– by Calumbacha

The morning sky had been a beautiful sight, not a cloud to be seen. The walk to work was like any other day, the birds chirped in the distance as I drank my morning juice. I waved to the old man at the local general store as he was still opening his store, a friendly man who had been in the neighborhood for thirty years. I do not remember what came first, the darkness or the noise but the look on the old man’s face was something I will never forget, I sometimes wake in the middle of the night from the memory. He had been looking away from the beautiful sunrise, which I had been walking towards. Now that I think of it, I may not be waking in the middle of the night from the memory of the old man’s face but the memory of what he had was looking at. When I turned the clear blue sky had changed, and filled with clouds, the clouds began to spread out all across the sky from a single point covering most of our small city. The clouds began to turn red and I could soon make out a large object falling towards the outskirts of the city, the red clouds been caused by the red glow from the base of the object. I looked at the old man and he looked back at me, he motioned towards the centre of the city. I followed the old man down the road as we made our way to town hall.

City hall was the largest building in the city and when we arrived a minute later a crowd was already gathering, there was a buzz of nervousness around the crowd, which was soon wiped out by the noise of the falling object. The windows on city hall started to vibrate from the noise of the falling object, the crowd got louder. The City Mayor emerged from City Hall and from a small podium at the top of the steps started an announcement. I could only just make out his words, he was saying the object was some visitors from the stars, the visitors had originally contacted our mayor who agreed to let them come here in peace; we could mutually help each other out in a big way. The Mayor read out a statement from the visitors, as he began to read I somehow deep down did not believe any of it. The statement was saying that they were friends here to help our people advance in technologies and in exchange, they would setup some factories to help us use our planets natural resources, which would lead to more jobs and prosperity for all, they would teach us many new things on our way to the stars.

By the time the ground shuddered under my feet from the falling object landing in the distance the speech that changed the history of our city was finished. The Mayor began to repeat the speech again, this time we could easily hear what he was saying as the noise had dissipated; everybody listened once again to the speech. After the second time through, I understood more of what was going on; I made a quick exit from the crowd trying to decide what to do. I soon arrived at work and realized my legs had carried me there by themselves, but the office was almost empty, the couple of people that where there where looking into the distance towards where the object had landed. The clouds had only just started to clear and it was beginning to look like a beautiful day again. By Lunchtime the few of us that came to work had given up and decided that, our boss had not even come in so we all headed home. I walked past the store on the way home and the store was still closed.

The next morning I woke and the sky was clear not a cloud or falling object to be seen, I made my breakfast and whilst I waited headed for the front door, nothing in the sky today. I quickly ate breakfast and headed down the road to the store to see if the community notice board was updated. The store was still closed but people were standing around outside reading the community notice board. I made my way into the small crowd until I could read the notice attached to the board. The crowd muttered around me as I read, the notice was warning of more landings over the next few days starting with at least two today in the same vicinity of the first. The notice had some sketches of the landing site and a warning to stay clear as it was a secure area, it was only an hour outside of the city.

The notice continued on to explain what the landing objects were, they were ore extractors, which would get the resources out of the ground deep below the planet’s surface and prepare them for transport to the stars once they were refined. Interviews for jobs at the factory would start in the next few days, on the job training to be provided; it read more like a propaganda article. Before I finished reading the notice, the noise from the day before that signaled a landing object came again. The crowd stirred and I looked in the same direction as the noise the day before to see another object falling from the sky. Over the next few days, the notice warning had been an understatement nearly every hour another object fell from the sky and according to the newspaper reporters at the landing site, they were creating a small base with all different size and shape buildings. On the third day, the noticed at the store changed and was now calling for people to work in the alien base doing mining work, mostly hard labor.

That night someone caught sight of something strange; it appeared to be one of the aliens, as it did not look anything like one of our people. The community notice board the next day had a sketch and a description of the aliens. It had two legs and two arms like us, but stood about 2 meters tall, twice the height of any of us, the alien appeared to work with some tools, the notice was very vague as the person who wrote it could not see then the alien for long as it soon disappeared back inside one of the buildings. Over the next two days, more sightings occurred, more sketches appeared on the notice board, it was a great mystery and every morning people who stood around the notice board began to wonder what the aliens looked like and why they were hiding.

When the interviews for jobs started a day later, people began to queue for hours, most just wanting to see the Aliens. As it turned out the Mayor and his aide where doing the interviews, many people questioned the Mayor what his motives where and some even threw fruit and other objects at him. Once news got out there where no aliens to be seen the queue disappeared; no one wanted to work for the aliens, most said they feared for their lives even though lots of people needed the work but no one wanted to help the aliens. This lack of support for our new arrivals caused more speeches at city hall from the Mayor, he offered large bribes and tax breaks for anyone who went to work for the aliens, but still no one went to the job interviews. Whilst I watched the speech from the crowd, there was an explosion from the direction of the alien base. I ran through the crowd, which frantically ran in all directions, towards my house and closed the door behind me. As I hid in my lounge room peeking out the window I did not think that one explosion would start the chain of events to unravel down the path that has caused me to be where I currently am.

From what I have since heard three days after the first interviews failed, troops went to nearby mines, they soon shut down and the workers directed towards the new extraction facilities. Many workers did not want to go but rumor has it after the first few who refused were threatened and one man executed the rest went quietly. No one found out about it as the reporters were watching the aliens to make a move, but they didn’t leave their base, the workers been force marched to the alien base by our own troops never made community notice boards, threats to people to stay silent followed. Another notice, this time from the Mayor later that day claimed the workers were been guarded by our soldiers, as protection from violence by our people as unknown assailants caused the explosion at the alien base a few days before hand. Many including myself believed this at the time, why wouldn’t we?

