Deceit, disconnection, and destruction:
Mining is a very boring profession. Hours upon hours spent in the belts cause most miners to be very social when encountering others of their creed so long as the other occupant of the system has a positive security rating. I was no different but my motivations ran a bit darker than boredom as I struck up a conversation with a fellow miner in a low security system. We prattled on and on about ore intake, preferred mineral types, the virtues of hauling your minerals across New Eden for better prices and many other inane threads of thought (A realization struck me. I was this boring.). We filled the time with chatter, but we were both experienced miners, as I learned when I warped into the belt he was working. He was far from the warp in point and aligned for what I assumed was a planet. He flew a retriever and had mining drones out, which told me that he had absolutely no combat capability. I politely waved to him in our channel and warped to another belt. What he did not realize however was that I had bookmarked an asteroid near him. I mined one more cycle, deposited it into a jetcan along with another item of import and mentioned some latency issues in our channel. He expressed sympathies as I logged out. Hoping he believed it to be a disconnection I awoke my scourge, and the hunt began!
Cleared for publication by: Ander, next time put your images on eve-pirate.com please.
My speed was exemplary, reminiscent of primal lightning itself, but it was no use. He was gone as I slipped out of warp right where my prey should by all rights have been. Sweeping around me, my sensors picked up his trail again and narrowing the scans singled out a moon as his most likely location. Suspicious, I altered what my sensors searched for and nearly growled in annoyance. A starbase.
I contemplated moving on but as I pondered it, refreshing the scan as a matter of habit, he was gone! Was he blind?! Or, more insultingly, did he not consider me a threat? I waited to pick him up again and did easily enough at an ice belt in the system. My ship lunged forward and barely constructed a warp tunnel before it collapsed, depositing me at the foot of an ice belt that was humbling in size.
I spotted my elusive catch at the midpoint of the belt, nearly hidden amongst monolithic spars of frozen material. A quick burst of speed launched me into warp and I emerged very near him, garnering a very rude response in local even as my targeting systems gathered a firing solution. His warp drives scrambled to Nifleheim and back, I forced him in place with webs and hit as hard an acceleration as I dared in a tight orbit. He had no drones when I last laid eyes on him, but his stint in the starbase could have easily changed that. My autocannons roared, spitting fire and steel into his shields as the barge groaned in protest rolling, turning its considerable bulk in the direction of his starbase. I felt a sliver of pity as he vainly accelerated. He must realize that there was no escape. I was on the verge of opening a channel and demanding a ransom in exchange for his ship when my eyes flicked towards the local comms net....
I snarled in anger at the insults being spewed at me and redoubled my attacks, until the barges shield emitters shorted and the light armor plating began to splinter and break apart. Soon enough it became difficult to see the hull beneath through the floating debris until the cloud of metal was lit from within by an explosion that rocked my Rifter class vessel back a few meters and created a beautiful wave of wreckage. My sensors had just begun a targeting sequence when he escaped in his life pod. One day I'll upgrade those systems....
I gathered some spare parts from the wreckage that my pious half might find interesting (I doubted it, but after being so boldly insulted I had no intention of allowing him to mitigate his loss somewhat), and maneuvered out from between the ponderously turning giants of ice. My warp engines flared to life and I was gone.
A quarter of an hour later I returned in my law abiding guise, but he was gone from the system. Hmph, good riddance. Eve has no place for the impolite.14 Comments
I can't believe pricks who pirate around, and bitch when ppl get pissed. What, you expect them to smile back when you blow their expensive ships?
You expect gf in local from a retriever?
I'm not a zealot, but this is simply stupid.
No, here's the thing. When a pirate blows you up, you don't have to go "OMG ur so aewsome thx for pwnin my sh1p!!!!!!"
But, you also don't have to smacktalk, and that's what this guy's target did. If you wish to keep away from a pirate's targeting sensors as much as possible, BE COOL ABOUT IT when you die. I mean, expressing displeasure is great, and to be expected. Just don't shower him with insults, it'll just make things worse.
Taking down an unarmed lone miner is not big or clever.
You must have been desperate for the kill mail.
You deserved all the abuse he gave you.
Great write up. Excellent use of trickery. Forget what the whiners say, this game is made for PvP no matter how you do it.
All I have to say to the naysayers is that piracy in my definition of the word in no way mandates a fair fight, or an even fight. As for the smack talk, as a long in the tooth miner I've been pirate food many times and I never smack, because it accomplishes nothing. They got me because I got complacent, my fault that I learned from.
Who the hell mines in lowsec anyway? You're asking for trouble, and it's not like it's worth it.
To some point, i agree about using STRONGLY abusive language. But, you attacked. The thing that botheres me is your high and righteous bitching about your victims smacking in local. Spamming local is annoying, but polite and healthy F* you is in order.
Let me tell you what i think about you.
What most of pople writing stories here do (freaky ftw), is like hunting. Like bears or boars, or whatever that can bite back. What YOU do is like white man slaugtering buffalo.
But whatever, i know what to expect, i always fly in my pvp setup, and i don't mine.
All i resent is your fake morality.
What you fail to mention is that the other writers or hunters are experienced in their trade,where as I am not. Five drones aboard a retriever would have likely twisted the ending of this escapade. Furthermore my targets are those of opportunity, and I choose miners since they are the earliest piracy opportunities. At no point do I express a stance on the moral implications of my actions, merely a distaste for flinging insults. As for my false morality, that is an understandable view since my first posting was accidentally destroyed (The likely culprit being myself). I single out miners allied with a certain alliance having been a member of that organization and its allies for some time. I was mistreated repeatedly as I slaved away and now I seek petty, petty revenge. But you have your opinion, I have mine, others have theirs. They conflict.
Screw it I'm getting a beer.
Hm. Personal vendetta i can uderstand.
This changes things. And, to some degree, my opinion.
Lol ill goddamn smacktalk anytime i want. Im no carebear and dont mind losing ships in pvp. But most of u sad belt pirates... (come on grow up, three months of that bs and u get tired of it)actually love it when some poor miner talks smack cuz it gives u the feeling of empowerment. Something u lack in real life is given to you in a virtual world. Which is all very understandable, but pls stop acting like you are really insulted and you are the better one. You know pirating wouldnt be fun if the subject doesnt squeel like a pig.
I love how YOU know what I would consider fun or what I love which is a powerful talent considering the fact that you are not me.
I just stereotyped you, and I love how YOU get angry about it... (it's very stereotypical..)
LOOOOOL touché
Ha, touché indeed. I apologize.