Dune_ House Atreides - Brian Herbert [226]
“Tleilaxu strategy is always woven within a web of strategies, any one of which may be the real strategy,” he intoned the axiom of his people. “The magic of our God is our salvation.”
Every axlotl tank contained the ingredients of a different experiment, each representing an alternate avenue for solving the artificial melange problem. No outsider had ever seen a Tleilaxu axlotl tank, and none understood their true function. To produce the precious spice, Ajidica knew he would have to use unsettling means. Others would be horrified, but God will approve, he repeated in his secret soul. Eventually, they would mass-produce the spice.
Realizing the complexity of his challenge, the Master Researcher had brought in technological adepts from Tleilax One—learned men who had widely divergent views on how that goal might be attained. At this early point in the process, all options must be considered, all evidence studied for clues to be inserted directly into the DNA code of organic molecules, which the Tleilaxu called the Language of God.
All of the technological adepts agreed that artificial spice must be grown as an organic substance in an axlotl tank, because the tanks were holy sources of life and energy. Master Researchers had nurtured countless previous programs with astonishing results, from sligs to clones and gholas . . . though there had been many unfortunate failures, as well.
These exotic vessels were the most sacred of Tleilaxu discoveries, with their workings shielded even from Crown Prince Shaddam, his aides, and his Sardaukar. Such secrecy and security here on Ix—now Xuttah—had been a requirement of the original bargain with Emperor Elrood. The old man had agreed with deprecating amusement, must have assumed he could take those secrets whenever he wished.
Many people made such ridiculous assumptions about the Tleilaxu. Ajidica was accustomed to being dismissed by fools.
No one other than a Tleilaxu Master or a full-blooded Tlei-laxu Researcher would ever have access to this knowledge. Ajidica drew a deep breath of the rank chemicals, the unpleasant humid stink that was an inevitable consequence of the functioning tanks. Natural odors. I feel the presence of my God, he thought, forming the words in Islamiyat—the arcane language that was never spoken aloud outside of kehls, the secret councils of his race. God is merciful. He alone can guide me.
A glowglobe floated in front of his eyes, blinking red . . . long, long, short, pause . . . long, short, color change to blue . . . five rapid blinks and back to red. The Crown Prince’s emissary was anxious to see him. Hidar Fen Ajidica knew not to keep Hasimir Fenring waiting. Though he had no noble title of his own, the impatient Fenring was the Imperial heir’s closest friend, and Fenring understood the manipulations of personal power better than most great leaders in the Landsraad. Ajidica even bore a certain amount of respect for the man.
With resignation Ajidica turned and passed easily through an identity zone that would have been deadly to anyone not properly sanctioned. Even the Crown Prince himself would be unable to pass through safely. Ajidica smiled at the superiority of his people’s ways. Ixians had used machinery and force fields for security, as the ruthless and clumsy suboid rebels had discovered . . . causing messy detonations and collateral damage. Tleilaxu, on the other hand, used biological agents, unleashed through ingenious interactions—toxins and nerve mists that rendered powindah infidels lifeless the moment they set foot where they didn’t belong.
Outside in the secure waiting area, a smiling Hasimir Fenring greeted Ajidica as the researcher exited the identity zone. From some angles the weak-chinned man looked like a weasel and from others a rabbit, innocuous in appearance, but oh so dangerous. The two faced each other in what had once been