Caught in a Hole

Simple boredom, and the need for a high sec shopping trip lead me to go wormhole hunting. The first two holes that I found were nice and empty but dead ends, Active towers in each but no ships or signs of activity.
Then I found a nice C3 that had a C2 static. The C3 also had two visiting holes, one in deep low sec and one up to Cloud Ring in the north.
Again no sign of activity in the C3, 14 different sigs on scan, with 5 active towers suggested a certain lazyness on the part of the inhabitants. Anyway with the others checked I warped to the C2 static and went through.

From the hole a quick Dscan showed me an active tower and little else, but several planets were out of range. So bookmarked the hole and cloaked up and warped to the outer planet. Here found a tower and two ships, a Hawk and a Brutix. Were they on line? I narrowed down the location on Dscan and warped in at 50 for a look.
Both ships had pilots and both were in the pos shield. Fair enough I thought, maybe I should leave, but the hole (J111740) had a High and C3 static... So went and created a deep space safe, out of range of all but 1 planets(with no tower). Only 3 sigs not scanned, and I came through one, so I thought that I would quickly get the other 2, and 50-50 chance of the high sec hole.
Took less than a minute to get both pinpointed, so sucked the probes back in and warped to the nearest. Turned out it was the C3. So warped to the other at 20km. On landing I could see the Hawk in a tight fast orbit of the hole...
The Residents obviously spotted my exit hole (or my probes)and assumed there was at least one person in with them. Not good, so I warped to a planet 10 AU from my way back and hit narrow Dscan, A Brutix and a Legion... Even worse. So I created a new safe in Dscan of both and settled down to wait...
After my recent stay in a hole waiting to get home I honestly just wanted to leave, and try elsewhere. It was also gone midnight my time and I had to work the next day. After 10 mins noticed that the Hawk was going back and forth between the two and the Legion and Brutix had gone. Well from D scan anyway.

So I thought, well before they roll the hole I will get out, and waited until the Hawk was not on Dscan and warped to the C3 and home...

Or so I thought. Unluckily on landing on the other side, found the Hawk less than 1500 meters away... Not good what was worse however was 2 Legions and a Proteus sitting there....
Ok, I was 6k out from the hole, so had two choices, burn for the hole and go back or try and initiate warp and cloak really fast...
I chose the latter, and thought that I was home free, as I was just entering warp a scram came on from the hawk, and hit reality once more. I was not fast enough on the cloak either. Such is life. Kicked a couple of Hobgoblins and 3 EC300's out and set on the Hawk to give him something to think about and opened fire as well.
Started taking solid hits from the Proteus and cap was just running out, the Legions were neuting really well.
The Hawk was doing a really good job of killing my drones and speed tanking the blasters, but cap was my issue, very quickly the Legions were taking their toll. Right I thought jump back and try and shake them off.
I should also mention here that the webs from everyone had killed my speed to a massive 32 m/s so the slog back to the gate was painful, and I was in about half armour when I hit the gate.

My intent must have been obvious though as when I landed the Hawk was up and ready, and a couple of Proteus and a Tengu and the Brutix were waiting.
Again not fast enough to warp and cloak and the Hawk got the scram. He also got the rest of my hobgoblins for distraction, while I locked up one of the Proteus and started firing.
With the Brutix, Tengu and 2 Proteus shooting me the end was indeed nigh. So picked a planet to align to, said well done in Local and spammed the warp button. Pod escaped to the planet, and I immediately aligned and warped to the high sec hole... The Hawk pilot was on the ball and just landing at the same time as me, and starting to lock as I jumped though.
Kill mail link below.

My Dead Proteus

In high as planned, without ship which was not.

Learnings.
1. If they know you are there, be patient.
2. Assume that they may be waiting on the other side of the gate/hole. Not something I actually thought of, and my panicked response on the other side, I think helped me get caught.
3. Assault frigates are very hard to kill.
4. And quick to lock, quick enough that I assume some sort of sensor booster was involved.
5. Neuts, at least I do not have an active tank, but weapons, scram and webs still need cap. This is a real pain.
6. Not everyone on one side of the hole (Legions) jumped back to be with me at the end. I assume that they were polarised.
7. Should not have bothered probing once I saw the combat ships, should have just left. Would not in hindsight have been a good route back either.
8. Try and take one with you! Again in hindsight the Brutix (unless the Protei were really crap fit) was the weak point, and I should have hit him and kept hitting him until I died. Should have been able to at least killed his ship.

Good fight though. I was far from bored and gave me something to think about for days.