As more objects fell from the sky, the notices stopped and changed to large ads calling for workers. I eventually stopped going to the closed store to read the community board as nothing new was coming from it. The first I found out what was really going on was when my front door was kicked in a few days later. A giant alien all covered in some type of black material barged in. He grabbed me with one of his large arms and picked me up as if I were a small child; the alien carried me out to the path. In the middle of the path stood everyone from my neighborhood, the alien dumped me rather hard on the ground, my neighbor came up to me and asked what was going on, as he helped me up, I shrugged; no one seemed to know what was happening. The Aliens surrounded us, and whenever we tried to leave the group, an alien pushed us back in to the group; more people were slowly added to the crowd from the neighborhood. A person from down the street, I still cannot remember his name, made a break for it slipping past two alien guards as they talked to each other. He only made it a short distance when they saw him, the two guards raised the large weapons, which they carried and fired at him one shot each. His body slumped to the ground, after that we all co-operated, I did not get a good look at his body until we were force-marched towards the aliens base. His left arm had been blown off and a large part of his head was missing. We had to walk through some of the blood covering the path; I still remember the look of the footprints people left made of his blood. As we made the rest of the march in silence, I could not bring myself to march quickly to my death and soon found myself at the rear of the group. The guard at the rear kept poking me in the back with a weapon if I started going to slow, that was all the motivation I needed to speed up.

We were out of the city and still a distance off from the alien base when I heard a cough from the guard behind me. Another cough came a moment later, and then another, when I looked around the alien guard was falling behind the group, so I slowed as well. When the guard fell to its knees its black face looked up at me as it was holding its throat, the large weapon rose towards me, it said something to me, which I could not make out. Before I could move towards the group, which was still walking away, the weapon fell to the ground and the alien slumped to the ground, still clutching its weapon, the alien just lay there coughing and wheezing, gasping for air. The Alien fell silent and stopped moving at three hours after sunrise on the eleventh day since their arrival. I tried to pick up the weapon; it was very heavy, too heavy to hold so I dropped it. I looked at the group as it marched on; they had not noticed what had happened, I took this as my opportunity, and ran towards the woods on the side of the road and hid in a large shrub. A moment later there was yelling and two guards from the group ran back to the slumped guard, I was so close I could easily make out what they were saying. Their friend was dead, one of the aliens picked up the weapon and the other picked up the body, then I heard something that made me almost throw up.

“Leave his body here, he is dead, send the medic’s back for him” they moved the body off the path and put it on the side of the path near the woods, they removed the armor and some other things from the body “he will need these when he is revived from the clone vats.” The men moved off towards the group and the forced march resumed. I did not know then what I do now; life means little to these aliens, as with their technology they are almost immortal so a body has no meaning as it does for us. We have strict rituals for dealing with our dead. The aliens get rid of their dead as quickly as they can, and take over a clone, which has been grown for them.

I hid in the shrub for a few minutes until the group was out of sight, I then walked over to the body; the alien had a face now that its black suit was removed. Short brown hair on the top of the head with pinkish white skin, two arms, and two legs covered in some type of goo. I stood for a while looking at the body and realized what ever killed it could help my people. With all my strength I began to move the body in to the woods, I dragged and pushed and dragged some more, then thankfully there was a slope and I rolled the alien body down it. I cleared away the drag marks behind me hiding the trail the alien corpse had left whilst I moved it. I then followed the body to the bottom of the valley where I soon found a hiding place for it in a small cave out cropping. I heard a commotion at road level and I assumed they were looking for the body. The commotion slowly died off in the late afternoon but I was still very careful and stayed hidden in the cave with the body for the rest of the day until nightfall.

Unsure what to do I left the body hidden and moved deeper into the hills, over the next three days I lived off berries and fruits in the woods thinking of what to do next. I eventually got the courage up to go spy on the alien base, to see if I could help any of my fellow people out of there. I slowly and quietly made my way through the woods towards the alien base; the sun had just gone to sleep when I saw it. It was lit up like daytime and guards stood in guard towers all around the perimeter fence, which was almost five meters high. I then saw what gave me hope, a short distance off at one point where guards were not looking; a small group of my people was approaching the fence. They threw some things through the fence and ran back into the woods, a moment later explosions erupted in the alien base. I smiled to myself and headed in the direction the attackers had gone, I wanted to join them, help them anyway I could.

It took me all night but in the end I gave up, I did not know where they had gone so I stopped at a water hole for a drink. I had to find them and tell them about the body I had hidden away. As it turned out they found me, when I came up from my drink there were five of my people standing behind me all of them were armed with spears, one even had an alien weapon of some type. Their leader stepped forward,

“Why are you following us?” I finished swallowing the water in my mouth and stood up.

“I want to join you, I saw you attack the alien base.” The leader smiled.

“We could always use more help, all my men are great fighters, and do you have any fighting skills?” I realized I did not know how to fight; I had never been in a fight my entire life, not even as a child.

“I cannot fight very well,” I answered then it dawned on me “but I have something that can help us all.” The small group was suddenly more interested, “I watched one of the aliens die, and I have its body hidden away.” I spent the next few minutes telling of the forced march and the alien how it coughed, wheezed, and died. Once I had finished with my story, I lead them to the alien body I had hidden. As a group, we carried it through the woods to their hide out, which were some caves high in the hills. When we got to their hide out, we left the alien body with a doctor to examine the cause of death and I was taken to a large meeting where the leader told us of the latest successful attack on the alien base. There were so many of my people hiding in the caves at the meeting I even saw the old man from the store. I told him of the neighborhood and that his store was still safe, he died a while back; he was out gathering food for us cave dwellers and was killed by an alien patrol. A few days later we watched as objects were launched towards the sky. The objects were a lot smaller than the ones that had landed, since the first launch, more launches followed at regular intervals, every hour, and when the first scouts from the alien base returned later that same day, they reported that the launches were the extracted minerals, being sent into the sky.

Over the next few months, more people arrived at the caves, and more of my people died attacking the aliens in attacks launched by our new leader. Word of more aliens dying by the same coughing and wheezing came from the new arrivals. The Doctor examining the alien body eventually found out that the alien died of a common virus, which our people were immune. Our Leader told of a great plan he and the Doctor came up with to poison the food and water supplies of the aliens with as many viruses as he could make in his small cave surgery. I still remember shooting him down at that meeting, I should not of been so brash. I told them all of the conversation I over heard about the clone vats and how when they die they come back to life. No one believed me for days, the doctor worked on his viruses growing cultures in little trays and our leader worked on a plan of attack. It would take many weeks of planning and preparing but our leader knew we could be victorious.

Two weeks into planning another arrival at the caves, who had escaped the alien base told a story of aliens been grown in vats, he told of aliens he had watched cough and wheeze and die, be reborn in the vats. They would then walk out to their dead body and collect the weapons and armor; the bodies were just thrown away into disposals. They all believed me at that point, we had to attack the clone vats as well as poison the food and water supplies. The plan never really changed, our leader just expanded it with another team leaving an explosive surprise that would destroy the clone vats. It meant more preparation time, and getting our hands on large amounts of explosives, but we were very patient.

