Berserker Fury

by Fred Saberhagen

  Hardly had Field Marshal Yamanim finished his change of clothes when he was already reading, quickly but thoroughly, the report concerning the lost spy ship, which made incidental mention of the heroic survivor—whose debriefing had not shed much light on the reasons for the ship's loss. Well, they would probably never be known.

  Before turning to stride out of the office, the field marshal struck the paper briskly with a couple of fingers. "Put that man on the medals list. But let him have his leave before we bother him with ceremonies. I'd say he's earned it."

  His aide murmured an acknowledgment of the order, and neatly stowed the paper away again. Yamanim avoided using robotic aides as much as possible, employing them as a rule for only the most routine tasks. He much preferred to run his ideas through another human mind.

  Next on the list of things he had to do within the next few hours was a discussion of tactical and strategic problems, which meant joining Admiral Bowman, who was waiting to discuss them with him.

  It was a relief to discover an old friend amid the endless succession of anxious, demanding faces coming before him with their requests and problems. The two men greeted each other with informal enthusiasm.

  Admiral Bowman had thin, sandy hair and a rugged face. He looked the part of a fighting man, so much so that his colleagues sometimes wondered (privately, because Bowman was popular) whether it was manner and appearance as much as actual achievement that had advanced him as far as he had come in rank.

  No one had ever called into question his trustworthiness, though, and Yamanim had no qualms about telling Bowman about the new intelligence findings.

  "The thing is, Jack, our people in the basement have broken the berserker communications code. At least the one that they've been using in this sector."

  Bowman thought about it for a moment, then whistled softly.

  "Yeah."

  Bowman's forehead wrinkled. "I've never got it completely though my head how we can even intercept a message, without knocking down the courier that carries it. Not like a radio wave."

  "That's about where they lose me too. The world turns into mathematics, and then the math turns into philosophy or metaphysics or some such. They tell me it has to do with quantum mechanics—treating a whole courier machine like a subatomic particle. But it seems to work."

  The berserkers, as far as any Solarian was able to tell, were probably aware of the new Solarian hardware scattered about in space. But they had been content with the routine computation that the new message-reading system was no more than a new version of the warning net.

  "Actually, the two functions are fundamentally incompatible. If you interfere with the courier, you'll never be able to read its message—unless you stop it altogether."

  Continued surveillance of enormous volumes of space, millions of cubic light-years, was still being carried out by the vast network of spacegoing robots and crewed ships. This massive effort resulted in ever more interceptions of enemy messages, fodder for the massive optelectronic brains, perhaps the largest and fastest machines of their kind ever assembled, which were engaged in cryptanalysis. But the surveillance, the gathering of information, of course was not run from down in this basement. Only the decoding.

  Each new reassessment of the situation, whether made by the analysts on Earth or those at Port Diamond, tended to confirm the earlier estimates of the strength of the berserker task force, and its probable objectives. The enemy force was poised to strike at the Fifty Fifty base, and though some of the details were still unclear, it was ominously strong, much stronger than any collection of ships that the people of Earth could now assemble in the Gulf to meet it.

  But there were rays of hope. For one thing, there was no reason to suppose that the enemy knew that its strength had been accurately appraised, that organic brains in the Solarian headquarters were reading berserker plans, knowing them down to the very hour of scheduling and the assignment of individual units to the berserker versions of fleets and squadrons. Nonorganic people—as some breathing folk were wont to call those complex programs, even the ones that never pretended or attempted to be human—played an essential role in the defense too.

  The latest picture drawn by intelligence, incorporating morsels of information that had come in with the courier carrying the supposedly heroic Spaceman Gift, continued to be consistently (some still thought suspiciously) plain: The consensus of scoutship sightings and readings in flightspace from the robot network faithfully confirmed the earlier estimates and predictions. Not only had enemy strength been accurately estimated, but the berserker attack forces seemed to be crossing the Gulf in the type of deployment and at the times and places intelligence had predicted. All indications were that they intended a mass attack on the space atoll called Fifty Fifty.

  The field marshal also told Bowman of his assignment as commander of a task force that was being sent out to intercept the berserker fleet as it neared its goal.

  "There'll be two sections. Officially, two separate task forces. Naguance will be taking the other, since Yeslah's laid up in hospital—some kind of damned skin disease that the medics can't seem to figure out. You're senior to Naguance, so the overall command is yours. In your section you'll have one carrier, Lankvil, which is promised to be spaceworthy in a few days. I want the other section to lift off first, and it'll include two carriers, Venture and Stinger."

  Yamanim also announced his decision that at least one knowledgeable person ought to go to Earth, to answer in person all questions regarding the new intelligence system, to make all possible efforts to ensure that the highest leaders accept the intelligence reports provided by himself and his colleagues, as giving a true picture of berserker intentions.

  The obvious first choice for the mission to Earth was the leader of the premier intelligence section on Port Diamond, the code-breaking crew called Hypo. Yamanim's first impulse was to send Commander R. The equivalent intelligence group, code-named Negat, who worked on Earth, had no individual member whose personal plea would be as effective with high authority.

