Brian Herbert - Navigators of Dune

Josef suggested, “I want them to act as intermediaries, to talk to Roderick on our behalf. I don’t want this feud with him, and I don’t want to be Emperor! Roderick can have his damned throne, provided he becomes a suitable leader.”

“Manford Torondo will never allow the Emperor to make peace with you,” Cioba cautioned. “He has his own agenda.”

“Then we will have to get rid of him—that much is obvious.” He fumed. “In fact, it would solve most of our problems.”

While supervising the unloading of spice, Josef and Cioba were surprised when Draigo Roget approached them from a landed shuttle. “I have a report for you, Directeur,” he said. Stepping up to the dusty spice transport, the Mentat came to attention and quirked his lips in a small, uncharacteristic smile. “Fortunately, it is good news this time.”

“Statistically, there has to be good news now and then,” Cioba said.

“I just intercepted a report that EsconTran tried to keep secret. They lost one of their largest cargo transport ships due to a fatal navigational error.”

Josef couldn’t control how thrilled he was to hear this. “A true disaster, then? All hands lost? All cargo lost?”

“Everything, Directeur.”

He smiled. “Excellent. Once again emphasizing how foolhardy it is to use any transportation company other than the VenHold Spacing Fleet. The half-Manford keeps flying in his spacefolders without Navigators, claiming that God will protect him. If only that little worm would disappear in a navigation mishap.” Josef drew a deep breath of the bitter, fume-filled air.

“According to my Mentat projections, Directeur, if the Butlerian influence were removed, the Emperor would be more amenable to adjusting his position. He would owe you a tremendous debt.”

“Mentat, you don’t have to convince me that we need to eradicate the barbarians,” Josef said. “Do you have a report on the cymek plans? I gave instructions for those battle machines to be made ready as soon as possible.”

Draigo clasped his hands together behind him as the trio walked away from the spice transport. “That is my next piece of good news,” he said. “The Denali scientists have nearly finished constructing the full cymek army and training the Navigator brains to guide them—one hundred additional units, as you specified, ready for your conquest of Lampadas. We will require no more than another two weeks.”

Josef considered the news. “Considering how much havoc a mere three cymeks were able to cause, more than a hundred of them could level the planet.”

The Mentat nodded. “Ptolemy is quite eager to move against the Butlerians. He submitted a detailed military assault plan for destroying Lampadas, and we are ready to present it for your modification and approval. Very soon, we will be capable of overrunning that defenseless world.”

“The only problem is, the half-Manford and his barbarians are now ensconced at Salusa Secundus.” Josef scowled. “I would much rather unleash all of my forces against Lampadas. Roderick may not believe this, but I respect the Imperium. I believe we should build it up, not tear it down … if I can just find a way out of this tangle.”

“In the meantime I will see if the Sisterhood can assist us,” Cioba said.

He smiled lovingly at his wife, then sighed. “We will be ready to attack Lampadas as soon as Manford goes back there. I don’t doubt the Emperor is desperate to be rid of them, and he would undoubtedly consider it a favor if I do the work for him … but our timing has to be right.”

Anna had waited for this moment—for Erasmus—and her anticipation was intense, but somehow she kept herself calm in his presence, knowing that he appreciated being in control. He had trained her carefully during the many months he had been her constant companion, the voice whispering in her ear, and more.

In his new body Erasmus was the perfect male form, as if sculpted by a classical master from those hedonistic days before the Time of Titans. The face resembled Gilbertus Albans, but the person was completely different: Erasmus, her friend and protector, the one who understood Anna better than anyone else. After her mind had been twisted by the Sisterhood’s Rossak drug, she had never thought anyone would understand her again. But Erasmus did, and always had, even before revealing himself as a disembodied, whispering voice in the first phase of their relationship, advising her and asking probing questions.

But now he was real, standing before her in a form so handsome that her eyes ached. She could only gaze briefly at him because a thin sheen of tears softened the image. “Just walk with me, Erasmus.” She took his hand—his hand of real, tangible flesh.

He appeared to be comfortable and in control of his new body. Together, they strolled through the corridors of the laboratory domes, passing workrooms, pausing to look at the hangars where immense cymek walkers were being refurbished and armed for their impending assault on Lampadas.

When Erasmus clasped Anna’s fingers, she felt electricity tingling through her arm—not electricity from the robotic gelsphere that held his memories and personality. No, this was the electricity of physical contact, the spark of a long-anticipated touch.

Anna had a spring in her step as she led him along, but when he stopped to stare at the enormous walkers, Erasmus had a distant, admiring look in his borrowed eyes. For a long time now, he had been telling her about the cymeks and the Synchronized Empire. He liked to talk about his magnificent villa with its slave pens and laboratories on Corrin, before the humans wiped it out in a barbaric atomic attack. Anna wondered what he thought now when he looked at these new cymeks.

She looped his arm around hers. “I want to show you so many things. I’ve waited a long time for this moment.”

“As I have waited. Every sensation in this body is new and noteworthy.” His voice sounded different coming from a natural, human throat. It had a rich and sonorous quality that sounded very much like Headmaster Albans.

“And if you are going to be human, you need to experience everything possible—in the way humans experience those things,” she said. “I can show you, if you let me be your guide. I want to be special to you.”

“You are already my special one, Anna.” He looked down at her with a blank expression for a moment, and then the face shifted into a warm smile, as if Erasmus was thinking of how to manipulate a flowmetal robotic body but didn’t yet understand the nuances of an expression made of flesh.

He raised his hand so he could stare in wonder at the palm. He flexed and unflexed the fingers. “So many lines and patterns on my fingertips and palm. I don’t understand the code, and I wonder at the biological necessity of such randomness and infinite perfection. This also merits further study … a study of myself, instead of someone else. Thank you for bringing me here, Anna. You are a very important part of my instruction and growth as a sentient being.”

While the Denali engineers kept working on the cymeks, Anna guided him away with her. They entered the sterile laboratory vault that held the enlarged and distorted brains of failed Navigators, the mutated gray matter holding many more cellular ripples than a normal human brain. As a bodiless memory core, Erasmus had expressed interest in the Navigator brains, and Anna had often taken him there so that he could observe with his optical sensors.