A Logged Week
16 Apr 2018S. O'Brien
Suddenly being well off enough to sit around in a station, working odd jobs, and eating great food without spending a single day in a ship... makes someone very boring to be around. The payout for building Colonia and the exploration data for all that uncharted space left me as just that kind of person. Drowning in money and unwilling to do something dangerous and interesting because of it. Without a goal, how am I supposed to want to fly?I thought maybe playing the Power Play games of the major factions would bring some joy. But even supporting Felicia Winters via gunfire and propaganda wasn't enough to really keep me going (plus it was hemorrhaging money). Then, in the worst of possible explosion of inspiration, the Thargoid war reached a boiling point. No longer were they attacking random ships in space, or stopping corporate megaships from operating. They struck stations. Rumors of Medusa-class Thargoids tearing apart stations and the Major Powers building all new fleets just to combat the threat finally gave me some purpose. Unfortunately I'm also very behind on a combat commander's connections.
First Thing's First - 13 APR 3304
If I'm going to take on the Thargoids in any meaningful way, I need better equipment. A corvette class ship, with fighters and these new Guardian weapons are the best bet. Since I'm already ranking through the Federation, I figure I might as well work towards the Federal Corvette rather than an Anaconda - it's more money, but it's a Federal support ship I can get behind. I can work on getting promotions at any time, but I have a lot of ground to cover on funds and Guardian equipment. My time in Colonia really dragged me from all the new tech in the Bubble.
From what I've seen, the Guardians lived in the Rigor Sector, leaving ruins and such on planets with all sorts of tech laying around. I'll spend a week out there soon, but first I need to meet a man named Ram Tah, who specialized on these ancient aliens - and possibly some FSD upgrades from Farseer...
- Ram Tah - Meene System
- Requires that I know Lei Cheung
- Turn in 50 Classified Scan Data Banks (I can get these by scanning Transport ships while doing everything else)
- Engineer Lei Cheung
- Requires that I know The Dweller
- 200 Units of gold
I need to make contact with some engineers... I can't make a dent in any goids with my AspX and a few seeker missiles (I hear those can't even lock on). My options are Farseer (who needs Meta Alloys) and The Dweller (500,000 Credits). Clearly, I have one of those at hand. The Dweller sits in WYRD, which happens to have some booming Fed factions near by that can help me pull in some promotions.
On the way from Rhea to WYRD I made a stop in Charick Drift for a boost, thanks to my inability to bother to read about other commanders' discoveries, I found the Generation Ship Atlas... a ship that was discovered a year ago. The logs on that ship... are devastating. I took some photos and saved those logs for my own records.
I'll have to dig deeper later on to see if they ever started a colony with the escape pods they launched. They said they'd name it after the engineer that stayed behind, Tom Edwards.
Sometime between making my plans and flying out to WYRD, power in the system shifted to Mahon, while I'm still under the Winters' flag... meaning the engineer's base is no longer in friendly space. Checking with friendly forces is an option, just to see how dangerous it might be, but no one's ever called me patient. Thankfully, no trouble making my way there.
Incidentally, the system is apparently well known for ganking people just making their way to the engineer. Guess I lucked out.
The Dweller is an interesting character, not really a fan of the Federation (likely due to his criminal onionhead operation), but willing to help a commander regardless of their stance on the matter. His power distributor work is top notch, and should help keep my stuff from burning out while I test new equipment. With that finished it seems that Lei Cheung is ready to hear from me, just need to work with 7 more markets (weird business requirement) and about 2 million credits in gold...
Epsilon Eridani - 14 APR 3304 1:04
Holy shit, Hutton Orbital is no joke! At 0.22ly from landing that might have been my longest star-to-station trip I've ever made. Nothing like the week it took to Colonia though, eh? I gotta say though, 125 cred for a mug 3 hours through frameshift might just be a ripoff.
Fortress Cousens has good combat work, closer to landing than Alpha Centauri has anyhow; and after that grueling 3 hours flying just to make CPO (thank you very much), I could use a break. Thinking I'll sight see a bit and drop off some non-local bounties before getting back to work (better than losing about 25% on that new interstellar business). Of course, not 15 minutes into hitting random systems (trading at new ports) and Lei Cheung contacts me ready to deal. Just going to take 2 million credits in gold from Mercury loaded up into an Siuil... sure... sounds wonderful.
Look, as much as I love an Siuil, it is neither a combat vessel nor a transport. There's no way 200 tons of gold is getting taken across 3 jumps and surviving an interdiction - doesn't matter if I have seeker missiles attached to the damn thing, that was for ring rats not protecting gold that makes her ass drag!
Three deliveries - and somehow no interruptions - later and Lei has me set up with wider sensor angles and a few other minor modifications. That's enough for me to hear from Ram Tah. Unfortunately even with all my running around today I haven't found more than 12 of those damn databanks. Still, one step closer to the Ancients.
LASAK, Trader's Rest - 14 APR 3304 19:43
Short note, again no one called me patient... Nor I suppose, organized.
Classified Scan Databanks are a pain in the ass. All day I've spent on the stuff and I still only have 15! I can only find them by scanning transports or lucking into them on scans in salvage locations. Gonna go back to working for the Fed and maybe some of those targets will drop enough before I get a Corvette.
HIP 9599 - 16 APR 3304 5:37
I just couldn't take it anymore. Fighting petty wars, stealing or delivering useless corporate data. Every time I opened the galmap I saw that string of broken stations, the millions of lives lost to Thargoid attacks. I couldn't just sit around and watch anymore, I had to help.
Guidoni Enterprises is the most recently hit station in the area and the Pilot's Federation sent a ship to help with the rescue effort. As I entered the system though, other than the number of Thargoid signatures blotting out my nav menu, the first thing I saw was the number of conflict zones. HIP 9599 Comms Industries and Allied HIP 9599 Defense Party were having a civil war in the middle of an alien INVASION! Unbelievable! These stupid factions can't even stop fighting while their star system is on fire.
It took me a little while to get the hang of heat management in the middle of a burning station, not to mention operating a limpet controller since I haven't really been one to mine or collect much (probably the start of my materials issues) but eventually I got to work helping survivors and escape pods dropped into the docking area. Thankfully the PF brought along a ton of heatsinks and extra utility hardware along. I think I made 10-12 trips all together before my ship's thrusters started acting up, should consider getting those looked at by an engineer too. There's still so much work to do here. So many lives still left in the air on that station. I'll be working the relief center with Aldo Porter while they fix up an Siuil, then I'll get her back out into the frying pan to try to make a dent.
-S.
I've never seen her so banged up; not pirates, not three round trips to Colonia, nothing. I'm not done working towards that guardian equipment... but I can't just leave this alone.