The Void is the most irritating of the many anti-logical constructs which have been made necessary by the development of the Holtzman Theories. Anyone who has ever traveled on a Guild heighliner has experienced a profound disturbance upon being told that while in transit the traveler and the ship he rides are, literally, nowhere at all. The intense feeling of being "lost" is sometimes too much for unstable individuals to bear, and repeated exposure to the Void can lead to serious personality imbalances.
The secret of controlling the field was difficult to learn because, during its early development, the investigators did not have any theoretical understanding of the suspensor-nullification effect. It was almost a century before researchers came to realize that as soon as the field was disturbed, the space-time pocket was formed and translated to some other location. The investigators at first thought that they had merely discovered a very expensive way to send unwanted matter to nowhere. Today, under Guild management, the control of the suspensor-nullification field is a highly specialized art: before spice-heightened navigators, space travel was perforce directed by computers.
The most mundane use of the suspensor-nullification field was discovered only after Holtzman published his unified theories. There is, it turns out, a certain critical size for the three-dimensional Holtzman Effect field: if the field is smaller than this size and it is itself enclosed within a globular planar effect field, a second-order of the inner surface of a planar field is manifested. This effect, known as Holtzman Repulsion, is much more powerful and long-ranged than the mass-repulsion effect of the inner side of a planar effect. the effect is strong enough that it can be used to "levitate" masses on planetary surfaces. Suspensor platforms are used occasionally for personal transport, but they are quite expensive, and are normally used only by the very rich, or in circumstances where normal magnetic levitation cannot be made to serve.
W.D.I.
HOUSES MAJOR
see GREAT HOUSES.
HOUSES MINOR
The popular name for the planetary gentry, those landowners, politicians, entrepreneurs, and performers who were confined by economic circumstance to one planet or planetary system. The Houses Minor were far more numerous (some estimates have reached as high as one million; other commentators limited the number of Houses Minor to about 100,000, using economic and political factors to decrease the possibilities) and far more diverse than the Houses Major; they cannot be described except in the broadest of terms. In general, however, they consisted of those persons or families who had reached an economic status of relative luxury compared to those around them, or who had entrenched themselves as a persistent political power in the lives of the citizens of at least a planetary continent, but who had not yet transcended planetary status. Many of the Houses Minor were employed by the Houses Major; none of the Houses Major served others except in transitory political alliances.
The Houses Minor were represented in the Landsraad through forty "Circles," blocks of votes representing forty arbitrarily defined sectors of Imperial space; each Circle was allocated a certain number of votes, ranging from five to twenty, based upon population, relative wealth, political status, and growth potential; and votes given each Circle were apportioned a year before each Landsraad session by the Spacing Guild, presumably neutral upon such matters (but who were rumored to accept extracurricular emoluments). Representatives to the Circles were elected by the Houses Minor in each sector through an elaborate system of proportional voting; each Circle determined which Houses were eligible to vote, and each circle sent to the Landsraad three representatives, who consulted among themselves before casting that sector's vote in the Landsraad sessions; two of the three determined the Circle's vote in a dispute. Although the Circles never organized their votes into a bloc, they tended to support the policies of the anti-Imperial faction of the Great Houses, except in those instances where their own aspirations might be jeopardized. They supported, for example, reduced qualifications for Great House status, thereby backing Imperial moves to dilute the power of the Great Houses. Hence, in a roll call vote on admittance of a new House to Great-House status, the Houses Minor would vote aye virtually unanimously.
Similarly, the Houses Minor generally voted against a blatant attempt to increase Imperial power at the expense of the high middle class, but supported moves against the Houses Major, many of whom have exploited the bourgeois. Since issues of this kind required lengthy examination, and passage of laws affecting the Great Houses or the Imperial power required consideration and approval in three successive Landsraads, few passed muster. The Landsraad did provide a forum, however, for the airing of grievances of all kinds, and many of the Houses Minor gained a wider audience for their views through Landsraad speeches or publications.
