Love is Blind

Fiction Friday! If you are not into your Eve fiction then try here. My father is still visiting so I have little or no Eve time. This was the case last night when I was down at the bar getting hammered with him whilst the CCP live event was happening. I woke this morning with a massive hangover and a lot of Tweets. Drunk Tweeting is bad mmmmm'k! However also on Twitter it appeared to suggest CCP rounded up a big fleet of High-Sec carebears and took them to null-sec... at the same time encouraging players who couldn't join the high-sec team (you know, because they are -10 due to all the PvP'ing they do) to head to that null-sec area. I mean, what's the worst that could happen there?

This piece was supposed to be an entry for the Pod and Planet fiction contest, but not sure I'm going to submit it. I liked the initial idea in my head but not sure that it turned out to be as quiet as good as I thought. Oh well...


Love is Blind

Hakeem sealed the clear transparent tank and opened a valve on one of the many tubes that were fixed to the containers lid. A quiet hiss broke the steady hum from the starships engines that filled the room. An opaque gas filled the glass camber that was located directly below the bleeding rooms. This particular starship was used for one purpose, to harvest humans, particularly their blood.

This was Hakeem's first expedition in total charge of the bleeding process. For nearly five years he had worked his way up the crew ranks. In fact he was only one step away from the bridge. Whilst at 23 years of age Hakeem would have been considered too young for such responsibilities in most of the major factions of New Eden, the Blood Raiders didn't have a long life expectancy. The militant wing of the notorious Sani Sabik cult existed to capture victims and collect their bodies, but mainly their blood, to further their research. Unsurprisingly this gave them a fearsome reputation and marked them as shoot-on-sight to all law enforcement agencies. Along with Sansha's Nation, stories of the Blood Raiders were told to young children to scare them. Bounties were placed on most of their ships which in turn attracted the capsuleers. Life with the Blood Raiders was usually short and brutal.

He opened a second valve and the gas in the chamber cleared. It was now fully sterilised and ready to be filled. It wouldn't be long now. An hour ago they had intercepted a Gallente hauler. After disabling it with the cruisers energy neutralisers they had latched onto the hapless ship and sent boarding parties over. Hakeem had heard the call for the second and third squads to move out. That was a good sign to him. If one team had taken the ship it would have meant only a small crew was present. If all three squads were needed then there must be many more. Hakeem could be very busy, very soon. Perhaps it was a refugee transport. With the two rooms above his head they could bleed 20 people at a time. A hundred bleedings would take him over a day. This particular mission required male and female blood to be extracted separately. If there was a big difference in proportions it would take even longer as he had set aside one room for the men and another for the women.

Half an hour later he was informed over the communicator that the bleeders were ready. He was bitterly disappointed to hear there were only three live and one corpse recovered from the other ship. Apparently the crew had set a trap killing squad one in a single fire in the galley. Squad two were flushed into space when a mining charge hidden in an airlock was triggered. This crew of four had put up more of a fight than any of their last targets.

Hakeem entered the first bleeding room and realised why. An older man and a boy were restrained against the wall in the bleeding alcoves. Their resemblance was obvious. Father and son. Nothing is more dangerous than a parent protecting its offspring. Hakeem  lanced at the corpse storage tubes. Empty. Therefore the dead crew member and the other live one captured must both be female. He picked up a thin tube with a large gauge needle in the end and approached the father who was pleading for him to stop.

Twenty minutes later Hakeem checked on the father. His skin was grey and ashen, he was almost gone. The man tried to speak but was too weak. Hakeem could see in his eyes that he knew all was lost. He was slipping away slowly. His son next to him was clearly dead already having been bled out several minutes ago. Hakeem waited a while longer until the father was fully drained before he shut of the machines. He then proceeded through a small airlock to the second room. The first thing he saw was the woman in one of the corpse tubes. The mother he assumed given her apparent age, meaning... he turned to the wall and gasped. There, suspended against the wall was the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen. No, not a woman, a girl. She was Gallente, late-teens and was sobbing heavily. He was mesmerised. She had jet black hair that cascaded down over her shoulders. Her skin was slightly tanned and in stark contrast to the white strappy top that she wore. He was frozen, rooted to the spot. The comms unit crackled into life and broke the spell.

"Hakeem we've detected a frigate in the next belt, given the poor harvest here we are moving to intercept. Be ready for more."

Hakeem blinked and slowly picked up the tube with the needle attached and walked up to her. She was restrained against the wall in one of the 'bleeding alcoves'. He placed his hand against her arm ready to insert the needle that would drain the blood from her body. The skin was soft, flawless and she smelt incredible. He paused, his head moved closer to her hair taking in her scent. Suddenly a pair of lips brushed his temple. The kiss was light, loving. "Please." the girl whispered. Hakeem froze, his heart raced.

"I can see you are a good man." she whispered "You don't want to do this."

He paused, conflicted, confused. Hakeem had never had a girlfriend and limited experience with the opposite sex. His heart pounded, his palms were clammy. Could this be love at first sight?

He turned to face her, she stretched her head against the restraints and kissed him lightly on the lips. He didn't respond, he was frozen.

"Please." she whispered again "Save me." She kissing him again this time he responded back. He felt her tongue push pass his lips as the warp engines engaged.

-o0o-

"Hakeem standby we're bringing four males to you."

"Acknowledged. Please set them up in Room 1. I'll be up there shortly."

Hakeem placed the communicator back on his belt and looked through the tiny crack in the door. He saw the troopers march by leading the prisoners. He and the girl were hidden in a small storage room near to the ships main airlock. As the sounds of the boots faded he grabbed her hand and ran to the open airlock. There was a very short tube where the docking arm had latched on the other ship. They stepped into the frigate and Hakeem smiled. The ship was Amarrian, an Executioner. Whilst the Blood Raider ships were slightly different, he still could fly this as the controls would be very similar.

He dragged the girl to the small bridge and jumped into the cockpit. The systems were still operational and the ships capacitor had recharged to 46%. Once the Raiders had captured the crew the energy neutralisers had been turned off.

"Hakeem. They are ready."

Hakeem picked up his communicator.

"Acknowledged. I'm down in the collection room sterilising fresh containers. Leave them there and I'll be up shortly." There was silence, no acknowledgement for several seconds.

"I sent a man down to see if you were there before I made this call. You were not there. What is your exact location, and where is the body of the girl we brought in?"

Hakeem dropped the communicator. With a flick of a switch he closed the airlock remotely and fired the engines. The docking arm between the two ships was ripped apart as the small frigate moved away from the cruiser. He knew that would have de-pressurised that one corridor on his old ship and activated just about every alarm on board. The small frigate slipped into warp before the Raiders could respond to the unbelievable turn of events.

-o0o-

An hour later Hakeem entered the galley, it was heavily damaged by the fire the crew had set off earlier. The girl was preparing them some food. She smiled at him as he entered.

For a moment he worried what he'd done. He'd abandoned his faction, stolen a ship and was now on the run. He knew he was relatively safe. Since warping off from the Blood Raider cruiser he had bounced between planets until he was sure that he had lost them. Then he had headed for the nearest high-sec stargate. Thankfully their hunting grounds were near to the low-sec border, more targets could be found this close to Empire space. As soon as they had left low-sec he knew he'd gotten away with it.

"Are we safe?" she asked as she seductively licked some sauce from her fingers.

"Yes. We're on autopilot. The ship will fly itself and even dock in the station like you asked." he replied. His heart quickened as he'd recalled what she'd said to him. "Once we're in high-sec, set the autopilot. I need to give you your special reward and don't want to be disturbed!"

