Prologue

Daegna’ar and Holmes

Ever since the Daegna’ar’s resuscitation, he’s been driven to create a gateway back to where he was pulled from, but with a body that will not allow him to become a helpless soul that can be ruled over by the powers of Tartarus.

He’s been pushing Eireen more and more making her spend exceeding hours on the gateway tech, while sharing his knowledge with her, linking up more and more information for her to solve the puzzle of interdimensional travel. The Infernal realm must bow down before Daegna’ar. Even at the cost of an ever-increasing body count that is being sent down to the morgue. There’s no time to consider costs, more workers and subjects can be grabbed from the streets at any time.

Meanwhile, Eireen has been sleeping less and less, her eyes became bloodshot, and her temper shorter with each day. Is she that driven by Daegna’ar’s vision? Is she mad about him and wants to please him? Nobody knows, neither does Daegna’ar. Only the Doc knows, and she is not sharing a single bit. Or could it be all of those experiments with Faomori blood and the casualties endured during those experiments not allowing her mind to rest at night?

Dr. Holmes has been occupied with so many things at once, no mere mortal could sustain the load, not without excessive use of performance-enhancing drugs, including those yet to be tested, synthesized out of Faomori Blood. First, there were tremors and spasms. Then came the voices, and intruding thoughts of all kinds. From gibberish nonsense to concise directions on her goals. A few weeks after using and abusing the medication, the tremors subsided, so did the spasms. But the voices grew stronger, driving her mad, preventing sleep, and no chance at concentrating on research. They told her of ways to get to the power, that she must be the chosen one, ripping through the veil between worlds, and reaping the benefits that come from within the underworld. Only then Daegna’ar will notice, only then he will see her as an equal, and not a tool.

As the gateway tech is being developed, they have to defend the Tower and support their little army with new enhancements, reinforcements, and weaponry. The Tron-City corporations never sleep and have been trashing the Soranus facility with the rest of the mob, but at the same time conducting reconnaissance about the secretive tech they’ve heard whispers about. The intel wasn't wrong, so A-Z Space Industries and Ultec Robotics have gotten enough intel to start their own research, using the scraps and data dumps they’ve got from spies that infiltrated Kenshi Towers, Soranus data dumps, and even data gathered from the stolen cadavers out of the mortuary. The intel was not very precise, nor did it give the full picture, however, that was more than enough for the corporations to start the Gateway Race to figure out what is Dr. Holmes trying to achieve, to gain the upper hand. And while they are doing that, they continue to siege the Kenshi towers and Soranus complex to give themselves time to go through the intel and figure out the end result for this mystery of the gateway.

The portal tech isn’t stable for months, not a single portal could hold up for more than minutes at a time.

The covert war wages on, and the research is being pushed further with every passing day.