|
"Now, what name of manhood do you choose for us to call you openly?"
The title of this article is conjectural. Although it is based on canonical information, the actual name is a conjecture and may be supplanted at any time by additional information released from canonical sources. If this occurs, please move this page to the appropriate title. |
- "Even after the fall of the Thinking Machines, we discovered new enemies in our ranks, those who would pull our civilization in different and dangerous directions. Two extremists tried to tear apart the Imperium from opposite sides."
- ―Emperor Roderick Corrino recalls the war
The galactic civil war was a three-way galactic conflict which broke out in the first century of the Corrino Empire between the ruling but as yet unstable House Corrino, the vast commercial empire of Venport Holdings and the vehemently anti-technology Butlerian movement. Originally a traditional two-sided war with the Corrinos allied with the Butlerians, Roderick Corrino turned against the movement after taking power following the assassination of his brother Salvador.
House Corrino emerged victorious, and Roderick fully established their empire as the dominant power in the galaxy. The war resulted in the near-total annihilation of the Butlerians, and the dissolution of Venport Holdings, with only one subsidary, Foldspace Shipping Company, that of the crucial Navigators, allowed to remain under agreement with the Emperor, becoming the Spacing Guild and monpolizing space commerce, transport and interplanetary banking for the next fifteen thousand years.
History[]
Background information (1182-88 BG)[]
The very earliest roots of the galactic civil war could be traced back to the year 1182 BG, at the end of the Time of Titans, when the evermind Omnius established the Synchronized Empire after usurping the Titan-controlled worlds. Shortly after, Omnius launched his first attacks against the League of Nobles, beginning a war of attrition which lasted for centuries.
This first war was heightened in 203 BG and in 201 BG concluded with a rebellion on Earth sparked by the murder of Serena Butler's child, Manion "the Innocent", an event which began a whole new and more dangerous holy war, the Butlerian Jihad, which itself was the precursor to the galactic civil war. The jihad raged across the Known Universe for a century and billions perished on both sides.
During the re-ignition of the Butlerian Jihad after her murder, Serena Butler was made a saint and one of the Three Martyrs. Religious individuals prayed to them and hoped they would send their angels to protect them. This led to the phenomenon of the Martyrists - fanatics devoted to the Three Martyrs, that wanted simply to destroy thinking machines at every cost - but at this point, this destruction entailed only the hostile thinking machines being fought in the Jihad.
In 108 BG, Omnius sent the Omnius Scourge, a highly deadly virus designed by Yorek Thurr, to ravage the League Worlds. This resulted in the death of many, adding to the already extensive death toll of the jihad. Having seen her parents succumb to the Scourge on Parmentier and barely surviving herself, young Rayna Butler began her personal crusade against the machines. Working with the Martyrists, she founded the hyperfanatical Cult of Serena, secretly planting the roots for the galactic civil war, as the Cult would later become the Butlerian movement. The Cult destroyed both electronic and mechanical machines across the League Worlds, and eventually official legislation was introduced forbidding the development of any devices or circuits that even remotely resembled the gelcircuitry computers of thinking machines, even punishing those who would refuse.
Prelude (20s-5 BG)[]
- "One might think that humanity would have peace and prosperity after the defeat of the Thinking Machines and the formation of the Landsraad League to replace the old League of Nobles, but the battles had just begun. Without an external Enemy to fight, we began to fight ourselves."
- ―Annals of the Imperium[src]
Assassination of Rayna[]
After the Battle, Rayna continued to preach against the evils of machine technology until she was assassinated in a bombing in 22 BG at age 97. The same blast derived Manford Torondo of both legs, and she died in his arms. He began leading the Cult, adapting it into the true Butlerian movement. He led Swordmaster Anari Idaho and millions of people across the Imperium to cleanse humanity of its reliance on convenient technologies, often exploiting religious paranoia to advance his agendas. This marked the approximate beginning of war, albiet as yet undeclared.
