Mentats of Dune

Chapter 16 (The desert is endless)

When Draigo Roget returned to Arrakis City and breathed the crackling dry air, he viewed the details around him with the catalog focus of a trained Mentat. He also drew upon his own experiences. He had been to this planet many times.

Among Draigo’s other duties, Directeur Venport had delegated oversight of the spice-harvesting operations to him. With his Mentat focus and loyalty to VenHold, he had already improved the efficiency and profitability of the work.

Since leaving the Lampadas school, Draigo had trained several Mentat candidates of his own. Given the volatility of the Butlerian fanatics, Directeur Venport knew it was too dangerous to infiltrate more operatives into the Mentat academy right now. If he did, the paranoid Manford Torondo might discover them — and kill them. Better that Draigo teach the candidates himself.

Through VenHold intermediaries, he had obtained a supply of a promising new thought-focusing drug, sapho, and had begun administering it in small doses to some of his students as an experiment; Headmaster Albans kept a supply in the Lampadas school, but had not used it. Draigo’s early results looked promising, but he intended to proceed slowly.

Several of Draigo’s trainees worked in Arrakis City as Combined Mercantiles employees, and two of his new Mentats met him at the spaceport. Needing no pleasantries, Draigo asked for a report as they made their way to company headquarters. The first Mentat, a small man with a high voice, delivered a crisp summary of their activities. “We’ve been studying weather patterns on Arrakis, analyzing images from our new proprietary meteorological satellites. The weather is capricious, but we are developing general models. The more efficiently we predict storms, the better we can plan our harvesting operations.”

“And reduce equipment losses,” said the second Mentat, a taller, slightly older man.

“Any progress on coping with the giant sandworms?” Draigo asked. “Can we detect them earlier or drive them away when they attack our spice-harvesting operations?”

“No progress, sir,” said the first Mentat. “The sandworms cannot be stopped.”

Draigo paused to think about that for a moment, then gave a curt nod. He accepted their conclusion. “Unfortunate.”

The Combined Mercantiles building was cool inside, and the air remained dry. There were no real windows in the sealed facility, but on the wall of the conference room was a fake picture window showing a rugged shoreline and crashing waves under a sky filled with thick rain clouds, a place the Arrakis natives had never seen.

“We brought several Freemen candidates, as you requested. Some refused, but one was curious enough to convince the others.”

“A curious Freeman?” Draigo said. “That is a good sign.”

Six dusty, tanned young men sat in the room around a long table. Draigo Roget studied them in silence, and they did the same to him. All had blue-within-blue eyes, indicating a lifetime of exposure to melange — which would need to be disguised, so as not to rouse suspicions offworld. That problem could be resolved.

Some of the desert people were uneasy, and regarded the wall image of the ocean with awe and intimidation. One of the young men was more fascinated than the others, and his intensity seemed to encourage them to pay attention. Because they were wrapped in spice-fiber robes covered with grit, and their bodies encased in the distillation suits necessary for desert survival, it took Draigo a moment to realize that one of the group was a female.

After a long pause of mutual assessment, the Mentat said, “I have been wanting to speak with you. You are the free people of the desert?”

A young man, with a lean face and pointed chin, glanced at his companions, then rose to his feet. “We are not free people, if we are prisoners of the enticing offer your men made to us.”

“And you want to hear it, or you wouldn’t be here.”

“We should go back out to the sietch,” said a scowling Freeman with creased, weathered skin. “We do not belong here.”

“I don’t belong out there either,” said the young man with the pointed chin. “We discussed this. I thought you wanted to learn about the other worlds.”

“I have the whole desert to see,” grumbled the scowling Freeman. He slumped back into his chair.

The lone woman among them looked at Draigo and pressed, “How do we know we can trust you?” She was so lean and leathery that her beauty had been leached out by the heat and the arid climate. Her body had no spare moisture whatsoever to fill out her breasts in a normal manner, and her distilling suit concealed even the hint of a curve.

Draigo chuckled. “We have done nothing to make you doubt us. We showed you hospitality, offered you water, and you drank it. You may leave if you don’t wish to be here, but first take a look at the world featured on the wall. We can take you there.” He pointed. “And to many other planets. Do none of the Freemen dream of the rest of the universe? If you don’t like it, you can go back to your squalid desert.”

“Why did you ask us to come here?” said another of the young men.

