Navigators of Dune
Page 35
Feeling elation, Ptolemy skittered forward on his mechanical body with swift, spiderlike grace made possible by the advanced thoughtrodes that he and Dr. Elchan had developed long ago. That was fitting. Ptolemy’s optical sensors were focused on the Butlerian leader and his Swordmaster. He swept sideways with one of his claw-ended legs, smashing Anari Idaho aside like a tiny toy.
This knocked Manford out of his harness, throwing him violently to the ground. Ptolemy reached forward and snatched up the hated leader by his torso, even though the vile man tried to escape by scuttling away on his hands.
In the air, Manford squirmed and flailed his arms, looking so weak, so helpless. Ptolemy lifted him high even as the Butlerians screamed in rage and panic. With his visual enhancement, Ptolemy recorded the look of disgust on Manford’s face. He wished it were fear instead, but realized he was witnessing the bravery of fanaticism, Manford’s willingness to become a martyr. Ptolemy didn’t care about that, he just wanted the man dead.
“For the future of humanity,” Ptolemy shouted through his speakerpatch. “For the blood of all your victims!” He reached up his second clawed hand, holding Manford Torondo with both mechanical arms in front of the raging crowd, dangling him over them. The fanatical leader yelled something, but his words were drowned out in the howls from the Butlerians.
“And for Elchan!”
It was like a child ready to pluck the wings off a fly.
* * *
FAR BELOW, STILL grasping her sword, Anari lurched to her feet, coughing blood and looking upward in horror. She knew that something was broken inside her, but she didn’t care about her own pain. She screamed, spraying red from her mouth. “No, not Manford!”
As if they had been paralyzed all at once, tens of thousands of Butlerians gasped in an instant of sickening silence.
In the last second Manford looked down at his loyal Swordmaster and companion, with an expression of deep love and a beatific acceptance of his fate. His loyal Swordmaster remembered something he had said to her once: The strength of a martyr is a thousand times the strength of a mere follower.
Then the cymek ripped Manford apart and threw the bloody remnants—torso, arms, entrails, head—in different directions.
A person who is willing to admit defeat is simply unskilled at redefining the situation.
—DIRECTEUR JOSEF VENPORT, address to surviving scientists at Denali
After a long slow voyage, Admiral Harte’s fleet of old-style FTL ships had arrived at the outskirts of the Lampadas system, unseen. In accordance with his orders from the Emperor, Harte directed his ships to stand down and wait in communication silence, setting a trap to be sprung when the time was right.
His crew deployed stealth-wrapped recon satellites, scout buoys, and shielded picket ships to monitor Lampadas and the Butlerian fleet that had returned from attacking Kolhar. He had been surprised to see so many of their warships intact after their assault on VenHold’s fortified headquarters. Both Emperor Roderick and Harte had assumed that the Butlerians would be decimated, if not completely destroyed. His fleet was supposed to be no more than a mop-up operation.
But Manford Torondo’s forces had returned home, looking only slightly bruised—and far too strong for his ships to fight in a head-to-head battle. And if he attacked the Butlerians and failed to eradicate them completely, the fanatics would retaliate in ways the Imperium might not survive. No, it was better to be cautious until he understood the complete situation.
And so his fleet monitored the planet, gathering information, looking for an opening. His powered-down ships hung in the outer darkness for days.
On the flagship he met regularly with his team of tactical specialists and space combat experts. Harte had all the advance information he needed, including comprehensive data on the Butlerian fleet’s abilities and weaknesses. The Emperor had given him great latitude in his orders, instructing him to look for an opportunity—and if one came up, to pounce on it.
Then such an opportunity appeared. The VenHold Spacing Fleet arrived unexpectedly and launched a full-scale attack against the Butlerians on Lampadas.
“Battle stations!” Admiral Harte shouted. Across his gathered warships, officers ran to their posts; weapons grids powered up, artillery launchers loaded.
But Harte told them to wait. They hung silently in position, observing the clash in Lampadas orbit.
