The Catalyst slid out of the docking bay and into the pseado darkness of space. Billboards and the lights of the station glistened off of the ship as it pivotted and aligned for the beginning of a long run into Amarr space. Mike reviewed the first part of the plan as he guided his ship from gate to gate.

“Okay, this time I do go get the excaped slave. It is the same one who escaped before and she was the source of the information on the Caldari payoff. If we don’t get her back to the heir then the deal may fall through. Make it look good, make it look real. Easy enough.” Arrival and checking ninto the Amarr station was the usual cold shoulder as his record was well known in this region. While he worked well enough hunting Serps and Guristas his past of also hunting slavers was common knowledge.

Opening a private comm line to Mar he got right to business. “I’m heading up to the agent now. You manage to get in touch with the reporters?”

Mar chuckled. “Roger that, mainly ‘human interest’ reporters who want to do a piece on ‘going faster’”

“Well just make sure they all have access to the right things at the right time. You may want to feed them some stuff about how racing is getting an upswing, give them a contact to get sound bites from, like Quintrella.”

“Who is that?”

“Am I the only one who follows sports around here? Quintrella has been champion racer in assault frigs and interceptors, Ms Speed herself. Given your love of the fast boats I figured it would be a sure thing for you to know her.” Mike rummaged tapped his comm. “I used to have her number here . . . ”

“You’ve spoken with her?”

“Was working on a story. But anyhow, I’ll see if I can get you a current contact for her and it might give the reporters something to chew on until the main event.”

“Racing huh? Always thought I would make a good racer.”

“Ask her about it then. The league went quiet a while ago due to some sort of financial difficulties but I have always thought it could make another go of it.”

“talk. to. famaous. person. Got it. So I will keep lining up the audience but you have the fun part of managing the stage.”

“I’m on it. I’ll call and confirm once the first step is completed.”

They closed off the chat and Mike headed up to report in to the agent. This one had supercilious attitude that should have qualified him for a seat in the Amarrian High Theological Council as opposed to his current job of being the go between for a bunch of capsuleers. Mike grinned insolently as he sat down. “So, I heard you might have a job for me?”

“It is against our policy to allow a second chance to people such as yourself, but I am given to understand you excel at finding and retrieving small cargos.”

‘What sort of small cargo are we talking about?”

“A favored slave of one of the heirs, we have received information that she did not run as far as we had first assumed. IF someone moves quickly, and IF that person is not.” He sniffed, “squeemish then we can end this with a minimum of fuss. I might also add that the favor of an heir will go a long way towards swaying the opinion of those in power that you are beginning to see the light of truth.”

Mike smiled and bit back his first three choices of reply and settle for a nod. “We can only hope, eh?”

“Correct.”

The relevant data was uploaded to Mikes comm and he headed back down to the Boomerang. On the way he tapped his padd that sent a simple one symbol message. ‘1′

—————————–

One system away lovers embraced for what would be the last time. Their comms both chimed as the single digit appeared.

“I could be caught in a shuttle . . . ”

“No, we already discussed all this with Free. If we do not make it look authentic then they may suspect something. All our people are volunteers, they know what they are going into. But if this exposes that ship think of the number of people who will be released. I love you Jaliti.”

“And I, you.” She kissed him one last time and climbed into the escape pod which he locked down and double checked for integrity before opening the hanger channel.

“Right, we have one shot at this play and we want to make sure it is a good show for the folks. Try your best to shoot down this Azariah. He will be returning the favor.”

“What if he isn’t good enough and we pod him?” One young pilot called from his Rifter.

“I asked Free about that, she just started laughing. But tell ya what. You pod him we will come up with another plan and I will buy you drinks for the rest of this year, sound good? That goes for any of you.”

A roar of agreement filled the hanger as the pilots climbed into their little frigates and started to assemble outside of the station. Kilm was the last to hit vacuum and he sent the guards out to patrol for their expected guest. “Redstock to squad 1, report.”

+Nothing here+

“Squad 2?”

