Berserker Base

by Fred Saberhagen

  ''Like my father," she blurted.

  "He is a planetologist?"

  "Yes. Professor at a college in western Oregon, if that means anything to you. He doesn't do much fieldwork anymore, but it used to take him away for long stretches. Mother endured his absences, however."

  "A remarkable lady."

  "She loves him." Of course she does. It was ever worth the wait, when Dad at last returned.

  "Tea's ready," Dunbar said, as if relieved to escape personal matters. He served it, sat down facing her with shank crossed over knee, filled and ignited his pipe.

  The brew was hot and comforting on her palate. "Good," she praised. "Earth-grown, I'd judge. Expensive, this far out. You must be a connoisseur."

  He grinned, it made his visage briefly endearing. "Faute de mieux. I'd liefer ha' offered ye wine or ale, but we're perforce austere. I daresay ye noticed the Spartan sauce on our food. Well, as that fine old racist Chesterton wrote,

  " 'Tea, although an Oriental,

  " 'Is a gentleman at leas!—' "

  Startled, she splashed some of hers into the saucer. "Why, you sound like my father now!"

  "I do?" He seemed honestly surprised.

  "A scholar."

  Again he grinned. "Och, nay. 'Tis but that on lengthy voyages and in lonely encampments, a fellow must needs read."

  A chance to probe him. "Have you developed any particular interests?"

  "Well, I like the nineteenth-century English-language writers, and history's a bit o' a hobby for me, especially medieval European." He leaned forward. "But enough about me. Let's talk about ye. What do ye enjoy?"

  "As a matter of fact," she admitted, "I share your literary taste. And I play tennis, sketch, make noises on a flute, am a pretty good cook, play hardnose poker and slapdash chess."

  "Let's get up a game," he suggested happily. "Chess, that is. I'm more the cautious sort. We should be well matched."

  Damn, but he does have charm when he cares to use it! she thought.

  She tried putting down any further notions. The men who attracted her had always been older ones, with intelligence, who led active lives. (A touch of father fixation, presumably, but what the hell.) Dunbar, though—she would not, repeat not, call him "Ian" in her mind—he was…

  Was what? The opposition? The outright enemy?

  How to lure the truth out of him? Well, Dad used to say, "When all else fails, try frankness."

  She set her teacup on the shelf beside her chair: a hint, perhaps too subtle, that she was declining continued hospitality. "That might be fun, Captain," she declared, "after you've set me at ease about several things."

  For an instant he looked dashed, before firmness and… resignation?… deepened the lines in his countenance. "Aye," he murmured, " 'twas clear ye'd raise the same questions your colleagues did. And belike more, sin' ye've a keen wit and are not being rushed as they were."

  "Also, I have a special concern, " Sally told him. "Not that the rest don't share it, but it was bound to affect me harder than most of them. You see, my study hasn't been the structure of the planet or the chemistry of life on it or anything like that. It's been the natives themselves. I deal directly with them, in several cases intimately. They—certain individuals—they've become my friends, as dear to me as any human."

  Dunbar nodded. "And today ye see them threatened wi' extermination, like' rats," he said, his tone gentler than she would have expected. "Well, that's why we came, to protect them."

  Sally stiffened. "Captain, I know 'a fair amount about the berserkers. Anybody must, who doesn't want to live in a dream universe. If a planet is undefended, and you assure me they suppose Ilya is, then a single major vessel of theirs can reduce it in a couple of days. Therefore, they'll not likely bother to send more than that."

  Dunbar puffed hard on his pipe. Blue clouds streamed past his visage and out the ventilator. She caught a tart whiff. "Aye, we've based our plans on the expectation."

  "You seem to have planted your most potent weapons, ground-based, here. The berserker will scarcely happen to show first above this horizon. No, it'll assume orbit and start bombardment above some random location—sending a line of devastation across Ilya, from pole to pole, till it's swung into your range."

  "That's what our spacecraft are mainly for, Dr. Jennison. They're insufficient to destroy it, but they'll draw its attention. Chasing them, it'll come into our sights."

  "You're risking countless lives on that hope."

  "Wha' else ha' we? I told ye, wi'out this operation, the planet is foredoomed anyhow."

