Sandworms of Dune

by Brian Herbert

  The Baron laughed, and the Face Dancers hurried him away. When he looked at his escort, the shape-shifters showed disapproval at what he had done. “What? I don’t have to justify my reasons to you. At least that Abomination is gone now.”

  Gone, you say? A little girl’s loud titter like breaking glass inside his skull. Gone? You can’t discard me so easily! I was rooted inside your head before that ghola was ever born. The voice grew louder. Now I shall torment you more than ever. You leave me no choice but to serve as your conscience, Grandfather.

  The Baron marched away at a faster pace, trying to shut out her mocking presence.

  The stake in a total war is total—to conquer is to save everything, to succumb is to lose everything.

  —a warrior of Old Terra

  While the thinking machines maintained a tight cordon around the no-ship, Sheeana watched Jessica carry little Alia’s body away. How painful it must be for her. With her memories restored, Jessica knew intimately who Alia really was and understood her great potential. How bitterly ironic, too. St. Alia of the Knife—felled by a knife.

  Jessica cradled the limp child in her arms, shuddering as she fought to contain sobs. When she looked up at Sheeana, there was a cold deadliness in Jessica’s eyes. Duncan stood beside Jessica, his face a mask of grim anger. “We’ll have our revenge, my Lady. So many of us despise the Baron, he can’t survive for long.” Even Yueh sat coiled and dangerous, like a loaded weapon.

  Paul and Chani clasped hands, drawing strength from each other. Leto II watched in silence, undoubtedly holding an avalanche of conflicting thoughts in his mind. The boy always seemed to have so much more to him, like a giant iceberg whose bulk was concealed beneath the surface. Sheeana had long suspected that he might be the most powerful of all the gholas she had created.

  Jessica held her head high, finding strength within her. “We’ll take her to my quarters. Duncan, would you help me?” Dr. Yueh, desperate for forgiveness, hovered close to them.

  Filled with anxiety, frustration, and anger, Sheeana watched the tableau. In addition to losing the Bashar, Alia had been murdered, while three key gholas—Paul, Chani, and Leto II—remained unawakened. Stilgar and Liet-Kynes were left on Qelso, and Thufir Hawat had been a Face Dancer. Now that they were facing the Enemy and needed the ghola children to fulfill their destinies, too many of her “weapons” were not available to her! She had only Yueh, and Jessica . . . and Scytale, if she could count on the Tleilaxu.

  Exhaustion threatened to overwhelm Sheeana. They had fled for so long, carrying their plans and hopes, but never finding an end. This, though, was not at all what they had hoped for.

  The quiet and distant voice of Serena Butler awakened within her again, angered by the revelation about the Enemy. She spoke from firsthand knowledge. The evil machines have always wanted to exterminate humanity. They do not know how to forget.

  “But they were destroyed,” Sheeana said aloud.

  Apparently not. Trillions of people died during the Butlerian Jihad, but even that was not enough. In the end, I was not enough.

  “I am pleased to meet you finally,” said a raspy female voice. A lone old woman strolled down the no-ship’s corridor, a broad grin on her wrinkled face. Despite her apparent age, she moved fluidly and had a deadly look to her.

  Sheeana immediately guessed that this must be the mysterious old woman who was their relentless hunter. “Duncan has told us about you.”

  The woman smiled in an unnerving manner, as if she could see through Sheeana to her innermost thoughts and intentions. “You were quite a troublesome quarry. All those years wasted. Have you guessed my true identity yet?”

  “You are the Enemy.”

  Abruptly the crone’s face, body, and clothing rippled like molten, flowing metal. At first Sheeana thought this was another Face Dancer, but the head and body took on a sheen of highly polished platinum, and the matronly clothes became a plush robe. The face was smooth, with the same smile set in radically different features. A robot.

  Deep in her consciousness, Sheeana felt a tumult in Other Memory. And out of the clamor, Serena Butler’s familiar voice rose to cry, Erasmus! Destroy him!

  With great effort she shunted aside the voices in Other Memory, and said, “You are Erasmus. The one who killed Serena Butler’s child, setting off the centuries-long Jihad against thinking machines.”