She leaned against the counter top, leaving the food unfinished. She beckoned him over to her with one finger whilst she bit her bottom lip. Hakeem wanted to run to her, his desire was burning, but he tried to act cool. He slowly sauntered over and stood in front of her.

"I want you." she whispered and took his head in her hands. The kiss was warm, wet, and passionate.

All thoughts of his treason against the Raiders melted away as his new lover ground her body into him. This is what he wanted, this is what he needed.

The sudden pain made his vision go blurred. It was unbelievable and all consuming. He staggered back, breaking the passionate embrace, confused. He looked at the girl, her look of need, wanting and passion was gone. Replaced with a visage of hate, anger and sorrow. His vision panned down her body. At her side she held a large carving knife, it was dripping with bright red blood. It slowly dripped which formed a small pool on the scorched floor. Time appeared to slow down. He looked down at himself and saw where the bright red blood on the knife had come from him. A gaping wound pumped rivers of blood from his left side. The wound was large, she had twisted the knife hard after stabbing him deep. He slumped to his knees trying to stem the flow of blood with his hands.

"Why?" he gasped.

The girl shot him a look which appeared to say "You really need to ask?"

To his amazement, a short laugh left his lips. Of course he didn't need to ask. His shipmates had killed her mother and he'd personally bled her father and brother to death. The irony was not lost on him, as she pushed herself up and sat on the worktop and watched him slowly bleed to death.

Space Yurts and Ghost Sites

So we have our space Yurts on the server. In case you are wondering what a Yurt is, in our time it is a small potable igloo-shaped home used in Asia. In Eve Online it is a deployable home from home.

It is 50m3 in size packed and you drop it and anchor it like any other deployable structure. Once its in space, this is what you get:-

 

The short stats are.. well... it has a fitting service (like a carrier) and 3000m3 of cargo space. Good for storing and swapping modules, not much cop as a forward base for reshipping. You can stick a packed frigate in there, but there is no way to assemble or launch it so no point.

I tried scanning it down, and got some weird ghosting. There were two mobile depots showing up on the probe scanner but on D-Scan there was only one. Anyway I was able to scan it down fairly easily with sisters combat probes once I found which one it was!

DRACKARN! KILL!

Four volleys from my Naga and it was space dust. It drops a wreck you can loot from.

For me I don't really see much use for this thing tbh.

CCP have also announced another Rubicon feature. Ghost Sites.

Basically these appear to be PvE NPC pirate research centres where you can hack the databank and steal their stuffz. Their stuffz being mainly blueprints for a new faction implant set (the first one to be crafted by players) that gives a bonus to warp speed, materials to make these implants and blueprints for the new depot type deployable structures.

These are timetrial sites, and when you enter one, a hidden clock starts ticking. When the counter reaches zero space-ponies are released, Nyan Cat does a fly past and you get covered in Amarrian custard.

OK, not really, the site detonates in a fecking big bang which will likely destroy your ship!

There appears to be the potental for pirate rats trying to stop you hacking the site, but these have no bounty and no loot so farming these is pointless. The idea for the site is to get in, hack and get out before the pirates say "Oi! That capsuleer is stealing our hard earned research. ACTIVATE THE SELF DESTRUCT!"

The countdown is to be hidden so you have no idea how long you have. I assume CCP has made a formula that randomises the time, may be even linked to the quality of the loot. Something like 3 minutes +/- 0 to 45 seconds.

Nothing really there to interest me personally. The implants are niche. With the interceptor rebalance, warping changes and this implant, 'ceptor pilots will be keen to get one of these. Then again if they are really expensive are pilots going to risk them in null-sec and wormhole space? Many won't risk low-grade faction implants in low-sec even. That might limit their appeal. Time will tell but I don't think these are going to be anywhere near as popular as a Slave or Snake set. Outside of PvP I do see freighter pilots eyeing these up, especially after the warp changes meaning their slow-boating becomes slooow-boating in Rubicon. As freighters are 99% confined to warping around high-sec, I think some freighter pilots will splurge on some new hi-grade implants to cut off a chunk of their time spent in warp.

Me? I'm assuming their will be an acceleration gate to enter these Ghost complexes. These sites do not have to be scanned down and will pop up apparently. Whether this will be straight onto overview or in the scanner window like faction war plex I don't know. I guess CCP don't want new-bros to warp to this funny thing and then DIAF when the site goes boom as they "explore" without reading any pop up thoroughly. So if I come across one I'll grab a Cockbag Thrasher and sit outside it on the gate. Surprise!

One thing that does make me happy is that the blue print for the Omega implant only drops in low-sec and wormhole space. Along with the tags-4-sec introduced earlier this year it goes somewhat further to balance the woefully unbalanced risk vs reward in low-sec. Anything to atract more people to low-sec, so I can shoot them, is a good thing!

I'm a bit surprised that the loot component required to build all of the six implants only drops in high-sec. I assume CCP were worried about supply and cost if it dropped in more dangerous places. PI materials and Trit are also required but I doubt the demand for these implants will make any sort of ripples in the PI market whatsoever.

So two new bits of Rubcon... not really much for me personally.

Test Driving the Stratios

I'm a bit limited on Eve time this week, my dad is visiting from the UK. He's come all this way to see me so not really right I spend all my time on Eve. However, whilst he's watching some TV I found time to try the new Sisters of Eve cruiser.

As a PvP'r I've gone from PvP fit Stratios. Shock! I know! First up was a dual web armour tank with drone DPS. I imagine using something like this to lurk in a plex cloaked waiting for squid farmers to arrive.

Not looking too shabby. DPS-wise it is fairly close to my other drone Cruiser, the Vexor. It is also comparable to my Flabber (Fleet Stabber). Tank wise its a bit less than those other ships. Both of them have 1600mm plates and I could only squeeze a 800mm on the Stratios. However, one word. Cloak!

In space it made short work of rat destroyers but against a Claymore piloted by an alt it didn't do a lot. But then again, that is expected! 400dps against a Commandship would take a while.

With a 400m Drone bay the Straitos screams SENTRY DRONES!!! So I refit for a ranged version with Garde II's and beam lasers.

Yup, that works. Same tank of 31k EHP but now with 726 DPS! 

Tried that on the alt in the Claymore and had to take off DPS as his tank was breaking. A few of these with sentry drones assisting fast tackle could be very nasty!

So in my very quick trial it appears to be an interesting craft. I think the sentry drone fit will be the most common. Although I fear to think what the Caldari Militia will make of this for LP farming. I shudder to think...

Yes, as I thought, a very effective squid militia fit! Killed the cruiser rat in the medium plex with drones rather quickly and didn't drop below 90% shields even with the lack of tank. Triple stab and covert ops cloak. Catch me if you can!

Hang on, two can play that game! The FFF - Federation Farmer Farmer fit...

Rigs reduce the 6 second sensor recal on declaoking to 4.3 sec and the twin scram makes sure he's going nowhere. Oh yes, that could be useful hiding in plex waiting for squid farming Strats to enter!

SCASSSS - Iceland Style

At some point today SCAS will have had as many visits are there are people in Iceland!

OK it probably pales against Jesters Trek, Eveogander and the like but I'm a happy bunny! The funny spike in the graph above is what I have called the 'Manifest Effect'. I got two posts linked by CCP on their Facebook page in consecutive months once, hence the massive spike.

