Sandworms of Dune - Brian Herbert [114]
“Over the millennia, I created wondrous works of art and many illusions.” Erasmus’s face and body shifted, and he became entirely human in appearance. Even the gaudy and unnecessary garments altered, until the robot stood before them again as a matronly old woman in a floralprint dress holding a small hand trowel. “This is one of my favorites. I have perfected it over the years, drawing from more and more of the lives my Face Dancers bring me.”
With the hand trowel she dug in the simulated soil near the bench, getting rid of weeds that the Baron was sure had not been there moments earlier. A worm crawled out of the exposed, dark dirt, and the old woman sliced it in half with the trowel. The two parts of the squirming creature faded into the dirt.
A gentle undercurrent flowed in her voice, not unlike that of a grandmother telling bedtime stories to children. “Long ago—during your original lifetime, dear Baron—a Tleilaxu researcher named Hidar Fen Ajidica created an artificial spice that he called amal. Though the substance proved to have significant defects, Ajidica consumed huge quantities of it himself, and as a result he went increasingly mad, which led to his demise.”
“Sounds like a failure,” Paolo said.
“Oh, Ajidica failed spectacularly, but he did accomplish something very important. Call it a side effect. For his special ambassadors, he created greatly improved Face Dancers, with which he intended to populate a new domain. He dispatched them into deep space as scouts, colonizers, preparers of the way. He died before he could join them. Poor foolish man.”
The old woman left her trowel stuck in the ground. When she straightened, she pressed her hand against the small of her back, as if to comfort an ache. “The new Face Dancers located our machine empire, and Omnius allowed me to study them. I spent generations working with the shape-shifters, learning how to draw information from them. Lovely biological machines, far superior to their predecessors. Yes, they are proving to be extremely helpful in winning our final war.”
Looking around the illusory garden, the Baron saw other forms, minor workers who appeared to be human. New Face Dancers? “So you made an alliance with them?”
The old woman pursed her lips. “An alliance? They are servants, not our partners. Face Dancers were made to serve. To them, Omnius and I are like gods, greater Masters than the Tleilaxu ever were.” Erasmus seemed to be pondering. “I do wish they had brought one of their Masters to me before the Honored Matres destroyed nearly all of them. The discussion could have been most enlightening.”
Paolo brought the conversation back around to a subject that interested him. “As the final Kwisatz Haderach, I will be a god, too.”
Erasmus laughed, an old woman’s cachinnation. “Beware of megalomania, young man. It has brought down many a human—such as Hidar Fen Ajidica. Soon I expect to have a key to help you reach your potential. We need to free the god that crouches inside your body. And that requires a powerful catalyst.”
“What is it?” the young man demanded.
“I keep forgetting how impatient you humans are!” The old woman brushed off her flower-print dress. “That is why I enjoy the Face Dancers so much. In them, I see the potential for perfecting humans. Face Dancers could be the sort of humans that even thinking machines might tolerate.”
The Baron snorted. “Humans will never be perfect! Believe me, I’ve known plenty of them, and they’re all disappointing in some way.” Rabban, Piter . . . even Feyd had failed him in the end.
Don’t omit yourself, Grandfather. Remember, you were killed by a little girl with a poison needle. Ha ha!
Shut up! The Baron scratched nervously at the top of his head, as if to dig through flesh and bone to rip her out. She fell silent.
“I fear you may be right, Baron. Humans may not be salvageable, but we don’t want Omnius to believe that, or he will destroy them all.”
“I thought you machines were already doing that,”