  "And you came in pure, disinterested altruism," she challenged, "for the sake of nonhuman primitives whom none of you had ever even met?"

  He grinned afresh, but wolfishly now. "No, no. Grant us, we'd ha' been sorry at such a cosmic tragedy. Howe'er, from our selfish viewpoint, there'll be one berserker the less, o' their most formidable kind."

  She frowned, drummed fingernails on shelf, finally brought her glance dashing against his, and said: "That doesn't make sense, you know. Considering how many units their fleet must have, your effort is out of all proportion to any possible payoff."

  "Nay, wait, lass, ye're no' versed in the science o' war."

  "I doubt any such science exists!" she spat. "And I'd like to know how you know the enemy knows about Ilya, And—"

  A siren wailed. A voice roared from loudspeakers, beat through the door, assailed her eardrums. "Attention, attention! Hear this! Red alert! Berserker scout detected! Battle stations! Full concealment action!"

  "Judas in hell!" ripped from Dunbar. He sprang out of his chair, crouched over his computer terminal, punched frantically for video input. Woop-woop-woop screamed the siren.

  Sally surged to her feet. She looked over Donbar's shoulder. No radar, of course, she realized, nothing like that, which the intruder might notice; instruments in use were passive: optics, neutrino detectors, forcefield meters—'

  They did not spy the vessel from Lake Sapphire. The coincidence would have been enormous if it had passed above. However, from devices planted elsewhere the information, scrambled to simulate ordinary radio noise, went to the fortress. His screen showed a burnished spindle hurtling through the upper air. It passed beyond sight.

  He sagged back. She saw sweat darken his shirt beneath the arms. She felt her own. "The scout,"' he whispered. "'Tis verified—"

  "Bandit has left atmosphere and is accelerating outward," chanted the loudspeaker. " Reduce to yellow alert. Stand by."

  Silence rang.

  Slowly, Dunbar straightened and turned to Sally. His voice. rasped. "We'll ha' action soon."

  "'What' did it want?" she asked, as if through a rope around her neck.

  "Why, to make sure Ilya remains unguarded."

  "Oh. Captain, excuse me; this has been a shock, I must go rest a while."

  Sally whirled from him and stumbled out into the hallway. "No, don't come along, I'll be all right," she croaked. She didn't look behind her to see what expression might be on his face. He didn't seem entirely real. Nothing did.

  The knowledge grew and grew inside her, as if she were bearing a death in her womb. Why should the berserkers send a scout? The original chance discovery and whatever investigation followed, those should have been plenty. In fact, why didn't they strike Ilya at once, weeks ago?

  Because they didn't know, until just lately. But the Adamites say they did. And the Adamites were expecting that spyship.

  Then it must be the Adamites who betrayed us to the enemy. Are they goodlife? Do they have some kind of treaty with the berserkers? If not, what is their aim?

  What can I do? I am alone, delivered into their hands. Must I sit and watch the slaughter go on?

  Even as she groped her way, an answer began to come.

  A few food bars were left in her baggage. She stuffed them into pockets of her coverall. Ilyan biochemistry was too unlike Earth's for a human to eat anything native to the planet. By the same token, she was immune to ever
y Ilyan disease. Water would be no problem—unless it got contaminated by radioactive fallout.

  Return to Dunbar's room, she thought desperately. If he's still there. If not, find him. Persuade him… but how? I'm not experienced in seduction or, or anything like that. Somehow, I've got to talk him into covering for me.

  He saved her the trouble. A knock on her door summoned her. He stood outside, concern on his countenance and in his stance and voice. "Forgi' me, I'd no' pester ye, but ye acted so distressed—Can I do aught to help?"

  The knowledge of her power, slight though it was, came aglow in Sally like a draught of wine. Abruptly she was calm, the Zen relaxation upon her which Ito had tried to teach, and totally determined. Win or lose, she would play her hand.

  '"Don't you have duties, Captain?" she asked, since that was a predictable question.

  "No' at once; The berserker scout is definitely headed out o' this system. Twill take fifty or sixty hours at least for it to report back and for a major ship to get here. Belike the time will be longer." He hesitated… stared at the floor, clamped his fists. "Aye, they'll soon require me for final inspections, tests, drills, briefings. But no' immediately. Meanwhile, is there any comfort I can offer ye?"