Long-distance surveillance showed the escalating space battle. Detonations vaporized pairs of warships at a time, both Butlerian and VenHold; some of Manford’s ships engaged in suicide runs, ramming and destroying opposing vessels so easily that Harte had no choice but to conclude that the VenHold fleet was, for some incomprehensible reason, unshielded.
The VenHold ships fought back with great fury, destroying one Butlerian vessel after another. The Admiral sat back in astonished satisfaction as the two enemies of the Imperium tore each other apart. “They are doing our work for us,” he said to his adjutant.
Like spectators at a sporting event, Harte’s crew observed the battle for hours. Manford’s fleet was decimated, and the VenHold vessels—reeling despite their victory—had suffered severe damage because they refused to use their shields.
Harte narrowed his gaze. Only a few Butlerian ships drifted in orbit, their crews undoubtedly bloodied and weak, and the damaged VenHold ships were completely vulnerable. He could not pass up such a chance.
Harte felt his anger rise toward Josef Venport, the man who held the Admiral’s ships hostage for months … the man who had laid siege to Salusa and tried to overthrow the Emperor. Venport was an enemy of the Imperium, just as the Butlerians were.
When dispatching this slow, silent fleet from Salusa Secundus, Roderick Corrino had given Harte full authority to act, and now his decision was clear. The chance to finish off Venport was right there in front of him. “Attack!” Harte shouted into the fleet comm-system. “Go in with weapons blazing.”
Maintaining communications silence afterward, his surprise fleet accelerated down toward Lampadas from the edge of the solar system. The VenHold ships might have been able to pick them up on long-range sensors, but Harte was confident no one was looking in his direction. He would catch Directeur Venport completely unawares.
And if any Butlerian ships were still fighting, Harte’s battle group would “accidentally” destroy them, as unintended collateral damage. The Emperor had made it clear that it was necessary to eliminate both Josef Venport and Manford Torondo in order to build a strong Imperium. Harte’s preference would be to leave no survivors on either side.
Emperor Roderick would give him a medal.
Coming in from behind, mostly unseen, his fleet of restored Imperial battleships blasted their way into the reeling remnants of the space battle. With their combined firepower, Harte’s ships destroyed ten unshielded VenHold vessels in the first two minutes.
The comm-lines burst into life with the remnants of the Butlerian fleet declaring, “We are saved! The Imperials have come to rescue us!” Harte ignored the irony, and then Directeur Venport demanded to know who these new attackers were.
Umberto Harte took great pleasure in responding to Venport. “It is an old friend, Directeur. Remember Admiral Harte? By order of Emperor Roderick Corrino, your life is forfeit as a criminal and traitor to the Imperium.” He turned to his weapons officers. “Continue firing until the job is done.”
* * *
AS THE CYMEK tossed the pieces of Manford’s mangled body to the streets, Anari screamed and sobbed at the grisly sight. She dropped to her knees and pounded her fist into the ground, ignoring the pain of her shattered ribs and internal bleeding. Her grief ignited a torch of anger and vengeance.
For Manford!
Energized by the memory of their beloved leader, she rose to her feet. Her eyes were bright and fiery, her expression fixed like a mask. Years ago, she had given her life over to Manford, had sworn to protect him. She had failed her master, the worst of all possible failures—he was dead.
Tens of thousands of impassioned Butlerians charged forward screaming his name. From across the city, hundreds of thousands joined them. Sweaty, wild-eyed, some burned and bleeding from fighting the cymeks; one man had a broken arm with a splintered bone protruding from his skin, but he seemed to use the pain as euphoria and staggered forward howling his challenge. The sweeping crowd ran into the fray without a care for their own survival, chanting, “Manford! Manford! Manford!”
Against such numbers, even the strongest armor and advanced cymek weaponry could do nothing. The screaming fanatics surged onto Ptolemy’s cymek walker and scrambled up the blood-smeared metal limbs. They broke apart the legs with wrenches and cutting tools, dismantled the cab, blew open the turret, and yanked out Ptolemy’s brain canister.
