Intergalactic Summit

Why do you live? Why do you keep clinging to this existence, to this world, when it tears you apart, when it takes everything you value, everything you hold dear, everything you love? Why do you keep your fight? Why do you keep your life? What makes you move?

Universe by itself is just a collection of silent rocks and superheated plasma, cold as death void and uncountable number of flying at supersonic speed garbage like milliards of tiny bullets, ready to pierce through anything standing in their way. It is dead stagnant worlds, rotating around dying stars, and violent pulsars, tearing apart everything that gets into their gravity claws. It is bright stars and, supernovas, and giant supermassive black holes making whole galaxies to dance to their music.

And here come us, changing it for our needs, for our survival. We claim it as our home and forge it like the Maker forged us into being. We build, enhance, erect and level, crush and reassemble. We create something greater, and we live with it. But there are forces who fight against us. There are those, who destroy what we create, who take from us what we own. By their malice or their design they become enemy, enemy of the State, enemy of Caldari, of humankind… They are like parasites, who suck our juices, who envy our success… and they won’t seem to stop. It is not enough that we live in a harsh world that isn’t friendly for us, that we have to fight to conquer our living space from dead rocks and burning elements. But it is against sentient malicious beings we have to fight as well. And they are hitting us where it hurts the most. They take what we dear the most.

Tell me, what have you lost already? Have you lost your family? Your home? Your loved one? Even if you haven’t, they will come for them, for this is their nature. I have learned already, that it is better not love to not feel the loss when they take it away. And even if you kill them, if you keep fighting and stand against all the odds, they are still pouring more and more and more. Eventually they will take everything, kill everybody dear to you, take all your posessions and take your own life. So tell me, why are you still alive? Why do you keep clinging to this world, full of hatred, malice, loss and violence? Why haven’t you pulled the switch and ended this pseudo-immortality farce?

I have answered this question for me quite a long ago. Even if they took everybody I loved. Even if they take everything I have, and even if they take my own life, I still have something they can’t take. However they will try, they won’t, unless I surrender it myself. And I won’t let it happen, because this is something that is worth fighting for. This is what belongs to you, but also it is not yours. It is fragile as a newborn child, and strong as an army of hovertanks. And it is something that only you can control.

It is your duty. YOUR duty. To your State, to your people, to the humankind. It is your duty to stand and fight, and to protect those, you can. Because doing your duty you will keep killing enemies, and by this you can save someone’s loved one, make parents to return home to children… even if not yours, even if you won’t know them, never see them and they will never recognize what you did for them, but your contribution will mean for them way more than the whole universe. If you have lost someone, you will understand how…

This is why I will keep doing my duty. Because this is what I have, this is all what I have, and this is what they can’t take from me. I will keep doing it disregarding odds, disregarding my life and my possessions. And I will stand for what is real.

And would you?

The chief aim of man is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever.

... Oh, gods, the world is wonderful.

My dear Miss Kim are you being refreshingly diplomatic?

But... do we need a reason to be?

I am, that is really all that matters.

I lost the why somewhere along the way and yet, I still... am.

Oh... and welcome back.

Why do I live? Because I have a dream...

I want to be the very best,
like no one ever was.
to match them is my real test,
and Mind Clash is my cause!

I will travel across the stars,
Clashing far and wide.
these Mind Clash stars to understand,
the power that's inside!

New Eden! It's you and me.
I know it's my destiny!
New Eden! oh, you're my best friend.
The cluster we must defend!

Mind Clash star, a heart so true.
my courage will help me through.
You play me, and i'll beat you.
Mind Clash stars! Gotta Clash'em all!

Unit. Corp. Ancestors. State.

I'll keep my serious reply brief.

I live for God, family and loved ones, my House and Empire and my friends. I don't know why I in particular been given the right to exist, but I do. I intend to do right by and protect those I care about, serve my God and Empire, and enjoy life while I can. If I can leave some mark on this cluster, or atleast on those close to me, for the better... I'll consider that a life well lived.

I admire Commander Kim's sense of duty, I believe it is something that we have in common.

As one of the Faithful, I live to bring glory to our Lord, to spread His Light to the darkest corners of space. As His tool, a capsuleer, I am to defeat His enemies and protect His people. Should I perish it is my duty to rise again and continue my work. This I will do until He calls for my final death, at which time I pray He will be pleased and will welcome me into Paradise.

Within this context I am also to serve my House. I have been entrusted with a Holding and it's people. I am to do all that I can to enable those under my charge to become paragons of Faith, to flourish, and to prosper. For as His peoples' light shrine brighter, none will be able to contest the Truth of His Word.

Finally, I live for my family. Of all the Blessings He has bestowed upon me, this is the one I am least deserving and most grateful for. I pray they forgive my failings and know, know, that they are dear to me.

I am not True Amarr, but God has made me with purpose, and with Faith. Though I shall never be as a True Amarr in God's eyes, I strive to live as one... obey as one... one of His Chosen.

So the Lord sent forth the Chosen,
to bring forth the light of faith
And those who embrace his love
Shall be saved by his grace
For we are his shepherds in the darkness
His Angels of Mercy.
But those who turn away from his light,
And reject his true word
Shall be struck down by his wrath
For we are his retribution incarnate
His Angels of Vengeance

- The Scriptures, Book of Reclaiming 4:45

When I was young, they took everything from me. My home, my family, even my planet and somehow I survived because I kept fighting. When I joined the Legion, even after a grenade took half my face and my left arm, I survived because I kept fighting. When the Legion found out that I was with the Templis the only reason I stayed alive was because I kept fighting. I fought to earn my way into the Academy, fought to graduate ahead of my peers, and fought to place myself into the empyrian program.

It is true that this world began violent, devoid of meaning, and indifferent of my existence. But it is also true that this world is a forge. From the vastness of space, stars form. Stars give birth to planets, which fosters life where civilization my grow and prosper. Once civilization is formed and only the most powerful concepts from a people's environment has taken shape, it may rise to the stars where it will clash and do battle with a different set of ideals until it results in the refinement of both worlds. And now here we exist as capsuleers, all products of our environment like myself born from a complex system greater then ourselves, but risen to a point where death has no meaning. We have all run the gaunlet of civilization and emerged as immortal beings, largely incapable of adjusting our outlook to anything more than simple refinement or the all too familiar feeling of nihilism that has become synonymous with the capsuleer community.

If this world truly is a forge, then how could it allow the creation of us empyrians when immortality makes us incapable of any meaningful change? The only conclusion I find acceptable is that we have all evolved to a point of existance beyond civilization, as living avatars representing whatever intangble force has brought us this far. For Kim, this may well be Duty. For Max Singularity, this might be Kindness. These concepts continued to persist into this new existance that we all enjoy, and we are all now expected to carry on our lineage into eternity. We become icons to some, enemies to others, but exemplars to many. In this sense, it is no exaggeration that we've all grown to be as gods, each a living embodyment of the abstract concepts in our lives made flesh. Therefore, the best thing we can do to continue this purpose is to continue to act on our own volition and try our best to be masters of our own free will.

I'm not entirely sure what I represent, so I'm not sure what I continue to live for. Tenacity? Obstinance? Self-loathing maybe? I can't be certain, and it's likely that many of us might not even have a word for the abstracts that we represent, but I consider it an honor to count a living avatar of Duty among one of my friends and allies Kim-haani.

Welcome back.

Oh, what would I do without you, Diana darling. Oh! We are not implacable foes any longer!