Dune_ House Atreides - Brian Herbert [109]
Then he learned that his own failure wasn’t the worst thing he had to face.
“Where’s D’murr? Did he succeed?” C’tair’s voice filled with hope.
The proctor nodded. “Admirably.” She extended her hand toward the exit, but he sidestepped her. C’tair looked back toward the inner corridor and the sealed testing chamber where his brother had gone. He needed to congratulate D’murr, even though the victory was now bittersweet. At least one of them would become a Navigator.
“You will never see your brother again,” the proctor said, coldly. She moved to block the way back in. “D’murr Pilru is ours now.”
Recovering after an instant of shock, C’tair broke past the proctor and ran to the sealed chamber door. He pounded against it and shouted, but received no answer. Within minutes, Guild guards surrounded him—more businesslike than gentle—and peeled him away.
Still dizzy from the unaccustomed aftereffects of melange exposure, C’tair didn’t realize where they were taking him. Blinking and disoriented, he found himself standing on the crystal walkway outside the blocky gray embassy. Below him, other walkways and streets bustled with traffic and pedestrians traveling from one tower building to another.
Now he was more alone than ever.
The testing proctor stood on the embassy steps, barring C’tair from reentering. Even though his mother worked somewhere inside, deep in the banking section, C’tair knew that the doors of this facility, as well as the doors to the future he had counted on, were now locked to him.
“Rejoice for your brother,” the proctor called from the steps, her voice finally showing some life. “He has entered another world. He can travel to places you’ll never imagine.”
“I can never see him, or talk to him again?” C’tair said, as if part of him had been ripped away.
“Doubtful,” the proctor said, crossing her arms over her chest. She gave him an apologetic frown. “Unless he . . . suffers a reversal. His first time, your brother immersed himself so completely in the spice gas that he started the . . . conversion process right there and then. The Guild cannot deny such talent. He has already started to change.”
“Bring him back,” C’tair said, his eyes tear-filled now. He prayed for his brother. “Just for a little while.” He wanted to be happy for his twin—and proud. D’murr had passed the test that meant so much to both of them.
The twins had always been so close. How could they possibly go on without one another? Perhaps his mother could use her Guild banking connections, so that they would at least be able to have their farewells. Or maybe his father would use ambassadorial privilege to get D’murr back.
But C’tair knew that would never happen. He could see that now. His mother had already known it, had been afraid of losing both sons.
“The process is, in the majority of cases, irreversible,” the proctor said with finality.
Guild security guards marched out to stand beside her, ensuring that C’tair did not become irrational and try to force his way inside.
“Trust me,” said the proctor. “You don’t want your brother back.”
The human body is a machine, a system of organic chemicals, fluid conduits, electrical impulses; a government is likewise a machine of interacting societies, laws, cultures, rewards and punishments, patterns of behavior. Ultimately, the universe itself is a machine, planets around suns, stars gathered into clusters, clusters and other suns forming entire galaxies. . . . Our job is to keep the machinery functioning.
—Suk Inner School, Primary Doctrine
Both frowning, Crown Prince Shaddam and Chamberlain Aken Hesban watched the approach of a diminutive, scrawny man who nonetheless walked as tall as a Mutellian giant. After years of training and conditioning, all Suk doctors seemed compelled to take themselves far too seriously.
“That Elas Yungar looks more like a circus performer than a respected medical professional,” Shaddam said, looking at the arched eyebrows, black eyes, and the steel-gray ponytail. “I hope