Earth Strike. Ian Douglas

the more time he spent trying to dodge incoming missiles, the less able he would be to carry out his primary objective, which was to close with Turusch capital ships and destroy them.

      He pulled the Starhawk around until it was again traveling straight for the planet ahead.

      “This is Blue Omega Seven,” he called. “Request clearance for PCO launch on this vector.”

      “Omagea Seven, Omega One,” Allyn’s voice came back. “You are clear for AMSO.”

      “Firing PCO in three … two … one … Fox Two!”

      In space-fighter combat, Fox One signaled the launch of any of a variety of all-aspect homing missiles, including the Krait. Fox Two, on the other hand, signaled a sandcaster launch—Anti-Missile Shield Ordnance, or AMSO. An AS-78 missile streaked from beneath his cockpit, accelerating at two thousand gravities. After five seconds, it was traveling one hundred kilometers per second faster than Gray’s Starhawk and, when it detonated, the individual grains of sand—actually sand-grain-sized spherules of matter-compressed lead—were released in an expanding cloud of grains, each traveling with the same velocity and in the same general direction. Sandcaster missiles were dumb weapons as opposed to smart; protocol required requesting clearance for launch, because a grain of sand striking a friendly fighter at several thousand kilometers per second could ruin the day for two pilots, him and his unintended target.

      Over the tacnet, he could hear other Omega pilots calling Fox Two as they slammed sand at the oncoming missiles.

      In a few more seconds, the sand cloud had dispersed to the point where it created a physical shield several kilometers across. His initial velocity after his turn-and-burn with the enemy ship-killers had been just over twelve thousand kilometers per second; he increased his speed now by an extra hundred kps, slipping up close and tucking in behind his sand wall and drifting at the same speed.

      White light blossomed ahead and to starboard, dazzling even through the stepped-down optical filters of his fighter’s sensors.

      A second nuclear blast, ahead and below … this one close enough that the shell of expanding plasma jolted his ship and sent hard radiation sleeting across the Starhawk’s electromagnetic shielding.

      Gray decelerated, braking hard. Eta Boötis IV was rapidly swelling to an immense crescent just ahead, as thousands of brilliant stars flickered and flashed against the planet’s dark night side—sand grains striking atmosphere at high velocity and vaporizing in an instant. By now, the defensive cloud had either dispersed to ineffectiveness or been swept aside or vaporized by repeated nuclear detonations. But he’d run the gauntlet in close to the planet, and now he was within combat range of the majority of the Turusch fleet.

      The near presence of the planet complicated things, but more for the defenders than for the Blue Omega Strike Force. The planet’s bulk now blocked the line of sight to a number of the Turusch warships in low orbit, provided the gravitational mass for free course changes, and in this world’s case even added an atmosphere that could be used either as a defensive screen or for simple delta-V.

      The other fighters of Blue Omega were scattered across the sky now, each operating independently of the others. Gray could hear the cockpit chatter, but had to focus on his immediate situation. His wingman … where the hell was his wing?

      There she was—Blue Omega Eight, two thousand kilometers aft and to starboard. Katie Tucker was engaging a big Turusch Echo Sierra—an electronic scanner vessel. That, at least, was what Intelligence thought those monsters might be, with their far-flung antennae and hundred-meter sensor dishes.

      Confederation tactical doctrine suggested that pilots work together in wings for mutual protection, but standing orders didn’t require it. One Starhawk could kill a Turusch capital ship as easily as two, and a single one of those thermonukes they were tossing around could take out a pair of gravfighters if they were too close together.

      “This is Blue Seven,” he reported. “I’m going to try to get in close to the objective.”

      Objective meaning the Marine perimeter in Haris, Eta Boötis IV. It took him a moment to orient himself as his AI threw up the curving lines of longitude and latitude on the image of the planet. Haris was tipped at an extreme angle, with an axial tilt of nearly 90 degrees. At this point in its year, Eta Boötis was 30 degrees off the planet’s south pole, the Marine perimeter at 22 north.

      There it was … a green triangle marking the Islamic base and the Marine expeditionary force sent to protect it, just now rotating into the local dawn. Turusch ships swarmed above and around it, or poured fire down from orbit. It was what carrier pilots liked to call “a target-rich environment.”

      Gray loosed another half dozen missiles, then spotted a special target. Three thousand kilometers ahead, a Turusch fighter transport lumbered just above the planet’s cloud-choked atmosphere, fighters beginning to spill from her bays.

      “Blue Omega Leader, Blue Seven,” he called, bringing the nose of his Starhawk around and accelerating. “I have a Fox Tango dropping Toads. Engaging. …”

      “I copy, Blue Seven. Blue Five! Blue Four! Get in there and give Blue Seven some backup!”

      “Ah, copy, Blue Leader. On our way. …”

      The Turusch heavy fighters code-named “Toads” by Confed Military Intelligence were big, ugly brutes thirty meters in length and half that thick. Less maneuverable than their Confederation counterparts, they could accelerate faster, and individually, could take a hell of a lot more punishment in combat. As Gray swung onto an attack vector with the transport, the Toads already released had begun boosting into intercept courses.

      “Fox One!” Gray shouted over the net as he released a Krait. “And Fox One … Fox One … Fox One!”

      The red-and-black Toad transport was a prime target, easily worth the expenditure of four nuke-tipped Kraits. Confederation fighter pilots steadfastly refused to refer to Fox Tango transports as “carriers.” They insisted that the code name Fox Tango, in fact, was short for “Fat Target” rather than the more prosaic “Fighter Transport.”

      Missiles released, Gray snapped out an artificial singularity to port and rolled left, breaking off the run. The enormous transport was throwing up a cloud of defensive fire—sand, gatling KKs, particle beams, and point-defense HELs.

      The Toads already released by the transport were falling into echelon formation as they accelerated toward Gray’s fighter. There were five of them, and they were already so close they were beginning to loose missiles at him.

      He plunged for atmosphere.

      By now he’d bled off most of his velocity, and was dropping toward the planet’s night side at a relatively sedate eight hundred kilometers per second. Using full reverse thrust, he slowed still further as his Starhawk’s crescent shape flattened and elongated somewhat for atmospheric entry, growing aft stabilizers and a refractory keel. He was moving at nearly thirty kilometers per second, eight kps faster than the planet’s escape velocity.

      He felt the shudder as his craft sliced through thin atmosphere, and used the aft singularity to slow him further still.

      “Alert.” The ship’s computer voice somehow managed to convey the illusion of sharp emotion. “Shielded anti-ship missile closing from one-eight-zero, azimuth plus zero five! Impact in six … five …”

      The lost missile, coming in from dead astern. There was no time for maneuvering, and no way to outrun the thing with the bulk of Eta Boötis dead ahead. Gray flipped the fighter end-for-end, searching for the telltale red star of the incoming warhead.

      There! Twenty kilometers! Lock … and fire…

      The warhead detonated in the same instant that he gave the fire command.

      Seconds passed before Gray blinked back to full awareness. Motion-streaked stars alternated with blackness spinning past his field of view. “AI!” he cried out. “Situation!”

      There