Dune: The Battle of Corrin

by Brian Herbert; Kevin J. Anderson

  — KREFTER BRAHN,

  Special Advisor to the Jihad

  Soon after the Vengeance Fleet hurtled through the scrambler network, they suddenly entered the densest concentration of enemy fire. The robot battleships formed concentric walls to protect Corrin, and they did not intend to let the humans pass.

  The machines launched an endless rain of precisely targeted explosive shells, blast after blast after blast that dissipated harmlessly against the Holtzman shields. But already the front lines of the Army of Humanity, pressing forward, were overheating. From the flagship, Vor viewed the projections, knew that under the constant punishing the shields would overheat and fail within an hour.

  A second line of League javelins and ballistas came immediately behind them, and a third, and a fourth. He clenched the arms of his command chair, keeping his face expressionless and unreadable. It seemed to be a question of which side would be the first to dwindle to nothing.

  “Keep firing,” Vor said, though the gunners needed no such instructions. “Give them everything we have.”

  “Targeting systems are still faulty, Supreme Bashar. We’re wasting a lot of our munitions.” After Seurat’s treacherous sneak attack, rapid repairs had been completed on the LS Serena Victory, but Vor had lost over a hundred crew members in the explosions.

  “Take your best guess.” He shook his head. “Look at all those robot warships— how can you miss?”

  A forest of enemy vessels blocked him from his objective. Vor bit back a curse. It should have been such a straightforward operation! Abulurd had derailed so much planning, had made the offensive here so much more complicated.

  When the Bridge of Hrethgir inexplicably failed to detonate even after Vor passed the trip line in space, two million human hostages had received a reprieve. If the League achieved victory on Corrin, they had standing orders to rescue as many of the hostages as possible. Especially if Serena Butler and her child were among them.

  Though the Vengeance Fleet ships had minimal crews and thus plenty of extra space, they could never hold millions of refugees. They were slow vessels and would take a long time to reach another habitable planet. The only solution for the hostages would be to shuttle them from their cargo containers back to the surface of Corrin.

  But not if Vor turned the planet to radioactive slag, like the other Synchronized Worlds in the Great Purge.

  Now that he had proved the Bridge of Hrethgir seemed to be just an elaborate and diabolical bluff he could not so blithely doom all two million hostages. This epic victory would not be as neat or as simple as he had hoped, but he would achieve it nonetheless.

  As Vor plowed ahead, the shields began to fail on the front line of beleaguered League ships. Many of the captains dropped back to be replaced by new vessels, but others plunged ahead, refusing to withdraw even as their Holtzman defenses flickered. Thus unprotected, the human vessels swiftly succumbed to the relentless bombardment. Numbers appeared on his summary screens.

  “Launch kindjal squadrons,” he said. It was time for the next step of the plan. “Tell the pilots to be ready to deploy their pulse-atomics.”

  “But, Supreme Bashar, we’re not even close to the surface!”

  “No, we’re not— and we won’t get there at all unless we can clear away some of this clutter.” He drew a deep breath. “Save enough warheads for a final coup de grâce, and tell the Ginaz swordmasters we’re going to need them for some precision work.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  As Xavier had lectured him many times before, a battlefield commander had to be flexible. Many routes led to the objective. The pulse-atomics would do the job of getting them through to Corrin… and he could not accomplish the primary objective of destroying Omnius unless he got to the planet. One step at a time.

  The revised tactic would save lives— not only the millions still crowded aboard the Bridge of Hrethgir, but also all of the soldiers who would die if the Supreme Bashar insisted on hammering against the robot defenses with conventional weapons.

  “It does no good to save our atomics if all our ships are destroyed here in orbit.”

  Swarms of kindjal squadrons flew out of the launching bays of the large ballistas, thousands of the sharp-winged fighters and bombers. They were small, like bits of fluff thrown against a herd of behemoths. But they carried the seeds of immense destruction.

  The kindjals deployed their atomics, tossing them in a broad spread against the dense conglomeration of targets the thinking machines had arranged to block the Army of Humanity.

