"Ian Douglas - Inheritance Trilogy 1 - Star Strike" - читать интересную книгу автора (Douglas Ian)

lanced the squat building from which the plasma bolt had been fired. The explosion further lit the night, as
the first of the shape-shifting landing craft began touching down.

In his mind, Garroway turned, watching as other craft passed overhead. There was a city behind the
beachтАжand what looked like a large and sprawling spaceport. Beams of light continued to spear out of
the angry heavens, vaporizing enemy hardpoints.

And now, individual Marines were appearing in their cumbersome combat armor, bounding through
flame and smoldering wreckage and sand dunes to close with the enemy.

тАЬThis,тАЭ WarhurstтАЩs voice said in GarrowayтАЩs head, тАЬis taking place on a world called Alighan, about four
hundred light-years from where youтАЩre standing right now. ThereтАЩs a slight delay in the feed, but, within
the uncertainties imposed by the physics of FTL simultaneity and the time lag down from the Arean Ring,
it is happening more or less as you see it. The image is being relayed from our battlefleet straight back to
HQ USMC. Colonel Peters thought you should see this.тАЭ

More Marines surged across the beach, sweeping toward the outer Alighan beach defenses. Other
landing craft had passed over those bunkers and gun emplacements and were settling to ground on the
spaceport itself. Fire continued to lance out of the sky, pinpoint bombardments called down by Marine
spotters. Garroway found he could hear some of the chatter in the background, a babble of call signs,
orders, and acknowledgments.

тАЬThe Islamic Theocracy,тАЭ Warhurst went on, тАЬhas blocked several key trade routes into their territory.
Worse, they have supported terrorist incursions into Commonwealth Space, seized Commonwealth
vessels, and are suspected of holding Commonwealth citizens as slaves.

тАЬAs you should know by now, the sole purpose of the U.S. Marine Corps is to protect Commonwealth
worlds and Commonwealth citizens. To that end, a naval battlefleet and a Marine Expeditionary Force
have been dispatched to effect a change in the Theocrat government. Their first step is to capture the
spaceport you see in the distance, so that Army troops can land and occupy the planet.

тАЬThe politics of the situation are unimportant, however. Marines go where theyтАЩre sent. They do what
theyтАЩre told to do. They do so at the behest of the United Star Commonwealth, and the Commonwealth
Command Authority. All very nice, neat, and cleanтАж.

тАЬBut this, children, is what modern combat really is.тАЭ

The scene around Garroway was rapidly becoming a burning nightmare out of some primitive religionтАЩs
hell. With a mental command, his point of view drifted up from the beach toward the spaceport, where
the heaviest fighting was now taking place. The landing craft all were down nowтАФthose that had survived
the approach. Upon touching down, their fuselages had broken into sections, becoming automated
mobile gun platforms; the wing, cockpit, and spine assemblies then each had lifted off once more,
becoming airborne gunships that darted across the scene like immense, spindly insects, spewing plasma
bolts and blazing streams of autocannon fire. And individual Marines, forty-eight to each LV, fanned out
across the flame-tortured landscape, hunting down the enemy one gun position or hardpoint at a time.
Overhead, Marine A-90 Cutlass sky-support attack craft darted and swooped like hideously visaged
black hornets, locking in on ground targets and blasting them with devastating fire.

Clouds of gray fog swept over the landscape from different directionsтАФcombat nano and counter-nano,
waging their submicroscopic battles in the air and on the ground. Disassemblers released by the Muzzies