”This is Hope City, 2066 A.D. It’s the broken, makeup-smudged meth prostitute of cities. I may be too harsh on her but whatever happened to innocence, empathy or human beauty, it ain’t around here anymore. Gigantic neon signs flashes with commercial revelations of our new idols of worship; cheap celebrities and crap products. Politicians are the crowd-pleasing prostitutes of the big corporations, possessing fake power to make fake decisions of fake social change. All is predecided. Cold winds are blowing. People suffer but they won’t rise up. They are numbed by technology that has given us both salvation and despair. The street a mile down below carries with it souls of extreme potential, but hardly no one ever stands up and claims a purpose, a destiny. Instead they survive the day, backstabbing and clawing their way around the oil drum fires that lies scattered in the constant night of the skyscrapers’ shadows. But through all this madness, the drugs, neon blood and violence, a hidden war is being constantly fought between mercenaries hired for mainly two causes. The last stand for freedom is within the Aether network, an entire virtual universe of information. And information is money. There are ”Cyberpunks” who want to share this awesome force with everyone and free the masses through untainted knowledge. And then there are corporate cut-throats determinedly trying to stop them from disturbing the status quo. They want to keep it the way things are, using the Aether to enslave people without them knowing it. The venues of this city are all potential arenas of these battles. A nightclub. A desolated field. A hotel lobby. Lady Hope has two options for mercenaries like yourself – Will you rock the boat or quench the flames?” - Former S.W.O.R.D. Captain James E. Luther.