=====

Her face buzzed.

Wha?

There it was again, the left side of her face buzzing, like a hornet inside her temple.

“What the…”

Light, as she opened her eyes a crack, and then squeezed them shut, trying to drown out the irritating drilling noise coming through the side of her skull.

The com-unit burried under her half-awake cheek buzzed again.

“Who in the HELL is calling me at 3 a.m.”

She squinted in the darkness at the screen, before recognizing the face of her associate. Sophia frowned; what could she possibly need at this hour? She grudgingly toggled the anwer button and held the device up to her ear. “mmm….whats wrong lady?” she mumbled, laying her head back down on her pillow.

“Dump your oxytopes, now”

Sophia frowned again, “what?” Her associate on the other end repeated herself, stressing for effect:

“Dump. Your. Oxytopes. Now.”

Sophia was suddenly keenly aware of the urgency in her friends voice; she picked her head up and sat up-right.

“Wait, whats wrong?” she said stone-faced, awake now as she flicked on the light next to her bed.

“Mittens has officially announced the end of the Goons’ Ice Interdiction, they’re going to War”

Her alertness rose another notch as she shook off the remainder of her sleep.

“Wait, that means…yikes” she didn’t finish her sentence before she swung her legs out of bed and reached for her boots.

“Yeah, exactly” her friend replied on the other end. “You need to lose those stockpiles like, yesterday, because there’s going to be a bank-run as soon as this spreads”

Sophia was already running up the gang-way to the hanger, keying up her Obelisk and pre-loading the hold.

“Check Dodixie prices for me, I’m checking Jita right now” she barked into the com, completely awake now.

“I’m seeing 1,485 isk a unit here, Jita looking better?”

Sophia checked the market window on her control panel as she finished loading “Speed Demon” with the last of her stocks: “forget it, thirteen-hundred something; guess the word already spread here.” she grimaced: “shit” she muttered under her breath.

“Pack it up and MOVE it then, by morning this is going to tank”

“I’m leaving now, be there in about 15 jumps”

She was running on adrenaline now. Sometimes, it was the thrill of combat that threw your pulse into over-clocked mode, and then there were times like this, when literally billions were riding on how fast you could whip your fat-assed freighter 15 jumps. She paused for a second to smile though:

“Hey, humor me…what’d we buy in at again?” She grinned and bit her lip

“480 a unit-” her associate paused as she did the quick math in her head; she whistled “damn girl, looks like Christmas is coming early this year”

Sophia was grinning ear to ear as she gazed out over her completely full freighter-load of oxygen isotopes.

“yes…yes it is.” She smiled, disconnected from her friend and chuckled

“Thanks Mittens” she said, smirking, and entered her pod; time to haul ass.

=====

So apparently, the Ice Interdiction is in fact over, and this girl is cashing out. When news first hit of The Mittani’s plan to use his Swarm to screw with the oxygen isotope market, I literally dropped what I was doing, logged in, and bought close to 5 million units of oxytopes at 480 isk a unit. As my associate so aptly put it, Christmas IS indeed coming early; thanks for the 5 billion isk profit Mittens!

The door hissed shut, and the room was plunged into darkness; she held her breath as she felt the other people in the room move around and cough nervously. Someone sneezed.

“I can’t believe he actually cracked that firewall!”

“Didn’t even have to crack it dude. Heard he did a reboot into an admin’s home-network, broke HIS firewall, and then re-programed his access code to allow decryption”

Sophia pursed her lips and rubbed her temples; this was a mistake.

“Dude, that is awesome!”, an incredulous and somewhat high-pitched male voice said falteringly.

“I know, right! Not bad for a total noob!”; this one more nasally with a slight twinge of superiority.

“Guys! Lower your voices! This place coud totally be bu-”

“Erol can we please get some lights on in here?” Sophia interrupted.

Silence; a beat.

“Yeah give me a sec Soph.”

There was the click of a breaker box, and then large holo-monitor on the wall flicked to life, engulfing them in a phosphorescent blue-ish glow.

“Thanks.”

“Whoophish!” The owner of the nasal voice made a whip-cracking sound and gesture and snickered at Erol, “way to be totally whipped dude!”

Sophia stared at him deadpan, sill rubbing her right temple with her hand. “Seriously?”

He made a ‘whatever’ face and looked away.

“I can’t believe I actually came to this” She muttered to herself.

Erol had sent her one of his “urgent” and absurdly encrypted memo’s the other day by way of station bot-messenger (he was convinced that evemail was “totally watched”), asking her to come by one of his “hideouts” in the lower station to see something “crazy, something they don’t want you to see”, as the message had said.

In spite of every single piece of her rejecting the idea, she always ended up going to see what Erol was up to. He was young, paranoid, and really way more enthralled in books about espionage and intrigue then what might be healthy for an already paranoid personality, but he also happened to be a genius programer and hacker, and he’d definitely come in handy on a few occasions. Besides that, he’d been friends with her brother, so she overlooked the fact that most of his friends were tools.

The funny thing was, she knew they actually always wanted “the girl” there, as if the proximity of a different gender somehow lessened the staggering nerdness of these little clandestine sauge-fests of theirs; as if somehow she legitimized this whole thing.

“So stop stalling and show it man!” nasal-voice croaked out to Erol while staring at her chest. She kicked his chair, startling him, and put her jacked back on.

“Ok, guys, what you’re about to see is….is…just crazy. They don’t want you to know about this shit, but we need to spread the word and show the universe. The freedom of information must be preserved!”

She had to smirk; Erol was big on the theatrics. Still, it was hard to take anyone seriously in a bathrobe. She raised her hand.

“Yes Soph?”

“Yeah, Erol, hun, great to be here and all, and really, psyched to see what you’ve for for us today, but do you think you could maybe put some pants on? We talked about this.”

Nasal-voice, who was actually wearing a cape (seriously?), burst out laughing and pointed at Erol.

“POWNED DUDE! HAHA!” he choked out, cackling like an idiot, and elbowing their other shy friend to join in.

Sophia reached over and grabbed his ear, twisting hard.

“OW! What the fuck! Erol tell your girlfriend to get her fuckin hands off me!”

Sophia twisted harder and smiled politely at Erol.

Erol just started, non-perplexed at the pleasant-looking Sophia and his writhing, cursing friend. “Whatever, robes are comfortable” he said matter-of-factly. He turned back to the monitor. “Anyways, behold!” and with a slightly dramatic flourish, he touched the screen, bringing up the first image.

She let go of her grip on nasal-voice’s ear, and he stopped squirming. “Woah” he breathed.

Sophia stared at the screen. As always, she had to give Erol some props; this was pretty crazy intel he’d gotten his hands on.

“No stats available, cause I know you’re all thinking it, just these pictures so far” Erol said towards the screen, starring along with the rest of them. He touched the monitor again, bringing another snapshot to the full-frame:

Another hush fell over the group as they stared at the image in front of them. Nasal-voice looked like his eyes might actually leave his head, and Shy-guy was jittering and fidgeting in his seat like a like he had to use the bathroom.

“Erol, what exactly are we looking at here” she asked

“As far as I know, these are one-of-a-kinds so far. I couldn’t find any evidence of mass production or manufacturing, so I think these are prototypes.”

“Bad ASS prototypes!” Nasal butted in. She was inclined to agree.

