Conspiracy?

We were scrambled out of our beds earlier this morning to intercept the NTF Iceni, the name of Bosch's ship that escaped the depot yesterday. Command had apparently identified it and we were rushed out to intercept him before he could escape again. But for whatever reason, we were jumped in at coordinates that put us several clicks behind Bosch's flag. I pushed my engines to the breaking point, but it wasn't enough. The Iceni escaped.

My wingmen weren't happy, none of us were, and one of them, Booth, said a lot of things that got us thinking. It did seem as if Command wanted the Iceni to escape. Bad coordinates, little support...I really don't know what we would have done if we had caught up to Bosch. It's not like we had enough anti-ship missiles or anything that could even slow a ship like his down. It also didn't help that he left us with a message, questioning the "wisdom" of our leaders. I'm not sure if that meant the wisdom of not believing his NTF rhetoric, or something else entirely, and that bothers me.

On the other hand, it could be that Command was too embarrassed to admit that they had screwed up. I hope Takeda is alright. He can't be taking this well. I know he's up against Bosch and he isn't exactly a pushover, either. After leading the NTF for eighteen months in open rebellion, the man has to have more than a few tricks under that Admiral's cap of his. So far it just seems as if he knew we were coming and planned out to be two steps ahead of us every time. Takeda hates to lose. We probably might not see him around for the next few games.

After Bosch jumped out, we got caught in the middle of a rush of ships from the NTF making for the same jump node. Fighters and cargo freighters don't last every long against something like the Myrm, but the two cap ships that jumped in at the end weren't something that we had expected to engage outside of the Iceni. Our fighters threw every Tempest we had at them and the Vasudans also sortied the Psamtik back into action to help. Both were destroyed, but we were left with a lot of questions.

Debrief was quick and Lt. Loukakis told me that I would be transferred over to the 107th Ravens. Wilkins said that meant that my aim wasn't as good as I thought it would be so I'll be dropping bomb rockets on larger targets to improve my score. Sheryl laughed when she heard that, but congratulated me all the same. Studi simply said to make sure that when I fire my capship killers, to be out of the way of the explosion.

It looks like I'll be heading back in for more training modules, then.