Navigators of Dune

67

The cymek walkers marched forward like monsters from the greatest nightmares of mankind, smashing buildings into rubble, slaughtering crowds as if they were massed insects.

Even so, Manford went out to face them. Bravely, he rode high on the shoulders of his Swordmaster. He showed no fear, because fear was a weakness — and thousands of his followers thronged around him. They did not flee from the deadly machines, but instead rushed defiantly toward them. With so much faith and strength all around him, Manford did not feel weak. Not at all.

Wearing a powerful voice amplifier, he shouted the familiar mantra to rally them: “‘The mind of man is holy!’” They took up the call and turned it into a battle cry.

More than a hundred cymeks unleashed an array of appalling weapons against his valiant followers: fire, acid, poisonous smoke, explosive projectiles. Thousands of victims lay strewn across the city, smoking, melting bodies, writhing unrecognizable forms, nameless. The faithful. The martyrs. The blessed ones. The only shield the Butlerians had was their numbers and their powerful faith — something even demonic thinking machines could not defeat.

From Anari’s shoulders, Manford waved his arms and shouted for his Butlerians to press forward. The mob flooded ahead without hesitation, knowing that the lives they expended before the mechanical monsters were not a wasted effort, but more sparks in a rising conflagration. Even surrounded by explosions, horrific screams, smoke and blood and terror, Manford felt fully alive and energized. “Tear down those machine demons!”

Anari raised her sword in front of her and strode forward. During her training on Ginaz, she and her fellow Swordmasters had practiced against combat meks, but those had been much smaller programmed robots, with computer minds. The fact that the cymeks were driven by traitorous human brains made these enemies much worse, far more dangerous.

The terrible battle machines destroyed everything in their path and kept going, but Manford had over a million followers here. Any number of sacrifices was acceptable, so long as the cymeks were destroyed and Venport was defeated.

Additional Swordmasters in the throngs now joined the fight, trained fighters who led countless believers in the biggest surge against the cymeks, a tidal wave of simple weapons and flesh slamming against the machine walkers. Wild and desperate people clung like bugs to the nearby warrior forms; they climbed up the segmented legs to reach the main turrets.

Deacon Harian accompanied a pair of Swordmasters, shouting as they led a mob of thousands down a side street and up onto the rooftops. They intercepted and attacked a cymek walker that rumbled close. Its flame-cannons and artillery projectiles destroyed the nearby buildings, but did not kill all of the people — at least not yet.

The two Swordmasters led the close-in attack, throwing ropes and grappling hooks so they could swarm the war machine. The mob members carried makeshift weapons: crowbars, clubs, and metal pikes; some even had small explosives. Those who managed to get close enough could sweep in under the flame-cannons and artillery projectiles. First, only a few made it, but then dozens of fanatics reached the core of the cymek walker, climbing its metal sides. As their numbers increased, they detonated explosives at the articulated joints of the walker, exploiting weak points.

One of its legs broke off at the joint, and the enormous apparatus groaned and collapsed. On the ground, the crippled walker flailed in a semicircle as it tried to stabilize itself. Seizing their chance, Deacon Harian and the two Swordmasters dismantled a second leg with explosives at the joints, and that kept the machine on the ground. Although it still fired detonating projectiles in desperate random directions, enough of the attackers survived to rip open its turret and expose the disembodied brain in its protective canister. They pulled the thoughtrodes free and tore the brain canister loose. Unguided, the walker body simply froze in place.

Deacon Harian lifted the brain canister and gleefully threw it to the ground below, where the infuriated mob smashed the naked Navigator brain into a pulp of biological residue.

As Manford guided Anari into the thick of the attack, he saw another group of ingenious Butlerians using heavy ground vehicles to pull steel cables. Dozens of them swooped under another walker form and used the cables like webs to entangle and trip the machine. When the cymek was slowed sufficiently, the Butlerians swarmed forward and overwhelmed it, despite heavy losses.

As a last defense, the entangled cymek belched defensive clouds of poisonous gas that settled over the oncoming horde, killing the faithful. But when breezes dissipated the smoke, a new crowd swept forward, and enough of them scrambled aboard the cymek to destroy its guiding brain.

Seeing the destruction of two cymeks, Anari brandished her sword, letting out a wordless battle cry, as Manford shouted orders from her shoulders. A wave of Butlerians howled alongside. She charged ahead, carrying Manford in search of another enemy. His throat was raw, his voice hoarse from shouting.

Riding on her sturdy shoulders, Manford could feel the spirit of Rayna Butler within him, and he touched the icon painting of her that he kept inside his shirt. He knew they would win here today. Even if victory cost the lives of thousands of Butlerians for every single cymek they destroyed, he would pay that price without hesitation.

Yes, he had that many followers to spend.

Anari must be feeling the energy within her as well. She jogged ahead, leading throngs of enraged Butlerians down a wide street and around a corner, where they came face-to-face with another looming cymek. The demon machine rose up on segmented metal legs.

With a smile, Manford faced his nemesis.

IN SPACE OVERHEAD, the battle continued, with suicidal Butlerians using lasguns against the Holtzman shields before Josef could spread the word among his fleet to drop those defenses. The lasgun-shield interactions triggered a succession of pseudo-atomic blasts, which wiped out seven more VenHold vessels, and an equal number of their own, before Draigo’s frantic message circulated. “VenHold ships, drop shields! Drop your Holtzman shields!”

Josef reviled the barbarian tactics, but was not surprised by them. As soon as all shields were down, he observed, “We are no longer vulnerable to instant annihilation, but we’ll still be battered by the barrage from their conventional weapons.”

