NationStates Jolt Archive

A comet hurtled a leisurely path through the solar system. It was quite large, as comets go, but it was not going to hit anything while it continued its current orbit. As it approached the sun, the ice around it began to melt and fly off, giving the comet its charecteristic tail. Nothing was really out of the ordinary. Ancient cultures may have taken it as an omen, and maybe, in this instance, they would have been right.
The comet was no ordinary one, despite its appearance. Firstly, though it's present course meant that it should've been last seen less than twenty years ago, it had never entered the inner regions of the solar system before. Secondly, although most of the surface looked like a comet, concealed in one of the smaller craters was an airlock.
There was a simple reason for all these abnormalities regarding the comet. The fact was, that it wasn't really a comet at all. It was one of the Ineffable Imperial Level 4 Secure Research Stations, or in other words a secret lab. It was passing through the system after having received a coded transmission from a courier craft from Leda, and it needed to be closer to home in order to deliver components for the prototype of the weapon that had been under development.
A heavy cruiser was dispatched from Leda, carrying a large shuttle intended to land on the comet and "take samples".
Meanwhile on Earth, coded transmission were sent from The Silver Turtle to several Metus nations.

A few weeks later, as what the solar system had widely regarded as a comet was on it's way out, and the scientific mission had returned to Leda, anyone observing Lysithea would have noticed some strange goings-on.
From one of the craters, there was occasionaly what appeared to be a bar of light shooting up at the sky. At first glance, it looks like a laser, except for the fact that in a vacuum environment such as this it would be invisible if not observed head on. These beams were emanating from the side of the moon used by the government as defence posts, so civilian observers assumed it was some sort of new weapon being tested.
They were absolutely right.

*checks... Lysithea == jupiter moon... ok, I have an actual reason to see it*

ic:

The Fall of Night was patrolling the Jovian system, as usual. There were always a couple of ships doing it, considering the extensive amount of Angstian holdings in this area, however, this time, they weren`t exactly doing the usual schedule.

It stayed close (Well, relatively close, for jovian circumstances), observing the events... Right now, it wasn`t overly interesting, they didn´t catch much information... Althought their sensors were reading to check emissions and stuff should it be tested again.

[/glorified tag]

Lysithea, A Few Weeks Later
Five Righteous Fist of Bob class DSAs, mothballed due to the development of the Wrath of Achilles DSA IIs, moved into orbit around Lysithea, remotely-controlled from an outpost on the surface.
Suddenly, a blue-white beam of light stabbed up, ripping a hole through one of the ships. The beam persisted for about half a second and then winked out. The ship lasted about half a second longer, before exploding. About half a minute later the beam stabbed up again, destroying a second ship, and it continued in this manner, firing about every thirty seconds until all the ships were destroyed.
On the base below, the commander smiled, and began constructing a data package to send to The Great Ineffable Bob.