Journal: 113.04.27

We got to discussing old injuries and medical treatment in corp chat tonight. I shared the whole story about the day they took all the classified augmentations out of my body, re-grew what they removed. Pointed out that this isn't even technically my face any longer.

Except that it is, of course. An exact replica, right down to the cellular level. Every hair follicle, every crease and wrinkle, every smile-line.

And I smile a lot. I laugh a lot. For all that many of my log entries here have a black turn to them, for all that my mind goes wandering down dark paths sometimes. But I'll chuckle and smile at the slightest provocation, and don't need much more to throw my head back and roar with laughter.

Funny how I've never really thought of myself that way before.

Save. End.

Private Comms log, YC113.04.27

  Channel ID:      -21185468

  Channel Name:    Private Chat (Rohet Kandar Ixiris)

  Listener:      Verin "Stitcher" Hakatain

  Session started: 113.04.27 03:06:00

[SESSION TRUNCATED]

[ 113.04.27 03:08:29 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > You associate with an Andreus Ixiris, correct?

[ 113.04.27 03:09:11 ] Stitcher > You could say that

[ 113.04.27 03:10:27 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > Sir, with due respect, I was led to believe the Caldari to be a straightforward folk, who didn't bother with the is-he-isn't-he one-hand-doesn't-know-what-the-other-is-doing nonsense...

[ 113.04.27 03:10:41 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > ... that is the hallmark of the Gallenteans, whose Federation my people have the dubious honour of living under.

[ 113.04.27 03:10:47 ] Stitcher > You want blunt? fair enough.

[ 113.04.27 03:10:55 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > Yes, sir, I do.

[ 113.04.27 03:11:10 ] Stitcher > I don't talk to people I don't know. I especially don't discuss people behind their backs with people I don't know.

[ 113.04.27 03:11:26 ] Stitcher > You want a conversation, you make my acquaintance first.

[ 113.04.27 03:11:48 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > Well, then, sir, my name is Rohet Kandar Ixiris, patriarch, as much as it matters, of the Ixiris family of Calluya, Intaki Prime.

[ 113.04.27 03:12:13 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > I am, if you must know, the biological father of Andreus Ixiris, but he is not my son.

[ 113.04.27 03:12:40 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > He burnt that bridge long ago.

[ 113.04.27 03:13:46 ] Stitcher > You understand of course that I intend to share the log of this conversation with him.

[ 113.04.27 03:14:23 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > Well then.

[ 113.04.27 03:14:45 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > I have a fair idea of how your kind works. What am I going to have to give you to change your mind?

[ 113.04.27 03:14:57 ] Stitcher > a damned good reason.

[ 113.04.27 03:15:59 ] Stitcher > and by the way, if you keep the borderline racism up and call me "your kind" again, then this  conversation will be terminated and you go on my comms blacklist.

[ 113.04.27 03:16:05 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > I only know a little bit more than the general public knows about that... wretched boy has been doing since he became a capsuleer, but I know enough of him both before and after to know that he's poison.

[ 113.04.27 03:16:23 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > I was referring to capsuleers, sir.

[ 113.04.27 03:17:00 ] Stitcher > the point, Mister Ixiris, Is that I do not like being generalized

[ 113.04.27 03:17:05 ] Stitcher > deal with me as a person, or not at all.

[ 113.04.27 03:18:03 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > Fine then. I'll tell it to you straight, but I suspect you already know. That that boy is poison. And everything he touches withers and blackens.

[ 113.04.27 03:18:38 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > That nothing good ever comes of associating with him, and that all he'll bring you is bad luck.

[ 113.04.27 03:18:48 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > Bad luck and broken promises.

[ 113.04.27 03:20:34 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > I mean, look at what he did to that Caldari organisation that was in the news recently - Ishuk-Raata, was it? One of the subidiaries of one of the State's megacorporations?

[ 113.04.27 03:20:49 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > He only needed to join them for a week to tear years of work to the ground.

[ 113.04.27 03:21:56 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > But I came looking for you because I heard rumours - just rumours, you understand, vague ones, nothing more solid than that - that you had more first-hand experience with just how much of a monster the boy is.

[ 113.04.27 03:22:09 ] Stitcher > Mister Ixiris. Right now, I am in the middle of writing a strategic briefing document concerning Sansha's Nation. I have not seen my wife in three days. I have about a hundred million ISK worth of stuff to sell.

