Just want to share a nice (and so typical Elite) experience of me, an already long-term Rat-on-a-Holiday. By the way, if you have any stuff for
The Fuel Rats Artists Collective, please let me know, I might be seldom seen Ratting these days but I am still dedicated!
I was out in my Dionaea Uvelii Lab 69 Python (a Thargoid bug squasher) in HIP 24046 when I met a fellow Rat (tell me if you want to be named. It would be a pleasure). Small universe indeed!
We loosely ate some Scouts for breakfast at the local AX Conflict zone, occasionally shooting random Decon Limpets at each other (you never get the Rat out of a Rat). When things calmed down a bit, we sided for some photoshooting and chatting.
For some reason, my fellow Rat loosened a random shot at me and became Wanted immediately. It wasn't a big deal since Sec was quite focused on bugs and not on him, but annoying it still was for him, I guess ...
So we chatted on. Don't nail the order of events on me from here on, but as far as I can recollect, he parted after a while of camping and taking down the occasional nosy scout to clear off that bounty. He already was quite far away, spooling up his FSD, when I felt a strange ... wave washing over my ship. Yet, nothing to see.
I hadn't even time to develop a really really bad feeling when my ship was disabled by the EMP wave of a huge Hydra ... which had spawned
right on top of me.
the Swarm hammered on my poor Python, and the Hydra had fun using me for some target practice. Which looked like this:
When my systems came back online, my shields where already depleted, most modules at zero percent including the Power Distributor -- no, no Boosting here, my friend. Nearly panicking -- Rats never panic, as long as no Snickers are involved -- I sent SOSses to my fellow Rat. But he had just entered Supercruise and was disabled in mid-jump by the blast.
Long story short, I made it out at 24% hull. Yet it was not over: My fellow Rat almost ran dry while on his way to clear that bounty.
"Running out of fuel after shooting at Uvelius, that would have been a line", he wrote, laughing.
And a bit later, when we happily hunted down more Scouts again, he became subject to a Hydra-on-top-spawn.
This was really some Rat holiday to tell stories from!