Backstage - OOC Forums

Please login or register.

Login with username, password and session length
Advanced search  

News:

The language of the Amarr empire is spoken by more people than any other language? Read more in this Chronicle.

Pages: [1] 2

Author Topic: [Contest] Inspiracy Grand Opening Contest! Poll up!  (Read 8980 times)

Silver Night

  • Admin
  • Demigod
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2250
  • Elitist Oldtimer

Inspiracy Grand Opening Contest!

Your nominees:

Vieve - http://backstage.eve-inspiracy.com/index.php?topic=416.msg4591#msg4591
Shalee Lianne - http://backstage.eve-inspiracy.com/index.php?topic=416.msg5073#msg5073
Ken - http://backstage.eve-inspiracy.com/index.php?topic=416.msg4606#msg4606
MadMuppet - http://backstage.eve-inspiracy.com/index.php?topic=416.msg4718#msg4718

Voting goes for one week!


The Contest:
Just write a short description of a crew member on one of your characters' ships. Could be an officer, or a regular crew member. Someone your character has tea with or someone your character has never seen. The contest will run 2 weeks from the time of this post. Submit your description in this thread. (Either the description itself or a link to it). Judges will nominate several potential winners, and the grand prize winner will be picked by a poll.

The Prizes:
1st Prize: 500m ISK

2nd Prize: 300m ISK

3rd Prize: 200m ISK

Everyone who is nominated by a judge but doesn't place in the poll will receive a 25m consolation prize.

The Rules:
  • Descriptions should be no more than 500 words. A few more than that may be ok, but judges may choose not to consider entries that break the limit. Go over at your own risk.
  • One entry per person
  • New (previously unpublished) material only
  • Description needs to be within the bounds of Eve PF (Canon). If you aren't sure about something, I suggest asking - the 'OOC' channel in-game would be a good place to start, or on the Inspiracy forum itself. Everyone is always happy to help. If you aren't familiar with the PF, there is plenty on the eve-o official site in the backstory section.
  • All decisions by me in regards to the contest are final. There is no appeal. Don't feel I've been fair to you? I will try to be fair, but in the end, Eve isn't fair. Value it as a learning experience.
  • Contest will run for 2 weeks, starting at the time stamp on this post.
  • Rules subject to change.

Format:

The contest will be open for entries for 2 weeks from the time of this thread. Judges will review the entries in this thread. Each judge will pick 2 once the contest closes. There will be a couple of days for judges to do the picking, if need be. The judges will post their picks in the contest thread. I will create a poll, which will run for 1 week. The winners will be picked via that poll.

Any sign of tampering with the poll will lead to an alternate selection method.

Misc:

Thank you to Kaldor Mintat and Ciarente for helping with prize funds! :D
« Last Edit: 02 Jun 2010, 16:54 by Silver Night »
Logged

yani dumyat

  • Clonejack
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 21
Re: [Contest] Inspiracy Grand Opening Contest!
« Reply #1 on: 09 May 2010, 08:47 »

He Did Not Want To Die Like This

He looked at his hand, laughed at the way it trembled and joked with his shipmates about his Amarrian heart lacking warrior strength at the moment his manhood was to be tested, the moment every navy man prays for and the moment he would be judged in the eyes of his God.

It says much about Lieutenant Kor-Zaml that he thought about his wife when most men would be consumed by pleasurable thoughts of another life. He was as pious as any man who fought for God and empire but knew how pride and temptation could get the better of him so prayed that any judgement on his soul would not last too long.

Matari artillery blowing chunks of armour off their battleship seemed like a distant memory but the claxon warning of a hull breach still rung in his ears and his mind replayed the explosion over and again like a horror movie projected over his every thought. The shell had smashed through the other side of the control room and he would no doubt be awarded a medal for saving lives as the panicked crew fought their way towards airtight escape chambers, it would be a hollow prize for a woman and son cheated out of a loyal husband.

Despite his injuries the Lieutenant had survived the engagement and the respect he commanded from his men was obvious when he led cheers of joy and many salutes to the victorious Amarr who scooped their escape pod to safety. Leadership was something he took very seriously and it resulted in a constant battle between the vanity of being an alpha male and the humility of being a loyal subject.

The journey home took them close to Gallente space and the intercom announced they would be docking for repairs at a station that had been recently captured by the Caldari, crew would get a few hours shore leave while the worst injuries were transferred to a hospital. The lieutenant’s men followed him to a vehicle waiting outside the ship and as he stared at the unfamiliar panorama of Gallente architecture he felt his darkest hour approach.

The battle of vanity vs humility raged in his head as the vehicle reached it’s destination but he knew deep down that vanity had already won and he was shackled to the guilt of being alpha among the lads. His crewmates applauded as a young woman in a nurses uniform approached and the lieutenant couldn't help thinking that her skimpy outfit would not be acceptable back in Amarr, he wanted to turn and run away but knew his crew were expecting him to be a man.

