Hunters of Dune dc-7

by Herbert Brian

  At least he had kept them safe. So far. Some of the passengers—especially Garimi and her faction, as well as the Rabbi's people—were growing increasingly restless. By now, dozens of children had been born, and were being raised by Bene Gesserit proctors in isolated sections of the Ithaca.

  They all wanted a home.

  "We can't keep running forever!" Garimi had said during one of their recent all-hands meetings.

  Yes we can. We may have to. The giant self-contained ship needed refueling only once or twice a century, since it was able to gather most of what it needed from the rarified sea of molecules scattered throughout space.

  The no'ship had been cruising for years without making another leap through foldspace. Duncan had taken them farther than the imaginations of those who charted space. Not only had he eluded the Enemy, he had slipped away from the Oracle of Time, never knowing whom to trust.

  In all that time, he had seen no sign of the glittering net, but it made him uneasy to remain in one area for long. Why do the old man and woman want us so badly? Is it me they're after? Is it the ship? Or is it someone else aboard?

  As Duncan waited, letting his thoughts drift along with the vessel itself, he felt the overlappings of his own lifetimes, so many lifetimes. The mergings of flesh and consciousness, the flow of experience and imagination, the great teachings and the epic events he had experienced. He sifted through countless lifetimes, all the way back to his original boyhood on Giedi Prime under Harkonnen tyranny, and later on Caladan as the loyal weapons master of House Atreides. He had given his first life to save Paul Atreides and Lady Jessica.

  Then the Tleilaxu had restored him as a ghola called Hayt, and afterward many Duncan Idaho incarnations had served the capricious God Emperor. So much pain, so much exhilaration.

  He, Duncan Idaho, had been present at many critical moments in human history, from the fall of the Old Empire and the rise of Muad'Dib, through the long rule and death of the God Emperor… and beyond. Through it all, history had been distilling events, processing and sifting them through the Duncans, renewing them.

  Long ago, he had loved the beautiful, dark-haired Alia, even with all her strangeness. Centuries later, he had loved Siona deeply, though it was obvious the God Emperor had thrown them together intentionally. In all of his ghola lifetimes he had loved many beautiful, exotic women.

  Why, then, was Murbella so difficult to get over? He could not break the debilitating bond she had with him.

  Duncan had slept little in the past week because whenever he went to his cot and clasped his pillow, he could only think of Murbella, sensing the emptiness where her body wasn't. So many years—why wouldn't the ache and addictive longing fade? Restless and wanting to put even more distance between himself and Murbella's siren call, he erased the current navigation coordinates, used his bold—or reckless—intuition, and made a random foldspace jump.

  When they arrived at a new and uncharted portion of space, Duncan let his mind drift in a fugue state, deeper than a Mentat's trance. Though he did not admit it to himself, he was looking for any hint of Murbella's presence, though she could not possibly be here.

  Obsession.

  Duncan could not concentrate, and his woolgathering left them vulnerable to the gossamer yet deadly net that began to coalesce unnoticed around the no-ship.

  *

  TEG ARRIVED ON the navigation bridge, saw Duncan at the controls, and noted that the other man seemed consumed by his thoughts, as he often was, especially of late.

  His glance went to the control modules, the viewscreen, the path the no-ship had taken along its projected course. Teg studied the patterns on the console, then the patterns in the emptiness. Even without the no-ship's sensors and viewscreens, he could grasp the sheer volume of empty space around them. A new void, a different starless region from where they had been.

  Duncan had made a reckless jump through foldspace. But the nature of randomness was such that any new location was just as likely to be closer to the Enemy than farther away.

  Something troubled him, something he could not ignore. His Atreides-based abilities allowed him to focus on those anomalies and discern what was not there. Duncan wasn't the only one who could see strange things.

  "Where are we?"

  Duncan answered with a distant riddle. "Who knows where we are?" He snapped out of his preoccupied trance, then gasped. "Miles! The net—it's closing in, tightening like a noose!"

