In A New Space

Shocku smiled as the image from the camera drone went white for an instant as the Blood Apostle battleship exploded under fire from his massive artillery cannons. He ignored the chime of his neocom for a moment as he ordered the drones in and set the navigator computer to warp the ship to the next belt. As his Maelstrom began slowly aligning, he ordered the crew to reload the gun magazines from the cargo hold. He wasn't sure if it was the hull or his ears that still resonated from the last volley of artillery, each shell almost a meter and a half in diameter.

As the warp bubble enveloped the battleship in null space, he relaxed for a moment and glanced at his neocom. It was a message from Avi, "Everyone doing well?" He quickly sent back, "Yeah, everything is great... killing Blood pirates for bounty to pay for ships". Shocku tried to remember a time when his last CEO had made such an inquiry, and came up with a blank. That man had been too absorbed in his own T2 industrial work to pay any attention to those filling the coffers.

The last week had been quite a ride, with lots of information to absorb. His screens were covered with windows and comm channels for corporate and alliance information. The Maelstrom dropped out of warp 70km from another group of Bloods, and the artillery fired with another bone jarring shudder only partially dampened by the massive gyroscopes. Shocku heard his new corpmates on the neocom chattering about the latest kills against the Northern Coalition. He couldn't wait for the day he could join them. He was determined to contribute to his new clan's fighting force.

Shocku watched fragments of the Blood ship scatter amongst the asteroids and smiled. Another bounty toward the purchase of the Rapier he had trained for so long.