24 - Metempsychosis

'How many have died?'

Keram shrugged, unsure, while appreciating the backside of the naked woman gazing out of the wide panorama window of the observation deck into the endless depths of space. 'Fifteen-hundred, maybe two-thousand.' He did not sound particularly affected by the idea of so many dead people.

'And on their side?' she asked.

'Probably about ten times as many.' the Amarrian replied. 'A good part of them died when you turned off life support on that Nyx before self-destructing.'

'Self-destructing.' she echoed with a bitter chuckle. 'As if there was anything left of me to destroy.' She did not turn to face Keram, and if she minded him staring at her nakedness then she showed no sign of it.

The former pirate shook his head. 'I got to say, turning off life support was one thing, but locking down the escape pods, that was just cold.'

Now the woman turned her head to look at him. 'Do you realize how many I saved by letting none of them live?' she said with an intensity that belied the low whisper of her voice.

She turned back to stare into the void.

'Well.' Keram said with mocking cheerfulness. 'You clearly cared enough to commit mass murder.' He drew his eyebrows together and continued more seriously. 'Actually, so did we, and we sacrificed a lot too. Don't forget that.'

'Forget.' she repeated introspectively, hugged herself and shivered. It was not a tremor caused by chill. In fact the interiour of the Tombship was rather hot and humid due to its aged and struggling climate control systems. The woman ran her hands along her body like she had to remind herself that it was actually there. 'I remember my name.' she said only slightly louder.

'Good.' Keram answered sarcastically. 'I wasn't sure whether the burn scanner was still working properly.'

The olive skinned woman turned around fully and now fixated his eyes with her own. 'My real name.' she breathed in a low voice. Keram found that he could not hold her gaze. Since he had known her, she had never been a person he felt at ease with, but now there was something decidedly unsettling in her eyes. He distracted himself by looking lower and following the swell of her breasts while she slowly approached.

'The Hive had erased me. The Ida nuns gave me a new name, but it was not mine. When they released me to go back to the stars they gave me another. It was also not mine. Year after year I have lived a life as another woman. Now that they wanted to destroy me again, I finally remembered who I once was.'

Due to her tall Gallente physique she ended up face-to-face with Amarrian man and the intensity of her presence forced him to look into her eyes. 'I will not ever forget anything again.' she finally added.

Keram pressed his lips together. With uncharacteristic seriousness, and suddenly not interested in her body at all anymore, he finally looked at her directly. 'Sandrielle, or whatever your real name is, you know I have suffered a lot too. We all have. It is a fucked up universe out there, and being immortal does not make us gods. If anything, it makes us even more fucked up.' he put his hands on her shoulders. There was nothing but sincere concern expressed by the gesture and his voice.

'Don't go crazy on us Sandrielle. We need you. You are one of us. We came for you because of that. Tenshin Noy and all the men and women in his fleet came for you because of who you are. It doesn't mean shit who did what and when to make you that person. That you are here today and talking to me, alive, that's all that matters. If you lose it then everyone who died in that battle gave their life for nothing.' he grasped her shoulders more forcefully and almost shook her. 'Do you hear me?'

'Tenshin Noy?' Sandrielle looked perplexed.

Before Keram could reply, a multicoloured flare outside illuminated the Amarrian's aquiline features and he looked over Sandrielle's shoulder. 'What in the name of the empress' tits?' he growled and let go of Sandrielle to approach the panorama window.

At the center of the crackling energy field a spindly ship with solar panel outriggers floated motionlessly. Seconds later, space erupted with ships. A whole fleet with the massive discus shape of a red-and-green patterned Nyx supercarrier at its centre suddenly floated right in front of the Tombship.

'Great!' Keram shouted and threw up his arms in defeat. 'So much for the secret hiding place of our clone store.'

***

'Sandrielle!' Tenshin Noy increased his pace to be the first to reach her after entering the expansive observation deck together with several of his commanders and the Awakened Industry capsuleers in tow. The Intaki was spurred on by the excitement of seeing the woman he had once loved back among the living. Upon reaching her, he immediately threw his arms around her now robed body and rested his cheek against hers with unrestrained affection.

The woman who had always displayed the most incredible self-control for as long as her wormhole-settler companions could remember, now appeared utterly surprised and incapable of any reaction. Then, tentatively, Sandrielle returned the hug. At last she wrapped her arms around him more tightly and kissed his face. 'Tenshin.' she breathed. 'It has been so long.' she ran her hand through his black hair and it looked like tears were clouding her eyes. 'I can not even say how that makes me feel now.' Overwhelmed by her own reaction she shook her head.

'Then say nothing.' Tenshin Noy replied with an affectionate smile and pulled her closer again. Tears rolled from his eyes, and against his shoulder Sandrielle spilled her own.

Cedrien remained at a respectful distance from the two former comrades, friends and lovers embracing each-other. Of all the Awakened Industries capsuleers he had known Sandrielle best. Yet he could not make sense of her reaction at that moment and wondered how she had changed. He looked at Keram with that unspoken question written on his face. The Amarrian leaned back in the chair he occupied at a seating area off to the side and shrugged helplessly. It looked like he would come up with something witty, but he never made it. Alira came at him faster than that and straddled him with her slender frame.

'It's good to feel you again.' she said with a saucy smile and a wink.

