The pilot awakes.

[CS-ACI-]

Hello and welcome to the events of the past few days, weeks or is it years.

Part 1

I woke up to the sound of beeps and squeaks but not my ships usual sounds, I lay still listening carefully to what else I could hear. I hear people moving around and talking but not my crew and the smell is not my ship, it is much cleaner. With my eyes shut I can see that the area is well lit again not like my ship, so I slowly open my eyes allowing them to adjust to the light. As I do this I realize that I am in a medical unit, I look around everything looks normal but different. The tone changes on one of the machines and someone enters my field of view and says “Hello.� I reply in kind and ask what is going on?

She explains to me that what was left of my ship was found adrift but that the trader, would not say where, and that it was so badly damaged that the self repair system was the only thing keeping me alive. There was only the escape pod left and the repair system, as there was nothing else to repair all it was doing was keeping the pod at 100%. I was inside in suspended animation as the computer had calculated that there was no other way to preserve my life. She also tells me that I have fully recovered from all my injuries after two week intensive care and asks “Do you know who you are?�

“Who I am, I don't even know where I am?� She lets me know I am at Evochron Station in Sapphire. I smile and relax back in to a deep sleep.

Later I awake again and have another look around, I don't remember the station like this, but then I have never been in the intensive care unit before.

I have to think about this as I ponder which identity do I use, so many names so many cover stories and which to use now. So for now I admit to not knowing, but ask what the date is when she answers it does not make sense. After she leaves the room I grab a data terminal and start to look at the news then history. As I trace back the time line, I find I have been out of the game for decades. I am from the cream of the crop, before the Borderlands, Legends, Renegades and Mercenaries. I have been drifting for so many years I can not trust anyone, I shall pick my old cover name for now as it should allow me to be anonymous.

Being from an organization that is covert, secretive and best defined as elusive, I shall have to tread carefully, the identity I chose to use is a simple miner/trader. Luckily for me, the cover is still good and come with a ship and some equipment, but not what I had nor what I need. I shall have to make some cash quickly but not get noticed. Once I get some together, the ship will get the upgrades needed, then the trip in to the void, hopefully not everything is different and I can get to the original base.

More too follow.

[DaveK]

An excellent start - please keep it coming!

[Maarschalk]

Very Coooool!...........

[CS-ACI-]

Part 2

I get into my ship and look around . . . this is not what I remember. The ship yard has “improved� the ship again, you never know if this is going to be good or bad. First thing I see is more buttons and controls as if there were not enough before, I hope this means the ship is better equipped. Reluctantly I get the manual out as I don't want too blow something up or open a jump point into a planet and start reading. After a quick glance it is all blah blah blah but then a new feature catches my eye that could be really handy. I log in to the trading systems ( at least that's the same ) and sell all my missiles and the gun for some extra cash, just leaving me with my mining/tractor beam.

I head off too the hanger next to tweak my ship for max range and cargo, after configuring the hull I don't have enough credits. Back to the trade system and accept a contact to mine 25 units of Platinum. Log off and hit the jump button, seconds later my scanner is full of contacts and my first thought is FRAK. It was an over reaction looking back as they were white and not red, but I had not seen this many contacts on radar since the big fight. It was an upgrade I had wanted before but never got, the smaller asteroids are now tracked with distance. I mine 2 loads of Platinum and 3 of Diamonds and head back to the station, where I sell the remaining Platinum and the diamonds. This allows me to head back into the ship yard and get the larger fuel tanks, and so my journey home starts.

I have a full tank of fuel, turn the IDS off and jump a couple of times to the first gate, Thuban having made sure I was 0 degrees on the compass so I can move straight in in inertia. Seconds later I am in Thuban, my scanner shows red targets, I hit the after burners to out run the missiles as I have no counter measures as I sacrificed them for hull space. Once I am at about 3.5K and nothing is keeping up with me I switch to the nav screen and locate the next system I need, then engage auto pilot. Couple of jumps later the next gate is in range, so I turn off the auto pilot re-align the compass to zero and make the last jump too the gate which I pass in too and arrive in the next system. Again the after burners for a few seconds to out run the bad guys and missiles whilst I enter the co-ords I remember to get me half way home.

I really should have upgraded my jump drive, one sector jumps for about 700 sectors, about three hours and 1,200 units of fuel. My memory although having some holes served me well, what I wanted to see was here and I saved my data. Made a small jump too put me right in front of it, then drifted through. When I exited the far end thousands of sectors away the Vonari were waiting. After burners again to keep ahead of them whist I decided which worm hole to take, they all looked like I remembered so I took the one that leads home.

The big fight is a part of my memory that is still not clear, I can't remember where, when or why, I just remember it happening.

I have now arrived home and will report later on what I find.