[EVE] The Bench

There is a bench somewhere in the Federation that I keep trying to find again.

I know that sounds ridiculous. New Eden is enormous—thousands upon thousands of systems, stations, colonies, forgotten outposts orbiting quiet worlds. Entire wars disappear into history out here. People disappear even faster.

But still, every so often, I go looking for that bench.

It sits beneath pale trees on a Gallente planet whose name I can never quite remember afterward. The sky there turns gold in the evenings, and the city lights below the hill shimmer like station traffic seen from orbit. Capsuleers are not really meant for places like that anymore. We become too large, too detached, too immortal.

But somehow, that bench always makes me feel small again.

That’s where I meet them.

Our lives never quite align properly. One of us always chasing duty, distance, obligations, timing. Sometimes they’re across the cluster. Sometimes I am. Sometimes weeks pass in silence before a single message appears asking the same quiet question:

The bench?

And somehow, one way or another, we find our way back.

I think that’s why I search for it so carefully when time passes. Not because I’ve forgotten where it is, but because I’m afraid one day I’ll arrive and find the spot empty. No saved place beside them. No familiar silhouette waiting under the evening lights.

But they always save me a spot.

Always.

Even when things don’t work out. Even when life bends in difficult directions and timing remains cruel. The bench remains ours in the small way that matters. A fixed point in a universe built entirely around motion.

Today I found myself drifting through Gallente space again, chasing fragments of memory from orbit to orbit. A hillside looked familiar. A station tram sparked recognition. For a moment, I thought I had found it.

I hadn’t.

Still, I smiled.

Because somewhere out there is a quiet bench beneath golden skies, and someone patient enough to keep saving me a seat.