As we prepared for the big attack, we started with smaller attacks all over the city to draw their forces away from the alien base; we blew up many things and attacked alien groups as they tried to round up our people. From what I remember, they never seemed to do much damage, just annoy the aliens. More of our people died in each attack as not all went well, I remember one time the explosives went off early and I watched as a man blew up next to me I will never forget some of things I saw. One of the final outings before our large attack, we were heading back to our hide out in the hills; we passed through my old neighborhood and where I use to work, they were deserted except for the dead bodies on the paths. It made me weep when I went to sleep each night that we had to leave the bodies lying where they had died.

What seemed to be months and many attacks later, our leader announced that we were ready and our attack would take place that night. I still remember being so nervous, I could not sharpen my spear properly and I broke it. My orders were to guard the men with the explosives, with the clone vats destroyed by them, the aliens would not come back to life once either we had killed them or the viruses in their supplies had killed them. The attack was going to be massive; nearly everyone of our group in the caves was involved. After night fell we all marched out of the caves towards the alien base, we watched another object launched from the base towards the sky. One more object was launched by the time we neared the base but it seemed to have fallen quiet when we neared.

I stood with my team hidden just inside the woods, so close to the alien base I could almost touch the fence. My heart pounded in my ears and when the team leader signaled forwards we moved, I do not even remember telling my legs to move, my body just followed the team. We got quickly through the fence line and made haste for the building that we knew to be the clone vats. We started planting explosives all around the building, we than moved inside through the large door. No aliens were around except for the bodies been grown in the vats the place was very creepy. I watched the door as my team moved around placing more explosives. I could see across the other side of the alien base one of the other teams was getting into the storage supplies. No alarms or aliens had been alerted, I remember feeling relieved that it was working. For the first time in a long time, I could feel we had a chance.

We moved out and headed back to the fence line, we just made it though when the alarm sounded, bright lights pointed towards the storage supplies building. We watched as our people moved out of the building, they tried to run for the fence line but were all shot by one of the tower guards. One of the men in my team grabbed the detonator and pushed the plunger down. The explosives all detonated at once obliterating the clone vat building. The bright lights in the guard towers swung towards our direction and one of them found us almost straight away. I remember the man next to me screaming and when I looked at him there was a hole through his torso with blood all over him, he dropped to the ground dead. The rest of us ran I could hear more shots ring out and felt a shot whiz past my ear. I did not want to die so I hid behind a large rock; I realized as my breathing slowed and I calmed down a bit, that I had dropped my spear in all the commotion.

I heard more shots in the distance and could hear approaching heavy footsteps; they had to be aliens looking for my team. They got closer and closer and I realized I had to run or they would find me, I gathered all my strength, slowly stood and started to run. I probably did not get more than ten meters when I felt a large hand grab me by the neck and pick me up. I was held up as if I was a prize by the alien guard as he yelled out he had caught one of the little terrorists. I struggled for a bit until the alien that was holding me held me up to its face. The voice that said stop it was like the sound of death, I froze stiff and did not move any more, I was carried back to the alien base and thrown into a cell with one window. As the night turned into day, I watched as more objects were launched into orbit. An alien came by my cell and gave me some food for breakfast; the alien also delivered another of my team from the attack to my cell. He was battered and bruised; he tried to smile at me but winced in pain as he did. We sat in silence for hours until he spoke, as it turned out neither of us knew what had happened after the explosion, and if we had been successful.

A day later, the cell door opened and an alien stepped inside flanked by two alien guards, he looked us over and removed his helmet. He smiled at the two of us.

“I am the base commander” he said introducing himself, “I can make your life very comfortable here, if you tell me where your little base is in the hills.” my cellmate and I did not answer we both looked at the ground in silence. “Your attack yesterday accomplished nothing.” my cellmate spoke up with a passion.

“You will all die now, with no clone vats you are no longer immortals.” The guards behind their commander started to laugh. The commander held his hand up and the two guards went silent.

“My dear little prisoners your little attack succeeded in destroying our clone vats and poisoning our supplies, but we have a cure for the viruses on the planet and new clone vats will arrive from orbit tomorrow. You have failed.” At this point, I did not know what to say. “You perceive the world as your small city and not much else; do you realize how large this planet is? We have a fleet in orbit setting up mining all over the planet; your people could have been our friends. So tell me where your hide out is?” We both sat in silence and eventually the base commander knelt down next to us and continued.

“I have been a capsuleer all my life and now my Alliance has given me this chance to prove myself. When Concord lifted the planetary prohibition, it meant that your little planet was now worth more than you could possibly imagine. My Alliance needs this planet it is strategically important, a war is headed this way and we need the resources here to defeat our real enemies. You are not my enemies, so tell me where your base is so we can end this once and for all.” We stayed silent again.

“If your people had been as welcoming as your Government said they would be none of this would have happened, if you had not attacked us we would not have been forced to defend ourselves.” The base commander paused again.

“Come on men I do not have time for these little creatures.” The base commander stood and started to leave the room. “You either work with us or you will die. I will be back in a few days so think about it.” The cell door closed and my cellmate and I sat in silence ‘You have failed.’ The base commanders words echo in my head even until this day, how were we to know how big this was? How were we to know how much of a waste this all was?

The guards are now coming down the hall to my cell; the leader of the aliens told my cellmate and I that we were either work with them or die. My cellmate and I said we would rather die than become slaves for the murders of our race and our planet. My cellmate for the last few months died yesterday. I write my story on the back of this report I stole from a guard last night as I hope someone finds it someday. The guards are now at our door and it is now time for my life to end, I do not have a clone to come back as, but maybe someone will find my story and realize what horrors have happened here. I hope someone fights for my planet, I hope who ever these aliens are fighting win so these aliens die with no clone to come back in; I hope my race survives to see that day. It has now been a year since the dust settled from the first alien landing and with our executions; I hope the fight will not continue much longer.

– by Oche Firestar

D DAY –8 10:05 Local Time New Caldari

The low murmuring of people talking died off slowly as the branch director headed to the podium at the front of the auditorium. Looking out at the crowd of employees he waited a few moments for the last of the noise to die down.

