Sandworms of Dune - Brian Herbert [122]
After Scytale completed the blood and cellular tests, Sheeana was still not satisfied. “Even if we can now trust the ghola children, that means only that other Face Dancers—if there are any more—must be hidden among the rest of us.”
“Then we’ll test the rest,” Garimi said. “Or use Scytale’s poison gas. I’ll personally submit to any scrutiny, again and again, and I suggest we all do so.”
Scytale raised his small hands in alarm. “This test is an intensive one. I’ll need to prepare enough panels for all passengers, and that will take a great deal of time.”
“Then we will take the time,” Sheeana announced. “Doing anything less would be foolhardy.”
Why do we find destruction so fascinating? When we see a terrible tragedy, do we think ourselves clever for having evaded it ourselves? Or is our fascination rooted in the thrill and fear of knowing we could be next?
—MOTHER SUPERIOR ODRADE,
Documentation of Consequences
Murbella and Janess—mother and daughter, Mother Commander and Supreme Bashar—orbited the dead world of Richese. They rode in an observation ship, separate from the teams of engineers, who were still leery about the burned-out plague on Chapterhouse. Though the disease had run its course, the Ixians refused to be in a confined space with Murbella and Janess, who had been exposed to it.
Nevertheless, alone in their small ship, the two women had a perfect view of the unfolding test.
More than five years earlier, rebel Honored Matre ships from Tleilax had bombarded Richese, erasing not only the entire population, but also the weapons industries and the half-constructed battle fleet that was to have been delivered to the New Sisterhood. Now that the planet was lifeless, however, Richese was a perfectly appropriate place for the Ixians to demonstrate their new Obliterator weapons.
Murbella opened the commline and spoke to the four accompanying test ships. “You take a smug pleasure in doing this, don’t you, Chief Fabricator?”
On the screen, Shayama Sen arched his eyebrows and jerked his head back in a fine display of innocence. “We’re testing the weapon you ordered from us, Mother Commander. You asked for a demonstration, rather than taking us at our word. We must prove that our technology functions as advertised.”
“And the rivalry between Ix and Richese had nothing to do with your choice of targets?” She barely held her sarcasm in check.
“Richese is just a historical footnote, Mother Commander. Any enjoyment Ixians might have taken from our rivals’ unfortunate fate has long since faded.” After a pause, Sen added, “We admit, however, that the irony does not escape us.”
Since last visiting her high above Chapterhouse, the factory leader sounded subtly changed. Recently, when Sen had come back to deliver full records of all their tests on Ix, he had seemed surprised, even embarrassed. He had followed her suspicious suggestion and used the cellular test on all of his people, with the result that twenty-two Face Dancers had been exposed, all of them working in critical industries.
Murbella would have liked to interrogate them, maybe even apply an Ixian T-probe. But those Face Dancers who weren’t immediately killed took their own lives, somehow using a machinelike suicide shutdown in their own brains. The lost opportunity angered her, but she doubted her Sisters would have learned anything from the shape-shifters anyway. Nevertheless, she was glad to have installed eight trusted inspectors to watch over the industrial progress from that point onward.
“Our delivery schedule is tight, Mother Commander, as you demanded,” Sen transmitted. “We are arming the ships from Junction as quickly as possible. After seeing these four Obliterators successfully tested, you can’t deny that our technology is reliable.”
“It seems a shame to waste such destructive power on a target that doesn’t harm the true enemy,” Janess said. “But we require proof.” Both of them had reviewed earlier films of the tests,