Transformation of the movement[]
Despite the core of the movement remaining, there were subtle distinctions between the old Cult of Serena and this new movement. Despite the clear fanatacism and strict rules of the old Cult, it had ultimately presented itself as a temporary and necessary movement to rid humanity of dangerous thinking machines and complex devices which served as a crutch for humanity. Torondo attempted to make it seem relevant and lead it to a permanent group of the new Empire, with the power to destroy any technology which he deemed at all dangerous by any means possible - which often meant the most destructive methods such as the use of atomics.
The defeat of the machine empire left the movement searching for enemies and it had no trouble finding them. Initially the movement focused on attacking defunct machine technology wherever it could find them. The movement quickly turned its attention to attacking those who excused the existence of any technology for the conveniences that it provided. It also heavily confronted those who sought to repurpose the remnants of the machine empire like Josef Venport.
Invasion of Tlulax[]
Tlulax was invaded by the movement in 20 BG after Butlerian Leader Manford Torondo visited the Thalim system. The Butlerians declared the Tlulaxa biological projects to be against the laws of man and God, and they were destroyed, strict rules being imposed upon all Tlulaxa scientists.
Open war (5 BG - 1 AG)[]
Battle of Thonaris[]
The Thonaris shipyards were a manufacturing and refueling shipyard facility in the Thonaris System, used by Omnius during the time of the Synchronized Worlds. Abandoned after the Battle of Corin, the facility remained idle until agents of Consolidated Transport discovered them, supposedly by accident.
Mentats Draigo Roget and Gilbertus Albertus had both surmised the existence of an the inactive manufacturing and refueling shipyard facility after studying shipping records from the days of the Synchronized Worlds. (Gilbertus later mentioned this to the Erasmus gelsphere, who confirmed that the Thonaris System did in fact host a large-scale operation.)
Acting on Draigo's mentat projection, Josef Venport sent an armed fleet of VenPort space craft to take control of the facility. Upon arrival, Venport discovered that CT was using the facility, and its owner, Arjen Gates, was overseeing the operations. Venport quickly attacked and subdued the CT presence, with the added bonus of capturing (and subsequently killing) Arjen Gates, furthering the consolidation of space commerce for VenHold.
Using the knowledge of the existence of the shipyards as a bargaining chip to protect the Mentat school from Manford Torondo, Gilbertus shared his "projection" of the existence of the former machine facility to Manfred, who seized upon the opportunity to destroy yet another remnant of the Synchronized Worlds. Manfred led a Butlerian fleet of 200 Jihad-era warships "donated by" Emperor Julius Corrino to destroy every trace of the facility. Upon arrival, they were surprised to discover that Venport had taken control, and was utilizing the facility to full capacity.
A battle ensued wherein Draigo and Gilbertus were pitted against each other in a live space battle. Josef Venport attempted to negotiate with Manfred Torondo directly to preserve his facilities and keep Venport employees unharmed, but the negotiations failed and Torondo launched a salvo of missiles at the ground-based facilities, causing considerable damage and casualties. Outnumbered and desperate to hurt as many Butlerians as possible, Draigo negotiated a pause in fighting to evacuate VenHold personnel. It was, in fact, a ruse to launch functional (but otherwise abandoned) space craft directly into the Butlerian fleet and detonating them, causing chaos and destruction. When Gilbertus saw the ruse for what it was, he immediately advised the Butlerian fleet to assault the remnants of the facility and all remaining robot craft. In an attempt to escape, Driago Roget and Josef Venport evacuated the facilities in an evac-ship, hoping to slip through the wreckage unnoticed. They were saved from destruction when Norma Cenva suddenly came to their rescue, folding a VenPort heighliner around their craft and then folding space again, transporting them to safety.
Death of "Torondo"[]
As the now open conflict escalated, both leaders put a price on one another's head. Josef Venport sent Taref, a young Freeman from Arrakis who had been recruited by Draigo Roget to sabotage EsconTran space ships to the benefit of Josef 's space transport operations, was sent back to the desertt world to recruit more Freemen. While Taref failed to convince anyone else in his sietch, when returning to Arrakis City he spotted Manford Torondo arriving to incite the populace. Taref used his Maula pistol to shoot the Butlerian leader in the head and escaped to return to Kolhar and report the successful assassination. Unbeknownst to Taref or Josef, Taref only killed Manford's body double.