  “So I am still remembered, even after all this time.” The robot sounded pleased.

  “Serena remembers you, all right. She is within me, and she hates you.”

  Pure delight shone on the robot’s face. “Serena Butler herself is in there? Ah yes, I know about your Other Memory. Face Dancers have brought many of you Bene Gesserits back to us.”

  Inside her, the clamor of memories returned. “I am Serena Butler, and she is me. Though thousands of years have passed, the pain is as sharp as ever. We cannot forget what you destroyed, and what you started.”

  “It was only one life—merely a baby. Logically, can’t you see how your race overreacted?” The robot sounded so reasonable.

  Sheeana felt a change in the tenor and cadence of her own voice, as if her body were being taken over by a force within. “Only one life? Merely a baby?” Serena was speaking now, thrusting herself to the forefront of the innumerable lives. Sheeana let her talk. After such a great length of time, this was Serena’s confrontation with her greatest nemesis. “That one life led to the military defeat of your entire Synchronized Empire. The Butlerian Jihad was a Kralizec in its own right. The end of that war changed the course of the universe.”

  Erasmus seemed delighted by the comparison. “Ah, interesting. And perhaps the end of this Kralizec will reverse that result and put thinking machines in charge again. If so, we will be much more efficient this time.”

  “That is how you foresee the end of Kralizec?”

  “That would be my preference. Something fundamental must change. Can I count on you to assist me?”

  “Never.” Serena’s projected voice was cold and implacable.

  Looking at the independent robot, Sheeana understood more than ever before that she was part of something far greater and more important than one life, that she was linked to a vast continuum of female ancestry stretching into the past and—hopefully—into the future. A remarkable assemblage, but would it survive?

  “There is a familiar fire in your eyes. If any part of you is indeed Serena Butler, then we must catch up on old times.” Erasmus’s optic threads gleamed.

  “She no longer wishes to converse with you,” Sheeana said in her own voice.

  Erasmus ignored the rebuff. “Take me to your private quarters. A human’s den reveals much about the individual personality.”

  “I will not.”

  The robot’s voice hardened. “Be reasonable. Or should I decapitate a few of your fellow passengers to encourage your cooperation? Ask Serena Butler inside you—she knows I will do it.”

  Sheeana glared at him.

  The robot continued in a calm tone, “But a simple conversation with you in your quarters may slake my appetite for now. Wouldn’t you prefer that to carnage?”

  Motioning for the others to remain behind, Sheeana turned her back on the robot and walked to one of the still-functional lifts. With gliding footsteps, Erasmus followed.

  In her chamber, the robot was intrigued by the preserved Van Gogh painting. Cottages at Cordeville was one of the oldest artifacts of human civilization. Standing rigidly, Erasmus admired the artwork. “Ah, yes! I remember this clearly. I painted it myself.”

  “It is the work of a nineteenth-century Terran artist, Vincent Van Gogh.”

  “I have studied the Madman of France with great interest, but I assure you, this is actually one of the canvases I myself painted thousands of years ago. I copied the original with the utmost attention to detail.”

  She wondered if he could possibly be telling the truth.

  Erasmus removed the delicate painting from the wall and examined it
closely, passing his metal fingertips over the thin plaz that protected the rough oil-paint surface. “Yes, well do I remember each stroke, each whorl, each point of color. Truly, this is a work of genius.”

  Sheeana caught her breath, knowing how old and priceless it was. Unless it really was a forgery perpetrated long ago. “The original was a work of genius. If this is what you say, then all you did was copy someone else’s masterpiece. There can be only one original.”

  His optic threads gleamed like a galaxy of stars. “If it is the same, exactly the same, then both are works of genius. If my copy is perfect down to every single brushstroke, does it not become a second original?”

  “Van Gogh was a man of creativity and inspiration. You merely mimicked his work. You might as well call a Face Dancer a work of art.”

  Erasmus smiled. “Some of them are.”

