All right, the new and improved chapter 1.
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Chapter 1 - A small fish in a big ocean
Fifteen mizura later I had my ship, and after spending another ten mizura setting up the control interface and checking that the thing was indeed spaceworthy I was ready.
Uhm, yeah … Ready for what, exactly? I had myself and an undershielded, battered old Mamba that packed enough punch to kill a spacefly, and I was up against a man whose sole purpose in life seemed to be screwing people over. If not for the fact that the owner of the shop owed me big time I wouldn't even have the Raven, as Pa had done just about everything in his power to make sure I couldn't buy anything bigger than a toothpick.
All right, Val. Deep breath. What was it they taught you in the academy? Find out what you can do, and then how to apply it to the problem at hand? Well, since I can fly a ship and I'm decent at shooting stuff I guess I'll have to start there.
I had another problem, though. Trading. As in 'getting my mitts on basic stuff'. Trading with the Argon was out of the question, as Pa had outdone himself dragging me through the mud. The Boron hated me because Kriss, our resident rich kid, screwed up on a training mission and blamed me, the 'Nids just hated me for being Argon and the Split didn't give two flying dicks about it. That left me with Pirates, Teladi and Yaki, and the pirates hated my guts because I had used them for target practice on every possible occasion. So, Teladi and Yaki then.
That meant I could either try to cross Hatikvah's Faith or head south to Montalaar and cross into Avarice. Since I only had decent speed to cover my ass I was considering Avarice, but against my better judgement I opted for Hatikvah's Faith.
*beep*
What the ... A
Pirate bounty hunter? Someone put a price on my head!? My first idea was to try and shake him, but considering the fact that I was in a Mamba I'd have better luck taking a piss in the sea and expect to see it rise. I did have guns, though, and he got a taste of them right away. He lasted some two sezura under the onslaught of my HEPTs, before he turned to dust. He even left me a missile, which I scooped up and intended to sell first chance I got. Company Pride, here I come.
Hatikvah's Faith, and not much going on here. I checked the mission beacon on the rastar refinery, but that was just a 'Nid offering some star charts which I of course couldn't afford. Being penniless does have its drawbacks. Onward to Thuruk's Beard, then.
Ups ...
No wonder Hatikvah's Faith was quiet. All the action had moved to Thuruk's Beard instead, and although the Split were on the ball I intended to stay as far away from that clusterfrak as I could. At least until it cleared up, so I could get my hands on that abandoned Scorpion there.
Apparently I didn't stay far enough away, because I soon attracted some very unwanted attention in the form of the Mako and Elite, and a slew of Banshees. Betty went bonkers trying to keep up with the missiles they launched at me, so I did the only thing I could at the moment and ran screaming like a girl. I'm sure I screamed at one point too, as flames from those blasted Plasma Burst Generators licked around my cockpit and dropped my shields to zero.
All right, one thing at the time. First, get rid of the missiles. I kept refreshing the targeting solution until it showed the Banshees I had after me, then whipped my nose around and gave them a spray of plasma bolts. I seem to have gotten them all, as the missile warning died immediately afterwards and the Mako suddenly got occupied elsewhere.
Phew. That was a liiittle too close for comfort.
As the Split mopped up the last fighter I moved in on the Scorpion. As per interstellar law it was now mine to claim, and I intended to turn it into lots of delicious credits. But first,
cleanup duty. Yeah, it had to be at least a hundred and twenty grand worth of missiles floating around there.
So, after helping the Split clean up their space lanes it was time to concentrate on that Scorpion. The only thing I didn't like was the fact that I had to go EVA to hack the mainframe, so I took an extra turn looking for enemies before I parked next to it and got into my space suit.
Whoa,
free gifts? Oh hello, taxi missions. Now to patch this baby up and find a shipyard.
I had gotten it up to about fifty percent hull integrity, when ...
"Warning, one of your ships is under attack - Thuruk's Beard."
Suddenly the Scorpion was gone, and something flashed by my visor.
"PAC fire ...?"
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And that is definitely the end of that. Got a bad case of the dumbs there, but at least it was a quick one (in more than one meaning of the word).
It's gonna be weird not playing the game with a notepad and pen at my side, but since none of my DiDs have lasted more than two ingame days I think it's safe to say I suck at staying alive
And now I really have run out of ideas that doesn't involve uncomfortable amounts of rehashing old stuff, so this is
probably it. With a tiny bit of emphasis on "probably."
It was fun while it lasted, though. Thanks for reading
