(Untitled)

[acts_of_gord]

"Having a pleasant evening, Dr. Freeman?"

It was too dark to see the speaker. It didn't matter. There was only one voice like that, anywhere, ever.

A flicker of green briefly lit up a lipless, mirthless smile. "And here you'd been under the- impression- that you were all out of such things. That you would never have a quiet evening to yourself

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[a_mere_child]

Alyx isn't sure what stirred her awake. There was no loud noise, nothing jostling her, no bad dreams (that she can remember, anyway)... and yet here she is, wide awake in the middle of the night for no apparent reason.

It doesn't take her long to realize she's not alone in that.

"Gordon?"

[acts_of_gord]

It takes Gordon a moment to realize that was actually a voice, and not just some stray thought of his.

"Over here. Didn't mean to wake you."

[a_mere_child]

Alyx sits up and peers at the desk. "What are you doing?"

[acts_of_gord]

Gordon hesitates a moment, then shrugs. There's a desk lamp, a small one with three settings; he'd been using it on the lowest, but he turns it up a notch so Alyx can see.

Some of it is the math that he knows all too well, the math that lies behind the theory of slingshot teleportation. Some of it is fuzzier; it's what he remembers from those terrible moments at Aperture, staring at the screen that promised a way to punch through Black Mesa's satellite barriers. Some of it's just doodled speculation, though, branching trees of circles expanding rapidly outward from a central trunk. A few of the circles are labeled- Xen, Earth, Overworld- but the rest are just speculation, not named at all. Sometimes he thinks that way. Sometimes he tries not to.