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After the strange-looking ambassadors arranged themselves in a clump, Khrone looked down at them from the steps on which he stood. "Inform your superiors that you arrived safely." He unclasped his hands, brought them to the front, and cracked his knuckles. "And please inform them that the damage to your bodies was no fault of mine."
The men looked confused. "Damage?" The hairless men had pale skin with an oily appearance. Various devices were implanted in their skulls and chests: primitive electronic gauges, tubing, augmented memory chips, indicator lights. Raw red sores of unhealed wounds surrounded the implants. Everything had such a horrific, retrograde feel that Khrone had to wonder if this was a subtle and incomprehensible joke played by the old woman. She had a far quirkier sense of humor than her aged companion. "Damage? We were designed this way."
"Hmm. Interesting. My sympathies."
The mechanical additions were so primitive that they looked like a child's botched experiment. Yes, Khrone thought, this has to be a joke. The old woman must be truly bored.
"We have come to observe and record." The foremost man stepped away from the cluster. Dark fluid circulated through tubes in the thing's throat, extending to a pump behind his shoulders. His eyes were a deep metallic blue, showing no whites whatsoever. Another joke, suggesting that he was addicted to melange?
"They must be frustrated to have lost the no-ship. Again." Khrone gestured for the representatives to enter the castle's great hall. "I certainly hope our masters do not take it out on me. We Face Dancers are doing an exceptional job, as instructed."
"Face Dancers should have a greater sense of humility," said another of the augmented delegates.
Khrone raised his eyebrows. He wondered if his expression matched one the ancient Duke Leto might have made. "Am I remiss as a host? Come, would you care for refreshments? A feast?" He controlled his smile. "Or perhaps some much needed maintenance?"
"We prefer to spend our time collecting and analyzing data so that we can return with a full report."
"By all means, allow me to facilitate your departure as soon as possible." Khrone led the ambassadors to the castle's laboratory levels. "Fortunately, despite the escaped no-ship and the damaged net, everything else is going extremely well. Here in the Old Empire, my Face Dancers are undermining the foundations of all human civilization. We have infiltrated every major power group and have begun to turn them against each other."
"We require proof of this." A strange smell wafted from the first representative's body--caustic chemicals, halitosis, and a hint of rot.
"Then open your eyes!" Khrone paused in mid-step, calmed his voice, and continued in a more relaxed tone. "I invite you to travel among the worlds of the Old Empire. Your appearance may be alarming to most people, but enough anomalies have crawled back out of the Scattering that no one will question you too closely. I can provide a list of key planets and point out what you should look for. They will all be ready to fall like a house of cards as soon as the outside military forces arrive. Have our masters launched the battle fleet yet, or will they wait until they have the Kwisatz Haderach in hand?"
"That is not for us to say," three representatives said in unison, their augmented minds linked, their voices overlapping in an eerie echo.
"Then you make it difficult for me to conclude my activities. Why should our masters withhold vital information from me?"
"Perhaps they do not trust you," said another of the hodgepodge representatives. "Your progress has been unimpressive so far."
"Unimpressive?" Khrone snorted. "I have the Baron Harkonnen ghola, and I have the Paul Atreides ghola. It is guaranteed."
At the entrance to the thick-walled laboratory chambers, Khrone unsealed and hauled open a heavy door. Inside, a somewhat plump ten-year-old jerked to his feet, looking around warily with piggish eyes, as if he'd been caught doing something he shouldn't. Recovering quickly, the adolescent snickered at them, captivated by the horrifically mangled observers.
Khrone did not speak a word to the ghola, but turned back to the six representatives. "You see, the next phase of our plan is imminent. I expect to restore this Baron's memories soon."
"You can try to do it," the youth spat at him, "but you haven't yet convinced me that it's to my benefit. Why won't you let me play with little Paolo? I know you're keeping him here on Caladan."
"Exactly why do we need the Baron Harkonnen?" asked one of the hideous observers, ignoring the boy. "Our masters are interested only in the Kwisatz Haderach."
"The Baron will help us facilitate this. He will be like a wrecking bar to the Paolo ghola. After he becomes himself again, our Baron will be a valuable tool to unlock the powers of the superhuman. Historically, the problem with a Kwisatz Haderach is one of control. Once he helps me raise Paolo properly, I am confident the Baron can assure our hold on him."
