| Described by Tarrant as "the most powerful fighting ship in the galaxy", Liberator was a vessel of unknown origin found drifting parallel to the London after a battle between unknown protagonists. Leylan reckoned that the battle involved "two fleets, maybe more", and so the Liberator might not have been fighting alone, although this was never made clear. | |
First impressions of the ship were of a technology that Avon described as "not just advanced" and Blake as "conceptually alien", although Avon later (in The Web) described it to Gan as "a little more advanced" than what he was used to: this may have been ironic understatement on his part. The armoury, when found, initially allowed each person to take only one weapon each (what Avon called "single function isomorphic response"), although this problem was never encountered again. The gun locker could hold up to 35 weapons, although only 8 were seen present in Cygnus Alpha. Exploration of the controls by Jenna sent the ship hurtling forward at incredible speed, causing Avon to comment on "negative hyperspace", prompting Blake to mention "crossing the antimatter interface". Jenna then found her hand affixed to a control, and was swamped with a feeling she described as "being completely known": at this point the Zen computer announced itself, but ignored Blake's questions regarding the proper owners of the ship or their whereabouts. Avon found a control panel indicating that the previous crew, whoever they were, had abandoned ship in life capsules. Zen was the first to use the name Liberator, but Zen had apparently plucked this from Jenna's mind; Jenna said she thought the name was appropriate, and Zen replied that "your thought was accepted".
| Over the course of time further information came to light regarding the ship's capabilities. It was fitted with a working teleport, had an advanced automatic repair system, could travel at a speed of up to Standard by 12 (see SPEED), was armed with neutron blasters, had ground attack capability (in The Harvest of Kairos an area of fifty square surface millispacials was instantly obliterated on Servalan's command) which apparently utilised plasma bolts, and Vila in Redemption tried but failed to launch "a couple of seekers". |  In Killer |
In Redemption further details of the Liberator were revealed, as its original owners reclaimed it and took the ship back to Space World in the 12th Sector. The ship had been built by the System, to whom it was known as Deep Space Vehicle 2.
 At Kairos |
Liberator was taken to the following planets/space stations: Cygnus
Alpha, Saurian Major, UP-The Web, Centero, Destiny (probably),
UP-Duel, UP-Project Avalon, XK-72, UP-Bounty, Lindor
(probably), Cephlon, Aristo, Space World (docked), Space City, Zonda,
UP-Weapon, Horizon, Earth (twice), the Host, Servalan's HQ, Fosforon,
Exbar, Albian, Asteroid P-K118, Atlay, UP-Gambit, Goth, Star One,
Sarran, Chenga, Obsidian, Crandor, Xaranor (probably), UP-Sopron, Kairos,
Keezarn, Auron, Ultraworld (artificial planet, docked), Sardos,
UP-Death-Watch, and Terminal. Others, unspecified, were undoubtedly
visited "between episodes", but 38 were seen to be so.
|
 Space Command under attack from the Liberator in Trial | In Shadow Cally destroyed a gunship launched from Space City after issuing two warnings. In Weapon the ship sustained damage from impact with one of the micro-mines seeded in orbit by Travis. In Horizon Blake lured three pursuit ships into the magnetic barrier around Horizon, destroying them. In Trial an attack was made on Servalan's HQ, causing a number of casualties, probably including Fleet Warden Samor, Senator Bercol, Secretary Rontane and Major Thania (Travis described the toll as "high, and rising all the time"). |
 Under attack from the Mark Ten pursuit ships | In Volcano eight Federation cruisers landed just three hits, but these did considerable damage, and it was some time before Liberator could get underway again. In The Harvest of Kairos Tarrant's piloting experience outmanoeuvred three pursuit ships in an eclipse pattern, and later he destroyed three Mark Ten pursuit ships without realising that this was in accordance with Jarvik's plan to take the ship. Two hits were sustained in this engagement. No significant battles took place thereafter. It was mentioned in Volcano that the weaponry systems needed recalibrating, presumably at periodic intervals. |
The defence system was only activated twice: against those boarding from the London in Space Fall, when Blake disarmed it, and against the Thaarn's personnel in Dawn of the Gods. Control of the ship was partially or wholly lost in: The Web, when Cally, under the control of the Lost, destroyed the forward detector links and planted a bomb on the primary power channel, blinding the ship and rendering the drives dysfunctional; Duel when Sinofar took control of all systems on board; Orac, when Orac took control of all ship systems; Redemption, when the System asserted control of all systems, denying all repair attempts and in one case directly attacking Blake;
|
Shadow, when the Darkness
assumed control of Orac, drained power from Liberator and tried to
generate the energy needed to effect its entry from its own dimension by
destroying the ship in atmospheric entry burn up; Dawn of the Gods,
when the pull of the Thaarn's black hole was too powerful to resist;
Sarcophagus, when the undead alien crippled the ship psionically to
supply the energy she needed to take on physical form; and Ultraworld,
when Liberator was brought into dock under the influence of the
Core.
|  The Liberator flies either way up in space |
 About to enter the cloud of fluid particles in Terminal |
Numerous features of the ship were mentioned, many of them only once. They
include various detectors, asymmetric thrust computers, autorepair system,
battle computers, navigational computers, autonavigator, directional probes,
orbital drift compensators, outer teleport transducers, propulsion computers,
recycling machine, remote visualisation unit, repair monitors, and steer
control unit.
