Frixprl the Explorer had just about hit his stride in the dream realm, sharing about 14 million human dreams at a time. Human creativity and content production looked good for the long-term market. They were just starting level two Gate exploration, where much more customized content could be expected, and a few humans had learned of the transport winds. Mana concentration was still very low - well below awareness level in most areas, but that was rising quickly with the mass importation of Power metals and the ongoing spread of Earthly life forms busily building up total biomass awareness.
His next phase centered on those few humans who were gathering internal mana at exceptional rates, due to either their living circumstances or their internal talents and predispositions. He even had a human child, all on her own, well on the pathway to producing an eventual avatar for him to curate humanity through. He hoped he could live up to her expectations and become a hidden master to aid the training for future human fantasy heroes - but it was up to such humans to choose him, he was not allowed to offer his services.
Any human that put serious focus into interactions with his dream self was also evolving their mana connections at the same time, since mana was integral to his presence in the realm of human awareness. He was everything from a little green man, to a frog, to a goblin to (for some reason) a lizard-like creature that would grow inside a human body, to then burst out and try to eat everything - which he finally understood when one of his contacts fell asleep watching "Alien Revival".
Frixprl the Explorer didn't mind - he would take on any role given and do his best to further the storylines. Hero or villain was all the same for him.
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In the abandoned Gate of Torture, where North Korea had herded thousands of unwanted prisoners before sealing the Gate until it closed, Ky San was the only one left. He really had been the assassin they accused him of being, but there had been no real evidence, so he had been imprisoned instead of executed. Over the past 3 months, violence and starvation had claimed all the others - mostly violence, as the killings had provided enough to eat for those who could take their share.
For Ky San, he at last knew peace, with the defeat of his final opponent. He knew his course now. It was written in the green pond scum and the insects that fed on it - the only life that shared this desolate pond with him. The 80 foot across, 10 foot deep pond, with tiny, intermittent, inflow and outflow streams was the only source of life support they had found in that first week of despair.
It was possible that one of the downstream explorers had found more, but the several hundred foot drop-off a mile downstream had discouraged most ventures.
The lake was badly contaminated, of course, as much of the group's human wastes had ended up there during the confrontations. And then there was the fact that he simply had no idea how Gates were opened - he had already been in prison at the time of the E-mail.
So Ky San, after salvaging and drying all the meat he could find, simply passed his time in quiet contemplation and meditation, usually outside, but in his shelter of salvaged clothing when the rains would pass through.
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In the New York Harbor area, near Sunset Park, a small, unused warehouse blew up with great intensity, creating a large toxic cloud that drifted northwards on the winds. Buildings were badly damaged for 3 blocks around, and windows blown out for nearly 10 blocks.
Emergency response was quick, at first, but then the survivors of that response were just as quickly called away - the gasses were deadly in the extreme. The city lost dozens of police, fire, and EMT personnel. Very few who were wounded in the explosion survived. Hundreds more died as the cloud spread, thousands more were hospitalized. It would have been much worse had not the majority of the people in the path of the cloud evacuated to Gateworld.
Investigation teams in hazmat suits were soon on the scene, measuring contamination levels, taking samples of everything, and pinpointing the origin of the explosion. The warehouse ownership was quickly investigated, leading to a 3-monse lease by a fictional company. Further attempts at backtracking began, but it would be slow work - the trail was at least a month old.
The physical investigation, over the next few days, was able to determine that the combination of explosives and toxins used could only have come from the middle east, most likely Iran or Pakistan, and regional investigations were launched.
At the same time, in Washington DC, the house of a small-time opiate dealer had been bought for cash and was currently being filled with similar explosives and toxins.
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Rachel was having a wonderful spa vacation, now that she had a few essential supplies, and hated to leave her Gateworld retreat, but her collogues would be waiting at the hospital, and they weren't going to be able to explain why they were in a maternity room for long if she didn't show up.
It turned out to be no problem, her three fellow grad students and the floor nurse were waiting at the doorway when she appeared - seemingly in the exact same spot as before. She wondered if she was going to have to start paying the hospital some kind of transit fee. Outside the door, a hospital security guard had been waiting, but the nurse quickly informed him that the wild story had panned out, and there was no threat beyond the usual Gateworld biohazard potential.
The nurse got Rachel's contact info and both assured the other that they would do their best to notify the other of when that room might be in use.
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On his way back to Salt Lake, Shane was settled into his nightly camp and went to sleep as usual. At some point (he didn't bother checking the time), he got up to answer the call of nature. Not wanting to waste battery power, he groped his way across the rocks to find a good spot to pee. When done, he was slightly disoriented and not sure which way his campsite was. Before getting out his flashlight, he acted out of long habit from nights back on Earth, and tried to get his eyes to adjust.
He almost fell over again - he could "see" a short distance, even though all he could see was blackness. Yet somehow he could make out shapes. He tested this, reaching out to the nearest rocks, and finding them to be exactly where his new "sight" was showing them to be. He immediately started playing with his new "dark-sense" until he could reliably find footing, and could toss in the air and then catch small rocks.
His "visual" range seemed to be less than 5 feet, though, and he had to bend down a bit to "see" his footing. He also realized he had no clue which way his camp was, after all this distraction, so he had to bring out the flashlight after all.
Back in camp, he got very little sleep that night, having to constantly go experiment and prove to himself that his new ability wasn't a dream.