He looked at his hand, laughed at the way it trembled and mad a joke to cover the pain of his inner turmoil, he followed the young woman to a back room in the pleasure hub and the faithful husband and father beating in his chest curled up to die.
« Last Edit: 09 May 2010, 08:48 by yani dumyat »
Logged

Albetta

  • Clonejack
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1
Re: [Contest] Inspiracy Grand Opening Contest!
« Reply #2 on: 09 May 2010, 15:21 »


Expendable either way

   So he’s sitting in a bar, drunk out of his mind. These guys come in and they are talking about that last fight. People start clearing out, and he wonders what’s going on. “Pod pilots,” somebody says. So he walks right up to them. He asks for a job. They laugh. He needs money. He needs it bad. While their voices blend into an indistinguishable den, he thinks back to the accident. The fight he had with the helmsman when they where in that belt in some backwater system. The helmsman pushes him, and he pushes back, and then they start punching each other. He punches the helmsman hard, and he’s on the floor, and he’s bleeding, and the ship is heading straight for the asteroid, a there’s blood everywhere.
   That was eight months ago. He can’t recall how he’s been living for so long without steady income, but he just wouldn’t get on another mining ship. But now he decides to man up, and as he’s thinking about how nice it is going to be to have money again, one of the pilots slaps him in the back of the head and says “your with him”.
   He looks up and sees this small little guy, so young, but with so much age in his face. And the guy walks right up to him and shakes his hand, the first time anybody has since…well, since he was the only person to come back to the station that his ship of thirty-five souls left from.
   The guy, the pilot, asks him what he does. He pauses. “I’m an engineer.”
The pilot smiles. “You’ll fit right in”. After that conversation he signs papers for what seems like hours. His hands are tired, but as soon as he puts the pen down he is told that they are setting off. He does not know where, but he catches the words “dead space pocket”.
   There is no time for introduction with the crew. He is informed that the pilot can control the ship as if he where controlling his own body, but that the crew must keep the ships systems running at all cost. He begins to feel the tug of a warp grabbing at his limbs. He is shown to his station.
   Then there was shooting. The cannon’s reports only slightly muffled by the thick hull. There is an explosion. Damage control quickly seals off the breach, but the superstructure is crippled. The guy next to him, Aaron or Eric, something like that, gets hit in the head by an overhead beam that crumples and falls. Then the shooting stopped.
   He isn’t sure if the man is still alive. A team shows up, grabs the body, and carries it away. They get back to the station, and he is told to get off. He asks why. He is told that he only signed on for service on that cruiser, and that the pilot is upgrading to a different ship. He is given money.
Logged

Silver Night

  • Admin
  • Demigod
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2250
  • Elitist Oldtimer
Re: [Contest] Inspiracy Grand Opening Contest!
« Reply #3 on: 12 May 2010, 08:59 »

Only about a week left!

Jerrod Kane

  • Clonejack
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1
Re: [Contest] Inspiracy Grand Opening Contest!
« Reply #4 on: 13 May 2010, 11:16 »

The Kameria

The Kameria sat in centre of the room; legs cross as praying silently to the Empress. Markings and symbols of her devotion are tattooed into her shoulders with black ink the centre of each with golden metal of the symbol of the Amarrian People. Around her neck, hangs a golden necklace showing the symbol of the Empress' house, a symbol to her Mistress' devotion and to who she is protect above all others, including her own Mistress.

Rising slowly from her prayers, and padding quietly towards the full length mirror, she remained passive upon looking at her own reflection in the polished glass. Her form was battle-ready and perfect. Virtually all aspects of her femininity had vanished, excepting the small rise of her breasts and the void between her legs that had been treated to prevent the monthly cycle of menstruation affecting her negatively.

Her raven hair hung well below her shoulders, far in excess of what she personally felt comfortable with. However her Mistress had called for her to grow her hair, so that she was recognised amongst the 500 other Kamerias she commanded. Some spoke in quiet circles that the Mistress occasionally slept with her Captain. The Kameria soon "corrected" those rumours with ruthless efficiency.

Approaching the mirror, the Kameria moved the hair from her eyes, revealing their steely-blue colouring to the world. She made this an almost daily ritual, for her helmet denied others to see beyond the one-way plexi-glass. Only in death would her eyes be revealed, and they would show nothing but her contempt for those that killed her. At least in this period of quiet, they would be seen as their true nature of someone who would be, in any other circle of life, seen as a depressed individual, seeking out something grander in her life.

She approached her battle-dress, enforced upon all of the Kamerias on this vessel, entitled "Celestial Grace", she stroked it lightly, circling it nude, admiring its design before sliding on the armoured under body-glove that disguised her true form from the world, tying her hair back into a ponytail to control its direction. After the body-glove was sealed, she slowly placed on the outer armour, the metal struck from the same as the hull of the ship. Its weight would be beyond most to wear for short periods of time, yet she wore it for nearly 10 hours in each shift with no complaint or regret.