[ 113.04.27 03:22:26 ] Stitcher > In other words, I have better things to do than listen to somebody say mean things about his estranged son.

[ 113.04.27 03:22:34 ] Stitcher > so when I say "get to the point" I hope you understand that I don't want a...

[ 113.04.27 03:22:34 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > I want you to kill him.

[ 113.04.27 03:22:38 ] Rohet Kandar Ixiris > I'll pay you whatever price you want.

[ 113.04.27 03:22:44 ] Stitcher > No.

[ 113.04.27 03:23:02 ] Stitcher > Good day.

---------------------------------------------------------------

[ 113.04.27 03:23:03] SESSION TERMINATED

[ 113.04.27 03:23:04] Ixiris, Rohet Kandar added to blacklist, priority B

[ 113.04.27 03:23:17] log transcript forwarded to Ixiris, Andreus.

LOG ENDS

Journal: 113.04.21

One of the big mysteries I want to clear up is why the Republic would choose Shakor over Midular. I mean, the weight of popular opinion behind the Sanmatar is enormous.


I've spent so long attributing it to some... cultural character flaw. Like they just lacked the patience and foresight to take the long, slow, difficult but successful path over the quick, easy and futile one. That was short-sighted and prejudiced of me, and obvious in hindsight that I shouldn't even entertain such ideas. So instead, I'm looking for more fitting possible explanations.


Here's one. I described slavery as being "endemic" in the Empire. This observation was immediately the subject of a flat denial by pilot Nicoletta Mithra. Her specific quote was in fact the simple statement "Slavery is not endemic in Amarr society."


Now Mithra's a zealot, that much is obvious from just that one sentence, and it would be totally unfair to judge all of the Empire and the people within it by her obviously deluded standards. But it makes me imagine the number of times that the people who are willing to open a dialogue with the Amarr have been met with that kind of outright denial of reality.


How frustrating would that be? I could feel my fists itching even before she was done with that sentence. Extend by a year, ten years, a century, three! At least I've never yet met a Gallentean who denied that the bombing of the homeworld ever took place, though I've met plenty who think that the U-Nats underreacted and that Caldari Prime should still be a Gallente world, and probably even renamed.


I can understand zealotry and jingoism. I can't understand how a person can say in all seriousness that something isn't happening which provably is.


Makes me wonder about Midular even more. She grew up Matari, was born and raised to know about and ultimately experience exactly that kind of contemptuous dismissal of reality. She can't be less sensitive to this stuff than I am as an outsider and observer with only six days of exposure. But she still kept the faith that a diplomatic solution was ultimately viable and the best way forward.


I can't decide if that's inspirationally idealistic, or heartbreakingly naive. 


Save. End.

Journal: 113.04.20

The last few days have done one thing wonderful for me - they've reminded me that I have a history.

Five years isn't exactly a short space of time, and the lives of capsuleers are hectic. I have to think hard to recall all the places I've been, all the things I've done, all the people I've known and my relationships with them all.

Of course there would be EM pilots who'd react to me - a former STPRO pilot and vocal State loyalist - being a member of their alliance with surprise, alarm and suspicion. Most of them don't know me and the few who do quite probably know me as an old enemy.

They don't know (or at least don't believe) that there's no conflict between my being here and my being loyal to the State. They think that by being here "to learn" I mean I'm gathering intel on their strategy, their tactics, their pilots and ships. But all I want is to get a glimpse - just a tiny, shred-of-blue-sky-through-the-rainclouds glimpse - of what it's like to be Minmatar.

Even if only for a fraction of a second, I want to experience something other than a Caldari perspective, so that I can look back and understand what it means to be Caldari all the clearer.

Save. End.

Alliance Comms log, YC113.04.17

Channel ID:      (('allianceid', 701459600),)

Channel Name:    Alliance

Listener:       V. "Stitcher" Hakatain PilotID:267169

Session started: YC113.04.17 11:22:58

---------------------------------------------------------------

[ 113.04.17 12:39:53 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > ... Hakatain.

[ 113.04.17 12:40:13 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > No offense, but what in an Amarrian hell are you doing on my alliance chat?

[ 113.04.17 12:41:24 ] Stitcher > the commcode came with my corporate jacket, locker key and monogrammed pen.

[ 113.04.17 12:41:47 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > So.