  Duncan had thrown the ship not into a safe wasteland, but directly into the vicinity of the Enemy. Like hungry spiders reacting to unexpected vibrations in their web, the old man and woman were closing in.

  Already on edge from his premonition, Teg reacted with a burst of speed, without thinking. His body went into overdrive, his reflexes burning bright, his actions accelerating to indefinable speeds. Moving with a metabolism no human body was meant to withstand, he seized command of the navigation controls. His hands worked in a blur. His mind flashed from system to system, reactivating the Holtzman engines in the middle of their recharge.

  Immeasurably swift and alert, Teg became part of the ship—and guided them into a sudden and alarming foldspace jump.

  He could feel the gossamer, sentient strands make one last futile grasp, but Teg tore the ship free, damaging the net as he lurched the huge vessel across a wrinkle in space, jumping to another place, and then another, wrenching the craft from the searchers' trap. Behind him he sensed pain, severe damage to the net and its casters, and then outrage at losing their prey again.

  Teg streaked across the bridge, making adjustments, sending commands, moving so swiftly that no one—not even Duncan—would know he was covering for the other man's mistake. Finally, he slowed back to real time, exhausted, drained, and famished.

  Astonished by what Teg had done in less than a second, Duncan shook his head to clear away the tar-pit memories of Murbella. "What did you just do, Miles?"

  Slumped at a secondary console, the Bashar gave Duncan a mysterious smile.

  "Only what was necessary. We're out of danger."

  10

  A mere player should never assume he can influence the rules of a game.

  BASHAR MILES TEG, strategy lectures

  Snip!

  The blades of the hedge trimmer clacked together, severing random branches to alter the shape of the greenery. "You see how life persists in straying from its well-defined boundaries?" Annoyed, the old man moved methodically along the high shrub at the edge of the lawn, pruning the outlying stems and leaves, anything that detracted from geometrical perfection. "Unruly hedges are so unsettling."

  With an insistent clicking of the blades, he attacked the tall shrubs. In the end, the planes were perfectly flat and smooth, according to his specifications.

  Wearing an amused expression, the old woman sat back in her canvas lounge chair. She lifted a glass of fresh lemonade. "What I see is someone who persists in imposing order rather than accepting reality. Randomness has value, too."

  Taking another sip, she thought about mentally activating a set of sprinklers to drench the old man, strictly as a demonstration of unpredictability. But that sort of prank, while amusing, would only provoke unpleasantness. Instead, she entertained herself by watching her companion's unnecessary work.

  "Rather than drive yourself mad with adherence to a set of rules, why not change the rules! You have the power to do so."

  He glared at her. "You suggest I am mad?"

  "Merely a figure of speech. You have long since recovered from any sort of damage."

  "You provoke me, Marty." A brief flicker of danger passed as the old man, with renewed vigor, returned his attention to the garden trimmers. He attacked the hedges again, shaping and molding, not satisfied until every leaf was in its desired place.

  The old woman set her glass down and went to the flower beds where a profusion of tulips and irises added splashes of color. "I prefer to be surprised—to savor the unexpected. It makes life interesting." Frowning, she bent o
ver to inspect a bristling weed that thrived among her plants. "There are limits, however." With a vicious yank, she uprooted the unwanted plant.

  "You seem quite forgiving, considering that we still do not have the no-ship under our control. It angers me more each time they get away! Kralizec is upon us."

  "That last time was very close." Smiling, the old woman moved through her flower garden. Behind her, the wilting blossoms suddenly brightened, infused with new color. The sky was a perfect blue.

  "You aren't much concerned about the damage they just caused us. I expended a great deal of effort to create and cast the latest tachyon net. Lovely tendrils, far-reaching… " He twisted his lips into a scowl. "And now everything is torn, tangled, and frayed."

  "Oh, you can re-create it with a thought." The woman waved a tanned hand.