Finally, she reached for her las-pistol and attached it to an armoured holster on her armours waist. The charge was always set to kill, after her one and only failure had caused her Mistress to receive extensive cybernetic reconstruction in order to survive. In her other hand she held loft an energised halberd, a weapon she was almost at one with, it having been gifted to her upon completion of her Kameria training. Firing up the energy cell, and lowering her helmets visor, she set out to follow her Mistress' Orders.



((Payment of any awards needs to made to Arline Kley))
Logged

Vieve

  • Guest
Re: [Contest] Inspiracy Grand Opening Contest!
« Reply #5 on: 13 May 2010, 11:31 »

"Suosio Songenshi." The knot-tailed Civire woman who took a seat on the only empty chair in the room was short, young, in ridiculous good shape and very blonde. Her vivid blue eyes were more than a little bloodshot, but she didn't smell of anything but fatigue and cheap soap. Her gray overalls and white long sleeved workshirt were spotless. Wrinkled as hell, but still spotless.
 
"Sus ... Susan?"  the Gallente interviewer asked her, after looking down at the list of names on her roster.
 
"If you're issuing my scrip, you can call me whatever the Jita you want."  Suosio waved to the apple sitting on the table in front of the recruiter. "Are you gonna eat that?"

"No."

She scooped it up. "Thanks."

"So, you were a junior navigation officer?"

"Yeah."

"And you believe this makes you qualified to be a crew chief?"

"Yeah."
 
"Why's that?"

"Because the last crew chief I served under was a complete idiot."

"Not a partial one?"

"Oh, you're funny.  No.   Completely.  See, we were in Sivala three weeks ago.  The pilot was based in Uedama.  He was going home to Uedama.   We were crammed into the shuttle he was flying, and the half-asleep bastard started heading for the Kubinen gate instead of the Uedama one.   So I say, 'hey!  That's the Kubinen gate!'   And my crew chief tells me to shut up, that the pilot knows what the fuck he's doing, that it must be some strategic maneuver.  Half a day later, I'm waking up in the Lai Dai infirmary in Kubinen.  There's a message waiting for me from the pilot telling me I was fucking lucky, fucking right and I was fucking fired."
 
"Why did he fire you if you were right?"
 
"I wasn't aggressive enough."
 
"What the hell did he expect you to do, punch the crew chief in the face and steal his control key?"
 
Suosio shrugged. "Gallente.  Who knows what they think?"

« Last Edit: 14 May 2010, 21:03 by Vieve »
Logged

Ken

  • Will Rule for Food
  • Veteran
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1261
  • Must Love Robots
Re: [Contest] Inspiracy Grand Opening Contest!
« Reply #6 on: 13 May 2010, 12:18 »

DATA CACHE, NEOCOM AUDIBLE FREQUENCIES MONITOR
OPERATOR'S VOICE IDENTIFIED AND SELECTIVELY REMOVED FROM RECORDING

Oh, hey there, good morning.  Name's Haakon.  Good to meet you.  

You're not... the guy are you...?  

Okay, good.  I didn't think so, but sometimes those pod jockeys go out of their way to blend in.  You never know.  

Oh, alright, you're his corporate contact.  They said they were sending someone down.

What's that--ah, yes, she is just about ready to go.  Right over there on pylon seventeen.  If you want to step over that way with me, I've just got a few final checks to perform.

Here we are.  Brand new one, in fact.  We gets dozens of these as recycles every day, sometimes ten an hour when things are really busy, but this baby...

Is fresh from the factory...  

Let's see, master power, check.  Processor, check.  Capsule interface, check.  Now there is a light gatling railgun system mounted.

Yep, you can see it right there.  Also got a baseline mining laser fitted for you as well.  All standard.

And, of course, one other thing.  If you'll take this, please.

One cubic centimeter of refined tritanium.

Yea, it's all part of the contract, but we drew the smiley face on it.  The boss' idea...

Oh, I'm sure you do.  Bosses, eh...  Say, what's it like working for an egger?  I've heard some of those fellas can be pretty harsh on staff.

Really?

That actually sounds not half bad.  Huh...

Ah, well it's not too rough working out on "the floor" as we call it.  I was a data pusher in the office for six months and just about lost my mind.  I like being out here working on the ships.

No, don't do much flying, hehe...

It's funny because I have to list myself on the manifest for every one of these models we issue out.  They can be controlled entirely from the pod, but the policy is that every ship must have a crew of at least one until we turn it over.  So, technically I work for your boss too.  Just one of the salty space dogs, hehe...  At least until he undocks and the manifest updates.

Ah--oh, there we go.  We have green light from pylon control.  I'll just need you to sign here and... here.

And mark with biometrics here.

Great.  This is your copy.

Thank you, sir.  She is now all yours.  And I'm required to tell you that we truly regret the recent loss of your employer's spacecraft.  Here's my card.  Ping me if you need anything else.  Haakon Irikagi, Pend Insurance.

Oh, it's not a problem.  

Yes.  Well, I've got more birds to preen before quittin' time.  Good to meet ya.

