Deciding to be a member of the underground is a momentous decision. It essentially means that you'll be committing yourself permanently to the destruction of the Conspiracy. The underground cannot allow dabblers, they need committed elements.

Though it's very possible that your recruiter may know your name, it's important not to share details about one's identity with other members of the underground. Doing so means that losing one member makes it easier for other members to be captured subsequently. To that extent, codenames are used instead of real names at all times. You need to select one.

So the basics are these. Beings from other places than our world have come to our world. It appears likely that they've been coming over for all of humanity's history, and perhaps longer (who can say?), but that it appears that their influence was limited. As of some point in the twentieth century, probably the latter half, that changed. Humans have always been capable of unexplained powers, but these, too, seem to have become more potent at around the same time as the increase in influence by creatures of the otherworlds.

This also happens to coincide somehow with the appearance of aliens from other stars in our world. Though some speculate that these “aliens” may actually have come from just another of these other “dimensions.”

These other worlds are often referred to as “proto-dimensions” as these other worlds are thought to be generally more rudimentary than ours. Though some feel that's just our perspective on the subject. He gives substantial details on how humans can travel along dimensions in our world quickly, or, by turning just right, enter other proto-dimensions… in theory.

In practice only a few humans are known who can go to these other dimensions, mostly because they simply don't know which way to turn to get to them. Benny is one of the few, knowing how to get to two other dimensions now. The underground has another member, “Veronica” who is a “mystic,” which means that she is capable of easily entering and exiting a dimension of mind alone, which they refer to as the Astral Plane.

As for why one would want to go to these other worlds, at this point it's basically all about gathering information, and getting a clearer picture of who the enemy is. That said, such efforts have been rudimentary up until this point.

This is a listing of the few proto-dimensions known to exist.

This is a place where reality seems to change fairly quickly and with no rhyme or reason. There are myriad types of sapient beings in the Changing Lands, but few are easy to communicate with.

Peopled by a generally tall and slim race of beings (therefore referred to as “The Tall Ones”), the dimension of the Black Chamber is small and odd, repeating back upon itself after only what appears to be about a Kilometer or so. In it's “center” is a lake, in which is a vaulted edifice whose Tall One inhabitants refer to as The Black Chamber. These beings have some sort of odd social structure, and seem to be obsessed in many different ways with flesh.