“As you all know by now CONCORD has brokered an agreement whereby capsuleers now have access to planet side resources,” he said pausing for a moment as murmuring broke out again which quickly died away. “While the specifics of the agreement have not yet been obtained by Head Office its clear that this is going to affect a lot of business,” he continued. “The stock markets are already reacting to this news and resource company stocks are all over the place. Even the stock of our company, which offers geological and planetological services, has seen more changes in the last couple of hours compared to the previous 6 months. We just do not know what the future will hold for us. So effective immediately all work on our contracts is suspended except for fieldwork, government work or any work that is due within the next forty-eight hours. Head Office has promised us as update within that time. If you have no work because its been suspended see your project manager to discuss with them what you can do. If you want a day off now might be the time to ask for it.”

The director looked up and out at his audience. He could see that many of them were in the same boat as he was. They were suddenly uncertain of what the future would mean for them and their families and friends and perhaps more specifically would they still have a job tomorrow or the next day or even next week?

“I’ll be candid with you. This caught everyone off guard. At best we can hope to keep doing what we do but for new bosses. At worst we have to find something new to earn our living. For sure there are going to be tremendous changes and upheaval as we all learn what this new agreement will do to us. If any of you have stock in resource companies or even our own company I’d advise you to sell them as soon as you can because I don’t think they’ll be worth that much for the foreseeable future.”

There were a few scattered nervous laughs from the audience at that and the director could see one person glance down and punch something into their personal com-unit.

“Well I won’t keep you any longer. While I know you have questions I don’t have answers. Perhaps in a couple of days we’ll all have them so that’s it for now.”

The director stepped away from the podium and made his way out of the auditorium. Some of the crowd of employees started talking to their neighbours while others got up and began to leave as well. Helen stayed in her seat until the rush had died down and then she slowly got up and left for her cubicle. She was working on a long-term contract so that meant she did not have any work. Sitting down at her desk she felt at a bit of a loss as to what to do. It was still mid-morning and she decided that perhaps she could answer some of the mail she had. That might occupy her for an hour or two by which time she could go to lunch and then check in with her project manager. By that time perhaps there would be more information.

As Helen worked on her backlog of mail she had a thought about an old classmate of hers from University. ‘Hadn’t he become a capsuleer?’ she thought. ‘Yes he had and pretty much at the start of the whole program,’ she recalled. Finishing the mail she had open she went back into her contact list and looked for an address. It was an old one and not in service. A few seconds of thought and she accessed the public database and started a search for him. Within moments she found the information she needed. ‘Oh that’s out of the system,’ she thought with dismay, ‘but at least I can contact him. Perhaps he’ll remember an old classmate.’ It took about five minutes to work up a letter that she was happy with. She sent it off and leaned back for a moment and then went back to her mail.

12:05 Local Time New Caldari

“We’re going to lunch. You want to join us?”

Helen looked up with surprise at one of her co-workers who had poked his head around the partition to her cubicle. She glanced at her watch and saw with some surprise it was now just after noon.

“Sure,” she said, “where we going?”

“Pop’s Place. There’s going to be about a dozen of us and Griogi is just calling them now to reserve a table for us.”

“Great. Though with only an hour it’s going to be tight to get back here on time.”

“No worries the boss is coming with us. Says it doesn’t really matter if we have an extended lunch today. Kind of a possible last good time together if the worst should happen.”

“Always rely on the boss to look on the bright side.”

Helen shut down her computer, grabbed her purse and stood up. Since the way to Pop’s Place was indoors all the way she did not pick up her coat.

“Lead on,” she said.

13:13 Local Time New Caldari

The meal was delicious as always and Helen sat in her chair savouring the gourmet coffee she had ordered to round it off. The conversations around the table had been numerous and had a touch of nostalgia about them as people recalled their time at work. There had been fun times and sad times. There had been many successes and a very few failures. Today seemed that it would be one of those days that they would recall with sadness as friendships and shared success gradually faded away as they moved on to other things for it seemed that life would never be the same again for any of them. It was hard to believe that nearly two hours had passed but it had. She looked over at her boss who had, it appeared, finished their tea and was asking for the bill. Her com-unit beeped. Glancing at it she saw that there was a reply to her mail to her old friend. She toggled the read button.

“Audio-visual display message received. Playback?” her com-unit asked.

‘That’s a surprise,’ Helen thought, ‘most people just text because its cheaper. Wonder what’s so important that he’d use visual?’

Knowing that it would be a few minutes before the bill arrived and believing that the message had to be important Helen touched the “Yes” button. All heads at the table turned towards her when a full sized holographic image materialised in front of her. There was the usual slight shimmer normal to all such images that her com-unit projected but otherwise it was as if the person being recorded was there in the room with them.

“Playback begins,” her com-unit stated.

“Helen. Nice to hear from you after all this time. I do recall you from class and what you ask is not a bother at all. I’ve been following the news on the planet resource treaty. Even had a chance to muck around with some simulations we’ve got access to concerning planet installations. Its not all good news I’m afraid. Well good news for us capsuleers I mean though it might be good news for some planetary corporations in the short term. The economics don’t justify the amount of time needed to even begin to break even on running planet stuff. Of course things keep changing as more data comes out. I doubt many capsuleers will bother with it right now as it stands. There needs to be a jump of about a magnitude in efficiency for it to become something many capsuleers will get into. Right now looks too much an ISK sink. People will just lose too much.”

The image glanced down at something in front of it, which was invisible to anyone there in the restaurant. By now it had the attention not only of Helen’s table but that of many seated nearby as the distortion less voice carried on.

“Hmmmm. Just had an update come through. There might be one or two things that will show enough profit.”

The image looked back up and seemingly divining the thought that many at the table were asking themselves.

“I know you aren’t really familiar with how quick tech changes up here. Even though its still weeks away its still possible that we’ll get something much more workable. Already see some economic studies from other pilots on it as well as suggested changes to structures to be installed. Hell in just the last twenty-four hours there are some two hundred comments on the whole thing. But then again CONCORD can be real stubborn at times and plump for the worst possible implementation for everyone involved. Takes years to get them straightened around when they do that and this may be one of those things. Look I can’t really show things to you over the link so why don’t you come up here for a couple of days. That way you can go over things and see for yourself what might be coming down the road. Oh! And don’t worry about the cost of the trip. I’ve had everything arranged so just use my name and this code and I’ll pick up the tab. Not that it be that much anyways. Just means a few ISK less profit on my next mission. Just let me know when you can get here. Looking forward to hearing from you soon.”

