Long Time, No Peep...Thoughts On The Obvious
12 Dec 2022Scubadog
It has been a really long time since I've made an entry. And, to be honest, I've watched the 'verse spiral out of control. Commanders have stopped being commanders and have taken up being mercenaries, getting into fights on the ground. For stupid crap. Then, some damned fool decided that swatting a few Thargoids to keep them at bay wasn't enough...he had to come up with a machine to piss them off all the way OUTSIDE the galaxy. So, now they're hitting the Bubble with somewhat of a vengeance. 
I've been slowly adding more ships to my fleet, going through various specializations and upgrade. My beloved Python--which I primarily use for mining--isn't nearly as smooth and attractive as she used to be, but the additional rigging gives me added protection in those tight planetary rings and the additional lighting is seriously helpful. In fact, I took a shining to it so much that I spent a few weeks doing the same thing to my exploration Anaconda. When I set down on the dark side of a planet or moon to check out some interesting bits, the amount of light I can shed on the area is impressive.
So, out in the Colonia region life is much, much slower and nothing close to intense. The overwhelming majority of us who call it home pretty much stick to ourselves, and aside from the occasional "o7" we pay nobody no nevermind. I have more conversations over the wave with my Silverbacks bothers and sisters than anyone living around Colonia. We generally like it that way. We don't much care what happens in the Bubble. Even after that joke they call a "Colonia Bridge", it's done virtually nothing to change life out here.
With the Thargoid expansion of hostilities, many of use expected to see a fairly sizable increase in migrations out to Colonia, but that hasn't really materialized (thankfully). Galnet seems to think there's a danger of the Thargoids working their way out to Colonia, but that makes no sense at all. The Bubble is BIG. And, as busy as the Thargoids have been lately, it's still just a drop in the ol' bucket. They'd have to bring in a hundred of those "maelstroms" to even come close to taking over the Bubble, much less snake their way out here. If the Bubble burns, it burns.
Anyway, I noticed that familiar pang, so I new it was probably time to venture back out into the black. A two weeks ago I set to prepping my Anaconda for an extended trip...foodstuffs, repair materials, checking which modules I wanted to take with me on this trip. A week later, I launched with a plan to visit one or more of the old Guardian ruins that are sprinkled approximately midway between Colonia and the Bubble. I've been gathering a fair amount of planetary scans along the way.
After a week of travel, I finally settled on one of the ancient Guardian ruins sites to see if I could top off the Epislon pattern data (I have full loads of the rest).
Not finding too many obelisks with that pattern, I popped over to site 2, scanned a handful more, and then settled in on the bridge to watch a sunset on ancient history.
I could hear the low growl of the alien energy that had been awakened during my jaunt around the site, even as I left the bridge and worked my way down to my stateroom. I poured a bit of wine as I looked out the stateroom window at the last rays of this system's star. I finished the glass of wine, dimmed the cabin lights, caught up on news from the 'verse and, again, I wondered why anyone wants to live in the Bubble. I was born in the black, born in the Between. No world has ever been my home...not like there is for most folk. Even my home port out in Benzaiten system isn't planetside. It's a station. A pretty one, to be sure, but still just a station. Hell, even the Silverbacks' home port is a station, which suits me just fine.
So, will there eventually be a mass exodus? Doubtful. Humans are persistently defiant cusses, so I've no doubt the Bubblers will mount a decent retaliation. Likely, we'll either settle back into something like it was before all this mess with the Thargoids, or drive them out altogether. Either way, I don't expect any of it to affect me much.
It sounds like the Guardian ruins have decided to call it a night, seein' as that growl has died down and is barely even detectable. Looking out the window, I no longer see the blue-green glow of obelisks. I guess that's my signal to go to bed. I won't set an alarm. I'll wake up when I wake up, and then decide what I feel like doing. I have no pressing reason to high-tail it back to Colonia. Maybe I'll swing on to the outer rim and follow that back around to Colonia.
We'll see.