The young man grinned at the newcomers. "You certainly are ugly. What happens if you pull out those tubes?"
"He does not seem cooperative," observed one of the spies.
"He will learn better. Reawakening a ghola's memories is a very painful process," Khrone said, still ignoring the young Harkonnen. "I greatly look forward to the task."
The Baron ghola let out an eager laugh that sounded like twisting metal. "I can't wait for you to try."
Khrone paused at the door, reminding himself to keep all security systems in place, especially with the mercurial Baron, who was quite prone to mischief. Khrone led the delegation of nightmarish humans into another room and carefully locked the chamber behind him. He did not want Vladimir Harkonnen to run loose.
"Our Atreides ghola is progressing nicely."
Before entering the castle's main chamber, Khrone turned a cool stare toward the hideous patchwork people. "Our victory is foreordained. Soon I will go to Ix to complete another step in the plan." Khrone meant victory for the Face Dancers, but the ambassadors would interpret it as they wished. "The rest is just a formality."
Reputation can be a beautiful weapon. It often spills less blood.
--BASHAR MILES TEG,
first incarnation
F
oremost among the Mother Commander's weapons were her flesh-and-blood fighters. The rebel Honored Matres on Gammu wouldn't have a chance against the Valkyries. They had made a serious mistake in attempting to strike Chapterhouse with their Obliterators.
After their attack failed, the dissidents on Gammu had expected Murbella to overreact and retaliate instantly. But she had exercised the meticulous care and patience she'd acquired from her Bene Gesserit training. Now, striking back after a month's delay, she knew that every aspect of the plan was perfectly arranged.
Before setting off for Gammu, Murbella reviewed and revised her options based on the latest intelligence reports, as well as the information she had gleaned from Sharing with Priestess Iriel before she died. It was still unclear whether or not the renegade whores would make a suicidal stand on Gammu, triggeri
ng any last Obliterators they possessed, rather than let the world fall to the New Sisterhood. This would be Murbella's most critical battle to date, the toughest enclave of rebels.
Alone with the responsibilities of supreme command, she stood high atop the western rampart of Chapterhouse Keep. The attack itself, and victory, would occur swiftly. More than just excising the festering sore of rebel Honored Matres, the New Sisterhood needed the Gammu military-industrial complex for further defenses against the oncoming Enemy.
Murbella had already sent in operatives to soften the resistance: secret assassins, adept disseminators of propaganda, and members of the Missionaria Protectiva to rally the ever-growing religious groups against "the whores who killed the blessed Sheeana on Rakis." It was exactly what Duncan Idaho would have done.
The Honored Matres on Gammu were led by a charismatic and bitter woman named Niyela, who boldly claimed to trace her ancestry back to House Harkonnen--an obvious lie, since Honored Matres were unable to traverse the webs of Other Memory and could not remember their predecessors. Niyela had made her claim only after spending time digging through old records from the days when Gammu was a grimy industrial planet called Giedi Prime. Even after so long, the local population held a visceral hatred for the Harkonnens. Niyela apparently used that to her advantage.
The Honored Matres had set up extensive defenses on Gammu, including sophisticated scanners to detect and destroy incoming aircraft and missiles, specifically tailored to foil the New Sisterhood's traditional mode of attack. For the time being, small gaps remained in their coverage, especially in the least populated regions of the planet.
Janess assured the Mother Commander she could bring their forces in through one of the gaps and mount an overwhelming surprise attack. For the first time, her fighting women would rely primarily on their Swordmaster skills.
After gathering all their ships and summoning Guild transport, the Valkyries launched.
FROM THE NIGHT side of Gammu, scores of troop transports disembarked from an orbiting no-ship and headed down toward a region of broad, frigid plains. Flying only meters above the icy ground, Murbella's ship raced overland toward the capital city of Ysai. Behind them, a formation of small troop shuttles cruised along like a school of hungry piranhas. Under her direction, the stealth shuttles paused just long enough to release their swarms of female commandos into the city, and then streaked off without firing a shot, triggering no alarms.
