Taking the high-sec hint and getting a Falcon

8th October 2012 – 5.37 pm

Fin, Aii, and two wormholes. What a pleasant start to the evening. The K162 in the home system comes from class 2 w-space, and my glorious leader reports that she's just resolved an outbound connection to class 1 w-space to go with the exit to high-sec empire space. That sounds alluring, and I'm sure Fin can handle whatever there is to be found, as Aii says that our neighbouring C3 has 'lots of sigs'. I'll go and help him sift through them.

I jump to C3a as Aii resolves a K162 from class 5 w-space, and as the system is scouted and empty I launch my own scanning probes to see what else there is to be found. Not much, actually. Ten anomalies and five signatures are plenty combined, but the anomalies need no additional scanning and can be ignored. Aii gives me a reference to the C5 K162, I have our home K162, which leaves me resolving the static exit to low-sec, a K162 from high-sec, and a vast gas reservoir for Aii's harvesting pleasure.

C3a is scanned and the class 5 system awaits. I jump through the K162 to a clear result on my directional scanner, and warping around finds a tower with an unpiloted Purifier stealth bomber floating in the force field. Maybe there is another K162 pointing to the source of activity, so I launch probes and start scanning the nine anomalies and twelve signatures. Along with five more pockets of gas to keep Aii busy, I resolve a K162 from class 4 w-space and a couple of radar and rock sites. I'd better keep heading backwards to ensure our gas harvesting doesn't get unduly interrupted.

Jumping to C4a has nothing interesting on d-scan, and warping around finds only an unoccupied system. Scanning doesn't find much more, apart from the expected wealth of anomalies, with no K162s being present, and I can only suppose that whoever scouted the constellation has since collapsed the originating wormhole. At least that limits the number of pilots who could be passing through, and C5a remains looking sleepy indeed. In the other direction, Fin has found more high-sec from the unoccupied C1 and has started looking at running logistics through the K162s from home. I'm going to keep scanning for now.

I pass Aii gassing away in C3a and exit through the K162 to high-sec, where resolving the four anomalies and three signatures gives me two more wormholes. A K162 from class 3 w-space is neat, but an outbound connection to class 2 w-space is neater. Jumping in to C2b has nothing close, letting me launch probes safely, and warping around finds a tower with no ships. Five anomalies are bookmarked and seven signatures scanned, giving me four more wormholes. The K162 from high-sec is dull, as is the static exit to high-sec, and the other K162 from high-sec surpasses the previous dullness by also being at the end of its life. The saviour to my scanning is the second static connection, which leads to class 1 w-space.

Two towers and a Badger appear on d-scan from the K162 in C1b, which gets me bouncing around the moons of the sole planet in range only to find the hauler unpiloted and unlikely to go collecting planet goo. I take a breath and explore the system, but all there is to find are rocks and a static exit to high-sec from the three lonely signatures. Okay, all this high-sec is getting the hint across that maybe I shouldn't shirk my responsibilities and actually pick up the replacement Falcon recon ship that we need.

Unsurprisingly, with seven to choose from, one of the high-sec exits puts us close to Amarr. And, conveniently, that one is the K162 from our neighbouring system, C3a, which makes the route short and relatively safe. I pass the still-gassing Aii, exit to empire space, and make the few hops to pick up and then fit a new Falcon, badly. I know it uses ECM, but that's about it. The important part is getting the hull and getting it home safely, which I manage easily enough.

Returning to w-space, and with a sitting target in a ladar site I can warp to directly, I test the ECM capabilities on Aii's gassing Ferox battlecruiser. That probably annoys him a little, as I drop his lock on the gas cloud, so with a successful test of the new Falcon I head home and hide so that he doesn't come to shoot me. It's been a quiet evening of mostly scanning, but finding gas, scouting, and replacing a support ship has made this a productive evening.

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