“Mathematically, Directeur, our numbers of ships and weaponry are far better than theirs, and our hulls are strong enough to withstand a fair amount of damage,” the Mentat said. “We should still succeed.”

“I don’t care what it takes to finish the task,” Josef growled. “Destroy those warships before the enemy imagines he has achieved some kind of victory.”

“I am happy to do so, Directeur.” The Mentat guided their flagship forward, while transmitting to the rest of the spacefolders as they closed in on the Butlerians. Despite their limited technology, the enemy ships caused an inordinate amount of damage to the VenHold attackers, proving tougher to destroy than expected.

Draigo frowned, staring at the screens. “I’m afraid they have an advantage, Directeur. Since the Butlerians know we will not employ suicidal tactics or fire lasguns at them, they have maintained their own shields, while we are vulnerable.”

“Then increase our bombardment,” Josef said. “Overwhelm their shields. We have the power.”

“The task is more difficult, Directeur, but not by an impossible amount.”

Using their superior weaponry, the VenHold ships were relentless, pummeling and pummeling the fanatics. On one Butlerian ship after another, the defenses collapsed under the barrage — and waves of weapons fire destroyed them. Their fleet dwindled.

Even so, knowing that Josef’s attacking ships lacked shields, the Butlerians pushed forward in an increased opportunistic frenzy. Their old-model warships could withstand several minutes of constant hammering before their shields failed. The barbarians grouped their ships and hurtled forward at full speed, like a salvo of gigantic artillery shells. They rammed into the unprotected VenHold hulls and destroyed three more of Josef’s ships.

His throat went dry, and his pulse pounded in his temples. “They are all mad!”

“Directeur,” the helmsman yelled. “Incoming ships!”

Josef looked up to see three suicidal vessels hurtling toward his flagship. “Evasive action — get us out of their way. But keep firing. Take out their shields.”

The oncoming enemy ships glowed like comets as their shields deflected the play of weapons fire, and they blindly accelerated toward Josef’s flagship. He braced himself, realizing that his vessel could not lumber out of the way in time.

“Grandmother!” he shouted at her tank. He knew she was watching the shifting battlefield. “Now!”

Suddenly, thanks to Norma, his spacefolder was in a different place, jerked sideways to the other side of the space battlefield. “Too many Navigators lost, too many of our ships damaged,” she said. “We must destroy this enemy.”

He exhaled a long cold sigh of relief. “Yes, Grandmother. They certainly deserve to be destroyed. I’m trying to do just that.”

Even if the Butlerians proved to be more difficult to kill than expected, he would not retreat until the job was done.

ON THE GROUND, no matter how many of the savages Ptolemy gassed, burned, or shot down, they kept coming. He drew little satisfaction from his rampage, but he continued forward nevertheless, tearing a wide swath of destruction through Empok.

The Butlerian fanatics were like a plague, and their numbers seemed infinite. Where did they all come from? Tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, maybe a million or more. They surged forward like cockroaches, crowding the cymeks with utter disregard for the appalling casualties they suffered. The streets were piled with bodies.

In disbelief, Ptolemy had watched them scramble over their own dead and take down one of the Navigator cymeks, dismantling its body, smashing the brain canister. In even greater horror, he’d watched them bring down other walkers with wrecking bars, wedges, cutting tools to dismantle a single joint or protected cable. Some attackers used primitive explosives at key vulnerable spots, while other rabid swarms simply used astonishing numbers and unchecked fanatical energy. They fell upon the cymeks, including Administrator Noffe!

In alarm, Ptolemy crashed his way toward his besieged friend, intending to roast these vermin by the thousands, but he was too far away to reach him in time. Noffe’s walker form stalled under the weight of tens of thousands of Butlerians, many wielding crude weapons, and then they got to the administrator’s brain canister.

Noffe had sacrificed so much already, and now in this pivotal fight for the future of humanity, the mob took him down. Through the communications link, Ptolemy heard Noffe’s panicked mental screams until the ruthless barbarians cut off the thoughtrode contact and crushed his preservation canister.

Those screams had sounded much like Elchan’s.…

Now, as Ptolemy thundered forward, infuriated and unwilling to stop, he came upon an even larger, swelling crowd. The mob was like a mindless organism with a single deadly goal. The people swarmed out of side streets and thoroughfares, climbed the remnants of burning buildings, and threw themselves from rooftops onto the cymeks.

Confronted by this new throng, Ptolemy’s enhanced optical sensors spotted a familiar man riding on the shoulders of a female Swordmaster. The Butlerian leader looked confident and arrogant, as if he had the situation under control. The roar of the mob was deafening, but Ptolemy focused all of his hatred on Manford Torondo.

The Butlerian leader was shouting in a ragged voice that sounded like a thin and insignificant squeak, but he had a voice amplifier. “We will destroy you, demon — and all of your mechanical brethren! Our faith is a shield that you cannot comprehend.”

The response of his people was deafening, primal.

Years ago, as a diligent scientist in his original laboratory, Ptolemy had felt insignificant and helpless, unable to defend himself. He now felt stronger than ever. His cymek body was nearly invincible, his weapons powerful, and his anger unquenchable.

Ptolemy amplified his voice, even though he doubted the Butlerian leader would remember him. “Manford Torondo, you and your followers must pay for your crimes against humanity — and I am the one to call in that debt!”

Manford had time to yell in a scornful voice. “You talk about humanity? You, a monster?”

A single blast from Ptolemy’s flame-cannon or a drenching spray of caustic acid would have leveled the entire mob and incinerated the legless fanatic. But instead, he wanted to make Manford feel as helpless as the man had made him feel on that terrible night years ago. This was too personal a vendetta for Ptolemy to use a weapon of mass destruction.

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.