Erol brought up the next image:

Wow. Sophia actually found herself for the first time with a strange urge to actually fly a Caldari Battleship. Shy-Guy kept trying to look at every point on the screen at once, his mouth wide open and breathing heavily.

Erol looked at Sophia, grinning. “You’re going to LOVE this one!” he gushed with some excitement.

And he was right. She didn’t even care what the stats were, she wanted one, now. As if reading her thoughts, Erol chimed in again.

“NO Soph, I don’t have any stats for this one either”. She grinned at him.

“This next one is going to freak you guys out though, check it.”

That was it for Shy-Guy, who couldn’t contain himself anymore:

“THAT IS SO AWESOME!!” he all but squealed, literally jumping out of his chair and dropping his glasses on the floor.

Sophia had to admit, the ship in front of her, both in aesthetics and function, looked pretty incredible. What was that, a cruiser-sized Logi ship? She sat forward a bit more.

Erol flicked to the next screen.

Sophia had to laugh; poor Hurricane. Nasal of course felt a need to open his mouth: “Hey look! You got a spaceship for your girlfriend Erol! Does it shoot ‘make me a sandwich’ lasers?!” Nasal disolved into wheezy laughter before Sophia deftly kicked out the two legs of the chair he was leaning back into; laughter turned to more spitting and cursing as he was knocked to the floor. She smirked.

“What are you, on the rag?!” Nasal-voice fumed at her.

“Is ‘getting laid’ on your to-do list, like, at some point ever?” Sophia tilted her head and started at him quizzically. Nasal turned beet-red and angrily looked away.

Without warning, the room was suddenly plunged into darkness again as the monitor clicked off.

“Erol-”

“It wasn’t me!”

It was then that they heard the whirring and buzzing screech of metal coming from the other side of the door. Nasal was off the floor in a heartbeat, panic in his eyes, and lit a pocket light. “Erol! Did you remember to bypass the admin trace?!?”

They all turned as he put his pocket light on Erol, who was staring at the front of his robe very determinedly without answering. Sophia acted first.

“Ok, backdoor? Emergency access? What’ve we got.” She looked around the small storage unit they were trapped in, the sound of the metal-shaving band-saw growing louder on the other side of the door. There; on the other side of the room behind a tarp-draped crate, she spied the panel to the emergency maintenance tunnel.

“Hey, Shy-guy! Help me move this!” she barked at the quiet one, moving towards the crate. Nasal jumped in and they managed to wedge it out of the way of the panel. Sophia snapped the blaster out of the holster at her hip and fired off four rounds, melting the bolts securing the door; Shy-guy stared in awe at the smoking weapon, Nasal was staring at her chest again. She kicked the door in and yelled at the two of them. “Move it! Head left, and get topside of station as soon as you can, and be quick!”

She shoved them through the doorway, ignoring the muttered “whatever, bitch” from Nasal and went to grab Erol, who was still trying to get the monitor to turn on.

“Erol, its go-time, lets move!” She grabbed his arm and hauled him out the access panel as the sounds of the main door giving way shrieked through the room. Quickly, they sprinted down the tunnel, up a flight of stair, and out another access door, bringing them out behind a dive-bar in the station’s shipping district. Sophia turned and bolted the door shut behind them. From here they could at least blend in with the crowd and make their way home.

—

“So, sorry about all that.” They were walking briskly through a crowded shopping district towards the train station. Erol looked perplexed and genuinely confused over the turn of events. She ruffled his hair.

“Don’t worry about it kid” she smirked, and he looked a little relieved.

“Oh but Erol?”

“Yeah?”

She stopped and looked at him.

“You need to find yourself some new friends.”

========

I can’t claim to be the finder of the ship displayed in this post. Instead, I found them here as posted by T’amber Anomandari Demaleon, and allegedly, you too can find these ships on SiSi although I haven’t gone to check myself. I do recommend going to check out some of the other examples in T’amber’s post though, there’s some pretty interesting stuff there. Enjoy!

-Sophia

Not with slow creep or with modest hesitation, but with a roar and heralding blare of trumpets did change crash upon us.

While we slept the ashes of failure and defeat were cleansed by wind, and the embers of hope-that-was began to burn.

Some compared it to Christmas; to waiting silent in the dark, daring to strain our ears for the sound of bells jingling and elves tinkering. And as we tried in vain to close our eyes, our imaginations betrayed us.

While we slept, new wonders fell among us like ink upon a whetted page; like snowflakes that we chased like children on a winters day.

While we slept, towers grew mighty, and the machinations of war burned fierce. Time itself was slowed, the grounded were given wings, and giants were felled as the weak stood and screamed “no, we will not lay down!”

We are but sailors and satellites in a sea of endless black, and while we slept the stars shone a little brighter to light our way home.

Also, not one to refuse a challenge, I’ve decided to inject the amazing Rixx Javix into the story as well. I hope he takes my free range in fleshing out his “character” in stride .

Edit: Contest results in! Although I didn’t manage to snag 1st, 2nd, or 3rd prize amongst the list of heavy and very talented competition (hey, can’t win them all right?), I *did* manage to walk away with both the “Rixx Javix” Award of 250 mil and a pirate frigate of my choosing (Mr. Javix, I’d like a Daredevil please ), as well as Duncan Feldane’s “Jack Sparrow” Prize of a fully fitted (lol) Zephyr! Many thanks to both Rixx and Duncan for the generous prizes, and of course to Mord for getting this thing together.

========

Sirens wailed as another volley of autocannon fire slammed aginst the side of her exploration Tengu, pounding through the meager shields. Her mind was on liquid fire, choking on adrenaline as her assailiants came in for a tight orbit, unloading metal hail against her defenseless ship, making it howl and groan in protest.

The Loki had appeared out of nowhere, catching her heart in her throat as it disrupted her warp engines before being joined by a Hurricane and a Vexor, also pirates. The Loki held point now as the three of them circled, another volley rocking the ship sideways as the alarms screamed at her and more warning lights blasted through the darkness of her pod. Shaking, she felt her shields give way as another viscious round tore through the remainder and started to bleed into her armor. Her breathing went ragged as the sirens’ cacophony ricocheted off her ears and her fragile ship began to list sideways; screeching metal haunting her.

========

Two days prior:

She sat, staring over the rim of her glass at him across the bar; she couldn’t help it. She studied the way he kept laughing at something someone else in his group would say, or his habit of doodling unknown things on the sides of his napkin. He was just so…

“Soph”, a finger poking her arm.

“Soph!” The finger poked again. “Damnit girl you’re not even listening to…”

“Bets, thats Rixx Javix sitting over there” she said, shrugging off Bettina’s prodding finger and ignoring her, without taking her eyes off of him.

“Yeah, great. Soph, he’s a PIRATE. How is he not being arrested right now by the way?” Her friend huffed at her.

“Bets, “

“Not that I think this will in any way disuade you, but he’s married you know.”

“Yeah yeah, I know. He’s just so damn…I don’t know, mysterious and dangerous looking to me. Bets comon! You don’t think he’s in any way attractive?”

Her friend stared at her in only half mock disbelief and shook her head. “If by attractive you mean ‘probably looking for someone to murder with a spoon’ then yes, totally with you on that one”

Sophia laughed and rolled her eyes at Bettina. She turned her gaze back across the bar to the silver-haired outlaw as he laughed heartily at the remark of some comrade and took a long pull from the beer in his hand.

“Whatever” Bettina continued “maybe waking up with my skin as someone else’s new face mask just isn’t my thing, I must be a weirdo or something.” She poked Sophia’s arm again.

