Defence of the Realm

 

The U4-Q2V system, Syndicate 

Syndicate, or the two constellations of the Syndicate Coalition, has become my home, as God has willed it. Part of my role here is maintaining the stability of this part of space so that SynCo's interests can develop and grow both economically and spiritually.

Some of those interests include maintaining the small number of planetside colonies that exist here. You may have seen the recent press release detailing the establishment of the San Mendenaeya colony on XS-XAY IV.

One of those colonies has existed on U4-Q2V III for nearly a century, long before the capsuleer era, long before even SynCo was a thing. A detailed description of the colony's history is available elsewhere, but in short, Intaki refugees established the colony, named 'Pelsiddhakyl', in YC 39, after which it essentially minded its own business until YC115 when it received significant investment from I-RED's 'Project Dustbowl'. At the same time a group of Amarrian missionaries from the Penitent Order of St. Charduzir of Assimia-Reclaimed arrived at the colony and establised a church of their own, in apparent direct conflict with the religious practices of the established Intaki community that had been here for 77 years.

The Project Dustbowl investment only lasted a year. Between then and the present day, tensions between the two religious communities in Pelsiddhakyl have resulted in deaths, a situation that was made worse by interference from the heretic Nauplius and his 'Sedavacantist Church' which caused the near-eradication of the Charduzite mission in what was tantamount to an act of ethnic cleansing. 

Since then, I-RED has restricted access to the colony for its own safety. As an Amarrian I naturally side with the Charduzites and support them in their desire for freedom of worship. I'd like to think that the presence of the Societas and the Cathedral of Syndicate in the interstellar vicinity means that the Sedavacant-whatever won't get anywhere near it. Whether the mission can co-exist with the Intaki, who were there first, remains to be seen. Whether the colony can continue to exist at all, also remains to be seen.

For now, the colony must be supported and defended; so when I was on duty in the ops command centre in the Cathedral and saw there were seven separate 'Cosmic Anomalies' in U4-Q2V - five of which were Serpentis facilities -  I had to do something about it.

The next night I assembled a small fleet. The way the Societas operates, we're all usually busy doing our own thing when there is not a LUMEN 'stratops' mission happening, so an actual SFRIM fleet like this is quite rare, especially out here in Syndicate.

I'd recently taken delivery of a Sacrilege-class Heavy Assault Cruiser. The fit on this ship is a remarkably imaginative fusion of power grid and armor upgrades sourced from all over the cluster, so this Amarrian ship has modules on it that were designed in the Republic. I mean I knew that LUMEN always took a pragmatic approach to ship doctrine (we do operate Typhoons) but fusing Amarr and Minmatar designs into the same ship must be something bordering on heretical, right? Actually, wrong - it's something the Ammatar have been doing for years, look up the 'Autocannon Punisher'.

Anyway, our fleet set off the next evening and headed to U4-Q2V and set about cleansing the system of any cosmic threats.

We found several Havens, hollowed-out rock formations with those unregistered and illegal stargates in the centre of them.

But then this is null-security space, so the concept of illegal is... contentious...

Then we found two Drone Hives. I'm conflicted about these. We seem to assume that Rogue Drones are vermin that are to be eliminated on sight. The thing is they never put up much of a fight. We've never been able to communicate with them and establish their motives; the entire eastern side of the cluster is considered 'their' territory as fallout from Operation Spectrum Breach years ago. 

What do they want?

It's why wasting them always leaves me dissatisfied, like they were actually, really just minding their own business and doing their drone thing their own way.

But if we didn't keep tabs on them like this, what would they become?

One of these 'Strain Mother' things destroyed a Strategic Cruiser I owned a few years ago. That hurt.

But the work had to be done. The colony on U4 must be made safe again.

I have to say the Sacrilege is an incredible ship, it does the work of a battleship but in a package at least 60% smaller with all the manoeuvrability benefits that that implies. If I'd brought my Raven here the job would have taken three times as long and I would have had to stand off at like 130 kms and snipe them all with cruise missiles. Mixing it right up close and personal in the Sacrilege is more fun. 

But then whenever I think on those terms I have to go back to the Cathedral and pray for my soul as eliminating life is not supposed to be fun.

The colony in U4 is safe once again, for now, but this is our duty; this is God's work. God's work is not fun, it's serious.

Brief Notes on the Blackglass/Zeugma Combo

 

I upgraded my head recently. I installed a Neural Lace 'Blackglass' Net Intrusion 920-40 implant into what I've come to regard as my Explorer Clone: the version of me that has a whole bunch of very expensive implants installed in it, all to make me uncatchable, undetectable and as slippery as a Gallente politician.

The Blackglass implant is remarkable, incredible in its enhancement of my ship's hacking power. It is so powerful that the total combination of ship, modules and implants means it is now virtually impossible to fail even the most difficult of hacks.

Even when this happens:

And even then I still succeeded in hacking the Serpentis data node. But I'm not proud of this. There was no elegance, no style, no precision to this hack.

Sometimes God sends these things to test us.

Don't get complacent out there. You will die. It might even be me that kills you if you happen to be in Syndicate.

Shadow Serpentis Titan Encounter

 

The Syndicate Region - 10/20/123 15:10 hrs

LUMEN has deployed to Syndicate for Operation Oriflamme Threshold: a series of exercises aimed at asserting Amarrian influence in the region against both the Serpentis Corporation and the Fed; and to demonstrate our ongoing support of our allies in the Intaki Business Logistics Union [I-BLU] and the Ishuk-Raata Enforcement Directive [I-RED], who hold significant interests in Syndicate under the 'SynCo' umbrella.

All week we have operated fleets against intruders into SynCo's territory, and against Serpentis ships, eliminating whole squadrons of them, bases, flotillas, 'Forsaken Hubs' with fleets of battleships, probably killing tens of thousands of Serpentis personnel. I have no problem with this as it is God's will that brings us to Syndicate to perform this Inquisition.

Earlier today I was patrolling a few of the asteroid belts in Empress of Amarr in one particular system and generating a considerable amount of Serpentis salvage.

Then this thing showed up:

I couldn't believe it: an actual straight-up Shadow Serpentis Titan.

It was spellbinding. I had just a few seconds to break that spell it was holding over me and engage my cloaking device before it would inevitably blow my ship away.

I sent cam drones over to it. I mean, my God, look at the size of it.

It just sat there. 

Waiting. 

Not even that. 

It just sat there, because capital ships are more like political weapons than actual military weapons. Something about the concept of the 'fleet-in-being' - namely that big ships just have to exist; that you don't have to actually do anything with them in order to force your enemies to respond.

It's the implication of them.

Perhaps our work in the region over the last few days had been registered by the Serpentis Corporation and this was their response. A message, if you will. 

Perhaps this was their response to me.

In that case, I am honoured that they sent the biggest ship they've got.

I watched it for a while, then requested advice from leadership on the comms channels. The bounty on it was 240 million ISK.

The considered opinion was get the hell out of there now...