Chasing Shadows

Sisters of EVE epic arc - The Blood-Stained Stars
Chapter 7 - Closing In
Previous mission: Sealing the Deal
Next mission: The Missing Piece

Type	Encounter
Objective	Retrieve Kritsan Parthus
Faction	mercenaries
Best damage to deal	EM Th
Damage to resist	EM Th
Rewards	250,000.00 ISK + 181,000.00 ISK (bonus)

Mission briefing
Our agent hasn’t been able to determine where Dagan is. But in decoding her sensory data, we managed to pick up a clue. An Amarr pilot named Kritsan Parthus recently delivered a cargo of drone parts to Dagan. These parts were black market, and may have been scavenged from some of your recent battles. We contacted Parthus. He’s an independent operator, but wouldn’t see the light. We’ve managed to locate him by tracing his communications signals. Unfortunately, it will be necessary for you to bring him in for a meeting under duress. Our archive data suggests that Parthus will travel with a small contingent of support ships. Identify his command vessel, destroy it, and retrieve him from his pod. Bring him to me, personally.

Objective
Eliminate the squadron and bring Kritsan Parthus back for interrogation.

Notes
Fly to the designated mission location. You'll see Kritsan Parthus in an Independent Harbinger (Battlecruiser), escorted by five Mercenary Rookie frigates. Beware: Parthus' ship will neut you if you get too close - orbit at a distance and kite him, or use drones or missiles to take him out. Another alternative is to speed tank him close range (orbit at 500m) in a fitted and fast frigate like a Rifter with one or two 'Overdrive Injector System I' (my 10-day old char was able to pull this off). Even with 0 cap, a Minmatar frigate can still pound him with Projectiles and Rockets.

You may/should have to destroy his escorts first. Once you destroy the 5 escorts another three Mercenary Fighters will spawn. Killing the Fighters will be the end of spawns.

(6/10/2020 Update: It is possible to pop the Battlecruiser and ignore the others, but you'll need a good tank to handle the incoming fire. Doing this will not spawn the additional three mercenary fighters, and as soon as you kill the Battlecruiser , the item you need is automatically deposited to your cargo hold. There is no need to loot the wreck. Kritsan Parthus's Energy neut is 100 GJ every ten seconds.)

After you blow up Parthus' ship, you'll hear from another new agent - Amarr, this time: "That’s an Amarr citizen you’ve kidnapped, pilot. But if I understand your motives correctly, we can overlook that. Once you’ve extracted Dagan’s location, we’ll help you bring the hammer of God down on that bastard." No one likes Dagan, it seems! Loot and return Parthus to Sister Alitura.

On turn in, Sister Alitura says: "I’ll handle questioning Parthus. Rest assured, he will be treated humanely, and compensated well."

Wave 1