One late restless night shortly after Apocrypha was released, I saw an ad for Eve Online. Honestly, I don't quite know why I choose to click the ad and download it, but I did. Within hours, I knew I was nearly hooked but resisted subscribing.
Older characters in my starter corp kept warning me about this scam, don't trust anyone, avoid doing that, stay away from there... all good advice, but it also turned me off a bit... ships getting ganked, people getting ripped off, jet cans flipped, the usual stuff. I was amazed and impressed by the game, but I wasn't sure it was for me.
On my 11th day in game, not knowing any better, I decided to try and scan out one of these wormhole things everyone was chatting about, exploration was all the rage. Using almost all the iskies I had, I fitted out my by-then trusty little Catylst with a probe launcher and 5 core probes, and following a video someone linked to me, I started scanning. I was so thrilled with myself when I found a wormhole on my very first scan!
I jumped on in and started flying around. Actually wondered what the fuss was about, cause honestly, I didn't see anything, just some planets. I hit the ship scanner and found some odd things called Frontier Fortifications and Solar Cells, so I warped to one of them.
Nearly died on landing, but managed to warp away, flames flying out of the back of my poor little ship, barely half my hull intact. Had no idea anything could hit that hard... OMG my heart was racing so much! I could not believe I actually escaped!
I look at the overview for the gate to get back out... and it is not there. I *swear* I saw the wormhole on the overview when I jumped in, why don't I see it now? With confusion, I asked in the npc corp chat.
"Didn't you bookmark it when you jumped in?"
Um... Bookmark? What's that? Seriously, I didn't know. "Um, no, I didn't bookmark it, I didn't know I had to do that. I thought I could just warp back to it like any gate..."
Wormholes were still new, and as it turned out, nobody in the chat at the time had actually been in a wormhole yet. But despite what I am sure was much laughter, came advice to scan it out again.
And that is when I realized I had no probes. I left them outside, in my rush and excitement to see the wonders of this wormhole I'd so painstakingly scanned out. There was no warning pop-up about leaving probes behind back then.
"Um... I left my probes outside..."
And at that moment, I leaned back in my chair and realized that I was truly lost in space, something that simply could not and did not happen in *any* other game. I got up and started pacing, amazed, I'm STUCK! There's no game mechanic or NPC rescue squad to save me! How the heck do I get out of this place?
Sitting back at my desk, I started flying around the planets, in that vast and empty space... I was truly alone.
It was real.
Meanwhile, the people in my npc starter corp chat were brainstorming, trying to figure out how I could get out. One person finally spoke up and asked me what system I found the wormhole in. I did happen to remember that - so I told him, and he said he'd come scan it out and try to find me. Everyone else in chat warned me not to trust him, "He'll just blow you up in there," "Just self destruct, it's better than risking your ship on a stranger..."
He scanned out the wormhole, jumped in then sent me a fleet invite, which I accepted with trepidation, all those warnings of never fleeting with strangers ringing in my head. Hands shaking and heart pumping, just *knowing* I was warping to a trap, that I was about to die with no glory, flames still pouring out of my ship, I warped to him, and what do you know, there's the wormhole right there in front of me!
I was rescued! It wasn't a trap! I was FREE! I wanted to hug my knight in shining armor right then and there!
Exhilarated, ecstatic, I jumped into hisec, and offered him all the measly few iskies I had for his time and effort as thanks. He refused and simply said, "Just help someone else stuck like you, if you ever get the chance."
I jumped from my chair shouting, cheering, knocked over my soda can then ran into my kitchen, grabbed my purse, dug my credit card out of my wallet and subsribed right then and there, my hands still shaking from the adrenaline of it all.
My hero's name was Aarthen. Although I've never flown with him since, I'll never forget him.
Three days later, I proudly paid the favor forward and scanned another newbie out of a wormhole they found themselves stuck in. A few weeks later, I joined Sephray Industries corporation, eventually joining the "inner circle" of the corp inside a class 3 wormhole that they colonized, as it turns out, three days after Apocrapha was released...a wormhole we named The Zoo. We lived in The Zoo for over two years, until May of this year when we lost it in an epic six-day seige to Russians. A major loss that had an emotional impact unlike any I've ever experienced in any game, and rarely in real life.
I was promoted to Director last year, led the formation of our own Alliance, and am currently the acting CEO of both while our real CEO is taking a break. We still maintain a small presence in wormhole space but we all feel like wormhole space has become too predictible and crowded now. While we miss our Zoo, our "home" as we felt it to be, we're desiring new challenges now, we'd really like to head to null sec but don't want to pay billions as renters or cow-tow to Napoleonic egoists ... we want to make our own way in null sec but are just too small right now to defend any space we could claim.
So we wait with bated breath for the great Null Sec Revamp, hoping for changes that make Null Sec feasible for small alliances like mine ... hoping there's a new place for us to call Home.
Written while still Director/Acting CEO of Sephray Industries. Originally posted on the Eveonline.com forums. Click Here for original post.
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