Hunters Of Dune Page 16

  In a superior tone, Hellica explained, "We are Honored Matres, not slaves to melange! Our version of spice comes as a direct consequence of pain." She and the observers looked down at the writhing subject. "It is more suited to our needs."

  The pretender queen bragged (as she often did) about her lab programs, exaggerating the truth by increments, much as Uxtal overemphasized his own questionable skills. As she told her lies, he always nodded in agreement with her.

  Since his work producing the melange substitute had expanded, he now supervised a dozen lower-caste laboratory assistants, along with a leathery, long-in-the-tooth Honored Matre named Ingva, whom he was sure served more as a spy and snitch than a helper. He rarely asked the crone to do anything, because she constantly feigned ignorance or offered some other excuse. She resented taking instructions from any male, and he was afraid to make demands.

  Ingva came and went at unpredictable times, undoubtedly to keep Uxtal off balance. More than once, overdosed on some intoxicant, she had pounded on his door in the middle of the night. Since the Matre Superior had never claimed him for herself, Ingva threatened to bond him to her sexually, but hesitated to openly defy Hellica. Looming over him in the dimness, the old Honored Matre ranted threats that chilled him to the bone.

  Once, when she had consumed too much artificial spice stolen from the fresh laboratory supplies, Ingva had actually been near death, her delirious eyes completely orange, her vital signs weak. Uxtal had very badly wanted to let her die in front of him, but he was afraid to do so. Losing Ingva would not have solved his problems; it would have cast suspicion on him, with unknown and terrifying repercussions. And the next Honored Matre spy might be even worse.

  Thinking quickly, he had given her an antidote that revived her. Ingva had never thanked him for the rescue, never acknowledged any debt whatsoever. Then again, she had not killed him, either. Or bonded with him. That was something, at least.

  Still alive. I am still alive.

  AS HE GREW, the child ghola of Vladimir Harkonnen lived in a guarded nursery chamber on the laboratory grounds. The toddler had virtually everything he asked for, including pets to "play with," many of which did not survive. Obviously, the Baron had bred true.

  His mean streak greatly amused Hellica, even when he turned his nascent rage against her. Uxtal didn't understand why the Matre Superior paid attention to the ghola boy, or why she cared about the incomprehensible Face Dancer plans.

  The little researcher was uneasy about leaving Hellica alone with the child, sure that she would harm him in some way, thus leaving Uxtal to suffer severe punishment. But he had no way of preventing her from doing anything she pleased. If he made so much as a peep of complaint, she could wither him with a glare. Fortunately, she actually seemed to like the little monster. She treated her interactions with the boy as a game. Over at the neighboring slig farm, they happily fed human body parts to the large, slow-moving creatures that chewed the flesh into paste, which their multiple stomachs digested.

  After seeing the cruel streak already manifesting itself in the toddler Vladimir, Uxtal was glad the remaining cells in the dead Master's hidden nullentropy capsule had been destroyed. What other beasts had the heretic old Tleilaxu hoarded from ancient times?

  The origins of the Spacing Guild are shrouded in cosmic mists, not unlike the convoluted pathways a Navigator must travel.

  --Archives of the Old Empire

  N

  ot even the most experienced Guild Navigator could begin to comprehend this altered, nonsensical universe where reality held its mysteries close to its chest. But the Oracle of Time had summoned Edrik and his many fellows here.

  Agitated, the Navigator swam in his tank of spice gas atop the immense Heighliner, peering anxiously through the windows of his chamber into the landscapes of space and his inner mind. Around him, as far as he could see and imagine, he beheld thousands of enormous Guildships. Such a grouping had not been assembled for millennia.

  Following their summons to an unremarkable set of coordinates between star systems, Edrik and his fellow Navigators had waited for the otherworldly voice to provide further instructions. Then, unexpectedly, the fabric of the universe had folded around them and cast all of them into this vast and deeper void, with no apparent way back out.

