Murbella caught her breath. To her amazement it resembled a sandworm from Rakis, though only about ten meters long--and with adaptations that enabled it to live in the water. Impossible! A seaworm?
Corysta ran frantically down the rocks and waded into the surf. The Phibians had already seen the monster and tried to swim away. The worm darted toward them, spray glistening from its greenish rings.
Two more of the long, sinuous monsters appeared from the deep water and circled around the Phibians. The aquatic people clustered in a defensive formation; one male with a scar on his forehead drew a wide, flat-bladed knife used for scoring cholisters on the ocean floor. The other Phibians brandished their own weapons, which were laughable against a sea serpent.
Knee-deep in waves, Corysta slipped on the algae-slick rocks. Murbella ran after her, fixated on what she saw in the water. "What are those creatures?"
"Monsters! I have never seen them before."
The scarred male Phibian emitted a loud vibrating sound and slapped one webbed hand on the water with a sharp crack. The clustered Phibians bolted like a startled school of fish, several diving underwater, others swimming briskly across the waves.
Though they had no eyes, the swimming worms knew where the Phibians were. With a blur and a flick of long serpentine bodies, they pursued the aquatic workers, driving them toward the rocky shore.
Murbella and Corysta watched the largest worm lunge and grab one of the Phibians, scooping him down into the wet gullet. The other worms attacked like a group of frenzied sharks.
Murbella waded out to grab Corysta's shoulder, preventing her from swimming farther into the churning water. They were both helpless to prevent the violence. "My Sea Child," Corysta moaned.
The seaworms thrashed and splashed as they fed. Bloody waves lapped against Murbella's legs, and she dragged the sobbing Corysta back to shore.
A planet is not merely an item for study. Rather it is a tool, perhaps even a weapon, with which we can make our mark on the galaxy.
--LIET-KYNES,
the original
Now that Stilgar and Liet had their ghola memories back, they had become the no-ship's experts on extreme recycling, making the most of their reduced resources. The Ithaca's life-support systems had been designed by geniuses out in the Scattering, descendants of those who had survived the horrific Famine Times. The highly efficient technology could serve passengers and crew for long periods, even in the face of the increasing population. But not in the face of deliberate sabotage.
Tall and lean, with the body of a youth and the aged eyes of a naib, Stilgar looked ready to embark on a desert journey. He and Liet-Kynes had been bound at first by common interests and more recently by their awakened pasts. Liet refused to talk about the crisis through which Sheeana had broken him--it was a matter too private even for close friends.
For himself, Stilgar couldn't forget what the witches had done to him. To the very depths of his being he was a desert man of Arrakis. Watched over by Proctor Superior Garimi, he had read of his history as a young commando against the Harkonnens, later as naib, and then as a supporter of Muad'Dib. But to trigger his ghola memories, the Sisters had tried to drown him.
At a water-filled recycling reservoir, Sheeana and Garimi had tied weights around his ankles. Stilgar fought, but the witches were more than a match for him. "What have I done? Why are you doing this to me?"
"Find your past," Sheeana said, "or die."
"Without your memories you are useless, and better off drowned," Garimi said. They dumped him into the pool.
Unable to free himself from the weights on his ankles, Stilgar had quickly sunk. He had struggled mightily, but the water was everywhere, more oppressive than the thickest dust cloud. Trying desperately to peer upward, he made out only the vague wavering shapes of the two women up there. Neither lifted a hand to help him.
His lungs screamed, and blackness closed in around his eyesight. Stilgar thrashed violently and grew weaker every second. He was starving for breath. He wanted to cry out--needed to--but there was no air. Exhaled bubbles roared out of his open mouth. When it was more than unbearable, he inhaled a huge gulp into his lungs, flooding his air passages. He couldn't see any way out of the tank--
--and suddenly it was no longer a tank, but a wide, deep river, which he realized was on one of the planets where he had fought in Muad'Dib's jihad. He had marched with a regiment of Caladan soldiers and they had needed to ford the river. The water had been deeper than anyone anticipated, and all of them went under. His companions, who had been born swimming, thought nothing of it, even laughed as they made their way to shore. But Stilgar was dragged beneath the surface. He reached up, clutching for air. He had inhaled water then, too, and nearly drowned--
Finally, Sheeana dragged Stilgar out of the tank and pumped his lungs. A disapproving Suk doctor scolded her and Garimi as she revived the young ghola. They rolled him over, and he vomited up sour mouthfuls of water. He was barely able to rise to his knees.