The image faded away into nothingness at that last word. For several seconds the other patrons in the restaurant were quiet then, as if embarrassed at themselves for shamelessly eavesdropping even though there was no way not to have heard, they turned back to what they had been doing before the message played.

“Playback ends. Additional data received. Stored in secure memory.” Helen’s com-unit said.

Helen looked up reddening as she saw that her message had been the focus of everyone’s attention.

“I didn’t expect full sized vid,” she explained, “I mean who uses that when it costs so much?”

“Well apparently someone doesn’t think it costs an arm and a leg,” her boss said. “I think you might consider taking that trip. In just that short message we’ve had more information about this than we’ve seen publicly so far. We can discuss this further back in the office.”

13:47 Local Time New Caldari

“The company can’t order you to do this since it’s a personal trip though the company business is what seems to have sparked your message,” her boss said. “However we’d all be grateful if you did go and could supply us with information. At the very least you’d helping your friends know what the future is likely to be like and they could plan ahead for it.”

The blatant ploy about her friends did not go unnoticed by Helen. On the way back to the office she’d overheard her co-workers talking about the message and what this or that bit meant. She had also noticed an undercurrent of tension as people thinking over things began to realise that capsuleers appeared to have access to information that they were having trouble getting hold of. There had even been a murmur of how that seemed typical of the government fawning over capsuleers and ignoring the rest of the people. She had decided that she had to go just to see for herself what was going on.

“Considering the impact potential it could have I don’t think I’ve much choice,” said Helen. “I’ve my own future to look out for as well. It’s just very convenient that at the same time I can help my friends and co-workers and the company all at the same time.”

“Thanks. I haven’t cleared this with the director yet but you can consider yourself on company time while on the trip. Even if he doesn’t clear it I’ll make sure you get paid for the time.”

“In that case I’d better go and set-up the time I’m going to make the trip.”

“Sure. While you are doing that I’m going to go to see the director and tell him what happened. You know this doesn’t seem quite fair. I mean through a bit of luck we might be able to get through the coming change in better shape than others. I know that the capsuleers have changed things in the past but that all seemed remote. Now it’s become personal. I’m affected and because someone I know knows a capsuleer my life might be better off because of it.”

“That does seem ironic. I’ve heard that the capsuleers have made everyone’s life worse. I suppose it’s just human nature to blame someone else for something that they can’t change.”

“You are right there. I won’t keep you any longer. Got to get to the director.”

Helen got up and left the office. A few moments later she was back at her desk and keying in a reply to her capsuleer friend. She could not go this week as she had a commitment she could not back out of on the weekend. However her calendar was free for the following week. Looking ahead she realised with some shock that the very next week after that was when the treaty went into effect. With that she put into her message that she would be starting her trip in four days time.

D-DAY –4 08:00 Local Time New Caldari

The vid news services seemed to carry nothing but news about the treaty over the next four days. If they were not talking to economists they were trying to talk to government officials. If they were not talking to officials then they were interviewing people on the street. Everyone had an opinion and it seemed that that opinion was not a good one. More details had become publicly available and it seemed that resource extraction companies were going to be hit hard by the competition from capsuleers. Since much of those resources would go off planet there would be potential shortages locally and that would drive prices on most goods up. It rather looked like there could be rationing of goods that even during the fighting going on had not even been mentioned by any of the interstellar governments. Now because of this new treaty there could be.

Not all news seemed bad. Those companies that made extraction equipment looked in good shape but Helen had noted something disturbing even there. The equipment being shown off was pollution free but that came with a cost. She had looked over the treaty and nowhere in it did there seem to be anything that said that capsuleers had to abide by local pollution laws. In fact the extraterritoriality that capsuleers had which exempted them from most local, planetary and interstellar laws applied to virtually everything they would be able to do on planets. Yet no one seemed to have caught onto that fact. When she considered that her friend Oche had mentioned costs she had no doubts that if the capsuleers bought extraction equipment it would be the cheapest they could get and to hell with consequences to the environment. After all they did not live on the planets. It was not their problem. By the time her shuttle was to leave she was sick and tired of the whole thing. At least, for a few days, she could get away from it.

The flight would only take about eighty minutes to go the five jumps from new Caldari to Osmon where Oche, her capsuleer friend, was currently based. As she had a seat next to one of the windows she spent most of the time looking out at the vista of space. While she had visited the sights on one of the local moons Helen had never truly traveled any distance in space. Indeed this would be only her second time out of New Caldari. Her first trip had been to University on Jita. She caught glimpses of various ships as they approached or departed from stargates but she could never get a real good look at them. For some reason she felt disappointed. It was as the shuttle approached the Sisters of Eve station in Osmon that she got her first look at a ship. It was a Charon, a Caldari freighter that undocked as the shuttle made its approach run. As they drew nearer it took up more and more of the sky. The size of it came home when what appeared to be another ship that had undocked raced past the lumbering Charon. It was a Raven, a familiar sight on newsvids these last few years. She knew how big that was yet it seemed a pygmy in comparison to the freighter it ran beside. The Raven ran up to warp speed and disappeared off into the far reaches and as it did she now began to understand what power the capsuleers had. The freighter could move mountains while the battleships could provide force to ensure that no one tried to stop those mountains being moved. The Caldari was proud of its Navy but as she looked out while they approached the station she saw several freighters moving about and over a dozen non-naval marked warships. And as she knew this was not exactly a bustling station in terms of such traffic. As they had come up from New Caldari she had seen a much larger gathering of ships at the local space station and even that was nothing compared to what happened in Jita.

09:20 Local Time Osmon

She claimed her luggage little though it was and then waited in the custom’s line up. The line moved quickly and she soon reached the bored custom’s agent. He held out his hand for her identity card which she handed over. He inserted it into the card slot at his desk console. His bored look dissolved when it beeped at him. He looked at the display in front of him and then looked up at Helen.

“Welcome to Sisters of Eve in Osmon Miss Zimmand,” he said smiling. “If you will just wait a moment there will be someone here to take you to Mr. Firestar’s hangar.”

