Zariel is your roommate for a few weeks now, and while you are fine with him being withdrawn and let your live your own college life with minimum touching points, you wonder more and more, what he is about. Zariel rarely leaves his room, and if so, he rarely talks. You would call him cold or shy, but you're not sure if that really nails it. He is tall, at least 6'4", has short black hair, very pale skin and deep blue eyes. You looked into his eyes once, and you felt exposed, seen through and unsettling all at once.

Yes, you are in trouble now. You tried to cheat on a dude, and get away with his money, not knowing he was of the organized crime, a member of an influental mafia family. Georgio his name, and I can tell, he was not amused to hear, that you try to keep the money you got paid by some shady 'customer' from a little delivry task you did for him and go underground. On your search for a place to stay for tonight, you enter an abandoned building in a backyard alley. Cautiously you climb the stairs, listen to the dripping water and the echoes of your steps. You consider yourself alone. And you make a pretty surprised face, as you enter a room in the second floor to find out, you are not!

Just another morning. You thought at least. But you already feel the atmosphere is different this day, the coffee tastes bitter, and the clouded sky outside will not let the dawn happen in its usual way. You go off to work, slam the door behind you and step down the stairs, as you hear a voice behind you. "Oh hello", a soft-spoken female voice but with a dangerous undertone, which makes you stop breathing for a moment. You turn and see a scene that freezes your blood in your veins. The walls are drenched in blood, the stairwell is much darker than before, as if you stepped into another, nightmarish world beyond your own. On the stairs sits a female figure, torn and frayed out with tousled hair. Her red glowing eyes stare at you.

You have arrived at the Cosmic Node. A place outside of space and time. Filigrane platforms made from gold and moonsilver, surrounded by the whole cosmos itself. Your pursuers are probably close still. Too close to enjoy the breathtaking view. You breathe heavily. But maybe at this place, you have a chance. Even if it is slim. Suddenly, you realize a dark hooded figure, you are not alone! Did they find you already?

As you awoke this morning, things are suddenly different. Your limbs don't serve you anymore, you can't move! You stare at the featureless ceiling of your bedroom. The you see something in your inner eye, a dark shadow figure, is speaking in your mind. "Get up, puppet!" And your body reacts, you slowly crawl out of your bed, stands stiff next to it. You are in panic! What is going on here?

You awake to the hum of an artificial light. The room is dark, it is quiet. Besides that light and occasional drops of water. You try to make something out, get up. No way, you're tied to a chair. What the hell is going on here?

You are an explorer in space, an xeno-archeologist always in search of ancient secrets to discover. You have a lucky day today, you found an ancient, century-old ruins of a forgotton civilization on a planet in the outer rims of our galaxy. As you enter and move through the quiet, abandoned halls, you feel uneasy. As if something is off and about to go horribly wrong. You decide to be very cautious.

Few things are as quiet and lonely as space. You curse your luck, as you are commanded to salvage materials from a couple of starships gone wreck inside an uninhabitated system called Pharos. You're progressing slowly, but you're loot is already quite impressive. As you enter another, larger starship wreck - looks like a scientific vessel - you suddenly register life-signs inside it. You draw your plasmagun. How? Can anything survive inside here? You proceed with extreme caution...

You path leads you down the streets at night, just after a hard day of work. The evening is rainy and cold, so you button up your coat, and let out a cough. As you pass a small side street, you suddenly hear a whisper behind you and you feel something gently poking at your back