Sandworms of Dune - Brian Herbert [135]
“I have had enough.” The old man turned away. “I am beginning to find them somewhat distasteful. They are all the same.”
“How can you say that, Daniel? Every human is different, so beautifully chaotic and unpredictable.”
“Exactly what I mean. They are all confusing. And I am not Daniel, I am Omnius. Kralizec is upon us, and we have no time for further preparatory games.”
“Sometimes I still like to consider myself Marty. In many ways it’s more appealing to me than the name or guise of Erasmus.” The old woman took a step closer to Khrone. The Face Dancer didn’t dare flinch, though he despised what was about to happen. Her hand was gnarled, with large knuckles. It felt clawlike when she touched his forehead. She pressed harder, and Khrone shuddered, unable to block the intrusion.
Each time a Face Dancer mimicked a human shape, he sampled the original subject and acquired both a genetic trace and an imprint of the memories and persona. The thinking machines had set the shape-shifters loose into the Old Empire. Infiltrating the humans, they gathered more and more lives as they subsumed useful people and played their roles. Whenever a Face Dancer returned to the machine empire, Erasmus in particular wanted to add those lives to his vast repository of data and experience.
Out of forced subservience, Khrone and his comrades surrendered that information. But though the thinking machines could upload the various lives the Face Dancers copied, they could not take their core personas. Khrone held onto his secrets, even as he offered up all those people he had been in recent years—an Ixian engineer, a CHOAM representative, a crewman on a Guildship, a dock worker on Caladan, and many others.
When the process was finished, the old woman’s hand withdrew. Her wrinkled face wore a satisfied smile. “Oh, those were interesting ones! Omnius will certainly want to share them.”
“That remains to be seen,” the old man said.
Feeling drained, Khrone caught his breath and straightened himself. “That is not why I came.” His voice was shamefully weak and quavering. “I have obtained a special substance you will find invaluable for your Kwisatz Haderach project.” He held out the ultraspice package, as if offering a gift to a king, precisely as Omnius expected him to behave. The old man accepted the package, scrutinized it carefully.
The Face Dancer gave Paolo a condescending look. “This potent form of melange is sure to unlock the prescience in any Atreides. Then you will have your Kwisatz Haderach, as I have always promised. There is no need to continue pursuing the no-ship.”
Omnius found the comment amusing. “Strange you should say that now.”
“What do you mean?”
Beside him, the old woman grinned. “This is a momentous day, since both of our plans have come to fruition. Our patience and foresight have paid off. Now, what shall we do with two Kwisatz Haderachs?”
Khrone paused, startled. “Two of them?”
“After so many years, the no-ship has finally fallen into our trap.”
Khrone slid his surprise back into himself and went rigid. “That is . . . most excellent.”
The old woman rubbed her hands together. “Everything is culminating at once. It reminds me of the climactic movement in a symphony I once wrote.”
The old man began to pace around the chamber, holding the package of ultraspice in his hands. He sniffed it.
Paolo turned away from the chess game. “You don’t need another Kwisatz Haderach. You have me. Give me spice now!”
Erasmus shot him an indulgent smile. “Perhaps in a little while. First we’ll see what the no-ship has for us, who their Kwisatz Haderach is. It should be interesting.”
“Where is the vessel?” Khrone asked, focusing on the main question. “Are you sure you have it?”
“Our cruisers are surrounding it even now, and our operatives aboard took steps to guarantee that it could not escape again. Your