There is an odd quickening, a sense of metamorphosis in the environment. The sky beings to darken ominously. The vivid green color begins to leach from the grass and leaves. The bird song is fading. The sound of wind begins to sweep up. The running water in the creek sinks into its bed
“Don’t blink or you will miss it. Sometimes everything can change…overnight.”
There is a flash. Suddenly everything has changed. The earth is brown; the sky is grey. The streambed is dry and black. The trees are twisted skeletons now. The sound of birds has been replaced with the distant cries of houndeyes and bullsquids. A crow crouches in the black willows, cawing. On the horizon the city appears grey, no longer lively. A pall hangs over it. In the sky, streaks of deadly light, dark aircraft. Explosions bloom on the horizon. Louder, louder, the explosions coming closer, closer. There is another explosion, surrounding you.
“Don’t be nervous. We’re not really here…not yet anyway.”
Another flash engulfs you, and as it fades you find the land has changed again. The earth is utterly blasted. The streambed is choked with ashes. The trees are gone. There is a new sound in the wasteland where you stand, an ugly insect chirring. The city is a blackened ruin, its surviving towers tilted and about to fall. The sky is choked with smoke. From the center of the city, an alien spire begins to rise, towering over the damaged human structures. A light flares out from the spire, like a beacon.
[Half Life 2 first scripts]
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