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| The monument to the Pandemic Legion near the Ossogur gate |
On late Thursday evening, DJ Destiny of EVE Radio, the most poplar music channel in New Eden, announced that he would be leading a roam into low-sec, advertised as "death - probably, fun definite".
Xeddiphan and Lord Mandelor, already well known in the corporation for wandering far outside of Consolidated Holdings territory, immediately joined up.
"I just refitted my missioning drake by replacing two of the hardeners with a microwarp drive and a scrambler and I slapped on at the last second," Mandelor shrugged.
Xeddiphan, on the other hand, loaded up a few 150mm gauss guns on his Cormorant destroyer to join the fleet.
"I've had that destroyer since I first started my piloting career," Xeddiphan reflected distantly. "I was too attached to it to sell it but didn't have a use for it anymore, I felt it should die in glorious battle."
When the two ConHo ships joined the hastily assembled roaming fleet, Mandelor had already become aware of just how suicidal it would be.
"For starters, the DJ himself is in this Ibis with a civie gun, and it's a damaged ibis to top it off. Spiritless, our impromptu Fleet Commander, lost a Dramiel to one of the gate guns, so decided to command from a capsule. If that wasn't enough, the FC had a full set of slave implants too, yet still decided to go into low-sec with us. That took some balls."
The fleet itself was composed of a colorful variety of ships, most of them Minmatar. The fleet began with around 14 members, including a Cyclone, a Thorax, and a Harbinger. A Blackbird ECM ship later regrouped with the fleet, flown by Mobius03. To make matters even more interesting, SpoonRECKLESS, the 8th most wanted man in New Eden at the time (as of the time this article was written, someone claimed his bounty), was in system offering to play tag with them.
"Spoon would jump in from gate and then out again," Xeddiphan noted. "He was flying a Drake, but he still had a bounty well over 2 billion, and the fleet was itching to try and get him. We kind of just gave up on it after a while"
While the fleet jumped through low-sec systems looking for targets, the DJ took the liberty of announcing to all of his listeners each name of the fleet members, the ships they were flying, and their location, thus scaring away most attackers in the low-sec systems being traveled. Then, as Spiritless went to switch from a pod to a Maller, things became drastic.
"All of a sudden, Spiritless says 'Hey guys, we should go to Amamake'. The Cyclone just dropped fleet and warped out of there, along with two of the smaller frigs. One of the guys said he could actually feel his implants melting already."
The Radio Fleet then moved into Amamake, and immediately encountered a -9.7 sec status pirate who locked on to Mandelor's battlecruiser but did not fire on him. Another pirates in the area had a ship that could deploy a cyno, and possibly an ally of the Pandemic Legion.
"Mandelor's ship has a psychological tank," Xeddiphan explained. "His shield fitting is so ridiculous that it just stops people from even wanting to try and fire on it. That and it's a Drake."
When the fleet reached the other side of Amamake (losing a few stragglers on the way), orbiting one of the gates, a thrasher jumped into system, which two of the fleet members tried to engage before being decimated by gate guns. The fleet then warped to Amamake I, while Spiritless bellowed challenges to the pirates it local. Within 17 seconds, a fleet of four ships jumped into Amamake I's gravity well in an organized formation. The radio fleet then warped to Amamake II, waiting for the pirates to approach them.
"The tension was unbearable," Xeddiphan groaned.
After a few minutes of holding, the pirates jumped into the area. The pirate fleet, though small, composed of a Blackbird, an Omen, and two Ruptures. The battle began.
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| The Minmatar Rupture Cruiser, usually fitted as a slow ship with a lot of firepower |
"Our Thorax was the first to go," Mandelor reflected. "Projectiles were flying everywhere, and I saw Xed's destroyer just weaving through all these explosions firing every weapon his Cormorant's got. The next thing I know is the Blackbird has him locked and one of the Rupture's just unloads these autocannons on him and his ship gets decimated."
"Just how I wanted it," Xeddiphan beamed.
While the Thorax pilot and Xeddiphan quickly warped to safe areas, the battle raged on. Mandelor's ship focused fire on the blackbird, launching three (loyal) Hornet II's and two ECM drones to harass it, pounding it with heavy missiles. The damage from the Thorax and Cormorant had already weakened it a bit, and the Radio Fleet's own Blackbird was jamming it and hammering missiles at it. DJ Destiny's Ibis orbited it, firing the deadly civilian rail gun at it. The Blackbird turned to warp out of system, but was immediately scrambled by Mandelor. After an intense firefight, the ECM ship was destroyed.
"At this point, everyone is surprised that our own Blackbird isn't dead, one of their Ruptures is on half armor and the Omen they have is starting to lose shields. We're starting to think we can win this fight when we see the FC's Maller explode in the middle of a 'warp out, warp out!' command. So yeah, we scattered like roaches after that."
The slaughter didn't end there. After the fleet scattered, the Harbinger warped to a planet 150km out instead of a safespot, refusing to move from it, he was quickly discovered and scrambled by a Loki, who killed him quickly. A few frigates were destroyed by gate guns as they attempted to flee the system in panic.
"It was insane!" Mandelor declared. "Out of that whole fleet, the ECM ship and Ibis survived. I mean, so did I, but I was flying a Drake. These guys were the most likely to die but escaped with names on the killmail. That's pretty awesome for them. Still, Spiritless did an amazing job as FC. That leadership probably saved a lot more pilots"
While it is unknown if DJ Destiny plans to hold such an occasion every Thursday, some of the pilots from the Radio Fleet have already become acquainted with each other, and plan to go on another roam organized by themselves in EVE Radio refuses to sponsor another after the Amamake Raid.
"It was a ton of fun," Mobius, the Blackbird pilot, commented. "I'd love to do it again."
that was a fun roam!
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