Sandworms of Dune - Brian Herbert [164]
They call me Tyrant without comprehending my kindness, the great purpose behind my actions! They don’t know that I foresaw the final conflict all along.
In those last years, God Emperor Leto had strayed so far from humanity that he had forgotten innumerable marvels, especially the softening influence of love. But, as he rode Monarch now, young Leto remembered how much he had adored his twin sister Ghanima, the good times they had shared in their father’s incredible palace, and how they had been slated to rule the vast empire of Muad’Dib.
Now Leto was everything he had ever been and more, enhanced by the firsthand memories of his own experiences. With his new vision, as fresh precursors of spice from the worm’s body pumped through his blood, he beheld the Golden Path extending gloriously before him. But even with this remarkable revelation, he could not quite see around all the corners ahead. There were blind spots.
High atop his worm, young Leto smiled in determination, and with a single thought he sent the serpentine army forward. The leviathans charged between the great buildings, throwing themselves against reinforced barricades and breaking through. Nothing could stop them.
Hands still buried deep between the ring segments, Leto II rode with a shout of joy on his lips. He gazed forward through eyes that had suddenly become blue-within-blue, eyes that saw what others could not.
Now that I have ridden one of the sandworms and touched the immensity of its existence, I understand the awe the ancient Fremen experienced, why they considered the worms to be their god, Shai-Hulud.
—TLEILAXU MASTER WAFF,
letter to the Council of Masters in Bandalong, dispatched
immediately before the destruction of Rakis
The last pair of Waff’s sandworm specimens died inside the arid terrarium.
When freeing the first test worms out in the desert, he had kept two with him at the modular laboratory for research, hoping that what he learned would improve their chances of survival. It did not go well.
Waff prayed vigorously each day, meditated on the holy texts he had brought with him, and sought guidance from God on how best to nurture the reborn Prophet. The first eight specimens were now loose, tunneling through the brittle, crusted sand like explorers on a dead world. The Tleilaxu Master hoped they had survived in the blast-zone environment.
In their final days, the last two little worms in his laboratory aquarium became sluggish, unable to process the nutrients he gave them, though the food was chemically balanced to provide the sandworms with what they needed. He wondered if the small creatures could experience despair. When they lifted their round heads above the sandy surface of the holding tank, it seemed as if they had lost their will to live.
And within a week they both perished.
Though he revered these creatures and what they represented, Waff was desperate for vital scientific information with which to better the other worms’ chances of survival. Once the specimens were dead, he had little compunction against picking apart their carcasses, spreading their rings, and cutting into the internal organs. God would understand. If he himself lived long enough, Waff would begin the next phase, as soon as Edrik came back for him. If the Navigator ever came back, with his Heighliner and the sophisticated laboratory facilities aboard.
His own Guild assistants offered their help—persistently—but Waff preferred to work alone. Now that these men had set up their standalone camp, the Tleilaxu Master had no further use for them. As far as he was concerned, the Guildsmen were free to join Guriff and his treasure hunters in seeking lost spice hoards out in the wasteland.
When one of the bland Guildsmen appeared before him, demanding his attention, Waff easily lost the delicate