Demigoddess with a Conscience

So I was in my Nightmare in Penirgman (Parud Constellation, Domain) and my agent had me go investigate a series of deadspace pockets in system. Rumor had it that the Arch Angels had set up a base in the area and that they were preparing a major staging in Penirgman. So I was sent in to dispatch of the Angels.

While I was busy dispatching (they have really crappy ships compared to the Sanshas, I might add), a Catalyst warped in and started looting and salvaging the Angel wreckages I left behind. I cleaned the pocket from any remaining Angels and then moved about 20 kilometers off the Catalyst and melted him.

He warped his pod out and I expected him to return, so I warped back to my home station in the neighboring system.

I suspected that he’d be waiting for me in Penirgman so I dusted off one of my old acquisitions: The Sansha’s Phantasm. A wierd ship to be sure, but what performance! Fast, agile, sturdy and capable of raining death upon an unsuspecting foe. I jumped back into Penirgman just to check and yup, he was sitting on the gate in a Dominix. Right, a cruiser up against one of the most feared battleships in the universe, I don’t think so. I slammed my microwarp drive and quickly increased the distance between him and me. He apparently understood that he had no chance of catching me, and warped off. This was my cue. I warped back to the gate, traveled back to my station and had my hangar crew refit my Nightmare for close range brawling. Mega Pulse lasers instead of Tachyons, energy neutralizer, warp scrambler. I was going to be ready for this.

Just about finished with the refit I docked my pod into the interface and requested undocking permission, which was swiftly granted. Back in Penirgman there was no sign of the thief but I expected him to be back soon. Funnily enough as I entered the third deadspace pocket, there he was. I quickly sent a comms message to the only corporation member online, King Klown, and asked his position. “5 jumps out and in a Falcon.” he reported. My heart skipped a beat.

The laws of engagement in high security space forbade him to fire upon me now but I was free to fire upon him. I figured that with a Falcon on my side, what could go wrong? I locked him up and rained hell upon him with my megapulses.

His shields crumbled after the second volley, his generators overloaded by the sheer power of the lasers. His response was fast and while not too unexpected, horrible. My insides froze over as I felt my capacitor completely drained ef energy. “Where the fuck did my capacitor go?” was all I could think. Then I saw the crackling torrents of neutralizing energy emanating from his ship. “A neutralizer Domi…great”. Guess Klown will have to pick up the pieces of my ship.

Not ready to give up just yet I committed myself entirely to the fight. Both our warp engines were disrupted beyond usage, and we were close together. His drones fired volley upon volley on my shields while my lasers slowly ate through his massive armor plating.

I was having serious issues keeping my capacitor up in spite of the heavy capacitor booster I had fitted to run the very demanding shield booster system that was on my ship. Gigajoule after gigajoule was streamed into the shield generators, rejuvenating them as the onslaught carried on. Suddenly I heard Auras wonderful voice tell me that the capacitor was empty again, and that I had no energy to fire my lasers. Soon the shield hardening failed and even my Damage Control, which required only a token amount of energy, failed.

As his drones were the greatest threat I locked them up and sent my own drones on them while I kept my lasers on his ship. Every cycle of the cap booster gave me enough juice to squeeze more shield boost cycles and volleys out of it. I was hanging by a thread now. I was really starting to think this was a bad idea when my warp disruptor and webifier sputtered and turned off. Another cycle of the cap booster and I was up and running again while the Dominix still wasn’t taking structural damage. My shields were wildly flinging between 20% to 40% power with me boosting them every time I had cap to spare.

However, just as Klown uncloaked the Falcon right next to us, the Dominix shuddered and exploded in a brilliant flash. Apparently, he hadn’t fit an armor repairer to his ship and my onslaught eventually punched through his armor plating and breached his hull.

With Klown on the scene I cleared out the last of the Angel pirates and the final wave angrily entered the scene. Woop, would you look at that, a Hyperion on my directional scan. The ID signature was unknown at this distance, but I instinctively knew it was the same guy. He was actually coming back? I finished off the Spider Drones that were sent on me by the Angel commander, who was spouting profanities at me over the local channel, but I couldn’t kill him because he was way outside of my scorch range (about 71 km away).

Suddenly, the Hyperion came screaming out of warp. I told Klown to stay cloaked and I opened up on the Hyperion at 35 km away. His shields melted like butter and was down before my lasers had cycled a third time. Once the lasers started hitting his armor plating he was taking less damage and was reparing at an impressive rate. I assumed he’d learned his lesson and fitted a repairer this time around. He came burning towards me at high speed, probably with an afterburner on. Once in range my warp core went offline and my sublight engines went to a crawl as his scram and web hit me. Heavy fire from electron blasters slammed into my shields but I was holding. Four Mk II Ogres came roaring at me and they made quite an impact on my shields together with the blasters.

In standard order I sent my drones after his and they got rapidly chewed up by my faster, smaller and nimbler Hammerheads. My enemy realized that his drones were rapidly getting lost and retracted them. I told Klown to decloak and apply his magic, which he did. The Hyperion’s electronics, sensors and backups failed as Klown showered the gallentean battleship with wave after wave of interference from his ECM projectors.

Our enemy managed to compensate for the interference and locked Klown’s fragile recon ship and sent the Ogres on Klown as he was well outside blaster range. The four heavy drones almost obliterated Klown’s shields in a few seconds, and I desperately locked them up and fired with my scorch amplified lasers. Four volleys later the drones were space dust and Klown was safe. The Hyperion soon exploded under the burns of my heavy neut and megapulses.

Just another day missioning.

Look at this place! It’s all just a massive mess of old datapads, leftover foodstuffs and only the gods know what.

It’s been a while since I came here, my old offices in the Caldari backwater system of Isseras, Sela Constellation in Lonetrek. We had a small office set up in the Perkone Factory station at VII – Moon 6 way back. Something we rented with the bare scrapes of our wallets.

What times we had back then! We were flying cheap frigate, because quite frankly, we couldn’t afford anything else. We spent most of our days dodging Guristas, that were looking for targets, in the belts around Isseras trying to make a living mining. Sure, it was tough times, but it felt like we were really working for something, you know? Making a living, having a goal and all that.
As I looked around the old office, hazy memories trickled through my mind. I found myself missing my old adventurous friends: Dasone, Malachim Caldach, Lexx Looter and the others whose names I can barely remember anymore. Still, it has only been a little more than two years since then. How times change…

I popped another booster in, and cringed as the liquid in the capsule burned my tongue. I hastily downed a cup of water to get rid of the sensation.

I was so innocent back there, with hopes for the future… and look at me now.

With a long sigh I took another look at the market to oversee the final signings. Another Armageddon was transferred to my ownership. I always loved Amarr ships for their sturdiness, and the sheer power of lasers under my command is a thrill that is hard to top.

I shivered as the effects of the nerve sticks slowly set in. With a deep breath, I could feel the stress running off me like water. I eyed the crew roster of the Armageddon over with an increasingly callous look. There were names there I probably should have cared about, yet the thousands of names glazed my eyes over and I found it didn’t really bother me anymore.

Hell, I worry too much…