Earth Strike Read Online Free PDF Page A

objective.
    Fifteen targets. Gray had hoped there would be more, but it was something with which to work. Fifteen large starships appeared to be in stable, predictable orbits around the target world, their orbital data precise enough to allow a clear c -shot at them. Of those fifteen, six, the data predicted, would be on the far side of the target planet 136 objective minutes from now, so they were off the targeting list. The remaining nine, however, were fair game.
    The actual targeting and munitions launch were handled automatically by the AI-net, requiring only Gray’s confirmation for launch. So long as there was no override from Commander Allyn, all eleven Starhawks would be contributing to the PcB, the Pre-engagement c Bombardment.
    Release would be at a precisely calculated instant just before deceleration. He checked the time readouts again. Five minutes, twelve seconds subjective to go.
    He worked for a time trying to get a clearer look at the objective. The visual image was blurred, grainy, and heavily pixilated, but he could make out the planet, Eta Boötis IV, sectioned off by green lines of longitude and latitude, the shapes of continents roughed in. Fifteen red blips hung in space about the globe, most so close they appeared to be just skimming the globe’s surface, and he could see their motions, second to second, as the AI updated their locations. A white blip on the surface marked the objective—General Gorman’s slender beachhead. It was on the side of the planet facing Gray at the moment, the planet’s night side, away from the local sun, but in another two hours objective, it would be right on the planet’s limb—local dawn.
    Additional red blips flicked on, a cloud of them, indistinct and uncertain, centered around and over Gorman’s position. Those marked enemy targets for which there was no orbital data and that most likely were actively attacking the Marine perimeter. Or rather, they had been 136 minutes ago, when the photons revealing their positions had left Eta Boötis IV. For all Gray knew, the perimeter had collapsed hours ago, and the squadron was about to make a useless demonstration at best, fly into a trap at worst. He shoved the thought aside. They were committed, had been committed since boosting clear of the America . They would know the worst in another few subjective minutes.
    He opened his fighter’s library, calling up the ephemeris for Eta Boötis and its planets. He scrolled quickly through the star data, then slowed when he reached the entry for the fourth planet.
     

    P LANET : Eta Boötis IV
     

    N AME : Al Haris al Sama, (Arabic) “Guardian of Heaven” Haris; Mufrid.
     

    T YPE : Terrestrial/rocky; sulfur/reducing
     

    M EAN ORBITAL RADIUS : 2.95 AU; Orbital period: 4y 2d 1h
     

    I NCLINATION : 85.3; R OTATIONAL PERIOD : 14h 34m 22s
     

    M ASS : 1.8 Earth; E QUATORIAL D IAMETER : 24,236 km = 1.9 Earth
     

    M EAN PLANETARY DENSITY : 5.372 g/cc = .973 Earth
     

    S URFACE G RAVITY : 1.85 G
     

    S URFACE TEMPERATURE RANGE : ~30ºC – 60ºC.
     

    S URFACE ATMOSPHERIC PRESSURE : ~1300 mmHg
     

    P ERCENTAGE COMPOSITION : CO 2 30.74; SO 2 16.02; SO 3 14.11; NH 4 13.63; OCS 12.19; N 2 5.55; O 2 3.85; CH3 2.7; Ar 0.2; CS 2 variable; others <800 ppm
     

    A GE : 2.7 billion years
     

    B IOLOGY : C, N, H, S 8 , O, Se, H 2 O, CS 2 , OCN; S ESSILE PHOTO-LITHOAUTOTROPHS IN REDUCING ATMOSPHERE SYMBIOTIC WITH VARIOUS MOBILE CHEMOORGANOHETEROTROPHS AND CHEMOSYNTHETIC LITHOVORES …
     

    Gray broke off reading at that point, shaking his head. The squadron had been briefed on the native life forms on Haris, but he’d bleeped past the recorded lectures. He wouldn’t be on the planet long enough to worry about any native life forms.
    Hell, from what he had picked up at the briefing, it was mildly bizarre that there was any life on the rock at all. One point seven billion years ago, the stellar companion of Eta Boötis had burned up its hydrogen fuel stores and entered a red