So a few stats:-

Top posts

PL : WTB New Titan - Linked by CCP in their Facebook Feed.
Can I Haz Eve Stuffz - Linked by CCP in their Facebook Feed.
I'm Sorry, There is No Excuse.... - Linked by someone on Redit.
300, Loren Gallen, Chuck Norris and Overkill
The Ridiculously Quick Faction War Guide


Top Referring Sites

http://www.evebloggers.com/
http://www.facebook.com/
http://sandciderandspaceships.blogspot.com
https://www.google.com/
http://www.evealtruist.com/
http://blogpack.evebloggers.com/
http://eveoganda.blogspot.com/
http://jestertrek.blogspot.com/
http://www.reddit.com/r/Eve/
http://www.reddit.com/r/eve


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My Sister's Ship

This will be an entry for the Pod and Planet fiction contest. I thought I'd try and write a Eve-O expansion chronicle type piece for Rubicon.

In other news I have another Novellette almost ready. This one is slightly shorter than "A Second Chance at Life", less than 20,000 words as I recall. I pay crap, but if anyone with good Ingrish skills out there fancies proofreading it I'll throw some ISK your way (I split a billion between three who did last one) plus give you a credit in foreword of the e-booklet.


My Sisters Ship

A huge window looked out towards the planet below. The conference room lights were dimmed which made the view into space even more spectacular. The sun had moved behind the temperate planet of X-7OMU II and created a black orb against the star field.

Santimona Sarpati looked away from the window and up at the large display screen as the engineer stood recounting lists of boring specifications and technical data to the board who were seated around the large conference table. The CEO of the Sisters of Eve glanced around the various executives present. Some were looking intently at the big screen on the far wall that displayed the images and data of the prototype craft. Others appeared disinterested and were flicking through their datapads.

She discreetly glanced at her own datapad as the engineer described the improved electronic sub-routines that increased the strength of the scanner probes by 19.43%. There were three new messages. The refugee crisis in Black Rise was worsening. The Gallente-Caldari war was swinging backwards and forwards every six months. There was a message from her team out there requesting more support against the bureaucracy that was hampering their rescue efforts. The next message was reporting that the situation in Fountain had died down substantially. The capsuleer war there had been short and brutal. Millions had died and millions more had been displaced. However, the Sisters involvement was now reducing, she hoped they could be end major relief operations in that region before the end of the year. Finally there was a message regarding the famine on Konora III. Unusual solar flare activity had led to the planets entire crop failing. 400 million people were in danger of starvation and the Minmatar Republic had asked both the Sisters of Eve and the Gallente Federation for help. The message she had received was from a member of President Jaque Roden's Federation cabinet who responsible for external aid and relief efforts. The sleazy politician was probably suggesting dinner again to 'discuss' the situation. She rolled her eyes, another evening meeting where she would be trying to get an agreement on aid shipments and he'd be trying to talk her into bed.

Santimona looked back to the big screen, the engineer was summing up and a video simulation was playing in the background showing the new ships moving towards a half-destroyed Nyx class super-carrier. Flames and wreckage spewed from the crippled craft as the bright white prototype ships moved towards it. A large explosion inside the Nyx blasted a chunk of wreckage towards one of the approaching frigates. The small ship gracefully dodged around the massive chunk of spinning metal and resumed its course towards the stricken craft. Most of her board were now busy with their datapads having heard enough. The CEO knew as soon as it got to the questions segment they'd all be paying attention. She knew that after she asked the first question all hell was going to break loose. Inwardly she smiled, this was going to get very interesting in the next two minutes.

".... and so esteemed executives of the Sisters of Eve, I give you the Astero and the Stratios. Next generation ships, designed from the ground up, to specifically serve the requirements and needs of the Sisters of Eve." the Engineer concluded.

There was a polite round of applause as the lights in the conference room were turned up. The room went silent, the engineer who had been giving the presentation looked at the CEO expectantly. She cleared her throat.

"Excellent work. Please pass my gratitude onto the engineering team. These are impressive and iconic ships that the very sight of will bring hope to those in the most dire of situations. When all hope appears to be lost, when death appears to be the only certainty, the sight of these craft will be a beacon of light in the terrible darkness."

Another polite round of applause. The CEO smiled and nodded in acknowledgement whilst thinking "Bunch of kiss-asses!".

"I myself have only one question for the design team." she continued. "Could these ships be made capsule compatible?"

There was a moments stunned silence, then the room erupted in shouts and hand waving. She fully expected this, she welcomed this. It was time to have this discussion once and for all and the unveiling of the designs of these new ships was the perfect opportunity. She sat up straight and eye-balled each director. Slowly the shouting died down to a murmur.

"I'm sorry? I thought this was the executive board of the Sisters of Eve, not a Matari school playground."

Embarrassed looks were exchanged around the room.

"Now I know this is a delicate subject, so you'll all get your chance to give your opinion. But first, I asked our Engineer a question. Can they?"

All eyes turned to the engineer stood at the end of the table.

"Yes ma'am, the actually design changes needed to make any ship capsule compatible is actually easy to design in and doesn't require much special..."

The CEO raised the palm of her hand. The Engineer realised he'd answered the question and he abruptly shut up.

"So that is a yes then. Before I go around asking you each of your opinions and we take a vote, you will listen to mine. The Sisters of Eve is THE premier rescue and disaster response organisation in New Eden. We are the ones the Empires turn to in times of crisis. We have no political bias. We will save those in need whether they are pirates or monks, saints or sinners. Yet there are sometimes when we ourselves need additional help. The capsuleers, whatever your opinion of them, are a valuable tool in certain limited circumstances. Whether you agree with it or not, we have a long history of working together. Since the new laws, which were implemented this year, that required scan probes have auto-return subroutines included, fewer capsuleers have been approaching our agents looking for work. Pilots are no longer losing our modified scanner probes as much, therefore demand for replacement probes has fallen drastically. This has meant many of our capsuleer contracts have been going unfulfilled and we have suffered, and when we suffer other people suffer. The demand for the goods we offered as a reward for services rendered has dropped, therefore the capsuleers have been offering their time and services to other organisations where they can make a better profit. We need to offer them something to bring them back to working for us. These ships are unique, there are nothing like them. Yes, New Eden would be better off without the capsuleers, there is no doubt about that. However, the fact of the matter is they are here and there is nothing we can do about it. So do we distance ourselves further from the capsuleers, or do we make use of their services for the greater good?"

Again the room erupted in shouts and again was silenced by a wave of the hand from the CEO.

"Titrutolf?" she asked the Minmatar Chief of Staff.

"It is a difficult one. We all know sometimes we need firepower to prevent further disaster and loss of life. It is perhaps one of our greatest issues we must wrestle with on a daily basis. Destruction and death for the greater good. Some around this table may say violence is never an answer, but they are wrong. Whatever your opinions of the capsuleers are, we need them. We have tried contracting traditional mercs, but we have found that this usually only leads to more deaths. I agree with the proposal, the Empyreans have deserted us for more profitable organisations, we need something to tempt them back. These ships are the answer."

"Ishemi?"

The head of administration and chief financial officer steepled his fingers under his chin.

"The finances have been very strong lately. This is simply because we are no longer paying out billions of Interstella Kredits in capsuleer contracts. Since the demand for our scan probes dropped, they have been seeking greener pastures it is true. Well, more profitable pastures at least. In fact we have a surplus of cash. From a finance point of view we are better now than ever. However, I do not think we should be talking about money, we should be talking about actively encouraging capsuleers! They are the angels of death in New Eden and we expend more resources cleaning up after their destruction than on any natural disaster or war! We cannot, we must not, encourage or support these Empyreans. The fact of the matter is that the cluster would be a safer place without them! They will not use these ships for good! They will use them to destroy! I will vote no."

