HLVRAI Oneshots

Breaching the Skybox and making an unexpected friend

He couldn't remember how long it'd been since the Resonance Cascade. Mostly because he hadn't been paying attention. Not to mention, it's hard to keep track of time when you're trying not to die. Not that that's been too much of an issue for Dr. Harold Coomer, PhD, though. A few punches was all it took to goon some enemies. That's what years of practice gets you! They'd just finished talking about a certain security guard, and were getting ready to continue. Dr. Coomer hadn't taken that conversation too seriously, though. It was hard to really care about what Gordon was saying when his beautiful husband was kicking ass at soccer in the background. But now, they were moving on. Gordon had finished speaking to Benrey about the decision to let him cone along, and they'd begun moving. Gordon had seemed to stop, though, looking towards some big, red doors, and motioning towards them.

"That's going to take us back into the base. Why don't we just climb? Why don't we just go over the rocks and fucking— get out of here? We're at the surface—" He asked, now motioning towards the mountains. That was when Bubby had stepped into the conversation cutting Gordon off, and squinting at him with crossed arms.

"Gordon, do you remember that we're in the middle of nowhere?" Bubby questioned, clearly doubting that it would be a good idea.

"We could walk." The man suggested, squinting back at him. The two hadn't always gotten along. At least, that's what Coomer had seen thus far. In all honesty, he doesn't really care much about their little subconscious feud. As long as it's safe and consensual, what's the harm in a good ol' battle of wits? This train of thought was cut off by an idea he had, which he quickly vocalized.

"I could always try to clear the mountaintops with my SuperLegs!" Dr. Coomer suggested, looking over the rocks, at the sky. It wasn't even that big of a jump for him, really. He'd jumped higher than THAT before. What did he have to lose?

"You wanna give it a shot?" Gordon asked, tilting his head a bit. Before he could even hear what Bubby was saying, he'd sprung over the mountains at high-speeds, ready to see what was on the other side.

Dr. Coomer landed on the other side of the mountains, standing on some sand. He looked back over at the mountains, to find that they were completely hollow on this side. Then, his attention was drawn to what lay beyond the mountains. The sand continued for a little while, until everything simply stopped. This confused him greatly. It hadn't quite hit him yet. Slowly, he started walking towards the edge. Hesitantly, Dr. Coomer stepped off of the sand, and onto the void.

Void. That's all it was. That was what he was standing on. Absolutely nothing. He was surrounded by nothing. There's nothing out here. How? This isn't possible, he thinks. He remembers the outside. He LIVED out there. He had a family out there, before he started working at Black Mesa. Black Mesa. That's where he works. Why is there nothing outside of it? Had he missed something? No. He would never not hear of something like this. Harold was hit with an overwhelming sense of dread, as he became fully realized.

Nothing is real. That's why there's nothing out there. This is fake. He looks down at his hands to find that they're nothing but polygons. He tries to separate his fingers, but he can't. Dr. Coomer places his hands on his lab-coat, trying to find any semblance of reality that there might be. His clothes are a part of his skin. He doesn't have organs, or blood, or a brain, even. He's just a 3D model. He runs back over to the sand, falling to his knees and desperately trying to scoop it up. It's flat. There's no texture. It's a completely flat surface. The man ran over to the hollowed-out mountains, hoping to feel rocks when he ran his hand over it. Nothing. He felt his face. No hair, no eyes, no nose. He's just a couple of polygons.

Now he was thinking about it. The more he thought about it, the more things made sense. Those weren't clones. Those were NPCs. All of those things that happened were scripted. He wasn't speaking on impulse. Those were his prerecorded lines, recorded by somebody who was REAL. He didn't have a personality. It was all fake. He's not Dr. Coomer. He's listed as 'Einstein' in the files. All of the things he did in the past— were those memories fake as well? Had he been lying to himself the entire time? They felt real. But, he knows they weren't. He didn't exist until the game was turned on.