I woke up this morning and checked my terminal for news, communiqu?s, manifests, Ageira logs, the works. There was little of interest except for a puzzling message from someone by the name of Bob Jackson on Ouray in Colorado. Apparently he and a group of his "buddies" needed help driving out "some no good Junkers" who were enroaching on their "turf. I was 'opin' y'all could help."
I headed off to Colorado after a shower and a (generous) dose of Cardamine. As I approached Ouray I was hailed and I responded with the question: "Die." They didn't take to kindly and began lobbing gobs of ionized silver (or whatever it is their weapons do, it's not effective that's for true) at me. One Xeno by the name of Wodan took my question personally, and rightly so. Shortly thereafter he complied.
After the Ouray went into some sort of lockdown, perhaps to prevent any more of their ships from being destroyed, I flew off to find patrols. I found only lone Starfliers, not enough to make them realize I wasn't there friend. I had several cunning schemes to bait them, I even tried mining silver (which I gave to some miner in the hopes that he might one day become worth pirating).
Eventually I gave up and decided to head home. Having lacked the excitement I had hoped for, I decided to fly past Manhattan. Before I got there I recieved a mayday from a Junker train in Texas heading towards the jumphole to New York. He was carrying Cardamine and under attack from the Liberty Navy. I told my engines to "engage that way," and they did.
I flew past West Point and picked up some nosy pilots who thought that killing me was an act for the greater good. Mr Andromeda, Johny Leroy, Alexis something, and a handfull more insignificants. Annoyed that I might lose out on a hold-full of Cardamine, I let loose on my pigtails -- navytails? -- with a sigh. And my Hellflurries. After some time what must have been some sort of mercenary came buy and told me he would assist me for half a million credits. Then he assisted me, despite that I politely ignored him. In the purple haze I couldn't quite make out if any other philanthropists were helping me as well, and I suppose there was because soon thereafter two ships (including the mercenary's) were destroyed.
There was Rogue chatter nearby, but they seemed occupied. They might have peeled off one or two of my... prey, but from then on it was me against Mr Andromeda and Mr Leroy, flying a Havok MKII and Guardian respectively. I focused on the clumsier of the two -- Mr Andromeda in his Havoc -- and we danced for a while. The dancing was quite one-sided -- unfortunately so for Mr Andromeda -- and the two eventually executed a tactical retreat on thrusters to West Point.
By now the Cardamine Junker was long gone, I cursed as I wiffed another dose of the wonderstuff. Speaking of wonderstuff, I should get an air-cardifier and hang it over my instrument panel.
At West Point there was a battle going on between a number of Rogues and a ragged assortment of LSF and Navy. Unfortunately, the Rogues were losing as I got there. Defeats, however, should always be viewed with the appropriate perspective:
With a smile on my face I headed for California and Magellan. I had not flown a thousand meters when I picked up two traders going the same direction I was. Unfortunately they were quite far ahead of me, but I pursued nonetheless.
One of them peeled off and docked someplace, but the other -- Nerelag was his callsign -- kept going. For some reason he headed off into the Sierra field and flew back towards the New York jumpgate. Perplexed as always I folloed a few thousand meters behind. We passed across the jumpgate tradelane and continued toward Alcatraz. Nerelag then broke off towards that icy and droll planet, Californa Minor is it? If I remember correctly I was now slightly less than two thousand meters behind. A bit too far to risk firing a cruise-disrupter, in my opinion.
I caught him near the Magellan jumpgate and we started dancing. It was little more than a line-dance for the Turanic Freighter, though. We went at it for I don't know how long. After my earlier prolonged fight with the Liberties, I had quite few mines, nanobots, and shield batteries left. Nevertheless Nerelag rarely hit me with anything but his Debilitators, so I was in no real danger. Unfortunately, he managed to place a mine that I didn't dodge -- call it luck -- which took out my counter measures and two of my Hellflurries.
My middle name is Persistence, and though I might not be as persistent as someone who's first name is Persistence, I'm quite persistent. I kept up the Viennese Waltz until Nerelag saught the refuge of Battleship Yukon.
With the mutual respect we seemed to have developed, we interchanged some secure coms with wishes of reunion and such. After Nerelag sent me one million credits, and after I sent them back, I finally made it to our very own ice field.
Mr Big was there, and we joined up.
I went to America to repair my ship. The fatigue hit me then and I decided to sit down here and write this before I collapse. On the bed. Over there.
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