Slowly Santimona Sarpati worked around the room, each of the board members taking one stance or the other, very few sat on the fence other than Vampant Antyles. The head of the archives recounted several incidences where capsuleers working with the Sisters had prevented massive losses of life. A silence engulfed the room when he recounted the plague on Gicodel IV where a lone capsuleer was able to save the vaccine after pirates had hijacked the shipment. Tens of millions of people had been saved due to that one capsuleer. However, as impartial as ever, Vampant also recounted several incidents where the Capsuleers had caused huge losses of life completely unnecessarily. In the end he admitted he didn't know if the Empyreans were a blessing or a curse on the cluster.

The last of the executives gave their opinions. There were those who believed the Sisters should not be associating with the capsuleers and that they should cut ties with these immortals totally. Others pointed out that whilst an aid agency, the Sisters regularly needed a more military solution to problems to prevent further loss of life. Compared to the other alternatives, capsuleers where the lesser of the evils. Finally the last executive, who was in charge of the Security Division, gave their opinion in support of the proposal and all heads turned back to Santimona Sarpati.

"Well unsurprisingly we appear to have two camps. Now I must ask you all to vote. Should our next generation of Sisters ships be casuleer compatible so that we can offer them to Empyreans as a reward for services rendered, or should be continue to distance ourself from them?" she asked.

One by one, each executive tapped their datapad. Within thirty seconds all the votes had been cast the results appeared as a three-dimensional graph slowly rotating above the table. The assembled executives had to crane their necks forward to get a closer look, the two bars appeared almost level.

Santimona Sarpati nodded, her face not showing any expression.

"The aye's have it by a single vote." she announced "The next generation of Sisters of Eve ships will be capsule compatible."

Fool Me Once, Shame on You...

... Fool me twice.... well that aint gonna happen because I'm coming back in a big bloody cruiser... with friends you cloaky motherf......

The fighting has continued around Northern Black Rise since my return from holiday on Friday. It is a great time to be in faction war. There is plenty of good solo and small gang warfare going on and for once the number of squid LP farmers are outnumbered by the number of squids actually looking for a fight. Add in to this neutrals and pirates like Stay Frosty roaming the area and its really fun to be in the Nisuwa area currently. I've also finally broken into the 'top 1,000' rankings on BattleClinic. I started the year just outside the top 5,000 and got to just above the top 1,000 over the summer. However, a lack of targets in my TZ, too many farmers, a bitter-vet induced 'meh' stage and a few OOG issues left me there for a few months. Now we have a lot of targets, plenty of solo action and my Eve Mojo is back which is driving up my BC points.

On Monday I'd been out and about and got a few kills. Simply sitting a Cockbag Thrasher on an acceleration gate can get you good action currently. There is a tendency for some squids to use kitey ships with good GTFO-ability. However, even a Crow class interceptor has issues when it drops out of warp and is stationary long enough for your full rack of T2 280mm howitzers with two T2 Gyro's to open a new "feature window" in their port side. Its even better when the same Crow pilot goes to fetch another one and dies again a few minutes later.

Anyway, onto the story of the title. It was getting late on Monday when I spotted a Republic Fleet Firetail on scan towards a Medium Federation Outpost in our home system of Nisuwa. Now as Nisuwa was 0% contested there would be no point in any Gal Mil to be in there. And looky here! There is a war target in system! Warp drive activated....

I was in a 10mn AB Thrasher. These can be very effective against all T1 frigates. With speeds of over 1600m/s the frigate target must use a MWD if it wants to keep out of optimal range. Turning on the MWD increases a ships signature radius 500% making them very easy to hit, very hard. I dropped out of warp on the acceleration gate and did a quick 21m KM D-Scan as I always do when landing on an acceleration gate. You never know who else may have warped just before you and already entered the plex. Just the Firetail on scan so I activated the gate and entered the plex.

Three orange flashies on overview inside as I drop out of warp. What. The. Feck?

I look at my D-Scan in disbelief. The 21m KM scan I took before entering the plex is still on screen and still only showing the RF Firetail. The Kitsine and Ashimmu came from nowhere! Wait... Ooooooo the cloaky motherf.......

I know I'm dead, and unfortunately another QCat had also seen the Firetail and was not far behind me. I said on comms what was happening as I was scrammed, webbed, jammed, neuted dry and DPS'd. My Thrasher went down in short order as there was nothing I could do. Tz's Kestrel that followed me in also died a death the same way. We both podded out and docked up.

So they sprung a very effective trap. Put some bait in a plex and have a cloaky Ashimmu and Kitsune waiting to spring. Another QCat reported the Ashimmu and Kitsune had vanished from D-Scan and only the Firetail was left. Wait... surely they are not just resetting the trap. After all they played their hand to two people who belong to a corp who live in the same system. Wow, apparently they are.

Suddenly the QCats went to work. If you are a child of the 80's like me you might what to have this theme tune playing in the background as you read the next bit.

Tzenick quickly shaved a mohawk and blackened up his face with shoe polish. Clive put his cap on backwards and gave some crazy-eyes, Defqon undid a his top three shirt buttons and shagged the nearest hotty and Djalis put on an extensive disguise and lit a fat cigar. The QCats were in A-Team mode! Cruiser hulls were stripped and re-built with cap injectors, energy vampires, ECCM and drone DPS. Tz went back out and entered the plex in his refitted Rupture (remember they had just killed him two minutes before). They "sprung" the trap again and the rest of us dog-piled in as Tz announced he had the Ashimmu locked down. The enemy Firetail fled as we arrived, the Kitsune stuck around at range until it got several flights of drones in the face and then promptly warped off which left the Ashimmu against the rest of us. Just like Colonel Decker, he had no chance. One Thrasher and one Kestrel lost in round one, one 200m ISK Ashimmu destroyed in round two. I love it when a plan comes together!

A very effective trap guys, but you really need to consider moving along once you've played your hand to the residents of a home system.

OK, We'll Call it a Draw

I was going to blog about the Bastion module today. But whilst I was on holiday someone at CCP mirrored SiSi so the High Energy Physics I was training on SiSi... didn't. Bah, another 5 days. So I'll blog about my weekend on Eve then:-

After 10 days with no Eve and very limit internet access I dived straight back into the game as soon as I got back from holiday. That was a mistake!

After a very early morning flight and then a long taxi ride back I arrived home tired but with an Eve itch that needed to be scratched. I thought I'd log on and see what was happening as a lot appeared to be kicking off whilst I was sunning myself on holiday!

Before I left TEST had announced their intention to join the Caldari militia. They were going to grind standings first and I had assumed this would take them a while. Not so, and they joined faction war only a day or two after I went on holiday.

Around the same time, the Caldari Militia alliance Talons of Blood decided they would plot to invade the QCats home system of Nisuwa and capture it. That offensive started last week apparently.

Anyway, Friday afternoon I logged on and almost immediately I was asked if I could take care of a Tristan in a novice plex in the system next-door. I went over there... and died horribly. I had a second go. And died. I then went to bed taking the hint that my body and mind was giving me. A few hours of sleep later, I tried again.