The agent pulled out the ID card and handed it back to Helen. She stepped to one side and started to look around and spotted a uniformed woman making her way towards the spot she was at. As the woman came closer Helen started making out details on the uniform and noted with some surprise that it appeared to be some sort of military uniform. She was even armed with a holstered weapon yet no one seemed to be paying her any attention especially the armed station security personnel she saw scattered around the area. Helen moved forward to make herself more visible and the uniformed woman, spotting the movement, angled over towards her.

“Miss Zimmand, I am Corporal Marchand. I am your escort and charged with ensuring your safe arrival at Mr. Firestar’s hangar,” she said as she stopped in front of Helen. “If you will follow me please I have a vehicle waiting for us just outside the terminal.”

Helen picked up her luggage and followed Corporal Marchand as she turned and starting making her way out of the terminal.

“Do you mind if I ask a few questions?” said Helen.

“No I don’t mind.”

“Armed guard?”

“Oh nothing special really. Not sure what other capsuleers may do when they have guests but since Mr. Firestar is a collector he has armed personnel to make sure no one steals anything,” Marchand shrugged.

“Isn’t station security good enough?”

“Its not that it’s the fact that station security can’t go into a capsuleer’s hangar. It has the equivalence of a foreign nation.”

“I hadn’t thought that the protection capsuleers had extended that far.”

“Yes it does though once they undock they are subject to local laws their hangars are not.”

By this time they had reached the exterior of the terminal and the corporal turned to the right towards a grav vehicle that had a uniformed man standing by it. Seeing the two of them the man opened the boot and then the 2 doors on the right side. Then he moved around to the other side and took the driver seat. Helen put her luggage into the boot and Corporal Marchand closed it. They both got into the vehicle which then pulled smoothly away from the terminal.

“We’ll be at the hangar in about five minutes,” explained Corporal Marchand.

“I could get used to this kind of service,” Helen jokingly said.

“We don’t do this often. Actually I think this is the first time that Mr. Firestar has done this so far this year,” replied Marchand. “Most people come on business rather than as an invited guest.”

The vehicle swiftly made its way through the traffic and then peeled off towards a drop shaft. It descended a few hundred meters and then entered a short tunnel. This opened up and it quickly became apparent that the area was clearly dedicated to storing large quantities of goods. There were many transport vehicles moving around their identity clear from the containers they carried though the contents were hidden. After about a minute the vehicle they were riding in pulled off to one side and slowed to a stop in front of what looked like a large office building. The driver popped the boot open and Marchand exited. Helen realising that this was their destination waited to make sure Marchand was clear before opening her door and then got out herself. She went around to the boot and pulled out her one piece of luggage. Marchand closed the boot and then led the way into the building.

Helen looked around the large lobby area as they moved towards a reception desk manned by several people some of whom were uniformed. She noted two guard stations each manned by several heavily armed personnel. Around the lobby were a few groups of casually attired people some of whom were seated at some of the couches talking to each other. She also noted the prominent sign which pointed towards “THE HANGAR” and had a stylised glass with a small umbrella in it. It seemed to indicate a bar was that way. She looked at Corporal Marchand and pointed at the sign.

“What’s that?” she asked.

“That’s our nightclub. Open to the public though it will be several hours before it opens,” replied Marchand. “Mr. Firestar is not just a collector. He is, after all, a businessman. That is just one more of the businesses he runs or owns.”

By now they had reached the reception desk and the person they stood in front of looked up at them.

“How can I be of service Corporal?” he said.

“Miss Zimmand. To see Mr. Firestar,” replied Marchand indicating with a nod of her head Helen to her side.

“Miss Zimmand. It is a pleasure to meet you. We’ve assigned you suite 5021.” He took from a pile a small card which he inserted into the console, entered a few keystrokes and then pulled it back out. “This is your key,” he said handing over the card to Helen. “When you leave please turn it in back here.”

As he spoke there came a beep from another console at which a uniformed guard sat. That guard pulled out a card and handed it over to the first man who had turned towards the beeping console.

“And this is your security pass,” he added passing that over. “Please keep this on you at all times while in this area.” He glanced down at the console. “Mr. Firestar will be available in an hour. Just take the lift to floor 150. They’ll look after there.”

Helen look at the security pass and not seeing any means to attach it to her jacket slipped it into a pocket. “Thank you,” she said.

Corporal Marchand then led the way to the large bank of lift shafts. “Suite 5021 is on the 50th floor and to the right when you get there. I hope you enjoy your stay with us.”

At that she turned and went back to the lobby area. Helen entered the lift shaft and pushed the button marked 50. The doors closed and she was whisked swiftly upwards. A small chime sounded as the lift came to a stop and the doors opened. Helen stepped out and turned to the right. She walked down the corridor looking at the numbers on each door as she went. Finding the one marked 5021 she slipped the card through the reader and the door swooshed open. She stepped through into the suite and stopped in astonishment. Having stayed in hotels on some of the projects she had been on she was expecting the usual style and size of room they provided. This, however, was something altogether different. Beside the door was a closet for guests’ jackets and a few steps further brought one into a large room. In this room were several couches around a large coffee table. Separate from them were another two couches placed so that a large vidscreen could be easily viewed from them. Beyond those was a balcony area on which was a table and several chairs that looked out into space through a large window.

Helen took several more steps into the room and could see off to the left a large kitchen area with a breakfast nook. She could see a fridge and a number of cupboards with a large working surface. Looking to the right she could see a bar area which was stocked and with its own bar fridge. She began to wonder where the bedroom was and then she saw the stairs that led up. She looked up and saw an open loft area where she surmised the bedroom was. Since she had an hour she decided that she could unpack and perhaps freshen up a little and ascended the stairs. Upon reaching the top she was again shocked at what she found. There was a large king sized bed and off to one side was the bathroom. She put her luggage onto the bed and opened the door to the bathroom. Not only was there the usual toilet facilities there was a large sunken tub in which several people could easily fit without crowding each other. She closed the door and quickly unpacked the things she had brought with her. Deciding that she could change for her meeting she did so and then went back downstairs. She explored the area more fully and found another powder room, a library area with a late model computer console, and beside the bar a full entertainment system. She also discovered the vidscreen not only could access all local channels but seemed to be connected to many interstellar channels as well many of which she knew were pay-to-view. By now an hour had almost passed so she gave up on her exploring and made her way back to the lift shaft.