  But the field marshal did not need to think about the matter for long before accepting Bowman's advice, in a reversal of his own first impulse. The idea was that Commander R herself had better stay right where she was, on the job.

  Yamanim nodded slowly. "She's undoubtedly a genius, but one can't say that she has much of a persuasive presence."

  "No. Well, not unless she gets you in her lair, where she's surrounded by her secret displays. And she can bring to bear all the arrays of logic and probability and whatever else she uses." As an afterthought, Bowman added, "witchcraft," and shuddered slightly. "I've had that treatment, and I can testify."

  "Of course the commander might bring whatever materials she needs with her—but no, you're right, we need Mother just where she is, on the job. If anyone's irreplaceable, she is."

  After a short conference it was agreed between the two officers that Admiral Bowman himself would go to Earth, there to argue the case at the highest level for accepting the intelligence estimates.

  "And don't let the premier keep you waiting around. You'll have the perfect excuse in that you'll have to be with Task Force Seventeen."

  "Oh, I'll be very firm with her. Yeah, sure." And Bowman gently shook his head.

  Field Marshal Yamanim had set a different goal for himself, as he now probably told Bowman. Simultaneously with dispatching his old friend to Earth—or only a few minutes later, maybe while he was in the process of climbing out of whatever pit or tank or force field encased the major repairs on his carrier—Yamanim decided that his own best move would be a swift trip to the peculiar outpost called Fifty Fifty, which he had never taken a good look at.

  Graphics of that peculiar outpost he had observed plenty, but he had seen the thing itself only incidentally, once, years ago, while passing through. Looking at a holostage, or even, when he got back on his flagship, plunging into the virtual reality of a tencube representation, was never quite the same as coming to
grips with the thing itself. He wanted to conduct a personal tour of inspection, to get a feel for just how defensible the place was—and what the garrison assigned to the job of defending it now thought of their own chances.

  Also, the field marshal wanted to carry directly to those people a warning of enemy plans. Having allowed himself to become firmly convinced that this time the intelligence people were right, Yamanim wasn't going to waver. He didn't want to wait for final approval from Earth before issuing a few essential warnings.

  And Yamanim wanted to see for himself the object for which it seemed a great battle was likely to be fought.

  The field marshal knew he was considered something of a politician. That didn't bother him, since it was true of all officers of very high rank—of all the really successful ones, he thought, going back through history. Undoubtedly some were better at concealing the fact than he was. His manner was usually careful and conciliatory, his temperament for the most part placid. He had been genuinely distressed, just after the great Port Diamond raid, to learn he had been given command of the whole Gulf fleet in this desperate situation, but no idea of trying to avoid the burden had ever crossed his mind. He had long experience as a subspacer—on ships that cruised almost entirely in flightspace, only emerging into normal space at long intervals, meanwhile using fine instruments to keep in touch.

  Jory Yokosuka, pacing in front of headquarters, was occupying her mind by deciding what to pack for her upcoming trip. It would be best to keep the physical burden as light as possible, because she would probably wind up toting it around herself—civilian robots would have to be allowed on Fifty Fifty as part of the tools for making the documentary, but they might not be available as baggage handlers.

  She found herself nagged by the memory of her brief contact with the wounded spacer, Sebastian Gift. Something strange about that one, she kept thinking, besides his possible connection to the mysterious Hypo. But the matter of Gift kept getting pushed to the back of her mind by other developments.

  Still her mind kept drifting back, again and again, to the interview—if you could call their brief talk that—she'd had with Nifty Gift.

  No, Jory was not entirely satisfied with what she'd got from the wounded spacer. Her first impression had been that the young man exemplified the legendary type of modest, tongue-tied hero, and she wanted to write something about him, though she was not sure what—but then the connection with the mysterious Hypo had made her think again. One problem, she realized, might be that she had zero previous experience with war heroes, and indeed little contact with the military at all.

  Naturally, there had been an official press conference with Gift, as he had told her there would be, and she had attended. His eyes had rested on her once or twice as she stood in the second row of correspondents, and she was sure that he remembered her from her unauthorized evening visit. But he had made no overt sign of recognition, which was fine with her.

  Apart from the press conference, there hadn't been enough on her recording to make an exclusive interview out of her brief talk with Gift—of course, it would have been interesting to see what the Port Diamond censors made of the mention of Hypo.

  The bite-sized record of the press conference on its plastic tile sounded and looked all right when you ran it on a holostage—but still, her instincts told her there was something more to the story than she'd been able to get at. Well, whatever was there would just have to wait until another day—maybe sometime she'd have the chance to pursue the matter.

  She looked around and came to a stop. Here came what she was waiting for, approaching down a corridor just inside headquarters, on a palm-shaped walkway just outside: The fast-walking entourage of the field marshal himself.

  Jory hastened to position herself in his way, and succeeded in bringing the small group to a halt.

  She managed to do this only because, as she had hoped, but not really dared to expect, Yamanim himself was minded to take an interest. He questioned her while his aides stood by, looking at her blankly.

