It was cold, painfully so, as I trudged through knee-deep snow. Probably not even water-snow, who knows what toxic concoction of chemicals made up this so-called 'snow'?

I dragged myself through it, the frigid subzero temperatures managing to seep into my exosuit, leaving its stinging touch coursing through my body. My muscles were stiff, and I struggled to move so much as a finger, but I continued onward.

This world was empty, dead, its atmosphere had been stripped away from it by its host star many thousands of r'xere ago. Not a single living being resided here, not even the smallest, most worthless bacteria, let alone a multi-celled organism. And yet, here I was, the only living being for potentially hundreds of light-gret, if not more.

I had been dropped onto this planet after the captain had heard of my mysterious interaction with the Abyss, the 'world beyond' as they had called it. This was just superstitious garbage - nothing but jargon often used by pirates in Zyxxeen space to brand heretics in the ridiculous 'religion' they seemed to come up with. The Abyss was forbidden, to them, it was out of reach for a reason. Drawing energy from it, or interacting with it in any way was deemed as 'dangerous' and 'brought about death' supposedly.

And that's why, though my interaction had been only momentary, I was almost immediately ejected from the starship.  Apparently, I had "awakened" to my Abyss Link, which, in their eyes, meant I was cursed. Of course, the only logical solution, assuming I really was 'cursed', would be to throw me overboard. Frankly, though, no matter how sound their logic might be when viewing it through the metaphorical clouded lenses they saw through, revering it as their 'religion', I was going to kill them anyway. They had already taught me all they knew, and I was planning on getting rid of them before, too, but the fact that they abandoned me here solidified for me that I really was better off without them from this point. In other words, the only deaths brought about by this incident would be those pirates and would be caused by me directly, of course, assuming I was able to get out of this alive.

"Fuck." I muttered from within the confines of my exosuit, which barely managed to keep me alive. It was a losing battle for the exosuit. Despite being temperature-controlled, it still failed to keep me warm, though without whatever little heat it created, I would have been nothing more than a human ice-sculpture for a while now.

This utterance of a human 'swear word' was simply due to the pain in my joints. It felt as though my very bones were gradually transitioning from their state of mostly solid Ca3(PO4)2 to solid H2O. In other words, I was slowly freezing to death.

I would turn into a human ice-sculpture regardless if I didn't find a way off of this planet-sized snowball quickly enough.

As the dark sky above grew even darker, and the light from the planet's parent star, the only pitiful warmth present, began to slip away, I felt something.

Something vague, and yet so clear. Beyond my comprehension, and yet perfectly understandable.

It called out to me, not using words, or by communicating, in fact, I couldn't describe it. An echo resonating through the inside of my very mind. A force beckoning me towards it.

I was drawn towards whatever this thing was. Somehow, subconsciously, though I couldn't make any sense of it, I knew it was calling me. With whatever strength remained within me, I forced myself in the direction of whatever it was. Perhaps it would help me.

Best case scenario, I'd survive somehow with mostly working parts, worst case scenario, I would acquire a brand-new case of either hypothermia or frostbite (maybe both) and suffer until I eventually died alone and forgotten forever. By my brief mental calculations, I had figured that it would be preferable on multiple accounts to hope for the former, and that I'd rather not die quite so soon.

At least not in a way so inefficient and painful.

There was something in the distance - a structure of some kind, peeking over the icy horizon. I squinted, struggling to make out a shape.

It looked like a tower; it was tall and triangular in shape. Wait, no, not a tower, but an empty triangular frame. In near complete darkness, the only light to speak of from my exosuit’s built-in emergency flashlight and the faint glimmer of the stars in the sky, I carried on.

As I drew nearer, more of whatever this structure was began to reveal itself to me.

Two pillars stood proud, one one either side, and a 'path' of some kind led to it, gray and smooth, seemingly composed of some metal. I didn't know what to make of it, but I was called towards it, I had to keep moving. Despite my lack of knowledge on what this thing was, I needed to get to it. I didn't know why, I didn't know what made me want to go there, but I did, and it was waiting for me.

This triangular frame had markings spanning its surface, strange symbols the likes of which I had never seen. It was veiled in an aura of mystery, and I could swear that the symbols glowed. Closer now, I could discern that they did, in fact, glow, and also grew ever so slightly brighter the nearer I was to the structure.

Even from a distance, it seemed large, but now that I was up close to it, it was almost threatening. It loomed over me, like the Geskarrs over on Zyokt’er, a race of unintelligent behemoths the size of entire hills which also had a tendency to nest in and consume mountains larger than themselves.

It was then that I felt pulses of energy surging through my body, as blinding light erupted out of the center of the structure. Stringy black ‘arms’ oozing out towards me, slimy and wet, wrapping themselves around me. Attempting to fight it was pointless. Whatever this thing was, those repulsive black tendrils. It seemed to crush my lungs and throat, not a single breath could escape or enter my mouth or nose. My eyes watering, my body was engulfed by the darkness.