The Houses Minor possessed certain legal rights under Imperial law not granted to ordinary citizens, although their privileges did not approach those of the Houses Major. The Head of a Minor House and his immediate family could not be jailed, exiled, or executed without a trial conducted by their peers; when capital charges were brought against a House Minor or its official members, three Landsraad representatives from Circles other than that of the House being tried were selected by lot, and sat in judgment as a court of last resort, subject to the final veto of the emperor. The emperor could summarily convict a House Minor when he had proof of treason, but in no other circumstances; he could also overturn a conviction of a Landsraad court or suspend its findings, in each case making a report to the next session of the Landsraad concerning his rationale. Houses Minor could be convicted of misdemeanors by local courts, and fined; these fines had to be paid before the next Landsraad session, or charges might be brought by the planetary administrators to strip the errant House of its status. As with the Great Houses, under Imperial law the Head of the House was the House under certain circumstances, and might be forced to suffer the ultimate penalty of death or exile if members of his House transgressed.
The numbers of the Houses Minor fluctuated greatly throughout history, depending primarily on economic conditions and political gamesmanship. During the reign of Leto II, many of the Great Houses were demoted to Minor House status, and most of the existing Minor Houses lost their economic bases, becoming ordinary citizenry. Only under the strongly feudalized conditions of the Corrino Empire could this highly artificial structure maintain itself; as that structure disintegrated, so did the props supporting it. Business entrepreneurs will continue to exist as long as there is business to conduct but the Houses Minor had virtually disappeared as a unit of society by 13000.
R.R.
Further references: GREAT HOUSES; Count Borit Evon, The Houses Minor: A Major Part of Imperial Government 10188; (Kaitain: Linthrin UP); Audrii Krauwon, A Social Dialectic of the Houses Minor (Centralia Kutath); Heralds' College, The Planetary Gentry (Kaitain: New Burke).
HUANUI (or Deathstill)
A device to distill the water from a corpse. It was developed and used, so far as we know, only by the Fremen of Arrakis, the Dune planet. Nowhere else have people tried to survive in such an arid climate, and their strange death ritual underlines the importance of water conservation in their society.
The deathstill's major components were two plasteel vats, one within the other, plus a heating device and condensing system. Its use was very simple. The body was placed in the inside vat and the space between the walls of the two vats was filled with maker oil. The lid, containing a pressure valve and vapor tube, was clamped on. Heat from an external source was transferred by the oil from the outer to the inner vat. Inner-vat temperatures reached over 200°C in prolonged use. The liquid in the body began to boil. The pressure buildup accelerated the process. Vapor escaped through the valve and was channeled through a coiled condenser tube. Condensate was collected and measured.
There were two distinct types of Huanui. The more permanent was built on stone footings within all the sietches and many of the large stopovers. Its interior vat was usually about 2.5m long and 1m in di
ameter. An ultra-high-frequency wave generator produced a 2,450 megahertz signal to heat the maker oil, which appears to have had a very high boiling point. (Tests of the trace compound disclosed a match between this oil and tissue samples from fossilized shaihuludata.) The space between the two vats was 5 cm. The locking lid covered both vats, tab locked to the inside one and clamped with a snapring to the outside. The domed center of the lid contained a spring and ball pressure valve opening into a high-temperature vaportube. Up to 10 m of tube was coiled in concentric spirals above the lid. The tube led to the waiting basin of a flowmeter.
Some sophisticated details of the device included encased cooling tubes and a drain tube at the bottom of the inside vat. These helped cool the inside and condense trace vapor, which was then collected in the waiting basin. Spice-paper filters in the drain tube kept foreign matter from clogging the system.
The portable Huanui were much smaller, measuring only 1.5 m long and .75 m in diameter. There was just 2 cm between the inner vat and the shell. The heating unit was a parabolic solar collector, 50 cm across at maximum. The energy generated was transferred to resistor coils on the exterior surface. It had only a large-capacity catchpocket, without flowmeter, instead of a waiting basin.
