Navigators of Dune

The Emperor assessed the black-robed man, then stared at the closed door. He could hear no noises on the other side now, wondered if any of the VenHold prisoners were still alive. “Yes, and the results? Do you know where he is hiding?”

“I am confident that the first five captives had no information to reveal, but several others finally provided a star-system name and astronomical coordinates. A planet called Denali. They say it is the site of a top-secret VenHold research facility.”

This confirmed the information from the half-damaged navigation database in one of the stranded VenHold ships.

He stepped around the Scalpel interrogator, entered the sealed chamber. The room smelled of blood, urine, and terror but he was even more sickened to see the VenHold employee: he was horrifically broken, most of his skin flayed, his arm and leg joints in all the wrong places. Cecilio proudly went to the unconscious victim and prodded him, as if he considered this wreck of humanity to be a trophy. The eyelids flickered, didn’t open.

“Sire, I’m convinced that the subject’s information is accurate—and consistent with the revelations from three other prisoners.”

Though Roderick was disturbed to see such mangled remnants of a human being, he had to reassess what actions he considered necessary and acceptable. It was a matter of priorities. “Thank you, Cecilio.” He turned to Admiral Harte. “Denali?”

“Sire, I had an aide look it up in archives from the League of Nobles. Denali appeared in the old records as a small planet with a poisonous atmosphere … possibly an old cymek base, but not confirmed. Never settled, never even noticed as far as the records showed.”

The Emperor nodded. “A poisonous planet for a poisonous man.” That was where Roderick would go.

* * *

RODERICK RUSHED AN Imperial communiqué back to Salusa, summoning the bulk of his armed forces on two foldspace carriers so he could bring an overwhelming fleet to Denali. He intended to snuff out his last major enemy.

When the Imperial battleships arrived at Lampadas, Roderick studied a screen in the main salon of his barge, with Admiral Harte standing beside him. “A handful of ships will be enough to keep the remaining Butlerian fanatics under control here, Sire,” Harte said. “They have nothing. Better to devote our main force to fighting Venport, who is still a threat.”

Harte’s forces had already commandeered any damaged but functional Butlerian ships and pressed them into Imperial service as well. Without Manford Torondo, the fanatics were disorganized; Anari Idaho was a Swordmaster, not a true leader. The Butlerians were fewer in number now, and too weak to pose much of a concern. The problem was mostly solved.

Ironically, Josef Venport had done exactly as he’d promised: He had taken care of the fanatics and killed their commander. And the Butlerians, in turn—with the timely and unexpected assistance of Admiral Harte—had caused significant damage to the VenHold threat. A crackdown on Denali would wrap it all up, and Venport would not know what was coming.

“The Directeur is not yet sufficiently defeated,” Roderick announced. “We will leave some of your FTL ships here to monitor the Butlerians on the ground, but I am taking the rest of our fleet to finish the job at Denali.”

Harte followed Roderick out of the barge’s luxurious main salon. “The Butlerians will wish to join us so they can continue their fight against the Directeur. Since his cymeks killed Leader Torondo, they loathe him more than ever.”

“I forbid their further involvement,” Roderick said. “The Butlerians no longer dictate my actions. We will achieve our own victory, Admiral—an Imperial victory. And then we can end this terrible mess, once and for all.”

The glory of love.

The nature of love.

The foolishness of love.

—ERASMUS, attempts at poetry, New Laboratory Journals, volume 2

Inside the laboratory domes, Anna followed Erasmus wherever he went. She drew strength from being in his orbit, but her constant presence bothered him more and more, especially now that he had to concentrate on urgent preparations for the defense of Denali. Not surprisingly, she seemed not to understand the magnitude of the crisis, and he did not have time to explain it to her now.

During his initial observations of Anna at the Mentat School, he had catalogued her mood swings and biological obsessions. Now that he was with her physically as well as conversationally, his comprehension of the young woman’s needs had grown. She had given him a great deal to ponder, ideas for subtle follow-up research, but none of that was important now. He actually found her irritating, even though she could not be blamed.