  Perhaps the Oracle knew of their desperate need for spice, because Chapterhouse kept a stranglehold on supplies to "punish" the Guild for cooperating with the Honored Matres. The vile Mother Commander, flaunting her power yet ignorant of how much damage she could truly cause, had threatened to destroy the spice sands if she didn't get her way! Madness! Perhaps the Oracle herself would show them another source of melange.

  The Guild's stockpiles dwindled daily as Navigators consumed what they needed in order to guide ships through folded space. Edrik did not know how much spice remained in their numerous hidden storage bunkers, but Administrator Gorus and his ilk were definitely nervous. Gorus had already requested a meeting on Ix, and Edrik would accompany him there in a matter of days. The human administrators hoped that the Ixians could create or at least improve a technological means to circumvent the shortage of melange. More nonsense.

  Like a breath of fresh, rich spice gas, Edrik sensed something rising from the depths of his mind, filling his consciousness. A tiny point of sound expanded from within, growing louder and louder. When it finally emerged as words in his mutated brain, he heard them simultaneously thousands of times over, overlapping with the prescient minds of other Navigators.

  The Oracle. Her mind was unimaginably advanced, beyond any level even a Navigator's prescience could attain. The Oracle was the ancient foundation of the Guild, a comforting anchor for all Navigators.

  "This altered universe is where I last saw the no-ship piloted by Duncan Idaho. I helped his ship break free, returning him to normal space. But I have lost them again. Because the hunters continue to search for them with their tachyon net, we must find the ship first. Kralizec is indeed upon us, and the ultimate Kwisatz Haderach is aboard that no-ship. Both sides in the great war want him for their victory."

  The echoes of her thoughts filled Edrik's soul with a cold terror that threatened to unwind him. He had heard legends of Kralizec, the battle at the end of the universe, and had dismissed them as no more than human superstitions. But if the Oracle was concerned about it . . .

  Who was Duncan Idaho? What no-ship was she speaking of? And, most amazing of all, how could even the Oracle be blinded to it? Always in the past, her voice had been a reassuring and guiding force. Now Edrik sensed uncertainty in her mind.

  "I have searched, but I cannot find it. It is a tangle through all the prescient lines I can envision. My Navigators, I must make you aware. I may be forced to call upon you for assistance, if this threat is what I think it is."

  Edrik's mind reeled. He felt the dismay of the Navigators around him. Some of them, unable to process this new information that shook their fragile holds on reality, spun into madness within their tanks of spice gas.

  "The threat, Oracle," Edrik said, "is that we have no melange--"

  "The threat is Kralizec." Her voice boomed through every Navigator's mind. "I will summon you, when I require my Navigators."

  With a lurch, she hurled all of the thousands of great Heighliners back out of the strange universe, scattering them into normal space. Edrik reeled, trying to orient himself and his ship.

  The Navigators were all confused and agitated.

  Despite the Oracle's call, Edrik clung to a far more selfish concern: How can we help the Oracle, if we are all starved for spice?

  The young reed dies so easily. Beginnings are times of such great peril.

  --LADY JESSICA ATREIDES,

  the original

  I

  t was a royal birth, but without any of the customary pomp and circumstance. Had this occurred at another time, on faraway Rakis, fanatics would have run through the streets shouting, "Paul Atreides is reborn! Muad'Dib! Muad'Dib!"

  D
uncan Idaho could remember such fervor.

  When the original Jessica gave birth to the original Paul, it was a time of political intrigues, assassinations, and conspiracies that resulted in the death of Lady Anirul, wife of Emperor Shaddam IV, and the near murder of the baby.

  According to legend, all the sandworms on Arrakis had risen above the dunes to herald the arrival of Muad'Dib. The Bene Gesserit had never been beyond manipulating the masses with trumpets and omens and delirious celebrations about prophecies come true.

  Now, however, the decanting of the first of the gholas from history seemed utterly mundane, more like a laboratory exercise than a religious experience. Yet this was not just any baby and not merely a ghola, but Paul Atreides! Young Master Paul, who was later the Emperor Muad'Dib, and then the blind Preacher. What would the child become this time? What would the Bene Gesserit force him to become?

