Xavier tried to determine from the tenor if it really was a human voice, or only a clever machine copy. Thinking machines were not devious . . . unless there was a preserved cymek brain aboard. Some of the kindjals dropped back, uncertain.
“Stay on your guard,” Xavier said to his squadron, “but cease fire until we figure this out—”
Before he could finish his order, the suspicious ship looped and began firing its own weapons, minimal defensive volleys that nevertheless took the Armada fighters by surprise. One kindjal veered away, its engines damaged.
Xavier’s console screen showed the image of a human face with dark hair and shining fanatical eyes. A sleek, mirror-faced robot stood next to him, his flexible copperfilm body rippling as he operated the controls of the ship.
A human and a robot, working side by side? Xavier couldn’t believe it.
“Open fire!” he shouted. “Destroy that ship.”
• • •
“IT IS NOT wise to provoke them too much, Vorian,” Seurat said, maddeningly calm. “I would rather leave here posthaste.”
“I just gained us a few precious seconds, didn’t I? You wouldn’t have thought of using a bluff.” Vor couldn’t stop grinning. He had read similar words in the memoirs of Agamemnon and was glad to echo them.
As the Armada commander took evasive maneuvers and rallied his kindjal pilots, he hurled insults back at Vor on the comline. “You are a disgrace to humanity, a traitor!”
Vor laughed, proud of his place here. He quoted what he’d been taught all his life. “I am the pinnacle of humanity— a trustee of Omnius, the son of General Agamemnon.”
“I apologize for interrupting your grand speech, Vorian, but I am detecting more hrethgir ships,” the robot said. “More than we can evade. Therefore, I am breaking off engagement. Our responsibility is to protect the updates aboard. We have to make our report.”
Vor said grimly, “If the Giedi Prime– Omnius is already destroyed, we will never have an update of what it did during its months of operation here. We’ll never know what he accomplished.”
“A grievous loss,” Seurat said.
The robot guided the Dream Voyager toward orbit, farther from the deadly scrambler fields. The acceleration pressed Vorian back into his padded seat until he nearly lost consciousness. A squadron of human-operated ships closed in on their tail, and the update ship shuddered as an energy pulse hit the aft section.
Seurat dodged, and another volley of blows pounded the hull, damaging the armor plates. This vessel was not made to endure such punishment. Vor heard onboard systems hissing, automated routines making temporary repairs to the damaged parts. Another blast hit, even worse than the others.
“We are operating on reserves,” Seurat announced. Vor scanned the ship’s diagnostics himself, assessing the damage. The air in the cabin began to smell acrid and smoky.
The Dream Voyager lurched. More kindjals surrounded them, targeting their engines. An explosion jarred Vor to his bones.
“We cannot tolerate much more of this,” Seurat said. “Our engines are functioning at only a third of normal capacity, and I am flying as fast as I can.”
“Head into that high cloud,” Vor said, as an idea suddenly occurred to him. “The water vapor is thick enough to act as a projection surface.”
Listening to his enthusiastic copilot, Seurat steered into a giant, towering cloud. The damaged engines strained. More blows came from the pursuing kindjals.
Vor worked furiously at the controls, using the ship’s sophisticated systems to project virtual copies in its wake, electronic images of the Dream Voyager. He had hoped to use the scheme in a tactical game with Seurat . . . but this was a different sort of game. If it didn’t work, the already-damaged update ship would never survive.
Moments later a hundred illusory Dream Voyagers seemed to surge through the cloud, solido images reflected on the water vapor. Momentarily confused, the pursuing squadron chased decoys.
And the real prey limped away, its pilots stealing up into orbit and hoping to remain unnoticed until they could get out of range. . . .
Even the expected can be a terrible shock when we have been holding on to threads of hope.
— XAVIER HARKONNEN
While the survivors of Giedi Prime counted their dead, documented the damage, and made plans for the future, Xavier felt hope fading. It seemed that no one on the whole world had seen Serena Butler since she’d departed from the island compound in the northern sea.
