Let's Get Podded

I noticed that my clone is only good for a few more days before my training will require me to purchase a new one.  Since I'm going to be buying one in a few days anyway, maybe I should go on a roam through null sec space and get podded.

Null sec is a dangerous place for pods.  With warp bubbles (which we don't have in low sec) sometimes keeping a pod from escaping they die much more often.

So I picked a jump clone with no implants and grabbed a slasher and headed to the closest null sec gate.  It was L4X-1V in Etherium Reach.  I popped through hoping for a gate camp and some excitement.  Instead I found an empty system.  Just me.  Anticlimactic.

I passed through and jumped into the next system expecting trouble.  Empty.

And the next.  Empty.

Then after a couple more jumps through empty systems I arrived in the Great Wildlands and started going from system to system.  Sometimes there were people in the systems.  One time I spotted a tengu on dscan - but (luckily for him) he immediately either cloaked or fled to safety.

I continued on, but eventually decided to plot a route back to Heild.  It meant that I did a big loop through the Great Wildlands - in at C4-DOW and out at N-RAEL.  As I traveled on it was more of the same.  I never saw another ship through 39 null sec systems in total.

Not another ship.

Mostly totally empty systems.

Until...

Until...

Just as I was jumping out of N-RAEL and back into low sec there was a gate flash and a taranis appeared on my screen.  I hit Ctrl-Space to try to abort the jump, but I was too late.  I finally find a ship and I miss the fight.

When I arrived on the other side I immediately hit the afterburner and headed back to the gate to jump through.  Luckily, the taranis was looking for a fight too and had waited on the other side.  At range - about 40k from the gate.  I headed towards him and he headed towards me.

The taranis is fast and (in this case) shoots blasters.  Blasters need to be very close to their target - they are nasty when up close.  So my plan was to keep distance and use my barrage ammo.  Things went well for my slasher - I was able to circle at around 6k and kept him from damaging me too much.  Once, when we got close, all of my shields disappeared in a single instant!  But he was already in structure by that point and doomed.  He exploded!  GFs were exchanged in local.

So, my null sec expedition didn't have it's intended conclusion - me being podded.  But it did at least have one fight.