It has been squid-tastic over the weekend. The Talons of Blood offensive had ground to a halt and only a few of their members were spotted out about in my TZ. There were still plenty of squids about and there was solo and small gang fights all weekend. Many of the times we were outnumbered so resorted to Attrition Thrashers. What are they? Well they are basically cheap-ass Cockbag Thrashers. They are T1 fit with 280mm arties, se-bo, long point, small shield extender and gyro's. You can fit one of these up for about 2m ISK. The idea is to rush the enemy and pop as many of them as you can before you die. Obviously with T1 guns and gyro's you are not going to get the same level of alpha as a proper T2 Cockbag Thrasher. However, they will still pop most frigates and destroyers in two or three volleys. Whilst you might (probably will) loose the ship, the chances are you'll kill more than one enemy and very likely you'll win the ISK war. Simply overheat and volley away!

It was a nice change fighting squids that wanted to fight rather than LP farmers who rage in local if you kill them. The farmers were still about, just mixed in with actual PvP players. I was shocked when I pointed a Punisher and it didn't warp off! 99% of Caldari Militia Punishers are packing multiple warp core stabs. Anyhow, check out these awesome farmer fits:-

Yesterday we heard that Talons of Blood are stepping down their Nisuwa campaign. Apparently it is a draw! Their offensive stated middle of last week and Nisuwa has been 0% contested and at upgrade level V all weekend. We got more kills and won the ISK war. However, we are assured it was a definitely a draw.

However, apparently there was a fantastic side-effect of the Talon's offensive for the wider Caldari Militia. The Talons believe that the reason the Caldari have captured so many systems in the last week was because they tied up the QCats in Nisuwa. Now I'm not sure what the FOUR THOUSAND TEST Alliance Caldari Militia pilots make of that, I feel that they may consider that they had something to do with it. Whilst I, biased of course, think the QCats are awesome, I'm also not sure us being distracted by a home invasion led to a dozen Gallente systems falling.

Who knows!

Anyway with the Talons of Blood sticking around in faction war and TEST slowly pushing ahead, we're going to have some interesting times ahead.

Lock and load boys!

SCASSSS - Back!

Well for the past two weeks I've been staying here:-

And when not laying on the beach or drinking I've been scuba diving with these:-

But I'm back now and time for another quick Special Sunday Short!

I landed back on Friday and what do I get back to find? TEST have joined faction war and that the Talons of Blood (squid corp) are trying to capture my home system of Nisuwa. Brilliant! Home delivery for war targets. Over the weekend I don't think I went more than one jump from Nisuwa and had plenty of action. The farmers were still there of course with their stabbed and cloaky ships, but there were actually squids looking for fights. I killed, I died, I had fun. Talking of fun, there was a corp mail waiting for me regarding defensive ships. I thought the links would be to the fittings. No, they were links to gif's representing each of the ships....

The Attrition Thrasher
This Thrasher is basically a cheap version of the QCats Cockbag Thrasher. T1 fit, cheap and can be thrown away in Leeroy Jenkins style suicide rushes!

The Kestrel

Well we need something to get these kitey ships down with.

The Atron

One Atron on its own.... well no good. But when you have a few....

There is Always a Bigger Fish

Fiction Friday. This is the last of the 7 blog posts I queued up whilst I was on holiday. I should be home pretty much the same time this posts!


There is Always a Bigger Fish

Chan's heart almost stopped. A Black Raven. Of all the cards his opponent could have turned over last, that was both the most unlikely and the worst possible.

He was sat in a small gambling den in the spacestation orbiting the first planet in the Grinacanne system. Down on Deck 4 very few police dared to tread. This deck and the ones below it were almost over-run by the criminal elements on the station. Between the immense generators and life-support plants dozens of illegal establishments had sprung up. Just like then one Chan had visited and now was regretting. He knew he had a problem with gambling, he was an addict. But just because he knew didn't mean he could stop. The beautiful Caldari woman sat opposite smiled sweetly even though she had just taken him for everything he had and more, much more.

Chan swallowed. This was it. His amazing 'cannot loose' hand had just lost and he'd staked a hundred times what he had on this unbeatable hand that had been beaten.

"So Mr Chan, I want that million credits by this time tomorrow station time. You don't have a problem with that do you?"

Chan just sat like a deer in the headlights. A bead of sweat dripped down his forehead.

"You do have the money right?" she purred ideally fingering the chips on the table.

Chan just sat there not knowing what to say. If he said yes she'd know he was lying and probably kill him. If he said no, she'd probably kill him. Well, in all truthfulness she wouldn't herself, but a click of her fingers would indicate to the massive Brutor bodyguards behind her that they should snap him like a twig.

"I......"

She leaned forward, Chan wondered how long he had left to live.

"Oh Mr Chan. I'm sure you can come up with something. I mean you work for a small financial corporation. A lousy million credits should be easy to get hold of."

Chan sat there still. He wanted to shake his head. The fact she knew where he worked should have sent alarm bells ringing in his head, but he was too scared to think. The idea that he had been set up never registered. He was to busy thinking how he could get a million credits in 24 hours and save his own life. He was a low-level manager in a Caldari financial institution. He didn't have direct access to the money and, as with all people at his level, they were watched carefully with all data access being carefully monitored. They were a very small institution, so monitoring was easy. A million was no more achievable than a trillion.

A snap of the woman's fingers brought Chan out of his trance and made him jump. A Matari man emerged from behind a curtain. Chan almost gasped. This wasn't a man, it was a hulk. One of the scariest Brutors Chan had ever seen was standing there, his body oiled up, in a loin cloth. The sight was absurd. He looked like an entrance for the Mr New Eden Power Lifting event. Immense rippling muscle gleamed in the dim light of the room.

"Olaf here is my favourite employee." the woman said smiling as she rose and walked over to the man "He is a very useful man to have around."

The woman walked over to the Brutor and ran her hand down his oiled chest tracing the muscle groups with a bright red fingernail. She reached his loincloth and untied it, letting it fall to the floor. Throughout this he never moved and simply stared straight ahead.

Chan just looked at this, mutant of a man. The only thing that was more scary than his muscles was what was swinging between his legs. It looked the size of Chans forearm. He'd never seen anything like it, not even in those contraband Gallente holovids that were passed around. He was now terrified of what was to happen next.

"As I said, you have 24 hours to get the money. Olaf can be a very considerate lover, I know. But he has a dark side, a very, very dark side. 24 hours Chan, otherwise Olaf will be introduced to your daughter."

Chan's eyes went wide with terror. His head was spinning as two bodyguards gripped him by the shoulders and threw him out of the door.

-o0o-

"JOLI? JOLI?" Chan shouted as he burst into his apartment. He raced to her room. She wasn't there, the vivid pink decor hurt his eyes. He should never have allowed her free reign to decorate her own room. It looked ridiculous. However, after the loss of his wife and her mother he knew he had spoilt her. Something out of place caught his eye. It was a holovid disk laying on her bright pink bedsheet. "Watch me" was scralled across it in red letters. With trembling hands he placed it in the entertainment centre at the foot of her bed.

The black screen was replaced by a picture of a naken man in a mask. Whilst the mask hid his face Chan knew exactly who it was, it was the same unnatural body he'd seen in the last hour.

The camera panned round. It looked to be somewhere on the station. A dark, dingy room in the lower decks. In the corner was a filthy mattress and a woman was laying on it. Chan breathed a slight sigh of relief when he saw it was not his daughter. The woman was much older and stick thin. Chan assumed may be one of the girls from one the 'establishments' down there. She looked broken and malnourished. Probably a flood-head, addicted to the hallucinogenic narcotic mindflood. On the screen Olaf picked up a knife and started over to the girl in a menacing walk, his fists balled tight.

