Plus one.
I connect. Unsurprisingly there is not a lot of urgent or important mail to read. Information? Yes, but nothing world shattering that requires my attention. I have been keeping in touch via mail and forum, so I’m not entirely out of the loop. I join voice chat, say hello to some corpies and visitors. I feel like I have been away for a very long time, but it’s only a few weeks.
It’s summer and summer is usually a quiet time. From what I can tell, it’s been very quiet. Everyone seems to be biding their time, waiting for Aegis to be deployed.
AJ tells me we have new neighbors. A small corp has moved into the area, into a system that we claim in the sovereignty by occupation model that occurs naturally in NPC space. Rumor has it they want to talk to a diplo about getting positive standings. He jokes that we should have them talk to KT, whose idea of diplomacy typically starts and ends with torpedoes.
I make a note of the corp name and mull over an appropriate response.
My Neocom flashes: We have a low fuel warning on one of the POS. So I get out of my Griffin and get in a Crane. Dig through the hanger and find fuel. After the first trip, I remember how long this is going to take flying a Blockade Runner.
There’s a neutral Wreathe on the undock when I return to station, going to warp. I dock up, grab a Flycatcher and go hunting. 2 gates to choose from. Of course, I choose poorly and he’s off and down the pipe.
He is probably someone you know, flying incognito.
Back to base, I get in a Bustard named Terrible Ship. While I do like the size of the Fleet Hanger, I can’t stand how she handles. I am absolutely horrified with how long it takes to get into warp. It’s awful. I remember to pulse a cycle on my MWD to bump speed up and shorten my time to warp.
Terrible as it is, it makes short work of refueling the POS. I top off a second POS before I head back to the barn and park the Transport ship for another six months.
More corpmates and blues log into comms. I give them an update on what is keeping me from being around more. I link them my Jackdaw fit, a ship I built 2 weeks ago but have not yet flown in combat. 2 weeks ago, I was patroling our space solo, looking for action that never came. Today, I am doing household chores, and it’s quiet in space. Damn quiet.
Maybe you should start up your PI again?
Three hours pass quickly while I talk and listen to my friends. Omega gets me up on my soapbox for a time, and we laugh: everyone knows that they can get me to stay later if the conversation is interesting enough. And I remember for the second time in as many weeks that it’s always the people I miss when I am out of the capsule. My people.
It’s never really been about the spaceships.
Minus one.