him in the stomach. “Don’t be a party pooper.”
“Tch-“
“...What’s Gmod?” Gordon asked slowly.
Neo’s eyes LIT UP. He quickly sorted through his incredibly messy desktop, opening a bunch of folders- Gordon wasn’t going to ask what “Good PS2 Games” was about- until he finally realized that Gmod had been on his desktop the whole time.
Neo spun around to face Gordon as Gmod loaded up. “Okay, so. Half-Life, right? The company that made it got some shit called the Source Engine. This game borrows a lotta shit from the source engine. You following? Now, a lotta people just use it to dick around. But it’s, like, powerful, bro... And I wanted to show it to you guys for ooone reason in particular.”
Neo spun back around, pointing to the screen eagerly. Their player model was familiar to Gordon- Benrey.
What was very much unfamiliar to him was how Benrey was spitting out musical, rainbow orbs.
“Wh- HEY! I didn’t teach you that! How are you doing the Sweet Voice??” Gordon yelled, leaning over to see.
“I think... I think you’re fucked up,” Neo said.
“Okay, rude.”
“No, no, I mean, like. You’re a glitch, dude. You were like, the really ugly final boss thing, but you’re totally a glitch, so you got the power to like- be a guard and use Gmod assets and stuff.”
Gordon blinked once or twice, cocking his head to the side as he studied the Sweet Voice. “Huh... Does it still have the same effects?”
“That’s the cool part, bro. It doesn’t. You INVENTED lore, Gordos,” Neo said with an excited grin. “Wait, wait.. can you still do it??”
Gordon frowned. “Of course. Why wouldn’t I be able to, dude?” He cleared his throat, and began to sing.
“Wow. Gay little Gordon,” Neo muttered, trying to hide the fact they were blushing.
Neo got beaned in the face by a red orb before Gordon continued.
Neo reached out to touch them- the beautiful, glowing spheres that had become a different thing from the Wowozela entirely. As they stuck their fingers in, they felt a calm shudder go down their back, and they hummed pleasantly.
“Epic.”
Gordon finished with a smile. “Thank you.”
“Oh, oh, ooone more thing...” Neo quickly tapped at his keyboard frantically, a mischievous grin spreading across his face.
“Woah, woah, what the hell are you doing?” Gordon asked with a squint.
“Hey. Look what I can do,” Neo said, leaning back and admiring his work.
Gordon was transfixed by Benrey’s model, which was morphing and glitching exactly the way he had during the final battle.
“What the fuck-“
“Packs, my man... packs.” Neo cackled like an old hag then deactivated the changes, going back to whacking everything with a crowbar.
“That’s... amazing, actually. I didn’t know that all my... My biology? Came from...” Gordon muttered to himself, watching his hair wrap around his finger.
“Kinda,” Neo shrugged. “Umm... I think your thing was actually... the- the game not knowing how to handle the True Gordon. So it defaulted to- to corrupting the model. Y’know?”
“No, I don’t know, because I’m a fucking AI,” Gordon said dryly.
Neo reached out their hand expectantly, and one of Gordon’s tendrils wrapped its way onto Neo’s finger as well.
“Man...You’re in the real world now, though? You were already self-aware and fucked up, but now you’re like. Flesh Gordon Freeman.”
“Gordon FLESHMAN!” Neo whooped, wheezing at his own joke.
Gordon rolled his eyes. But still... it was oddly reassuring. He had already come to terms with the idea that he was a video game character, but to carve out his own agency... It was a great power trip. Almost as fun as beating everyone up on Xen!
...Well, he shouldn’t say it was fun.
Even if it kinda was.
He snapped back to reality when he realized Neo was staring at him in awe.
“Dude...”
“Do you think if you made it to the real world, the science team could too??”
He shook Gordon by the shoulders excitedly, wiggling in place.
“Er... yeah, I guess so, man. This place big enough for them, though?” Gordon asked, looking around the room.
“Yeah, man. I’ve been looking for roomies for a while, now, but I think using some of my... resources n’ stuff, I can pick up most of the rent myself,” Neo said excitedly, wiggling his arms.
“And I could get a job too! A human job!” Gordon added to the excitement, but Neo frowned.
“Gordo, you didn’t even know what sleeping was.”
“Well- I do NOW, okay?! Jeez,” Gordon huffed, folding his arms.
“Yeah well we’ll see. As long as your job isn’t anthropology related you SHOULD be epic and gamer. Now... Do you think we can. Um. Get them out?” Neo asked, looking at Gordon expectantly as they tapped their fingertips together.
“I think...” Gordon said, closing his eyes. “I think if I’m still strong enough, I can just boundary-break into the game and drag them all out with me.”
“Like a barrel of monkeys!” Neo added.
“Yeah. Like a barrel of monkeys. But if it doesn’t work and I get stuck there, you have to finish your code.”
“...Got that?”
“I’ll never let you rest if you don’t.”
Neo blew a raspberry. “JEEEEEZ, Gordino, Bubby’s already got a death threat on me. Don’t gotta add another to it.”
He looked away. “...Good luck, Gordon.”
“...Thanks,” Gordon said quietly, adjusting his helmet. He went over to the computer outlet, as Neo pulled up Half-Life.
Gordon crouched near the outlet, putting his hand on the plug. Slowly, it started to lift out of the socket, that same electric blue light making up the distance between the socket and the plug. Gordon started to disappear into the light, and Neo nodded, looking back around their shoulder every few seconds.
Gordon made his way back to the start bar, looking around Neo’s desktop-
Where’d the desktop go?
Ahh.
Gordon realized that Neo had pulled up MS Paint and was now trying to draw arrows so that Gordon wouldn’t get lost.
“HALF LIVES THIS WAYS!!!!!! :)”
God dammit, Neo.
Gordon walked over to the black window, and slowly stuck his head inside like he was diving in a dumpster. He looked around, checking for life, only to see a group of people sitting in a circle, playing a card game.
Bubby looked over his shoulder, and flipped him off.
“Ahh! Hello, fucker!”