He took twice his normal shifts aboard scout kindjals, flying regular patterns over the settled continents, where thinking machines had caused the most destruction. If Serena was alive, Xavier knew she would never be hiding. Rather, the determined young woman would be in the midst of the hardest work, taking charge as always.
Flying eastward on the next scheduled search pattern, he watched the yellow sun set behind him, leaving splashes of gold and orange in its wake. A powerful gust buffeted his craft, and he fought to control it. Xavier rose to a less-turbulent altitude above the jet-stream, while his squadron followed him.
Someday, after he and Serena were married, he could tell this story to their children. His chest tightened at the thought, but he continued his search, not daring to consider what he would do if something had happened to her.
From this altitude, Xavier could make out the major geographical outlines of continents and seas as they soaked up the approaching night. Through a powerful scope, he saw the center of a city and made out clusters of lights marking human encampments. During their brief and brutal rule, the machine conquerors had slaughtered countless people and sent millions fleeing into the countryside.
Now survivors began to filter back to their homes. Construction crews had moved into the industrial complexes, where they ripped out machine modifications and reestablished the production capacities that were necessary to repair dwelling units and distribute food and supplies. Back in Giedi City, Armada experts pored over the ruined Omnius citadel, analyzing the debris from the high-thermal attack. Only scraps of twisted, burned-out hardware and an electronic signaling mechanism remained.
But full recovery would take a great deal of time.
Xavier hated machines more than anything, but he also believed in honor among men. He could not understand the turncoat Vorian Atreides, who willingly flew beside a robot captain in a thinking-machine spy ship. Brainwashed, obviously, but something in the young man’s arrogant demeanor suggested deep convictions . . . a fanatical, single-minded passion. Atreides had claimed to be the “son” of Agamemnon, the worst of the cymek Titans.
Below, one of the squadron ships veered toward the water in the vast, open sea. “Tercero Harkonnen, I’m detecting debris in the water below. Metallic wreckage of some sort.”
With sudden dread, Xavier said, “Check it out.”
Two kindjals swooped down to the open sea. One pilot transmitted, “The mass and configuration suggests that it’s the remains of a League ship with military-grade armor. Maybe a blockade runner.”
“Did we lose any ships of that type in our engagement?”
“No, sir.”
“Retrieve the wreckage,” Xavier commanded, surprised at how steady his voice sounded. “We’ll run an analysis.” He didn’t want to say it, but knew that Serena and her team had taken such a craft out onto the open sea, when departing from the transmitter facility.
He thought of the shimmering image of Serena projected from the black diamond necklace that Octa had given him. The memory was so sharp that the achingly beautiful woman seemed to be standing in front of him again, proud and determined with her misguided idea of helping the people of Giedi Prime.
As the crews gathered the scattered debris, Xavier saw that the hull had been painted an unobtrusive gray with a film of stealth coating, now blistered and peeled.
He felt numb. “We have to make certain, one way or the other.”
• • •
LATER, WHEN THE debris had been delivered
to a temporary military encampment in Giedi City, Xavier Harkonnen ordered a full examination on any traces found in the interior of the destroyed craft. Other parts of the wreckage seemed to have come from robotic aerofoils, but he didn’t care about that. His mind and body were numb with dread; the conclusions seemed inescapable.
Inside a battered lifepod not far from the downed blockade runner, the recovery team also found the mangled remains of an old man, identified as Ort Wibsen. All doubt dissipated. This had been Serena’s vessel.
They found more blood inside the waterlogged ship. Obviously they had put up an extraordinary fight at the end. Xavier ran full DNA scans, hoping for any result other than the one he feared most.
But the results proved that the other victims had been the Home Guard messenger Pinquer Jibb . . . and Serena Butler herself.
Serena. My love . . .
