A post on reddit covers an email exchange with Marc Laidlaw that says the writer is no longer affiliated with Valve, where he wrote the stories for both Half-Life and Half-Life 2, as well as the episodic Half-Life 2 expansion, which remains only 67% completed. There are a couple of follow-ups attempting to prove this exchange is genuine, and GameSpot reports this news is "confirmed," but we're not seeing anything as concrete as that. Presuming this is true, it could be taken as another indication that Valve has no plans to return to the first-person shooter series, though on the other hand, Marc certainly had time to write stories for more than one game in the series in the over eight years since the release of Half-Life 2: Episode Two. Update: Gamasutra reports they have confirmed this news directly.