10:30 Local Time Osmon

Upon reaching the 150th floor she got out noting that if she had it calculated right she was higher than her initial entry into the station. She mentally shook her head not being able to fully comprehend how one person could command so much space even if they were a capsuleer. A few meters in front of her was another reception desk. She walked up to it noting once again the mix of casually attired people mixed with uniformed armed guards. The receptionist looked up as she approached and smiled.

“Welcome Miss Zimmand. Mr. Firestar will see you right away. Lieutenant Dearnst will show you the way.”

As his name was mentioned a tall, muscular man stood up and came around the reception desk. He smiled at Helen and extended his hand.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” he said shaking Helen’s hand. “If you will come this way.”

He turned once Helen started walking in the direction he had indicated. They walked a few meters and then turned to enter an area hidden by the reception area back wall. It appeared to be another lobby area though this one was packed with a lot of people. Some were seated by themselves, others were in groups and even more were walking to or from office areas, which lined either side of lobby. She glanced at the Lieutenant and raised an eyebrow questioningly.

“On the left with the Amarrian Light Marine guard in front of it is where our Amarrian Diplomat has his office. On the right side opposite with the Temko Marine guard is the Minmatar Emissary’s office.” The Lieutenant pointed to the offices as he spoke. “Over there is where our Colonel and his aides have their offices. And over there is Administration.”

“This building is one hundred and fifty floors high. What do all those floors have on them?” Helen asked.

“Most of them are residences for the people who work for Mr. Firestar,” the Lieutenant replied. “That includes the security forces, the nightclub staff, research staff and the general workforce personnel. I believe the current figure is around twenty five thousand people altogether.”

“And Oche…I mean Mr. Firestar employs them all?”

“Yes. And the thirty floors below us are the work offices or research labs where most of the people work except, of course, the nightclub, which is on the first 3 floors of this building.”

“It must cost a fortune to run this place.”

“Well as far as I know it’s all rent free. Part of the capsuleer agreement by CONCORD I believe. Of course the capsuleers pay taxes on a number of things they do and that pays for it but I am not totally sure on the specifics.”

By now they had walked through the lobby area and had approached another desk. The Lieutenant walked up to the desk.

“This is Miss Zimmand who is here to see Mr. Firestar,” he stated to the seated secretary behind the desk.

“Miss Zimmand can go right in Lieutenant.”

Lieutenant Dearnst ushered Helen over to the door that had opened up off to one side of the desk. Helen walked in. While she had thought she could not be surprised further she turned out to be wrong. The office she entered was huge. Off to the right was a lounge area with a number of couches and chairs and a bar area. There was also a dining table and chairs. Off to the left there was an even larger area that contained many display cases and stands She could not see what was in most of them but the nearer ones seemed to contain minerals with the nearest looking like a typical piece of spodumain. Further back she could make out what appeared to be an open book and in another a statue of some sort. While taking this all in she slowly moved forward to the desk that sat in front of a large picture window. From behind the desk Oche Firestar stood up and moved around in front of it waiting for Helen to reach him. He extended his hand as she finally reached the desk and they shook hands.

“It looks like you have an impressive collection of minerals in your display area,” she said, “though I didn’t see them all.”

“Yes well I collect a lot of things and you’ll find a number of the smaller items over there,” Oche replied. “The bigger stuff is in my hangar though. You can see some of them through the window.”

He indicated the window behind him with a nod of his head. Helen looked at him enquiringly and seeing him smile stepped over to look out the window. From her viewpoint she could see several spaceships though it was only after looking for a few moments that she saw the other ships that were dwarfed by the Charon freighter that filled a lot of the space she was looking into. As she looked out Oche stepped up beside her.

“What you are looking at are my ready ships. That is, the ones I use a lot but weren’t the last one I took out,” he explained. “Most of them are cargo carriers of various sizes but you can make out a Crow interceptor down there. My CNR is out in the main docking ring since that was what I flew last. A mission to take out some Guristas saboteurs.”

“You haul a lot of cargo then?’ asked Helen.

“Actually no. Most of the time I fly combat missions. I use the cargo ships for collecting salvage or for moving it to other facilities for sale or for manufacturing purposes. Since a number of them are rigged it would cost to repackage them so I don’t bother.”

“Repackage?”

“I have over seventy different types of ships. Most are not assembled. Sometimes I get called on to use something unique so I get one of those assembled. When I am done because of the modular nature of their construction they can be disassembled or repackaged so they take up less space. Those are kept in an ship assembly area which you can’t see from here.”

“I see a lot of ships but surely that’s not all you keep.”

“No but to see more of that you’ll have to move over to the window behind my display area.”

As he talked he pointed to another large window area a distance from where they were standing and moved off in that direction. Helen followed though she took time to look at the display cases and stands revealed as she walked. Reaching the new window she looked out on a large open expanse of flooring a few levels below the one she was at. Looking in the direction of the ships she had seen she could see that it ended abruptly at the beginning of that huge space. She surmised from the array of loading equipment that from here those ships could be loaded. Even as she looked she could see containers being moved around.

“That’s just the cargo preparation area. The warehousing is in the areas just behind that. There are weapon systems, engines, sensors, and scanners…. well pretty much anything you care to name down there somewhere. Well almost…minerals and ores and most of the ready to use salvage is on another station in another system.”

“It must take up a lot of space.”

“I really haven’t figured out how much space we do take up,” Oche shrugged.

“And all this is yours?”

“There isn’t much in this hangar that I don’t own. I don’t own the people for example.”

“Sorry?”

“I don’t own the people. I don’t have any slaves here working for me.”

Helen looked puzzled at the change in topic and turned to look at Oche.

“I don’t quite see how that came up.”

“Excuse me but normally when people say do you own it all they think that the people here are owned by me as well. Most of them somehow think of us pod pilots as slave owners.”

“I never thought that.”

“I can see that now but while many pilots do own slaves I don’t. Well technically I own 19 but they are injured and currently in our medical facility. Their emancipation paperwork is going through so by the time they are well they’ll be free. I did buy them but only so I could get them treatment.”

Helen looked at Oche as he said this and saw that this was a touchy subject.

“I take it you buy a lot of slaves and free them then?” she enquired.

“Yes. Can’t abide slavery. If it were in my power to destroy the institution I would. As it is I do what I can to get some their freedom.”

“You have an Amarrian diplomat out there. Isn’t that strange for someone who doesn’t like slavery?”

“I try to keep on friendly terms with the Empire. After all I do occasionally have to do business out that way but he is here mainly to smooth over anything that those within the Empire might do that could cause trouble. It’s pretty much the same with the Minmatar emissary. Just looking after their interests.”