  "You're just annoyed because something didn't happen the way you expected it to. Have you considered that the no-ship's recent escape provides evidence of the prophetic projection? It must mean that the one you expect—whom the humans call the Kwisatz Haderach—is truly aboard. How else could they have slipped away? Perhaps that is proof of the projection?"

  "We always knew he was aboard. That is why we must have the no-ship." The old woman laughed. "We predict he is aboard, Daniel. There is a difference.

  Centuries and centuries of mathematical projections convinced us that the necessary one would be there."

  The old man jammed his sharp hedge trimmers point first into the grass, impaling the lawn as if it were an enemy.

  The mathematical projection had been so sophisticated and complex that it was tantamount to a prophecy. The two knew full well that they required the Kwisatz Haderach to win the impending typhoon struggle. Previously, they would have considered such a prophesy no more than a superstitious legend spawned by frightened people cowering from the dark. But after the impossibly detailed analytical projections, along with millennia of eerily clever human prophecies, the old couple knew that their victory required possession of the wild card, the human loose cannon.

  "Long ago, others learned the folly of trying to control a Kwisatz Haderach."

  The old woman stood up from her weeding. She put a hand to the small of her back as if she had a muscle ache, though it was only an affectation. "He nearly destroyed them, and they spent fifteen hundred years bemoaning what happened."

  "They were weak." The old man took a half-full glass of lemonade from where he had set it on an ornate lawn table and drank it down in a single gulp.

  She went to his side and looked through a razor-edged gap in the hedge toward the extravagant and complex towers and interlinked buildings in the faraway city that surrounded their perfect sanctuary. She touched his elbow. "If you promise not to pout, I can help you repair the net. You really must accept the fact that plans can be disrupted quite easily."

  "Then we must make better plans."

  Nonetheless he joined her in concentration, and they began to weave the gossamer strands through the fabric of the universe once more, reconstructing their tachyon net and sending it out at great speed, covering impossible distances in the blink of an eye.

  "We will keep trying to catch that ship," the old woman said, "but we might be better off focusing our efforts on the alternative plan that Khrone has in mind. Thanks to what was found on Caladan, we do have another option, a second chance to assure our victory. We should pursue both alternatives. We know that Paul Atreides was a Kwisatz Haderach, and a ghola of the boy has already been born, thanks to Khrone's foresight—"

  "Accidental foresight, I am sure."

  "Nevertheless, he also has the Baron Harkonnen, who will be a perfect fulcrum with which to turn the new Paul to our purposes. Therefore, even if we do not capture the no-ship, we are guaranteed to have a Kwisatz Haderach in our possession. We win, either way. I will make certain Khrone does not fail us. I have sent special watchers."

  The old man was powerful and rigid, but at times naive. He did not suspect treachery enough. The old woman knew she needed to keep a better watch on their minions dispersed throughout the Old Empire. Sometimes the Face Dancers were too full of themselves.

  She was happy to let each participant play his role, whether it be the old man, the Face Dancers, the passengers on the no-ship, or the vast herds of victims standing in the way in the Old Empire.

  It amused her for now, but everything was changeable. That was the way of the universe.

  11

  Plans within plans within plans — like an infinite array of nested reflections cast fry angled mirrors. It takes a superior mind to see all of the causes and effects.

  KHRONE, message to the Face Dancer myriad

  On Caladan, the strange delegation from far, far outside arrived to see Khrone. They did not need to identify themselves when they demanded to learn of his progress with the Baron child and the Atreides ghola they called "Paolo." Khrone already had what the old man and woman needed, a little boy with all the necessary potential in his gene markers. A Kwisatz Haderach.

  Instead of rewarding the Face Dancer, though, the distant puppet masters breathed down his neck, watching everything he did. They wanted complete control, and Khrone resented it. The Face Dancer myriad had suffered from too much domination by fools during the millennia of their existence.

  Nevertheless, he bided his time. He could deal with these misfit spies.

