**** Incoming transmission ****
From: Danny Sutherland, patrol vessel Apollyon
To: IMG Guild Channels
Subject: Patrol Encounters
It was a busy day for Apollyon's crew. We started off with escorting a guild member towards Narita after meeting up by chance in Frankfurt. It wasn't long before we received a distress call from Java. Apparantly, the usual suspects were out in force again. However, upon arriving, we encountered nothing more then several strikecraft engaged with eachother. Cautioned to stay a distance as we'd only get in the way in close quarters fighting we observed a while, but as the fighting progressed it became apparant our assistance was not needed.
We then set course for Dublin. A brief checkup on Hood and a lot of chaotic communications resulted in nothing interesting. We encountered mr. Henderson near Essex while passing to the gate - but he too had nothing specific to report, short of some "TS-" tagged transponders - bombers that seem to have been declared pirates by the Armed Forces. We'll keep an eye out for those guys.
Cardiff was next on our patrol path, but it was as quiet as ever. One of the few mining operations that doesn't fall under regular attack, the Beryllium trade. We passed to Aland but there too everything was running smoothly. We docked and took on some supplies there.
Omega 7 was a different story. We received some chaotic communications and assumed it might be a ship in distress. It wasn't long before we found the cause. A pack of Hessians, and a Molly in one of their heavy bombers. When I inquired what in the nines a Molly would need to be doing in Omega 7, I was met with a request for credits, for my safety.
Well, that wasn't going to happen.
A fight ensued in which we, supported by a mercenary in a Virage, took out the Molly Barghest, Hessian Odin and Hessian Gunboat. They must not have been elite fighters - our shields did not even go down during the entire battle. The transponder IDs of the enemy vessels read:
YaphetS_Fanboi (Molly Barghest)
Count_Floyd (Hessian Odin)
Balduin (Hessian Gunboat)
While I hope this won't sour our relations with the Mollies and Hessians, we were acting in self-defense in this matter.
The mercenary vessel involved was "Gas.Mask", can be considered friendly.
I then invited the mercenary for a drink on Freistadt - we both needed to resupply. An hour or so later we resumed our patrol, and the merc tailed us for a while, probably hoping for more work. Wasn't long before we received a call from the north field. Apparantly a junker was stealing ore - again. We met up with the Pilgrim liner not far north of Freistadt and immediately engaged - IMG and Kruger vessels in pursuit both caught up fast. Junkers sure know how to make friends.
The Junker vessel's ID was "Columbia". And to my surprise, it set course to moor with Freistadt. I'm sure station security will have prepared a warm welcome for this idiot - despite my request to Freistadt to lock down moorings. I suspect this thief will be turned over to the Rheinland authorities shortly.
A further distress call came from the vicinity of the Stuttgart gate - We went to investigate but instead found three Corsair vessels lurking, sending a false distress. Quickly realising our own vessel was outgunned in this instance we withdrew to the mining field - with the miner's aid we'd have better odds. But the Corsairs did not pursue. We warned the miners of this ambush, and the Rheinland military eventually scattered the ambush.
A final encounter came a hour or two after this. We headed to the north field after an unexpected ion storm drove us back to Freistadt. We were greeted with the sight of a damaged Kruger Hegemon. When asked what happened, it became apparant there was yet another attacker. We got an intercept vector and set course to pursue. Another ore thief, this time by the name "Taykyostuph.Industries", was fleeing a Kruger mining drone. We intercepted and made short work of this thief in an assault transport. He managed to stammer something about "IMG should dislike Kruger". That being the case - we hate thieves aboard the Apollyon here.
The transport was offered it's survival on the condition of dropping the stolen cargo. It did drop the cargo - and promply vaporised it. The Kruger bot eventually destroyed it, assisted by our weapons until the vessel was too damaged to resist. Note to all miners - in case one of these bots goes haywire, they are not programmed for mercy.
****Transmission Closed ****
Wide awake in a world that sleeps, enduring thoughts, enduring scenes. The knowledge of what is yet to come.
From a time when all seems lost, from a dead man to a world, without restraint, unafraid and free.
Mostly retired Discovery member. May still visit from time to time.