+ . . . damn it, lock him up. He’s coming right at me now . . . +

“Squad 1, move to squad 2’s position. Move it and be aware, target is in system”

+Roger that, Kilm? Nice working with you.+

“See you beyond the chains.”

————————————————-

Mike pivotted the Boomerang and kicked the afterburner again to head back through the pack. Eight ion blasters carved another rifter from the heavens and he grimaced. The overview lit as a new groups of ships arrived, one of them tagged as the probable escaped slave. He opened co=mm lines as a practiced eye checks cap, shields, and ammo. He activated a reload and swung wide around the new arrivals to buy time. “All I want is the girl. This doesn’t have to be your day to die.”

“She is NOT going back. Turn away from this now, capsuleer.”

Mike sighed and looked aorund at the wrecks already scattered in near space. “Bit late for that offer. Ready or not, here I come.” He kicked the afterburner into a high speed approach to close orbit of the first of the guardian rifters.

“This is you last warning . . .” Kilms voice was just a background to the roar of the ion blasters. ” . . . were betrothed since we were young. . . ” Another rifter popped and Mike looked for the next target, ” . . . now or face destruction.”

And then there was one.

Mike triggered a tight beam communication. “Well fought, now we finish this, be ready to eject when I hit hull.”

“I will do what needs doing. Just make sure 3 is as good as 1, for all our sakes.”

Mike swooped in and for the last time the ion blasters roared and another ship melted under the eight guns. One lonely pod flaoted free of the wreckage. “Aw damn boy.” Mike whispered, tears in his eyes. “You coulda lived through this.” He listlessly brought the pod into the cargo hold and confirmed the contents before warping back to the agent to turn in the ‘escaped slave’.

“When the Boomerang goes out, things come back.” Was all the message that he sent to the agent. His isk balance changed and he went to his ship to wait for the expected message.

*******************************

Lessons

There are some games within the game that some enjoy. Racing is/was an activity for a lot of folks and I, for one, would love to see it make a comeback. If you agree then make some noise and lets see what comes up.

Or look at this for another sort of sport.

Last is something common to a lot of corps, including even some carebear ones do some internal 1 v 1’s to keep practice up and generate some internal morale.

This is one of the great things about Eve, CCP may have made a game but they don’t mind if we make other games within it. We make our own goals, our own stories and it is all to the good. In channels I listen to folks talking about a quiet night where they only made a 50 or 100 mill. I feel good if I turn a profit of 3 mill in an evening? Do I feel like I am losing at Eve because of this? No. I am just playing at a different level, a different game.

Oh and I will try to get the next one done fairly quickly . . . all this to explain one winning . . . I am a fool sometimes

m

. . . and so we won’t be making drinks out of THAT anymore.

As I was saying earlier, Captain Jiorj is an OK guy but you can see the changes already. He just got augmented to be an egger and already he is acting all funny. He raced through training courses that would have taken a normal pilot far far longer to learn. Would you believe he has already finished all of the Career choices the the Republic Military offers? But he came down to tell the crew that we were shifting systems he looked more frazzled than celebrating.

We loaded up a destroyer and filled the cargo bay with fittings and such before heading out into space. He left behind a hanger with at least half a dozen ships in it. I asked him before we left what he planned on doing with them and he looked off into the distance and told me we would come back for them someday or he would donate them to the tribe so the next young pilot would have materials to work with. I got a glance at the accounts and he is sending home 10% of his earnings in tithe. Can you believe that? Now he is talking about sending ships home as well.

But like I was saying, he is getting different. It is almost like he is uncomfortable outside of that goo he flies in. It started when he took one of those training missons that involved him flying a ship full of explosives into a pirate base. He left all of us behind in the bay and flew it solo. When he came back in the small life pod he just looked at us, lined up in the hanger and shook his head before goin to report a successful mission. We had to add some crew to man the destroyer. If we move up to the battlecruisers we will have to bring some more kids up from the surface or else hire here in the station.