  According to the Guild manifest and the expertly doctored identification glyphs they carried, the bizarrely augmented humans claimed to come from Ix.

  It was an acceptable cover story that would explain their odd appearance to any human who happened to see them. But Khrone knew that this technology sprang from an entirely different seed, and these ambassadors came from a much greater distance, where the breakwater fringes of the human Scattering had crashed against the bulwarks of the Enemy.

  In the past, the meddling masters had pestered him via their interconnected net, but apparently since the net had recently sustained some damage, the two faraway watchers preferred a less vulnerable communication method. The old man and woman had sent these… monstrosities. He wondered if the supposed masters actually meant to intimidate him—him! The Face Dancer leader smiled at the very idea as he went to meet the delegation.

  In the high-ceilinged foyer of the restored Castle Caladan, Khrone selected a guise that looked like an old archival painting of Duke Leto Atreides. He dressed in crisp gray clothes of an antique style, checked his appearance in a tall goldplaz-framed mirror, then clasped his hands behind his back as he descended the grand waterfall of stairs to the echoing hall. Stopping on the bottom step, he put on a bland smile, and waited coolly to receive the six men.

  The scarred, pale-skinned representatives were clearly flustered by the physical effort of trudging up the steep walkway from the spaceport. Khrone had no incentive to make the journey easier for them, however. He had not asked for their presence, and did not intend to make them feel welcome. If the tachyon net was damaged, maybe the old man and woman would not transmit their waves of agony to goad him anymore. And then the Face Dancers could at last act with impunity.

  Or maybe not. Uncertain, Khrone decided to maintain his docile charade just a while longer.

  After the strange-looking ambassadors arranged themselves in a clump, Khrone looked down at them from the steps on which he stood. "Inform your superiors that you arrived safely." He unclasped his hands, brought them to the front, and cracked his knuckles. "And please inform them that the damage to your bodies was no fault of mine."

  The men looked confused. "Damage?" The hairless men had pale skin with an oily appearance. Various devices were implanted in their skulls and chests: primitive electronic gauges, tubing, augmented memory chips, indicator lights.

  Raw red sores of unhealed wounds surrounded the implants. Everything had such a horrific, retrograde feel that Khrone had to wonder if this was a subtle and incomprehensible joke played by the old woman. She had a far quirkier sense of humor than her aged com
panion.

  "Damage? We were designed this way."

  "Hmm. Interesting. My sympathies."

  The mechanical additions were so primitive that they looked like a child's botched experiment. Yes, Khrone thought, this has to be a joke. The old woman must be truly bored.

  "We have come to observe and record." The foremost man stepped away from the cluster. Dark fluid circulated through tubes in the thing's throat, extending to a pump behind his shoulders. His eyes were a deep metallic blue, showing no whites whatsoever. Another joke, suggesting that he was addicted to mélange?

  "They must be frustrated to have lost the no-ship. Again." Khrone gestured for the representatives to enter the castle's great hall. "I certainly hope our masters do not take it out on me. We Face Dancers are doing an exceptional job, as instructed."

  "Face Dancers should have a greater sense of humility," said another of the augmented delegates.

  Khrone raised his eyebrows. He wondered if his expression matched one the ancient Duke Leto might have made. "Am I remiss as a host? Come, would you care for refreshments? A feast?" He controlled his smile. "Or perhaps some much needed maintenance?"

  "We prefer to spend our time collecting and analyzing data so that we can return with a full report."

  "By all means, allow me to facilitate your departure as soon as possible."

  Khrone led the ambassadors to the castle's laboratory levels. "Fortunately, despite the escaped no-ship and the damaged net, everything else is going extremely well. Here in the Old Empire, my Face Dancers are undermining the foundations of all human civilization. We have infiltrated every major power group and have begun to turn them against each other."

  "We require proof of this." A strange smell wafted from the first representative's body—caustic chemicals, halitosis, and a hint of rot.