“I see.”

Helen turned once more to the window and stood there looking at the activity going on. After a few moments she turned back to Oche.

“While this is interesting this is not why I came out here,” she said.

“Yes. You had questions about the new resource treaty,” Oche replied. “Come on over to my desk I can call up the simulations I got to give you an idea of what’s involved.”

They walked back to his desk where Oche entered a few commands into his computer console. A holographic display came up showing in miniature a ship in a docking bay.

“Its an Iteron V,” Oche commented. “The size of the command centers are such that my other cargo carriers don’t have enough space and an Orca or freighter are much too big and valuable to just hang in space while mucking around with the getting things setup.

“Of course once it is set up you don’t have to leave the station to get things moving. Just go out and move the products around to where they need to go is all.”

As he spoke Oche manipulated controls and a number of items were put into the cargo hold of the Iteron. A small indicator showed how much space was used. An error message popped up stating that the vessel could not carry everything that was being put into it. Another command and this was solved.

“Ok now I’ve just loaded up with a number of Elite Command Centers. The best you can buy. Don’t know what they’ll cost yet but we figure millions of ISK at least,” said Oche. “Now lets undock and get them set up!”

For the next few hours they kept busy working on the various aspects of planetary interaction. While it was simple to begin with the complexities increased as they tried to maximise output while balancing input to the various processors. It soon became clear that this was perhaps going to be a full time job and not something that could be set up and checked once in awhile. Helen became aware that she was out of a job unless some worlds were somehow exempted from the treaty. New Caldari was perhaps one of the very few that might be exempt because of its importance to the Caldari as its capitol. It was almost certain that Jita being such a trade hub would have a blanket exemption. Too many ships moving around for it to be safe to do much else though if trading moved elsewhere that could change. It struck Helen that she would need to find something else to do now that it was almost certain that here company would be going out of business. While thinking on that she almost missed the chime that sounded somewhere on Oche’s desk. Bringing her attention back to what was in front of her she could see Oche glance over to the side at a console display. He made a face and then stood back from the controls he had been working for the simulation.

“Well looks like there is a glitch with the whole thing,” he said. “Obviously they found some sort of fault with the command centers and so they’ve pushed back the date of activation of the treaty.”

“Does this happen often?” Helen asked.

“Not for some time. Always thought that they were rushing this a somewhat and so I’m not surprised they found bugs.”

“How long is the delay?”

“Just a couple of weeks from what they are saying right now unless they find some more problems.”

“So what happens now?”
“They’ll keep the simulations updated with new information and so on but the urgency has dropped a bit. By the way its lunchtime. You hungry?”

“Yes.”

“Well lets head on over to the cafeteria and grab something to eat. We can talk more about this afterward.”

13:35 Local Time Osmon

After lunch they had returned to Oche’s office and sat down on the couches. Almost immediately Oche had bounced back up and started for the bar.

“Did you want something to drink?” he enquired.

“Anything without alcohol in it?” replied Helen.

“There’s Quafe if you want that. Or a number of different fruit juices.”

“If you have lotus blossom I’ll have one of those please.”

“Coming right up.”

Within moments Oche was back and passed the cool glass to Helen. She took a sip while organising her thoughts.

“You’ve been looking at the planetary interaction material for some time now. What do you think it will mean for us on planets?” Helen asked.

“I think the biggest problem is that for it to show any sort of decent profit the person doing it needs to be well organized,” mused Oche. “They’ll also not want any problems with staff on the planet. I suppose that will mean they’ll look to pay as low a wage as possible and if they need to move stuff will give no thought to the people they fire. They’ll just do it.”

“I can see that will cause issues down the road. Unions won’t like the mass hiring and firing going on and will agitate against that kind of thing.”

“Exactly. The thing is that since most pilots don’t really care about what happens down on the ground so unless someone down there can lob missiles at a ship in orbit it won’t mean anything.”

“And then there is dislocation caused by many companies going out of business. That isn’t going to win you any friends either. Hell even I am most probably going to be out of a job because of this. You don’t need geologists to survey for you you got those damned scanners that can do it from orbit!”

“Yeah it will most probably get ugly. Up until now any impact was positive for the people on the ground. So much got moved around cheaply that prices were kept low. Now suddenly a lot of people are going to be out of work. A lot of people. And then there will be shortages of resources locally. That will raise prices for everything.”

“It’s going to be a nightmare.”

“I think it will lead to war. Or at the very least a lot of people sabotaging what ever they can if it has anything to do with planetary interaction. That’s not something I look forward to but the thing that makes it so aggravating is that so much is now being tied into those resources. Even if we didn’t want anything to do with it it would cut back so much else we can do. So someone will do it and to hell with the consequences.”

They both sat in silence for a few minutes as they contemplated what the future might hold. Helen reached a decision.

“I need to talk to my boss. Is there a terminal I can use?” asked Helen.

“Use the one at my desk,” replied Oche.

Helen went over to the terminal and keyed in the address. She spent about ten minutes typing bringing her boss up to date on what she had seen. She did not try to hide the truth as she saw it and told him that effectively the company was dead in the water. There could be some hope if some planets were exempted from the resource treaty but so far nothing had been released officially on that. She also added in that there was a good chance that a lot of unrest could be generated perhaps enough to lead for calls for war against the capsuleers. She then added in a last thought.

‘…I don’t know if there is much that can be done under the present government setup. It does seem that maybe it is time for the current political landscape to be changed. Perhaps some of the leading members of the company should try their hand at that and work from inside to get political change. While it may not avoid the problems in the short term perhaps the long-term prospect of bloody war might be avoided. For if that occurred there would be many lives lost and they would not necessarily be those who picked up the weapons in the first place. At the very least the Caldari State cannot ever be the same as it was as it surrended more of its sovereign power to the capsuleers.’

Helen closed the message with her resignation from the company effectively immediately. When she had sent it off she did a search on another topic. Finding what she needed she opened up the new page, filled in the required information and then sent that off. Sitting back for a moment she felt much more satisfied than she had been for the past several days. She stood up and went back to the couch where she had left her glass. She sat and took another sip of her drink.

“How long does it take to qualify as a capsuleer?” she asked Oche.

Oche, who had been busy with a small reader built into the coffee table, leant back and started laughing.