Negative. We Amarrians know life is too sacred to be killed purely for competition. Yes, even clone lives of an immortal soldier. If we shall run any form of competition on this matter, it will be in conjunction with our current efforts to wipe out Matari terrorists.

I was one of the few children born and raise by my parents for the first 15 years of my life. My father was military man in the Wiyrkomi honor guard. My mother was a school teacher. My mother taught me all about the winds and the Caldari way. My Father taught me honor and respect. He also trained me day in and day out in the art of war. Once I reached 15 I was placed in a state ran academy so I may be placed in the Wirykomis' military academy the following year. There I was ahead of all my fellow cadets in everything war. In academics though I was mediocre. At the age of 17 I went off to fight alongside my father on Caldari Prime. Now I'm a simple merc trying maintain the honorable Cayton name.

Academic part? Did you went to the officer classes Jacques? Because in my time in the Academy did I only had to attend some classes on the topic of squad movement and operations, Gun and equipment maintenance and first aid advices and those weren't hard at all.

Or do you people from Wiyrkomi do the whole "bootcamp" routine a little different than we from the Kaalakiota branches?

Academic part? Did you went to the officer classes Jacques? Because in my time in the Academy did I only had to attend some classes on the topic of squad movement and operations, Gun and equipment maintenance and first aid advices and those weren't hard at all.

Or do you people from Wiyrkomi do the whole "bootcamp" routine a little different than we from the Kaalakiota branches?

I thought all academies taught equipment maintenance and battlefield first-aid... Why would you need to mention that?

At a young age, I was trained by my father in the ways of the amarr, he taught me how to operate a scrambler rifle, my training was even more furthered when I joined the company of marcher lords where one of the nobles oversaw my training, not all of it was how to fight, he also had me memorize scriptures everyday until I had every scripture in my head, I would later on sign up for the clone program, after I joined I was accepted as a templar recruit where I will resume my training and become a full pledged templar

Does that memory extend to the great book of records?

(Yea pretty much)

Wow, how long did that take you?

There has to be over a million different tomes...

Not long figuring I got an neural implant that allowed me to skim and memorize it.

That depends on whom you represent.

I am torn, as always, by my dual life treading the line 'twixt empires. But, by birthright I should rightly represent the Khanid.

Birthright or Tradition.

Therein lies an issue I have struggled with for a long time.

By tradition and Blood the Ouryon Family is of Old Udorian stock, or so I am sure my grandfather, and his father before him through the ages to Kaniya and the Second Founding of the house, and further back to Ouraya and Arnab the earliest Ouryon's.

Though my Father would tell me that Udorian blood was impure.

Kador my friend, in this instance your division is surely deeper and more complex than mine. Petty squabbles and political intrigue between noble families has nothing on conflicts of identity!

I have no doubts as to whom my grandfather would want my allegiance to be given...
If we were back on speaking terms, that is. His distaste for my status as a clone is not something I have yet been able to overcome.

Hm.

Perhaps our situations are not so different after all.

Reading through this thread I see there are a lot of hard cases with broken homes and misspent youth in here. I suppose that is to be expected. Mercenary groups throughout history have consisted primarily of hard cases from the streets, and military vets who know no other life.

I am neither of those things. To be frank, if it was not for the implants I would never have willingly become a solder. It is not that I am afraid to die. It is more that I would prefer to continue living.

Reading over the stories of other Caldari I realize that I did not mention my mandatory service training. Believe me, it was not much of an oversight. The idea of making every young person serve is fine in theory, but in reality not every young person it fit to serve, and the system unofficially adapts to that reality.

They had pegged me as someone destined to design new weapons, not weald them. My mandatory service training was simply going through the motions. My instructors did not expect me to ever see combat, and neither did I. I did not really pay too much attention. I learned to march and look good in a uniform but that was about all that they really insisted on. If I had any musical talent I am sure they would have put me in a marching band. As it was I fulfilled my mandatory service guarding things that no one was really interested in stealing anyway.

I had long since completed my mandatory service when uncle Renier came to visit for the first time after his exile, telling me stories of his adventures fighting with and against pirates in Syndicate.

Of course the Company that drove him out took exception to RenierGÇÖs return, and they sent a number of large men to talk to him about it. Renier kindly extended to these men the hospitality of his crew, a crew he had picked up on freelance stations in Syndicate space. This induced the Company men to remain on their best behavior, but that obviously would not have been the end of it. Except that Renier had picked up some sensitive information relating to the CompanyGÇÖs operations when salvaging the remains of a cloaked industrial ship that had tried to slip through Syndicate space.

When Renier contacted Company management to discuss this information, they came to a mutual agreement that it would be best to stay out of each otherGÇÖs business. Renier had explained that there was no need for him or his associates to release this information to the competition, if the Company did not give them a reason. The Company concluded that continuing to take punitive action against Renier Gaden was no longer a financially sound course of action, so Renier was once more free to operate in Caldari space, as long has he took no further action against the Company.

So Renier was free to visit us, and on his visits he described his new perspective on conflict, explaining that battle was as much a mental endeavor as a physical. He was not the same man I had known as a child. He was confident and sure of himself. Facing death and rebirth had changed him, given him perspective. I, and my brother Crash, admired this, and we wanted to experience that sort of challenge ourselves, to pit our selves against worthy opponents. I had harbored hopes of becoming a Pod Pilot like my uncle, but then I heard that my Company had landed a contract to design the next generation of cognitive interface implants used in the creation of Immortal Solders. Since I was already working in R&D, it was not hard to get myself transferred to the project, and volunteer as a test subject.

My younger brother Crash was just going into his mandatory service training when Renier first returned to inspire us with his stories, so Crash took his training far more seriously than I had and as a result he got a lot more out of it. Six months after my first battle as an Immortal Solder, I had developed enough connections that I was able to pull some strings to insure that Crash received implants as well. CrashGÇÖs first experience as an Immortal Solder was not as one sided as mine. He went in with some training, and gave almost as good as he got.