  “Here it comes,” Vor said to no one in particular. “All shields at full strength. Front lines, withdraw if you can.”

  Seeing the unexpected shift of tactics, the robot battleships moved forward, eager to regain some of the ground they had lost.

  Then a wave of dazzling pulse-atomics detonated, overlapping floods of enhanced energy specifically designed to erase gelcircuitry minds. The enormous amount of physical damage was only secondary.

  As Vor covered his eyes against the flash, he studied the automatically dimmed screen on the flagship. It looked as if the blinding, luminous hand of God had just swept through the robot lines, paralyzing the craft, killing the thinking machines aboard, and leaving the impenetrable defensive line in ruins.

  No, Vor thought. It was not a waste of our warheads.

  He had no doubt that many hapless Corrin prisoners had been placed aboard those enemy warships, and had died along with their robot captors, but Vor didn’t pause to think about those casualties. They were necessary, unavoidable. Perhaps someday history would compile an accurate tally. But humans would write this history only if they emerged victorious from the Battle of Corrin.

  “Full forward, into the breach!” he shouted. “If you’ve still got shields, use them against all that debris— and hold on!”

  Like a battering ram, the Army of Humanity crashed ahead, blasting through the dead robot vessels until they encountered the inner line of machine defenses. Taken by surprise, the robot battleships scrambled to tighten their positions.

  Vor sent out the next wave of kindjal bombers— and annihilated the next enemies standing against him. And then the third and last line. By the time they finally broke through to the atmospheric fringe of Corrin, the Vengeance Fleet had depleted most of their store of atomics.

  Though they had used many of their warheads, at last the target lay below, exposed and vulnerable.

  “We have business to finish down there.” Vor pointed at the last machine planet, which stretched in a gentle curve almost seventy kilometers beneath them.

  * * *

  THE REMNANTS OF the opposing fleets locked in combat in the skies over Corrin, with warships on each side blasting their way through and then returning to open fire again. Vor guided his ballista into the fray as if he were at the controls of a one-man fighter, as if he were a young officer again, trying to prove himself. He remembered the first great battle of the Jihad over Earth.

  His fleet dipped into the upper atmosphere. The escort ships accompanying Vor’s flagship took a heavy beating from ultrasound aerial torpedoes, and when many of the Army of Humanity vessels caught fire and tumbled away, others took their place to protect the Supreme Bashar.

  Hostile fire hit a nearby ship, overloading the already weakened shields until the League vessel exploded, pelting the LS Serena Victory with debris. Vor grimaced as bodies and body parts tumbled away from the wreckage into the high, thin air.

  Much more destruction would follow. He did not fear death himself, and was proud of his crew on the flagship, as they performed their duties flawlessly. He could not possibly have asked for more.

  Artillery blasts from the LS Serena Victory and the rest of the Vengeance Fleet obliterated thinking machines in their battleships and on the ground. Explosions blossomed in the sky and on the surface of the planet. Down there, Omnius still remained intact.

  With the way cleared and a safe path opened up in orbit, now the Viceroy’s diplomatic
vessel approached from the outskirts of the battle zone. Several shuttles emerged, descending swiftly toward the heart of the fiercest combat. Over the comline, Vor heard the feverish voice of Rayna Butler. “By the grace of Saint Serena, we’re getting through! I told you we could do it!”

  Angrily, Vor opened a direct channel. “Viceroy Butler, what are you and Rayna doing? I did not give permission for this. Stay out of the line of fire.”

  Faykan’s voice came back. “It isn’t me, Supreme Bashar. It seems… Rayna has her own mission. She was quite insistent.”

  The pale young woman transmitted from her shuttle, “Corrin is the den of our enemies. This is— and has always been— my calling in life. My followers, and the spirit of Saint Serena, will protect me.”

  Vor heaved a deep, exasperated sigh. Somehow, that woman could rationalize any contradiction. Rayna believed Serena was alive on the Bridge, but she also felt she was guided by Serena’s spirit. Of course, Rayna also wanted to destroy all forms of technology, yet she rode in spaceships….