Oh, one more thing.  You may want to change the IFF codes.  They default the ship's ID to the customer's name whenever we fill the contract.  Can't imagine your boss would want to be flying around with "Kenreikko Valitonen's Ibis" painted all over the Neocom.
« Last Edit: 14 May 2010, 21:24 by Ken »
Logged

MadMuppet

  • Clonejack
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1
Re: [Contest] Inspiracy Grand Opening Contest!
« Reply #7 on: 14 May 2010, 18:31 »

Crew Files of MadMuppet: Stacker

When I set out to buy and sell livestock I didn’t think I would need to hire someone specific. However, after the minor incident with the GSC and nearly four thousand head of cattle, I realized that some specific talent was needed. So that night during the largest beef cookout ever to happen in Amarr space, I looked for someone that would be willing to handle the, usually, live cargo.

Nonaw Atay was his real name, but everybody called him ‘Stacker’. Below average height and above average odor he seemed to fit in just fine with the livestock. His office, for a lack of a better word, was a black and yellow hammock made out of construction banners suspended between two of the bulkhead doors. The area underneath his sleeping area was a small wasteland of holoreels, used food wrappers, and items that the ship’s biologist has refused to look at, let alone test.

On most runs Stacker had little work to do and whatever he was assigned he always managed to get rid of through some sort of gambling event that always seemed to be stacked in his favor, hence the nickname. He did have a few other names that he was routinely called, all of which were colored in relation to the amount of isk someone lost to him.

Stacker’s clothes were always of high quality and value mixed with the lowest grade filth that he could manage to pry out of some corner of the ship. Nothing he touched would ever again be considered clean by any level and some felt that his filth was how he would cheat in games of cards or chance. It is also believed that his very appearance was the reason that he handled cattle so well; they simply didn’t want to be near him.

It was a dark day when Stacker passed away. No really, it was dark. The ship had taken fire and the power had failed. Thinking that the ship would explode at any minute Stacker felt around in the dark and shut the door on what he thought was an escape pod, his last action being to activate the rotary hammers of a metal reclamation device. The end result of which was he was mist.

Stacker will also be missed as well.
Logged

Azenn

  • Clonejack
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1
Re: [Contest] Inspiracy Grand Opening Contest!
« Reply #8 on: 16 May 2010, 07:45 »

Disclaimer:

Okay, okay... I broke the word limit with this one, I admit it! You can probably tell.  :D Really sorry about that, I swear. I couldn't come up with a way to get it all out without extending it a bit though. Hope you all give it a read and a consideration regardless. Thanks for hosting the contest. This helped me break a stint of writer's block.

Cheers


=====================
Just Like Old Times
=====================


It is calming to awake suddenly into one’s own mortality. Hellstrom’s breath slowed. His cold hands relaxed their sweaty grip. Warp Drive Offline, whispered the familiar robotic drone. Systems collapsed around him. He felt the frigate’s heating unit shudder one last time, and it too, fell into deep silence. A stray shot must have punctured the capacitor during the final, desperate dogfight through the asteroid belt. It was now an iced-over tomb in his cockpit, so cold and so very quiet.

It reminded him of the primordial crypts of the zealot kings that he had once braved as a boy on the Prime. He closed his eyes and listened to the pounding of his heart. So, too, would Duke Hellstrom come to rest in his steel tomb atop a steel throne. It was the one thing left in his control. He sat up straight and proud in his pilot’s chair. What had he to fear now? His last breathes misted before him against the steamed glass. The distant star systems he would never again see twinkled one teary goodbye, and then the menacing shadow blotted them out of his existence. It was all over. For there it was.

That wretched Omen, the cat that had stalked him across the lonely Derelik expanse these past few months, purred leisurely before Hellstrom. It dominated his vision. The triumphant beast wanted to play with its prey, it seemed, and Hellstrom had no choice but to humor it. With a sigh, he released the unresponsive warp drive (he had still been clutching it), and surveyed his spent silos. His kingdom for one last Cruise Missile, thought he. But no, what half-blown panels still shone all glared back at him, frightfully red. The hunt was over. His engine lay dead; his warp drive scrambled; his missiles exhausted. The mouse had been caught.


The grim-looking Omen with its byzantine appearance and personality bankrupt fitting winked at him. Sheathes of nailed plate armor reflected the orange sunlight into his eyes; the packed-in batteries of mammoth laser turrets all grinned toothily, less than a kilometer away, as they charged up their utterly efficient channels of streamlined death.

His cockpit lights flashed once and went dark. The laser batteries that stared at him through the glass began to hum a melodic hymn. Somewhere out of the corner of his eye, Hellstrom noticed his starboard wing give one last whimper and shiver off into space towards the backdrop blue planet, a giant of a world still slumbering beneath its waves. Yes, he would die here; here, in this nameless system, somewhere beyond the pale of the Amarr Empire. This would be his fate, come at last to sing him to sleep. Yes, he would perish here; here in this pathetic, nameless system with its pathetic, nameless planet and its pathetic, nameless civilization who, even as they dreamt their primitive dreams of fire and tinder, could never dream the saga of Duke Hellstrom the Blood Raider and Lord Korazen the Grand Inquisitor as they tread the jeweled stars like pebbles of warm sand sinking through sandaled toes.