Choking on her drink, Sophia stuttered out a laugh.”Well my dear Bets, we’re going to have to agree to disagree. And on that subject, I’m going outside to have a smoke.”

Ignoring her friend’s protests, she headed for the door.

========

She stepped out into the glass atrium attached to the bar and touched the end of her cigarette with her lighter, smiling to herself as the tip caught and glowed. Inhaling deeply, she tilted her head back to stare up at the stary view as she slowly exhaled, luxuriating in her satisfaction.

“You know those are bad for you”.

The deep, gruff voice behind her shook her from her reverie and she spun around.

He was standing right there, arms nonchalantly crossed over his chest, one silver eyebrow raised in slight amusment, and a smirk playing out on his lips.

She felt the corners of her mouth drawing up. “So I hear” she said smiling bemusedly. “Aren’t you…”

“…also looking to get out of that place and make some questionable choices? Yeah” He gestured towards the cigarette between her lips, “you mind if I…?”

“Oh, yeah of course” she stamered, realizing she’d been staring at him. Slightly mortified at her schoolgirl-crush behavior, she started to reach for the pack at her hip when he reached out, pulled the cigarette from her lips and brought it to his mouth. His eyes stayed on her as he took a long drag from her cigarette, handed it back to her, and exhaled slowly.

“I’m Rixx” he said grinning, this steely eyes still fixed on her. She felt warmth flushing into her face.

She laughed, a little too forcefully “Yeah, I know”.

‘Jesus, get ahold of yourself lady’ she muttered at herself inside.

“Sophia” She extended her hand, which he took in his and shook firmly.

“Pleasure to meet you Sophia” he said through his smirk. She felt the color in her cheeks growing a little warmer.

They lingered, her hand still in his, his eyes still on hers, without speaking. After a long moment, he broke the silence

“I’m married you know”

She laughed again, this time a little bit more naturally, and let her hand drop from his. “So I also hear” she quipped again, smirking back at him and tilting her head to the side.

‘And holy shit, I’m openly flirting with a notorious MARRIED pirate. I am actually insane’ her internal voice hissed at her through clenched teeth.

Rixx chuckled and took a step back, letting the mood lighten a little. Sophia took another drag of the cigarette and passed it back to him

“So what brings you to civilization Rixx?”

He grinned, “Oh, you know, children to kidnap, housewives to ravish,” he paused “hunting for someone to murder with a spoon” he winked at her. “you know, business as usual”.

Sophia felt her cheeks burn “You’ve got good ears” she stated, biting her lip and looking away to hide her smile.

“And you’ve got great eyes” he said “but I won’t hold that against you.” She felt herself blush again.

“And you? What are you up to when not indulging in,” he winked pointedly “bad habits?”

“Why Mr Javix” she said in mock fluster, taking her cigarette back from him “I’ve got a strung hunch that a certain MRS Javix would be more than a little concerned at the direction this conversation is heading” She let her eyes stay locked on his, hoping to make him look away first. No such luck.

Rixx said nothing, but grinned a little more fixedly at her.

She caved. “If you must know, I’m out visiting an old friend before making a few low-sec pit stops to pick up some research jobs”

“Research huh? Didn’t peg you for a nerd” He stuck his tongue out at her as she playfully punched at his arm

Suddenly his arm went around her waist and pulled her close, and she felt her breath catch.

“Careful though,” he said his face close to hers “Theres Pirates about”. His grining eyes hardened for a second before softening once again as he let his grip loosen and pulled slightly away from her.

She felt her racing pulse coming back down to normal and regular functionality returning to her lungs. “Yeah, I’ll uh, try and remember my water wings” she said sarcastically.

Rixx grinned wolfishly, took one last drag from the cigarette, and passed it back to her. “Well Ms. Sophia, its been a pleasure talking to you”.

She felt herself grinning like an idiot. “Mr. Javix, its been…surreal talking to you as well.”

“Watch yourself out there,” his eyes holding hers as he started to move away. “Until next time”. And then he was turning, walking back towards the door and disappearing back into the bar and leaving her alone in the dark atrium.

“What. The. Hell. was that” Sophia set outloud, looking around her. She felt the schoolgirl crush still coursing in her cheeks as she stubbed out the cigarette and headed back to Bettina inside.

“Bets is going to kill me”.

========

She felt the ship violently shake again as another volley slammed into the raw, unfortified armor of the fragile Tengu, sending another wave of warning sirens blasting through the ship.  Another volley, and she screamed out loud as she felt the ship groan and crumble against the onslaught of autocannon fire. Tears starting to fill the corners of her eyes, and she vainly tried to will the ship into warp for the hundredth time, her face crumbling like the ship around her,  screaming “damn external forces!!” at the nav computer. She felt her hands shaking uncontrolably, and the adrenaline coursed through her veins. Another volley of Hail came crashing into the side of the ship, shredding the remainder of the Tengu’s armor and raking against the actual hull of the ship. The Tengu audibily groaned the gut-wrenching sound of twisting metal and screeching girders.

‘This is it’ she thought through her screaming brain. ‘This is how this happens.’

And then, the miracle. Her overview flashed as the Loki very abruptly warped from the field in a seemingly random direction and instantly disappeared from the local transponder list, leaving the Hurricane and the Vexor behind to finish her off. She paused: leaving the hurricane and vex….her eyes flew to her overview: no points.

On pure adrenaline reflex, she punched the warp engines as she felt the hull begin to give way around her, flames and gases venting into space, and screamed as she felt the battered ship enter warp towards the highsec gate. She could feel the ship dying around her as she landed gate spamming the jump button, and then…safety; Empire space. Weak from her adrenaline high, she started breathing again as she started hailing the local Fed Navy station for emergengy repairs.

========

She sat on the gangway in her hanger, legs dangling over the side, cigarette between her lips, with the oddly wrapped parcel sitting on her lap. Her docking manager had left it for her, with a note mentioning that it was dropped off after hours. Furrowing her brow, she pulled the bizarrely tied ribbon off, noticing the strange little doodles along the paper for the first time. As she tore at the paper, a bit of metallic surface shone through, puzzling her, and she ripped off the remaining paper.

She stopped short and shook her head; “that damn bloody pirate” she muttered to herself, as she glared down at the spoon siting amongst the wrapping paper in her lap.

========

Again, the events written about above did actually transpire for me while exploring low-sec. The Loki pilot had probably had the all-time best/worst timed DC ever, which allowed me to escape the two remaining, non-point-fitted pirates.

While I seriously doubt that Rixx Javix had anything at all to do with my Tengu’s close brush with certain demise, the idea of including him as this total character in the story was too good to pass up. Hope you enjoy!

-Sophia

Instead, she wordlessly swung her legs out of bed and stood, wrapping the blankets around her and padding softly across the cold metal floor to the opposite end of her quarters, her feet chilled but familiar with the journey. Reaching for a glass from the shelf, she dropped 3 small blocks of ice into it, letting them pling one at a time before setting the glass on the counter. The familiar squeak of real cork-wood on a real glass bottle, followed by the warm and oaky smell of the scotch whiskey made her pause before splashing some of the bottle’s contents out over the ice and re-corking it. Hugging the blankets around herself, she took the glass in her spare hand and turned towards the open doorway leading out to the gangway and her hanger.