  Abruptly, with powerful hands, the robot ripped the painting and its frame into tiny pieces. As if putting a punctuation mark on the grotesque display, Erasmus whirled and stomped on the broken pieces, saying, “Call this artistic temperament.” Moving to depart, he added, “Omnius will summon your Kwisatz Haderach soon. We have waited a long time for this.”

  What is the difference between data and memory? I intend to find out.

  —ERASMUS,

  Laboratory Notebooks

  The independent robot’s memories of Serena were as fresh as if the events had occurred only days ago. Serena Butler . . . such a fascinating woman. And just as Erasmus had survived through the millennia as a package of data nearly destroyed and then recovered, so Serena’s memories and personality lived on, somehow, in the Other Memories of the Bene Gesserit.

  This posed an intriguing question: No Bene Gesserits could be Serena Butler’s direct descendants, for Erasmus had killed her only child. Then again, he couldn’t be sure what had happened to all of his experimental clones over the years. He had tried many times to bring Serena back, with no success.

  Aboard this no-ship, however, the humans had grown gholas from their past, just as his own plan had brought back Baron Harkonnen and a version of Paul Atreides. Erasmus knew that a nullentropy tube hidden in a Tleilaxu Master had contained a wealth of ancient and carefully gathered cells.

  He was confident that a real Tleilaxu Master could succeed in bringing Serena back, where his own primitive experiments had failed. Erasmus and Omnius had both absorbed enough Face Dancers to have instinctive reverence for the abilities of a Master. The independent robot knew exactly where he had to go before leaving the no-ship.

  Erasmus found the medical center and the axlotl chambers where the whole library of historical cells had been catalogued and stored. If Serena Butler was among them . . .

  He was surprised to find a Tleilaxu already there, harried and frantic. The diminutive man had disconnected the life-support systems of the axlotl tanks. With his olfactory sensors, Erasmus noted the smells of chemicals, melange precursors, and human flesh.

  He grinned. “You must be Scytale, the Tleilaxu Master! It’s been a long time.”

  Scytale whirled, looking fearful at the sight of the robot.

  Erasmus took a step closer, and studied the Tleilaxu’s face. “A child? What are you doing?”

  The Tleilaxu drew himself up. “I am destroying the tanks and the melange they produce. I had to surrender that knowledge as a bargaining chip. I won’t let thinking machines and traitorous Face Dancers simply take it from me—from us.”

  Erasmus showed no concern for the sabotaged axlotl tanks. “But you appear to be very young.”

  “I am a ghola. I have my memories back. I am everything that any of my previous incarnations were.”

  “Of course you are. Such a marvelous process, perpetuating yourself through serial ghola lives. We machines understand such things, although we have much more efficient methods of performing data transfers and backups.” He looked intensely at the genetic library that held the potential ghola cells . . . Serena Butler . . .

  Noting the robot’s keen interest, the Tleilaxu sprang to stand in front of the sealed wall of specimens. “Beware! The witches placed security sensors on these gene samples to prevent anyone from tampering with or stealing them. The library has a built-in self-destruct system.” He narrowed his dark, rodentlike eyes. If this Master was bluffing, he was doing a remarkably convincing job. “I need only yank on a drawer, and this entire cabinet will be flooded with gamma radiation, enough to ionize every single sample.”

  “Why?” The robot was perplexed. “After the Bene Gesserit took those cells from you and used them for their own purposes? Didn’t they force you to cooperate? Would you truly stand on their side?” He extended a platinum hand. “Join us instead. I would greatly reward you for your assistance in growing one particular ghola—”

  In a threatening motion, Scytale placed his small hand on one of the many cell containers. Though trembling, he seemed entirely determined. “Yes, I would stand with them. I shall always stand against the thinking machines.”

  “Interesting. New enemies make unexpected alliances.”

  The Tleilaxu didn’t move. “In the final assessment, we’re all humans—and you are not.”

  Erasmus chuckled. “And what about Face Dancers? They fall between, don’t they? These aren’t the shape-shifters you produced long ago, but are instead far superior biological machines that I helped create. And because of them, Omnius and I are, in effect, the greatest of all Face Dancers—among many other things.”

