Frank Herbert - The Eyes of Heisenberg

Allgood looked up into the globe. A dancing lacery of power placed a deceptive transparency over the interior. Through that curtain could be seen shapes, outlines—now clear, now enfolded.

“I came,” Allgood said.

Boumour and Igan echoed the greeting, reminding themselves of all the protocol and forms which must be observed here: “ Always use the name of the Optiman you address. If you do not know the name, ask it humbly.”

Allgood waited for the Tuyere to answer. Sometimes he felt they had no sense of time, at least of seconds and minutes and perhaps not even of days. It might be true. People of infinite lives might notice the passing seasons as clock ticks.

The throne support turned, presenting the Tuyere one by one. They sat in clinging translucent robes, almost nude, flaunting their similarity to the meres. Facing the open segment now was Nourse, a Greek god figure with blocky face, heavy brows, a chest ridged by muscles that rippled as he breathed. How evenly he breathed, with what controlled slowness.

The base turned, presented Schruille, the bone slender, unpredictable one with great round eyes, high cheeks and a flat nose above a mouth which seemed always pulled into a thin line of disapproval. Here was a dangerous one. Some said he spoke of things which other Optimen could not. In Allgood’s presence, Schruille had once said “death,” although referring to a butterfly.

Again, the base turned—and here was Calapine, her robe girdled with crystal plastrons. She was a thin, high-breasted woman with golden brown hair and chill, insolent eyes, full lips and a long nose above a pointed chin. Allgood had caught her watching him strangely on occasion. At such times he tried not to think about the Optimen who took mere playmates.

Nourse spoke to Calapine, looking at her through the prismatic reflector which each throne raised at a shoulder. She answered, but the voices did not carry to the floor of the hall.

Allgood watched the interplay for a clue to their mood. It was known among the Folk that Nourse and Calapine had been bedmates for periods that spanned hundreds of mere lifetimes. Nourse had a reputation of strength and predictability, but Calapine was known as a wild one. Mention her name and likely someone would look up and ask, “What’s she done now?” It was always said with a touch of admiration and fear. Allgood knew that fear. He had worked for other ruling trios, but none who had his measure as did these three… especially Calapine.

The throne base stopped with Nourse facing the open segment. “You came,” he rumbled. “Of course you came. The ox knows its owner and the ass its master’s crib.”

So it’s going to be one of those days, Allgood thought. Ridicule! It could only mean they knew how he had stumbled… but didn’t they always?

Calapine swiveled her throne to look down at the meres. The Hall of Counsel had been patterned on the Roman Senate with false columns around the edges, banks of benches beneath glittering scanner eyes. Everything focused down onto the figures standing apart from the acolytes.

Looking up, Igan reminded himself he had feared and hated these creatures all his life—even while he pitied them. How lucky he’d been to miss the Optiman cut. It’d been close, but he’d been saved. He could remember the hate of his childhood, before it had become tempered by pity. It’d been a clean thing then, sharp and real, blazing against the Givers of Time.

“We came as requested to report on the Durants,” Allgood said. He took two deep breaths to calm his nerves. These sessions were always dangerous, but doubly so since he’d decided on a double game. There was no turning back, though, and no wish to since he’d discovered the dopplegangers of himself they were growing. There could be only one reason they’d duplicate him. Well, they’d learn.

Calapine studied Allgood, wondering if it might be time to seek diversion with the ugly Folk male. Perhaps here was an answer to boredom. Both Schruille and Nourse indulged. She seemed to recall having done that before with another Max, but couldn’t remember if it had helped her boredom.

“Say what it is we give you, little Max,” she said.

Her woman’s voice, soft and with laughter behind it, terrified him. Allgood swallowed. “You give life, Calapine.”

“Say how many lovely years you have,” she ordered.

Allgood found his throat contained no moisture. “Almost four hundred, Calapine,” he rasped.

Nourse chuckled. “Ahead of you stretch many more lovely years if you serve us well,” he said.

It was the closest to a direct threat Allgood had ever heard from an Optiman. They worked their wills by indirection, by euphemistic subtlety. They worked through meres who could face such concepts as death and killing. — Who have they shaped to destroy me? Allgood wondered.

“Many little tick-tock years,” Calapine said.

“Enough!” Schruille growled. He detested these interviews with the underclasses, the way Calapine baited the Folk. He swiveled his throne and now all the Tuyere faced the open segment. Schruille looked at his fingers, the ever youthful skin, and wondered why he had snapped that way. An enzymic imbalance? The thought touched him with disquiet. He generally held his silence during these sessions—as a defense because he tended to get sentimental about the pitiful meres and despise himself for it afterward.

Boumour moved up beside Allgood, said, “Does the Tuyere wish now the report on the Durants?”

Allgood stifled a feeling of rage at the interruption. Didn’t the fool know that the Optimen must always appear to lead the interview?

“The words and images of your report have been seen, analyzed and put away,” Nourse rumbled. “Now, it is the non-report that we wish.”

Non-report? Allgood asked himself. Does he think we’ve hidden something?

“Little Max,” Calapine said. “Have you bowed to our necessity and questioned the computer nurse under narcosis?”

Here it comes, Allgood thought. He took a deep breath, said, “She has been questioned, Calapine.”

Igan took his place beside Boumour, said, “There’s something I wish to say about that if I -”

“Hold your tongue, pharmacist,” Nourse said. “We talk to Max.”

Igan bowed his head, thought, How dangerous this is! And all because of that fool nurse. She wasn’t even one of us. No Cyborg-of-the-register knows her. A member of no cell or platoon. An accidental, a Sterrie, and she puts us in this terrible peril!

Allgood saw that Igan’s hands trembled, wondered, What’s driving these surgeons? They can’t be such fools.

“Was it not a deliberate thing that nurse did?” Calapine asked.

“Yes, Calapine,” Allgood said.

“Your agents did not see it, yet we knew it had to be,” Calapine said. She turned to scan the instruments of the control center, returned her attention to Allgood. “Say now why this was.”

Allgood sighed. “I have no excuses, Calapine. The men have been censured.”

“Say now why the nurse acted thus,” Calapine ordered.

Allgood wet his lips with his tongue, glanced at Boumour and Igan. They looked at the floor. He looked back to Calapine, at her face shimmering within the globe. “We were unable to discover her motives, Calapine.”

“Unable?” Nourse demanded.

“She… ahh… ceased to exist during the interrogation, Nourse,” Allgood said. As the Tuyere stiffened, sitting bolt upright in their thrones, he added, “A flaw in her genetic cutting, so the pharmacists tell me.”

“A profound pity,” Nourse said, settling back.

Igan looked up, blurted, “It could’ve been a deliberate self-erasure, Nourse.”