Soft at Heart

Contrary to Dauntless I, the second stage of their wormhole operations was seeing an increased presence of SPHERE pilots in this new home of theirs. A good thing, too, because in their very special brand of insanity, as Kayleigh saw it, the XianKun sisters had brought them to live in a Class 3 wormhole and not the previously planned Class 2 that would have made transitions a little smoother. In sharp contrast to the corp’s previous home, over here pilots were getting ripped to pieces by the local Sleeper population whenever they tried to face them solo.

The increased presence manifested itself in ways Kayleigh hadn’t expected. Some of the newer people were positively itching to catch the unwary traveller off-guard. Chief among these seemed to be Nethys. Only the previous night she had caught the capsule of some unfortunate pilot by the day’s exit. Lots of corporate chatter had ensued about aggression, podding, ransoms, war stories.

Kayleigh, who always felt that knot in her stomach at the idea of shooting anyone not actively shooting her first, couldn’t help feeling somewhat out of place. She was glad to be in her pod at the time, so her colleagues couldn’t see her blush, or feel her embarrassment. Yet if she really thought about it, this was a lawless place, and Dauntless I had taught her death would come swiftly and spectacularly to the unwary, from anyone at all who happened to get the drop on them, security standings notwithstanding.

So when her directional scanner caught a lonely frigate coming in, she decided to practice her scanning skills and try to chase him in her stealthbomber. It took her a while, being relatively new at this. While she was still working at it, the signature her scanner was reporting changed. A frigate wreck showed up, then a capsule. She winced. Someone had warped to a Sleeper nest on a frigate. That never went well.

She had fully expected to see the pilot go back home, so she warped to the exit, trying to catch a glimpse of him leaving. Nothing. Ten minutes passed and Kayleigh started to suspect this pilot had forgotten to bookmark the exit coordinates. Time for another sweep of the directional scan.

In the end, she found him at a planet. He was clearly going nowhere. She orbited him in a lazy arc, debating what to do. Nethys would probably have got the pod, but Kayleigh could still remember how it had felt when she had lost Kanunu in a wormhole and how gruelling it had been to get him back home safe. Being lost in a wormhole was scary enough without getting podded in the process. She took a deep breath and tried her best to act mean and hard, like she imagined might be expected of her in this place. She hailed the pilot on a private frequency.

Instead of podding him, she had decided to ransom him for a way out. She had heard reports of this working, it would make her look fierce (she hoped), and it certainly would help pad her wallet some more. After all, she still owed people some money for replacing the New Dawn.

Kayleigh Jamieson > Did you get stuck inside the wormhole?
Allizard > yes =(
Kayleigh Jamieson > Would you be willing to pay for a way out?

It didn’t hurt to be polite… Or maybe it did. She clearly hadn’t intimidated him enough. As conversations unfolded the other pilot claimed to have even less money than her – hard to believe, given his age – and the haggling was bringing the payment to a value so ridiculous that it wasn’t really worth her bother.

Failing to get a deal, Kayleigh ended up prompting him to speak more of what had happened to him. It was what she had thought: pilot new at exploration had warped to the first thing to come up on scan and had been taught a lesson by the locals.

The next thing she knew, Kayleigh had taken pity on the pilot and was explaining to him the very basics of wormhole must-know information. Once she realised he was thinking of self-destroying to get back home, she finally gave up on all pretence of being tough. She tried to help him.

First she jettisoned the exit coordinates at the star. Once safely cloaked again, she told him where to find those. Sure enough, seconds later he was there. Risky. It could have been a trap. Although she supposed that for someone contemplating a capsule self-destruct a trap was the least of his worries.

However, that plan failed. Without a cargo hold, the capsule was unable to translate those coordinates into the onboard computer. Kayleigh sighed deeply. Against all common sense and against everything she’d learned during her time as a capsuleer, she invited a complete stranger into her fleet.

Hoping he wouldn’t have time to spring a trap on her, she warped squadron to the exit coordinates, cancelled her warp, then disbanded fleet. Only then did she warp herself to the exit at range, just in time to see the capsule go through.

True to his word, and despite Kayleigh having given up on any ransom early in the conversation, the distressed pilot wired her the amount he had claimed was the entirety of his wallet. 5 million. He even sounded grateful for her assistance, which confused her, since she’d started the whole talk to try to extort money from someone.

In the end, she didn’t care what anyone else thought of her. She would have felt rotten to the core if she had podded that guy. She actually felt good with herself for having helped him out instead. In a way.

J135422

Dear Nakatre,

Day 9 of operation Dauntless, and things have been quiet. A little too quiet. You know I usually like things quiet, but it’s got to the point where there’s nothing at all to do.

We raided all the Sleeper structures we could find, harvested all the gas, and now our probes haven’t been finding any more signals out there. We keep analysing, of course. This is a big system. We get the occasional hit on something new. Or Sleepers try to slip back in. But yesterday there was nothing to do all day long, except look at the sights.

Not that the sights are bad. I do like the way the sun shines off the moon where we anchored Dauntless tower. However, it always feels cold here. I know it must be the colours, because I spend more time in the capsule than anywhere else and it’s always warm when we fly, as you know. The light is all harsh and blue out here. It’s beautiful, in its own way, but a far cry from the warm colours of Aunia and Vylade, where I started my piloting career, or even the brighter and lighter shades in Alenia. Sometimes this place feels downright lonely.

It’s not so bad today, though. Our newest pilot, Taejin, has joined us out here and found me an exit into another uncharted system, a J135422. There was a tower out there somewhere as well as some ships on scanner. They looked like they might be parked in space, so I went in and harvested some gas from under their noses before the connection winked out.

I wonder… were they asleep? Were they off in their tower having a drink? Were they writing home to their loved ones? I miss you.

It doesn’t look like there will be much more to do around here. We will pack up and leave by the end of the week, one week earlier than we’d originally planned. I’ll make sure to take a day off planetside to spend with you, no matter what.

Lots of love:
-- Kay

PS:
I’m feeling much better, since the day I lost the New Dawn. The odd feeling has disappeared and I no longer get headaches which is a big relief. I hope that never happens again. It was quite scary. Don’t worry, though; I’m feeling well. I’ve enclosed a picture of the New Dawn parked by the hangars, taken on the same day I lost it.

K.

J133417

She couldn't help asking herself why exactly she hadn't come to Metropolis sooner. There had been some reason or other - distance, work, something - but as she hovered by the mouth of a freshly-probed wormhole she couldn't remember what had been important enough to keep her from this: flying with Kalahari.

The invitation had come weeks ago, and she'd delayed the actual travel plans - a fact she now regretted, looking over to the other Loki who'd just come out of warp. Kalahari's ship was almost like her own, but slightly different, much like sisters.

In they went, into a class 2 system which her instruments were naming J133417. As always she got that slight flutter in her belly, the thrill of being in an uncharted place, pristine. A dangerous place, too. Perhaps not so much from the mysterious residents (not on a class 2, anyway) but because a distraction, failing to catch a capsuleer threat on the onboard scanner soon enough might spell disaster for any expedition.

As it was, the place looked deserted. Kalahari and Kayleigh scanned down some signatures and warped into some sleepers. Side by side the Lokis made short work of them. The jin-mei was happy with the way the New Dawn was behaving, despite the speed at which it went through ammo. She was, indeed, having a really good time which was something she hadn't been having often lately. As they quickly salvaged the wrecks, Kayleigh gave it some thought.

Kalahari and her went way back, of course, to the very first few months after Kayleigh had graduated. Back then the racing league (still on its very first season) was a project of the Glamour Syndicate so Kayleigh had braved her innate shyness and had in time become a regular denizen of the GLS lounge. She'd forged a friendship with a core of Glamour Bunnies pilots, but with none quite so much as with Kalahari Wayrest. It was she who'd most taken an interest in her racing exploits, she who'd become her #1 fan and later even her #1 sponsor. All that while being a colourful, sweet, unwavering friend.

As the instruments warned her there was nothing else to salvage from that wreck, Kayleigh realised she wasn't just smiling fondly, she was also blushing at some of the old memories. She could almost hear the girls, "What happens in GLS stays in GLS." Her smile widened.

But Kalahari was saying something on comms so she turned her attention back to the present. "Yes, I'm done. All ready to go back home." The two sister Lokis warped out in tandem, leaving just an abandoned structure behind.

J161138

It was Saturday night, a time when she would typically be busy with preparations for a race the next day, such as the horrible clone-jump she always had to make. But not this time. Tomorrow she would be missing the second race in a row on unavoidable planetside business. The fact had her edgy and restless.

Which was perhaps why when she was about to retire for the evening and her eyes fell on the Melted she hesitated and instead decided to go back out once more. It was about time she stopped moping around and went back to doing anything productive. Exploring was as good as anything else. This mindless sorting through assets she'd spent her day doing was what was driving her insane, surely.

An hour later, she felt much better. Alenia had held no results, but next-door Vaere had. So here she was now, on the Eternal Flame II which she hadn't flown since bringing it back from EndLand.

It was not like she herself was being vastly productive - sitting there watching as Laureline mined away at some arkonor in a system her instruments were calling J161138 - but she somehow felt better about herself. Never mind that the pesky Sleepers had decimated all but three of her drones nor that she was now basically just hanging still in space on a ship that maneuvered like a whale. And yet the thrill of discovery, of sitting guard in a dangerous place.. it was making her feel awake and alive once more.

Try as she might, she couldn't quite remember why she'd stopped going out there in her Helios to find hidden treasures.

She even smiled at the sight of that Nox Retriever gobbling up ore. It had been a while since she'd flown with anyone from her former alliance. She'd have to admit she missed many of them terribly, although Laureline herself was actually someone she barely knew. She'd arrived on the scene shortly before Kay's troubles with Dragonstar and had kept mostly to herself, perhaps because Dirtside figured on her employment history. The same Dirtside which had once fielded a racing team who'd shot down Kay in that fateful Race 10, Season 5. She wondered briefly if Laureline thought Kay would hold that against her, or if she thought Kay might try to do some espionage.

It didn't really matter to the jin-mei. She didn't mix racing with her regular job piloting in space if she could help it, and Dirtside didn't have a racing team anymore. As she helped the Nox pilot clean up and haul, she wondered if she would be up for a night cap before they went their separate ways again, maybe catch up on the latest in Nox Draconum.

J142617

Sometimes you just have to take a break from the daily grind and go off on something different. After days of toiling first in EndLand for Nox and then in Ney for Ms. Estisen I was in quite a dire need for a break.

Opportunity presented itself one day when my good friend Quintrala was feeling a little low. "We should do something together," I said. The 'something' turned into a little expedition into wormhole space, since Quin had seen little (if any) of it, to date. Last night we took off, she in a Helios doing the probing and me in my best-tanking ship, which just so happens to currently be an Ishtar.

And yes, I know the Sleepers come after drones something awful. I made sure I carried in my hold quite a number of replacements, and I definitely planned on doing a lot of micro-management on them. It's not like I am much good with my guns, anyway. But I'm quite fed up of only seeing the gas clouds out there. I wanted to see something else.

So we took off on a little roam throughout Amarrian space, Quin probing and me either just chatting (girl talk!) or dispatching some pesky Sansha while she kept looking for an unstable wormhole.

We ended up finding one out of Sizamod. We took the proverbial deep breath and jumped in.



I always find the lack of comms unsettling out there, I have to confess. I'm suddenly straining to peer farther, or to make sense of the sounds my sensors are translating from radiation floating around. It all sounds so... eerie.

The place might have been empty of people, according to our sensors, but it certainly wasn't uninhabited. We picked up a Gallente control tower somewhere out there which we didn't dare investigate, of course. And Quin, brilliant in her probing, found us some Sleepers.

And this is where I cursed myself for being all sorts of foolish coming out and trying to take them on all by myself. What if they warp-jammed me from insane distances? What if my tank failed? But this was our little adventure together, and I was determined to learn some bravery from Quin!

After some initial scouting that Quin did, I crossed my fingers and warped into what the sensors were calling a Perimeter Ambush Point. Two Sirius cannons stripped me of shields pretty much with just one volley, which didn't do much for my self-confidence. Still... I turned on the armour rep before their next volley hit, just in case.

Good thing I did, because they kept hitting hard from far away. The frigates, however, were very much ignoring me, so I had to maneuver much closer. When they finally locked they were fast in getting close. I launched my drones and... well what I remember most about the rest of the combat is keeping an eagle's eye on the damage indicators on my drones and on my armour while Quin lay nearby, cloaked, making sure I had a warp-in point in case things got ugly and I needed to break lock.

Despite my best efforts I lost count of how many Warrior and Valkyries II I lost. Fast as they are, they often wouldn't return to the drone bay quickly enough and poof! We got three waves of Sleepers and then nothing. Just the damnable Sirius cannons still taking big chunks off my armour and me fresh out of cap boosters to turn on the second repairer when the hits were better aimed.

I warped out, to let my cap and shields recover... and in all honesty to recharge my courage a little bit. Quin kept an eye on things but in the absence of more Sleepers and seeing my cap and shields all green, I warped in at close range, convinced that within seconds my Ash Green would be just another wreck in w-space.

Was I glad to be proved wrong! Those bloody cannons had an awful time hitting me at such close range. Despite my fears, my surviving Valkyries made short work of them without my even needing to turn on the first repairer.

I'm so slow that by then it was quite late in the night. Quin uncloaked, did most of the looting and then we got nosy around the ruins for a little, taking pictures, after which we went back home, feeling great about overcoming our first little challenge in uncharted space.

All in all, we had a great time. Can't wait to go out there again with her.

Kanunu Phone Home

Ship's Log Entry #4
(Wednesday 18.03.111)

We heard from Kanunu again, still alive out in the same uncharted solar system, and still mired in signals, trying to puzzle through them.

Throughout most of the afternoon and evening Nox Draconum egged him on, tried our best to help him with remote advice. Then finally he reported he was chasing a signal likely to be a wormhole. I could swear I heard a collective sigh over comms, and there was certainly no mistaking the cheers when he found it and jumped through... to another uncharted system.

Hope was well up, however, now that he had found a way out. And indeed within less than an hour he'd found an exit through to Zahefeus, in the very-charted Khanid region. Kanunu is back with us and I will be able to sleep easy tonight.

[end log entry]
[end expedition log]

Needle in Haystack

Ship's Log Entry #3
(Tuesday 17.03.111)

Probes, solar system views, dozens- no, hundreds of signatures to sift through. I have a headache from looking so hard at the elusive red circles and red dots until they turn yellow or green. Some turned out to be wormholes into uncharted space, but (unsurprisingly) none into Kanunu's last known location.

Jikomanzoku did manage to find an exit out of J160014, the same into Maturat that I'd left through less than 24 hours before. That, at least, is one less worry for me.

I'm not sure what else to do. It worries me that we haven't heard a peep from Kanunu all day. Is he still alive? Is he just too far out for his signal to reach us? If he gets killed so far out there will he still be able to download into his medical clone?

I've given all my friends Kanunu's last known location in the hopes that if someone happens to find a way in by sheer luck they'll be able to help him out. At least one pilot I've never actually met before has offered to help. Thank you to all keeping an eye out for J210247.

[end log entry]

Leaving People Behind

Ship's Log Entry #2
(Monday 16.03.111)

I didn't wetgrave by sleeping in my capsule. That's something. I did sleep longer than usual and I can't figure out if it's something this J160014 place has done to me or if it's the capsule trying to take care of me.

I'm glad I did get some good sleep because I woke up to terrible news: Kanunu had not docked up in high-sec like I thought he had the previous night. He hadn't even moved over to the less-signal-ridden J160014. As I caught up with the faint signal of corporate comms, I realised Kanunu had in fact gone to sleep at a safe spot in J210247 - the place Jiko and I had found linked to J160014 and had elected not to sleep in because it was so filled with confusing signals that we couldn't find any other exits.

I have left a man behind in a horrible, horrible place and now he can't find a way out.

Of course I immediately checked to see if both systems were still linked, but they were not. There was nothing else I could do for Kanunu except show moral support as he reported finding more and more signals, pinning them down one after the other. The last I heard he'd mapped 29 scanner signatures, and still he could find no way out.

All I could do was launch my own probes and work on finding an exit for both me and Jikomanzoku. After pinning down a few more gravimetric signatures I finally narrowed down a wormhole signature and found a way out. Into known high-sec, no less.

Now I was faced with a dilemma. Jiko wasn't logged on to comms. No one had, in fact, heard from him all day. Should I leave, trusting he'd find his way out, or should I stay and risk another night of sleeping in a capsule?

In the end, and considering J160014 isn't really too confusing as signatures go, I elected to leave. Jiko has equipment with which to scan for an exit and in there he won't have too many conflicting signals to sift through, unlike poor Kanunu.


That's where I ended up. I lingered at the mouth of the wormhole, torn as I hoped Jiko would miraculously show up. But he didn't. So I left yet another corp mate behind, and it weighs heavy in my heart.

I clone-jumped out of my racing clone and hopped back into my Helios. I went back out. I don't care that the chances of finding an entrance to precisely the system Kanunu is trapped in are slim. I'm going to bloody well try.


I almost immediately found yet another wormhole opening into Ney. I hopped inside, deployed probes. J142649 seemed to be some sort of hidey hole for Sleeper among asteroids. I didn't stay long. I have to find Kanunu.

Tonight I get to sleep in Ney - I'm too exhausted to go on. Tomorrow I will be looking for my corpmate among the stars.

[end log entry]

J160014

Expedition #1
Pilot: Kayleigh Jamieson-Read
Hull: Helios
Registered Name: Melted
Plate: GF-946738DS09-SL

Ship's Log Entry #1
(Sunday 15.03.111)

I should have known better than to venture into unknown space on a whim, knowing the bad luck I've been having all weekend long. While working with Feu on a gravimetric sign I'd pinned down in Ala, report came over corporate channel that local pilots in Ney were reporting finding a wormhole into the system. Kanunu and Jikomanzoku decided to practice their probing skills and undocked to pin it down. They managed to do so just as Feu and I were finishing up, and they went in to an uncharted system.

I forgot I wanted to be cautious. I forgot I was in the medical clone with all the expensive racing implants on. I forgot how badly the race had just gone for me, with all the glitches and mishaps. I boarded my Helios and set off to pin down the Wormhole. I forgot this was a highly traveled system with a Uni Caille station filled with eager explorers.

By the time I pinned down the signature, the sensors were already registering the anomaly as volatile, to say the least. I jumped through, knowing I'd be equipped to find a way out of there. I was still cloaked from my jump when someone showed up in a Kestrel and jumped back to Ney, collapsing the hole and leaving Feu alone back in Ney.

We went about pinning signatures down and found two other wormholes, one leading into Pochelympe and another into more uncharted territory. As we were charting this first one we noticed it might be uncharted but it certainly wasn't uninhabited: our onboard scanners were detecting no less than three towers anchored out there somewhere.

As time progressed and we couldn't find a more convenient exit back into known space, we moved over to the second uncharted system, J210247. This one didn't seem to be inhabited by anyone. It had, however, an inordinate amount of signals to chase. Hour after hour we worked, and all we could pin down were asteroid belts and gas clouds, but no exit.

Kanunu left to Pochelympe for the night. Jikomanzoku elected to go to sleep in his pod at a safe spot in J160014. I worked a while longer with no luck in finding a new way out. Being more experienced and having more probes in my hold, I'm going to stay the night in here. Tomorrow, Jiko and I will find another way out.

It's the first time I'm going to sleep in my capsule. I hope I don't wetgrave. If I do, you know I love you more than anything, Nakatre.

[end log entry]

The Unknown

It's funny how most signatures nowadays get left alone in Ney. I've been sitting at a Gravimetric site for the better part of an hour, now, and no one has come to see what it's about. Am I just getting lucky or is everyone truly off exploring uncharted territory?

I know most of the alliance guys are busy off who knows where. Chatter is filled with references to uncharted space, talk of dumping things in stations and plans for other encounters.

And I don't know why I feel slightly left out. It's too late and I'm too tired to go far from home, anyway. So why? Maybe I just envy them the fact they are adventuring into the unknown.

...

I think I need a change of scenery.

Bridge in Ney

Last night Ney local was abuzz with chatter. Busy bees that the local Caille students are, within 5 seconds (I imagine) someone had found this in system.



It's a rather scary moment, after the horrifying images of Seyllin still burned into my mind, to find one of those in the system where you and your corp have made home. I don't think I've ever been so glad to be a capsuleer, to know I'd have the means to not only transport myself to safety but also bring along all of the Dragonstar employees and a fair number of refugees along with them.

But anyway, apocalyptic fears aside and because things seemed to be relatively safe I took the opportunity to take the Melted out there with some probes and try to pin this wormhole down. Which I did after a while; and it was still faster than many, many probing sessions in the past. I do believe I'm beginning to like these new probes.

As for the wormhole itself it was already very unstable when I got there. I found fellow racer Cai Lun there at the mouth of the thing and he reassured me it was quite safe, while I was still hanging around, taking pictures and hesitating. I took a deep breath and jumped through, only to find myself in Yezara, out in Khanid Kingdom high-sec. The first thing that crossed my mind was that with such random portals, the slavers must be rubbing their hands. No customs at wormholes, no police. Just grab a few unsuspecting souls and voilà, hop right into the wolf's den.

I jumped back while the thing was still there, swapped ships, went and sat at an ice field doing some thinking.

J144636

Such a strange day, waking up to the terrible, horrifying news of Seyllin, stuck in Ney myself with no real way of helping. When confirmation came of the final fate of Seyllin I, it was too late for anything. I still shiver when I think of the fate of so many out there.

In the end, staying at home staring at the news holos only kept chilling my heart. So I went out, hopping from star system to star system, trying not to look too closely at planets, haunted by images from the news.

I picked up the Melted from Amarrian space and flew it back, taking the chance to try out the new probes. They certainly seem to be a lot more effective.

However, I got interrupted by cheers in alliance channel. Deathlords had found a wormhole. Trust pilots who really believe they are demigods to defy laws of physics and Concord warnings; they dived into it.

Soon reports were coming back of encounters with alien species and gas clouds! There were gas clouds out there to be had, and only a few in alliance with skills and equipment for it. I am one of them. I ran 17 jumps to get my harvester, then 25 more to where the wormhole had been found. Together with Deathlords, I jumped in.


It was strange being in a place where you knew no other capsuleer had ever been. I later wished I were sharing it with Nakatre, but first I had to deal with the pesky locals. Who are these - Sleeper, I hear people calling them? Nasty guys. They came after my drones with a vengeance, but they refused to reply to hailing calls.

I repelled the few frigates which came at my harvesting Brutix, while over comms the other alliance guys dealt with much bigger threats elsewhere in system. I finally sat in my cloud with Deathlords in his hauler by my side and I gathered gas.

It was eerily calm, out there. Nothing showed in local channels, because there were no gates, no beacons, no nothing relaying signals. It made my hair stand on end. I'm glad the wormhole held and we're all back in charted space.

No Luck

Sometimes the universe just hates you. As she docked back in Dantan, Kayleigh couldn't help the feeling that it was her turn to be hated by the universe in general.

First, only a few days ago, she'd lost her Ishtar. Then on Sunday night the party at Daredevil's had been less than she had expected. Nakatre had not made it there after all and neither had anyone else from the Scuderia - except for Quin, of course, who was there more as part of the organisation PR. It had been nice meeting some new faces and seeing Takashi again after so long, but truth be told the event had felt more like a pre-season briefing than a party proper.

She'd left Sinq after that, hoping to spend some quality time with Nakatre out in Kador, exploring or just doing anything at all, really. But probing today had yielded absolutely nothing. They'd visited just short of twenty star systems; all they got was nothing, more nothing and a few Unknowns in which they were not interested anyway. By the time they did find an uncharted asteroid belt it was so far from base and so poor in quality that they'd left it there for others to find.

