OOC: I'm not going to make an official announcement, so I expect your intelligence services will be confused.
Northern Anemonian Sea, Markoneits-Orfonin Imperial Citadel
"Ninth Advanced Reconnaissance Squad, reporting that North is clear."
"Tenth Advanced Reconnaissance Squad, reporting that East is clear."
"Eleventh Advanced Reconnaissance Squad, facility is clear."
"Sixth Inquisition Enforcers Intelligence Unit, standby."
"Valkyrie Fleet, reporting open ocean. Storm is due in three minutes."
"Freya Wing is landing in order to minimize threat of interference in the storm."
"First through sixteenth power generators are online, and ready to provide initial power."
"IFAM Arkicyr Imperyr dei Infactorei Ilfir has begun the reactors. Energy feed is online."
"Nox server is online. Data gathering units are intiating startup operations."
"Eteryr server is online. Weapons startup has commenced."
"Secondary coolant injection has begun. Weapons startup has reached stage two."
"Storm due overhead in two and a half minutes."
"Connection with the mainland is complete. Energy feed, online. Sailiei, Myrhandyr, Irmantsyr generators are providing sixty percent of full power capabilities. Power cuts in North Anemos Major have been intitiated."
"Savronin reports that storm is expected to continue along projected path."
"Satellite battery 207 is providing identical data."
"Intelligence satellite Orion Six is onstation and providing overhead images."
"Air exclusion zone has been broken. Valkyrie fleet is moving to safety radius."
"One and a half minutes to storm. Weapons startup is complete. Trajectory has been rechecked. Energy to the facility has been cut; switching to backup generators in three, two, one..."
"No errors reported in the system."
"Coolant injection, complete."
"... My Lord! Secondary targeting system is reporting energy provision failure!"
"Push the Sailiei reactor up 8%."
".... Error resolved."
"One minute to firing. Targeting rechecked."
'Valkyrie Fleet has reached safety zone."
"Firing is ready. Reroute control to Eteryr and confirmation to Nox."
"Rights added to servers."
"Forty-five seconds to firing."
Outside, as the seas were churned up by the waves, the black-painted ships of the Valkyrie fleet shook as they were pushed by the waves. The Anemonian flags, drenched with rain and seawater, still fluttered defiantly in the face of the thunder and lightning.
"Forty seconds to firing."
"Send a countdown to Savronin."
Docked just off the island, the IFAM Arkicyr Imperyr dei Infactorei Ilfir, the only floating generator in the Anemonian fleet, powered by six nuclear reactors, tried to free itself from the thick cables leading onto Markoneits-Orfonin. Coupled with the island's own generators and the power being rerouted to the island from three nuclear reactors in North Anemos, the island was currently being supplied with more energy than anything before it.
"Thirty seconds to firing."
"Brace yourselves."
On the island, a single, bead like object protruded from the mess of cabling and girders that was the island. Under it was a set of mirrors and focusing devices, with eighteen projection units placed equally around the bead.
"Fifteen seconds."
As the centre of the storm approached, a single object could be seen streaking across the sky. To the untrained eye, it was... who knows? A shooting star? To the trained one, however, it was a rocket powered aerial unit. And to the truly trained eye, it was an Anemonian Eterskratyr 201 ICBM, the latest in Anemonian missile technology, virtually impervious to any form of damage, and a Black project.
"Ten seconds."
As the storm approached, lightning began to sporadically strike the ground. The lightning was pulled towards the metal rods protruding from the side of the metallic, mirror-like structure.
"Five seconds; supplementary power feed has been confirmed."
As the object streaking through the sky neared the island, the bead-like structure swivelled until an 'eye' on its front was following the missile, slowly but surely. Then, as the countdown timer in the control centre began to near zero, the eighteen projection devices began to hum. A slowly increasing light began to build up as the projection devices fired into the bead, until a blinding beam of light was gleaming from each one. A moment passed, and suddenly the unbearable, blindingly bright streak of light flashed into the sky, searing through the darkness-ridden clouds and rain like a beacon of some kind. For a moment it stood, shone, and then faded away into nothingness. Almost as soon as the beam of light disappeared, the streak of light in the sky faded away, and a small blossom of flames could be seen high up in the sky.
"Target has been confirmed destroyed in less than three seconds!"
It had taken all the powerof Northern Anemos Major and more. It had taken years of planning and technological support and advances. It had taken the destruction of an object worth billions through the use of something worth many times that amount.
But it had happened. Eternyrmans, the Sky Reacher, had poured through the skies, a beam of pure, white light, and reached out to erase the world's most deadly weapon.
And amidst the rainstorm, the men and women watching the sky and those who knew what it was, knew that the fear of war was a thing of the past. No longer would they be tormented by fear of seeing their hometowns bathed in the searing flames of a nuclear explosion.
The age of missiles was beginning to reach its end.
It wasn't for king and country. For those who stood and watched the skies as the flames of the Eterskratyr fell, it wasn't a political weapon, or a military one at that. It was the ultimate expression of hope, the hope that war might be erased from the skies once and for all. For those who watched the skies, the pure, white beam of light was an expression of the new world they had fought for for so long.
