Y'know, being a boat owner isn't all it's cracked up to be.
I didn't even pay for this,
and I'm already having buyer's remorse.
Well, the engine's still running.
Yeah, and I don't even have to deal with licence
registration, docking fees, and it already—
Ah, shouldn't overthink it.
I'll run out of gas at some point,
then the problem will solve itself.
Dammit, how did they not know the river was dried up?
When the whole plan hinges upon the river,
how do you miss that?
If I go back, it's just that dead woman.
I guess I could try those apartments in the distance.
But I haven't seen anyone.
They're not going to have any food.
I could try following supply guy,
might lead me to the nearest town...
But he had that bot following him.
They've probably already sent troops there and are
rounding up people to be shot looking for him.
This is really frustrating, because
I'm still in the dark on so many things!
So all I can do is try to guess
which person is least likely to get me killed.
If the person dies, that doesn't help.
That just means they're wrong.
There have been a lot of wrong guesses today.
All roads lead to incompetence.
Yeah, here's the problem, it's this giant gap.
If that was filled in, I could almost make it...?
Y'know, just enough to get the front end on the ledge,
so I can flip the boat backwards with me in it.
I feel like I'm just not gonna have closure on this,
unless I total the boat.
I just need to extend the ramp.
Oh hey, besides cash and a map,
how about a multi-tool?
They couldn't have given me that?
Oh, well there's a big log there, but I can't secure that.
Yeah, a multi-tool is what? Ten bucks for a cheap one?
Though really, I deserve an expensive one.
Now I'm feeling a little shortsighted about
smashing them into pieces.
It's almost as if you have more options
when you don't destroy everything.
Yeah, I'm still coming out ahead with the boat
than if I had just walked.
I have another ten or twenty minutes before I'm tied,
so I can give this one more go.
They say the captain always goes down the ship,
but being a boat owner, I think that's just the politically
correct version that's been passed down.
As a captain, I kinda feel like if my boat goes down,
I want everyone to go down with it.
You need something to commemorate it, y'know?
I guess any stowaways could jump off,
they were never really invested.
I don't have any crew or passengers, though.
If that supply guy comes back,
I'll ask him to come down here.
Okay... this is an issue.
The board's too long, the nails aren't gonna line up.
Okay, I'll do it the classic way.
Diagonal here should be fine.
This is the complete inverse of my old job.
Before this, I had to come up with a
model for transmitting energy
along a pseudo-Riemannian manifold.
That was trickier than this, but it was all theory.
Here, it's "rotate the board."
But I have to actually go and do it.
Well, my old job doesn't exist anymore, so there.
Y'know, I don't even know if I'm gonna be missed
if I don't show up at... wherever they told me to go.
If this doesn't work, then everyone involved has
more or less sentenced me to exile,
wandering the countryside, looking for food and water.
I mean, would they send someone to find me?
Would they die within two hours?
So there's a chance, months from now,
some scout stumbles upon an old abandoned house,
and finds me wrapped up in an old blanket,
eating canned tuna, growing a ZZ Top beard,
and they're like: "Freeman, is that you?"
And I say, "Yeah. Fuck you."
Ah, who am I kidding? Months...
It takes years to grow a beard like that.
I say everyone's incompetent,
but there's more going on here than that.
Like, I assume the CIA guy
had some mission he drafted me for.
Yeah, that looks about right.
So when he dropped me off with no instructions,
no supplies, and no information,
I thought that was incompetent.
It's obvious now I'm some sort of decoy, but even then,
I'd be more effective with a fake objective.
Okay, that's about as good as it's gonna get.
I should strength test this.
I'll just do a quick jump.
Yeah, that passes inspection, I guess.
But yeah, I thought CIA was doing that thing
every manager I've ever had does,
where he assumed because I did something successfully, no matter how much of an utter miracle it was that involved a lot of variables,
and probably isn't reproducible at all,
that I'll do that every time.
So from his perspective...
it makes perfect sense to send me
into the lion's den with nothing.
I survived Black Mesa, therefore, I'll survive anything.
That's my defining trait as an employee.
Why would I need additional resources?
The problem, of course, is they can't understand the flaw
in this reasoning until failure occurs.
So, in my case, he can't learn unless I die.
Well, class may be in session!
Oh... I better not have this exact
same situation in five minutes.
Ah, yes, the beautiful c—
Pretty sure that's not a friend!
I probably shouldn't be following it!
There's another reason not to take the river!
My options are kinda one-dimensional!
I'm being tricked over and over again!
I'm not stopping! I'm not stopping!
What did you do to my boat?!
Pirates trying to board me...!
Can barely steer this thi—
You don't even have a boat!
Go back to lifeguard duty!
You're not even dressed for water!
Oh my god, are you kidding me?
Yeah, put the logs up, so I can't—
Wait, that's a ramp. Maybe...?
Well, I'm not spending ten minutes here
building another one!
This was such a bad idea.
I shouldn't have listened to anyone!
Yeah, that's sort of a ramp. Gun it!
Okay, that almost worked...
We obviously just need more speed!
[Metropolice chatter]
In fact...
Don't make me come over there!
You better not be here when I get back.
Oh my god, there's more of them!
Yeah, attack me from the bridge,
that's actually a great vantage point!
That's how I would try to kill me too!
Fuckin' swamp boat! I can't—
I need to get out of here...
Now forward, and don't veer off—
Guess that's the good fishing spot.
Man, this is really shallow.
Well the grass is green, I don't think it's drought.