=====

She sat on the floor at the end of the gangway, knees against her chest, staring out at the dim light of the hanger. Slowly, she sipped from the glass, letting the smokey liquor run over her tastebuds, pausing to savour the complexity of the taste before swallowing with an exhale.

Jared was gone these days. He’d decided one day that this end of the universe was too well known and that the other side seemed “more like the place to go”; the place to gowithout your girlfriend was the part he omitted at first, but whatever. Fuck him, right? She took another sip of her drink.

It might have taken her a while to admit it to herself, but she knew it was more than that that kept her up these nights.

She looked out across the hanger at the dim lights glinting and casting sharp contrasts across the crisp and polished metallic surface of her Guardian cruiser. “BTL Armor For Life” and the slogan “Maspah, Never Forget”, framed with what appeared to be angel wings and some sort of bird talons etched deeply into the side of the hull. She rolled her eyes and took a sip; what complete bullshit. She was no patriot, not one of those shield-banging freedom fighters, and definitely not a hero. But heros were what people wanted, and in their absence, what they looked for.

She thought back on the other day, of the little girl who had broken away from her mother’s hand to run over to look up at her and smile admiringly. Or last week after returning to station after a fairly pitched fight at a Nation Command Outpost, of the old veteran who’d gotten on one knee to bless and thank her. She wasn’t heartless, but they were misguided, and they were wrong.

At the end of the day, the money was great; match, point, that was it. Heroes were selfless, without material need, and altruistic. But when it came down to it, she was a paid gun; a mercenary, hired out by CONCORD to help take care of the shit they couldn’t. She’d bought the Logistics cruiser sitting in her hanger now from Acidius, when he’d first picked her up in that shitty pub in Amarr and recruited her into his Armor gang. She laughed, he was no hero either, but she’d learned that he’d picked up the cruiser from some old gun from the first Incursions, a true believer and freedom fighter all the way. When she brought up the slogans on the hull, he’d just shrugged and winked: “chicks sure love heroes” he’d said.

=====

The dim blinking from the holoreel screen in her quarters behind her caught her eye and attention; a new Incursion warning. Her com unit on the floor next to her buzzed with the now-familiar face of Acidius pinging her; damn he was fast she thought. She cleared her throat in the cold air of the hanger and picked up.

“Armor gang going up in Orkashu and looking for Logis, you in?” His voice was level, with a twinge of contained excitement that all the ex-military types seemed to have before getting into a gun fight.

She said nothing and briefly toyed with the idea of passing with some sort of lame excuse when he piped up again.

“I know you’re up doing nothing Soph, so move it and get that ass over here”.

She grinned to herself, “yeah, I’ll be there”, she said.

She ended the com-line and hung her head for a second before slowly hauling herself up off the floor. She drained her glass as she started flicking on command switches on the gangway dash, and then let the blanket fall around her bare feet as she moved towards her awaiting pod.

The garland of flowers with an Amarrian religious icon pinned to it draped across the railing next to her pod caught her eye. “So much for upgraded security measures” she thought as she picked up the wreath and tossed it over the side, making a mental note to request a new dock staff.

She paused and looked up as the lights caught the slogans and the angel wings carved into the hull and shook her head. “Buckle up, hero” she muttered sarcastically.

She’s a child again; her mother’s gentle face leaning over hers in the darkness to smile down at her as she’s tucked in for the night, whispering:

“You’re my special girl Aly! I have such hopes for you my wonderful girl. My Alexandra….”

And then she’s dancing, like she used to before, only she’s under water; swaying and twirling and jumping in slow-motion for mama.

“My special girl!”, her mother’s face leans in close again.

The face swirls into shadow, as it always does; the memory obscured by the spans of time and the mind’s sometimes bitter willingness to let go.

Wake up.

With a start and a gasp for air, she awoke; head jerking upright off the counsel in front her with her mother’s name hanging on her lips, as it was after every time.

“Shit.”

She rested her elbows on the counsel and ran her hands over her flushed face, rubbing the sleep out of her yes. She exhaled slowly in the hot, stale air of the control box, feeling the sweat bead and run down the nape of her neck before soaking into the already wet neckline of her tank top.

“Aaand we’re back on air” she mumble, humorlessly and to no one.

She sat up, stretching her arms and cracking her neck before drumming her fingers over the foggy glass of the control panel to run a systems check.

“Sleeping on the job…you better get your shit together lady” she murmured, again out loud to herself. She paused momentarily to wipe the dampness from her forehead with the back of her hand.

Gods was it hot out here. Federation Control Tower J-X449 was out in the ass-end of nowhere in Gallente Space. They were a deep-space ping tower, and also a oasis jump-point for fleets; fuel, ammo, supplies….and about 200,000 non-podder crew-members in cryo to be reawaken for active duty as needed.

Their tower was on reserve power; in power-down mode so-to-speak. An eleven member skeleton crew on a rig out in the middle of nowhere was hardly reason to keep a tower running on full steam, so it was down to the bare necessities unless a fleet showed up. That left most electronics down besides coms and scans, and most life systems on emergency mode; hence the jungle temperatures found pretty much everywhere but the cryo silos on this thing.

She wiped more moisture off her brow with her hand, and with another tap, she called up the systems report for the past hour. She already knew nothing exciting could’ve happened while she was catnapping, but the perfectionist inside herself had her going through the motions anyways. She glanced over the readout…as predicted, nothing. No inbound coms, to uplinks, no hails, nothing on direc…

“Hmm.” She muttered. And there it was again, the piece of date that shouldn’t exist. The same thing had popped up every couple days for the past month; a discrepancy, an anomoly. An indiscernible readout on something that couldn’t even really be an object, sitting on the absolute outskirts of the tower’s long-range sensors. She squinted at the data in frustration; data anomalies pissed her off.

She broke away from her concentration when she heard the sound of the tapping of boots on metal coming up the passageway to the control box behind her. She smiled as she guessed who it was based off his walk long before he reached the doorway, as they had all learned to do in the absence of pretty much any privacy that the lack of closed electronic doors entailed.

“Hey babe” she called back over her shoulder as she heard the familiar footsteps reach the box.

“There’s no way humidity is good for the operational box of a control tower” Jacob muttered as he entered wearing a similarly soaked tank top, his civvie pants and bare feet: the now-standard uniform of the tower’s skeleton crew. He glanced at the rough data on Aly’s screen and smirked.

“Ahh….looks like the Doc is stumped again, huh?” He gave her a sarcastic grin before reaching for an H20 pack.

—

They all sure did enjoy teasing her. Dancing had never panned out, despite her absolute mastery of it as a child. She lacked, as they had told her, “grace”, and that her dancing while perfect was too….what was the word…ah yes, “mechanical”. She grimaced at the word.

She could almost, but never quite remember the look on her mothers face, but she could always remember her voice leaning down and whispering to her as she fell asleep:

“My special girl, there are other plans for you my Aly. Don’t you worry!”

And of course she was smart too; smart enough to get herself through her PhD program in Deep-Space Communications at the top of her class, and then go back for a SECOND one in Cryogenic Psychology. She didn’t hear any peep about being “too mechanical” then.

—

She shoved him playfully, and he grinned. “It’s probably a lost drone or a random tangent astroid darlin, you know that” he said to her. “There’s no way in hell its big enough to even be a shuttle.”

She frowned again at the data. “Random tangent astroids don’t appear and disappear in the exact same spot on schedule over the course of 5 weeks” she muttered.