The coms channel flared to life. Hellstrom diverted what little power he had left into maintaining the weak signal. His old friend, his bitter enemy, would suffer him a few parting taunts, it seemed. So be it. Duke Hellstrom would never submit without a fight, even if his last breath of missiles had failed him. Empty words would have to do instead. He rubbed his brow, and cast back the shadowed black hood. He had grown to loathe words. The signal crackled to life.


‘You’re a damn good pilot, Hellstrom,’ laughed the capsuleer’s voice on the other end of the coms. ‘You would have been one of the Emperor’s best.’

Hellstrom did not laugh. He harbored a special disdain for pod pilots, and he especially disliked this one. ‘I’m very proud of you, Korazen. It seems the third time’s a charm.’

‘Unfortunately for you, us eggers are like cats.’ The voice paused. ‘Special cats with infinite lives. It’s the clone technology, you see. Those magnificent Jovian bastards…’

Hellstrom sighed. ‘So Korazen, life as the Ministry’s Grand Inquisitor has not dampened your famous sense of humor. I’d have thought the public executions and trial-by-fire’s would have burnt the soul out of you.’


‘And I’d have thought, old friend, that life as a swarthy pirate would have you floating arse upwards through space in a CreoDron trash compactor by now. Surely you’ve upset some drug magnate with that wicked tongue?’

‘You’re not the only one trying to kill me, friend,’ he snorted. ‘You’re just the closest.’

‘Just like old times,’ noted the voice, a somberness sinking into it. ‘It’s been what… nine years since the Academy?’

‘Ten,’ corrected Hellstrom. ‘If you count the half-a-year prior to my hasty departure.’


A tired sigh. ‘When you shot your way out of the Imperial Hangar Bay? It must have slipped my mind. You never could be a good little boy like the rest of us well-mannered disciples, could you, Hellstrom?’

‘The best tend to have that notorious rebellious streak. That’s what makes them the best,’ he said. ‘And I was the best, Korazen. I was the best.’

‘Yes, and I was second best. It took three tries, three different Navy ships, three hundred million ISK, but all said and done, I’ve got you here at last. And even if it took three hundred tries, even if it took three thousand tries: no matter how many times you bested me, you cheeky bastard, I knew I’d nab you in the end. Capsuleer technology and all. Magnificent stuff, really. If only you stuck around for final exams…’


Hellstrom bit down his tongue. He felt tired. The shadowed planet and its blue, sparkling oceans struck him out of the corner of his eye. No one would remember him, he knew. Not even these savages. How would they know to look up into the night sky and bear mute witness to his passing? They would dream on, stirring sometime on the morrow to fight their wars of spit and stone, utterly silent to the vast universe of stars spiraling around them. He had been like that once, a wide-eyed boy crossing through the black gates of the Academy, long ago. But now he knew no one would sing of Duke Hellstrom.


‘Open fire already,’ he said. ‘End it. I have made my peace.’

Another faint laugh. ‘So resolute? Well, I hope you’ve given Him a friendlier audience than you have an old friend. Not much of a talker these days, are you?’

Hellstrom gritted his teeth. ‘I know where and when to waste my breath. I do not beg mercy of Ministry slaves. I pray only that the higher lord offers me fair trial.’

‘A fair trial for shoving our teachings in His face and trading friends for Blood Raider scum? As one whom once called you my brother, Hellstrom, I only pray He doesn’t offer you fair trial.’


A long silence settled over the coms. Hellstrom watched as the opposing lasers, all seven of them, climaxed into a soothing orangish glow. Half-charged, they were, yes; but enough to melt him down into dust and ash and burnt sticky salvage for the dusty warehouses on ashen Amarr Prime. From dust to dust, he supposed. Such was life. Nothing more than a flipped toggle, a gasp of breath, and then the flash of light washing over him. He had abandoned the Academy, had fled from the Ministry, ignored all the hypocritical teachings. But they would damn him in the end. He always figured they would. This was the fate of all heretics; this would be his fate, too. Hellstrom cursed himself as the shiver slithered through him. Why could he not at least stare his death in the eye like the unwritten, unsung thousands before him?


‘Any last words?’ resumed the voice of his former classmate, now Grand Inquisitor Korazen. ‘For old time’s sake.’


Hellstrom shook his head, and then remembered himself not on Amarr Prime, in a cluttered dormitory somewhere. How it seemed so familiar. He paused, then added into the coms: ‘I knew that I would meet my fate somewhere among the stars above, my friend. I expect nothing less.’


