Half-Life: Phase Transition is a prequel novel to the comic book series Half-Life: A Place in the West.
At a science station in the New Mexico desert, an experiment goes very wrong, thrusting humanity into an ancient cosmic war. An authority called the Combine swiftly seize military control of the planet, and impose a brutal totalitarian state on the scattered survivors. Prisons masquerading as cities begin to rise, where scientists are hunted, truth is twisted and abused, and friend is pitted against friend.
In the midst of this discord, two strangers, Ray Casumi and Gemi Idrus, find themselves caught in a web of conspiracy and murder, and must embark on an odyssey across time and space, to the heart of the Combine’s dark rule, and perhaps to the lone spark of hope that may save the future...
Set within Valve's acclaimed Half-Life world, Phase Transition is an apocalyptic tale of science and revolution, of hope and despair, and of a people searching for their place in a vast and fantastical cosmos...