Chapter Text
Gordon took a drag from the last bit of his cigarette letting the smoke burn his lungs before releasing the breath. He leaned against the railing outside of the back of the Black Mesa Facility.
Beside him, his friend and co-worker Darnold already stubbed his out. "I'm heading in," he said.
Gordon waved him off while debating another cigarette instead of going in. He figures being lectured about it wasn't worth the time so he pushed himself from the railing. He doesn't get a step towards the door when a bright light filled the sky in a flash, following it was a bolt of light streaking across the sky above him. Gordon's eyes follow it and he sees the light land just over a hill not far from the facility.
Gordon looked behind him at the door back into the building and back to where the light landed. Normally he'd say fuck that and go back to work, he's bored enough to give in to his curiosity.
It doesn't take very long for Gordon to walk up the hill, he could see the smoke billowing from the crash site. He begins running towards it, as he got closer he can make out it's not a rock type object. Gordon froze just outside the crater it had made.
It was a space ship; the craft was round and looked to have stubby legs on it for landing but now most of was crushed into the earth. Gordon made his way over slowly, there were a few bits of desert bush on fire but wasn't dangerous enough to stop Gordon. The door was blasted open; it was free of fire so Gordon entered.
Inside a bunch of ruined consoles lined the walls. A single chair was in the middle, he can guess that's the captain's chair. He couldn't see the previous occupants of the ship anywhere. He looked at the consoles but couldn't make out what was being shown on them.
He felt his foot kick something when he moved away; he looked down and saw a large perfectly cut gemstone, it was about the size of his palm and a bright yellow. He picked it up and looked it over, it was gorgeous. He put it into his pocket and was about to look around when a bang startled him.
"Come out with your hands up!" A gruff voice yelled from outside the door.
Gordon does as he says until he got out and saw it was just the head of Black Mesa security Leon Forzen.
"What are you doing here, Freeman," he demanded.
"I came to see what happened," Gordon said.
Forzen frowned deeper and he almost growls, "Leave now, it's very dangerous here. We'll take care of it."
Gordon doesn't fight him; he left with the single gem he'd found, his hand clutched it in his pocket feeling the cool surface. He doesn't bother to return to work and heads straight home, he doesn't want anyone to see what he had.
Once he was safe in his home Gordon took a breath then took out the gem from his pocket.
The yellow color of the gem is so vibrant Gordon can't stop looking at it; the cut is perfect, it's in a shape Gordon isn't sure of so he looks it up– it's called pear, apparently. He can't believe the size of it now that he can really look at it, he could never sell it but he thought about how rich it'd make him.
He dropped the thought, he placed the gem on his kitchen counter before going to take a shower; he didn't see until then that he was covered in dirt and sweat.
Gordon finished his shower, he's drying off his hair when he hears a loud crash from his living room. Gordon pulls the towel tight around his waist. Shit! They know, he thought to himself. He didn't have anything in the bathroom to protect himself, so he takes it slow; he peaks out and doesn't hear anything else.
He sighed and scoffed, he was being paranoid. Gordon stepped out of the bathroom fully and headed to his bedroom. Gordon nearly screamed when his bedroom door swung open first.
Gordon came eye to eye with a... person? They were human-shaped: tall, lanky, with a rectangular build but the whole body was unnatural shades of yellow. Their skin looked smooth to the touch with not a single imperfection, expect oddly enough wrinkles around the forehead and eyes. His eyes look them up and down before landing on the same exact gemstone from the crash, he looked over at the counter to see it was indeed missing.
"Ah–" Gordon doesn't know what to say, he looked back at the being in his doorway.
The being looked at him, slowly blinking but does not a word. Gordon was becoming increasingly uncomfortable standing still dripping and in a towel while just staring at this, alien ?
He clears his throat and tries again, "um, hi?"
That seemed to get their attention. "Hi! I'm Yellow Fluorite," they said smiling.
"Y–Yellow Fluorite," Gordon said confused. "Like the stone?"
"Yeah, see," they said pointing to the gem in their chest.
Gordon nodded stupidly, he wasn't sure what else to say. "Can I get into my room to get dressed?" He asked.
They tilted their head in confusion but moved passed Gordon and into his living room. Gordon watched him fiddling with things, he didn't want to leave them alone though it was quickly outweighed by a shiver going through his body from the air on his bare chest. He goes to his room and changes as fast as he can.
Back in this living room, he heard the being moving around.
He stands at the door just absolutely not sure what to do; he couldn't believe it honestly. He opened the door with a sigh. Everything is quite so far; he looked overseeing the rock being found his laptop.
"What are you doing?" He asked.
"What is this?" They ask back.
"A laptop, you use it to do a bunch of stuff."
"Can I use it to find my friends?"
"You're friends?" Gordon thought for a moment. "There were other stones?"