And indeed, nothing else would be given. Above all else, the Royal Navy did not teach mercy; they obliterated it from all consciousness. Remorse became a sin, friendship a business tool, conformity a crusade. The arm of Amarr stretched far, very far, and an arm stretched beyond its reach must crash down hard on those that tire it. Dogma decreed it; such would be his fate. Hellstrom was an enemy of the state, a state that knew naught of quarter. How much brainwashing had Korazen suffered through the years? Enough to be a Grand Inquisitor. There was his sinister Omen, bearing the gray and gold battleflag of the Royal Navy. It carved through the black twilight of space, a sword aflame. The stars glistened as they swam behind it; they began to blur like fogged glass in the heavens beyond… or maybe that was merely Hellstrom’s clouded eyes. Such a beautiful sight was space, truly. That’s what he’d miss most about it all. 


He wiped a tear away. It unmanned him. ‘Overload your batteries,’ he said. ‘If it would please you, my friend, I’d like to go down in flames. Like the heretics of old.’

A tired sigh crackled on through. ‘You’re a damn good pilot, Hellstrom. A damn good pilot.’

Hellstrom said nothing. What could he say? He felt the pulsating stress of Korazen’s arrays as they heated up beyond capacity, even through the thick sheets of rolled tungsten and the thousand-some meters of empty void that gulfed the two. Only a thousand meters, true enough. One kilometer, but it felt half the universe away.


‘I know I’m about to regret this,’ came the far-away voice.

Hellstrom’s eyes were closed.

‘You’re a damn good pilot,’ continued the voice. ‘A damn good pilot.’

Yes, he knew he was. And the best pilots die doing what they love.

‘I’m going to regret this. I know I’m going to regret this. The Ministry of War will have my ass.’

Hellstrom blinked. He was a sworn enemy to the state; a pirate of the Blood Raiders.

‘Well,’ decided the voice, ‘to hell with the Ministry of War.’


Hellstrom blinked again. He began to speak, but Korazen interrupted him.

‘Congratulations, mate; ten years too late, but congratulations all the same.’

‘What do you mean?’ asked Hellstrom.

‘We’ll have to throw you a graduation party,’ continued the voice, firm now. ‘Yes, I’m taking you aboard the ship of the Grand Inquisitor… which happens to be my ship.’

A pause. ‘Aiding and abetting a known heretic, Korazen? The Emperor himself would have a fit.’
 
‘The Emperor has fits over his wardrobe and pleasure slaves, not trivial matters of empire security and human rights. Let me think. How does Navigator Second Class sound?’

‘It sounds made up,’ said Hellstrom, wary as always. ‘Serving the Inquisitor with honor, though? How could I refuse? The cream of the Academy would be jealous.’


‘Serving the Inquisitor, my slow-witted friend?’ laughed Korazen. ‘No, no… I am afraid you won’t be serving the Emperor much. Neither will I, sadly. We’re both traitors now; we’re in this together. I figured I’d have to first beat you down before you’d ever suffer me to tag along.’

‘They’ll dismantle your clones. If you were to die...’

‘I’ve realized, Hellstrom, that sometimes it’s worth putting life on the line for the proper cause. And you’ve made me realize that three times now. Third time’s a charm, indeed.’

The blue oceans sparkled in the corner of his eye. Hellstrom couldn’t help but smile. He was glad the lightless void of his shadowed cockpit concealed it. Someday he knew he would walk that planet. Not now, perhaps, but eventually.

‘Just like old times, Korazen.’

‘Just like old times, Hellstrom. Welcome aboard.’
« Last Edit: 16 May 2010, 08:19 by Azenn »
Logged

Lilyia

  • Clonejack
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1
Re: [Contest] Inspiracy Grand Opening Contest!
« Reply #9 on: 16 May 2010, 10:33 »

Hi everyone!
My entry is a condensed extract from the opening of my first character chronicle. I've managed to chop the passage down from 1000 to nearly 600 words, so I'm afraid it still exceeds the suggested limit, but I hope you will enjoy and consider it nonetheless! =)
Lily


Bay Seven

"--Malfunction detected in Weapon Bay Seven. Projectile delay timer inconsistent.--"

Rorc glanced up at the readings display above his workbench. Engineering teams Six through Eight had been tasked with the latest repairs, the announcement followed by a thunderous pounding of boots across the chamber and a host of requirement shouts. He allowed himself a quick sigh before pulling on his grease jacket, and surveyed the combat drone sat beside the bench. The gaping hole in its armored shell gave way to a tangle of electromagnetic wires, stretched across the grated iron floor to where he worked on the unit's navigation core. Rorc's brow furrowed, his gaze fixed upon the broken drone as he slung a giant utility sack over his shoulder. "Won' be long, little one."

Bay Seven was a hive of activity. Stability engineers swarmed around the loading platforms, tapes and levels in hand, examining everything from the platform's alignment to the angle of the turret's recoil brackets. Electronics teams were hooking up mobile diagnostic computers to every available hardpoint, flipping them open and hurriedly punching in a mountain of queries and commands. Rorc's fellow mechanics were mostly clustered around the seat of the weapon, stripping away panels to access and check the internal firing mechanism. Pointless, he thought, before noticing a vacant hardpoint just a few feet away from his crew. Rorc glared wildly at the open slot, his pulse quickening, before pulling away and scanning the room for overseers. The place is chaos, the sparkies have missed it, what the hell are you waiting for?