Howling and screaming, they held up the transparent cylinder, grabbed it and passed it from one set of hands to another. They were bloody, their fingers torn, their nails ripped off from clawing at the metal machine. But they had their enemy now, their prize, the one who murdered Manford.
They lifted Ptolemy’s canister high. It was disconnected from sensors and the speakerpatch, so he could not even scream. With a resounding roar of victory, they smashed open the seal, poured out the blue electrafluid, and dumped the naked pink brain onto the ground.
Thousands of brutal feet stomped until Ptolemy was no more than a thin splattered smear.
* * *
AS THE RISING tide of fanatical outrage surged across Empok, the crowds understood how to achieve their ultimate victory. As if possessed by the spirit of Manford himself, Anari led the infuriated followers in wave after wave of destruction. They all knew what to do. In their righteous rage, nothing could stop them.
Hundreds of thousands of Butlerians took down every last one of the rampaging cymeks. The fanatics paid an unspeakably high cost in blood—but they won.
Letting the mayhem continue on its own, Anari went back and wept over the torn remnants of Manford’s body. She cursed herself for failing to die in his place. She should be the one torn apart. Manford should still be alive!
Now, in her terrible misery, she understood exactly how Manford had felt when he held the mangled remains of his beloved Rayna in the wake of the assassin’s bomb blast. Yet Manford had used that anguish and fury to become a bright new flame, the next leader of the Butlerians.
A position he could no longer hold.
Anari touched Manford’s blood-soaked shirt, felt a hard, flat object inside, and drew out the stained icon painting of Rayna Butler surrounded by a halo of purity. He had treasured this, carried it with him every waking moment. Anari Idaho clasped the icon against her breast, feeling a warmth of love, and knowing exactly what Manford and Rayna would want her to do now.
The Butlerians needed a new leader.
* * *
SHAKEN BY THE surprise arrival of the Imperial ships, Draigo Roget scrambled to the flickering tactical console of the flagship. “We are betrayed, Directeur.” Harte’s fleet had plunged in from nowhere, opened fire on their unshielded ships. “The Emperor is attacking us.”
“But we are here on Roderick’s own orders!”
The Mentat said, “They hit us right when we were most vulnerable. A masterful treachery.”
The realization sickened Josef. “The Emperor sent them here to crush us while our shields were down and our backs were turned. Get those shields back up!”
Harte’s attack caused enormous damage to Josef’s flagship in the brief moments before the crew could reactivate their Holtzman shields. Meanwhile, on the live feeds from his cymek army down below, he was appalled to see one warrior machine after another go off-line, destroyed by hordes of savages.
Josef ordered his warships to ignore the pathetic scraps of Manford’s fleet and open fire on the Imperial vessels instead. They responded, but Draigo gave a grim Mentat assessment. “After the space battle, our weapons are mostly depleted, Directeur. Even our restored shields are far weaker than they should be. We have suffered great damage.”
Under concentrated Imperial fire, one more VenHold ship fell, its hull ripped open and engines blown off-line; the dying vessel drifted, a dark hulk in space among the other wreckage.
Josef tore the words out of his throat. “These—losses—are—unacceptable!”
Norma Cenva’s voice blared across the static and sparks of the flagship’s bridge. “My prescience did not warn me of this attack. Now too many of my Navigators are lost and we must retreat.”
Josef knew she was right. Admiral Harte intended to wipe them out—and had the weaponry to do so. Their shields were weakening, and their depleted weapons were no match for this large unexpected force. They had been cheated by the Emperor himself.
At least his vessels were faster, since Harte’s ships did not have Holtzman engines. “Tell your Navigators, Grandmother! Withdraw whatever ships remain.”
“They will expect us to go to Arrakis, Directeur,” Draigo said.
“Arrakis is well protected—no, we should go to our Denali stronghold, where they’ll never find us. Grandmother, set our course.”
The Imperial fleet continued to fire, causing more and more damage, and Josef needed to buy just another few moments as the Holtzman engines built up enough power to fold space.
He had one last card to play. It would be a close thing.
