Earth Strike

Earth Strike
Ian Douglas

The first book in the epic saga of humankind's war of transcendenceThere is a milestone in the evolution of every sentient race, a Tech Singularity Event, when the species achieves transcendence through its technological advances. Now the creatures known as humans are near this momentous turning point.But an armed threat is approaching from deepest space, determined to prevent humankind from crossing over that boundary—by total annihilation if necessary.To the Sh'daar, the driving technologies of transcendent change are anathema and must be obliterated from the universe—along with those who would employ them. As their great warships destroy everything in their path en route to the Sol system, the human Confederation government falls into dangerous disarray.There is but one hope, and it rests with a rogue Navy Admiral, commander of the kilometer-long star carrier America, as he leads his courageous fighters deep into enemy space towards humankind's greatest conflict—and quite possibly its last.

“Too little, too late, I fear. We have lost the planet, either way.”

He dipped his gravfighter’s nose and accelerated.

He wasn’t quite “down to the deck,” as he’d reported, but close enough. The Starhawk was dropping now past the twenty-kilometer mark. The sky above was still space-dark, the brightest stars—Arcturus, especially—still gleaming and brilliant, but the cloud decks below rose thick and towering, their tops sculpted by high-altitude winds and tinted red and gold by the rising sun. He’d crossed enough of the planet’s face that the local sun was well above the horizon now, casting long, blue-purple shadows and hazy shafts of golden light across the distinctly three-dimensional surface of the cloudscape below.

Gray adjusted his ship’s hull-form again, sculpting it for high-speed aerial flight, absorbing the deep entry keel and extending the wings farther and deeper into their forward-canted configuration. Behind him, a sudden burst of shooting stars marked another cloud of sand or debris entering atmosphere, a barrage of silent flick-flick-flicks of light.

He let his AI target on the Marine beacon, bringing the SG-92’s prow left across the horizon, then dipping down into a plunging dive. He opened his com suite to the Marine frequency and began sending out an approach vector clearance request.

He hadn’t crossed seventy-one AUs and survived a near-miss by a thermonuke to get shot down by the damned jarheads.

For Brea,who has seen me through many, many light years

Table of Contents

Too little, too late, I fear (#u8fc1b6ab-4add-5eff-bf18-93fe1ee0e08e)

Title Page (#u8fc08291-66d0-57f0-aa88-ba205c85b987)

Dedication (#u09fd5e25-649f-503d-bdc5-264d3ebfc178)

Author’s Note (#u4f94a18a-09ed-501a-96d7-731a6f755f2d)

Prologue (#u914beabb-2b06-569f-b7a8-cd58718b7391)

Chapter One (#u2edff47b-6956-53cd-a98c-43e72d91a39b)

Chapter Two (#u92732bf8-0a94-5ed8-9e1f-8c6fc17f07db)

Chapter Three (#u8cfa2af9-db38-58e1-be46-5cd954e5d7ed)

Chapter Four (#u4be7557b-201a-5afd-aa96-bdae6d2f31c0)

Chapter Five (#uaf47325a-c02d-5abd-842a-616eaaed9cd8)

Chapter Six (#u829a89e0-88c8-5e46-b9a7-39d137ee4be1)

Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twenty-One (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twenty-Two (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twenty-Three (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twenty-Four (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twenty-Five (#litres_trial_promo)

Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)

By Ian Douglas (#litres_trial_promo)

Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)

Author’s Note

Readers of the Galactic Marines series may wonder at first why the background for Earth Strike seems so different from the universe of Heritage, Legacy, and Inheritance. Where are the Xul, the Builders, the Marine Corps families and traditions extending across two millennia?

There’s a simple explanation. Earth Strike is the opening volley of a completely new military-SF series, Star Carrier, which explores the lives of Navy combat fighter pilots of the far future. Welcome aboard the Star Carrier America as she faces a new and deadly threat to Earth and all of humankind.

I hope you enjoy the cruise!

Ian Douglas

December 2009