Manford headed to Salusa Secundus and demanded that Emperor Salvador imperialize all spice mining as a strategic resource in order to strip Josef Venport of his power. Salvador agreed and opted to personally travel to Arrakis aboard his barge to oversee the hand-over. While outwardly compliant with the Emperor, Josef resolved to assassinate the Emperor, so that his more reasonable brother Roderick, who has no love for Manford or his fanatics, ascended to the throne.
Assassination of the Emperor[]
Josef sent Taref aboard the Imperial barge to sabotage the navigation system of both the ship's Holtzmann engine and the old-fashioned FTL drive, so that the barge would be forever lost in interstellar space. Feeling guilt, Taref only completed part of the sabotage, forcing Josef to go with a backup plan. He lured Salvador aboard a spice harvester and paid the spotters to delay announcing wormsign until it was too late, himself escaping on a small flyer.
However, just before a sandworm swallowed the harvester, one of Salvador's guards sent a message to the Imperial barge, announcing Josef's treasonous actions. Josef summoned the VenHold fleet to destroy the barge, but the crew managed to engage the Holtzmann engine. When the barge did not return to Salusa Secundus, Josef assumed that Taref's partial sabotage worked. After Roderick was crowned Emperor, Josef personally traveled with Norma Cenva to the capital world to congratulate him. However, just then, the barge managed to find its way back to Salusa Secundus and reported Josef's betrayal. The enraged Roderick ordered Josef arrested, but Norma Cenva used her mental abilities to fold space whisk both of them back to Kolhar.
Corrino-VenHold alliance[]
After breaking a VenHold siege of Salusa Secundus, with the help of the timely arrival of the Butlerian fleet, and Admiral Umberto Harte's battlegroup's successful escape from Josef Venport's clutches, Roderick sends Harte's ships to Lampadas using conventional FTL drives, where Harte is to lie in wait at the outskirts of the system and ambush whatever Butlerian ships survive the attack on Kolhar, the headquarters of VenHold. Unbeknownst to Roderick, Manford Torondo has obtained a cache of forbidden atomics from a planetary ruler loyal to the Butlerian cause. With their help, the Butlerians turn what would have been a massacre of their forces into a decisive victory against their hated enemy, devastating the planet with nuclear fire.
Josef Venport manages to survive thanks to a prescient warning by his great-grandmother Norma Cenva. He summons Emperor Roderick to Arrakis to discuss a rapprochement. Roderick agrees on the condition that Venport destroys the Butlerians. Venport agrees eagerly and personally commands a fleet of spacefolders in a strike against Lampadas, where Leader Manford Torondo lives.
Battle of Lampadas[]
VenHold forces arrive in orbit of Lampadas and engage in a battle against the old Ballista-class battleships used by the fanatical Butlerians. At the same time, 100 VenHold cymeks with brains of failed Navigators are dropped in pods onto the capital city of Lampadas with orders to cleanse the planet of all life. They are led by a scientist named Ptolemy, who has a personal score to settle with Torondo for destroying his lab and killing his friend and research partner.
Admiral Harte observes the battle in orbit of Lampadas using stealth probes, awaiting a moment to strike at both enemies.
In orbit, the outnumbered and outgunned Butlerians resort to suicidal tactics, such as ramming and firing lasguns at shielded VenHold ships, resulting in mutual annihilation. Venport orders his ships to lower their shields, exposing them to fire but preventing them from being instantly destroyed by the laser-shield interaction.
On the surface of Lampadas, the cymeks are killing thousands of people, most of whom are devout Butlerians. The fanatics rush the giant walker forms, dying by tens of thousands, but the survivors manage to overwhelm the cymeks and smash their brain canisters. Manford Torondo leads his followers into battle atop his Swordmaster Anari Idaho, but Ptolemy picks him up and tears him to pieces before the Butlerians overwhelm and kill him as well. By the end of the ground battle, tens, if not hundreds of thousand of people are dead, but so are all the cymeks. The capital city is leveled by the cymeks' destructive weapons, and the Butlerians have lost their leader.
