The Alacritious
14 Dec 2015Myshka
My excitement mounted when I heard back from the Distant Worlds expedition organisers. It would be leaving in the New Year, and the mustering point would be the Pallaeni system. Everyone was welcome to join, but would be expected to pull their own weight. The pace would be strenuous, expected to be 10,000 LY per week with several rallying points along the way. The expedition would not be able to wait for stragglers. Also, to reach Beagle Point itself would be very challenging. Cmdr Kamzel had had to make jumps in excess of 33LY to reach it.This was not news I wanted to hear. At best, my trusty Courageous would only make 24LY or so. Too slow for the main expedition, and impossible for the last section. Would I turn aside from this opportunity, or rise to the occasion? Research indicated only a few ship classes could be outfitted to suit, with the most highly recommended being the aptly named Asp Explorer. This was well outside my price-range, even if I traded the Courageous in.
As I was still wont to do at the time is to pop into Leesti on my current trading runs, and catch up with Erasmus for a quick drink or bite to eat, updating him on my progress. As I explained my plight he winked at me in his knowing way, and mentioned that in an effort to attract more pilots, Li Yong-Rui was currently offering a 15% discount not only on ships, but equipment as well. With some careful accounting and a few more lucrative trade runs enroute, I just might be able to scrape enough together for a basic Asp! It seems that I was destined to join Distant Worlds!
Not long after I plotted a route to the distant Sector ensuring each jump would net a nice profit and got going. Things went quite well; in fact I started taking on some missions as well along the route. In one system I even assisted in a local faction war for a while, which netted me quite a lot of profit. But after very nearly losing the "Courageous" in a firefight I decided to take the less profitable, but safer, option and continued trading.
Eventually I reached the LHS 28 system where I eagerly browsed the ships for sale. Surprisingly I only needed to trade in a few of the more expensive subsystems on the "Courageous" in order to purchase a brand-new Asp Explorer! Considering I was going to be out in the void for quite a while, I figured the new-ship surcharge might be worth it in the long run - I did not want to find a half-bodged repair from a previous owner when 10's of thousands of lightyears away from the nearest dock!
So I put in an order for a basic outfit and even plumped the extra to get a custom paintjob - Gold Pharaoh - and booked myself into one of the station's hotels to have a relaxing day or two while the ship was being prepared for her new owner. I deserved it after the recent stress!
The next morning I got a call that I could inspect my new ship, a Lakon Asp Explorer, which I will be christening the "Alacritious".. she would be ready to take on a maiden voyage the next day!