Anatomy of a Rescue

It was a quiet night at ESR Central Command. And before you get any false ideas in your mind about what that is, it’s basically a few small desks in a tiny, cluttered office buried deep somewhere within Paleo station. Even though the space has been mine for close to a year now, I still get turned around sometimes when trying to find it. “Labyrinthine” is a pretty word that comes to mind.

At any rate, it was quiet. A Dead Parrot and I were just sitting around chatting. While not an “official” member of the SAR crew, Parrot’s work with Allison has made him an integral part of what we do, and he’ll often be found in the SAR office, working on one thing or another. It was getting late on this evening, and we were done working and had turned to discussing how to encourage our rescue pilots to keep at it, brainstorming ways to keep the heart fires lit and to help keep enthusiasm high. Parrot was right in the middle of saying something about Allison’s role in all of this, when the stillness of the office was disturbed.

It was the chime that we both love (a chance to help!) and dread (what if we can’t?), the alert we get from Allison any time a rescue pilot enters a system with an active SAR request: “ESR Team, I just flew into J111629 (An active SAR system) with Holphi Kord.”

Parrot was startled out of his reverie. “Holee cow poop! Now I have to stay awake.”

“Wow,” I replied. “How’s that for timing?”

“Amazing.” Parrot was already springing into action to check on Allison’s logs.

Allison’s alert had gone out over the network to all of our Coordinators. We got a reply right away from Triff: “One of you two got this? I’m out and didn’t want to have to remote in.”

From some remote corner of Anoikis, Igaze chimed in: “I can get in and message Holphi. There’s not a Tripwire chain, though.” Igaze was out sowing and tending rescue caches.

Parrot was already on it, spooling back up the main systems that we had just put to sleep for the night. “Iggy, are you in touch? I can check Allison’s logs if you need me to. Maybe find the kspace connection.”

“That would be great. He’s not sure the exact route he took in. Looks like he came from null. He’s scouting connections now.”

With Igaze in touch with the rescue pilot, Triffton was off the hook, so he rang off. (We do like to give our Coordinators a break ever now and then!) Parrot realized pretty quickly that we did not have any recent intel on the system Holphi had discovered, and we communicated all of this through Igaze so everyone was on the same page.

After a few minutes of discussion, Igaze got back to us: “I’m letting Holphi map. I’ll be off for 30 minutes or so.” And than about 15 minutes later we received an update: “He found a null exit. I’ll be available again in an hour.”

After another 30 minutes, Allison notified us that Angel Lafisques had flown into the same system with Holphi. The two of them did their thing, and got every connection to this system scanned down and noted in Tripwire.

Igaze came back on: “I’m going to try and get back to Thera and then see if I can get there. The null connection is 38 jumps out though. I, of course, am buried as far from k-space as I can get, I think.”

“Don’t kill yourself to get there,” I told him. “Especially since we have other pilots in system. Have we heard from the stranded pilot yet?”

“No. Been mailed, though.”

About 30 minutes later, we heard from Igaze again: “Ran out of time. Sitting in a C1 with low static. Angel is scanning routes but won’t be on until again until 20+ hours from now. I’ll be back in 8 or 9 hours to see what’s been scanned down.”

So that was the end of it for the night. Until the stranded pilot replied, there was little more we could do but wait.

Then, early the next morning, Igaze provided a status update: “Angel has things mapped out. Pilot just responded and will be available in several hours. I can’t be on then, but I think Angel has it in hand.”

So we each went about our business, always mindful of this stranded fellow capsuleer, anxious for the next update, eyes unconsciously darting to the clock every few minutes. Several hours later, we received a notice from Allison that Holphi was remapping the system, updating it with the most recent connections.

Igaze had been in touch with the stranded pilot and was hopeful. “We might get this guy tonight. He’s online now and Holphi is talking to him. We’ll see what they figure out.” We all sent our best wishes to him, Holphi, and Angel.

About five hours later we received final confirmation: “Looks like the rescue was completed!” There was much rejoicing, a little bit of paperwork got filled out, and we all went back into waiting mode — ready to spring into action at a moment’s notice when our services were once again required by some poor, lost soul.

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This is not an atypical rescue. They are each different. Each comes with its own unique challenges and each requires a team of dedicated pilots and office personnel. If what you just read sounds like something you’d like to be a part of, consider joining Signal Cartel, and get ready for the first time our copilot AI, Allison, tells you: “Captain, this system has an active Search & Rescue request.” It’s a completely new way to get your heart pumping and your adrenaline surging, as you become a vital part of the EvE-Scout Rescue team.