Sender: Elliot Hines, Captain of GSV-Broadway Recipient: Gateway Shipping Administration Subject: Initial Flight Report, Gallic Commerce Raider Origin: Dyneford Inn, Littlewick Bourough, Planet New London Encryption: Moderate Priority: Medium
This'll be my first go at office work since a few years ago now, so here's hoping it all stacks up. First and foremost, I'll cover my first group sortie, then move on to discuss an encounter with one of the Roi's blasted raiders.
Yesterday, my crew and I were fulfilling several small contracts with pubs in Rheinland, Bretonia and Liberty to move some imported drink for them. Not much pay in it compared to ore, but the jobs are common and it's fairly safe. In transit, Captain Boreal of the GSV-Neptune and I got chatty over the company Neural-Net, and we linked up in orbit of Planet Manhattan to see about hauling some scrap out of the Puerto Rico system.
We worked our way over there (clumsily on my part, had to cough up a few thousand credits for some Zoner to show me the right jump hole), and found there wasn't much market for scrap hauling in Puerto Rico at that time, amazingly, considering the bloody -Junkers- there. Instead, Neptune led the way to Regensburg station in that mess of a system, Munich, where we picked up some proper aluminum ore, all ready for Bretonian industry to exploit.
We met up with the GSX-Odyssey and our very own CEO Alan Shepard (who I suppose will be reading this report, too - hello sir!) in orbit of New Berlin, and made our way out of the system and back to our lovely home House through the Omegas. As it happened, a dastardly pirate gunboat was picketing the jump gate into Cambridge, so Odyssey kept him busy talking while Neptune and I swung wide for the jump hole, sneaked past him all quiet-like. We managed to get the ore through to Southampton, though I will say, I'm still holding our CEO to the promise of delicious desserts. Where's my Maltese fried ice cream, Shepard?
Now, of course, to the serious bit. Earlier today, I was making the same run between Regensburg and Southampton. I made three hauls in total, but only two were successful, because on my second run, this bugger caught us as we jumped into New London from Cambridge. My second officer recommended we try to stick it to him with our Dulzians, considering he was a pretty fat target, but I took one look at that antimatter cannon and that notion melted away. He was spoiling to blow us to kingdom-come with all the warning shots he put on our shields, demanding we drop our cargo. We complied with the blighter, and he destroyed it right before our eyes. The most I could do was call him names and give him empty threats. We can't let these Gauls fly around unchecked!