When he turned his glare on Sheeana, he was more than an eleven-year-old boy. He was Naib Stilgar.
Later, when he saw Liet restored as well, Stilgar was afraid to ask what terrible ordeal his friend had been forced to endure. . . .
Now the two headed for the great hold to see the sandworms, as they had done many times before. The high observation chamber was one of their favorite places, especially now. The tremendous worms called up strong and atavistic feelings in them.
As they approached, Stilgar breathed in the comforting scent of warm, dry air with the distinct odors of worms and cinnamon. He smiled briefly in a passing nostalgia, before his face creased in a frown. "I should not be smelling that."
Liet picked up his pace. "That environment has to be carefully controlled. If the seals are leaking, then moisture could penetrate the hold." Yet another breakdown, after so many others!
Rushing into the equipment chamber, they found young Thufir Hawat supervising repair operations. Two Bene Gesserit Sisters and Levi, one of the refugee Jews, worked to install sheets of replacement plaz. They applied thick sealants around the windows high above the sand-filled cargo hold. Thufir was scowling.
Stilgar strode forward, his demeanor intimidating. The task of monitoring the sandworms and the recycling systems was generally reserved for himself and Liet. "Why are you here, Hawat?"
Thufir showed surprise at the coldly accusatory tone of the Fremen's voice. "Someone poured acid on the seals. The corrosive destroyed not only the sealant, but part of the plaz and the wallplates as well."
"We patched it in time," said Levi. "We also found a timed device that would have emptied one of our water reservoirs into the hold, flooding it."
Stilgar trembled with rage. "That would have killed the worms!"
"I checked those systems myself, only two days ago," Liet said. "This is no simple breakdown."
"No," Thufir agreed. "Our saboteur is at work again."
While Stilgar ran his gaze suspiciously over the gathered people, Liet hurried to the instrument consoles to check the desert environment. "There appears to be no permanent damage. The readings are still within the creatures' tolerance range. Scrubbers should bring the air back to desired levels in short order."
Stilgar took special care to inspect the new seals, found them adequate. He and Liet exchanged looks that said they had to be suspicious of everyone onboard. Except for each other, Stilgar decided.
Long ago, when he and Liet had first known each other, the two had shared many adventures fighting the nefarious Harkonnens. Like his father, Liet had led a double life, delivering grand dreams to the desert people while acting as Imperial Planetologist and Judge of the Change. Liet was also the father of Chani. While the Fremen girl's ghola did not remember him yet, he remembered her, and he looked at Chani with a strange, age-worn love.
Bothered by the acrid odors of acid and sealant, Stilgar turned grimly away from the observation window. "From now on, I sleep here. I will not let Shai-Hul
ud die, not while I still breathe."
"I'm working with the Bashar. There must be some kind of a trail, so we only need to find it. The corrosive was acquired from secure stores, so there may be fingerprints or genetic traces." Thufir's lips were not stained red with sapho, his skin not grizzled, his eyes not weary with age and experiences, as in the famous old portraits. "Perhaps the imagers captured the saboteur sneaking to the observation deck. Once I catch him, we can all rest more easily."
"No," Stilgar said. "Even then, I would not let my guard down."
IN A SUDDEN resurgence, the maddening sabotage continued in myriad ways and at random points around the huge ship, setting everyone's nerves on edge. The Bene Gesserits remained vigilant and wary, while the Rabbi preached to a growing number of followers about spies and murderers lurking among them.