This has been drained. It's like the Colorado River.
There must be some massive
irrigation project going on.
Or hey, you know what? They're aliens.
Okay, good. We have a stormtrooper in training here.
Why can't the whole day be—
Oh, no, no, no, no, no...
Okay, here's what's gonna happen:
I'm gonna gently nudge the gate open...
We really haven't had enough of this bullshit?!
They sent me to a canal lock!
Okay, that's it, that's it, I'm getting out.
Now it's time for the bullet ride!
Get ready, this one's a lot faster!
Oh what the fuck? Now he's getting sneaky on me.
Well, he missed me fifty times,
and now I'm coming for him;
So, either he's smarter than he aims, or...
he left to go get more ammo.
I'm sure there's more close by,
I mean, why wouldn't there be?
Of course, he's gonna play mind games now.
I'm half-expecting a cardboard cutout of him to spring out when I turn the corner, but still no sign of him.
I hate those life-size cardboard cutouts.
I remember attacking them
by accident at the shoe store.
He shot first! That is not how we do things now!
The thing is, my freak-out-o-meter has never
really gone down this entire time,
but I can't be 100% vigilant at all times!
So this goes nowhere! That's nice!
Dr. Breen [faintly]: "—direct
confirmation of a disruptor—"
Dr. Breen [faintly]: "—in our midst,"
Dr. Breen [faintly]: "—one who has acquired an almost
messianic reputation in the minds—"
Dr. Breen [faintly]: "—of certain citizens."
Is this the voice of God?
Dr. Breen [faintly]: "—with the darkest urges of
instinct, ignorance and decay."
Okay, I'm definitely hearing voices,
that's not where I want it to go.
Dr. Breen [faintly]: "have been laid
directly at his feet, and yet—"
Dr. Breen [faintly]: "—continue
to imbue him with romantic—"
Dr.Breen [faintly]: "—giving him such dangerous—"
But wait, I wouldn't hear the transmission...
Dr. Breen [faintly]: "—as the One Free Man,
the Opener of the Way."
Dr. Breen: "—the dangers of magical thinking."
Dr. Breen: "—from the dark pit—"
Dr. Breen: "Let us not slide backward into—"
Dr. Breen: "—just as we have
finally begun to see the light."
Man, computers look even more hostile now.
Dr. Breen: "—do not go unrewarded, and contrariwise,"
Ah, he's not saying anything important.
Dr. Breen: "—will not go unpunished."
But I guess this is the only entertainment
I'm gonna get for a while.
Aware. Yes, that is good advice.
Maybe I should watch more of that show.
It looked pretty dry, but maybe he has some good ideas.
Oh, speaking of which, I thought CIA was just
displaying classic manager syndrome,
but now I'm thinking there's more layers to it.
Oh, fuck! That's one of those chairs
they were gonna put me in!
Y'know, that says something about that Barney guy!
Sure, he spared me for Kleiner,
but what's he doing the rest of the time?
He might be a fuckin' psycho!
He was hiding behind a barrel!
The TV was trying to tell me!
God, I hate it when they pop out of barrels, and...
I guess that's an interesting way to go:
Jump out at someone going "Hoo-hoo-HEH-HEH!" and
watch them freak out and shoot you in the head.
There's too many surprises today.
A lot of people start dying
once they exceed my surprise threshold.
Nobody's going, "Oh hey, here, have a cake."
Oh, this is one of their vehicles.
Yeah, that's exactly the kind of surprise I mean.
It's not even a surprise now.
Man, there's a lot of cops here,
and they have equipment set up.
They didn't arrive twenty minutes ago!
There's computers, cameras, interrog—
This is a full-fledged outpost!
Christ, do we put in enough of these things?
The Underground Railroad leads
straight to a police outpost!
Dammit, there's another behind the door there.
I'm seeing sparks.
Maybe it's like that bucket of water trick.
Instead of getting wet, you get a face full of saw blades.
Alright, now it's safe—𝙚𝙧 to move forward.
Man, I need one of those little
sticks with the mirrors on them.
I wanted one of those even before all this went down.
Okay, I'll put the pin back in, but...
it's good to have that in my hip pocket.
Or, more like my entire waist.
What's up with these smart tactics all of a sudden?!
I like the old you better!
The old you wouldn't have set up a machine gun nest
fifty yards away to cover the only access point!
But I know someone who hasn't changed. Not really.
That just means there's
layers of wrongness going on here.
The Resistance is completely screwed;
they're being hunted down like rabbits,
but the establishment is stupid too!
They're too aggressive!
They're working against themselves!
I mean, they already have the—
[Metropolice chatter]
I mean, they already have the—
Metrocop: "That's a grenade!"
The Greeks say moderation in all things. I'm not Greek!
Well, it's not fun if nobody else is playing.
This is really a multiplayer thing.
Yeah, these guys look partied out.
But yeah, they had the perfect setup.
Lead the Resistance down the canal,
then interrogate and kill them once they arrive here.
And this place is outside the city, so you can kill all
Resistance and keep it quiet so you don't tip them off.
They'll just keep coming.
So why on earth would you attack this route?
That's like smashing roaches on their way
to the roach motel, causing them all to scatter.
This isn't rocket science.
This is the blind fighting the blind.
Yeah, that's right. Tell them I sent you.
Wait, this is just another dead end?
This is getting really old!
This is slowing me down a lot too!
Wait, that has live current!
If there's anything I've learned from the aliens,
it's don't get electrocuted.
Y'know, it's true what they say: