And Again!

The problem of going to sleep in your pod is that once you wake up, you can’t really rub your eyes, or drink a glass of water to clear the bad taste out of your mouth. Instead, all you have is all-encompassing amniotic fluid - and ship signals demanding your attention.

So, what do we have... ship finishing warp-in to my safe-spot, the CVA morale office still cloaking in our system... and an urgent comm request from Eta in Empire. I opened the channel.

“Good Morning! What’s up?”

[ “Morning”? It’s about midnight here! ]

“Details!”

[ Pah - I’m going to detail you, if you keep that up! ...but anyway: the Alliance is shooting Interbus Custom’s Offices next door, and could use any damage we have available. ]

“Didn’t they do that last night?”

[ No, that were just another couple of POSes in the other system. ]

I sighed theatrically: “We really have to do something about LC’s Dreadnought addiction.”

Eta chuckled.

[ Actually, it was the Koalas: ‘Wouldn’t it be nice if we owned all the Customs Offices - no PI taxes!’ - ‘Yes - how many dreads would it take to take out a CO?’ - ‘I have a dread available!’ ...]

“...and then it snowballed.” I laughed. “That does sound eerily familiar.”

I pulled up my asset list .... excellent: I still had my POS-bashing Apoc in our home system.

“Any hostiles?”

[ None so far. ... oh, and I donated 100M from Corp funds to put up the new custom offices. I hope you don’t mind. ]

“Nope, no objections!”

I looked at the map, and then continued:

“Ok, I’ll have to head to the nearest outpost, but then I can jump-clone back to Empire and add my feeble DPS to the effort.”

[ Sounds good - I’ll let them know. Good hunting! ]

The channel closed, and I instructed my stealth bomber to head for our system’s gate. As my ship picked up speed, I briefly considered whether I should wake her - but dismissed the thought almost immediately: she’d only get shot at needlessly. I’d make it up somehow later.

The gate fired, dropping me into the next system towards the outpost, and I prepared myself for a long night ahead.

Avalanche

Corp Comms, 07:32:11

Druur Monakh > LC!
Littlecritter > Wazzup!!
Druur Monakh > Moving fuel...

Corp Comms, 07:49:37

Littlecritter > We so need to kill that POS out here "during the week while quiet". You need to pester the powers to make that happen...i am getting trigger happy.
Druur Monakh > Hmm.... do we need more DPS, or more Triage support?
Druur Monakh > You have more experience with Cap warfare in these matters - could we take out that POS by ourselves?
General Offense > Good evening!
Littlecritter > 2 dreads should take it down in about an hour....remote reps on the dreads would be a must
Druur Monakh > General!
General Offense > I heard the magic D-word...?
Littlecritter > I say we skip the guns and go right after the tower.....we can always take everything else out after it goes int RI
Littlecritter > I have never seen any of these guys out here while I am out and there is a very good chance we could take it out un-challenged

Corp Comms, 08:05:49

Littlecritter > you remember what planet moon it was at? I must have erased the BM
Druur Monakh > VII-M23

Fleet Comms, 08:14:06

Littlecritter > get into something cloaky and warp to me. Its off line
Druur Monakh > Offline again?
Littlecritter > unless this isn't the right one - this is a large....i thought the other one was a medium
Druur Monakh > That's the one - I remember the gun layout
Littlecritter > can you shoot it if its anchored?
Druur Monakh > Yep. Don't know about reinforced though
Littlecritter > fuck it my dread is here
Druur Monakh > Lemme get my HAC. Miniscule DPS, but best I have atm

Alliance Comms, 08:24:16

Druur Monakh > FYI we're shooting the hostile POS at VII-M23. It's offline, so any DPS is welcome
Littlecritter > X for fleet
Hawk Pathfinder > x
Vash Di > x
Hawk Pathfinder > is it shooting back?
Druur Monakh > Nope, it's offline
Hawk Pathfinder > kk SB it is then
Littlecritter > Lets take this biatch out!!

Fleet Comms, 08:28:54

Bremhan > Wo Needs fighters, have 5 left
Hawk Pathfinder > trying to fund more torpedo's
Druur Monakh > If that's a hint that I should train for Amarr Revelations, I'm not listening :)
General Offense > If you can jump me out to lo-sec I can get my dread
Eta Monakh > About 15-25 min - I am in a different system altogether
General Offense > anyone in lo-sec that can pop a cyno? I can bring my dread
Hawk Pathfinder > I can do one

Fleet Comms, 08:34:40

Druur Monakh > We needs more DPS :(
Littlecritter > It only has 45mil shields
Druur Monakh > 'only' he says :)
Hawk Pathfinder > no sleep until tis pos is down this time :)
Druur Monakh > We're going to hold you to it :)
Hawk Pathfinder > in position, General, let me know when you want the candle
General Offense > light it

Fleet Comms, 08:47:27

tolharn > what do we need amarr pilot or a hauler ??
Druur Monakh > Damage
tolharn > oh ok
Eta Monakh > Sis, you really should learn Dreads...!
Druur Monakh > Easy for you to say!
tolharn > have an abbadon here
Druur Monakh > This is improvised, so the most sustained damage you can bring, it will be good

