Challenge #02449-F259: Weapons of Mass Amusement

it was all fun and games until humans found medieval style energy weapons -- Anon Guest

"So this is like an electric ballista?" had never before been words of impending doom, but these were Humans who were doing the talking. "The spearpoint is a trigger for a giant capacitor, right? Delivering a blast of excess electrons to the target."

"Er. Yes," said Museum Director Gorx, who was starting to believe this tour had been a mistake[1]. "The use of this weapons against enemy forces has been forbidden since the Treaty of the Arminath Pass."

Then the Human said the true words of impending doom. "Ooooh, what does this one do?" They were standing near a frame that was almost like a cranefly without its wings. "I can see a plasma generator, there, and a hinge, and... a magnetic field initiator in the basket arrangement." The Human gasped and grinned. "Please tell me this is a plasma trebuchet!"

Museum Director Gorx quickly consulted the infonets to find out what a 'trebuchet' was. The file they found had a small, instructional video. Oh dear. "The principal is similar," they allowed, "but that weapon creates a self-contained plasma ball and launches it at a hypothetical foe."

"No way. It shoots ball lightning?" Instead of being horrified, the Human was enthusiastic. "Please tell me you have a range where we can play with replicas?"

Museum Director Gorx, far ahead of the curve as it turns out, weighed the potential devastation in the balance and found themself wanting better insurance. "No," they said.

[1] Hindsight being 20/20, Museum Director Gorx is only slightly ahead of the bell curve by coming to this realisation before major structural damage has occurred. Let's see if they manage to prevent some.

[Image (c) Can Stock Photo / eric1513]

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