A research lab located on a remote space station far in the constellation of Scorpius, orbiting Antares, a massive red dwarf star 550 light-years from Earth, took a giant leap in the development of the Gateway forcefield technology which allows ships travel faster than the speed of light by forming a miniature wormhole through space and time taking the ship into unimaginable distances at a blink of an eye.
The lab researched a mysterious algorithm found carved on rocks and artifacts of the first alien race found at the edge of the constellation of Ophiuchus. By applying the algorithm to the basic mechanism of the Gateway engine, a portal was opened, but instead of ending at a certain distance, it seem to be ending in a new dimension of reality, parallel to our own.