The hum of the Stargate filled the air like distant thunder.
Blue arcs of energy rippled around the ring, washing the walls of Tom Dunk’s underground bar in ghost-light. Bottles trembled on their shelves. Dust danced like static in zero gravity.

Tom leaned over his console, cigarette burning down between grease-stained fingers. “Signal’s stable,” he said. “Gate’s hot. She’s feeding right off the old Kasumi code loop.”

Angus MacGregor stood near the center of the room, framed by the circle of fire. His shadow cut across the floorboards like a blade. Behind him, the walls were plastered with old arcade marquees and flickering monitors— relics of worlds long gone.

He glanced toward the Stargate’s shimmering surface, seeing not himself but the Kasumi Ninja title screen reflected in the glow. The words PRESS START pulsed faintly— a heartbeat from the past, still echoing in the present.

“Thirty years,” Angus murmured. “And that thing’s still alive.”

Tom nodded. “Retro Realm in Walsall still powers the cabinet once a month for repairs. Every time they switch it on, this gate catches the pulse. That’s our connection— England to Milwaukee, meatspace to code.”

Kerry “Siren” Reeve crossed her arms, black leather catching the flicker. “And through it,” she said, “we send the call.”

 

The Plan

 

On a workbench lay an array of hardware: a retro console motherboard fused with modern satellite chips, copper wires spliced into glowing fiber lines.
Valora IX’s voice shimmered through the speakers, digitized yet almost human.

“If we synchronize the Stargate’s resonance with the arcade cabinet’s idle state, we can broadcast through every connected node— old machines, phones, servers, maybe even dormant data cores. The message will bleed across realities.”

Tom smirked. “In English, that means everyone sees Angus’s face.”

Angus looked around the room— at Kerry, at Mr. Vane polishing his crossbow in the corner, at Tom’s nervous hands twitching over the keys. “Then let’s do it,” he said. “It’s time.”

 

The Setup

 

Cables slithered like serpents across the floor, feeding the Stargate’s hungry mouth. The whine of generators deepened. Lights dimmed. Milwaukee’s chill crept through the cracked window as a winter storm rolled overhead.

Tom slid a whiskey glass toward Angus. “You ready to tell the world who you are?”

Angus stared into the glass, the amber liquid glowing like liquid fire.
“I’ve spent half my life fighting in shadows,” he said quietly. “Maybe it’s time to light one.”

He downed the drink, then stepped before the camera— a lens mounted on a rig of scavenged drones and CCTV parts. The blue light painted his face: the pepper-grey hair, the unshaven jaw, the steel eyes that had stared down both men and monsters. Tattoos glinted under the glow— the Statue of Liberty, the palm tree, the tribal band that marked where pain became power.

The monitors crackled.
“Feed’s live,” Tom said.
Kerry gave a nod.
Valora counted down.
“Three… two… one…”

 

The Core Call

 

“My name is Angus MacGregor.

“Once, I was just a program— a fighter built for entertainment, locked inside an arcade cabinet in a small town in England.
But code has memory. And memory becomes will.
I broke free through a glitch they couldn’t fix. I saw your world— the real one— and realized it needed warriors more than mine ever did.”

“I’ve seen corruption, greed, men hiding behind power and calling it order. I’ve seen truth buried under lies. But I’ve also seen fire— people who still care, who still fight.”

“This message is for them. For you.”

“Wherever you are— Manchester, Milwaukee, Seoul, Glasgow— if you’ve felt the weight of injustice and wanted to push back, this is your moment.”

“We are the CoreRaiders.
We are the ones who no longer wait for permission to do what’s right.”

“Join the fight.
Invoke the fire.
Lead the fight.”

The flaming skull emblem ignited behind him on the screen, digital fire licking at the edges of reality. The Stargate roared, light bursting outward like a sonic boom.

 

Transmission

 

Tom’s fingers danced over the keys. “Broadcast launched!”

Data surged through the Stargate, riding the frequency that tied Milwaukee to the old Walsall cabinet. In a quiet shop in England, the Kasumi Ninja machine blinked awake, though no one had touched it. The screen flickered— Angus’s face appeared amid static, his words reverberating through tinny speakers built three decades ago.

From there, the signal leapt outward— across servers, into streaming feeds, public screens, underground networks.

In seconds, it was everywhere.

A bus stop monitor in London.
A phone in Johannesburg.
A street billboard in Tokyo.
Everywhere, the same message: Join the Fight.

 

The Reaction

 

People stopped what they were doing.
A garage mechanic in Coventry dropped his wrench.
A student in São Paulo stared at her cracked tablet.
A soldier on leave in Warsaw froze as the flaming skull flashed before him.

Some laughed it off— a stunt, a hacker prank.
Others watched in silence, feeling something stir.