  While waiting for the completion of the decanting process, Duncan turned to Sheeana. He saw satisfaction in her eyes, and uneasiness as well, though this was exactly what she had argued for. He was fully aware of what the Bene Gesserit feared: Paul had the potential in his bloodline. Almost certainly he could become the Kwisatz Haderach again, perhaps with even greater powers than before. Did Sheeana and her Bene Gesserit followers hope to control him better this time, or would it be a disaster of even greater proportions?

  On the other hand, what if Paul was the one who could save them from the Outside Enemy?

  The Sisterhood had played their breeding games to create a Kwisatz Haderach in the first place, and in return Paul had stung them terribly. Since Muad'Dib, and the long and terrible reign of Leto II (himself another Kwisatz Haderach), the Bene Gesserit had been terrified of creating such a one again.

  Many fearful Reverend Mothers saw hints of the Kwisatz Haderach in any remarkable skill, even in precocious Duncan Idaho. Eleven previous Duncan gholas had been killed as children, and some of the proctors had made no secret of the fact that they wanted to kill him as well. To Duncan, the very idea that he might fit the mold of a messiah, like Paul, was absurd.

  When the Bene Gesserit Suk doctors held up the infant, Duncan caught his breath. After cleaning sticky fluids from the fresh skin, the somber doctors subjected the baby to numerous tests and analyses, then wrapped him in sterile thermal cloths. "He is intact, undamaged," one of them reported. "A successful experiment."

  Duncan frowned. An experiment? Was that how they saw this? He could not tear his gaze away. A veil of memories about young Paul nearly blinded him: how he and Gurney had taught the boy his first sword-and-shield lessons, how during the Duke's War of Assassins Duncan had taken the boy off to hide among the Caladan primitives, how the family had moved from their ancestral home to Arrakis and into a trap set by the Harkonnens. . . .

  But he felt more than that. Looking at the healthy infant, he tried to see the face of the great Emperor Muad'Dib. Duncan knew the special pain and doubts this ghola child would experience. The ghola Paul would know about his past life but would remember none of it, at least not for years.

  Taking the infant Paul into her arms, Sheeana spoke quietly. "To the Fremen he was the messiah who came to lead them to victory. To the Bene Gesserit, he was a superhuman who emerged under the wrong circumstances and escaped our control."

  "He is a baby," the old Rabbi said. "An unnatural one."

  The Rabbi, himself trained as a Suk doctor, attended the birth, though only reluctantly. He had a pronounced aversion to the tanks, but he looked somewhat defeated. With his brow furrowed and his eyes troubled, he had mumbled to Duncan, "I feel duty bound to be here. I made a promise to watch over Rebecca."

  The woman was all but unrecognizable on the med-center table, hooked up to tubes and pumps. Was she dreaming of her other lives? Lost in a sea of ancient memories? The old man seemed to see something of his personal failure in her sagging face. Before the Bene Gesserit doctors had extracted the child from the augmented womb, he prayed for Rebecca's soul.

  Duncan focused on the baby. "Long ago, I gave my life to save Paul. Would the universe have been better off if he had died that day under Sardaukar knives?"

  "Many Sisters would make that argument. Humanity has been recovering for millennia from how he and his son changed the universe," Sheeana said. "But now we have a chance to raise him properly and see what he can do against the Enemy."

  "Even if he changes the universe again?"

  "Change is preferable to extinction."

  Master Paul's second chance, Duncan thought.

  He reached down with a strong hand, a Swordmaster's hand, to touch the baby's tiny cheek. If a miracle was created by technology, was it still a miracle? The infant smelled of medicinals, disinfectants, and melange that had been added to the surrogate mother's vat for months, a precise mixture that old Scytale had told them was necessary.

  The baby's eyes seemed to focus on Duncan for a moment, though such a young infant could not possibly see clearly. But who could say what a Kwisatz Haderach might or might not see? Paul had foreseen the future of humankind after journeying in his mind to a place others could not go.

  Like Magi, three Bene Gesserit Suk doctors crowded closer, chattering with awe over the baby they had worked so hard to create.

  In disgust, the Rabbi turned and swept past Duncan, heading for the med-center's door, muttering "Abomination!" before he slipped out into the corridor.

