Sandworms of Dune - Brian Herbert [193]
When Paul looked back at him, Duncan thought that the young man’s face seemed deeply old. Recovering from his past life had drained him even more than his mortal wound had. As a Kwisatz Haderach himself, as Muad’Dib, Emperor, and blind Preacher, Paul understood Duncan’s dilemma better than any human present. He nodded slightly. “No one can choose for you, Duncan.”
Duncan let his eyes take on a far-off glaze. “We can do much, much more. I see it now. Humans and machines cooperating fully, with neither side enslaving the other. I shall stand between them, as a bridge.”
The robot responded with genuine excitement. “Now you see, Kwisatz Haderach! You have helped me to achieve understanding along with you. You have shortened my way, too.” Erasmus’s flowmetal body shifted like a mechanical version of a Face Dancer, becoming again the wrinkled body of the kindly old woman. “My long quest is complete. At last, after thousands of years, I understand so much.” He smiled. “In fact, there is very little that interests me anymore.”
The old woman walked over to where the still-transfixed Paolo lay, staring blankly upward. “This failed, ruined Kwisatz Haderach is an object lesson for me. The boy paid the price of too much knowledge.” Paolo’s unblinking eyes seemed to be drying out. He would probably wither away and starve to death, lost in the infinite maze of absolute prescience. “I don’t want to be bored. So I ask you, Kwisatz Haderach, help me understand something I could never truly experience, the last fascinating aspect of humanity.”
“A demand?” Duncan asked. “Or a favor?”
“A debt of honor.” The old woman patted his sleeve with a gnarled hand. “You now epitomize the finest qualities of man and machine. Allow me to do what only living beings can do. Guide me to my own death.”
Duncan had not foreseen this. “You want to die? How can I help you do that?”
The old woman shrugged her bony shoulders. “All your lives and deaths have made you an expert on the matter. Look inside yourself, and you’ll know.”
Over the millennia since the Butlerian Jihad, Erasmus had considered distributing backup copies of himself as Omnius had done, but he had decided not to. That would have made his existence far less stimulating, and less meaningful. After all, he was an independent robot, and needed to be unique.
Duncan saw that along with all the codes and commands that controlled the host of thinking machines, he had received the life-function commands that regulated Erasmus. He could shut down the independent robot as easily as Erasmus had shut down all of the Face Dancers.
“I am curious to see what lies on the other side of the great divide between life and death.” The robot looked at Khrone and the identical shape-shifter bodies strewn on the floor of the cathedral chamber.
But it wasn’t as simple as flipping a switch or sending a code. Duncan had lived and died over and over, and learned more about life and death than anyone. Did Erasmus want him to understand whether or not a robot could have a soul, now that the two of them had been inside each other’s mind?
“You want me to serve as a guide,” Duncan said, “not just an executioner.”
“A fine way to put it, my friend. I think you understand.” The old woman looked at him, and now her smile held a hint of nervousness. “After all, Duncan Idaho, you have done this over and over again. But this is my first time.”
Duncan touched her forehead. The skin was warm and dry. “Whenever you’re ready.”
The old woman sat on the stone steps. Folding her hands in her lap, she closed her eyes. “Do you suppose I will ever see Serena again?”
“I can’t answer that.” With a mental command, Duncan activated one of the new codes he possessed. From inside his own mind, reaching down to touch his own numerous death experiences, he showed Erasmus what he knew, even if he didn’t entirely comprehend it himself. He wasn’t certain the ancient independent robot could follow. Erasmus would have to make his own way. He and Duncan parted, both of them traveling on utterly separate