Monday 11 August 2008

Honey, I'm home

Jayne: "Ten percent of nuthin' is...let me do the math here...nuthin' into nuthin'...carry the nuthin'..."

I walk into the dark hangar, the silence is deafening. There's no light but for the little coming in through the door, all systems are powered down. I walk over to my desk and hit the lights, my eyes take a moment to adjust as the hangar is lit and the array of deadly ships become visible.
I turn on my comms systems and take a moment to check the chatter before checking my mail.
A two week backlog takes me a few minutes to get through all the while looking at my hangar. I've missed this place, I've missed my ships and above all I've missed Piracy.

It's good to be back.

The first stage of Keira's business in high sec space is now concluded and she'll hopefully be moving back to lowsec for the foreseeable future. My other friend is also moving back after doing a bit of Ninja Salvaging in a high security mission hub. Soon the whole crew will be back in action.

I need to get the rust out so head for my favourite ship, a Rifter class frigate. I prime the systems and get ready to undock. The night sky of Gusandall greets me like an old friend, a sea of flashing red lights up my overview as the local Pirates are camping the station. Fortunately for me they aren't here for my Rifter and I warp off to Eifer to get the blood flowing. An old friend gives me a call and asks if I want to join up with them. "Not now" I say, there's some hunting to be done old school style.

Unfortunately Eifer is dead, nought but the usual haulers so I head back to Gus to join up with the flashing reds camping the station, I dock and board my Sleipnir, it seems a storm is brewing.
Capital Storm are an alliance of Anti Pirates and one of their members was docked in station. Having fought them on numerous occasions it's a well known fact that where there is one, there will be many more as they always fly in gangs with good support. It is with this in mind that the local pirates have a loose alliance of sorts. Separately we are easy pickings for a well oiled machine like Capital Storm but together we stand a chance. Moments after I undocked a Capital Storm Abbadon undocked and I engaged instantly, the rest of the flashing reds did the same and local lit up as his friends jumped into Gus. They had a large force, equal numbers but more firepower than us as we had three logistics ships in the unofficial gang. Capital Storm never fly without a Falcon recon ship in gang so with this in mind the assembled Pirates decided not to carry the engagement forward. I warped out to a safespot and the others docked. We do like a fight but to fight with the odds stacked against you is never the wisest of options.

A few minutes passed as did Capital Storm so I docked and grabbed my Rifter once more. Eifer dead, Ingunn dead, many outlying systems devoid of targets until I got to Hrondmund. A Stabber appeared on my scanner and I started to track him. Hrond has many belts so was a bit tricky but eventually narrowed him down to just one.

Warp Drive Active

Tackling systems set to overload for extra range in case he's too far, I burst out of warp just as the Stabber warps out to another belt, I can see the tell-tale signs of warp and align quickly for his destination.

Warp Drive Active

Once again normal space envelopes me as I enter the belt, the Stabber only 3000 metres from me, Targeting systems are quick to acquire, my warp disruptor and web kick in. My guns and rocket launcher are activated...

I lose lock as the Stabber warps out without a shot being fired.

"AAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRGGGGGHHHHH"

There's only one thing I hate more than ECM... and that's fucking Warp Core Stabilisers.
So... a great start to my return, nothing, nada, zip.

Oh well, I head back to Gus to take care of some business. Violencing will have to wait for another night.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Welcome back my friend. Am glad that Keira has sorted out business in high-sec. We have seen many REDS pass through Gusandall and beyond. Pity you missed that stabber, would have been a decent kill. You do realise all them plex runners are now back in Gus?

F

Anonymous said...

Nahh, the Plex runners are the pirates that aren't actually out hunting anything. That and we are camping the second room. Shhhhhh

Snake

Kane Rizzel said...

Pirates who aren't hunting anything? Surely that's called a carebear :P

Spectre said...

Gah, stabs. I had the same thing happen to me last night vs a Caracal. Nothing is more frustrating than sitting around waiting for a 15 minute timer to finish up because you engaged someone and they just warped away.