I apologize Chusa Hajime Hiroito-san. No insult was intended.
I am reporting from the Battleship Yamaguchi, where I'm stationed while my new Chimaera is outfitted. Several incidents to report today.
While patroling the border between Kyushu and Tau-29 I spotted a Train class transport and moved to intercept and scan the vessel. The vessel was traveling under the name of Fly.Arrow. As soon as it spotted me it turned to run towards the eastern edge of the Kyushu system, but I was close enough to get a full scan of his cargo hold which contained 3000 units of synthetic marijuana. Repeated attempts to contact the vessel were unsuccessful and it ignored all halt orders. He seemed perfectly willing to travel as far away from the core of the system as needed to throw off my pursuit. I issued a final warning that failure to halt could result in additional future fines and being added to the Kusari known criminal list. With no response I broke off the pursuit and headed back to the border.
Back at the border a small vessel, ID Vertis, dropped out of the trade lane and headed for the jump gate, a quick scan revealing that he was carrying a small quantify of Artifacts. Hailing him he immediately stopped and inquired as to the problem. He seemed genuinely surprised that the Artifacts were dangerous and prohibited. He had found them in an abandoned shipwreck and thought they were just a curiosity. He jettisoned the cargo and it was immediately destroyed. Seeing as he seemed new to the system and was genuinely unaware of the dangers and restrictions surrounding the Artifacts I allowed him to proceed without charging the fine.
It was mostly quiet for awhile and I spent the time practicing my engine kills in the nearby asteroid field, only adding a few dents to my already battered Chimaera, I didn't think the deck crew would notice anyway. Before long I received a hail from a trader by the name of Roy Jonsen. He was hauling cargo into Kusari from Liberty and was in need of an escort to Kyushu. I met up with the transport near Planet New Tokyo but sensors indicated that the known Blood Dragon gunboat "Haze" was in the area. I cruised into the trade lane and fortunately reached Shinjuku station without any interruptions, however scanners had briefly detected the gunboat in the are of the trade lane. Unfortunately before I was able to issue an alert another transport, Tarcil, entered the trade lane and a few moments later it was obvious he had been pulled out by the pirate.
At this point I made what may have been a bad call and chose to enter the trade lane again in the hopes of assisting the trader. Dropping out behind the gunboat I sent out an alert which was promptly ignored and opened fire on the gunboat, hoping that the distraction would allow the trader to escape. The filthy pirate instead decided to open up with all of the weapons at his disposal and destroy the trader before turning his attention to me. It had been clear from the beginning that I would not be able to bring down the gunboat alone and after a few minutes I was forced to fall back, my shield batteries completely depleted.
Reviewing the system logs it was clear that the transport crew had managed to escape before the ship was destroyed and their escape pods had been recovered by a rescue vessel from Planet New Tokyo.
The one piece of good news from the event was that Roy Jonsen did manage to get through safely and after escorting him through Kyushu I showed him the Shikoku Jump Hole from Kyushu. Jumping through ahead of the trader I was a bit surprised to see a pirate hanging right in front of the exit point. Seems he was a bit surprised as well and immediately cruised away.
The final incident, as my fellow warrior has already reported, involved the HMS Waterwitch. A Bretonia Gunboat class ship. Patroling in the area surrounding the Nago Station in Tau-29 a trader alerted me to a possible pirate near the trade lane to Kyushu. I immediately headed out and drop from the trade lane after a short distance, confronted with what was quite possibly the ugliest ship I've ever seen. Ever. And not scary ugly either.
A quick scan of the gunboat revealed that it was very heavily armored and armed and I attempted to pull back and avoid a confrontation. But my reaction was too slow, the gunboat opened up with its considerable firepower and with half a dozen missiles heading my way I was forced to eject. Fortunately for me the Bretonians were as sloppy as ever and did not notice my escape pod. Once the gunboat had cleared the area a rescue vessel from the Nago pulled in my pod. I caught a ride on the next transport to the Battleship Yamaguchi, and this is where I've been for the past few days. I expect to be ready for action shortly.
Oh, one last report. There was also a Zoner transport, Trader.Frey, that had intended to take Optronics to Bretonia. Apparently the pilot had fallen asleep in the trade late and he slowly drifted out quite a ways past the Jump Gate. I finally fired a couple glancing shots off his shield which seemed to jolt him from his nap and he responded to the radio hails a few minutes later. He turned back without incident.