  She pounced. "Let me go topside," she said mutedly.

  "What?" He was astonished.

  I'm not used to playing the pathetic little girl, she thought. I'll doubtless do it badly, Well, chances are he won't know the difference. "It may be my last walk around this countryside I love. Oh, please, Captain Dunbar—Ian—please!"

  He stood silent for several heartbeats. But he was a decisive man. "Aye, why no'? I'm sorry—surely ye'd liefer be alone—my orders are that I must accompany ye."

  She gave him a sunburst smile. "I understand. And I don't mind at all. Thank you, thank you."

  "Let's begone, if ye wish." Willy-nilly, she found that his gladness touched tier.

  Save for the pulse of machines, the corridors had quieted. Men were dosing down their construction jobs and preparing for combat. As. he passed a chapel, Sally heard untrained singers:

  ''—Lord God o' warrior Joshua,

  "Unleash thy lightnings now!"

  She wondered if the hymn spoke to Dunbar or if he had left the Kirk and become an agnostic like her.

  What did that matter?

  A ladder took them past a guard station where the sentries saluted him, and up onto desolation. A breeze off the lake cooled noontide heat. Clouds blew in ruddy-bright rags. Olga was a thin arc, with streamers of dust storm across the dark part. Sally pointed herself at a stand of trees some distance beyond this blackened section, and walked fast.

  "I take it ye want as much time as possible amidst yon life," Dunbar ventured.

  She nodded. "Of course. How long will it remain?"

  "Ye're too pessimistic, lass—pardon me—Dr. Jennison. We'll smite the berserker, ne'er fear."

  "How can you be sure? It'll be the biggest, most heavily armed, most elaborately computer-brained type they've got. I've seen pictures, read descriptions. It'll not only have a monstrous offensive arsenal, it'll bristle with defenses: forcefields, antimissiles, interceptor beam projectors. Can your few destroyers, or whatever they are, can they hope to prevail against it, let alone keep it from laying—oh—enormous territories waste?"'

  "I told ye, their main purpose is to lure it to where our ground-based armament can take o'er."

  "That seems a crazy gamble. It'll be a moving target, hundreds of kilometers aloft."

  "We've no' just abundant energy to apply, we've knowledge o' where to. The layout o' such a ship is well understood, fro' study o' wrecks retrieved after engagements in the past."

  Sally bit her lip. "You're assuming the thing is… stupid. That it'll sit passive in synchronous orbit, after failing to suspect a trap. Berserkers have outsmarted humans before now."

  Dunbar's tone roughened. "Aye, granted. Our computer technology is not yet quite on a par wi' that o' the ancient Frankensteins who first designed them. The monsters do no' behave foreseeably, e'en in statistical fashion, the way less advanced systems do. They learn from experience; they innovate. That's wha's made them mortal dangers. Could we' build something comparable—"

  "No!" said ingrained fear. "We could never trust it not to turn on us."

  "M-m-m,' a common belief… Be that as it may, we do lack critical information. Nobody has studied a modern, updated berserker computer, save for fragments o' the hardware. Software, nil. Wha' few times a capture looked imminent, the thing destroyed itsel'." Dunbar's chuckle was harsh. "No' that the weapons employed usually leave much to up."

  "And nevertheless you think 'you can trick one of their top-rated units?"

  "They're no' omnipotent, Dr. Jennison. They too are bound by the laws o' physics and the logical requirements o' tactics. 'Humans ha' more than once defeated them. This will be another occasion."

  Ash gave way to turf. "Maybe, maybe," the woman said. "But that's not enough for me. The berserker will fight back. It will employ its most powerful weapons. You've hardened your base, but what have you done to protect the neighborhood? Nothing."

  He wilted. "We could no'," he answered in misery. "We know naught about the natives."

  "My colleagues do. They'd have undertaken to make arrangements with them."

  "Rightly or wrongly, our orders were to clear your team out o' the way immediately and completely, out fro' underfoot, so we could get on wi' our task," Dunbar said shakily. "I hate the thought o' losing lives, but wha' we do is necessary to save the whole native species."