Keram displayed a crooked grin. '... said no Minmatar to an Amarrian ever.' he took the opening to finally deliver a snarky oneliner. The red-haired Sebiestor playfully slapped his face and then leaned down to plant a kiss on his lips.

At the rear of the group who had entered, Kassina Vikkonen smirked sourly. She switched to her native Caldari, addressing Shisei Kanioota who stood next to her and smiled beatifically at the emotional reunions. 'I reckon we can all be thankful for the passion of Gallente, Minmatar and Amarr people and the great adventures that has provided us.' The tall bounty-hunter frowned. 'As long as they don't forget to pay their debts to me.' she added.

Shisei's smile did not falter. 'Sarcasm? And I took you for such a strictly professional woman.' he paused. 'Sometimes achievement is its own reward.'

Kassina shook her head slowly. 'Spare me your Achura motivational quotes.' she sighed.

As Cedrien looked on, sadness cast a shadow over his features while he watched Sandrielle showing a side of herself that he had never seen and while Alira and Keram kissed wildly.

'She used to be very much in love with you.' a soft voice suddenly said next to him. He hadn't noticed Sylera appearing at his side. Bewildered he looked at the pale young Amarrian. 'I shared my mind with her. I felt the memory of it.' Sylera elaborated further and nodded in the direction of Alira and her Amarrian lover.

Cedrien nodded. 'I know.' he sighed heavily. 'But I couldn't. I am her commander.' He took a deep breath. 'And you might remember what happened to the last woman I loved.'

'You can not always live in the past commander.' Sylera said firmly. 'None of us can afford to do so. Actually, it was Sandrielle who made me realize that.'

Cedrien looked at the fine-featured Amarrian again, and she looked back up at him with those light gray eyes, smiling softly. Even affectionately, it seemed to him.

***

Darkness. Cold, damp metal against her skin. The skimpy dancing costume she had worn during the last moments she remembered hung in tatters from her. The depleted air stank of urine, faeces and the cloying, sweet odour of menstrual blood. She heard sobs and groans, pleas for mercy, names being called out, prayers and offers. A medley of female despair in all languages of the cluster. Slowly her fingers crept along the metal wall she must have been propped up against during her unconsciousness. She recoiled when she touched something that felt like hair.

For a split second the image of another young woman was illuminated by an impossibly bright light. It would have burnt itself into her retina, but before that could happen, she and everything around her had become vaporized.

***

With his chest thrust out in pride, the bridge adjutante approached the tall, straight backed figure wearing a long red coat trimmed with grey and white. He stopped at a respectful distance from the man viewing a tactical holograph of the fleet assembled at the newly spawned wormhole.

'Archdeacon-Commander. The Lord has accepted our sacrifice! Our scouts report that we have found the right place!'

'Finally our prayers were answered. Order the fleet to proceed and move up behind them.' The Archdeacon-Commander replied calmly.

OOC Entry 110 - Back on the Battlefield

After an extended holiday I am back on the battlefield, and I mean this in more than one way. On the one hand I have returned to the scenery of devastation that I left behind at the end of my last story, on the other hand I return after a round of rather turbulent things have happened in the world of CCP Games.

Of course, if you are reading this blog I am pretty sure you already know about the cancellation of World of Darkness and the further layoffs that were more recent.

I would love to say I am surprised, but I am not.

It is my personal experience both from military and professional experience that many endeavours that are thought up by higher ups often work out not because their idea was so incredibly good, but because they manage to motivate those who need to do the actual work. Sometimes those people are motivated themselves, sometimes they are even demotivated by their leaders but they still keep going because of personal conviction, professionalism, dedication to a cause or any number of other personal reasons.

If the decisions of the leaders are wrong, then it is often the lower ranks who have to suffer. In wars they die, get injured or have to endure a lot, and in business they can lose their job.

I myself have long become a very cynical person with absolutely no trust in any leadership whatsoever. This is also the main reason why I have never become part of any nullsec alliance in EVE. I simply have nothing but a sour smirk left for all those people leading their space empires. How could I become enthusiastic about something in a game world which I feel disillusioned about in real life already?

I also never felt any loyalty to CCP. They make the game which I liked to play, and they created the universe I like to write fiction about. Apart from that I could not care less about who they are and what they do. Personally I am sure they have a lot of dedicated people there (there are numerous testimonies confirming that too) and I am equally sure that their senior management are a bunch of people who consider themselves to be more important than they are.

Nothing new there as far as I am concerned.

That general attitude was what attracted me to life in Wormhole Space and more specifically it kept me there when our celebrity leader left us and the man who took over mainly lead on paper but he was just one of us. Sticking to my friends, my lovers, my family, my comrades and colleagues, that is something I can live for.

I do wish that all the continuing players of EVE get the development they hope for. I hope that Valkyrie and Legion will not be unrealistic pipe dreams that get scrapped before they can develop properly so more people can enjoy an immersive gaming experience in that universe.

I myself will stay in my little corner over here and continue to write stories. Right now it is a quiet corner because my fellow blogger is moonlighting on Evenews24 and Crossing Zebras and now it is him who is on holiday.

Of course I had my moments of inspiration while travelling around, and there is enough to pick up. What happened at the end when the Nyx changed hands? Did they win against the Hive? Have they managed to transfer Sandrielle into a new clone? What will happen with Awakened Industries anyway now?

That's what I am going to deal with in the next few days when I write my next chapter.

Until then.