|
|
Liberator carried an unspecified number of life capsules. An unstated
number were used by the original crew before Blake's arrival. Five would
have been launched in Aftermath if, as seems likely, Blake and Jenna
left in separate life capsules. Avon launched another in Powerplay,
but he may simply have activated the jettison system on an empty launcher.
|  The digestion of the ship starts |
 More digestion |
Flight could be manually controlled, but was usually governed by automatic
back-up computers that kept the ship's complex systems in balance. Without
the automatic systems, control could be lost very rapidly, as nearly happened
in Breakdown. Avon said in Deliverance that the ship could transmit and receive "sub-beam".
|
|
Equipment in the medical and/or surgical unit (references to each may mean
the same place) included diagnostic analyser, resuscitation capsules,
tranquilliser pads, and vor-ray scan. On its final voyage, to Terminal, the Liberator flew through a cloud of fluid particles that began to digest the ship, weakening it to the point where it broke apart once the main drives were activated. Those aboard were killed in the resulting explosion, except for Servalan who escaped, by her own account via a freak power surge through the teleport system
|  First explosion as the Liberator breaks up |
 The final demise of the Liberator in Terminal | See also DETECTORS, ENERGY BANKS, FORCE WALL, LIFE CAPSULES, NEUTRON BLASTERS, SPEED, TELEPORT, ZEN etc |
|
Varon told Blake that lie detectors had verified the statements made by the
three children Blake had allegedly assaulted. In Animals Dayna was
strapped into a chair aboard Servalan's ship that functioned as a lie
detector. It could, if desired, deliver a painful shock to the subject when
a lie was spoken. The Caliph's neuronic whip, in Dawn of the Gods, could also function as a lie detector. |  |
Rank within Space Command. Tarrant recalled that his first command was as a lieutenant on the previous kairopan harvest.
Emergency escape devices, generally short-ranged, fitted to a number of ships and referred to under various different names. References include:
| Aftermath: the life capsules on Liberator could be launched either from the inside or by remote from outside. This was presumably true of most emergency escape systems. Jenna's life capsule malfunctioned and she was reported by Zen as having sustained superficial injuries as a result. |  |
An abbreviation of 'life support system(s)', which in the B7 universe came in two main types. First was the equipment used to detect the presence of an environment capable of sustaining life, referred to in Space Fall, when Leylan asked Teague, after the latter had been put aboard the Liberator with Wallace, for a 'life support readout'. Teague, presumably using instruments on his survival unit, replied: 'Pressure normal...minimal radiation...breathable oxygen atmosphere'.
Second, and most common, was the equipment used to sustain life in a hostile environment, which came in two main sub-types. The first and most numerous were the life support systems aboard spaceships and bases, designed to sustain the lives of many; the second were personal life support systems, designed to sustain the life of one being.
Five spaceships had their life support systems mentioned: the projectile in Time Squad, Liberator (mentioned in three episodes), Travis' pursuit ship in Duel, Scorpio (also mentioned in three episodes), and Cancer's ship in Assassin:
There were references to life support systems in three bases: the mining company's old base on Asteroid PK 118, the Federation base on Virn, and Xenon base.
The personal life support systems referred to were varied, from those installed in life capsules to ensure survival in space, to those used to sustain the life of beings who would otherwise die due to age, illness or injury, to those used as a means of imprisonment.
Also in this episode, a life support system was used as a means of imprisonment. After Colonel Astrid tried to desroy Moloch, its punishment was to have him placed in a tank of liquid and kept alive by a 'totally efficient life support system'. As a result, he had 'No sensory perception. He just floats there, in a dark, lonely nothingness'.
Despite his use of and dependence on a life support system, Moloch forgot that it was not 'an integral part of himself, like an arm or a leg'; and he got Cally to teleport him to the Liberator without it, causing his death.
|
Terminal: Avon saw an illusion of Blake linked to a life support system.
The supposed Blake told him that if taken off it he 'wouldn't survive for
more than three or four hours'.
|  The whole illusion from Terminal |
 The Life-Support System |
| Cally was placed in a life-support capsule on Travis" orders after she was found injured in the wreckage of the communications centre on Centero. |  |
When Blake surmised that Liberator could cross the antimatter interface, Jenna stated that that was impossible, to which Avon replied, "That's what they said about the light barrier".
Vila began a limerick in the holding bay on Cygnus Alpha with the line: There was a young lady from Cygnus, but Arco shut him up before he could continue. One of the illogical wave emissions Orac produced from Vila to destabilise the Core of Ultraworld was a limerick, as follows:
There was a young lady called Perkins,
Who was very fond of small gherkins,
One day at tea,
She ate forty three,
And pickled her internal workings.
Vila then began another limerick with: There was a young man from -, but couldn't remember any more of it.
One of the weapons in the Federations armoury (and probably many other peoples" too). They were about to be used against Obsidian (and apparently delivered from a pursuit ship) when Hower destroyed the planet.
|
A brain-implanted control device fitted to Gan. It prevented him from
killing, although it did not apparently prevent him engaging in violent
activity (see GAN). Gan first revealed its presence
to Jenna while parked in orbit around Saurian Major. He initially thought
that his seeing Sinofar and Giroc on UP-Duel might have been caused by
his limiter malfunctioning. It did suffer a burn out in one circuit, turning
Gan into a violent maniac in Breakdown and repair was imperative to
save his life: Professor Kayn was coerced into performing the necessary
surgery.
|  In Breakdown his Limiter malfunctioned |