While the Imperium knew that Chaos forces had arrived in the Tarsis sytem it was unaware that the Tau had also sent an expeditionary force to the Imperial held world to conduct a feasibility study on the prospects for a full scale invasion. The ethereals were not convinced the Tau should embark on another costly and ambitious invasion, but more aggressive commanders claimed that without Tarsis Major not only would the recent Tau gains remain under threat, but that further Tau expansion westward would be halted.
In the end Sunstrike sanctioned a scouting force to be sent to the outer reaches of the Tarsis Major system. The force narrowly escaped annihilation before its arrival as it managed to avoid detection by a vastly superior Imperial fleet - in fact this was half the battle fleet of the subsector including two battleships, redeployed to Tarsis by Jellicoe - and made it to the outlying asteroid base far from the yellow sun of Tarsis. There they found that the base had already been taken over by the Night Lords.
The Tau fought a courageous action against the marines but were outgunned and outthought. Immediately the Tau withdrew to lick their wounds and a decision was made by the Tau high command. Aornis would be settled first and their new gains consolidated before any attack on Tarsis Major.
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