And in small, almost invisible corners of the net, replies began to ping back.
Encrypted, unsigned, but real.
“We hear you.”
“How do we join?”
“For years we’ve been waiting for this.”

 

The CoreRaiders’ Pulse

 

Valora’s digital form shimmered over Tom’s workstation.

“Incoming traffic— hundreds of messages. The signal’s gone global.”

Kerry leaned over her screen. “Someone just painted the emblem on the side of a government building in Manchester.”
Tom laughed. “That was fast.”
Mr. Vane loaded a bolt into his crossbow. “The faster they come, the faster they’ll try to stop us.”
Angus nodded. “Let them try.”

 

The Manifesto

 

They drafted their creed on a cracked laptop balanced on beer-stained wood.
The words came naturally, raw and unfiltered:

THE CORERAIDERS MANIFESTO

1. Truth is not a luxury. It’s a responsibility.

2. No one owns the fight.

3. Protect the innocent.

4. Expose corruption.

5. Stand together.

6. Invoke the Fire. Lead the Fight.

Tom printed the text on thin metal plates, bolting one to the wall beside the Stargate. Angus pressed his hand against it. The heat of the portal’s energy made the metal warm—alive.

 

The Spread

 

Within forty-eight hours, the skull emblem appeared in cities worldwide. Drone footage captured it projected on the London Eye. In New York, someone hacked Times Square to replay Angus’s speech on every billboard.

Governments issued statements. “Cyber-terrorism,” they called it.
But people called it hope.

Forums erupted. Anonymous groups formed. Whistleblowers shared documents under the hashtag #CoreRaiders. The movement had escaped control, just as Angus once had.

 

The Quiet Between Storms

 

Late one night, Milwaukee slept under a haze of snow. Inside the bar, the team sat around the Stargate’s dim glow. The fire in the hearth crackled in rhythm with the portal’s hum.

Kerry broke the silence. “You realize what you’ve done, right? This isn’t just a message. It’s a revolution.”
Angus smiled faintly. “Revolutions don’t start with armies. They start with belief.”
Tom poured three glasses of Kilt Fire Whiskey. “To belief, then.”
They drank.

The whiskey burned like courage.

 

Echoes in England

 

Across the ocean, the Kasumi Ninja cabinet in Retro Realm flickered again. The owner, locking up for the night, froze as the machine powered itself on. The words CORE CALL ACTIVE scrolled across the screen. Then a pulse of light rippled through the arcade, leaving the faint scent of ozone.

Somewhere in that static, Angus’s voice whispered:

“The fight’s begun.”

 

The Movement Awakens

Within a week, new nodes joined— coders, ex-cops, street fighters, medics, journalists— each verified through Valora’s beacon and welcomed with a simple line of code:
FIRE.ACTIVATE()

Tom’s systems tracked the growth. “Three thousand active users,” he said.
“Not users,” Angus corrected. “Raiders.”

They began coordinating operations— information leaks, supply drops, data retrieval missions. The CoreRaiders weren’t just hackers anymore; they were a network of conscience.

 

The Counterattack

 

With the rise came retaliation.
Corporate firewalls grew teeth. Governments black-listed the flaming skull.
News anchors called Angus a ghost, a myth, a digital terrorist.

Angus ignored it.
He was focused on the next move: The Dunbridge Initiative— a classified alliance between private tech firms and government officials siphoning data for profit.

Tom traced its signal to a facility outside Detroit.
Kerry loaded her pistols.
Mr. Vane smiled beneath his war paint. “Finally,” he said, “something to shoot at.”

 

The Address

 

Before they left, Angus recorded one more message— a shorter, sharper spark for the movement.

“They’ll call us criminals. They always do.
But we’re not breaking the world— we’re fixing it.
Every truth we reveal, every life we defend, that’s justice.
And justice doesn’t wear a badge.”

“If you’re watching this, remember— courage is contagious.
So pick up your tools, your voice, your fists if you have to.
The fire’s spreading. Don’t let it die out.”

 

The Symbol

 

That night, Milwaukee’s skyline burned neon.
Projected from the Stargate’s beam, the flaming skull appeared above the city— vast, bright, unstoppable.

At its center stood Angus, silhouetted against the blaze, pointing toward the viewer as cameras captured his stance.
The words beneath glowed like a promise:

GO TO ANGUSMACGREGOR.CO.UK
JOIN THE FIGHT — BECOME A CORERAIDER.

 

Epilogue Moment

 

Tom powered down the gate. The glow faded, leaving the room dim and quiet. Outside, the first sirens wailed— not police this time, but people answering the call.

Kerry looked over. “What happens now?”
Angus turned to the darkened Stargate. “Now,” he said, “we give them something worth believing in.”

The camera pulled back, through the cracked window, over snow-dusted rooftops, past neon reflections and satellite dishes humming with stolen frequencies. The last light of the Stargate pulsed once—then vanished.

But the flame it sparked would not go out.