  Behind him, the Bene Gesserit doctors adjusted their life-support machinery and announced that the now deflated axlotl tank was ready to be impregnated with another ghola baby from the Tleilaxu Master's stored cells.

  When one has an obvious need, one has an obvious weakness. Take care when you make a request, for in doing so you reveal your vulnerabilities.

  --KHRONE,

  private communique to his Face Dancer operatives

  F

  or millennia, the Ixians had managed to deliver miracles, providing what no one else could, and they rarely failed to live up to expectations. The Spacing Guild had no choice but to go to Ix when they needed an unorthodox solution for the melange shortage.

  The technocrats and fabricators on Ix continued their industrious research, pushing technological boundaries with their inventions. During the chaos of the Scattering, Ixians had achieved significant progress in developing machines that had previously been considered taboo because of ancient restrictions imposed in the wake of the Butlerian Jihad. By purchasing devices that were suspiciously close to "thinking machines," the customers themselves became complicit in breaking the age-old laws. In this atmosphere, it was in the best interest of everyone to maintain complete discretion.

  When the desperate Guild delegation arrived on Ix, members of the Face Dancer myriad were everywhere, in secret. Posing as an Ixian engineer, Khrone attended the meeting--another step in a dance so well-choreographed that the participants could not see their own movements. The New Sisterhood and the Guild would dig their own graves, and Khrone considered that a good thing.

  The Guild representatives were ushered into one of the giant underground manufactories where copper shielding and scan-scramblers concealed them from view. No one would ever know this group had come here except for the Ixians. And the Face Dancers. After decades of infiltration, Khrone and his improved shape-shifters easily fit in. They looked exactly like scientists, engineers, and fast-talking bureaucrats.

  Now, filling his role as a skilled deputy fabricator, Khrone wore short brown hair and a heavy brow. The lines around his mouth indicated that here was a hardworking functionary, someone whose opinion could be trusted and whose conclusions would stand up to any amount of double-checking. Three others in the largely silent assembly were also Face Dancers, but the spokesman for the Ixians was (for the time being at least) a true human. So far, Chief Fabricator Shayama Sen had given them no reason to replace him. Sen seemed to want the same things Khrone did.

  Ixians and Face Dancers shared a barely concealed disdain for foolish fears and fanaticism. Was
it truly an invasion and a conquest, Khrone wondered, if the Ixians would have accepted the new order anyway?

  Inside the immense hall, the air was filled with the hissing of production lines, vaporous plumes of cold baths, and the acrid fluids of imprinting chemicals. Others might have found the clamor of sights, sounds, and smells distracting, but the Ixians considered it soothing white noise.

  Edrik the Navigator's armored tank drifted on suspensors, flanked by four gray-clad escorts. Khrone knew that the Navigator would be the greatest problem here, for his faction had the most to lose. But the mutated creature did not take charge of the negotiations. That task was left to the sharp-eyed Guild spokesman, Rentel Gorus, who stepped forward on willowy legs. His long white braid hung ropelike from his otherwise bald scalp. The visitors covered themselves with a veneer of importance and entitlement, which revealed a great deal about the extent of their anxiety. True confidence was quiet and invisible.

  "The Spacing Guild has needs," said Administrator Gorus, sweeping the room with his milky but not-blind eyes. "If Ix can fulfill them, we are willing to pay any reasonable price. Find us a way out of the manacles the New Sisterhood has placed on us."

  Shayama Sen folded his hands together and smiled. "And what is it you need?" The nails on his two forefingers were metallic and patterned with the kaleidoscopic lines of circuitry.

  Edrik swam close to the speaker in his thick-walled tank. "The Guild needs spice so that we may guide our ships. Can Ix's machinery create melange? I see no point in coming here."

  Gorus gave the Navigator a glare of pure annoyance. "I am not so skeptical. The Spacing Guild wonders if Ixian technology could be used regularly and reliably for navigation--at least during this difficult transition period. Since the time of the God Emperor, Ix has produced certain calculating machines that can take the place of Navigators."