Commodity Futures
Author: Leehams DaWildabeast
Original post: https://pastebin.com/4ae47V6Q
Entry for the YC119 Pod and Planet Fiction Contest in the Eight Thousand Suns in New Eden category.
Captain's Log YC119, December 8. 02:05
Nothing eventful this round of scans, no activity, not even a rogue drone to speak of. Don’t know why I ended up with this backend system to patrol, or why anyone even has to. Nothing ever happens here.
Captain’s Log YC119, December 10. 02:13
Still nothing, same as yesterday, same as the day before that. I can’t wait for someone to come out here, would be a welcome relief to the boredom.
Captain’s Log YC119, December 11, 01:50
According to the patrol coming in before I went out, some random drifter ship showed up the shift before mine, but didn’t do anything except shine a light of some sort onto a few stargates before leaving. The wussies on that shift didn’t go fight it because “Oh, we don’t know what it will do, urrr.” Wish something like that would show up on my shift, I would easily dispatch of the intruder, no matter how insignificant.
Captain’s Log YC119, December 14, 02:51
Took longer than normal to finish up my rounds today, a wormhole popped up right at the end of my shift, go figure, and we had to investigate where it went. Go figure, it went to some random, uninhabited WH system. Something with potential even so much as shows up on my shift, and of course it ends up being nothing.
Captain’s Log YC119, December 16, 01:58
Some dudes in my faction apparently want to set up some sort of mining outpost in my system, since it’s so quiet. But they won’t even tell me where it is in system or what they want to build in it. Hopefully they build some bigger ships for me to fly in, I always wanted to be able to get a cruiser, this destroyer just gets so stuffy sometimes.
Captain’s Log YC119, December 17, 02:05
Holy shit, what the hell are they doing in that mining complex. Out of nowhere today, a small fleet of capsuleers showed up, attacked the mining fleet, obliterated the Battleships we sent to stop them, and then buzzed around the mining facility that was set up. They bothered to tell us where it is now, since apparently it is under threat of going down. But man, those battleships are supposed to be the pinnacle of our combat ships, and they went down so fast. What kinda tech do these capsuleers have?
Captain’s Log YC119, December 18, 19:15
Holy crap, I have never seen so many people in this system in the 3 years I have been stationed here. I am reporting early as we had a full system marshal of all forces to try to fight off the capsuleer fleet, but they brought a force like I didn’t even know existed. Hundreds of Battleships, dozens of Logistics Cruisers as support, and even a few Dreadnaughts and Force Auxiliaries. Naturally, we were cut down instantly, and I am now docked in the mining facility awaiting a new ship to be issued to me. The facility is stable for now, the shield generators were turned on to emergency capacity for 24 hours. Apparently, there is going to be a fight tomorrow that will be even bigger. I can’t imagine what that would entail.
Captain’s Log YC119, December 19, 20:27
I am beside myself, kinda literally. All that’s left is my own pod. The facility is gone, and so are all the ships that they somehow pulled out of that facility. I was straight up given a well-fit cruiser to fly when the capsuleers showed up, and we summoned a fleet of several hundred of our own, and they fitted us all with cruisers, battleships, and even 25 dreadnaughts. I didn’t know our faction even had that much at its disposal! But even though our forces were great, I was stunned when we undocked. There were at least 100 capsuleer capital ships next to the facility, including 10 freaking supercarriers and 5 titans. I thought that we were the biggest baddest gang in the region, considering we control the whole thing. For now, I’m gonna lay low from the faction for a while, since they think I am dead. As we speak, I am headed towards highsec and see what the application requirements are for entering the capsuleer program. Maybe one day I can be on that end of the fight.
Signing out, Johaan Karst Pithor Gurilla H-S5BM Patrol Squad Charlie Guristas Pirates