Alright, getting back into Black Mesa! The wattpad app is apparently having some... problems... so I'm writing this on the desktop site for the first time in... forever? I don't know the last time I wrote anything on a computer. Did I ever? I have no idea.

But, regardless, let's get on with it!

Last time, we ended off with Gordon jumping into an alien air duct. And where does it spit him out?

Right behind this sort of control center with a couple vortigaunts in it! Oh, yeah, and our arrival sounds an alarm!

Luckily, the vorts are our friends now, so this one goes and

Pulls the plug on the alarm! Then he goes right back to working, seemingly pretending to never have even seen Gordon in the first place...

But anyway. A short crawl through a few more air ducts, and we get a good look at the interior of this place, which would appear to be some sort of factory. I wonder what they're making...

(Just kidding, I already know.)

Hey buddy! How's it going?

Is that so? I'll leave you to it, then.

(I do like this, though, how none of the vortigaunts will look at you for more than a few seconds, like they're doing their utter best to not acknowledge that there's a disruption in their midst. They want Gordon to keep causing the chaos he's been causing. They want him to destroy the factory. And they're doing all they can to help him without raising the suspicion of their masters- which means ignoring that he's even there at all.)

One of the things that always kinda made me wonder in the whole of the Half-Life series is that the vorts never seem to use their third arm in any way. What's its purpose? Why have a third appendage if it serves no purpose? So I really like these animations for them, where they're actually using the third arm, even if it is for something so little as rubbing their chins.

Also, as I was progressing through the factory, I came to an unsettling realization, one that I don't recall being apparent in the original Half-Life. This factory, its walls, its ground, it all appears...

So very, unsettlingly organic. It looks like its made of meat, and these seams in the wall look like gaping wounds, stitched together with metal cables. Is this factory built inside something living? Was the factory grown? Was it sewn together from the flesh of a living creature? I don't know, and these are all very uncomfortable questions.

But regardless, Freeman presses on, unplugging machines and pressing buttons with no idea of what they do. And soon enough, that seems to cause a problem!

This display is all lit up in red, and it looks like there's some sort of clog in this tubing! Clearly, the answer...

Is to shoot it!

Seriously, Gordon. You keep getting really lucky, messing with all this alien technology that  you have no idea how it works. What if it had exploded and started pouring toxic liquid all over? You had no way of knowing that's not what would have happened!

Eventually, after shooting up a few more clogged pipes, we come to this sort of central display. It's got this kind of cool holographic map, and--

Gordon- Gordon, are you sure you want to plug that wire into that outlet? You have no idea what that's going to do!

But of course, you plug it in anyway, and what a surprise! It sounds an alarm, and more overseers fly in and start mind controlling the vortigaunts and shooting stuff at you, and you have to fight them off! For crying out loud, Gordon! What did I say about messing with alien technology you know nothing about?!

But oh well, nothing to be done about it now. Let's just...

...keep moving through this...

...uncomfortably fleshlike factory.

Seriously, this almost makes it look like these tubes are either the factory's veins, or else something being pumped into the factory's veins. I don't like it.

(Well. I mean. I don't like it in a sort of more general sense. In as far as the environment it sets in  the game, I think it's fantastically alien, and it works really well.)

But anyway, I'll leave you  off here, with Gordon crawling not through an alien air duct,

but through the interior of a creepily meaty tunnel! This must be so unsettling! Why would you willingly crawl in there! Gordon, you're insane!

Also, on a side note, if you're a Half-Life fan who enjoyed either Freeman's Mind or Half-Life: Full Life Consequences, I have some good news for you! The next big stupid funny Half-Life video production is here: Half-Life VR but the AI is self aware, by wayneradiotv on youtube/twitch! It combines all the stupid insanity of Full Life Consequences with all the enraged screaming of Freeman's Mind! You should go watch it! And don't forget your passport!