  He had more vital concerns at the moment. At least they would be fighting a real enemy now, instead of harmless surrogate machines on the League Worlds. Let the fanatics face the brunt of Omnius’s defenders— and better that the antitechnology fanatics burn out their vehemence here than at home.

  As the surviving ships of the fleet pressed forward to the main goal on Corrin, machine forces regrouped around the evermind’s stronghold in the center of the city. Vor summoned all the swordmasters and mercenaries, many of them seasoned veterans trained to deal with problems exactly like these. They had been waiting during the long journey for this moment.

  Ultimately, it is not what you are but who you are that matters.

  — Erasmus Dialogues,

  final entries

  Though he was numb in his heart and body, Swordmaster Istian Goss continued to fight. Corrin, at least, was a proper battlefield for his skills.

  For the weeks of travel across space to the final Synchronized World, he had been disturbed and restless, keeping to himself. Aboard the ship he encountered many of the Cultist zealots whom he hated so much. If he didn’t stay away from them, he might be tempted to lash out and break their bones.

  Instead, Istian trained alone in sealed chambers, pushing himself, improving his fighting skills much as the young Jool Noret had done. But no matter how hard he worked, Istian still did not feel the spirit of the great hero moving through him. Even so, as he smashed one test opponent after another, he realized that the inner silence of Jool Noret did not in fact make Istian any less effective. He was a skilled swordmaster in his own right.

  After the riots and demonstrations on Zimia had resulted in the deaths of both Nar Trig and the sensei mek Chirox, Istian had had no qualms about volunteering for this final assault on Corrin. Fighting the forces of Omnius yet again was far preferable to killing fellow human beings in order to assuage his anger and guilt.

  When the Vengeance Fleet finally clashed above the last stronghold of Omnius, plowing through the defensive lines of robotic battleships, Istian and his fellow mercenaries armed themselves, prepared for the combat. But the space battle was not part of a swordmaster’s fight. Istian had done little more than fidget aboard the ship, waiting, itching to use his pulse-sword in hand-to-hand combat.

  At last, when the wreckage of the machine forces lay strewn in orbit, along with many dead ships from the Vengeance Fleet, Supreme Bashar Atreides turned them loose. Istian Goss and his fellow mercenaries climbed aboard a fast personnel shuttle, ready for a final assault on the primary city on Corrin. Beside him he had seen accompanying javelins and ballistas full of mercenaries blown up by repeated machine fire.

  But some survived. Enough of them to do the job.

  The personnel shuttle streaked down through the atmosphere, accompanied by twenty similar craft. It would be the mission of Istian and his fellow warriors to make Corrin safe, to eradicate the rest of the thinking machines, to plant the precision atomic charge that would exterminate the last evermind.

  Beside him in the shuttle rode twenty-three other swordmasters, survivors of old battles, like himself. After the Jihad, many of them had found other callings in life, but they had returned for this conflict. One last opportunity to prove their combat skills.

  As the personnel shuttle skidded to a halt in the chaos of the machine city, the hatches opened and the swordmasters poured out, their pulse-swords ready. Nearby, two other shuttles landed, bearing diplomatic markings instead of the Army of Humanity insignia. Enthusiastic but clumsy, Cultists carrying cudgels and crude imitations of pulse-swords raced out to destroy any enemy they could find.

  His heart pounding, Istian turned away, not wanting to be distracted by fools when he had a real opponent to fight. An enemy that mattered.

  However, he realized that the Cultists didn’t care if they lost two or three fighters for every machine they managed to deactivate. This was pure jihad for them, more so than for anyone in the Army of Humanity. Unlike when they were back on Salusa Secundus, attacking useful machines such as Chirox, right now these zealots were actually Istian’s allies. He found it strange to think of them as such….

  After Istian and his fellow mercenaries had exited, the shuttle pilot took off again, while anti-aircraft fire peppered the sky. Explosions rocked the streets of the primary Corrin city. Combat robots swarmed out of glistening geometrical complexes. With a loud yell, the swordmasters ran to meet them.

  Eager for combat, Istian got there first. Before him, ominous combat meks stood to face the swordmasters, their weapons arms extended and optic threads sparkling, as if a machine could experience hatred.