  Yes, she responded to his first question, she was the civilian, or one of the civilians, who wanted a ride to Fifty Fifty.

  And yes, Jory was proud to be able to announce, she was the one who had just been hired by and was going to work for the famous entertainment director Jay Nash. Nash was also a military reservist, and had been sent in that capacity to Fifty Fifty, there to immortalize in documentary form the coming battle, or some part of it anyway.

  "Why'd he pick you?"

  Jory drew a deep breath. No use pretending to be modest. "I've been getting a certain reputation for knowing how to use certain kinds of recording equipment. Making things look and sound the way I want them to, without using enhancement. And I'm not timid. It's a job that I—"

  "Congratulations." Yamanim beamed at her with what she assessed as a wicked twinkle in his eye. "Have you ever actually met the man?"

  "No, but—"

  "You have something to look forward to." Was the field marshal smiling as he turned away and resumed his rapid progress? It was hard to tell.

  Concerning Jay Nash, her new boss, Jory knew what everyone else knew, and very little more: That Nash was, in civilian life, one of the most important entertainment producers in the homeworlds.

  Jory assumed that even before she managed to catch up with Nash, her next priority had better be learning all she could about the nuts and bolts of military operations, the people and hardware she was soon going to be writing about.

  It had taken some string-pulling to get a civilian employee, or independent contractor, assigned to a combat zone. But the man some considered Earth's greatest drama director had evidently had the strings in hand to pull.

  Nifty Gift's first day out of the hospital turned out to be a busy one for him indeed. Returning from his thought-provoking visit to Hypo, he ran into Jory Yokosuka once again. As far as he could tell, the encounter was purely accidental.

  After finishing her talk with Yamanim, she had turned away from headquarters and walked down the street, at a normal pace, past the unmarked entrance to Hypo. No sign of Gift just now, and she didn't want to loiter here.

  Moving on briskly, she went back to the hospital and waited for the staff car to bring him back.

  Fortune smiled on her plans, and she was able to run into him, right at the main entrance, as if by accident.

  The staff car had just dropped him off. Unescorted at the moment, he paused and was willing to talk.

  Demonstrating real sympathy, Jory asked the hero about his shattered and replaced hand. It was a subject on which Gift was ready to talk freely.

  Off and on there were increased stirrings of function and sensation, if not exactly of life, in the fingers of Gift's new left hand. Coming along, though he wouldn't want to try to learn the piano just yet. He seemed to be making progress at about the best rate that could reasonably be expected. The composite fingers, powered by his blood supply, were already actually stronger than his fleshy ones. But the doctors had been at pains to explain that they would never be as strong, as, for example, the servo-powered fingers of space armor.

  One of the hospital technicians, or bioengineers, had put it this way: "It's not space-armor, you understand; you can't arm wrestle a berserker with one of these."

  Jory had her recorder running. "And what did you say to that?"

  Nifty shook his head. "People have exaggerated ideas about what space armor can do. Thank God I won't have to wrestle any berserkers. Not any more."

  "They're giving you a new job now?"

  "When I get back from my leave."

  They talked a little longer.

  When she left Gift, she thought a little more about her new job. Working for the military would seem to put any journalist under something of an obligation to them

  The counterargument to that was: "But it seems to me that the military saving your life and your family's lives—if you have a family—tends to create a certain obligation too."

  And the
y had been saving everyone's life, for centuries. Berserkers were nothing new.

  She was also one of the many media people who had already been trying to pin down some hard facts about the rumored new spy system. Was that mysterious system, and the equally mysterious Hypo, one and the same?

  She'd been careful not to let anyone in the military know that she'd heard anything at all about either one.

  Field Marshal Yamanim was asking one of his junior aides, as the cruiser prepared for liftoff: "That gal get aboard? The one who's going to work with Jay Nash?"

  "Yes, sir, she did."

  "I want you to look after her en route," the field marshal directed after a moment's thought. "Run her through the ten-cube; let her know everything—everything that we would like her to know and write about. Think you can handle that?"

  "Yes, sir, I can."

  "Good." No need to explain. Everyone knew that the more rank any officer had, the more important it was to keep on the right side of the media.

  SIX

  Jory Yokosuka had hoped to arrange for herself a guided tour of Port Diamond's military installations. She wanted to get as good a look as possible at some of the military hardware that young Solarian warriors would soon be riding and guiding into battle. But as soon as word reached Jory that her ride out to Fifty Fifty was ready and waiting, she bowed out of the tour, or whatever else was going on, and hastily threw a few personal belongings into a bag. The big job she had wanted was ready and waiting, and everything else would have to wait.

  As soon as she was on the cruiser, and the formalities of getting under way had been completed, she resumed her efforts to pick people's brains.

  She was soon pleased to learn that, as Nash's aide, she rated a private briefing session in a tencube.

  She was walking down a corridor with the officer who was going to perform the briefing. The artificial gravity had been set a little light, and everyone's steps were buoyant.