EVE Fiction

What is war?
Ask the capsuleers who fight,
Men who defend the right,
Ask them - what is war?
"Honour - or death - that is war,"
Say the capsuleers.

What is war?
Ask the citizens who weep,
Mourning for those who sleep,
Ask them - what is war ?
"Sorrow and grief - that is war,"
Say the citizens.

What is war?
By ways beyond our ken,
God tries the souls of men,
Sends retribution just,
Punishing vice and lust,
God's wrath for sin - that is war.

Jita IV - Moon 4 - Caldari Navy Assembly Plant

One hour prior to its scheduled departure, the drones and thruster-shuttles servicing the TSS Eskeitan were flying to and fro. Like bees carrying honey back to a honeycomb they carried blocky, standard-sized grey containers and larger transparent habitation modules into the Drake-class battlecruiser, returning empty-handed to the docking ports, from where they would repeat the process.

Watching the embarkation process from afar usually made Knoot Enderas relax. He'd overseen it countless times before, enjoying the patterns that might be discerned in the chaos. This time, however, there was sense of finality to the process. The crew weren't just bringing along their workdaday clothes and gadgets, but their families as well. The Eskeitan had never held that many people before and her life support systems would surely be tested for the duration of the journey. The rest of the families' possessions had already been loaded onto a Badger, scheduled to arrive half a day later.

Althrough the Caldari Providence Directorate hadn't yet made any moves against Enderas or his crew, the move to Amarr space had been dictated by urgent political necessity. One week ago, Vikarion had announced on behalf of the Liandri Covenant that Heth and the Provists must be removed from power. As a member of that Corporate Alliance, those opinions were now supposed to be Enderas'. This, compounded with the fact that a prominent member of the Ishuk-Raata Enforcement Directive was arrested while leading anti-Provist protests and similar declarations made by other capsuleers put Enderas and his liberal, Capsuleer-led crew in the category of 'suspected dissidents'.

With a flash of anger, Enderas remembered the cool missive from the Pyre Falcon Defence Combine. Enderas had sought employment in the aggressively Patriotic subsidiary corporation. Fighting under such a banner would've shielded himself and his crew from suspicion and allowed them to remain in Caldari space. The reason for the rejection, he felt, had been spurious: the use of warp stabilisers in nullsec was not in line with corporate policies. The fact that his Jita-fit frigates had flown with them at all showed a 'lack of willingness to die for the State'. And dying for the state was that very thing that Enderas had so much wanted to avoid doing.

Advenus Classem, the Migrant Fleet, had provided a way out. As a Caldari Exchange Pilot, his continued loyalty to the State was guaranteed, whilst at the same time putting more than twenty jumps and an Imperial border between his people and a possible Provist crackdown. And, in an ironic twist of fate, it put Enderas in the same position vis a vis the Amarr Empire that his adoptive father had once held among the Gallente, so many years ago. The end of that, he hoped, would not be the same...

Moving this from Intergalactic Summit to EVE Fiction.

Thank you! I do as well!