She'd pretty much run out of Multispectral probes and had nothing to show for it. What a waste. Except...

... Except she found she wasn't as annoyed and frustrated as she used to get around Ney. She missed flying with Nakatre and she'd barely noticed time go by in her company. They couldn't find what they wanted? So be it. They'd simply park themselves near some rocks and talk while the lasers worked. And later.. maybe later they could try that quaint little restaurant she'd walked past just the other day on station.

A Narrow Escape

It was the dead of night, at least according to the official New Eden time. Tired after a long day of work, Kayleigh finally made the last jump into the solar system that was her destination, following on coordinates she'd picked up just the night before from some drones that had escaped her fire.

While still cloaked at the gate she checked her intruments: all systems go, drone bays full and ready to deploy, coordinates loaded... She sighed and warped the Ishtar hull.

As soon as she came out of warp the adrenaline kicked in: she'd landed right in the middle of a swarm of little drones, which usually meant trouble, and they had bigger friends right beside them. Immediately she willed the ship to turn and burn toward an exit point; as it aligned she heard the lock alarm, and in the same second released a flight of drones.

The missiles hit her hard, nearly wiping all shields in the small ship on the first volley. She heard her own guns fire, having aquired target - funny, she didn't remember turning those on. The hum of her engines went down in pitch: webbed. Shitshitshit! Then a soft beep indicated one of them was jamming her warp drive. Oh, nonono!

With heart hammering in her chest, she overloaded everything: guns, engine, web, armour rep. She had to kill that jamming drone and do it now! Her armour was gone, then back one-third, then gone again and bleeding heavily into hull, then back one-quarter...

Come on, come on!! Kill the little bastard already! she willed at her drones, her wide grey eyes glued to the stargate dead ahead of her but oh so unattainable. Half hull. Stay with me Verdigris, don't you die on me, damn you. Thirty percent hull. She put all her willpower into getting the ship to warp, but kept getting again and again the error message. She shut her eyes and yelled within her mind, finally realising she was going to lose her beloved ship.

Explosion.

"Warp Drive Active" - Aura's cool, mechanic voice.

Sonic boom.

Shaking like a leaf she opened her eyes just in time to see the display go up to one-third armour. Everything else was very, very red. Unbelieving she looked up hull integrity. 8%. If anyone even sneezed, the Verdigris would disintegrate.

Not that there were probably many left to sneeze. At 8% structural integrity surely most of the inner compartments would have been exposed to space, to explosions... She wondered if she had any crew left at all. It had all happened so fast!

If her drones hadn't been tech 2, if her ammo hadn't been nicer than norm, if she hadn't overloaded so much that every single module was now showing damage in the reports she was getting, the Verdigris would be no more.

New Place

I got fed up with never finding anything in Ney anymore. I did something that I hate doing and in fact hadn't done since the end of racing Season VI: I clone-jumped.

I picked up an old rusty cruiser I'd had parked in Amarrian low-sec for well over a year, I moved some ships around, and now have made smaller quarters in what looks to be a promising place to do some exploration. The station itself is in high-sec, but it borders two small pockets of more dangerous space. Perhaps all the eager Caille students haven't yet made it this far?

The first sweep of the area with probes, however, yielded nothing at all in 6 different systems. So that wasn't much of a welcome. I was starting to think there might be something wrong with my probes or my instruments. Finally just as I was about to dock in utter despair, the probes picked up a signal. Radar. Lovely!

It was worth the uncomfortable feeling of clone-jumping. Let's hope I keep finding little hidden treasures.

Tripping Over Probes

There was a Multispec probe again right in the undocking corridor of the Uni of Caille, Ney campus.

These days I can't find anything in any of the neighbouring systems, and this extends to the nearby low security ones. It's annoying, honestly. I keep tripping over other people's probes and my own seldom pick up anything anymore.

I'm not sure what to do about it, short of moving base and finding greener pastures, as the ancient saying goes.