Hey. Was sent this way by someone I met in an Incursion (Hamish?) Thought I'd pop out some writing I'd done relatively recently. Let me know what you think, and how you think I should improve. I've never really written before, so all criticism is good
New Beginnings – I –“You know Markus? I’m starting to get kinda sick of this” Anja sent into the comm, her tiredness evident in the vocal reproduction. She’d been in Inaro on support duty for a CALMU mining run for 6 hours now, starting early at 6am system time.
A brighter, more engaged voice returned back, the capsules neural interfaces reproducing Markus’s general good mood, exactly what Anja didn’t need. “Any minute now, you’re going to start reminiscing about our time in the Academy again. It’s the same old spiel”.
The Veldspar asteroid Markus’s retriever was mining crumbled into itself as his mining lasers pulled the last remaining ore from within it. Small chunks of the rock shaken loose spiraled slowly outwards, impacting his hull, bouncing off and leaving no trace. The retriever’s engines flared once realigning the lumbering ship to bring it within range of the next asteroid. “I’m quite happy here. The money’s good, the crew is tight and there ain’t much risk losing your baby in systems with a security status this high”.
Her kestrel, on a 5km orbit of the retriever cruised by, thrusters flicking on for a second or two to adjust it’s trajectory to match the movement of the retriever. “Yeah, I know Markus, I know. I just feel like, I’m…” She paused searching for the words. “…losing it. I guess. I was good, I used to be good, back in the Academy, and UNDEF. Yeah?”
He chuckled in response. How many times had they had this conversation now? She was never settled, never happy with the lot she’d found ever since they’d both graduated from the Academy. “Yeah, you were good, and you wouldn’t shut up about it then either.” He paused as the retriever finally crawled into range of the next asteroid and its mining lasers flicked on, their orange glow reflecting off the glossy viewing window of the mining barge. “Although, I’m not sure you could call our time in UNDEF good. We got our ass handed to us more times than I can remember.”
Anja snorted back down the comm “Yeah, YOU did Markus, you did. When we finishing up here? You filled those cans yet? I need a drink”.
Dropping heavily onto her bunk, Anja dumped her kitbag next to her and sighed. It was a hard decision, but it was done. It was time to move on. Move on to something new, something bigger. She folded her repair overalls, worn, marked and stained from too much time on the hanger deck, around a half finished bottle of Jack before placing it carefully in her kitbag. “Can’t be breaking this now. Hard to stuff come by”. She stood up and lifted her medals, a mix of campaign and service stars from CALMU and CIDEV from the wall, popping the frame open and looking them over individually before carefully placing them in the top of her bag.
“Well, I guess this is it” a sad note in her voice, but a hint of excitement at a new beginning. She looked around at the empty bunk room. The rest of the crew were out on another mining op, Eddius taking her place as fire support for the exhumers. She pulled a piece of paper from her jacket pocket and opened it, briefly scanning the note written on there, folded it again and slid it under Markus’s pillow on the bunk above hers. Well, not hers any more. She threw her kitbag on her shoulder and turned to leave, starting as she realised Gustav the CALMU CEO, was in stood in the doorway.
“Sure you don’t want to..”
Anja cut him off abruptly “I’ve made up my mind Gustav. I need to move on”
Smiling sadly, Gustav shook his head. “It’s been a good year here in Inaro, Anja. You’ve kept us safe, made some ISK, and you’ll make more. Eddius isn’t ready for this yet. We’ll miss you a lot”.
She shook her head, her hand moving up to push an unruly fall of hair from her face. “It’s done Gustav. I’m outta here.”
Shrugging, Gustav threw something at her. Anja caught it, the act causing her kitbag to fall from her shoulder into the crook of her elbow. “An ISK chip?”.
“Yeah, bonus on top of your last packet. Thought you might need it to hand, rather than straight to your account. Fly safe”.
“Thanks.” She pushed past Gustav, finding it hard to hold the bravado up. Just before entering the lift to the docking bay she turned back. “Keep them safe Boss. Don’t replace me with any old fly by night”.
Anja looked over the last of the ship ready log of
Catharsis, her Manticore, making sure all the diagnostics checked out. There we are couple of problems, mostly mid slot heat damage from pushing that afterburner too much. “I should get that repaired really” she muttered to herself. Almost in response to her, the comm jumped life. “Undocking permission Granted. Fly safe capsuleer.”
Confirming her intention to undock back to docking control, she powered the engines of the Stealth Bomber and guided her into the exit lane. Moments later she was out into space.
“Where to? Hmm. I’ve got some stuff in Kaimon I should sort. Autopilot: plot a course to Kaimon, The Citadel”.
“Destination accepted, Anja. 7 jumps, all systems of high security status.” the ship computer chimed in response, in an altogether too cheery voice. “Autopilot engage” Anja responded “and can the voice responses. I’m not in the mood”. The autopilot symbol appeared on the left of her vision and the ship begin to align towards the Sirppala gate.
Nodding to herself, she pulled open a screen and started looking for work.
It took 2 weeks of searching recruitment boards and local recruitment contracts before something came up which looked interesting. Anja leant against the bar, nursing a glass of something strong looking. The Caldari Steel late bar, Kaimon III Moon 18. The place was pretty full of the usual Caldari steel workers. Lab grunts, engineers, plus the local mining contingent crowded in a corner talking noisily about things they’d done, or claimed they did.
She flicked down on the datapad she was holding, pulling an advert up to review. “The Black Company. Mercs. That sounds like it could be interesting.” A few nudges of the datapad and she had details of the contact, Nexyrius up. Pausing to fix her hair a bit and take a gulp of the whisky, she initiated a conversation.
A few seconds later it connected. Nexyrius looked up at her from the datapad. Shaved head, trimmed goatee. He looked like he was busy, and meant business. “Did you check the advert?”
Anja blinked. “uh.. Yeah, just reading through it now. I think I’m interested.” Nexyrius nodded “Think you’re interested? Send over your details to me. Oh, and read this. Read it twice”. The file received icon flashed up on the datapad, something called, ‘The Charter’. “If your details check out, I’ll send you a location of where we are screening for conscripts. If you don’t hear anything, you weren’t good enough”.
Anja watched the conversation window close down, just leaving the gently pulsing icon of the file Nexyrius sent over waiting to be looked at. A short pause and another sip of the whisky and she sent her details over. “I’m good enough” she muttered under her breath, not sounding quite as convincing as she wanted to. “Guess I’d better start reading this then….”
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Topic: [Story] Some writings... (Read 688 times)