Forgoing further exploration for fuel
17th May 2013 – 5.39 pmOne site and the static wormhole does not equal four signatures. There's something fishy here. Oh, nope. It's just some new gas pockets. That explains the smell. Problem solved, I warp to the wormhole and see what our neighbours are up to. A clear result from my directional scanner suggests nothing much is happening at all, and with a single moon out of d-scan range, and even then only just, I'm not holding out hope for occupation. But, after launching scanning probes and blanketing the system, I end up warping directly to a tower.
That wormhole is in a nifty place in the system, given that there is nowhere else that offers a position to hide from the tower. I should probably save it for later incursions, but given the capricious nature of both w-space connections and capsuleer activity I doubt such a bookmark would offer any real benefit. There's no one home at the moment to take by surprise, for example. Still, I can label the bookmark and see if I remember to store it somewhere it won't get deleted. And now, I scan.
The few signatures in this class 3 w-space system offer a couple of wormholes, a lovely K162 from class 2 w-space giving me a better direction to continue than through the conventional static exit to low-sec. And in C2a d-scan shows me two Badger haulers, a Raven battleship, and two towers. My notes don't let me warp to either tower quickly, in case the haulers are about to collect planet goo, as my previous visit a year ago had just one tower in a different position. I'll just spin d-scan around for a bit, as that normally works.
One tower holds no ships, which makes it easier to decide to warp to the other, where I can see nothing is piloted. Oh well, back to scanning. A lack of anomalies may be why no one local is on-line, but seven signatures give me gas, some other sites I suppose, and two more wormholes. That's a bonus. The first is the second static link, which takes me to a high-sec system in The Citadel that's pretty much close to everything, which is neat, and the second is an outbound connection to more class 2 w-space. Also neat.
Pressing on to C2b has an Orca industrial command ship, Anathema covert operations boat, and tower on d-scan, with just one planet in range. I guess the tower's around that. Locating the tower sees the Anathema piloted, but there's nothing else in the system, not even scanning probes. You know what? It's quiet and we have a good connection to high-sec. I think I'll go to Jita in an Orca.
I abandon exploration to go home, swap my scanning boat for the massive Orca, and try to remember what it is I keep asking Fin or Aii to get me whenever I'm too lazy to hit the market myself. I should probably keep a list of what I need. I'm not sure why I don't already, as I write everything else down. Anyway, we can always use more fuel pellets for the tower, even if trying to check how much we have finds a bunch of blueprints for the blocks. Maybe Fin's making it now. I dunno. I'll buy some more anyway.
Getting to high-sec has a bit of a hitch, as entering C2a sees a Dominix battleship new to d-scan. Typical, really. Still, I'm here in an Orca, I may as well make a break for the high-sec wormhole and hope I go unnoticed. It's the journey back that will be more interesting. And it kind of is. Jita is fine, and I buy enough fuel blocks to fill the Orca, plus a few sundries that I remember. But heading home has my passing the wreck of a Providence freighter off a stargate, so someone is having a bad day.
My actual journey home is fine, though. I reach the high-sec entrance to C2a and jump in to w-space, where no one waits for me. Of course, it would be more prudent to lurk near the wormhole linking w-space systems, so that I can't escape back to the security of empire space when ambushed. But, then, which wormhole would I use? There are links to class 3 and class 2 w-space here, so making the wrong choice could be bad. I suppose that's why we stick cloaky scouts near the entrance and watch the direction of warp.
But no one's here today, not that I notice. I warp across C2a, jump to C3a, and cross that system to reach home and our tower safely enough. I restock the tower with fuel—well, I restock our stockpile, as I topped up the tower before I left for Jita—and swap back in to a slightly more agile ship. But I'm not going anywhere else. A bit of scanning and a trip to high-sec makes me tingle with a feeling of productivity. I think I'll call it a successful evening and go off-line.
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