"Yes! Please we have to get them," he said getting into Gordon's personal space.
"Listen– Yellow Fluorite?" They nodded. "I don't know where they could be, I didn't even see them."
"So you won't help?" They said, their voice wavered and Gordon panics not wanting them to cry.
"No, no. I just mean I can't do it right now. Maybe I can learn something at work tomorrow," Gordon was panicking more, he wasn't even thinking he just didn't want them to cry.
They broke into a smile and hugged Gordon tightly, he turned red and awkwardly patted their back. They let Gordon go with a smile.
"So," Gordon wasn't sure what to do now. "Do you want anything to eat or drink?"
"Oh no that's alright, I don't have to eat. My body is made from light," they said.
"Okay, so…" Gordon wasn't sure what to do now and he stood awkwardly.
"Can I use the laptop?" They ask. "I want to do some research on Earth."
Gordon decided why not and set them up with a basic rundown on how the internet works, as well as a few warnings about what can be found accidentally. Once they were set Gordon left them be. He had a sandwich before turning in.
"I'm going to sleep. Do you need to– like
to sleep?"
"No, don't need that either."
"Okay, well feel free to use the laptop all night then, YF."
"YF?" They looked at Gordon with that confused tilt of the head.
"Yellow Fluorite is a bit of a mouthful, so like YF for short…" Gordon felt awkward again, he clenched and relaxed his grip to calm himself.
"Oh," is all they said.
Gordon nodded and just left them to their research. He didn't realize how tired he really was until his head hit the pillow and he was out like a light.
It was early when Gordon felt something watching him. He cracked an eye open and was greeted with a huge smile from the being he met last night. Oh, God, he had hoped it was a dream.
"Hey, what time is it?" Gordon asked but didn't wait for a response he was honestly sure YF wouldn't even know how to answer.
His alarm says 6 am, an hour before he usually gets up but he couldn't really go back to sleep even if he wanted to.
"Ah, good morning," he said to YF finally.
"Good morning Mr. Freeman," they said still smiling.
His name coming from them nearly gave him a heart attack, "how do you know my name?"
"It's on your laptop," they said as if it was the obvious answer.
"Okay," Gordon relaxed slightly but was still very much put off; they must have gotten into my emails.
Gordon gets out of bed, he is still a little groggy and tried to start his typical morning routine but it wasn't much of an option with YF choosing to follow him around the house. "Listen I need to get ready for work, and you can't be in here."
"Why?"
"B–because," Gordon couldn't help his stutter and fumbling to find the right words through his embarrassment. "It's just rude, on Earth! So please a moment," he said.
That seemed to have worked and they exited the room but didn't go far. Almost forcing Gordon to close the door on their face.
"Mr. Freeman, I think I found a solution to my name," they said through the closed door.
"How about you tell me in a minute?" He called back.
Once dressed Gordon opened the door to find YF hadn't moved. "What did you find?"
"A website full of human names! There are so many," he said with an air of wonderment. "I was able to do so much more research on humans, like gender!"
"You don't have genders?"
"Nope, we are just Gems, we can choose whatever form we want. Though we have adopted your pronouns for convenience, a lot of past Gems were given the female pronouns, so it stuck."
"Oh, I've been using the neutral they and them pronouns in my mind."
"That's fine, it doesn't matter it's your language for it. I like the sound of the ones used for your males."
"He and him," Gordon said.
"Yeah!"
Gordon waited for a continuation but that was apparently it. "What does that have to do with names though," Gordon said to get more information going.
"Oh yeah, I found the names first then went to research gender after that, but I found an Earth name that I like the sound of."
"Okay, what is it?"
"Tommy Coolatta," he said.
"You chose the last name Coolatta?" Gordon couldn't help but laugh.
"It was on the website," he said.
"It was probably an ad," he said still laughing. "But it's fine, it's a good choice, Tommy."
Tommy waited for Gordon to stop laughing with a smile but once he had Tommy had a more serious look on his face. "When can we find my friends?"
"I'm going to work soon, I can try and find out where they could have brought them."
That seemed to satisfy Tommy though his smile was short-lived. Gordon panics and tries to reassure him, "Hey, we'll find them."
"We need to find them before they reform, I don't know what other humans will do, Mr. Freeman," he said.
"Don't worry we will," Gordon knew it was basically an unkeepable promise but he hoped it wouldn't have to be.
Gordon finished getting ready and had a basic breakfast of toast, "I'll be back later tonight," he said.
"Wait! I can come with you," Tommy said.
Gordon was about to tell him no when he's stopped by Tommy transforming himself into a tiny version of himself.
"Huh, okay. That might actually be really helpful," Gordon said, he bends down and picks Tommy up.
He goes to look for an old bag and packed it with random things he could claim he needed for work, he lets Tommy drop down into the bag.
"Okay let's go get your friends," Gordon said into the bag.