Sandworms of Dune - Brian Herbert [110]
“Go, Prophet! Reclaim your world.”
Eight worms slithered on the hard, smooth ground. Eight, a sacred Tleilaxu number.
The freed creatures spread out in random paths, while he watched them in awe. Waff hoped they could break through the fused sand and tunnel into softer levels below, as he had designed them to do. Each of the specimens had a tiny implanted tracer that would enable him to follow them and continue his investigations.
However, the sandworms turned and circled the vehicle, coming closer. Hunting him. In a moment of fear, Waff froze. They were certainly large enough to attack and kill him. “Prophet, do not harm me. I have brought you back to Rakis. You are free to make this your kingdom once again.”
The worms raised their blunt heads, swaying back and forth. Are they trying to send me some sort of message? He struggled to comprehend. Could their hypnotic movements be an alien dance? Or a predatory maneuver?
He did not move. He waited.
If this landscape was too harsh for them, if the Prophet needed to consume him in order to survive, Waff was fully prepared to donate the flesh of his own deteriorating body. If this was to be the end, so be it.
Then, as if at a silent signal, the sandworms turned in unison and sped off, their flexing ridges bumping across the glassy dunes. Presently they stopped, bent their armored heads downward, and smashed into the hard surface. They broke the crust and plunged downward, tunneling into the pristine, sterilized sands. Returning to the desert! Waff’s heart swelled. He knew they would survive.
As he returned to the groundcar, he realized he had tears in his eyes.
When the forces are arrayed and the final battle is engaged, the outcome may be decided in only a few moments. Remember this: By the time the first shot is fired, half the battle is already over. Victory or defeat can be determined by the preparations that are set in place weeks or even months beforehand.
—BASHAR MILES TEG,
resource allocation request to the Bene Gesserit
Chief Fabricator Shayama Sen agreed to come to Chapterhouse, but the Ixian dignitary remained aboard his ship high in orbit, far above the recovery operations. He would not risk exposure to any last vestiges of the plague, though the disease had burned itself out down there.
Murbella had to go to him to make her demands—but under the strictest quarantine conditions. Encased in her own decontamination sphere, like a laboratory specimen in a tank, she felt foolish and helpless. The Bene Gesserit sphere’s outer hull—though scorched by its passage through the atmosphere on the way to orbit and then exposed to the vacuum of space—underwent additional irradiation and sterilization procedures up there. Fail-safes, redundancies. Justified paranoia, she admitted to herself. Although Murbella did not fault him for taking such extraordinary precautions, the Ixian nevertheless had much explaining to do.
While waiting inside her sealed chamber aboard the Guildship (which was guided by a mathematical compiler rather than a Navigator), she composed herself. Still sore and battered from her duel with Kiria, she was satisfied that her violent response to the stupid power play had been necessary. None of the other distraught Sisters would challenge her now, thus leaving her role as Mother Commander uncontested.
Once again, Murbella cursed the rebel Honored Matres and their mindless destruction of the massive shipyards and weapons shops on Richese. Had that not happened, with both Ix and Richese producing armaments, the human race could have consolidated a meaningful defense. Now that Ix was the primary industrial center, the Chief Fabricator felt he could be intractable. Shortsighted fools!