I awoke from my slumber, surrounded by the gentle embrace of sleeping foam.

Sleeping foam was an extremely soft, breathable and yet warm material often used in hypersleep stasis chambers due to its unparalleled comfort.

“Open the pod doors,” I ordered Zero-Six’s computer.

With the murmur and clanking of pneumatic pistons, the pod doors opened, and I stepped outside whilst rubbing my eyes.

I stood in the hibernation bay of my ship. My journey to the designated coordinates given to me by the Lumrah was a long one, and so I put myself into hypersleep for the duration of the journey. After all, I had no intention of wasting almost two gret doing absolutely nothing but staring out into the distorted quantum bubble encompassing my ship. If I did so, I would almost certainly lose my sanity. Any intelligent third-dimensional being would in the process of gazing out upon the collision between multiple higher dimensions, and I had concluded multiple times that losing my mind after I had already lost my emotions would not be particularly helpful, but I digress.

If Zero-Six had woken me, it meant that I was approaching my destination. By extension, it also meant that I needed to stay alert. This job was a dangerous one, and I would be risking my life.

It was worth it, however. When more than four billion te’vrei are on the line, many things which are normally considered rather important become trivial.

Still, I needed to remain alive. After all, as a wise sentient being (the wise sentient being in question being me) once told me (I had made this up on the spot), “Money has no worth when one is dead.”

An astute observation on my part.

Walking over to the bridge, well, I was awkwardly shuffling, I hadn’t moved my body in a while now, I took a seat at the command station and quickly went over ship systems to ensure nothing had gone wrong while I slept. Thankfully, everything was nominal and the ship was in working order. 

Good thing I murdered the slime-thing earlier, perhaps if it had been alive then my ship wouldn’t have been working by now.

“You have arrived at your destination, Captain, quantum warp disengaging in three, two, one.”

I braced myself as Zero-Six creaked and the murmur of the quantum drive ceased, my ship and I dropping out of warp and stopping some short distance away from a massive triangular structure. An Abyssal Gate. Similar to that which I had witnessed in my dream of the past, but far larger. 

As instructed by the Lumrah, I sat and waited gazing out at the Abyssal Gate. After a few short t’erg, my MNID blinked. A data transfer request.

I accepted and was greeted with more instructions, as my ICD translated everything on screen for me.

“Greetings again, Hollow. Now that you are in front of the specified Abyssal Gate, your next task is simple. First, use your Abyss Link to connect both the gates the traders are coming through and the gate you’re at right now. Second, infiltrate the trade envoy, and bring slave number three-nine-twelve to me.”

“Simple, huh?” I muttered. None of this was simple, simple to understand maybe, but most certainly not simple to carry out. Especially the Abyss Link part, but I’d figure it out.

Another data transmission came in, saying nothing but “Thank you for your cooperation, Hollow.”

What a useless message the second one was. Nevertheless, I ignored it and began.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, that energy from the gate found its way to me once again, moving through my veins, a tingling sensation that wrapped around my body as I was engulfed by the darkness.

The thing is, use of the Abyssal Gates requires death, interaction with a void in which nothing happens any longer, naturally, would. In reality, what I was currently doing by using my Abyss Link was surrendering my own consciousness to the Abyss in exchange for the connection between the Gates. As for how and why this works, no explanation exists, though there are many theories, none can be proven with technology currently available to the Galactic Community. Normally, an interaction with the Abyss would permanently kill anyone who were to attempt it, but those with an Abyss Link are, instead of legitimate and permanent death, placed into a state of temporary death. Otherwise known as ‘Abyssal Death’. In this state, whichever being dares to tinker with the Abyss retains their consciousness, which exists somewhere between the Abyss and regular three-dimensional spacetime, and can even bring themselves back from the dead using energy supplied by the Gate. This cannot be used to revive any being which has already been killed however, as two prerequisites exist, one is that the being must be killed by the Abyss itself, and the second is that they must bring themselves back within a maximum time period of three t’erg. There is some variation on the maximum between species, but as a general rule, beyond three t’erg, the energy requirement to return from Abyssal Death grows too large, and the being’s consciousness will be forever lost to the Abyss.

A solitary light existed in the empty nothingness, and it moved towards me when I called for it with my mind.

Considerable pain rushed through my body as it made some attempt to deal with the sudden reintroduction of my senses as I returned from death. Lying on the floor of the bridge of Zero-Six, in a very uncomfortable position. I checked the ship's computer clock. It had been two t'erg. That was a near-perfect interaction with the Abyss.

I moved my arms and legs to ensure that they still worked. My body felt weak, but I was still breathing, and that’s what mattered most. 

Well then, it was time to go on a killing spree.