Rorc hated defying orders, almost as much as he loathed the orders themselves. Having spent the early years of his life bound by slavery it was no surprise that forceful authority didn't sit too well with the young Brutor. His family's rescue from the slave convoy had changed everything, yet in some ways nothing at all. Rorc was able to pursue his love for mechanics, his startling aptitude for the trade making the journey from laborer to paid starship engineer a relatively short one. Three years on, though, and he found that no amount of expertise could eclipse his status as a slave-child, so blatant was the sneering behind the cold eyes of his superiors. Rorc had learned to ignore these men, of course, but his unwavering determination to prove them wrong often threatened to destroy his career. Much like it was doing now.

Within seconds he was crouched beside the access hardpoint, ear tightly pressed to the console. The Brutor allowed his eyelids to slide closed, slowing his pulse, and listened intently to the hissing and pounding of the turret's inner mechanism. For minutes he sat there, silent and immobile, weaving a delicate bond of understanding between himself and the machine, until...
Click
Rorc's eyes shot open and in an instant he knew what had been overlooked. The malfunction was isolated, a tripped circuit in the Artillery's rig modification, offsetting the weapon's burst sequence. Leaning back, a smile began to creep across his face, a smile that quickly vanished as he turned to reach for his toolkit and the chamber came sharply back into focus.

Workers everywhere stood to attention, pushed back against the bay's walls. Their reverence belonged to the cardinal figure in front of them, but to a man their eyes were fixed upon the lowly slaver child he strode towards. Rorc stood, drawing himself level with the approaching figure, steadily raising his head until their gazes met. Fiery emerald confronted piercing blue, but there was no hostility in the other's calm regard, and when the Captain spoke, it was with an unmistakable hint of pleasant curiosity. "I wonder, engineer, how exactly someone other than myself is able to communicate with this ship?
Come along, and let's see if we can't thrash out an answer."
« Last Edit: 17 May 2010, 08:06 by Lilyia »
Logged

Calachur

  • Clonejack
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1
Re: [Contest] Inspiracy Grand Opening Contest!
« Reply #10 on: 17 May 2010, 08:40 »

Just another day

Battle stations…battle stations…this is not a drill, I repeat this is not a drill”, the C.Os voice came over the intercom system like a wave and washed the sleep from Robs head.  Oh no, he thought, not again as he glanced at his watch and realised that he had only managed to catch a couple of hours of sleep in the last 48.

Rob slipped from his bunk fully clothed, pulled on his boots and started moving, he did not run, as he knew that too many accidents could happen in the tight confines of the vessels rat runs  and started to make his way to his post.

Rob was a doctor on the ‘Murasaki Tora‘, an independently owned Raven-class battleship, that was currently engaged in operations against the Sansha’s Nation incursions. He had had to treat a lot of people in the last few days and had even started using his own meds to keep himself awake, if he was found out who knows what might happen.

He was about halfway to sickbay when he started to feel a tingle in his feet that travelled up his entire body, they had entered warp, so he picked up the pace as he knew that they could potentially be exiting that warp tunnel in the middle of a hostile fleet. He entered sickbay just as the Murasaki Tora fell back into normal space with a lurch, he bumped into one of the nurses who looked round and then smiled when she saw who it was. The Chief Medical Officer was giving his usual speech about ensuring that the most urgent patients were dealt with first and to make sure that everyone kept their minds on the task in hand, but Rob was more interested in flirting with the nurse he had just bumped into, they had had a couple of dates before, but nothing had come of it, maybe it was worth another shot.

Within seconds of the CMO finishing his talk the ship started to shake as it launched its cruise missiles against the enemy, it probably would not be long now and the casualties would start coming in, there were never an overwhelming amount of casualties but it was always best to be prepared.

Today was different though, something had gone wrong, a saboteur had taken the shields down and without its shields a raven is dead.

It did not take long for the people in sick bay including Rob to realise that something was wrong, the jolts were more pronounced, cracks started appearing in the inner hull and fires were springing up everywhere, “Abandon ship, abandon ship, all souls to the escape pods”, came over the speakers, Rob stood frozen listening to the announcement for what seemed like an age but which was in reality only a split second, then he started running, he knew from training drills that he had less than 30 seconds to get into his assigned escape pod before the computer would automatically eject it along with the rest.

Rob made it to the pod in time, along with 3 other members of crew, and then with a force greater than any they had felt before, the pod was ejected and the last thing Rob saw before passing out was the Murasaki exploding as the Nation nightmares lasers cut through it.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sorry I know it is a little over the 500 limit.
« Last Edit: 17 May 2010, 12:38 by Calachur »
Logged

Silver Night

  • Admin
  • Demigod
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2250
  • Elitist Oldtimer

Get those last minute entries in, this is the last day!

