It's been... quite a while, Command. Having your cockpit sawed through by a barrage of laser weaponry can do that to a person. In my case - no doubt Command is already aware of the details, of course - it involved a months-long stay in the Oubli's medical bay while they put my spine and left arm back together. Complications in the procedure, too. Again, I'm sure Command is more than aware of such, so I won't harp on about it.
In any case, the bureaucratic mess left in ex-Grand Maréchal Xavier's departure with regards the Foreign Legion was finally cleared up this week, and - after being cleared by the med personnel again - I got myself back in the cockpit alongside a certain Aspirant Morin. He seems enthusiastic enough, though I can't vouch for his combat skills, since we didn't run into any trouble on our short sweep through Magellan and Manchester.
Shortly after the Aspirant went off duty, though, the Oubli picked up something interesting after all. Amazing how things only start heating up when I'm alone, isn't it? Someone up in the sky must have it in for me by now. In any case, the three unidentified signals soon resolved themselves into discernible contacts upon entering radar range. A trio of Colonials - a Hydra gunship, a Nyx fighter, and an Eros scout ship.
I radioed Oubli control for backup, and the secondary fleet cruiser Angers was dispatched to assist. The engagement was brief and intense, and in the midst of the commotion the Eros managed to slip away. Unfortunately, it was soon replaced by a Waran-class heavy bomber, which provided their gunship with fire support on the Angers. Not even this could save it, though, and with the combined firepower of my Lynx and barrages from the Angers' batteries, the gunship was destroyed.
From then on, the skirmish turned into a rout. The Waran pilot panicked without his supporting fire from the Hydra, and quickly found himself unable to maintain hull integrity under a hail of Musketoons. It took barely a few seconds before he, too, joined his comrade.
Finally, the Nyx's pilot decided to make a run for it, and began fleeing frantically towards the occupied Magellan Freeport. Had my Lynx been equipped with the popularly-named 'shotgun' loadout, he might actually have made it. Unfortunately for him, my rapid-firing Carbines and Musketoons chewed through his shield and hull at a terrifying rate, and he was shot down over twenty kilometers from his point of refuge.
With that short but rather intensive first patrol complete, I returned to the Oubli to file the appropriate paperwork. Not bad for a first day back, wouldn't you say?