  Every one of them bore an eerie resemblance to Chirox.

  After having watched the sensei mek sacrifice himself rather than hurt a human being, Istian hesitated, feeling a heaviness in his heart. He wished Chirox could be there beside him now. Even more influential on him than the visceral spirit of Jool Noret, the reprogrammed combat mek had guided Istian’s life.

  He groped for Jool Noret inside his heart— and finally felt an emotional, spiritual connection. In front of him, these warrior robots were simply brute-force fighters. And they would fall. The moment that his pulse-sword clashed against a combat mek, he realized that all similarity to Chirox was an illusion.

  With the sensei mek’s training, Istian was more than a match for them. He dispatched two opponents in the first wave and threw himself without thought upon the next combat mek, who had just killed one of the rampaging Cultists. While blood still dripped from its sharp flowmetal arms, Istian fried its gelcircuitry systems and spun about to seek another enemy.

  As he continued to fight, all his ghosts and doubts burned away.

  Istian reached the final level of abandonment, the true secret of Jool Noret’s fighting style. He felt energized. This was what he had devoted his life to. This would always be the focus of his heart and mind.

  He and his comrades made their way toward the central Omnius nexus, awaiting the final signal to plant their city-killer warheads and end their mission. Swinging his pulse-sword, Istian felt he could fight like this forever— and there were certainly enough thinking machines to keep him busy.

  * * *

  WHILE THE FINAL battle raged around Corrin, Erasmus paused to listen to the peaceful sounds of water trickling from numerous mechanical fountains and streams, punctuated with the background noises of battle in the skies above the capital city. Seeing the unfortunate course of the fighting— yet feeling no guilt for his own part in the terrible losses— the independent robot had retreated here to where he might seek solace for his troubles and await the end. Or terminate himself.

  Abruptly, as he witnessed the return of his beloved ward, Erasmus changed his mind. With his crimson robe flowing around him, the robot strode forward to embrace a shaken-looking Gilbertus Albans, rescued from the cargo containers of the Bridge of Hrethgir. Even though the last Synchronized World was falling around him, he could t
hink of only one thing. “You are safe, my Mentat. Excellent!” The expression of joy on his flowmetal face was not simulated, but a genuine, unconscious reaction.

  The welcoming hug was so fervent that the powerfully built man gasped. “Father— please, not so much enthusiasm!”

  Erasmus loosened the embrace and stood back to admire the man he had raised, trained, and cared for over so many decades. Gilbertus looked dirty and tired from his ordeal, but uninjured. That was the important thing. And the robot said, “I never thought I’d see you again.”

  “I felt the same.” Gilbertus’s large olive-green eyes misted over. “But I was also sure you would find a way to bring me back. You would not let me get hurt.” He gave a worried frown. “But Serena is still up there. We must rescue her.”

  “Unfortunately, I am unable to help her now. Most of our defenses have been obliterated by human pulse-atomics. I fear that Corrin is lost to us,” Erasmus said. “The League fleet will be here soon.”

  “At least she wasn’t aboard one of the machine ships,” Gilbertus said, striving for any sort of consolation. “Then she would be dead already.”

  The independent robot did not lie to him. “If Vorian Atreides follows his previous pattern, you and I may not have much longer, either, my Mentat. He will sterilize Corrin as he did the other Synchronized Worlds, and we will be obliterated. Up on the Bridge, your Serena may survive.”

  “I don’t believe they will send waves of atomics to kill us all, Father. I saw their troops landing and entering the city— although their commander has already proved that he’s willing to sacrifice millions of hostages. I cannot understand why the explosive trigger failed in the Bridge of Hrethgir.”

  “It did not fail, Gilbertus. I deactivated it— in order to save one person.”

  Gilbertus was stunned. “You did that for me? You sacrificed Corrin, the entire machine civilization? I am not worthy of that!”

  “To me, you are. I have completed extensive projections, and it is clear that you will become a very important man one day. Perhaps when all the thinking machines are gone, you can teach your fellow humans how to think efficiently. Then all my work will not have been for nothing.”