When the short clip was over Chan rushed over to the waste bin and threw up. He needed to watch it but it was the most horrific thing he'd ever seen. He never knew pure evil could exist, but that Olaf, he was evil incarnate.

Chan composed himself. The video had stopped and the last frame was frozen on the screen. The lifeless, broken body of the woman was shown in the corner, but in the middle of the screen was a clock on the wall. It showed 21:00 hours, the deadline to get the money. Although the video had stopped the screams of the woman still rang in his ears.

-o0o-

Chan stood outside his bosses door. He had hardly slept and looked awful. He looked at the clock on the wall which read 09:00. Twelve hours to get one million credits. There was only one way he could see in getting the money. Plead with his boss and pledge his life to service.

He knocked on the door and entered.

Five minutes later two security guards rushed in and pulled a kicking and screaming Chan from the office. As he was dragged through the premises co-workers rose from their seats peering over the cubical walls. They saw the boss standing angrily in his office doorway watching Chan being dragged towards the exit who was screaming something about the boss killing his daughter.

-o0o-

The lift appeared to be descending faster than usual. Chan knew it was just his perception. He knew what was coming. After being thrown out of the office he had stripped his appartment of all of his goods and sold them. He had a bag containing 85 thousand credits and an empty shell of an apartment. The lift door opened and stale warm air flooded in. He stepped out and started towards the club.

Various workmen passed him, some giving him a knowing glance. How many times had the labourers down here seen the same thing. A dead-man walking to his execution, hoping that they will spare his daughter. Chan tried to be positive. He knew he was dead, but 85 grand was still 85 grand. May be it would be enough to buy her freedom.

As he approached the clubs entrance the two bouncers stepped aside. He was clearly expected.

The club was not very busy, it was still early. However, a number of men sat around tables as Matari dance music pumped out of the speakers. Several scantily clad girls danced provocative around poles hoping to attract attention. Chan noticed curtains drawn across some of the side alcoves where no doubt the dancers were entertaining clients.

He saw the owner sat with her bodyguards in an alcove at the back. He slowly made his way over.

"Ah Chan, just in time. I was thinking you wasn't coming. Oh, that looks a small bag." she purred seductively.

Chan placed the bag on the table and one of the men took it he opened it and glanced inside.

"Looks about 80 or 90k" he said.

Chan simply stared into the woman's eyes.

"Oh Chan, why did you have to make this difficult?" she sighed "You did see the holovid right? You know Olaf needs to blow off steam once in a while?"

Chan finally broke down.

"That is everything I have." he sobbed "I tried, I tried everything and everybody. I now have no job, no possessions, no future."

The woman eye'd him carefully with a slight smile.

"You are very right on that last point. You see I cannot let people see that I can be taken for ride. Especially not over debts of a million credits."

Chan sobbed pleading for her to spare his daughter. The woman nodded at a bodyguard who stepped forward and punched Chan in the stomach. He dropped to his knees gasping fopr breath.

"Give the girl to Olaf. Make sure it is filmed and he gets to watch as it happens. Then airlock him and his daughters corpse. Put the holodisk up for auction, such a disk should make back most of the money I am owed from the sicko executives who get off on that."

The bodyguard nodded. Suddenly a red dot appeared in the centre of his face and the wall behind him became splattered with red. Before the other guard moved the same happened to him. Chan looked up, finally regaining his breath and saw the woman staring impassively with her bodyguards dead on the floor. Chan turned around to see the 'patrons' of the bar on their feet with guns pointed towards the woman or the bouncers and dancers around the room. The people on the club floor were soon rounded up and taken to a back room. A Caldari man with a pistol trained on the woman approached.

"Do you know who I am? You are making the biggest mistake of your soon to be short life. I am Akari and I own this station!"

The man lowered the gun slowly which started to draw a smile from the woman's face. As the gun dropped he squeezed the trigger. The woman's face turned to one of horror. A red stain started to spread from her stomach.

"I know who you are. What you didn't know is who I am or that the company Chan here worked for was actually one of my organisations laundering fronts."

Chan looked at the man in shock.

"We do not take kindly to low-level whores encouraging our employees to steal from us. Mr Chan here only has his spine in one piece still, unlike you, because rather than try and steal from us he begged the manager for help."

The woman was indeed paralysed from the bullet that had severed her spine. Her eyes showed fear and her open mouth gasped for air.

"I'd say let this be a lesson to you. But I don't think you'll learn."

The man stepped forward and shoved his pistol into her open mouth. Her eyes flickered in terror. He pulled the trigger one last time.

Chan stood there frozen. A shrill cry of "Daddy" made him spin around as he daughter approached with a suited man beside her. His daughter ran into his arms and they embraced.

The man who had shot the woman walked over to them. He handed Chan an envelope.

"You cannot stay here, but the Syndicate appreciates your honesty. There are instructions there to meet a ship that will take you to your new home."

Chan gaped wide. The Syndicate? The Serpentis Syndicate? For the past five years he'd been working for one of the largest criminal gangs in the Cluster and had no idea. He looked down at the envelope and then back to the corpse of the woman. He wasn't going to argue with him.

-o0o-

Three weeks later.

"How was school darling?" Chan asked as he entered his apartment. His daughter was sat on the sofa crossed-legged eating a big bowl of popcorn and watching a holovid.

"Boring daddy. I thought pirate school would be cool, but its same lessons as before."

Chan smiled. The Serpentis Syndicate station that they now called home was full of surprises. He expected some sort of anarchic base with no law or order. School lessons on cooking mindflood and drop boosters. What he actually found was a highly civilised and ordered society. To an outside observer the outpost could belong to any of the major empires. Police patrolled the streets, the school lessons were standard Gallente curriculum, the shops and entertainment were better than home and law and order was maintained well. Chan himself was now a financial manager and was supervising his old manager as well as several other establishments back in high-sec. He sat down next to his daughter and put his arm around her. She snuggled into her father, not taking her eyes off the cartoon.

"Yes" thought Chan "Its the pirates life for me."

Test Alliance, Please Faction War

I'm on holiday, so if the situation has changed, whoops. TEST were apparently grinding standings to join the Caldari when I left.

So another massive null-sec entity is coming to low-sec. Now the popular view is that null-sec is the end game for of l33t PvP and low-sec is fill of bad players. Therefore TEST should steam-roll the war zone right? That's what their leader said. Warzone control tier V all the way!

We'll see. Basically TEST are likely to have a huge number advantage. Although they are well down from the 8000+ they had, they still have over 4000 pilots.

As for l33t PvP skills, I don't think so. Nulli Secunda found this when they came to faction war and many of us Gallente went over to the Amarr/Minmatar warzone to "farm Nulli". I've done both, low-sec FW and 0.0 sov holding coalition. I'm somewhere in this screenshot:-

Basically I found 0.0 to be poor for PvP. Most of the big battles needed no pilot skill. Lock what the FC broadcasts, press f1, rinse and repeat. Between large scale battles the small gang and 1v1 was very poor. Many of these guys are going to get a shock:-

Ship Types
To conquer faction war systems you need to capture complexes and a lot of them. There are four classes and three of them are restricted to cruiser sized hulls or lower. How are these null-sec dwellers on T1 frigate and destroyer ships?

Tactics
Small gang warfare is an utterly different animal to null-sec mass battles. You have to think for yourself, piloting skill is needed. FC'ing these fleets also is very different to big fleets of big ships.

