Rogue Agent

Hyperion from nearly head on. This image is from the perspective a probe sent to investigate this mysterious object. Hyperion's unique "shockwave" can be seen on the left.

P/2586 E7, commonly called Hyperion, is an enigma. Hyperion behaves like any other Oort Cloud object perturbed from its original orbit (comets), diving in towards Sol before ricocheting back out to deep space, yet it's the size of Earth's moon. The largest object of its type yet observed, debate rages within the scientific community whether it truly qualifies as a comet. Typical of objects of its type, Hyperion outgasses as it approaches Sol. Unlike the more common comets, however, Hyperion's gravity prevents it from forming a traditional coma and tail, as most outgassed material simply collects near the surface, similar to Pluto's summer-time atmosphere. What material that does escape forms a roughly shockwave-shaped cloud, somewhere between a comet's coma and tail and an extreme version of Pluto's atmosphere in behavior.

Though its orbit is "mild", compared to similar objects, at it's closest to the sun, it passes a mere 30 million kilometers from the Earth's orbit, potentially close enough to interact, if weakly, with the Earth itself, should the timing be right. While the current configuration of the solar system puts Earth on the opposite side of Sol during this orbit, it's only a matter of time.

Of equal concern is the as yet unknown event which set Hyperion in motion. Astronomers are still trying to figure out what could fling an object of Hyperion's size towards Sol, and what other effects it may or may not have had.