He transmitted a parting shot designed to make the Emperor think twice. “Admiral, you should know that Anna Corrino is safe in my custody. Her life is in my hands. Consider your next actions with extreme care. Unless you cease firing immediately, the Emperor will never see his sister again.”
On the comm screen, Harte was livid, but he did call off the continuing weapons barrage. “Directeur, I demand—”
The Imperial ships withdrew for just a moment, and it was enough time. The flagship’s Holtzman engines thrummed as Josef spun to face the Navigator tank. “Now, Grandmother.”
All the remaining VenHold ships vanished.
A person’s sense of balance is measured by how he handles the unexpected. The ability and will to survive in the face of unforeseen challenges is one of the most admirable of all human traits. Thinking machines cannot begin to understand it.
—GHAN MUMBAI, philosopher of the Jihad
Under the ruins of Corrin where he had made his new home, Vor awoke to the sound of screaming—many people in terrible agony. He was instantly alert. Had Valya Harkonnen come here with assassins?
The screams! As he bolted out of his sleeping chamber into a connecting tunnel, he experienced a bright flashback from the first century of the Jihad: There had been an explosion below decks during a space battle, and backwash fires had caused emergency bulkhead doors to seal the engine compartment. Vor and his fellow soldiers had tried unsuccessfully to free the trapped engineers, and they heard the screams of the men and women being roasted alive for ten of the longest minutes of his life.…
This sounded just as horrific.
His reflexes kicking in, Vor ran toward the screams with no thought for his own safety. He had survived countless challenges in his life, but merely surviving was not enough. Vorian Atreides had been programmed to help others.
In the dimly lit tunnels, numerous doorways led to sleeping compartments, and more of the ragtag scavengers began to emerge as he ran by. Vor didn’t answer their shouted questions, asking him what was going on, couldn’t take the time to reply. He just kept running toward the screams, his mind churning with his own questions. Had the Harkonnens launched a military attack on Corrin? Would they strike the entire settlement just to get at him?
But would Tula or Valya be so blatantly destructive? He didn’t think so. They would want to get me. Personally.
The screams continued outside, and it occurred to him that this might be a trap, designed to lure him out. He ignored the worry.
Ahe
ad, a strange glow shimmered from where a stairway descended to the larger and deeper main tunnel. He peered down to see a river of silvery liquid gushing through the lower tunnel like flowing metal blood, a living substance that pulsed like a mindless amoeba … and frantic scavengers were caught in the powerful flow. Like drowning victims, they flailed their arms and yelled for help. Some wore protective suits, but most were vulnerable. The malicious quicksilver engulfed them. Even as they struggled to get away, the powerful flow seemed to fight back, pulling them under.
Choking on the thick, bitter tang in the air, Vor scrambled down the stairs to reach the trapped scavengers. Their resonance extraction operations had somehow broken down the flowmetal and left it unconstrained. Now it seemed to be on a mindless rampage.
A wiry woman in a protective suit floated toward him in the current, struggling to stay above the surface; her face was covered by a half-mask breather. Boxy equipment floated alongside her, a set of the resonance manipulators that Korla’s people used to extract flowmetal from the ruins. A deep mining team must have triggered this unexpected backlash, and Vor didn’t know how it would ever stop.
The desperate woman yelled something that was muffled by her mask. She reached out to Vor, and he grabbed hold of her gloved hand. Because she was coated with a film of flowmetal, his grip nearly slipped off, but he clenched tighter and used his other hand to grab her by the elbow. He hoisted her onto the stairway, where she shuddered, dripping silvery liquid and retching.
Another man fought against the thickening metallic flood, struggling to reach Vor. But a swell of the flowmetal reached up to engulf his head and sucked him under the shimmering, quivering surface. The man’s screams fell silent.
Two more scavengers were swept past in the flow, still struggling, followed by a dead woman floating facedown, all of them well beyond his reach. The flowmetal pulled the bodies along in a powerful current, lifted them up, and compressed around them like a tightening fist. The men cried out, but their voices were overwhelmed by the sound of cracking bones.