Duncan studied the readings, ran projections. Again, he wondered if one or more of the Face Dancer Handlers might still be aboard, having escaped the wreckage of a crashed ship. Where else could the saboteur be hiding? After years of searching, Duncan and Teg had run out of ideas. How could this enemy elude surveillance imagers, Truthsayer interrogations, and vigorous searches? In a few suspicious incidents, a blurry form could be seen moving in restricted areas, but even enhancement could not sharpen the facial features to recognizability.
The saboteur seemed to know exactly where and when to strike. An endless succession of little breakdowns and small accidents, each taking its toll, ran the ship's company to exhaustion.
One time, imagers detected what appeared to be a man as he moved furtively down a corridor near a bank of oxygen-scrubber units and aircirculating machines. Dressed in dark clothing and a tight-fitting hood that covered most of his face, he carried a long silver knife and a pry bar, and his body leaned forward against the heavy air flow. Then, like liquid flowing around a corner, the man slipped into the central recirculation chamber, where great fans blasted air through a system of arteries in the no-ship, pushing it through thick curtains of matted fibers coated with biogels to remove impurities.
With sudden fury, the unidentifiable saboteur slashed and hacked at the porous filter mats, ripping them from their frames and destroying their ability to purify air. After completing this mayhem, the saboteur turned to flee. Not a single frame of the imagers showed the face; it wasn't even absolutely clear whether the hooded vandal was male or female. By the time security personnel rushed into the area, the saboteur had vanished into the howling, recirculated wind.
Duncan did not need to whisper the obvious answer. Face Dancer. He studied all records of the kamikaze ships from the Handlers, noting where they had crashed into the hull and how the bodies aboard had been confirmed dead and disposed of. One of the shape-shifting Handlers must have crawled out of the flaming wreckage.
Even worse, there might be more than one.
THE AIR SMELLED moist and foul, like seaweed and sewage. Duncan stood on the mist-slickened catwalk above one of the largest algae tanks. The entire vat was dying. Poisoned.
Standing next to him, gripping the catwalk rail with a whiteknuckled hand, Teg frowned at the chemical analyses displayed on his datapad. "Heavy metals, potent toxins, a list of deadly chemicals that even this stuff can't digest." He pulled up a dripping handful of the once-fecund green substance. The goop was brownish now, breaking down.
"The saboteur is trying to destroy our food supply," Duncan said.
"Our air, too."
"To what end? To kill us, it appears."
"Or simply to make us helpless."
Duncan glared at the vat, feeling angry and violated. "Get work crews to drain and scrub the tank. Decontaminate as quickly as possible. Then harvest starter material from other tanks to fertilize the biomass. We've got to stabilize it before something else goes wrong."
DUNCAN WAS ALONE on the navigation bridge when the next disaster occurred. Over the years the passengers had learned to ignore the faint vibrations of the no-ship's movement. Now, though, an abrupt lurch and an obvious deflection in course nearly threw him out of his chair.
He called for Teg and Thufir, then scrambled over the controls, scanning empty space around them. He feared they might have run into a piece of space debris or some gravitational anomaly. But he found no evidence of impact, no obstacles in their vicinity. The Ithaca was obviously yawing, and he struggled to steady it using the numerous smaller engines distributed around the hull. This slowed the spinning of the ship, but did not entirely stop it.
As the immense vessel continued to turn, he saw a glittering silver path like a scarf of mist, spewing from the stern. One of the no-ship's three primary water reservoirs had been dumped--intentionally. The great swath of water had been ejected with enough force to push the Ithaca off course. The evacuated water shifted the ship's ballast and sent them into a spin. The loss of angular momentum made their situation worsen as more and more water poured away, like a comet's tail behind them. The ship's reserves!
Working feverishly at the controls, Duncan overrode the reservoir hatch, praying all the while that the mysterious saboteur had merely opened the door to space, rather than using one of the deadly mines locked away in the armory.
Teg burst onto the navigation bridge just as Duncan managed to close the cargo doors and reestablish containment. The Bashar bent over the screens, his young but seasoned face creased in concern. "That was enough water to supply us for a year!" His gray-eyed gaze flitted around nervously.