Piloting
Frigates, destroyers and cruisers need piloting skill. Take that faction war stable, the triple-neut Tristan. You have a serious range issue, overheating is needed early on in the fight, cap issues abound, keep that injector going, local reps and over heat, watch your drones. Lock, f1, lock f1, lock f1 does not apply to faction war.

Burn Out
Plexing is BORING! I mean seriously boring. Warp to acceleration gate, activate, enter, kill single rat, wait for 20 minutes. Rinse and repeat. Plexing is not supposed to be fun, its supposed to generate PvP. Now if TEST have to resort to large fleets to capture plex, those LP are going to be spread mighty thin between all the members. I have a feeling many will be asking what's the point when they are getting little LP for a lot of waiting.

So we wait to see if TEST can grind the standings to get into faction war, then we see how they cope with some low-sec loving.

'On The Gate' by Eelis Kiy aka Kaz in Space

A guest post today whilst I'm still laying on a beach. Poetry on Sand, Cider and Spaceships??? Who'd have thought that!

On the gate
Mods hot
Breath still
Fingers poised
F1, F2...
Heart pounds
Tension builds
Sweat beads
Eve is real
I am the alpha
The Lioness
I guard the gate
I start the mess
I catch the kill
For the rest
To rip to sheds
But without me
The target flees
So come on target
Come to me!
I'm ready
To spring
Ready
To pounce
I orbit the gate
Around and round
And hope to see
Optimal range
And sluggish prey
And of course
Un-stabbed chassis
No chat on coms
Aside the sound
Of the FC
And the spies, around
Keeping tabs
On our victim
So ignorant
So innocent
So unsuspecting
Of their doom
For I'm the catcher
In the gloom
On the gate
Waiting still
Just for you...

Excited voice
In my ear
Adrenaline swims
The prey is here!
Overview
Lighting up
GO! GO! GO!
Target up!
Primary ship
In my sights
I spring to action
I start the fight
At lightning speed
Mods activate
None can escape
Their fate
On my gate

I see...
A flash
Of light...

I hear...
A familiar tone
Confusion...

Then the truth
Hits home
My catch
Flies away
My pride
Follows after
Coms fill
With laughter
I...

…shot the gate.



Drack's note - True story, I was there! :o)

SCASSSS - iHub Bash

Welcome to the third Sand Cider and Spaceships Special Sunday Short - The Heydieles iHub Bash.

Basically for those that don't know, in order to capture a system in faction war you have to run plex until the system becomes vulnerable. Each plex captured is around about 0.6-0.8%, so you need to do 150ish plex to get the system vulnerable +1 for each plex the other side captures. The average time to close a plex if you are not disturbed is 15 minutes ish (Novice 10, Small 15, Medium 20). So that is 40 hours of orbiting buttons for one system roughly if nobody defends! You looking forward to this TEST? That is a lot of doing nothing if you are going to push for tier 5 and need most of the 101 systems. Mmmmmmm?

Anyway when you get a system vulnerable... it is time to FIRE! I don't recommend using a stealth bomber unless you are epically hungover and cannot be bothered with the hassle of getting a DPS boat there and back. In my defence I did use faction torps so the DPS wasn't that bad!

The Reversal - Part 2

I'm on holiday so this is automatically posting whilst I am away.

The Reversal - Part 2

The group of a dozen survivors of the crash slowly trudged across the barren landscape. They wore fire-fighting rebeathers that allowed them to breath in the nitrogen rich atmosphere. It had only been a two kilometre walk but the higher atmospheric pressure was taking its toll. They were all suffering from mild nitrogen narcosis due to the dense atmosphere. Whilst they symptoms were similar to being mildly drunk, the Captain knew they had bigger problems. The air they were breathing from the rebeathers obviously contain oxygen, but under the right circumstances oxygen was poisonous to the human body. He rechecked the screen attached to his sleave. The atmospheric pressure was 4 times that of a normal temperate planet. Pressure of 4 bar on 21% oxygen gave a partial pressure of 1.04. Well below the 1.8 recommended maximum. Central Nervous System Toxicity would not be a problem. However there was the second type, whole body oxygen poisoning. The longer they stayed outside the more danger they were in.

There was a lot of dust blowing in the wind and visibility was low. Slowly a vast shadow started to appear in the gloom. As they approached, it took shape.

"That cannot be...." the XO spoke in amazement over the comm link.

"It is." the captain cut in. "It is the The Shimu Sota".

The group stopped and looked at the lost terraforming ship. It had crashed into the same area as they had and had slid into the side of a mountain. It had been there for nearly 100 years.

"OK people, it is an old ship, but its still a ship. Find your respective areas and see what we have."

The group broke up into small teams each heading to the area of the ship they knew best. The engineers grouped together and headed towards the aft of the ship and the engineering bay, the command crew started towards the front of the ship and the bridge. The crash had left many holes and tears in the Shimu Sota's hull so access was not difficult. It was also much more intact than their own ship that had broken up on crashing. The captain and the XO slipped in through a tear in the hull and into a dark corridor, they turned on the lights attached to their headgear. The ship was dead, the atmosphere was nearly pure nitrogen and there was no sign of power. Dust covered the floor and the surfaces, leaving footprints behind the two as they walked towards to front of the ship. Nobody had walked these corridors in generations.

They reached the bridge and it was the same. Dead. The Captain tried to access the captains console but there was no power.

"XO. See if there is any juice left in the backup batteries. They should be located behind that access panel."

The XO moved to the panel next to her and opened it.

"That's strange sir. Nothing here, and when I say nothing here I mean nothing!"

The Captain walked over and looked inside. She was right. Not only were the batteries missing but large sections of electronics had been removed. He plug in a small emergency power cell he had brought. The console came to life for a few seconds, and then died.

They continued their search and found a number of the crew. The dry, oxygen-free atmosphere had preserved the bodies. Their uniforms, although dusty, were still bright around the mummified corpses. The ones around the forward decks were obviously killed in the crash. However, as they worked back they found crew that appear to have been murdered.

"What in Divinities Edge happened here?" the XO muttered crouching down over a corpse that appeared to have been stabbed in the chest.

"Could have been mass panic. May be survivors fighting over food and resources. I wouldn't think it would take long for discipline to break down and people to do what they thought they had to do to survive." replied the Captain.

He moved further down the corridor and his boot kicked something under a layer of dust. He bent down and picked the object up, shaking the dust from it. It was a slave collar used to control Matari slaves. The Captain then realised they had seen no Matari corpses, and a ship of this era would have had a large slave compliment working on it.

After an hour of exploring the teams met up together.

"How is the reactor?" the captain asked.

"Its gone sir!" the chief engineer replied.

"Destroyed?"

"No sir, its been taken. Seriously, the hull plates have been removed and the reactor taken, somewhere. There are even gouges in the rock surface showing where it went!"

-o0o-

The 12 crew trudged on, desperately aware that time was not on their side.

The deep gouges in the surface led the survivors into a valley between the barren, rocky mountains. The trail had begun immediately where the side of the Shimu Sota had been hacked open and they had been following it for an hour. The mountains now towered either side of them as they progressed down the valley. The captain glanced at the panel attached to his sleeve. 25 minutes of air remaining in his breather. As he walked he wondered if he had done the right thing. There was no way they would have survived much longer on their ship and even less on the wreck of the Shimu Sota, but they would have had a few extra hours. The gouge marks led into a huge cave, there obviously had been water on this planet in the distant past. It had carved a massive cave and probably had formed the valley they had walked through to get there. The gouge marks continued into the black. For some reason someone, or something had dragged the reactor in here.

