A Series of Fortunate Events

Roaming around today for a couple hours, netted me a whole lot of nothing.Eventually going and checking Pelille/Dour/Grispire, had me needing to get through a gate camp to get back home, so I ended up docking up in Pelille for a little while and doing other things. Coming back, darmwand was in Iges saying that he's been playing cat and mouse with a Retriever and Drake, while flying a Merlin. I undock and head to the Ostingele gate, thinking that there very well could be a camp there. The members of Friendly Players Alliance aren't all that friendly to pirate-kind. Nothing on scan as I come to the gate, I cross my fingers and jump through, into a nearly empty system. Success! Jumping gate to gate, I land on the Iges gate, as darm reports that the Retriever just docked up, and seems to have gotten in a Cyclone and left system, sure enough he comes right through me. Completely unsure about being able to tank gate guns, and break a Cyclone's tank in my nano Hurricane, I let him go.

In Iges, we turn our attention to the Drake that's still in system. Putting the call out to my cov-ops ally, he docks the mining barge he had been in and comes to help us out with the potential targets at home. With good directions as to where the battlecruiser is, one pass on the probes is all that he needed for the warp in, and soon enough, with darm serving as fast tackle in a Taranis, and myself sitting in a dual medium armor repairer fit Stabber Fleet Issue, we're in warp to the Radar site. Coming out of warp, it's empty. We must have just missed him. He's still in space, and has probes out, so it may not be our last chance. Telling the Cov-Ops pilot to use regular probes to find the various sites in the system, soon enough we know where they all are, and soon enough we see the Drake on scan towards another of them.

Once again we warp over there. Landing 60km away from the Drake, darmwand heats his microwarp, trying to get there as fast as possible, but sadly, the Caldari battlecruiser warps before the distance is closed.
About to warp off, thinking that's probably the last chance we're getting, we notice combat probes on scan. After double checking with our friend, and confirming they aren't his, we decide to wait and see what comes for us. Not having us wait to long, we see a Republic Fleet Firetail, Jaguar, and Wolf on scan. I start to think about changing ships over to the armor tanked, dual web Hurricane in my hangar, but that thought is interrupted when the three frigates land on top of the Stabber. darm takes the chance to warp off and grab something a little better for the situation, as I turn my guns towards the Firetail. Able to use my afterburner to reduce transversal, along with the added damage from my drones, the Firetail falls without much difficulty.

Wanting to take as much damage off the field as I can, I load explosive rounds into my guns and start firing on the Wolf when I get the chance. Having to micro-manage my drones as they're picking them off, the few hits that land, aren't landing all that solidly. darm is back en route with a Wolf of his own, but before he lands enough of my hits had been landing on the enemy Wolf that he warps off. Able to switch point over to the Jaguar, I still couldn't hit it very well. It pulled range on me and let me get a few shots in, while darm did most of the work to pop it.

As we were looting and salvaging, the drake comes back, with a friend. As I had ended up leaving a rep and my cap booster running for most of that fight, I had to warp out and grab more cap boosters. darm's ship was full of overheated modules at the time, so we weren't sure about taking the fight. It was then that Pugnacious Monkey came around, I told him about the situation, and soon enough we were in warp to the site they were in with a pair of Stabber Fleet Issues. Upon landing, they both left again. Pug decided he wanted to jump into a different ship, and headed away while I waited until some of the pirates that lived in the site took notice of me. Warping out just as the Drakes were landing. Landing back with Pug, who was now in a Cynabal, we went in again. This time landing right on top of the two Drakes, I soon called TIRANOSSAUROS primary, and we went to work on the legendary tank of the Drake. With both drakes hurling their missiles at my Cruiser, the incoming damage was fairly high, but with the afterburner reducing the damage, one rep did most of the work, with just pulsing the other to keep topped up.

Soon enough the first Drake had fallen, and the other pilot 0Power0 knew he wasn't going to get his ship out of this in one piece unless he paid us, so after some quick negotiations, all three of us were 25,000,000 isk richer.

I started writing this entry after all of that had gone down, but before I finished we had more to do in system. Our friends had returned, TIRAN had come back with a Myrmidon, along with Power still in his Drake. Having all the sites scanned down, we soon were warping down to go fight them, this time with myself in a Hurricane, and Pug in his Megathron (darmwand had to leave in the meanwhile). Heading through acceleration gates, that the Mega actually couldn't get through, they noticed us nearby and left towards a station. Following them, there was also a flashy red Cyclone there. After playing some games on the station for a while, the Myrm and Cyclone ended up engaging my nano-Cane, and if not for the neuts would have destroyed it, as Pug was getting his Battleship in range. With the two ships focusing on him, he de-aggressed, and managed to dock before I got back in the fight, where I grabbed the drones I had left behind, and warped out again.

Before too long, I noticed that one of the pilots went to an asterioid belt, trying to bait us, with a Retriever. Going after it, my eyes crossed as I went through the targetting routine, and ended up keeping a Veldspar asteroid from being able to warp off, whoops. Before long, the Myrmidon came into the belt, and I started doing my regular kiting around, but soon bounced off an asterioid which let the Myrmidon catch me with a web, and soon a scrambler. The Hurricane was dead in the water, and going to explode fast. Overheating everything, since it wouldn't last anyways, I put as much damage into the Myrm as I can, as his friend arrives in the Drake again, though Pug is also en route with his Megathron. With my Hurricane reduced to wreckage. I jumped into a Cyclone and warped right back in, as the Megathron tore one last hole in the Myrmidon's hull. With both the Drake, and the unaffiliated Cyclone in belt yet, I burned towards the Drake, which between our combined firepower didn't last long at all, at which point the Cyclone, who had been burning away warped off.

As we were scooping the loot though, a Machariel warped into the belt, and with neither of us wanting to deal with that, we left. I later returned to see all the loot was still there, success!

A crazy series of events, which has led to probably my most memorable night in Eve. Right up there with "Industrial Fury" from a few months back.

With all that, I bid you adieu.
Fly dangerous

'Chord