Sandworms of Dune - Brian Herbert [150]
Erasmus smiled. “Some of them are.”
Abruptly, with powerful hands, the robot ripped the painting and its frame into tiny pieces. As if putting a punctuation mark on the grotesque display, Erasmus whirled and stomped on the broken pieces, saying, “Call this artistic temperament.” Moving to depart, he added, “Omnius will summon your Kwisatz Haderach soon. We have waited a long time for this.”
What is the difference between data and memory? I intend to find out.
—ERASMUS,
Laboratory Notebooks
The independent robot’s memories of Serena were as fresh as if the events had occurred only days ago. Serena Butler . . . such a fascinating woman. And just as Erasmus had survived through the millennia as a package of data nearly destroyed and then recovered, so Serena’s memories and personality lived on, somehow, in the Other Memories of the Bene Gesserit.
This posed an intriguing question: No Bene Gesserits could be Serena Butler’s direct descendants, for Erasmus had killed her only child. Then again, he couldn’t be sure what had happened to all of his experimental clones over the years. He had tried many times to bring Serena back, with no success.
Aboard this no-ship, however, the humans had grown gholas from their past, just as his own plan had brought back Baron Harkonnen and a version of Paul Atreides. Erasmus knew that a nullentropy tube hidden in a Tleilaxu Master had contained a wealth of ancient and carefully gathered cells.
He was confident that a real Tleilaxu Master could succeed in bringing Serena back, where his own primitive experiments had failed. Erasmus and Omnius had both absorbed enough Face Dancers to have instinctive reverence for the abilities of a Master. The independent robot knew exactly where he had to go before leaving the no-ship.
Erasmus found the medical center and the axlotl chambers where the whole library of historical cells had been catalogued and stored. If Serena Butler was among them . . .
He was surprised to find a Tleilaxu already there, harried and frantic. The diminutive man had disconnected the life-support systems of the axlotl tanks. With his olfactory sensors, Erasmus noted the smells of chemicals, melange precursors, and human flesh.
He grinned. “You must be Scytale, the Tleilaxu Master! It’s been a long time.”
Scytale whirled, looking fearful at the sight of the robot.
Erasmus took a step closer, and studied the Tleilaxu’s face. “A child? What are you doing?”
The Tleilaxu drew himself up. “I am destroying the tanks and the melange they produce. I had to surrender that knowledge as a bargaining chip. I won’t let thinking machines and traitorous Face Dancers simply take it from me—from us.”
Erasmus showed no concern for the sabotaged axlotl tanks. “But you appear to be very young.”
“I am a ghola. I have my memories back. I am everything that any of my previous incarnations were.”
“Of course you are. Such a marvelous process, perpetuating yourself through serial ghola lives. We machines understand such things, although we have much more efficient methods of performing data transfers and backups.” He looked intensely at the genetic library that held the potential ghola cells . . . Serena Butler . . .
Noting the robot’s keen interest, the Tleilaxu sprang to stand in front of the sealed wall of specimens. “Beware! The witches placed security sensors on these gene samples to prevent anyone from tampering with or stealing them. The library has a built-in self-destruct system.” He narrowed his dark, rodentlike eyes. If this Master was bluffing, he was doing a remarkably convincing job. “I need only yank on a drawer, and this entire cabinet will be flooded with gamma radiation, enough to ionize every single sample.”
“Why?” The robot was perplexed. “After the Bene Gesserit took those cells from you and used them for their own purposes? Didn’t they force you to cooperate? Would you truly stand on their side?” He extended a platinum hand. “Join us instead. I would greatly reward you for your assistance in growing one particular ghola—”
In a threatening motion,