Hanging his head, Xavier tried to hold on to the unraveling strands of hope. Perhaps the machines had only taken Serena prisoner. But that was a ridiculously unrealistic possibility . . . and given cymek and robot brutality, would that be a fate he could wish for?
No, he would have to return to Salusa Secundus and deliver the news to a distraught Manion Butler.
There could be no doubt about it: Serena must be dead.
Whether we are rich, poor, strong, weak, intelligent, or stupid, the thinking machines treat us as nothing more than meat. They do not understand what humans really are.
— IBLIS GINJO,
rearly planning for the Jihad
While other trustee crew bosses supervised the Forum monument projects, Iblis Ginjo received orders to process a load of arriving slaves. These captives had been freshly harvested from Giedi Prime and brought to Earth by order of Omnius. The work boss groaned inwardly, suspecting that the cymeks would want to build another enormous monument to celebrate the Giedi Prime victory, too, and his crews would have to build it. . . .
Erasmus supposedly had his eye on one female in particular, personally selected for him by the Titan Barbarossa. Iblis had read the documentation, knew that the new batch of prisoners might be an unruly lot, considering where they had been captured.
As the disheveled and disoriented slaves were herded off the space transport in dirty clothes, Iblis perused them with a trained eye, considering how to segregate them to work assignments, a few artisans, a few skilled workers, most of them mere slaves. He separated out a muscular, mahogany-skinned man for assignment to the Ajax pedestal project, smiling encouragement to him, then dispatched others to crews that required more manpower.
One of the last to emerge from the ship was a battered woman who, despite the dark bruises on her face and arms and the weary shock in her expression, carried herself with pride, showing internal strength in every movement. This was the one for Erasmus. Trouble.
Why would the robot be interested in her? He would probably just vivisect her anyway. A waste. And a shame.
Iblis called to her, but she ignored his gentle yet authoritative tone. Finally, with some rough encouragement from the guard robots, she stood in front of him. Though only of average height, the female had striking lavender eyes, amber-brown hair, and a face that might be pretty if cleansed of grime and anger.
He smiled warmly, trying to reach out to her with a little charm. “The records say your name is Serena Linné?” He knew full well who she was.
Iblis stared into her eyes and detected a spark of defiance there. She held his gaze, as if she were his equal. “Yes. My father was a minor official in Giedi City, moderately well-off.”
“Have you ever worked as a servant before?” he inquired.
“I have always been a servant— of the people.”
“From now on, you serve Omnius.” He softened his voice. “I promise you, it won’t be so bad. Our workers are treated well here. Especially intelligent ones like yourself. Perhaps you could even aspire to a trusted, privileged position, if you have the intelligence and the personality for it.” Iblis smiled. “However, wouldn’t it be best if we used your true name . . . Serena Butler?”
She glared at him. At least she didn’t deny it. “How did you know?”
“After capturing you, Barbarossa inspected the wreckage of your vessel. There were many clues aboard. You are fortunate the cymeks never needed to interrogate you in further detail.” He glanced at his electronic notes. “We know you are the daughter of Viceroy Manion Butler. Were you trying to hide your identity out of fear that Omnius might use you in some sort of blackmail scheme? I assure you, that isn’t the way the evermind thinks. Omnius would never have considered such a thing.”
She raised her chin defiantly. “My father would never surrender a centimeter of territory, no matter what the machines do to me.”
“Yes, yes, you’re all very brave, I am sure.” Iblis gave her a wry smile, meant to be comforting. “The rest is up to the robot Erasmus. He has requested that you be assigned to his villa. He has taken a particular interest in your circumstances. That’s a good sign.”
“He wishes to help me?”
“I wouldn’t go that far,” he said with a hint of humor. “I’m sure Erasmus wants to talk with you. And talk and talk and talk. In the end, it’s quite likely he will drive you mad with his famous curiosity.”
Iblis instructed other slaves to clean and properly reclothe this female, and they followed the trustee’s orders as if he were a machine himself. Although her mannerisms exuded hostility and resentment, Serena Butler did not waste effort on pointless resistance. She had a brain, but her intelligence and spirit were bound to be crushed before long.
