Everyone does their part

Lyncyne leans into the spanner as she fastens two panels together. Small conduits to protect control lines and transport coolant run across the engine she has started to cover. The roar of impulse engines firing up echo through the hangar as hefty Brutors wrestle machinery into place, but the noise doesn’t appear to distract her in the slightest. The capsuleer who flew this Claw had quietly explained the goals of his next sortie, and so the mechanic felt she owed it to him to ensure that the polycarbon engine housing didn’t come apart during maneuvers.

That had happened to somebody else in their wing last week, actually, when an overheated microwarp drive had come apart on the pilot. A Wolf assault frigate in the same squadron had managed to finish off the enemy Retribution from the 24th Imperial Crusade before it could take full advantage of the mishap. The mechanic responsible took a very long walk out the airlock the next day, and everybody else in the maintenance hangar worked well into the next shift in order to check and double-check the equipment.

Of course, Lyncyne hates the hours and feels like she’ll never get the grease completely off her hands. But she has listened to the pilots or space traffic controllers as they told ale-fueled stories of Amarrian industrial transports and starbase reactors exploding. She knows of the Crusade pilots and commanders introduced to their vengeful god earlier than they’d anticipated. Every day, at mess, she sees the dull eyes of the Starkmanir busboys and cooks working in the cafeteria as part of the Tribal Republic’s re-integration program. Sometimes at night, she thinks back to the girl in her second-year mechanics class who’d taken an assignment to an agricultural world somewhere in the low-security Hed constellation. Her transport never arrived, and while the Tribal Liberation Force had little to say about it, everyone assumed that one of the raiding parties had destroyed it — or, worse, captured it.

So now, in the hangar, perched on the cowling of a pod-pilot’s interceptor, she focuses tightly on rigging the bolts, the housing, and the conduits. Everyone does their part.

Friday Flash Fiction 9: Polycarbon Engine Housing

Welcome to another week of Friday Flash Fiction!

This week’s prompt: Polycarbon Engine Housing. “This ship modification is designed to increase ship’s velocity and maneuverability at the expense of armor amount.”

So what’s your story? A mechanic jury-rigging a ship? Race pilots swapping tales? Materials scientists planning an advance that will make billions of ISK for their megacorp? Whatever it is, write it on your blog and link it here in a comment!

Friday Flash Fiction 8: Etherium Reach

Yes, I know it’s Saturday and not Friday.

This week’s prompt: Etherium Reach.

Perhaps you’ll write of a researcher getting involved with rogue drones, or capsuleer alliances, or CONCORD conspiracies… let us see!

Friday Flash Fiction 7: “Ready, able, and willing”

Friday flash fiction once more peeks out from the darkness.

This week’s prompt:
“Ready, able, and willing

The report of a soldier? A young man’s response to a proposition? Or something else? Tell us in your fiction post on your own site, then post the link in the comments for everyone to enjoy!

Unn’s Tale

Many ages ago, a young girl named Unn looked out into the cold Caldari night and up at the stars. Clouds drifted past the moons, and the calls of the shark-birds to each other and their prey frightened her. Without words, she prayed to her clan gods for escape from the only home she’d known. They heard her prayer, of course, as they do all prayers, and after much debate among their council, the clan gods chose to elevate her. While the more traditional among them thundered against it, the council knew that their people needed a reminder of what could be.

That is why, to this day, travellers may find themselves passing through the Unn Nebula. It is a small, wispy place, and thus the astronomers named it for the young girl. Her spirit still looks down upon her clan, though they have scattered throughout the cluster and beyond. And children still learn her rhyme:

Darkly moonlit night
Shark-birds on their endless flight
The gods hear her plight
And now Unn casts down her sight
Vowing to set all aright

Friday Flash Fiction 6: Nebulae

Friday flash fiction never dies, it just sleeps for a few days.

Everywhere we fly in New Eden, the sky looks like fire. And pilots that may wander into the right places in deadspace will find smaller clouds of gas of all sorts. This week’s flash fiction topic, then, is nebulae. Maybe an intrepid explorer gets lost in a stellar nursery, or a scientist ponders a new chemical compound detected in a far-off cloud, or perhaps a young child looks in wonder at an image and notices a resemblance to his breakfast.