Jacob smiled at his wife and snuck a quick kiss as he heard more boot-steps coming down the hall towards them.

“Woop, game-face on darlin, looks like the morning crew is in”. He winked at her lovingly and started up his own work station as the other 9 control crew-members walked in, equally as a flushed and sweaty looking in the heat.

Greetings were mumbled as they went about turning on systems and starting pre-checks.

“Ping”

In the sleepy upstart to the morning, the first ping went unheard as they all engrossed themselves with waking up and getting their stations going.

“Ping”

There it was s second time. Julie, the coms tech, looked up.

“What was that?” She asked quietly. The rest of the room looked up.

“Ping”

They all stopped what they were doing and went silent. Markus walked over to the directional scanner and monitored as the quiet alarm went off again.

“Ping”

“Well thats not right, this thing says there’s something sitting right on top of us” Markus questioned, looking at the readout.

Silence filled the room as the ping of the directional scanner started to go off louder and with more frequency.

“What the hell…?” Jacob half rose from his seat to peer out the tower’s viewing shield, and they all followed suit, squinting into the darkness.

“Guys, I’m telling you this thing is bugged, it says there’s a fleet sitting right up our a-” Markus froze as a single Succubus frigate decloaked less than 500m from the tower’s shields.

“Holy. Shit.” Markus breathed, as suddenly behind the frigate, an entire Sanshas battalion, frigates through Nightmare battleships, seemingly aparated out of thin air.

The room went absolutely pin-drop silent as they froze at the reality literally staring them in the face. Aly felt her heartbeat pound in her ears as her breathing got faster.

“My special girl”. She heard her mothers voice in her mind.

“My special girl…” her mother’s voice again, calming her.

She turned her head, eyes wide, towards the frozen faces of terror next to her in the box, watching a bead of sweat slowly roll down the side of Julie’s jaw.

“Don’t be afraid Alexandra. My special, special girl!”

The voice was changing now, becoming louder, more urgent in the frozen beat of time as she watched the droplet of sweat gracefully let go of the edge of Julie’s face now, and fall to the floor.

The voice changed further still, sounding less and less like her mother, and yet more and more familiar, and more loving every second until she felt her pulse-rate slow, and her body let go.

“And now my special girl, dance!”

The droplet hit the floor with a small splash as time came roaring back to the present in an explosion of sound and action.

The blaring of klaxon horns and alarms started to blast throughout the ship as the crew of the box erupted into chaos and panic. Julie was screaming at someone through a com-link, her face a mask of terror, and Jacob was madly trying to online systems, his face also molded by fear into a parody of its former self.

Aly watched all this happen around her, unfazed, as the voice, surely no longer her mothers, but yet so warming, so understanding, and so gentle, again whispered inside her ear:

“Dance, my special girl!”

And she danced.

Calmly, she pulled the heavy blaster pistol out from under her chair, starting to and then ceasing to wonder or care how it got there, and rose, unblinking, her face in perfect composure. She turned, gracefully and on toe-point, towards the crew member to her right and calmly raised the barrel to the side of his face.

The ricochet of the blast thudded heavily in her shoulder as she spun gently back, twirling as the mans body crumpled to the floor.

“Yes! My girl! My Special Girl!” The voice was so lovely; so true.

She twirled around, gun raised, as the rest of the crew leapt from their stations at the sound of the blast.

“ALY!!! What the FU-” Jacob didn’t get to finish as the gun thundered again in her grip, blowing a hole through the back of his neck and throwing his body backwards.

And then they danced. Her, the center of the piece; the rest of them her chorus, in a miniature underwater ballet. The thundering of the blaster erupted out again, and again, and again in the heat of the control box amidst the screaming and the blood, and the musical voice POUNDING in her very veins! And she was dancing! Dancing with more passion than she’d ever felt in her life! She twirled, and dipped, and pirouetted; her face a perfect mask, her body an absolutely perfect machine.

She was perfect.

Perfectly, she felt felt her free hand close around Julie’s throat as she emptied another blast into Markus as he tried for the door, felling him as she felt a quiet snap with the hand gripping Julie. And one-by-one, she out-danced them all as the music in her limbs and in her heart hit a pounding crescendo note that almost moved her impassive face to tears.

And then, as the music dimmed, she twirled once more through the carnage, putting one last blast through the fleet-com line before whimsically dancing her fingers across the control panel to drop the tower’s shields.

The voice spoke again, and she was filled with her mothers love once again.

“My special girl, I always told you there were other plans for you!”

The voice was in her head as she closed her eyes and smiled, letting the gun drop from her grip to clatter on the floor.

“You are my girl, and there will be a place for you HERE! With US!”

The True Slaves filed into the control box behind her, some moving towards the cryo controls, other to the com-lines, and other simply embraced her.

She watched out the window as a giant leviathan of a ship exited warp outside the tower, and the voice was strong. The voice was true, and the voice was love, inside her head and filling her heart.

“Welcome Alexandra, to MY Nation! My special, special girl!”

=====

This is my submission to Silver’s Second Annual Fiction Contest. Total word count is 1,905. Hope you all enjoy, and feedback is always appreciated!

-Sophia

This months topic comes to us from @evepress, who he asks: The CSM: CCP’s Meta Game? The CSM, an EVE players voice to CCP. Right? In the grand scheme of things yes, the players bring up issues and the CSM presents them to CCP. But in its current iteration the CSM was supposed to be given small authority to assign CCP assets to projects that the CSM thought needed work on. As it has come out, this was not the case. So fellow bloggers, is the CSM worth it, has the CSM improved the game in any way, or is it just a well thought out scam by CCP to give us players a false sense of input in the game? What’s your take?

To preface, I am in FULL support of the Counsel of Stellar Management and everything that they represent and uphold to the greater Eve-Online community. Also, the concept of having a customer-selected group of player-representatives with the power to confer and actively participate with CCP on game-related issues is groundbreaking and I believe it reflects very highly of CCP.

But as a few others have already stated, there’s an inherent flaw in this question’s iteration that sort of throws off the possible answers. Originally, the CSM was created to “discuss and debate the ongoing evolution of Eve” with CCP, not to “assign CCP assets”. Subtle differences perhaps, but with largely different outcomes. Declaring that the CSM has the ability to “assign” anything to CCP implies that they have actual game-development power and authority to helm direction of the game.

“Discuss and debate” obviously has slightly different connotations, with the implications being more-so to “add input” or “create dialogue” rather than “assign”, “direct” or any other upper-management-esque jargon.

The problem for CCP arose with the last CSM election, when CCP declared that they wanted to give the CSM delegates “more power” and “more voice”; clearly, a little open to interpretation that one. What exactly does more power and voice constitute? Exactly.

I think there’s been a degree of misconception, especially with the most recent CSM election, that the Council is an elected managerial body in the hierarchy of CCP rather than a body of player-representatives. We, myself included, all voted for those representatives who we felt would represent us the best; those players who wanted to take issues we felt were important and meaningful and bring them to CCP’s immediate attention. For instance Mynxee (who I have a completely unabashed eve-celebrity crush on), ran on ticket of breathing new life into low-sec as well as pressing CCP to fix lingering game-problems before moving on to future development.

So is the CSM a “scam” by CCP? Hardly. On the contrary I think its a bold move forward in the gaming world, one without precedent that might set the tone for future MMO’s in terms of player representation. But like any bold step forward, its going to take some time to figure out how it all settles in.

