Gordon got used to bad sleep long, long ago. It's better than it used to be- five hours at a stretch before the nightmares kick in, sometimes more than that- but it's still a very strange thing for him to wake up without some sort of interruption or disturbance.

This night, alas, is a strange thing of an entirely different sort. When his breath ( Read more... )

Beyond the door that Magnusson opened lay a short corridor; it opened out, inevitably, to a dimly lit garage. Gordon had just enough time to appreciate the rocket launcher and stacks of RPG crates next to it when a grease-stained rebel waves to him from the other side of the garage. "Dr. Freeman, that's for you," he said, "but I wanted to show you ( Read more... )

Seattle-Tacoma International Airport (SEA)
South Satellite Terminal (International Departures)
Delta Airlines Waiting Area

"Mom said I'd find you here."
( If you twist and turn away )
The red-haired man in the pilot uniform paused mid-stride, turned with one eyebrow raised. Oh, the look on his face said louder than any words, there you are.
( If ( Read more... )

It takes twenty minutes to move from merely napping to the start of a proper sleep cycle. Anything before that is just idling, so to speak. After the twenty-minute mark the brain and body rhythms kick in that lead inevitably into dream and out of it. From there they ebb and flow, three to three-and-a-half hours at a time, until light or sound or ( Read more... )

Some days are longer than others. Days where the weather outside is rainy and bleak, and an attempt to get to the target range involved several falls and a lot of scratches and mud, and the sleep the night before had been poorer, thinner stuff than usual are a fine example of this. All Gordon wants at the end of a day like this is the chance to get ( Read more... )

( Here we stand or here we fall )
"I have been asked to say a few words to the transhuman arm of Sector Seventeen Overwatch, concerning recent successes in containing members of the resistance Science Team."
( History won't care at all )It was Dr. Breen's voice this time over the prison's PA system, not the distorted, pseudo-British female ( Read more... )

If antlions had eyes, Gordon couldn't have said where they were for the life of him. Nevertheless, the two antlions in the pit were staring at him, he was sure of it. The problem was that all his life, he'd been told not to stare back at a dangerous animal if he could help it, and he had no clue where he was supposed to look or not look. "Uh," he ( Read more... )

For all that he knew it made him a blatant target, and for all that the rebels at Lighthouse Point had assured him he was close enough to his destination not to need it any more, Gordon stell felt a twinge of mourning as he watched the Combine dropship cruise away with the dune buggy in its clutches. He'd liked that car. On the other hand, there ( Read more... )

( As silent as a mirror is believed
Realities plunge in silence by . . . )Once there was a cliff, hundreds of feet tall, millions of years old. Once there was a river, away down below as far as the eye could see and the stone could fall. Once there were terrible things tearing through the air and men with guns in the hot bright desert daylight, and ( Read more... )

Gravel sprayed everywhere as the buggy's wheels suddenly realized Gordon had pulled the handbrake lever. The buggy fishtailed to a stop; Gordon didn't much notice. He was too busy looking for some sign of human presence. There'd been Combine holed up near the last thumper, and the fighting had slowed him down. The settlement- New Little Odessa, ( Read more... )