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Monday, March 18, 2013

Flying High

Erun relaxed on the sofa of his quarters as he accessed his Neocom through his cranial implants.  Besides augmenting his already above baseline mental abilities, the implants allowed him to access the fluid router network operated and maintained by CONCORD.  The ever-present Local, Corp, and Alliance communications channels were open to him, as well as those run separately by the Intaki Liberation Front and the Intaki Prosperity Initiative.  All was quiet at the moment, one of his corpmates , Anais, had retired for the day after helping him harvest several clouds worth of material.  The material in question, Viridian Mykoserocin, was formed in the intense pressures of asteroids and moons, and was useful in the manufacturing of numerous electronics and weapons. 

Anais was also helping Erun become more familiar with the nuances of combat with other capsuleers.  He had quickly learned that combat against other pilots was very different than combat against the numerous pirate factions, and even the well-trained navies of the four empires.  The empire navies,  and to an extent the pirate flotillas all followed general doctrines that allowed their tactics to become predictable.  This could not be said of capsuleers, who by the nature of their existence are unpredictable and constantly evolving their tactics and strategies.  Anais' first lesson had been to teach Erun how to take advantage of an enemies' speed and turn it against them.

This "Kite and Tackle" technique assumed the user was in a fairly nimble vessel, usually a frigate or destroyer, which suited Erun just fine as they were his preferred size of vessel.  The technique required the user burn away from their target, then once the target was following them, turn and burn back toward them in order to get in close.  This technique was best used by craft utilizing blasters and autocannon which were most effective up close and personal.  Erun and Anais had taken out an Atron class frigate and a Stabber class cruiser to run their exercises, which had gone very well.

A notification from his Neocom roused Erun from his musings on the day, he'd received a message from a recent client.  Specifically the one who had bought all the gas he'd mined that day.  The client was interested in setting up a more direct transaction of materials than the more publicly browsed markets maintained and moderated by the Secure Commerce Commission.  Erun's right eyebrow went up as he ran a shallow background check on his prospective client.  He'd always heard about the "underground" drug production cartels, but he'd never actually been in contact with one of their agents before.  Besides being useful in legal production practices, Viridian Mykoserocin was also used in the manufacturing of the borderline legal Synth Drop Booster, a drug cocktail that that improved the users ability to track objects in space.  Erun had never indulged himself but he had heard horror stories from the capital ship pilots while in nullsec, about stronger variants that had horrible side effects.

Erun shrugged before sending off a positive response to his new client, pleased to have found another source of reliable income.  Erun didn't have any moral quandaries with selling his gas, the drugs produced by the  cartels were not intended for public consumption, being specifically tailored for capsuleer use.  The additional income would supplement what he was getting from his factories based in and around the Intaki solar system.  These were geared toward the production of products necessary for the maintenance of Pilot Owned Structures like robotics and coolant.  This income would do a great deal to alleviate Erun's worries about combat against other capsuleers. The replacement of ships, and getting more costly, clones, had always been the limiting factor for Erun when it came to combat.  Hopefully now he'd be able to get in the thick of things without having to worry about whether he would be able to replace the ship he was flying in...