I salute CCP first for their brave idea of having a player-voted council to bring issues directly to them, and secondly for choosing to stick with it even though at this point it would seem scrapping the entire idea of the CSM would relieve more than a few headaches in Iceland.

To the CSM, you guys are doing a fantastic job. Remember to keep in mind that dialogue is a two-way street, so keep those ears open too. But also remember that we all have your backs, and thank you for the work you’re doing for us; keep it up.

-Sophia

List of participants:

1. Growing Pains | CrazyKinux’s Musing
2. CSM: Hoax or Serious Business? « Lost in New Eden
3. CSM-Power to the people or puppets of CCP « A whole lot of Yarrrr!!!
4. Gaming the CSM | A Mule in EvE
5. A Taste Of Democracy | StarFleet Comms
6. CSM: Player Power or Paper Tiger? | I Am Keith Neilson
7. Governance Thrash Redux? « The Ralpha Dogs
8. CCP Doesn’t Care: Blog Banter 19 « OMG! You’re a Chick?!
9. The Cataclysmic Variable: It’s Crunch Time!
10. The 19th EVE Blog Banter is upon us… and about the CSM and CCP | Victoria Aut Mors
11. CSM: Lame Duck from the beginning?
12. Blog Banter #19 << Dense Veldspar
13. Be careful what you say, Roc « Roc’s Ramblings
14. Exchange Fraking Phone Numbers « Scrap Metal & Faction Ammo
15. Blog Banter #19: Assumptions
16. EVE Blog Banter #19 | EVE on Real Life
17. A Reality Check | A “CareBears” Journey
18. Quit your bitching | Fly Reckless – EVE Online
19. War has come to EVE | Scram Web
20. CCP and the CSM | Morphisat’s Blog
21. BB 19 Riding the elephant | mikeazariah
22. The CSM: A well thought out scam by CCP | Nitpickin’s
23. Eve Blog Banter #19: Two-Way Streets | Lovely Little Vagabond

She smiled flirtingly to herself as she listened to his response on the sat-link and felt her cheeks burn.

“Ok babe, I’ll dock up soon and see you in station in a bit.”

A pause, the flirting grin again

“Love you too.”

She disconnected the link and rolled her eyes at herself. “you are such a tool” she muttered at herself.

What had become of her? Tough, independent, rolling stone Sophia was now hopelessly trying to balance her capsuleer career with a guy; a planet-sider no less!

She smiled and shrugged to herself as she started to recall her drones and coax the lumbering Orca to turn and allign to the Federal Navy station. She couldn’t help it; introduced through mutual friends after one of his shows  up at station, they’d seemed to have found instant recognition in each other. God her mother would’ve killed her, dating a musician. She could practically hear the “With your education! You should be going after one of those doctahs!” coming out of her mother’s regional accented mouth.

So here she was, carefully trying to balance the two; her career, and the boy. Truth be told, he seemed to be having a pretty good effect on her as a capsuleer. She’d done some changing, cleaned house a bit, and started some new directions.

For one, she’d finally decided to respond to the diplomatic relations people at Fed Navy and Roden Shipyards who’d been yammering for her employment for months now. At Jared’s urging, she’d taken them both up, and after some well-played missions and some well called in favors, she’d quickly risen in both companies to level 3 clearance missions. Not a bad way to make some money really.

She’d also made a change in flying style, and even though that had no direct relation to Jared, she liked to think him in her life had played a subtle part. Shed traded in her native gallente hulls for the sleek, gleaming plating of the Amarrian ships, and was rapidly becoming profficient with her new laser weaponry.

Her thoughts were interupted by the coms buzzing. Rory. She rolled her eyes and and shook her head, wondering for the 300th time why she’d ever accepted a request to join his private coms channel, created by him, of course.

“Heya Soph!”

She cracked a smile inspite of herself; you just had to love Rory.

“Rory, dearest, how are you” she responded, already the detecting the sarcastic direction their conversations usually went.

“Not bad, not bad…so you ditch the tool yet?”

She could practically hear Rory grinning like an asshole on the other end of the coms. He loved giving her a hard time about Jared.

“Well Rory I can see this is going to be another stimulating conversation, but I’m just about to dock up in Fricoure here and have a drink before my tool shows up for dinner so I’m gonna cut this one short I’m afraid. “

She loved throwing it right back at him and cracked a grin.

“Fed Navy station in Fricoure? I was just about to jump clone there from null for some new headgear. I’ll meet you at Shay’s place for a drink, I’ll buy.”

“Rory” she rolled her eyes again, “we both know I’ll be the one buying your underage ass a drink you punk.”

She could hear Rory cackling on the other end.

“So it’s a date huh?”

She sighed, “fine, meet you in there in 20.”

====

“So you ditch the square yet?”

She slugged Shay in the arm and took a big first pull of her beer. Rory about fell off his stool laughing.

“Watch yourself there KID” she said to Rory, stressing the last word. Shay made an exagerated “I didn’t know!” face at Rory before passing him a fresh pint.

“Aww now why you gotta throw the kid under the bus Soph? If he wasn’t my favorite minor I might’ve even gotten upset there” he winked at Rory, who raised his glass in appreciation.

“Besides you know we kid cause we love ” he said, giving her a playful poke of the arm. “But really, how’s the boy?”

“The MAN” she huffed back, “is excellent, thank you for asking.”

“You know I still think he’d make a good pilot” Rory piped up.

They all had to laugh at that one. Jared was talented at many things, but when it came to being a capsuleer, to say he “needed some work” was an understatement. He’d joined and then either quit or been kicked from the training program 5 times now, which she was pretty sure had to be some sort of record.

“They ever settle that mess about him shooting at the Concord Captain one week and then the station the next?” Shay choaked out through laughter.

“Uuugh, you guys are terrible! Yes! Every-thing’s cool with that now. Luckily the Captain had a sense of humor about having his battleship shot at by a rookie ship, and the station directorship isnt pressing charges, seeing as his tracking and falloff were so bad he didn’t even hit the station”

Rory spit beer through his nose and actually DID fall off his stool this time.

“Laugh it up, ass” she grinned at Rory. Shay cleared his throat and gave a sarcastic salute over her head. Smiling, she turned around to see Jared coming through the front door giving Shay an exagerated salute back.

“Hey! It’s the sharpshooter himself!” Rory exploded, cracking up at his own joke. Sophia rolled her eyes at Jared appogetically

“Ahh…right right, the station thing” Jared smiled at Rory. “yYeah I think they’re still a little sore about that one, but no harm no foul right? Sorta like underage drinking eh buddy?” he winked at Rory

“Dude, why is everyone on my a..”

Rory got cut off by the rest of them laughing.

Jared threw some isk on the bar “his next ones on me Shay, but for now I’m stealing this lovely lady away for some dinner.”

Shay shook his hand warmly and made an exagerated bow to Sophia, who curtsied extravagantly as she let herself be led away.

“Night guys!” she threw back over her shoulder.

“Go get em eagle eye!” Rory belted out as he and Shay disolved into more laughter.

“I’m never gonna live that one down am I?” Jared chuckled

“No, no you aren’t handsome, but buy me some dinner and I’ll forget the whole thing”

Hand in hand, they walked off to the dining district.

