1 Prologue: The Bizarre Death of an Inventor in Room 3327 of the New Yorker Hotel

January 7th, 1943; Planet Earth Calendar; Milky Way Galaxy.

Room 3327 of the New Yorker Hotel. 11:56 P.M

Here, was the prosperous urban area of New York; one of the major cities of the United States of America. New Yoker Hotel with its 43 floors, stood out like a sore thumb on the eighth avenue of the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood in the Manhattan's Metropolitan area. The hotel's virtually plain facades consisting of alternating vertical bands of warm-gray brick-paint and dark-windows gave the building a contemporary feel.

The entrance to the hotel's reception that was usually crowded was devoid of any form of human activity. Even the hotel's bell boys that were always snappy-looking as trainees in top military academies were absent from their duties on this cold Thursday night.

The whole street in the front of the New Yorker Hotel was eerily quiet, with just some occasional barking of some stray dogs in the neighborhood.

However, the atmosphere in one of the rooms of this majestic hotel, was anything but quiet. There were occasional murmurs and grunts that could clearly be heard behind the closed doors of Room 3327.

The murmurs and grunts sounded like something out of a cultic ceremony, leaving the other residents of the hotel with some wild imaginations. But they just passed it off as another weird night courtesy of the character residing in the Room 3327. If they were the least bit inquisitive about the happenings in the delusional engineer's room, they would have identified that the sounds coming out from that room were different from the usual.

Within the confines of the room, three men were surrounding an aged man who was sitting on the smooth-woolen grey-carpet that was now tainted with some patches of red. From close observation, you could identify that the blood was from a number of hypodermic needles casually inserted in the soles of Nikolai's bare feet. The aged man was on his last legs.

Two days ago, Nikolai Teslai Sankara who was in the middle of one of his experiments was interrupted by a knock on his hotel room.

Looking at the old analog clock on his bedside table, he realized that it was just six o'clock in the morning. He concluded that it must be one of the maids who was coming to clean his room, and check if he needed some breakfast on the cold Tuesday morning. One of the maids named Alice was especially attentive to him – always reminding him to take his meals on-time and take great care of his health.

Nikolai opened the door to chase away the nosy brat, but was instead greeted by three strange and completely unfamiliar faces. Three faces under black-hats with angular chins were presented before him. All the men were stocky and huge, and were dressed uniformly in black trench coats. The men were all about 1.9 meters tall and each carrying a small travel bag over their left shoulders.

Looking at their mannerism, Nikolai made a wild guess that they should either be from the police or the army. But why would army or police officers be looking for me? Is it because of my unpaid hotel bills? …Nikolai pondered.

"What can I do for you young men?", Nikolai questioned them after clearing his throat.

The only response Nikolai got was a creepy grin from the buff blonde man in the middle. Before he could react, Nikolai was dragged back into the room by his collar.

The buff man casually tied him to a Vintage Baumann style wooden bistro chair, that was near his bedside. The man then stuffed one of Nikolai's stockings into his mouth, before going back to pick up his luggage which had been left by the door.

Over the past two days, Nikolai had been subjected to a variety of torture methods including sleep deprivation, tickle torture, and starvation. The most depressing thing about his circumstance was being tortured for some technology which he might or might not have invented. Through their short period of interaction, Nikolai could tell that his captors did not want to kill him. But today, the aura about the men was different. The men seemed to be impatient and prepared to use all methods possible to extract the information needed from him. They had already exposed their identities to him. They were German secret agents stationed in the USA. So, Nikolai was sure that they would not let him go after successfully obtaining the blue prints of the death ray. Nikolai knew that the longer he held onto the information they needed, the longer he would live. He was aware that one more hour of surviving under this cruel torture may increase his chances of being rescued from these Nazi hounds. That is how he managed to survive for the past two days without sleep and without any food.

Smack! Smack!... Nikolai was brought back from his memory lane by two slaps on the back of his head from one of his captors.

"Nikolai, hand over the blueprint of the death ray! We will spare you from the pain you are feeling!" captor one beseeched with a bit of impatience in his voice.

"You are already on the verge of death, just hand over the death ray – blue print. The others and I can leave you a complete corpse and ensure that your name is remembered for ages!"

"I told you already... I have no idea what you are talking about!" Nikolai stammered, sitting defenseless on the carpeted floor of the hotel room which had been his home for the past ten years.

"Nikolai, do not take us as fools who have not done any research before coming to you?" captor one retorted with another two slaps on his cheek.

"We are sure that you have been working on this high-tech weaponry for the past few years", captor two added in an accent which cannot easily be placed.

