em·py·re·an –noun
- the highest heaven, supposed by the ancients to contain the pure element of fire.
- the visible heavens; the firmament.
This is where we live. Work. Fight. In the empyrean. Our destinies are forged here. Whether we mine for precious minerals with which to build implements of destruction, or use those implements ourselves to try and impose our will on those who would share the empyrean with us, we make our own way.
Live to Win; Dare to Fail
At the time of this journal entry, the Empire cluster is gripped in conflict. Forever there has been bad blood between the Gallente Federation and the Caldari State. Forever there has been a flame of hatred burning between the Amarr Empire and my beloved Minmatar Republic. Hostilities eventually got to the point where all four empires agreed that all would be better served by peace. There were proceedings in Yulai and the Yulai Convention was signed. The CONCORD Assembly was born, made up of contingents from all four of the mighty empires and tasked with keeping the peace and ensuring the security of the empires’ core systems. Law and order had come to New Eden, and for a time there has been relative peace.
Recently, the Gallente struck at the Caldari State with a suicide attack - we all know about Admiral Noir’s sacrifice of a Nyx-class supercarrier by now, I’m sure. Today, a mixed fleet of Minmatar and Thukker Tribe capital ships with heavy support jumped into Yulai and converged on the CONCORD Assembly. CONCORD responded quickly once the Matari fleet opened fire, but when a cynosural field was lit and a Ragnarok-class Titan entered the fight, any further defense was nothing more than a token effort.
When Noir’s Nyx collided with the station in Malkalen, it was not in and of itself an act of war. It was put down as a mere act of terrorism, the last defiant cry of an insane zealot. Life went on. But not now. The actions being carried out by my Matari brothers will not be so easily brushed aside. Peace has left New Eden.
For months there have been whispers that something big was looming just over the horizon. Now we see what that something was, and to be honest, nobody has a right to be surprised by this. Now that open hostilities have begun (though at this time, no organized counter-offensive has been launched by the State or the Empire, and the Federation has not carried out a decisive strike in coordination with the Minmatar-Thukker operation), my people have asked me, “Where do we stand in the Factional Warfare that is about to begin?” For as long as there have been whispered rumors, I have thought about what course would best serve the Defias Brotherhood when the time came.
Another Faction Altogether
The Defias Brotherhood is a corporation operating primarily in lawless 0.0 space. There is no CONCORD Assembly to keep peace for us. There are no Gallente Federation vessels or Imperial Navy vessels or anything of the sort to rush to the defense of a distressed pilot where we fly. As a part of the DEFI4NT (DEFY) alliance, we must look after ourselves. We make our own rules and are left to either enforce them or die trying.
DEFY isn’t yet a known entity in New Eden. We’re nowhere near the size or power of Red Alliance, GoonSwarm, United Legion, Tau Ceti Federation, Band of Brothers, Against ALL Authorities… Those alliances are well known. Those alliances control entire regions. Those alliances are factions in and of themselves, holding just as much power as any of the four empires. CONCORD doesn’t dare send a fleet into Period Basis to dictate terms to Band of Brothers.
There are many alliances in New Eden that exist only for to make ISK. Alliances like Free Trade Zone, TCF’s special pet. Or Ultima Rati0, Red Alliance’s pet. Or even AAA Citizens, the pet alliance of .-A-.. These alliances do not deserve to exist, but because they feed the coffers of the important 0.0 organizations, they are suffered to continue operating largely unhindered. At the time of this writing, DEFY pays a tithe to Tau Ceti Federation in return for the use of their space, but this is not the extent of DEFY’s future.
The Alliance Senate met last week and decided on a number of matters, one of which was a firm recruitment goal. One of the many factors of success for a sovereign power in 0.0 space is the ability to have a standing defense fleet, able to react with speed and precision to any threat presented. We have decided that it is in our best interests to have a standing capital fleet with sufficient support craft available for defense on a moment’s notice, 23/7 with a support response time of under five minutes. We have a long way to go, but recruitment has been re-opened and production schemes have been stepped up across the alliance to work toward this and other goals that we have set for ourselves. I expect that it will take months before we are ready for conquest… I just hope the political landscape is accommodating when the time comes for DEFI4NT to step out from beneath the shadow of our landlords and claim our own piece of the empyrean.
In the meantime, we as an alliance have begun to be more proactive about our combat training. In the same way that forward elements from Stain Empire, Band of Brothers, G00DFELLAS and others roam through the space we inhabit looking for easy kills, two days ago we roamed through Red Alliance’s space in Feythabolis and Against ALL Authorities’ space in Tenerifis. We destroyed an Eos-class command ship belonging to Red Alliance, interrupting a modest ice mining operation in the process (there were six Mackinaw-class Exhumers on scene when we arrived, but we focused our attention on the command ship that was protecting them from the Angel Cartel vessels nearby). We also destroyed a Raven belonging to a .-A-. pet alliance in one of .-A-.’s outpost systems. After several recent hits against DEFY’s morale, it was a good thing to show our enemies that we aren’t the type to cower in fear of the larger, more notable 0.0 entities; we’re willing to take the offensive, too. More importantly, it was good to show ourselves that we could.
“Where do we stand in the Factional Warfare that is about to begin?”
On our own.
-Havo out.
