This was different. I had a couple minutes to stop by Eve and updated some of my trader alt's orders in Jita. Then I checked on Jack Dancer's training and while doing that there was some chatter about targets in Auner. Might as well undock my rifter of death and look around. So I did.
At first I could see nothing (mostly because my entire computer screen was covered with Jack's training schedule, plus the hangar info, the buy/sell screen, and the market screen from my previous trading session). I had forgotten to minimize them. DOH! I couldn't even find the "people and places" screen to run to a safe spot when I left the station! I quickly closed all the market screens (what does Jack "The Black Rebel Rifter Pirate" Dancer care about market screens?) and headed to a safespot I have near the sun to scan the nearby asteroid belts.
Finally, some peace and quiet! I hit d-scan a couple times and there were half a dozen targets around the system. But talk on the Black Rebel fleet screen (we were fleeted up) let me know that a couple of them were friendly. About then I started to mess with the d-scanner to get it to 15 degrees so that I could find some of these targets a bit easier. Now, where to look first?
ZUGZUGZUG!!! ZUGZUGZUG!!! ZUGZUGZUG!!! ZUGZUGZUG!!!
Suddenly, right on top of me, appeared a huge ship with a red unfriendly cross on it - an enemy of the Black Rebels! A Drake Battlecruiser! He was so close that I could hear his engines!
ZUGZUGZUG!!! ZUGZUGZUG!!! ZUGZUGZUG!!! ZUGZUGZUG!!!
Apparently this safe spot near the sun wasn't nearly as safe as I thought it was!
I did what any cold blooded pirate noob would do! I got out of there as quickly as possible! I immediately warped to the safety of the station! It was when I was back in the Rebel station that I realized my damage control (again!) hadn't been turned on and my systems (again) hadn't been set to overheat. Why should they? I was in a "safe" spot!
OK. Now that the surprise had worn off (and I had cleaned up the command area of the rifter as best I could), it was time to go back and give that Drake the full force of my rifter's fury. I warped back to my "safe" spot (turning on the damage control unit and overheating all the modules as I flew).
I landed right next to him and did everything by the book. Orbit, target, guns roaring, warp scramble, web, and nos. Right down the line. It certainly got his attention. And the attention of several other Black Rebels. I managed to hold on for 40 seconds and tried to hold the Drake until the rest of the gang arrived. I was doing damage (but not that much) but his missiles were certainly tearing though my ship (the aptly named "BoBo"). In the end I exploded and warped away in my pod to the station to sit out the 15 minute GCC.
I was trying to keep track of what was going on via the fleet communications. And a couple minutes later I was surprised to hear that the Drake had also exploded! Hurray for us!
So in the end I sorta felt like I had a loss added to my record, but then maybe also part of a win should be added. So, for the personal Death to Flying Things score, I think I'll just make it a no-contest.
It was great fun though and I look forward to more of this sort of thing. Thanks to Eraebus, Duke, James and Spike for being on my side in a good fight. And to Cuchulain Spartan for being our target.
And as a final oddity (there always seems to be something not quite right when I undock a rifter...), I noticed in the lossmail that I was shooting T1 autocannons. Where did those come from? I thought I only had T2s - I'll be talking to Bilko, my hangar supervisor about not having this happen again.
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