Have fun, and don’t forget to post your links!

Friday Flash Fiction 5: Sensor Boosters

Time for another week of Friday flash fiction! To recap:

That means I will post a small prompt every Friday. The following Tuesday, I’ll update the post with links to your own stories on your own blogs or even the EVE forum (preferably submitted through the comments here). This might consist of a phrase, or an object, or a location, or something else. Use it as the core theme, the starting sentence, or anything else; you just have to include it somewhere in the story. And the story should be really short. Definitely under one thousand words, but even greater brevity has great value. If you can tell a cohesive story (character, plot, theme) in a bare few sentences, go for it.

Combat ships depend on their sensor strength and signal resolution for targeting other ships, whether for friendly purposes or as a precursor to opening fire. Many pilots find themselves needing to improve their abilities in this regard. This week, let’s talk about sensor boosters. Maybe they play a key role in a fight, maybe a technician struggles to get them equipped, maybe a lone genius has found a way to increase their performance. Whether you take a technical turn or simply reference them in character drama, see what you can do!

Defiance

She stands next to the door: arms folded, eyes flashing with anger to mask the hurt and disappointment, shoulder leaning into the wall.

He looks right back at her: nostrils flared with defiance, overnight bag hanging from his back, fresh war tattoos adorning his face.

Finally, after a long moment, she speaks. “You did what?!”

“The war has heated up, and you know it. The enemy’s not giving up easily. I can’t stand by, knowing I could have helped.”

“But you’re one man…”

“That’s right. One man joining with thousands of others. The eggers need crew, and I’m headed out there… I’d hoped you’d understand.”

She nudges the door open with a toe and nods her head out into the darkened corridor beyond. “Get out.”

Friday Flash Fiction 4: “You did what?!”

Time for another week of Friday flash fiction! To recap:

That means I will post a small prompt every Friday. The following Tuesday, I’ll update the post with links to your own stories on your own blogs or even the EVE forum (preferably submitted through the comments here). This might consist of a phrase, or an object, or a location, or something else. Use it as the core theme, the starting sentence, or anything else; you just have to include it somewhere in the story. And the story should be really short. Definitely under one thousand words, but even greater brevity has great value. If you can tell a cohesive story (character, plot, theme) in a bare few sentences, go for it.

“You did what?!”

• Astrum Arcanum: All Gummed up
• Crux Meander: The Pit
• Ecliptic Rift: Defiance
• Jorshan (in a comment on this article)
• Nestor the Chronicled
• SpiderMonkey Express

(If I missed yours, please let me know!)

The God-tooth

Our most ancient legends from the remotest of time tell of an ancient sword forged from the tooth of a god that shone as fire and pierced any shield held against it. Constructed at great cost by skilled builders who served unwillingly, it became a curse upon those who possessed it even as it fulfilled its singular purpose as an instrument of war. Every time this weapon left its sheathe, a soul found its final destiny. And while men and women fought and schemed to grasp its power, few truly understood the terrible truth: the God-tooth knew only death and murder.

The development of the new fighter-bomber followed the pattern laid down by its namesake. A highly secret laboratory in the dark end of space housed a group of engineers and test pilots working for a shadowy corporation planning to sell the plans to the highest bidder. At the conclusion of negotiations with the Angel Cartel for the blueprints, test data, and personnel, the lab suffered a major hull integrity breach and an Einherji fighter launched towards distant deadspace just as the facility’s reactor exploded, destroying the entire test installation and datacenter.

The few surviving staff disappeared once more into the Molden Heath underworld, possibly to begin new projects or possibly to enjoy whatever gains they may have taken from the entire incident. But whispers in the officer lounges of the Republic Fleet units now flying the Tyrfing suggest that perhaps the Republic Security Services manipulated the whole project, allowing the Cartel or some other pirate faction to pay for the development while the Republic itself looked on carefully and ensured that it would keep the weapon for itself.

Whether or not this is true, the new Minmatar fighter-bomber has trailed death and fiery vengeance in its wake in the entire brief arc of its existence, including the fiery carnage brought down on its enemies on the battlefield.

Written for Flash Fiction 3.