Fleet Comms, 08:57:37

General Offense > Moros needs cyno opened in null
tolharn > can open one ya mate
General Offense > 1 min tolharn for me to recharge cap and then I need that cyno
tolharn > cool ill get it set now
General Offense > light it
Druur Monakh > Well, we seem to be at 85% shield on the POS already
Hawk Pathfinder > yeah is going down faster this time
General Offense > will go even faster when I get my dread there another 120k damage per volley
Hawk Pathfinder > of course it would go down even faster if I remembered to activate my missiles after a reload
tolharn > cyno up
Hawk Pathfinder > pockets nearly had a heart attack when you jumped out there :)
General Offense > lol

Alliance Comms, 09:09:50

Littlecritter > FYI we're shooting the hostile POS at VII-M23. It's offline, so any DPS is welcome
Tavi Calderon > where are teh shields at?
Littlecritter > I would say 75%
Tavi Calderon > does everyone have fighters
Hawk Pathfinder > not me
Tavi Calderon > cool - I’ll ring Kitai out
Hawk Pathfinder > need to kill it quickly. I said I wasn't going to bed until it was :-/
General Offense > General Offense could use some fighters

Fleet Comms, 09:16:47

Kitai Calderon > you guys ahve fighters now
Tavi Calderon > i will love to tell dns we took care of this problem! that will make us look good
Tavi Calderon > well done boys

Alliance Comms, 09:24:02

pockets62 > im on my way will b bout 10 min i can spaer some fighters

Fleet Comms, 09:41:56

Littlecritter > These guys will be in for a surprise when they log in tomorrow......shouldn't have let the fuel run out :)
Littlecritter > I have been dying to blow this thing up, and they handed it to me
Vash Di > I love the alpha on the Maelstrom..I just hate my short term memory loss
Vash Di > I keep fogerting to turn on the guns..:)
pockets62 > did u need carrier on feild ? or just drones
pockets62 > who needs drones only got only 7 to spear
pockets62 > im warping in aways just to look
Littlecritter > I see armor damage!!
pockets62 > i cam in time then yay

Fleet Comms, 10:29:37

General Offense > yeah 50% structure
Hawk Pathfinder > yay found some extra torps hidden at hanger
Littlecritter > 25%
Hawk Pathfinder > yeah it's going fast now

Fleet Comms, 10:32:31

Byrd Parker > awesome
Vash Di > WOOOHOOO
Hawk Pathfinder > yeeeehhhaaaaaaaaaaa
Byrd Parker > dreads off field now please
pockets62 > o/ party time
General Offense > waiting for triage to disable
pockets62 > ok im out
pockets62 > who got the final blow
Littlecritter > I got the final blow
Littlecritter > lol 32mil in damage :)
Bremhan > Sweet mate

Fleet Comms, 10:44:10

Littlecritter > Nice work everyone! For and unplanned hit it went very well....Props to everyone here tonight!!!
Hawk Pathfinder > drinks on the house
Bremhan > Cheers guys
Druur Monakh > Way ahead of you :)
Byrd Parker > well done all
Hawk Pathfinder > I'll start cleaning up POS modules, and come back after DT to do the rest.
Druur Monakh > Actually - special thanks to LC for noticing that this bloody POS was offline again!
pockets62 > THANKS LC!!!
Hawk Pathfinder > Booyah LC

Littlecritter > That my friends is how you make a statement! This is our space!!

Old Year, New Year

It is funny: after all this time - tens of thousands of years - humanity was still clinging to the concept of ‘years’, including celebrations of their turnovers, when the space we had conquered no longer had a meaningful single definition of a ‘year’. But as the Amarrian Empire continues to demonstrate: traditions are stubborn. And if they involve company and hearty drink - I wholeheartedly approve!

...assuming you don’t happen to be out in deep space, with nothing but your fully-automated CovOps to keep you company, and an outpost and a distant sun as scenery.

Judging from the latest messages, things in Empire were just going fine - even the latest war dec wasn’t much of an issue: the usual wannabe-scourges looking for careless industrialists. So far, the only fallout had been Eta’s bad mood, for having to online all those POSes yet again. In other news, a certain corp member had managed to clear the slate with the rest of the alliance, and things in our 0.0 operation are smoothing out as well. I should be happy that for once the corp works without having me to push things forward...

I was about to turn my ship around, back to our POS for an evening of light reading, when my sensors showed the arrival of a HAC in my vicinity.

Friendly. And also opening an encrypted communication.

[ Hey there. Pondering deep thoughts again? ]

“Yep. Wouldn’t you?”

[ Nope. Life’s too short for that. ]

“We’re capsuleers. We’re immortal!”

[ Still - There are many here among us who feel that life is but a joke. ]

I started to reply, but my visitor wasn’t finished.

[ ...But you and I, we’ve been through that and this is not our fate. So let us not talk falsely now, the hour is getting late. ]

“Now who’s having deep thoughts here?”

[ Not me - I’m just quoting something cool. ]

I laughed.

“And what do you have in mind for this late hour, pray tell?”

[ Dunno... you probe, I shoot? ]

“Nothing but Sanshas here tonight, sweetie.”

[ Then Sanshas it’ll be. Shall we? ]

An unexpected smile spread across my face - nothing like company when you least expect it.

“Yes. Let’s.”