  Scytale didn’t move. “Haven’t you noticed the Face Dancers are no longer reliable?”

  “Ah, but they are reliable to me.”

  “Are you sure?”

  The robot took a tentative step forward, testing. Scytale tensed his fingers on the handle of the sample cabinet. Erasmus amplified his voice. “Stop!” He eased himself backward, giving the Tleilaxu Master more room. There would be plenty of time to return and test Scytale’s loyalties. “I leave you to this facility and your cellular samples.”

  Erasmus had waited more than fifteen thousand years for Serena, and could continue to do so. For now, the robot had to return to the machine cathedral and prepare for the final show. The evermind was not quite so patient to achieve his ultimate goals as Erasmus was.

  Come, let us eat and sing together. We will share a drink and laugh at our enemies.

  —from an ancient ballad by

  GURNEY HALLECK

  The computer evermind sent his troops to bring Paul from the Ithaca to the machines’ cathedral-like nexus. New-model robotic guards swarmed down the corridors like quicksilver insects. Approaching Paul, one of them said, “Come with us to the primary cathedral.”

  Chani grabbed his arm and held on, as if she too had sprouted metal hands. “I will not let you go, Usul.”

  Looking at the inhuman escorts, he said to her, “We can’t keep them from taking me.”

  “Then I shall come with you.” He tried to argue with her, but she cut him off. “I am a Fremen woman. Would you try to stop me? You might just as easily fight these machines.”

  Concealing a small smile, he faced the sleek machines that clicked and flittered in front of him. “I will accompany you without resistance, but only if Chani comes with me.”

  Emerging from her quarters where Alia’s body now lay on the narrow bed, Jessica placed herself between Paul and the robots. Bloodstains still marked her shipsuit. “He is my son. I have already lost a daughter today, and cannot bear to lose him as well. I’m going with you.”

  “We are here to escort Paul Atreides to the primary cathedral,” one of the robots said, its freeform face flowing like heavy rain on a Caladan window. “There are no other restrictions.”

  Paul took that as agreement. For some reason, Omnius wanted him, even though he did not have his memories back. All other passengers and crew were apparently extraneous baggage. Had he been the subject of the hunt from the beginning? How could that be? Had the thinking machines somehow known he would be aboard? Paul g
ripped Chani’s hand and said to her, “It will be over soon, in whatever manner fate decides. All along, our destinies have hurtled us toward this point, like levitating trains out of control.”

  “We will face it together, my love,” Chani said. He only wished that he could recall all his years with her . . . and that she could do the same.

  “What about Duncan?” he asked. “And Sheeana?”

  “We must depart now,” the robots said in unison. “Omnius waits.”

  “Duncan and Sheeana will know soon enough,” Jessica said.

  Before they left, Paul made a point of taking the crysknife Chani had made for him. Like a Fremen warrior, he wore it proudly at his waist. Although the worm-tooth blade would do nothing against the thinking machines, it made him feel more like the legendary Muad’Dib—the man who defeated powerful empires. But in his mind he again saw the horrible recurring vision, the flicker of memory or prescience in which he lay on the floor in a strange place, mortally wounded—looking up at a younger version of himself who laughed in triumph.

  He blinked and sought to focus on reality, not possibilities or destiny. Following the insectile robots down the corridors, he tried to tell himself he was prepared to face whatever lay in store for him.

  Before the gholas could emerge from the ship through the ragged hole the machines had made, Wellington Yueh tried to push his way past the ranks of escort robots. “Wait! I want . . . I need to go with you.” He fumbled for excuses. “If someone gets hurt, I’m the best Suk doctor available. I can help.” He lowered his voice and pleaded, “The Baron will be there, and he’ll want to see me.”

  Still wrestling with her reinjured feelings toward him, Jessica sounded harsh and bitter. “Help? Did you help Alia?” Hearing this, Yueh looked as if she had slapped him.

  “Let him come, Mother.” Paul felt resigned. “Dr. Yueh was a staunch childhood supporter and mentor to the original Paul. I won’t turn down any ally or witness to whatever is about to occur.”