(Untitled)

[acts_of_gord]

[OOM: Gordon had a Terrible, Horrible, No Good Very Bad Day once.

Yesterday, it had some competitionWhen Gordon finally came in from walking the lake last night and went upstairs, he found his note to Alyx about going outside undisturbed on the bed. More importantly, he found the bed undisturbed as a whole. This... didn't surprise him, all things

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[watching_you]

Gordon looks like a sad picture drawn in sidewalk chalk on a rainy day.

Veronica can sympathize.

"Hey." Her tone is gentler than her words might suggest: "Is this a private moping party or can anyone join?"

[watching_you]

"How the hell did you manage not to get devoured or tentacled or face-huggered or whatever these particular beasties' M.O. was?"

[acts_of_gord]

"Headcrabbed," Gordon says. "The most up-close-and-personal species of the invaders was a parasite that looked like a tick. It'd clap itself over a person's head, open up their skull, and start piloting the body around as a zombie... anwyay, they didn't get me because I found out very fast that the crowbar the maintenance guys left in the emergency closet for prying open stuck doors works as a bludgeoning weapon, and then I found a dead security guard and discovered that I'm really good with guns."

[watching_you]

"Ugh."

Zombies. Had to be zombies. Veronica wraps her arms around herself to suppress a shudder.

"So what was alien invasion number two?"

[acts_of_gord]

"That..." Gordon shakes his head. "By the end of the invasion at Black Mesa I wound up in the dimension the aliens were coming from. The survivors sent me there to kill the thing directing the invasion. The being that teleported me out after I'd killed it sent me here, and I got stuck here for two months. Then, without warning, I got sent back into my own world- twenty years after the Incident."

"The second invasion, the one that saw Earth get conquered, had happened sixteen years before."

[watching_you]

It's a couple long seconds before Veronica can think of anything to say.

When she does get over it, all she can manage is a weak "Ouch."

[acts_of_gord]

"yeah."

Gordon exhales.

"Gets better. The people who survived Black Mesa- and the alien species that went over to our side after the invasion- started spreading stories. Pretty much the whole world thinks I'm their last hope at this point..."

"So, well. Not a lot of lab work any more."

[watching_you]

"No, I imagine not."

She leans back, letting her head flop onto the couch, eyes studying the beams of the ceiling.

"The last hope. That's fun." She chuckles. "Like Jesus with a crowbar. Fantastic."

[acts_of_gord]

"They put me in a stained glass window," Gordon says in a pained tone. "It was an Eastern Orthodox church of some kind and they put me in a window next to saints and things. That's just not right."

[watching_you]

That gets a laugh.

Without moving, Veronica shifts her gaze back to Gordon.

"So is that why you're looking like the world's most vengeful storm cloud has taken up residence above your head? Existential crisis from being a geek one day, the stuff of hymns the next?

"Uh, not that you're a geek."

[acts_of_gord]

"No, that's something else," Gordon says. "And I'm told I was always more of a nerd than a geek. This is just- would you believe me if I said I have a girlfriend, for starters?"

[watching_you]

Veronica gives a wounded look.

"Hey, now that's a mean question. Why wouldn't I believe that?"

[acts_of_gord]

"A real girlfriend, not a Canadian I met on the Internet."

[watching_you]

Flatly, "You've been mistreated by a lot of attractive blonde women, haven't you."

[acts_of_gord]

"That would imply that I interacted with them much," Gordon says. "I knew they existed, but science first, bike racing second, women... somewhere after that, I was never very clear on where." He shrugs. "Anyway. The point is, I do have one, and things got ugly the last time we spoke, and I don't know how to fix it."

[watching_you]

Veronica rolls her eyes as he speaks, but eventually manages to look sympathetic.

"Well that sucks. What happened? If you don't mind me asking."

After all the things he's told her thus far today, it might seem an odd qualifier - but there's personal, and then there's personal.