  The shaw was close. The man's sidearm sat within centimeters of Sally's hand. She felt no excitement, only a vivid sense of everything around her, as she snatched it from its holster and sprang back.

  "Oh, no!" she cried. "Stop where you are!"

  "Wha's this?" He jerked to a halt, appalled. "Ha' ye gone schizo?"

  "Not a move," she said across the meters of living sod. The pistol never wavered in her grip. "At the least suspicion, I'll shoot, and believe me, I'm a damn good shot."

  He rallied, mustered composure, said in a flat voice: "Wha' are ye thinking o'? I can scarce believe ye're goodlife."

  "No, I'm not," she flung back. "Are you?"

  "Hoy? How could ye imagine—"

  "Easily. Your story about the berserkers chancing upon Ilya doesn't hang together. The sole explanation for everything I've witnessed is that you informed them, you Adamites, you called them in. Dare you deny?"

  He swallowed, ran tongue over lips, bowed his head. "We've a trap to spring," he mumbled.

  "For a single trophy, you'd set a world at stake? You're as evil as your enemy."

  "Sally, Sally, I can no' tell ye—"

  "Don't try. I haven't the time to spill, anyway. I'm going to do what you'd never have let me, lead the natives hereabouts to safety… if any safety is to be found, after what you've caused. Go back! This instant! I'll kill anyone who tries to follow me."

  For a long while he looked at her. The wind soughed in the darkling trees.

  "Ye would," he whispered finally. "Ye might ha' asked leave o' the admiral, though."

  "Would he have granted if, that fanatic?".

  "I can no' tell. Maybe no'."

  '"It wasn't a risk I could take."

  "Fro' your standpoint, true. Ye're a brave and determined person."

  "Go!" She aimed the pistol between his eyes and gave the trigger a light pressure.

  He nodded. "Farewell," he sighed, and trudged off. She watched him for a minute before she disappeared into the woods.

  The deathmoon slipped out of flightspace and accelerated ponderously; toward the red son. Slarshine glimmered off the kilometers-wide spheroid that was its hull. The weak light ahead cast shadows past gun turrets, missile tubes, ray projectors, like the shadows of crags and craters on a dead planet.

  A radar beam brought word of the double world. The berserker calculated orbits and adjusted its vectors accordingly. Olherwise nothing re
gistered on its receivers but endless cosmic rustlings.

  The solar disc waxed, dark spots upon bloody glow. The target globe and companion glimmered as crescents. The berserker was slowing down now, to put itself in a path around the one which was alive.

  It passed the other one. Abruptly, detectors thrilled.

  Engines awakened, spacecraft were scrambling from both planets—human vessels.

  The berserker tracked them. They numbered half a dozen, and were puny, well-nigh insignificant. Not quite; any could launch a warhead that would leave the berserker a cloud of molten gobbets. However, even attacking together they could not saturate its defenses. It would annihilate their missiles in midcourse, absorb their energy beams, and smash them out of existence, did they choose to fight.

  Should it? Within the central computer of the berserker, a logic tree grew and spread. The humans might be present by chance (probability low). If not, they had some scheme, of which the revelation by the Montgomery unit had been a part (probability high). Ought the berserker to withdraw? That might well be the intent of the humans; they often bluffed. The assumption that they were strong in this system would affect strategy, as by causing underestimation of their capabilities elsewhere.

  The berserker could retreat, to return in an armada invincible against anything the humans might have here. But this would mean postponing attacks elsewhere. It would buy the enemy time he much needed, to bring help from distant sectors. Whole worlds might never get attended to.

  Information was necessary. The berserker computed that its optimum course was to proceed. At worst, a single capital unit would perish. It considered dispatching a courier back to base with this message, calculated that the humans would detect and destroy the device before it could enter flightspace, and refrained. Its own failure to report in would warn the others, if that happened.

  The berserker moved onward—majestically, a human would have said—under its great imperative, to kill.

  First, if possible, it should dispose of the opposing spacecraft. They were widely dispersed, but generally maneuvering near the target mass. Computation, decision: Move their way, seek engagement, meanwhile establish orbit, commence sterilization, lash back at any surviving human vessel which dared try to distract the berserker from its mission.