Berserker 13 - Berserker Fury (Novel) by Fred Saberhagen

Author:Fred Saberhagen [Saberhagen, Fred]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 1997-11-06T07:00:00+00:00

The actual launching went much too fast for verbal orders and acknowledgements, even among members of the same crew, to be useful or even possible while it was going on. Still, each farlauncher crew kept up an excited chatter among themselves, on intercom.

Launching from long range, and from behind thin screens of interstellar matter, protected the farlaunchers pretty effectively from the berserker carriers' defensive fire. But it also made for poor accuracy, and the Solarian missiles failed to hit any of their moving targets.

Somehow the living crew members of these farlaunchers were fooled, or fooled themselves, into thinking that they had done substantial damage to the enemy. Of course, they and their machines did what they could to record the results of the attack, and it was these recordings, computer enhanced, that later assured them they hadn't hit a thing.

Meanwhile their computer copilots were-much less emotional in their assessment.

Almost all of the Strongholds were able to return safely to their base on Fifty Fifty. One was lost to unknown causes.

Enemy fighters were in nearby space but had a hard time getting at them.

Once landed, the heavy farlaunchers were hastily repowered and reloaded, so they could get spaceborne again before the expected berserker raid hit home.

Solarian analysts examining the recordings decided that the berserker fleet undergoing this attack might well have been deliberately deceptive, creating what looked like massive secondary explosions and emissions of radiation. An additional effect of the same kind was owed to a peculiarity of the nebula through which they were moving; the clouds of thin gas and dust in which the shooting and missile-launching took place.

From the start, the Solarian leadership had counted heavily on having a third large carrier in space and ready to fight in defense of Fifty Fifty. Days ago, maybe a little over a week, Lankvil had been rushed to the dock at Port Diamond for repairs, after earlier combat damage in the Azlaroc Sector.

A preliminary estimate had stated that three months would be needed to complete repairs, but now maximum effort made by the shipyard workers was paying off. Repairs had been completed inside the three-day deadline, and the vessel, carrying Admiral Bowman's flag, had already left Port Diamond, hoping to catch up with and join her escort of smaller ships.

In fact, everyone agreed, the shipyard people and their machines had worked something of a miracle. Lankvil was ready for combat on schedule, loaded with fighters, undersluggers and hardlaunchers, and a full crew. Repairs were being completed while the carrier was under way again, in the center of her own task force, designated Seventeen .

A human outlook aboard the Lankvil , her eyes intent on the main holostage, confirmed the presence of a berserker scout, which had been reported by a robot scanner only a few seconds earlier.

"Looks like we've been spotted, sir."

"Begin evasive action," Admiral Bowman ordered.

With artificial gravity clamping the interior in a rigid vise of normalcy, the huge ship lurched and spun, stuttering on the verge of departing normal space, then skipping back.

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