-Sophia

I am one of those who believes that, though the game should not be changed to specifically go after that part of the gaming population, EVE Online would greatly benefit if somehow the balance the 2 genders roaming New Eden would lean towards an equilibrium. So I ask…

What could CCP Games do to attract and maintain a higher percentage of women to the game. Will Incarna do the trick? Can anything else be done in the mean time? Can we the players do our part to share the game we love with our counterparts, with our sisters or daughters, with the Ladies in our lives? What could be added to the game to make it more attractive to them? Should anything be changed? Is the game at fault, or its player base to blame?

=====

Talk about a perfect subject to get into for my first Eve Blog Banter! As one of those rare, mythic, and fabled “real female EvE players”, hopefully I can shed a little light on this one.

One of the big questions I’ve been asked over and over in EvE is how did I, a woman, get into this game? The answer is pretty standard actually: “the same way you did”. I didn’t stand up one day at the girls club (you know, that place where all of us woman-folk meet up once a week to discuss our lives, and hold votes on things like nagging breaking-points and which celebrities we’re going to love this month and which ones we’re going to shit on) and declare that I was going to be different and *gasp!* play video games.

I’m probably playing EvE for the same reasons you are. While I wouldn’t label myself “hardcore” at all, I do love playing video games, and I do love me some sci-fi (Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica, Firefly). I grew up in a house with a working mom, and a stay-at-home dad, with two older brothers whom I spent a nice chunk of my formative years playing side-scrolling Nintendo games with. Aside from some very dull times watching a couple of friends of mine play WoW (I have since expanded my social calender a bit), EvE is the first MMO I’ve ever really tried out. A year and change later, here I am.

Yes, I’m really a girl. Yes, we play internet spaceship games now. Referring to point #1, no, I won’t “prove it”, but nice try.

A lot of the talk I’ve seen so far in reading this particular blog banter revolves around the topic of Incarna, and how that will be a boon to the female player community in EvE. While I too am one of those eager geeks that can’t wait to get Sophia into some bad-ass space-boots and walking around station, I regretfully have to cast a little doubt to the thought that this will increase the number of female subscribers in any meaningful way. To this point, I refer to the “hot female heroine” games of the late 90′s.

Lets take the obvious example of Tomb Raider. Be honest; do you REALLY suppose the decision to make the main character a sexy little minx with a pair of daisy-dukes and the most flattering and gravity-defying sport bra in history was based on the desire to attract a female player-base to the game? Exactly.

I get it though! Female gamers are definitely on the rise today, but when Tomb Raider came out I doubt we were much of a spec on the “target market consumer group” powerpoint presentation. Games were a guys world, so why not have the main character essentially be a porn-star with guns? Don’t look for any signs of a feminist “male objectification” rant here either, you aren’t going to find one. I have two brothers and I live in the real world; I get it, and I’m not going to get on your “OMG BOOBS” male case about. And just for the record, I did play Tomb Raider, but it was for the fact that I was already a gaming geek who was done with Diablo, and because TR was cool as hell to play; it was not due to some repressed sapphic fantasy (sorry guys).

So I have to doubt that Incarna will have any noticeable effect on female subscribers, though I wager the probability of “loads of female avatars walking around station wearing as little as possible” is pretty high.

The other talk I’ve seen tossed around on this subject is that women aren’t attracted to EvE due to its aggressive and cut-throat nature; that PvP is sometimes non-consentual and that the hardships of space make their presence known every time you log in. There’s talk that we female gamers prefer a tamer, less hostile, and more casual gaming experience.

Let me just go ahead and de-rail that train right here and now. Boys, I work as a Jr. Editor for a major news magazine that you have probably read. The publishing world is a HUGELY male-dominated field even today, with no punches pulled, and I have worked some seriously shit jobs and put up with some serious bullshit to get myself into the position I’m in today. And you know what? I’ve enjoyed (or at least embraced and learned from) every single step on that climb. So please don’t tell me I’m not up to a challenge or would prefer an “easier” game. Believe me, that’s not the reason more women don’t play EvE.

I won’t deny that there is still a certain amount of social non-conformity surrounding female gamers. But as any of the male EvE players out their can I’m sure attest to, being a gamer does not exclude you from having a social life if you learn how to balance things. I know plenty of male Eve players who have girlfriends, play in bands, have families, and run small businesses in addition to playing EvE. Why should being a woman in EvE be any different? Its not; I work full time, I have a boyfriend, I distance-run daily (well, almost ), and I have a fun circle of friends whom I socialize and hang out with frequently. Do I get teased sometimes for playing video games and talking about internet space ships over drinks? Of course, but if you’re taking this game seriously enough that some good-natured ribbing from friends on the subject gets you heated, YOU might be the one who needs to think about playing something “easier”.

As just sheer numbers would attest to however, I’m sort of an exception to the rule, as are the other women out there playing this game. Plain and simple, there aren’t a lot of women playing Eve, even if there are a rising number of female “gamers” out there as the word loses a bit of its stigma. And so this brings me (I know, finally) to the actual question posed by CK: What can CCP do to increase the gals in EvE?

Well for starters, market to us! By this I don’t mean “put sexy space chicks on your banner ads”, and refer to that steaming pile of lame “Evony Online”. Why on earth are there dripping wet surfer-girls in bikinis, or huge boobs in tight t-shirts advertising for a sim-city type game set in medieval times? Take a wild guess (I’ll give you a hint, they aren’t chasing a female market-share).

I’d hate to say it, but take a page from Blizzard with their marketing push for WoW and build on it. William Shatner, Ozzy Osbourne, Mr. T, and Jean-Claude Van Damme wax funny and talk about their Warcraft characters? Brilliant!  Those commercials are smart, funny, and I think they made some great headway into breaking WoW out of the “MMOs are for geeky dorks” mold and into the mainstream (even though as EvE die-hards, we all know that WoW IS for geeky dorks, amirite? :p )

Now, take that idea and run with it, CCP. I don’t mean to suggest that you rip-off the Blizzard commercials, but putting a perceivably cool celebrity face on what is often stigmatized and shunned as “nerdy” (particularly to women) is boundary-breaking. Blizzard used all male celebrities, so expound upon that and one-up them with some strong female celebrities as well. Don’t chintzy or cutsie it up at all, because thats the last thing EvE needs to do to grow a larger female subscriber-base. Don’t change it, show-off how amazing it is.

Picture this as a commercial: A dark screen with subtle space-sounds and EvE music in the background; a single light comes on from far left to illuminate the close-up face of Angelina Jolie, EvE character-portrait style. A smirk on her face, a glint in her eye, she coolly talks about crushing her enemies, the pirate-corp she’s a part of, how she favors autocannons and fast frigates, and how she’s waiting for your puny transport ship on the other side of the next gate. “I’m Angelina Jolie, and I’m a Minmatar pirate. See you in low sec”.  A wink, a flash of her in-game character portrait, and the screen goes dark.

You totally got goosebumps didn’t you? Hell, I did just writing that! Lets try another angle. This one’s more lighthearted, to appeal to the budding industrialist. Warmer music and mood, and softer lighting; the face of Tina Fey comes up with the sound of a mining laser in the background. She gives one of her token full-smile grins with a shrug and cheerily talks about her mining operation, her masses of riches from building “things that go boom”, how she’s the queen of her own one-woman corp, resides in her own high-sec research POS, and how she can’t wait to get planet-side in the upcoming expansion. “I’m Tina Fey, and I, am a carebear.” With an cheesy smile and another shrug, she’s off.

