Guardian (War Angel Book 1) by David Hallquist (best contemporary novels .TXT) 📕

the weapons stations, Terran and Lunar, are now floating bits of wreckage. Communications and reconnaissance satellites have been wiped away, though new networks are being laid by Lunar ships as we watch. Many smaller space stations are severely damaged and have rescue teams on the way to take people off.

Lots of engine flares still move slowly through the misty space. Almost all the drive signatures out there are Lunar. Surviving Terran vessels are laying hidden in the mist for now or are boosting away desperately to seek asylum with Saturn or Venus. Distress signals fill the static-ridden space from escape pods, lifeboats, and the crippled hulks of spacecraft. Rescue vessels move back and forth, broadcasting their status loudly to prevent some trigger-happy fool from blowing them away. In this environment, anything could happen.

Other squadrons will deal with the remaining enemy ships or guard the fleet. We’re going to head into Earth’s atmosphere to neutralize the still hostile ground and sea targets.

Earth grows ever larger under us. Shimmering aurora glows from the poles, while chromatic lights play along the upper edge of the blue atmosphere. Sure, the light displays are tame compared to my home world of Jupiter, but it’s remarkable to see how bright it is above the Earth itself…

…it’s too bright.

 What’s going on? Chimera fills me in; all the blasts in orbit have super-charged the radiation belts and caused the aurora storm below. There’s also a high degree of charged activity in the uppermost layers of the atmosphere, causing red glowing discharges of energy at the edge of space. He also lets me know that the gamma rays from the antimatter blasts will cause increased cloud-nucleation that will increase cloud formation, planetary albedo, and…

…and generally make a mess of things for a while. There’s likely to be some climate disruption for a few years, with some colder weather. Weather control satellites can modify that with orbital mirrors, but still, it’s going to be rough for a while until those are set up. Then, too, the EMP and computer viruses flying around have likely wiped out most of the unshielded electronics. Finally, it’s going to be rough on people who were exposed under any of those near blasts—they probably picked up a dose of radiation and might have been blinded by a flash. Sure, the worst of the atmospheric impact was caused by Terra’s own antimatter bombs, but still…

Suddenly a clean war in space doesn’t seem so clean anymore.

* * *

We’ve broken up by squadron, and then by flight, and are approaching our operational areas on the planet. Mad Dog, Sparky, and I—it’s just the three of us out for a morning flight. Dawn breaks over the horizon, turning the limb of the planet red, then golden, and in seconds the blue vista of ocean dotted with clouds glows below us. The world seems peaceful, serene, with no hint of the terrible war above.

The upper atmosphere shrieks along our frames. Hulls glow in red heat and ionized purple as the thin air blazes into glowing plasma tails streaking out far behind us. Everyone on the day side will see the contrails of smoke, and everyone on the night will see lines of fire streaking through the sky. Anyone on the ground can probably hear the low thunder as we crash through the air. We’re as obvious as possible, and that’s kind of the point. Now that we have space superiority established, we’re making at statement: We control space above you, and now the air above you. Don’t mess with us. Of course, we’re not making this brazen move alone. We’ve got our task force and the Lunar fleet backing us up from orbit.

The atmosphere of Earth feels…different on my wings, choppier, heavier, more substantial, and gives better lift. It is different, of course. The oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere behaves entirely differently from the hydrogen-helium atmosphere of home, and it’s much hotter, and there’s also one-third normal gravity. Flying conditions are totally different on this planet. Still, Chimera knows what to do, and I’ve simulated training for atmospheric flying in every atmosphere in the solar system, so after a few seconds, we adjust to the alien world and fly normally.

It’s a perfect day for flying. The impossibly blue ocean below, flashing in the sunlight, is offset by puffy white clouds of almost pure water, in a blue sky that just begs to be breathed in, because you can. It’s a living world, and…

…it’s trying to kill us right now. Stay focused.

Below us, hundreds of ships are detailed in my cyber-sensorium. There are rickety fishing ships, hulking transit barges, platform-like mining ships, and salvage ships that look like they were made of salvage. Most things are highlighted in yellow, as possible threats. Even a crummy boat can harbor a surface-to-orbit missile. So ships have to be marked yellow until cleared by scanners. There are no reds; active hostiles get a missile or particle beam as soon as they fire, unless they surrender very, very quickly.

A flash of light blooms on Mad Dog from a surface laser. The triple-hulled ship that fired is highlighted red and…it disappears in a flash of light and a column of steam when an orbital particle beam takes it out.

“Hey! That was mine!” Mad Dog grumbles over the open channel. I can see that his frame took a little armor damage, but his attitude is the same as always.

“Good shooting, Indomitable,” I congratulate the Lunar cruiser that took the shot as she goes over the horizon.

“I had that one,” he grumbles. “I’ve got a bet riding on this…”

“I told you, Mad Dog, you’re going to have to move fast to get enemy kills; it’s open season on Terran hostiles.”

Clusters of missiles erupt from the sea now that the cruiser is gone. Our x-ray lances are already burning them down, and we each send an aerospace missile down. Our missiles move