Shalee Lianne

  • Wetgraver
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 97

One, two, Sansha's coming for you,
Three, four, the Nations at war,
Five, six, better warp out quick,
Seven, eight, didn't make it to the gate,
Nine, ten, never run again.


Crew chief Marcob Zammer pressed his hands against the console, staring into the holo screen, watching his daughter skipping rope at their house on Amarr Prime.

The holo drone panned out showing the two story house with a perfectly manicured lawn. The house his sign-up bonus had bought for his young family, one they had sacrficed everything for.  A perfect house.  A perfect family.   Enough isk saved to send his daughter to any academy she would want to attend.  Enough to provide for them their whole lives.  He had given them this.  This is what he'd leave behind.

A willing sacrifice.   

He stared unblinking at the holoscreen,  drinking in these last few moments. He exhaled a shakey breath as he watched his daughter playing, just an ordinary day in her world.  He heard her giggle as she misstepped and tangled herself in the rope. 

"Daddy are you watching!"

"Yes, I'm here.  I'll always be here, watching." He forced his voice to be calm.

Keela started over, repeating the rhyme she'd picked up at school.  The words were meaningless to her. 

His heart tumbled in his chest as he forced back a sob, keeping his expression as light as possible.  He would not have her last memory of him end in tears.

Their life had been a perfect dream. 

...one that was almost over, surely.

He kept his smile in tact as the camera drone panned over to his wife.  "Araeli..."

"Marc, don't....  I know."  She quickly brushed her hand across her cheek, forcing her expression to mirror his own.  Calm, despite the raging emotions that burned just beneath the surface. 

So many things they both wanted to say, but couldn't.  Not like this.

In the background, an automated voice announced they were two jumps out from destination.  "All hands man your battlestations."

"I have to go.."

She cupped her hand over her mouth as a sob broke through her resolve.  "Marc!"

A thousand words flashed through his mind, things he wanted to tell her.  Last words to leave her with, a last perfect memory, one that would outshine all the countless, trivial memories that made up their life together. 

But there was no time and poetic words failed him.  He held a hand up to the screen, "Araeli..."

She nodded suddenly as tears dripped down her cheeks.  "I know."  She hiccuped as she swiped her hands across her cheeks again.

"Me too."
Logged

Shalee Lianne

  • Wetgraver
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 97

Eeek did I make it in time or was I too late?
Logged

Izanami Rei

  • Clonejack
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2

Initiation.

”Good afternoon, I am Chief Engineer Aurio, I am currently charged with supervising and running the defensive capabilities of the ‘The Songbird’.”

Uesi looked his superior-to-be with a stumped expression, the man had gone off the instant the group of four had entered the room, like a recording in a museum. With him were another man and two women, none of which looked like crewmen on an active warship, but neither did he, he imagined.

“Whether you come to serve actively or on reserve does not matter, it will be my duty to teach you the ropes over the coming weeks and months; you will have the privilege to learn not only from my own experience, and that of the other crewmen, but also to serve on one of the most cutting edge ship designs in all of New Eden. It will be something worth marking on your resumes.”

Indeed, Uesi thought, strategic cruisers were all but legend in the eyes of common folk, and the Tengu he was standing in was no exception. Only so many could claim to have lived and worked on such a ship, but he would be one of those people.

“As you know, after we arrived to ‘base camp’ we started running some maneuvers to entertain the new blood in propulsion, when they are done playing with their exhaust pipes we can get you all settled in on the station. For now I will go over the basics of..”

That was all he got to say, suddenly an alarm went off in the room and a voice spoke from an unseen speaker “Calling all hands, abandon ship.” Chief Aurio’s eyes widened and he grabbed for the intercom on the wall, Uesi looked around in shock, the others in the group met his eyes in turn, all looking as confused and frightened as himself.

“Captain, confirm!” the chief had raised his voice, but he managed to regain some of his stoic persona.

“They have us pinned and will be deploying capacitor warfare in moments, there are too many, the ship will not hold.” The voice, was fluid but with an unearthly calm, considering what was transpiring. “You have your orders, bring the children home.”

They were running, Uesi could not recall how far they had run or for how long. The two women and the other man ran infront of him and Chief Aurio holding up the rear, herding the group along. One of the women, Arikio, fell. Uesi could not remember his name, but the other man stopped to help her, Uesi was about to do the same when the chief shoved him in the back, pressing him past the two, leaving them behind.

Siurua, the other woman, had already reached the escape pod and hammered the button that would open the door, a stride after, Uesi realized to his horror that the door was not opening, before he could lament that fact, the alarms stopped.

The captain’s calm voice sounded again. “The first thing I expect my crew to learn is how to abandon my ships. In this demonstration, two of you failed to do so in time. Your lives depend not only on competence at your workstations, but you ability to escape when ordered to. If you cannot coexist with this fact, you will be relieved and compensated for your time, welcome onboard.”

--------------------

Rushed this a little, I only just found out about the conest, hope you've enjoyed it.
« Last Edit: 19 May 2010, 17:41 by Izanami Rei »
Logged
Pages: [1] 2