One by one the crew switched on the lamps attached to their masks. The cave lit up as they looked around and headed deeper inside the mountain.

A beep from each rebeather sounded over the next five minutes, warning the users that they had less than 15 minutes of air left and should get safe. Worried glances were exchanged. Soon they were down to five minutes of air and the captain believed all was lost. He slowly raised his arm as he heard a double bleep from his console. Glancing down he expected to see a countdown to his death. Instead, the counter was going up. He shook his head assuming the atmospheric pressure and diminishing oxygen was playing tricks with his mind. He saw other crew member looking confused. Then he looked at the atmospheric readout. 81% N2 - 19% O2. Hardly a great atmosphere, but it was breathable. How? They were on a lifeless planet, how did this cave have a breathable atmosphere when the outside was pure nitrogen? The captain removed his mask and took a tentative breath. Clean, fresh air. Others followed after seeing their captain do it.

Slowly they made their way deeper, as they progressed the O2 levels slowly rose. As it neared 21% they saw some form of light source ahead. The group picked up their pace. A minute later they strolled into an immense underground cavern teaming with life. Fields stretch out in front of them and a small village could be seen in the distance. Artificial lights suspended from the cavern roof lit the area. The captain could just make out the fussion reactor near the village. They had stripped the terraforming equipment from the ship and had managed to get this cavern to sustain life.

The group walked into the fields and saw figures tending the crops. They stood and looked at the strangers nervously. They too were Amarrian but wore rags and were stick thin. Some ran off when they saw the new comers.

The captain approached one that had stood his ground.

"I am Captain Erza of the Imperial Navy Scientific Vessel The Righteous. It is amazing you have survived! The Empress and God be praised!"

The man did not reply, he looked terrified. The captain was about to ask what was wrong when he heard shouting. A group of men with crude weapons was running towards them. They were not just men, they were Matari. It took the captain a few seconds to realise what was happening. His fellow Amarrians, stick thin and dressed in rags were working the fields. These Matari looked well fed and better clothed. They must have been the slaves on the Shimu Sota, but now they were in control. They surrounded the captain and his crew as one of the larger men stepped forward.

"I am Beltard of Brutor. Welcome slaves, it is good that you are here." the large Matari leader announced.

"I am Captain Erza of The Righteous. A vessel of the glorious Amarr Imperial Fleet and we are no slaves, Matari!" he did his best to sound confident. He knew the situation was useless. They had not brought any weapons. Why should they on a dead planet? If he could bluff his way through then they might be able to gain control of these ex-slaves.

The Matari laughed heartily and casually swung his crude axe around lazily.

"Take their equipment and clothes. Give them something to wear more fitting for slaves. Men to the fields, women to the cells. Tonight we feast!" he announced to his men to a great cheer.

The captain stepped forward in anger. The last thing he saw was a huge fist launched at his face.

-o0o-

For the second time that day the captain came around in pain. He opened his eyes to find an old Amarrian tending his wounds.

"Who are you?" groaned the captain.

"I am Chel." the old man smiled. "My parents were crew on the Shimu Sota."

"What happened?"

The old man continued dressing the cut on the captains head as he recounted the tail. They were surveying the planet when there was a computer malfunction, the slave's collars all popped opened at the same time. Within minutes they had a full blown mutiny on their hands. An attempt to take over the helm controls from engineering had fired the engines and taken the ship into the atmosphere where it had suffered the same fate as The Righteous. The ship had survived the crash much better than The Righteous. The worst affected part of the ship was the fore. Most of the crew in the forward sections of the ship died on impact, unfortunately that included most of the officers and senior staff. In the confusion of the aftermath of the crash the Matari had taken control. With no command and being suddenly outnumbered the Amarrians hadn't stood a chance. The entire crew, now with the Matari in charge had looked for options. The ships scanners had detected the cave system and it appeared to be the only way to survive. They had stripped the terraforming gear and all useful equipment from the Shimu Sota and resettled there. Only this time it was the Minmatar who were in control. The ship had more than enough goods to make a good start, especially for the much smaller crew. From nutrient rich soils to cattle embryo's that could be grown in weeks in the clone vats they had enough gear to start a small eco-system. There was more than enough food to go around, but the Matari ruled with an iron fist. The Captain continued to ask questions and the old man replied as best he could.

A short while later the captain was collected.

The great hall was just how he'd imagined. A blend of scavenged resources and those they had grown naturally creating a homage to traditional Matari tribal architecture. As he was roughly pushed into the hall a roar went up. The tables were filled with food and foaming beer. The delicious aromas made his empty stomach grumble. However, there were no Amarrians seated, only Matari. The Amarrians present were walking between tables serving, including several of his crew. Rage boiled up inside of the captain. He was shoved forward again towards the top table that was on a raised stage and looked down on the other long tables lined with benches. Some were signing a song in the Matari dialect.

"Ah! Their leader is awake!" shouted the Matari man who had punched the captain. A roar sounded around the hall.

"Come! Come captain, please sit here."

The captain was pushed next to the leader and shoved into a chair. The Matari went back to their feast.

"As you can see Captain, we have prepared a feast in your honour. We were having some issues with our slaves, you Amarrians work slow and breed slow, and are awfully fragile. But now you have come to bring fresh blood, all is well!"

A plate was slammed down in front of the captain. It contained bones with a few shreds of meat attached. The captain wouldn't have given that to his hounds, there wasn't enough meat on them.

"Let the auction commence!" the leader shouted which was followed by a huge cheer. The captain had a sense of foreboding about this auction.

A minute later his fears were confirmed. The female members of the crew were led into the hall. They had been stripped to their underwear and were hoisted onto one of the tables. Each one looked terrified and most were sobbing. One by one the men in the hall called out their bids. Some of the Matari women sat with those men slapped them occasionally, the Captain assumed they were partners or husbands, when they offered a bid on the more attractive Amarrian crew members. Soon even some fights were breaking out between rival bidders. Although it appeared to be normal with the surrounding Matari whooping, cheering and egging them on. One-by-one each of the captains female crew where auctioned and collected by the winning bidders.

"You are animals." the Captain growled.

The leader turned to him and grinned.

"Now tell me captain. Obviously I have only heard tales from my parents, but how are my kind treated on your worlds? Have you not seen this all before?"

The Captain opened his mouth but stopped. He knew there was no way he could respond to that. This place was a frightening mirror of the Imperial Empire. The only difference was the roles were reversed. His father had took him to his first slave auction when he was 12. He can still remember the look on those Minmatar's faces as they were led up to the podium and the gathered Amarrians shouted out their bids. They were fearful, sad, broken.

As he considered that, he knew all was lost, there was no way out. He grabbed a knife from the table and lunged at the leader. A deafening roar of approval went up as the two men tussled. Even some of the men who were heading out of the hall with the captains female officers slung over their shoulders stopped to watch and cheer. The Matari seated adjacent to the Captain and their leader sprang to their feet but they didn't interfere. They cheered and encouraged the leader as the two men rolled on the floor. The fight was short.

The captain lay on his back motionless, the wooden knife handle protruding from his chest. Each laboured breath he took brought foaming blood to his lips. The Matari leader stood over him and smiled.

"Ha! Good fight captain and congratulations. You just made the slaves very happy! Take him to the slaves kitchen, let them know they have proper meat on the menu this week. Hell he might even last them until next week!"

As the captain was dragged by the wrists he caught the eye of some of his crew who were serving the Minmatar. In his fading vision he could see they were broken, he'd seen the look before. The same look he'd seen on his own the slaves back in the empire.

The End