Pacing the deck, Duncan stared out at the misty veil of dispersed water. "We can retrieve some of it. Scoop it up as ice, and when I fully stabilize our spin--"
But as he looked at the smear of lost water spreading out against the starry backdrop, he saw other lines appear, sparkling multicolored threads drawing together and enclosing the no-ship like a spider's web. The Enemy's net! Again it was bright enough for Teg to see it, too. "Damn it! Not now!"
Lunging into the pilot's seat, Duncan activated the Holtzman engines. With one or more saboteurs aboard, the engines themselves could have been rigged to explode, but he had no choice. He forced the enigmatic machines to fold space well before he could think about what course to take. The no-ship, still spinning, lurched off to another place.
They survived.
Afterward, Duncan looked at Teg and sighed. "We couldn't have retrieved much of the expelled water anyway."
Even the ship's sophisticated recyclers had their limits, and now the actions of the saboteur had driven them--intentionally--toward an inescapable conclusion. After many years of constant flight, the noship's provisions had to be replenished as soon as an acceptable planet could be located. Not an easy task in a huge galaxy, encompassing vast distances. They had found nothing suitable in years. Not since the planet of the Handlers.
But Duncan knew that would not be their only problem. When they found a place, they would be forced to expose themselves--again.
Synchrony is more than a machine, more than a metropolis; it is an extension of the evermind itself. It constantly shifts and morphs into different configurations. At first I believed this effect was for defense, but there seems to be another force at work, a surprising creative spark. These machines are exceedingly odd.
--BARON VLADIMIR HARKONNEN,
the ghola
The metropolis before them was beautiful in an industrial and metallic way: sharp angles, smooth curves, and a great deal of energy as structures moved and flashed like a perfectly tuned machine. Angular buildings and windowless towers covered every square meter of ground. The Baron saw no offensive greenery, no gaudy flowers or landscaping, not a leaf, blossom, or blade of grass.
Synchrony was a bustling symbol of productivity--along with concomitant profits and political power, if thinking machines ever figured out how to pay attention to such things. Maybe Vladimir Harkonnen would show Omnius how it was done.
After the long journey from Caladan, the Baron and Paolo rode a tram to the shifting center of the machine city. The Atreides ghola peered out t
hrough the curved windows, his eyes wide and hungry. They were crowded in the tram with an escort of eight Face Dancers. The Baron had never understood how the shape-shifters were connected with Omnius and the new Synchronized Empire. The elevated car shot along an unseen charge path high above the ground, whizzing like a bullet between the perpetually shifting buildings.
As they went deeper into the city, huge edifices moved up, down, and sideways like pistons, threatening to crush the streaking tram. When the half-alive buildings swayed like robotic seaweed, he noticed that the Face Dancers inside the tram moved in unison, wearing placid smiles on their cadaverous faces, as if they were part of a choreographed presentation.
Like a needle threading a complex maze of holes, the tram sped toward an immense spire that rose out of the center of the city like a spike thrust up from the netherworld. Finally, the car came to a clicking stop in a spectacular central square.
Anxious to see, Paolo squirmed and pushed his way out the door. Even with uncertainty and fear gnawing at his gut, the Baron marveled at the numerous fires burning at specific geometric points around the spire, each with a human tied to a stake, martyr-fashion. Obviously, in their conquest of world after world, the thinking-machine fleet had taken experimental subjects. He found the extravagance breathtaking. These machines certainly showed a lot of potential and even uncanny imagination.
He thought of the huge thinking-machine fleet out in space, as it methodically plowed deeper into human-settled territory. From what Khrone had explained, when the machines finally obtained a pet Kwisatz Haderach, Omnius believed he would be fulfilling the terms of the mechanical prophecy, making it impossible to fail. The Baron found it amusing how the thinking machines viewed everything as an absolute. After fifteen thousand years, they should know better.
Paolo had let himself be caught up in a megalomaniacal whirlwind. The Baron's job was to feed those delusions, always keeping in mind that he was in a dangerous situation himself and needed to keep his wits and focus. Unsure whether personal glory or ignominious death lay ahead, the Baron was repeatedly reminded that he was merely a catalyst for Paolo. Secondary importance indeed!
Sandworms of Dune Page 13