The Kitab al-Ibar says that "a man's flesh is his own, but his water belongs to the tribe." After the distilling process, water measurement, and mingling with the tribe's waterhoard, what little residue remained was treated with utmost care and "buried in the earth to share with Shai-Hulud."
J.L.G.
Further references: V. Anon., The Faces of the Marid Alhen, tr. Brauar Baum, Lib. Conf. Temp. Series 641.
HUNTER-SEEKER
An ingenious assassination device invented in 9846 by Roj Amalkin. Weapons Master for Audrii XI (9828-9851). Its development, coupled with Audrii's willingness to make judicious use of the weapon on his enemies, may have been partially responsible for the Emperor's enjoyment of a comfortable old age.
Elegant in its simplicity, the hunter-seeker was composed of two parts: the control console, from which its operator directed the weapon's movements; and the hunter-seeker proper, a hair-thin metal sliver measuring five centimeters or less.
The sliver was powered by a compressed suspensor field, which gave the operator the combined advantages of speed (the sliver could travel, in short bursts, at speeds in excess of 100 kph) and high maneuverability. In the hands of a skilled operator, it could also be moved with the exquisite timing necessary to penetrate a personal force shield.
At one end of the sliver — the "nose" — was a pointed crystal eye. Through this, the operator would see to hunt his or her prey; harder than the metal making up the body of the sliver, the eye was also the tip with which the hunter-seeker entered its victim's body.
Once contact was made, the outcome was inevitable. Regardless of what portion of the body it struck, the sliver, attracted to electric impulses, was drawn into the nearest nerve pathway. It would then follow this course to the major organs, leaving a path of torn and destroyed tissue in its wake. When sufficient damage had resulted to cause death, the flow of energy through the nervous system stopped, and the sliver froze in place. The unstable metal was designed to disintegrate within half an hour of losing its energy contact, leaving only the tiny — and easily overlooked — crystal eye inside the corpse.
The console and its operator, of course, were less easily concealed, particularly because the hunter-seeker's field could be controlled only within a seventy-five meter range. For approximately the first three centuries following the device's invention, such concealment was less crucial, as the knowledge of the weapon's existence was one of House Corrino's most carefully guarded secrets. Other Houses, Major and Minor, buzzed with speculation concerning the emperor's "private death's angel," but no real information was revealed until 10155.
Public exposure of the hunter-seeker was brought about by a thwarted assassination attempt against the then-Heir Apparent, Prince Shaddam Corrino (later Shaddam IV). The prince's household spies ferreted out the plot before it could be implemented, and young Shaddam read the report — which included a full description of the weapon of choice — to his father, Elrood IX, before the full Imperial Court. In the glare of such publicity, Elrood exercised the only option available to him: he arranged for the torture, confession, and execution of one of the more peripheral family members, on whom the entire affair was blamed.
That the revealed plot led to the widespread adoption of the hunter-seeker is certain. More open to question is the theory that, despite the scapegoat's execution, responsibility for the blocked assassination was traced back to Elrood himself, and was the motive behind the chaumurky which disposed of him less than a year later.
The hunter-seeker's popular usage lasted throughout the reign of Shaddam IV, but ended less than a decade later with the invention of the Reversant. This alarm/counter-weapon detected the compressed suspensor field at any level of power; it then amplified and fed the field directly back into the control console. The resulting explosion was violent enough to eliminate all but a few traces of the person operating the console; and, as every House that could remotely be considered for assassination made haste to equip itself with the new device, the hunter-seeker quickly fell from favor, remaining only as an interesting footnote in the history of a violent age.
C.W.
Further references: ASSASSINS' HANDBOOK; Mira Lady Corrino, Roj Amalkin, Master of Death (from the private library of House Corrino; avail, as Work-in-Progress, Arrakis Studies Temp. Ser, 481, Library Confraternity).