Now tell me that wouldn’t work. Strong, empowered women talking openly about playing an online video game about spaceships. You could even mirror it with ads in women’s magazines. Cosmo, Vogue, W; believe me, even if we’re embarrassed to admit it sometimes, we read that shit, and we look at every. single. ad. CCP, contact me about where to mail my check.

So the big thing here is not to actually change anything about this game just to bring in more real women. Put it into the mainstream, de-stigmatize even further the notion of “female gamers”, and show them how much fun they could be having in this fantastic virtual world.

Trust me, women are all about projecting and fantasizing. I have more girlfriends than I care to mention that do enough projecting onto petty crap like “The Hills” or People Magazine to rival any of you guys out there RPing your way through Caldari faction warfare. Give them a change of direction, show them they won’t be shunned by their friends, and give them a taste, and I guarantee you’ll be seeing more real women in New Eden in no time at all.

And go ahead, ask them to “prove it” and see what happens :p.

-Sophia

List of participants:

1. The Ladies of New Eden
2. Is EVE a man’s world?
3. Sorry, No Pink Spaceships Here Please
4. EVE Blog Banter: Chicks ‘N Ships
5. Eve Blog Banter: The Girls Who Fly Spaceships
6. It’s not about fluffy bloody Kittens people!
7. Space Boobies Are Bad, m’kay?
8. Special Blog Banter: I Like Girls
9. Special Edition or making Eve More Casual
10. I wish my wife played EVE
11. Is there something special about women?
12. CK’s Blog Banter
13. The Female of the Species
14. EVE Online Can Appeal to Women By Adding Casual Content
15. Blog Banter: The Ladies
16. Women Who Want EVE
17. Tech 2 stilettos
18. New Eden doesn’t need to change for Eve – Adam needs to get over himself
19. EVE Online and… women (sorta)
20. Think Outside the Spaceship
21. EVE’s monthly banter – Women, women, women
22. Girls Just Wanna Have… Guns!
23. Draco Horizons (Blog)
24. Don’t change Eve for me!
25. Where Are Teh Laydeez of EVE?
26. Where Are All The Wenches?
27. EVEquality: The Rise of the Female Gamer
28. Women? In MY SPACESHIP? Is she from Mars as well?
29. Blog Banter: Captain Kirk Hates Eve
30. The Female of the Species
31. The Ladies of New Eden
32. EVE and the X by X Genetic Succession Unit
33. Sociability V
34. Girl on Girls in Space
35. What women want (in Eve)
36. Time Is On Our Side
37. Roc Appeal
38. Women in EVE
39. Getting In Touch With Our Feminine Side
40. It’s a woman’s world (they just don’t know it yet!)
41. Women in EVE – Can it be done?
42. You’d Rather Be Playing The Sims, Right?
43. Blog Banter #17 – Women in Eve
44. How To Get The Betty’s
45. EVE: WTB girls?
46. All about EVE
47. Ladies to the gunfight
48. Hell hath no fury
49. The Ladies of New Eden (An Analysis on How Men are not from Mars, and Women are not from Venus)
50. EVE Blog Banter 17: The Ladies of New Eden
51. The Ladies of New Eden
52. Getting ladies to play Eve Online
53. Why Don’t More Women Play EVE??
54. Getting Girls to Play EVE
55. “Prove it”: Women In EvE
56. More to come…

Update!:

I’ve been a little out of the blog-game due to a heaping of RL work stuff, but I just wanted to say a big thanks to Crazy Kinux and CCP for the 2nd place honor in the “Women of Eve” contest! 100mil isk and $50 in Eve Online store shwag, how cool is that? CK, my in-game name is Sophia Jackson and I can be reached at sophiajackson83@yahoo.com . Thanks again!

She raised her glass and took another sip of the whiskey cocktail; expertly blended with just a touch of orange bitters, a perfectly smooth finish. She grinned to herself as she though that, after two of these, of course it had a smooth finish.

Oh where to begin in organizing the storm of thoughts going through her head. Probably, it was best to start with the money. At first she’d dismissed the messages as scams or jokes, until the man in the suit had showed up at her door to talk to her.

A week later, she was still trying to wrap her head around it all. Why her? She thought back to the conversation she’d had with him in her quarters after he convinced her that he was a legitimate lawyer, and that no, this wasn’t a joke. An “anonymous beneficiary” had decided to unplug from his pod for the last time, and had somehow come to the conclusion that she (of all people?) should be left the sum of 300 million isk and a brand new, unscratched, Vindicator-class battleship.

She’d recounted the story to Shaw, her friend and favorite bartender (and probably the best one in Sinq Laison) three times in the past week now, and it made him tear with laughter every time. Shaw and her had worked behind the bar together for years before her acceptance into the academy, and as a rule, he was her go-to for good talks, good jokes, and good drinks. Unlike herself, Shaw had never had any desire to get into a capsule, but he was always ready to hear about her own misadventures.

“Damnit Shaw, this is serious!” she’d snapped at him when confiding her first misgivings of her strange fortunes to him had resulted in peels of laughter from her friend.

He’d laughed harder and reached up to the top shelf behind him to take down a bottle of 25 year-old real oak-wood aged scotch. “Its just money kiddo, this,” he held up the bottle and tapped the glass with a finger, “this is serious” he finished with a wide grin. He’d taken out two glasses and poured them both a drink of the phenomenally expensive scotch. “Thanks for the drink though” he’d winked.

She thought some more about the Vindicator, an incredible ship, but not one she’d be able to effectively fly anytime soon. Shaw’s recommendation had been to sell it, and she was pretty inclined to agree with him. Not that she necessarily needed the money, but who couldn’t always do with another billion isk? It also might do better as cash to help fund the wormhole POS operation she’d been thinking about getting into recently.

Ah well, a lot to think about, and as Shaw had put it earlier when she’d expressed her conundrum, “whiskey and uncertainty make poor bed-fellows”. Too true.

With the warmness of the whiskey settling in her core, she decided it was time to go. She left some money on the bar (enough that she was sure Shaw would bitch about it being too much later), and made her way down to the end of the bar where he was taking a stock list of the wine bottles.

“Fantastic as always my dear” she said to him, raising an imaginary toast.

“I know” he said with a cheeky grin through his salt and pepper beard.

She laughed and gave him a hug as he came around the bar to say goodbye.

“See you tomorrow darlin” he said, and slyly slipped her an unopened beer. “For the road” he added with another of his token winks.

She made her way out of the bar and into the night of the warm constant spring of the stations bio-dome park. She cracked the beer as she left the path to take the long way home through the trees to her apartment, took a sip, and sighed. A lot to think about maybe, but there was no need to worry. She took another long sip and headed off towards home.

=====

As someone who did actually work behind a bar for a number of years, I have a certain affection and interest in creative mixology and cocktails. Many thanks to the amazingly talented guys at NYC’s “Death + Company” for making this one up for me the other night. Truly fantastic.

The Recipe:

Red Breast Irish Whiskey

St. Germain Elderflower Liqueur

Dash of Orange Bitters

Stirred vigorously but definitely not shaken, finished with a Laphroaig rinse and garnished (at my request ) with a thin sliced curl of orange. Served in a low martini glass.

I tried to remember to get a feel for the proportions but I missed it when he was pouring. Basically its a an old fashioned, “Old Fashioned” served up, so I want to say 2 parts whiskey, 1 part St. Germain. I’ll try to go back and wrangle the info out of them .

Enjoy!

-Sophia