In space, VenHold ships manage to destroy or heavily damage most of the Butlerian ships, but at great cost to the VenHold fleet. Picking this moment to intervene, Admiral Harte orders his ships to open fire on all VenHold and Butlerian ships, the strike surprising even the prescient Normal Cenva. Weak and damaged, VenHold forces are unable to fight back effectively, and Venport orders a retreat. To buy the Navigators several moments to charge their Holtzman engines, Venport transmits a message to Admiral Harte, warning him that he is holding the Emperor's sister Anna Corrino hostage. Harte pauses his attack, allowing the surviving VenHold ships to jump away to Denali, the location of VenHold's secret laboratory.
Battle of Denali[]
Admiral Harte's forces take control of Lampadas and send a message to Emperor Roderick, who arrives in force to put an end to the Butlerian movement. While the movement itself survives under the leadership of Anari Idaho, the devastating casualties and the loss of all spacecraft have set it back. Roderick, infuriated at Venport holding his sister hostage, orders Harte to scour the damaged VenHold ships and interrogate the surviving crews as to the location of the Directeur. Harte's people manage to locate the coordinates of Denali, allowing Roderick to attack the planet in force.
Meanwhile, Josef Venport is attempting to bolster the defenses at Denali and repair his remaining ships. The independent robot Erasmus, whose gelcircuitry has been implanted into the cloned body of his late pupil Gilbertus Albans, has been working on adapting Thinking Machines' technology for the defense of Denali, while simultaneously pursuing a sexual relationship with Anna Corrino. Erasmus manages to reprogram a number of mothballed war mechs to defend the facility against a ground assault.
The large Imperial fleet arrives in orbit of Denali and begins to siege the planet. In response, Directeur Venport warns Emperor Roderick to stay away, lest any harm come to his sister. Unbeknownst to either of them, Erasmus has deeply hurt Anna by making her believe that their relationship has been nothing more than an experiment for him. Devastated, the already mentally scarred Anna chooses to end her own life by walking out into the toxic atmosphere of Denali unprotected. Unexpectedly feeling remorse, Erasmus walks out to rescue her but is unable to make it back. Both of them die in a matter of minutes, as even the robot's gelcircuitry succumbs to the caustic atmosphere.
When Roderick finds out about his sister's death, he angrily orders Admiral Harte to attack the defending VenHold ships, while simultaneously raining bombs on the research facility. After several VenHold ships are destroyed, Norma Cenva transports herself onto the bridge of the Imperial flagship in order to negotiate with Roderick. She agrees to withdraw all ships to Arrakis and leave Denali undefended, if he makes a promise to spare all current and future Navigators and agrees to create an independent Spacing Guild and maintain the flow of spice. As soon as Roderick makes his promise, Norma disappears from his bridge, and all the VenHold ships jump away, leaving the planet exposed.
Stunned at his great-grandmother's betrayal, Josef Venport can only watch as swarms of Imperial troops transports land outside the facility. Some of them are destroyed by the few surviving cymeks, but the heavily-armed Imperial troops in sealed suits eventually overwhelm them. The war mechs programmed by Erasmus march out and engage the Imperial soldiers. After a fight lasting many hours and costing many lives, the Imperial soldiers prevail and enter the facility.
They kill any researcher, who attempts to flee or resist, and detain the rest. Some of the scientists release experimental weapons on them but are gunned down mercilessly.
Venport's Mentat Draigo Roget offers to negotiate with the Imperials in order to spare as many lives and research as possible. Knowing that his own life is forfeit no matter what, Josef thanks him for his years of service and sends him out, while Venport locks himself in an office and contemplates suicide, unwanting to undergo a public execution. Just then, Norma Cenva appears in the office and tells her great-grandson that he has one chance to survive, thanks to a loophole in Emperor Roderick's promise to her. If Josef becomes a Navigator, then Roderick can't harm him. While furious at being tricked at first, Roderick eventually accepts this fate for his enemy.
Aftermath[]
As the Imperial forces occupy Denali, Venport Holdings is no longer an entity, and its assets are confiscated by the Imperium. Mentat Draigo Roget is sent to Arrakis to manage spice harvesting operations. With his two main enemies defeated, Emperor Roderick declares a victory in a grand speech on Salusa Secundus, where Norma Cenva announces the formation of the Spacing Guild in order to provide safe foldspace travel to all of Imperium.