[ 113.04.17 12:42:06 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > All we are missing now is admiral Blake.

[ 113.04.17 12:43:14 ] Stitcher > I think you're wildly misinterpreting my beliefs and personal politics if you're comparing me to him.

[ 113.04.17 12:43:53 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > Merely my surprise of seeing you here. I respect loyalty, even if it is for the enemy.

[ 113.04.17 12:45:40 ] Stitcher > I've never considered myself an enemy of the Minmatar. quite the reverse in fact.

[ 113.04.17 12:45:53 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > Indeed.

[ 113.04.17 12:46:11 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > That's another thing you have in common with Blake, I guess.

[ 113.04.17 12:46:53 ] Stitcher > Hah! Ooh, that was barbed.

[ 113.04.17 12:47:07 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > Was too good an opening to be missed.

[ 113.04.17 12:47:24 ] Stitcher > yep. round one goes to you.

[ 113.04.17 12:47:57 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > Welcome, then. You will excuse me if I remain sceptical for a while.

[ 113.04.17 12:48:48 ] Stitcher > Sure.

[ 113.04.17 12:50:10 ] Stitcher > I'm not here to prove anything or change anything. I'm here because a friend invited me, and because I want to learn.

[ 113.04.17 12:50:33 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > Learn what? To use for what purpose?

[ 113.04.17 12:52:05 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > I should probably stress that you have no obligation to answer, nor to do so in public; I am not in your chain of command.

[ 113.04.17 12:52:31 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > Merely curious for my own reasons.

[ 113.04.17 12:52:46 ] Stitcher > I want to be a better person, and I want to make the State a better place. I can't do that without getting an outside perspective.

[ 113.04.17 12:52:54 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > Hmh.

[ 113.04.17 12:53:31 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > I am not sure I am comfortable of EM being a training academy for State loyalists.

[ 113.04.17 12:55:00 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > Though I can see the upside of affecting where the State goes, obviously.

[ 113.04.17 12:55:01 ] Stitcher > it's not about "training". It's... about getting a different point of view. seeing what the mountain looks like when you're not living on its' slopes.

[ 113.04.17 13:00:14 ] Stitcher > probably sounds like Fedo stink, right?

[ 113.04.17 13:02:38 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > Well, yes and no. As in, no, you are not getting secure information access if I have any say in it, but yes, I can see how this would be useful.

[ 113.04.17 13:02:54 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > Wish you luck seeing the mountain for what it is.

[ 113.04.17 13:03:57 ] Stitcher > I certainly hope to.

[ 113.04.17 13:04:45 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > Then maybe you will stay. Though I have to say, yesterday I'd have rated the chances that you defect to about equal to myself or Blake doing the same, and I still don't rate it very high.

[ 113.04.17 13:05:23 ] Stitcher > and you're quite right, I haven't.

[ 113.04.17 13:05:43 ] Stitcher > but you and I have different ideas about what my loyalty to my people and homeland mean.

[ 113.04.17 13:07:00 ] Elsebeth Rhiannon > Maybe.

---------------------------------------------------------------

Session ended: YC113.04.17 13:55:09 

Save. End.

Journal: 113.04.17

I've REALLY got to get out of the bad habit of corp-hopping. Which is why I plan to stick with Re-Aw for a long while yet.

The best-laid plans...

Save. End.

Journal: 113.04.11

Transportation of materials, assignment of build and research orders, fine-tuning of my market activities and so on doesn't take up a lot of time. I'd estimate that I spend... oh, about an hour maybe on keeping my private empire running.

Of course, the man-hours involved in keeping that many people, ships, and facilities supplied and managed is gargantuan, but that's what being immensely wealthy is for - I pay other people to pay some other people to sort out paying all the other people. Simple.

I've not spoken to Cia in a while. She must be busy being CEOrente. I miss her cooking - Nicole could burn a glass of water. I'll drop her a mail.

...maybe I should take a second look at that offer from Re-Aw. I miss having people around the office who aren't actually my employees. Since I've taken the holdings company into space, I'll need to appoint a new CEO for HDH... Sinikka could probably do with the distraction. She's all depressed again, between her ongoing argument with Meera and her love life. She needs to bury herself in work and since the school let her go she's been at a loose end.

I'll take her to the Mind Clash tomorrow, run the idea past her. Think she could do with a brother/sister night out anyway.

... Slow week.

Save. End.