The routine medical check, however, revealed a surprise. She glared at Iblis, trying to maintain her defensive wall of anger, but a glimmer of curiosity flickered behind her odd lavender eyes. “Are you aware that you’re pregnant? Or is that just an unfortunate accident?” From the way she reeled, he saw that her reaction was not feigned. “Yes, by now it appears about three months along. You must have suspected.”
“That is none of your business.” Her words were hard, as if she was trying to maintain her hold on something stable. The news seemed to be a greater blow to her than all the rough treatment she had endured since capture.
Iblis made a dismissive gesture. “Every cell in your body is my business— at least until I deliver you to your new master. Afterward, I will really begin to pity you.”
The independent robot would no doubt plan interesting experiments on her and the fetus. . . .
The psychology of the human animal is malleable, with his personality dependent upon the proximity of other members of the species and the pressures exerted by them.
— ERASMUS,
laboratory notes
Erasmus’s villa stood as a towering edifice on a hilltop overlooking the sea. On the inland side, the main building loomed high in front of a lovely flagstone square beneath high turrets; toward the coast, a cluster of bleak, crowded slave pens huddled on the opposite side, where human captives lived like livestock.
From the highest balconies, the robot found the dichotomy curious.
Forming his metal polymer facefilm into a paternal mask, Erasmus watched as two sentinel robots strode through a slave pen, hunting for twin girls that he required for a new round of experiments. The panicked humans scrambled away, but Erasmus didn’t shift his pliable face into a frown. His myriad optic threads scanned the lean and dirty forms, assessing.
He had seen the little girls a few days before, noting their short black hair and brown eyes, but they seemed to be hiding somewhere. Playing a game with him? The sentinels tore through a doorway into a tunnel that led to another pen; finally, they transmitted back, “We have located the two subjects.”
Good, Erasmus thought, anticipating the intriguing work ahead. He wanted to see if he could force one of the twin girls to kill the other. It would be a landmark experiment, one that would reveal important insights into moral boundaries and how siblings defined them.
He especially e
njoyed working with identical twins. Over the years he had processed dozens of pairs through his laboratory, compiling detailed medical reports as well as intensive psychological studies. He spent a great deal of effort on meticulous comparative autopsies, microanalyzing the subtle differences in siblings who were genetic carbon-copies. The slave masters working in the crowded pens had instructions to identify and select any new sets among the captive populace on Earth.
Finally, the squirming dark-haired twins stood in front of him, held by the sentinel robots. He shifted his pliable facefilm into a calm smile. One of the girls spat on the reflective surface. Erasmus wondered why saliva carried such a negative connotation for humans? It caused no damage and could be cleaned off easily. The forms of human defiance never ceased to amaze him.
Shortly before Erasmus had left his estate on Corrin, twenty-two slaves had removed their protective eye films and intentionally stared into the furious red-giant sun, blinding themselves. Disobedient, resistant— and stupid. What did the rebellious act accomplish, other than rendering them useless for slave work?
They had expected to be killed, and Erasmus would oblige them. But not so that they could become martyrs. Instead, he had quietly separated them from other workers to prevent the spread of their unruliness. Blinded, they could not find or earn food. By now, he supposed they must have starved in their self-inflicted darkness.
Still, he had marveled at their spirit, their collective will to challenge him. Even though humans were a troublesome breed, they were constantly fascinating.
A watcheye buzzed nearby, making strange, raw noises. Finally, Omnius spoke through it. “The recent loss of Giedi Prime is your fault, Erasmus. I tolerate your endless experiments in the hope that you will deconstruct and analyze human behavior. Why did you not predict the suicidal raid that obliterated my cymeks? The data and experiences of my Giedi Prime counterpart were never backed up. Barbarossa is equally irreplaceable, since he created my original programming.”
Dune: The Butlerian Jihad Page 24