Lots of Changes

I know it's been a while but I've been kind of unsure what to do.

I flew out of the station, admiring my brand new Reaper and my screen immediately filled up with demands to go to a tutorial sight. And I thought I'd done all the necessary training out of the pod. But I suppose the military will never be totally satisfied. Some of those old goats must think the Amarr are going to warp in to re enslave us all any second.


I headed over there and there was just all this and that they wanted me to go over, training some skill to do soemthing I didn't even know I wanted to do. I got so annoyed I just ripped the tutorial AI out of its chip socket. The pod didn't seem to respond all that well to doing that...but I appeared to be in one piece.

I didn't come out here to do even more training and rigid work. The ship didn't seem to give me anymore tutorial messages so I decided to stop worrying about it and go on my way.

I asked around back inside a station and found out 1: my ship shouldn't have lost any integrity from violently removing that particular chip component but my learning apparatus appears to be completely dead and I'll need it serviced at a station if I want to fly anything bigger than a frigate and 2: I should try some missions to get some money. I was quite happy about the first thing and curious about the second.

My curiosity turned into disappointment very quickly though. You know my cousin-who was completely against me getting inside a capsule-told me capsuleers were all soulless bastards with no morality and I think I know why now. The people who wanted to hire me were all so soul crushingly petty and shallow and sometimes they wanted me to go off and kill other shallow soulless people. Just how many rich heiresses are out there that someone else wants to see dead?

And really for the first time....right out of the gate I felt like maybe this was a mistake. Maybe I should never have gone into a capsule. I mean, I was happy on Matar. But every night...every night I'd look up at the stars. I could have joined the merchant corp or even joined the Republic Navy outright I suppose...but that wouldn't have been doing what I wanted to do. Only a capsuleer would go where they wanted. I didn't want to be doing endless patrols around a stargate scanning ships for contraband...I wanted to see the stars.

But here I was, and my options seemed so limited. Was this really the life I'd signed onto? Was I destined to choose either transporting soil between solar systems and being the tool of other people's vendettas?

No.

No I decided that wasn't my future. I refused to let myself remain trapped by the expectations and advice of the others around me. I wouldn't allow myself to remain trapped serving the wills of others. Not now. Not anymore.

I had Republic backing for clones, a fusion reactor that could last for the next fifty years and an entire galaxy to see. I wasn't going to look out at those stores while hauling other people's things. I was going to visit those stars.

If I was going to travel the galaxy I knew a Reaper wouldn't cut it. It's too slow and I was looking to travel in a least a little style. I knew I had to get a shuttle.

Unfortunatly it was outside of my price range. I'd been given a 5000 isk stipend but it seemed like shuttles could go for nearly three times that in some place. It really did scare me....what isk buys up here and what it buys planetside can be two different things. I know the rich can't see the differences but the cost of ammo some of the people I spoke to use in a single battle could feed a family of five for a year. I didn't like cheating but didn't want to have to wait either, so I took advantage of a loophole in the system.

I found out during training that whenever a Reaper is granted to a capsuleer it comes with a civilian miner and civilian projectile cannon free. It turned out, however there was a glitch in their automatic program and the Republic would outfit a Reaper with new civilian equipment every time the ship was assembled


I felt a little guilty, but had the tech crew repackage and assemble my Reaper about ten different times, hording those miners. Some people still saw a use for them so they had a tiny price on the open market. Selling those miners was what finally pushed me over the edge and gave me the money I needed.

So I set off in my brand new Minmatar shuttle and decided the universe was mine to explore. In fact I should keep a log of my exploration here. Perhaps some people who aren't as fortunate to be able to fly could enjoy it. And maybe the other capsuleers might enjoy it as well...a chance to come out of their tunnel vision, look away from their wallets and gaze out at the stars with me.

So, with 251.88 ISK in my wallet, I decided to set out and actually see what there was to find.