I
IDAHO, DUNCAN
The original Duncan Idaho (10158-10191), known as Duncan-the-First or Duncan Prime, considered one of the finest fighters in history. He was a swordmaster of the Ginaz, a warrior of superior abilities. Duncan Prime was one of three major aides to the original Duke Leto Atreides, along with Gurney Halleck and Thufir Hawat, when House Atreides ruled Caladan and later Arrakis.
Born the son of undistinguished lower-class parents, Duncan spent most of his early years on Caladan, His aptitudes and intelligence were discovered during one of the Atreides' regular assessments of the population, and he was apprenticed to House Ginaz. Duncan's abilities and aptness quickly singled him out as one of the few who would be trained in the multiple skills of a sword-master. He demonstrated extraordinary proficiencies and, prior to the War of Assassins, he had far outstripped his contemporaries and most of his teachers.
Caught up in the War of Assassins between House Ginaz and House Moritani shortly after his graduation, he energetically threw himself into combat, partially to ease the sorrow of having not been returned to House Atreides. Decades after his death, troubadors related his exploits, and it is still sung that he was finally captured only through the craven use of a hunter-seeker armed with a soporific. With everyone in his patrol dead, he stood with his back to the door while the Ginaz family attempted to escape, defying the finest swordsmen of Grumman. The ballads tell that he slew eighteen before the hunter-seeker finally took him.
After his capture, he was a slave on Grumman with his keepers hoping that he could be used as a trainer. However, his constant escape attempts, his disruption of even the most sophisticated imprisonments, and his tactical leadership of three slave revolts forced his sale to House Harkonnen in 10180, when he was twenty-two years old. Again, Duncan demonstrated that his desire for freedom and a return to House Atreides overcame any value his skills had to the Harkonnens. Like other incorrigibles, he was condemned to the mines on Hagal, almost always a death sentence. These mines, a minor CHOAM feif, had been largely exhausted of their jewels during the reign of Shaddam I. The Harkonnens were attempting to gather what little profit remained and could do so only by operating at the lowest cost. The conditions were savage, with the slave mortality rate over sixty percent. Duncan survived the darkness and the starvation for over three years. He had evidently learned subtlety from his unsuccessful escape attempts on Grumman, and in 10184, through
a series of bribes paid with hoarded jewels and the seduction of the daughter of the Harkonnen governor, he was able to send a message to Caladan and escape with the girl into Hagal's vast veldt. Six months later, Idaho was found by an Atreides commando force led by Gurney Halleck.
Duncan was heralded as a hero on his return to Caladan, and the large expense involved in his rescue demonstrated his value to the Atreides and the reality of the Atreides boast that they took care of their own. Duncan reciprocated with absolute loyalty. In the Atreides he saw his origins, his life, and his resurrection. He brought to them a personal integrity and an inherent morality that would continue to be of value to the God Emperor himself.
Idaho was a military genius, and his training as a swordmaster enabled him not only to plan military campaigns but also repair force shields, create linguistically complex battle languages, design military support facilities, and improvise weapons.
His greatest long-range contribution to House Atreides, however, was his training of the young Paul Atreides, or as Duncan was fond of calling him, "young master." Even though Duncan was not quite the swordsman that Gurney Halleck was, he was a superb teacher. Paul often remarked that Duncan's feline movements and swift reflexes made him a difficult teacher to emulate. However, Duncan's success is easy to measure in Paul's triumphs over the Fremen Jamis and the na-Baron Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen. More important to Paul's leadership to the Fremen, Duncan also made him a master tactician, and it would be foolish to expect that Paul ever would have been accepted by the Fremen, even with consideration of the religious forces, if he had not been a complete warrior.
Sadly typical of Duncan's services to the Atreides, his skill as a teacher brought House Atreides woe as well as joy. One of the primary reasons Shaddam IV and House Corrino supported Baron Vladimir Harkonnen's attempted destruction of House Atreides was that Duncan and Gurney Halleck had trained a small force to equal the Padishah Emperor's Sardaukar, and Arrakeen Fremen held great potential for expansion of this small group.
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