Sandworms of Dune - Brian Herbert [61]
So long as they were fed, the worms continued to grow and multiply. Seaworms apparently preferred to eat the large cholisters that produced soostones, tearing into beds tended by Phibians. The aquatic people had rallied to drive away the sea monsters, but they had failed.
Waff smiled. Of course they had failed. One could not change a path that God had laid down.
The angry witches had led hunting parties, taking boats out onto the waters, guided by vengeful Phibians. They begged Chapterhouse for weapons to kill the seaworms. But with Enemy forces attacking hundreds of fringe worlds, and the industries of Junction and Ix consuming most of the New Sisterhood’s resources, they were stretched far too thin.
The Bene Gesserits needed soostone wealth to build and replenish their armies faster than the Enemy could destroy them, but if the seaworms produced what Waff hoped, the creatures would be worth far more than any gem. Soon, there would be multiple sources of spice, including a new and more potent form. Waff could transplant the creatures to any ocean planet, where they could thrive without reconfiguring an entire ecosystem. Considering their current monopoly on melange, that would not make the Sisterhood happy.
The pilot circled the lead hornet ship. Guild assistants stared fixedly at monitors. “Picking up shadows at various depths. Numerous tracks. We are close.”
Waff moved eagerly to the other side of the craft and stared down at the choppy waves. Pulse beacons continued to emit siren songs, and hunting platforms flitted alongside. “Be ready to move as soon as you detect a worm. I want to see one. Let me know when you have a sighting.”
Down in the water, he noticed two slick-skinned Phibians, who seemed curious about the pulse beacons and the flurry of activity. One raised a webbed hand in an incomprehensible signal as the hornet ships and hunting platforms streaked overhead.
“Seaworm surfacing,” announced one of the Guildsmen. “Target acquired.”
The little Tleilaxu rushed forward to the cockpit. Below, a long, dark shape appeared in the water, breaching like a great whale. “We must capture and kill it. That is the only way to see what’s inside.”
“Yes,” said the Guildsman. Waff narrowed his eyes, never able to understand these people. Was the man agreeing with him, or simply acknowledging the orders? This time he didn’t care.
Waff glanced at the projected map, noting that their search had taken them to one of the inhabited rocky islands. Once he verified the success of the new worms, there would be no need to continue keeping secrets. The witches could do nothing about the seaworms, nor what they produced. They could not stop his work. Today, after his team captured a specimen and confirmed the results of his experiments, the truth would be obvious.
We will show the witches what lies beneath the waves, and let them draw their own conclusions.
The lead hornet craft slowed, its engines buzzing. The moment the seaworm emerged from the waves, ringed and glistening, Waff’s hunters fired a fusillade of supersonic harpoons from their hovering platforms. The barbed tips hit the beast before it could realize its danger and submerge. Spear points caught in the soft rings, anchoring themselves as the worm thrashed and writhed. Waff felt joy, as well as a twinge of sympathetic pain. From behind the lead craft, three other hornet ships shot more harpoons into the trapped creature, pulling back on hyperfilament cables.
“Don’t damage it too much!” Waff intended to kill the thing anyway—a necessary sacrifice in the name of the Prophet—but if the carcass and internal organs were too mangled, his dissection would be more difficult.
The group of hornet craft went into hover mode above the waves, their cables taut and straining as the seaworm thrashed. Milky fluid oozed into the water, dissipating before the Tleilaxu researcher could order one of the Guildsmen to collect samples. Other seaworms circled their struggling brother like hungry sharks.
The worm was twenty meters long—a tremendous rate of growth for such a