I dreamed of becoming a capsuleer like him, but now that I see the changes I wonder if the price is worth it. What is he losing, to gain those stars?

I will write again after we settle in a new system and I know what is going on.

Your Son

Nikolai

He still wasn’t comfortable in it. The pod fit well enough but the bloody thing handled poorly and moved so slow he felt like he ought to be mining on the way through systems. Mike kicked at the shiny new dash and triple checked the drone bay. Drone warehouse was more like it. Almost 30 beauties shone in the service lights bright glare. Not a one dented or burnt, yet.

He was new to the system and the agent for the corp he favored gave him a bloody easy hauling contract to start out with. That had taken too much time and payed poorly, Mike complained. The next one up had some meat to it and he wound up facing off against a few other battleships. It went poorly, for them. He brought home the intercepted viral package and probably saved some planets population that he would never meet and they would never know how close they came to disaster. Another day at the office.

The next mission “Should be easy” said the agent and damn if Mike didn’t fall for it. A simple escort, they said. Just go out and meet the convoy and bring it home, they said. Easy million ISK . . .

“When am I gonna learn?”

That was then this was now with alarms ringing and him grabbing onto the hand-holds as his . . . but that is getting ahead of the story.

The trip to the next system, uneventful. He triggered up the active defenses and set an intercept course for the friendly convoy. Coming out of warp brought that sinking feeling he knew too well. The convoy was NOT there . . . the wreckage of it was. He double scanned the area but nothing showed. He kicked the slug into ahead full and watched the scanner. Sometimes the attackers hope for an extra kill and hang about waiting for the rescue ships arrive.

He was already locking on before the automated systems started reacting to the sudden appearance of the drones. “Rogues, damn, I hate these things.” He glanced lovingly back at the monitor showing his own drone bay and whispered, “Not you babies, you I love, you won’t go rogue on me will ya?” A tap of a key cycled up the ogres and he sent them out after the closest rogue. A second glance made him curse and bring them back in. Damn that hurt . . . “Missile rogues? Where in Hels name are they getting missiles?”

OK, only four of them, four he could handle. He gritted his teeth and watched the shields buckle as he ground one after another into so much space junk. The third popped and he growled . . “Just one more and then it is . . what the . . . oh no.”

Bait, and he fell for it. All the rest now lit up and he was surrounded by rogues. In this boat there was no running for the outside and he hovered his finger over the warp button before switching and relaunching smaller faster drones of his own. They started chewing through the enemy as he did his best to keep the ship together and keep the attention of other drones. Boom, booom, boooom. His small dornes were making short work of the rogues, but there were so damn many. He watched his own armor vanishing even with the best efforts of repair units crawling all over it. If he could get to that tipping point where the repairs outpaced the damage . . .

The hull shook and inner structure seemed to scream. “That’s it . . . come home babies.” He tapped the return call for his drones as the damage started to sheer through hull. As soon as the last one was inside he stroked the warp key and grinned, a grin which faded as the warp did not kick in. “What the?” The second layer to the trap became very clear. In the huge mix of rogues out there was a warp scrambler, maybe more than one. I didn’t matter. he was well and truly . . . “Dammit Domi” he grabbed the hand-holds and the pod shot free as the last of the hull buckled and he floated free of the ship. Sadly he looked back at the wreckage of a battleship that had been his, once and all the rogues moving in to ‘feed’ and set the course back to a home system.

As the stars seemed to stretch out he looked back one last time and whispered. “damnit domi . . . ”

*******

Lesson. Missions, don’t get cocky, don’t get trapped.

Assume, when you hit L4’s that there will be webbing and scrambling and all sorts of bad things happen to you. Even carebears who mission need to know a bit about ewar and all the implications. Don’t get to focussed on the one ship you are fighting so much that you are not aware of what the rest are doing.

Oh and never, ever, fly something you cannot afford to lose. That one hurt, not for the cost of the ship but for the fittings and all my lovely babies.

A memorial service will be held, all donations to the Lost Drones Home may be made to Mike Azariah, ingame