Confidence is a thing you must build

This is my first try at both piracy and writing, and I've done it in character (even though I don't RP :)) Tell me what you think :) It's a rough ride, the life of the capsuleer. One moment you're riding high, earning more ISK in a few moments than most middle class Amarrian families could hope to see in a decade, and the next, CONCORD revokes your Pilot's License for nine months, banishing you the the hell that is being bound to a planet, with the fear that you may never see the stars again. Thanks to some sweet talk and the shuffling of some hefty amounts of the almighty ISK, I was finally back where I belonged- space. A few connections of mine that go way back hooked me up with a few money making opportunities, but after being confined by gravity for so long, I found myself longing for a new adventure. Something cruel had arisen within me whilst I was barred from flight, and it manifested in the form of greed, and the desire to forcibly take what was mine. I wanted to take it from other immortals. Piracy was something I'd never undertaken before. There were whispers here and there, if you listened carefully, about how it could be done, but for my first foray into the world of crime I decided to take a road that had been well paved by my predecessors. So called "can flipping" carried with it minimal risks, and allowed me to avoid the pirate infested swaths of low security space, as I was one and they were many. I fired up the engines of my favorite Merlin, and began my hunt for lone miners, jettisoning their ore. After only a while of searching, I happened upon one of the more common sites in the world, a Hulk stripping down asteroids to bare husks, and a hauler shuttling back and forth between the miner and a station. Feeling lucky, I sped towards the can, and jettisoned one from my own cargo, swapping the contents in the process. I could almost hear the alerts blaring through the hulk as I began to orbit it, praying the pilot would take the bait. He didn't. The pilot instead opted to warp away, seemingly abandoning his ore. I halfheartedly began orbiting the can, hoping perhaps he'd come back in another frigate that I could at least have a bit of fun with. Imagine my surprise when a Hurricane battlecruiser warped so close to me our shields rebounded off each other, and began locking me as quickly as possible. My first instinct was to panic- the Hurricane is a swift ship, and deadly, until my computer readout caught my eye, and I learned that, rather than facing rockets and light autocannon fire, the Hurricane was lobbing 720mm slugs in my direction. Which were, of course, missing me by kilometers. I fired up my engine and rapidly locked down the pilots propulsion and warp systems, and began plugging away with my blasters, which were about as effective as throwing rocks. I felt a moment of pity for the hapless, obviously industrial pilot. His ship was obviously set up to trap much larger, mortal prey. There were no signs of energy neutralization, stasis, or warp disruption, and if there was any onboard systems capable of shield reinforcement, they were either offline or malfunctioning. I sensed victory, and after what qualifies as a small eternity (as it turned out he did have an extra layer of armor or two,) my blasters found his reactor. His ship blew apart spectacularly. Grabbing what I could, I made my exit in search of new targets. Fast forward a couple hours, and I still had yet to find another miner foolish enough to take my trap, when I found the same pair of pilots as before, happily mining away in the exact same belt. They obviously remembered me, for the Hulk immediately fled, leaving his cargo container behind. Leaving his container behind. Idea. I quickly hopped over a few systems and boarded my rusted, but trustworthy Badger MK. II, equipped with more cargohold expanders than you could shake a stick at. Seeing these two pilots back at their work yet again I warped directly to their can and nabbed the whole thing. This infuriated the Hulk pilot enough to instantly deploy five Hammerheads upon me, which my Badger shrugged off like so many gnats. I docked at the station, screaming at that blasted clone of Scotty to hurry up and flew back to the belt in my Merlin at a frenzied pace. To my immense delight, the Hulk was still aligning, flashing bright, beautiful red on my overview. I scrambled his warp drives to hell and back and began melting through his shield and armor. Once his hull was in danger, I hailed him. I gave the pilot my most winning smile. "Hello there," I said, "It's going to cost you 100 Million ISK to walk away from this." I felt rather charitable that day. "I don't have that much," said he. "I only have about 30 Million." I decided this was hardly sufficient, and that reducing his ship to scrap would be more fun anyway. It was. Before I could sift through the wreckage in hopes of finding a nice Tech 2 strip miner or three, his friend, having finally mustered the courage to help his compatriot, got to it first in a Thrasher. I was certain that this spelled trouble for me. The thrasher was a quick ship, and designed especially for killing frigates. As fate or luck would have though, he opened up on me with 280mm Howitzers, hardly the correct tool to hit a tiny target orbiting you at maximum velocity from about a single kilometer. He went down without much difficulty, and I... well I managed to come out of on top in my first small step into piracy, along with a much needed boost to my confidence in my own solo difficulties. But confidence is a thing you must build, and it is a thing you must destroy, before it becomes overconfidence. So soon, I hope, I will explore low security. Where I fully expect to die in under thirty seconds. Linkage: Hurricane Hulk Thrasher