SUBJECT: ORBITAL ION CANNON “INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION”

THE SITUATION

The International Space Station is not a research laboratory. It is a GDI-pattern orbital ion cannon, and the beam is stuck on. It has been stuck on since launch. We are very sorry.

The beam sweeps a 1 KM scorch line across the Earth's surface at 27,500 KM/H, completing one full pass of the planet every 93 minutes. This terminal tracks the impact point in real time.

THE NUMBERS

• CURRENT TARGET — whatever is directly beneath the station, right now
• RATE OF LOSS — population currently under the beam (lives/sec)
• PACIFICATION YIELD — casualties in the last 24 hours, plus everything you have personally witnessed since opening this terminal
• ALL-TIME TOLL — every life lost since this terminal came online
• STRIKE LIST — major population centres entering the kill zone, with time to closest approach
• CHARGE STATE — the cannon is solar powered. In Earth's shadow it must suspend. The dead appreciate the breather.

THE MERCY OF THE PACIFIC

The counter flatlines for up to 40 minutes at a time. That is the ocean. Nobody lives there. Then the beam finds Java, and it does not flatline anymore.