"So why would you invent something which cannot be of any use in our current world? The death ray, such a godly technology that maybe ranked first in all new technologies. Surely, it's completely wasted in your hands. The best place for such an invention is at the war frontlines.How many years has it been since World War II started? The death ray can absolutely change the war! Just hand it over and it will be used by the Führer to purge the world of all inferior races."

The three captors knew that Nikolai was an 86-year-old man, which limited their options for torture and extraction of the required information. They could only hope that as an inventor, Nikolai would wish to share his work before he passed away. They had tried.

The expression on Nikolai's face remained listless, and his lips continued to remain silent. However, instead, his mind was filled with doubt.

How did the matter regarding the death ray blue print in his possession get disclosed?

Although he had stayed in a number of hotels, and often left behind a number of blueprints as payment for his hotel bills, he had never disclosed the fact that he was working on the death ray.

He had clearly conducted countless experiments for a total of twenty-two years before making progress in the invention of the death ray. After spending untold hardships, he had finally made some headway and completed the death ray blue print over the Christmas season. He had even not began building the first prototype of this new weapon.

However, why was he targeted by the German secret agents when he was keeping a low profile since World War II started?

He tried to recall his past actions during the past few days. He had followed his routine of reading some newsletters, conducting his experiments and commuting to the cathedral and library to feed the pigeons…

Wait: Commuting to the cathedral and library… at this point, he recalled a previous incident in the fall of 1937 where he was unable to dodge a moving taxicab and was thrown to the ground. His back was severely sprained and three of his ribs were broken in the accident. He refused to consult a doctor following his lifelong custom, and never fully recovered.

Could the assailants have started following me six years ago? he wondered.

Small, prickly goosebumps broke out across Nikolai's arms and stomach, sending a small, cold shiver through him.

Nearly all his colleagues had abandoned him and only the pigeons he fed every evening were his confidants. His efforts during the past twenty-two years were regarded as speculative, philosophical, and somewhat of promotional character. His work had often been criticized as theoretical and often concerned with the production and wireless transmission of power; but did not include new, sound, workable principles or methods for realizing such results. So why were these German agents interested in his blueprints?

For the past four years, Nikolai had known that he was going to die. He just didn't know when. He could not pretend that he was without fear when facing his assailants, but his predominant feeling was one of regret. He had not loved and not been loved; he had given much by the way of his inventions, but he was not appreciated; he had read, travelled, thought and written, but he did not get enough time to understand the world.

Nikolai's mind was wandering. He began to recall his life; he was born in the Austrian Empire, his early school life in the village of Smiljan, his early career in Budapest – Hungary, his move to the United States, his sucesses, inventions and hardships up to this date. He had often heard from his religious father that there is an afterlife, but as a scientist he was always skeptical. It would be nice if there was another life after this. I would be the greatest inventor and engineer in the world, he thought.

But how small is a human beeing? Our whole race is a small pebble in the river of time without causing any major ripple in the Universe, he mused. We are born with almost no purpose, except to live, eat and breed. If there is a higher being who created us, why did he give us a creative brain when he clearly knew that our lifespan was too short to maximize its benefits?

Why! Why? Why?!

His utmost emotions, were in his inventions! He had supressed his emotions and immersed himself into his experiments. The price he paid was a life of loneliness. Unfortunately, in the end, he still did not manage to make headway in his inventions. Was the choice he made wrong? Or was that path definitely a mistake?

I have already nothing left.

A blue-gowned graceful figure of a person seemed to flash within his mind, and it became clearer and clearer as he felt himself begin to fade away. It could have been his imagination, but slowly he felt a pair of warm arms hugging him tightly and heard a whisper "Son, if you ever feel hopeless and depressed, please remember to hold tightly onto the pyramid jewelry pendant. You will surely find a way if you wish for something".

"I have always been a supersititious person..." Nikolai muttered to himself while holding tightly onto the only gift from his mother that he still possessed. In his mind, a hint of remorse soundlessly began to diffuse. Like smoke, it directly engulfed his entire soul. At that very moment, he could no longer control his mind, nor did he want to control it.

Nikolai remained as in a trance, unmoving, the gaze of his eyes seemed to be looking at somewhere else beyond him. "My only wish it seems…" he thought to himself, "Is to have another life where I can fulfill my dream. Become…a peerless engineer". And that was his last most concise thought before the rest of his soul started to scatter.

Contrally to his expectations, the last moments of his life were the most tranquail. As the light bled out of his eyes, the eye embeded as a jewel on the golden pyramid necklace around his neck seemed to be shimering with a faint bluish light. Maybe it was the light being reflected off the glass windows, or maybe it was something else… but no one noticed since it was tightly clutched in Nikolai's hand.

And in Room 3327 of the New Yorker Hotel, a great inventor and engineer passed away, with only a penny in his pocket.