Half-Life

Story

Dr. Gordon Freeman is late for work at 8:47 a.m. at the Black Mesa Research Facility, using the advanced Black Mesa streetcar system that runs through the facility. When he arrives at the anomalous materials lab, his workplace, the security guard informs him that the scientists are conducting a special experiment today. He goes to the lower floors of the lab and arrives at the anti-mass chamber, where he learns that the sample to be used that day is the rarest and also the most unstable. He is told to push the sample into the scanning beam of the anti-mass spectrometer for analysis. However, as soon as he slides it in, it explodes, triggering a sudden catastrophe called the "resonance cascade," which opens a portal between Earth and a dimension called Xen. Freeman is apparently teleported to an alien planet and sees various alien life forms, including a circle of Vortigaunts, just before he passes out.