Intergalactic Summit

Clan's on Mikramurka, Matar. Investment business and local trade.

I keep on telling them that since I am technically a ghost, they could just run the Death Rites and let me go free. They think I'm joking.

It's universally tragic of all or perhaps some kind of cosmic joke that a child need explain to their own family the nature of their passing, and that even still present in some small part mind and body yet invariably rejected.

I don't exactly consider myself dead; I don't think the dead generally get drunk or laid, say. They are also not very effective as pilots.

But I *have died*, and thus I am technically a ghost, which would give the clan the option to perform a letting-go. It would be a highly practical way for them to remove me from the books, deal with my bloodline inheritance (which is, to say the least, a complete mess), and get rid of the discomfort of trying to fit me into a system I really do not fit in anymore. Moreover, it would do all that without anyone having to go into any sort of clan-split or disowning type of solution, which would only serve to make the property mess even messier.

(They still think I'm joking and that this is one of my phases that I will outgrow. How old does one have to be before Aunties stop considering anything unconventional you do "a phase"? Please tell me this will stop when I turn fifty.)

Well you have a new family now.

It's too long and too private a story to tell in detail on the IGS, but shortly: it is a combination of things that has lead to where I am now, not any one single thing, and not just capsuleer estrangement (though that definitely plays into it). It's related to how the Rhiannon (people) are and how Rhiannon (the place) is, and how I grew up, and what my role in the clan was and now suddenly is not, and my shifting loyalties in general, among other things. The end result is that I am fond of the guys (bless their snobbish, power-mongering hearts), but I don't really miss them as kin.

So, I don't really mind being part of the clan - as I said I like them, and it's not really like they can boss a capsuleer and ex-Heir around in any meaningful way. However, since actually treating me as officially dead regarding inheritance and status would settle a whole lot of awkward bureaucracy, I would not really mind doing that either. Everyone would know I'm still in the world and that they actually can talk to this ghost, so it should work out. We don't have a precedence for what happens if the ghosts talk back, so that should prove interesting Tradition-wise too.

I for one haven't revealed anything that cannot be found out in five minutes by anyone remotely competent with an access to tribal records...

I guess it was only a matter of time until this question came up on the forums, and I have to say I am honestly facinated by the wide variety in upbringings between us capsuleers. For the longest time I was under the cynical impression at we were all street urchens with daddy issues who by circumstance were given the power of gods to smite who we wish. It's good to know that only holds up about half the time.

As for me I imagine the first few years of my life were similar to any Caldari tube child you talk to. I was born on Oinasiken IX in Black Rise in an effort to populate the area so the Caldari could settle and lay claim to a district of the planet before the Gallente could move in. Even as children we were expected to learn how to operate basic industrial machinery as the colony built up around us.

At some point the Gallente launched an incursion on the area, firebombing factories and military targets while the Marine Expeditionary Forces withdrew further into populated areas. It was decided that the collateral damage in the ensuing firefight would be unacceptable, and a detachment from Mordu's Legion was tasked to aid in the evacuation of civilian personnel. The local commandant however didn't take too keenly to relinquishing us from his ward to a group of pirates, and instead decided to arm a group of us tube orphans and use us to keep the Gallente at bay until he could organize a counterattack before the Legion showed up.

I can't remember what happened after that but by the time the Legion found me I'd practically gone feral, holed up in an apartment complex taking pot shots at them. They could have just leveled the building I was hiding in but the squad leader, a guy by the name of Vârcolac, risked his life to climb up three flights of stairs and disarm me. He picked me up and rushed me to an evac dropship just in time for a sniper to pluck him off when he had his back turned getting me onboard. I later found out that I was one of only a handful of people to actually make it out of that colony after the Gallente started to shell it from orbit. If the commandant had just evacuated civilians like he was ordered to do most of the kids I grew up with wouldn't have been inside the factories when the attack began. I must have gone into shock after surviving that, moving from building to building firing at anything I could while both sides tried to mop up whatever was left of the other. I can't really blame the State or the Federation for my experience. It was just one of those SNAFUs that happens in war.

I guess it's not all dark and edgy though. The Legion took me in from there on out, and started calling me Wulver for how rabid I was when they found me in the field. They couldn't have a child soldier running around their station with nothing to do, so they put my mechanical skills to work by giving me a job repairing dropships for an older veteran. Eventually he introduced me to my best friend Galm, another outcast kid like me who was wandering the station. When I was old enough I signed on with the Legion with him, which eventually lead to me working as a Dragonaur agent in Pure Blind. My time with that unit might be the best years of my life, before circumstances forced me to return to the State where I worked my way to becoming an Empyrian.

My old unit in the Legion has since disbanded, with its old members scattered to the wind with the exception of Galm. He happened to set his sights on becoming one of those immortal clone troopers, and has since forged his own career. Though sometimes I downright hate the guy, he's really the closest thing to family I have.

What? Snowfall? I keep telling you people, I was never in Tenal and I won that scorch bomb fair and square in a poker match!

Wait, no, I remember you now. It's been a while templar, didn't ever think I'd see you again after that misadventure. It's good to see that you made it out of that scrap. I wish I could say the same about our mutual friend. Though he sent me a heartfelt gift thanking me for my assitance, I haven't yet had the chance to speak with him. But you know how he is, the boy carries a lot more on his shoulders than he will ever let on. I'm sure at this point he just hopes to retire to his life in the State with his wife, at least until yet another adventure becomes the object of his fixation. Reckless soul, that one.

People only gotta look down the list of targets on field to find my family. Haha.

If they wanna hurt 'em it's just a matter of switching targets! Though ninety six percent of the time it'll fail.

MY FATHER WAS ONE OF THE GREATEST SOLDIERS EVER LIVED!
If everyone were like him, we would have won this war seven years ago!

(Also I thought you were older... since gallentean swines began their invasion into Black Rise exactly seven years ago).