“Because you have been sabotaging our spice-harvesting equipment,” Draigo said, stating a fact, not accusing them. “You ruined some of our flyers, contaminated their energy packs with sand and breached their airtight seals.”

The young man with the pointed chin scowled. “We know nothing of such crimes. You cannot prove we had any part of that.”

“I don’t care whether it was you,” Draigo said. “And even if I were to punish you, someone else would come, and someone else after that. It would be like using one hand to block sand from entering a home while leaving the door wide open.”

“Then why are we here?” demanded the young woman.

“First, tell me your names,” Draigo said.

“A name is a private thing, not given lightly,” she said. “Have you earned it?”

Draigo smiled. “I offered you water. Is it so much to ask for your names in return?”

The woman smiled stiffly and said, “I am Lillis. The others can give you their names if they like. I am not afraid.”

Draigo chuckled again. “At least one is without fear.”

“I am Taref,” said the one with the pointed chin, who seemed to be the leader. The other four, with varying degrees of reluctance, introduced themselves as Shurko (the gruff one), Bentur, Chumel, and Waddoch.

Draigo paced the room. He had been out in the desert aboard the spice factories himself; twice he had even watched huge worms destroy harvesting equipment that could not be whisked away in time. He tended to agree with his Mentats’ assessment that no obvious defenses existed against such leviathans. He had even heard through reliable sources that the Freemen knew how to ride sandworms across great distances. Draigo wasn’t sure he believed that incredible story, but there were so many reports.…

“Your people have been sabotaging our equipment. I doubt you do it because you hate the offworlders who harvest spice. Combined Mercantiles provides necessary materials here in Arrakis City, if you choose to purchase them, but otherwise we leave tribes alone out in your desert. I think young people like yourselves vandalize our equipment because you are bored and restless. It is entertainment and a challenge. You wish to make a mark.”

Draigo watched their expressions. These young Freemen were guarded, but not well practiced in concealing their emotions. He saw a hunger in their brown and leathery faces, their dark, intensely blue eyes.

“Let me offer you an opportunity, a way to channel your abilities. You know the desert … and you know that the desert is not everything in the universe.” He gestured toward the projection wall. “Wouldn’t you like to go somewhere different, perhaps to a planet with so much water you could immerse yourself in it, or look up in the sky and see droplets falling through the air, like sand whipped up by a storm?” He listened to their muttering, nodded again at the oceanscape. “Caladan isn’t even a special world. No one else in the Imperium finds it remarkable at all.”

“How can that be?” Lillis couldn’t take her eyes from images of the stormy sea. “So much water in one place!”

Draigo laughed. “It’s called an ocean. Most worlds have them, at least the ones on which people live. Wouldn’t you like to see that planet firsthand, and others like it? I can take you from this desert, show you there’s much more than the dunes of Arrakis.”

“I have misgivings about this,” said Shurko. “My family and the desert have always been good enough for me.”

Taref snorted. “I have heard you say otherwise.”

Shurko looked cowed. “I was just agreeing with you when I said it. But that does not mean I meant to abandon the desert entirely.”

“If you are uneasy about it, then you’re not the sort of person I’m searching for,” Draigo said. “And if you go with us, we can bring you back in a year if you like, a much wiser and more experienced person.”

“I want to see the ocean,” Taref said, as if daring the others to disagree with him. He had the mannerisms of a natural leader, but his skill-set and his confidence were not yet well honed. “And you all have said as much to me when we were out in camp.”

His remaining companions looked at one another. They had been waiting for Taref’s lead, and they all agreed to accept the offer, although with varying degrees of enthusiasm. Shurko wavered and finally said, “Then I will go along as well.”

Draigo hardened his voice. “I’m not interested in volunteers who change their minds so easily. What we ask will be difficult, but exhilarating. A chance that no other Freeman has been given. Do you want to be the first … or do you want to be nothing?”

Now, however, it was a matter of pride for Shurko. “I give you my word. I will go with my friends. We will stay together.”

Lillis expressed caution. “What is it you want from us in return?”

Draigo smiled. “Do what you’ve already proved you can do so well — sabotage. We’ll train you. On Arrakis you may understand how spice-harvesting machinery works, but spaceships with Holtzman engines are vastly more complicated. A person requires decades of education and innate intelligence to understand how a foldspace engine functions.” He paused to look at the desert people, not bothering to conceal a little disdain. “Fortunately, it takes far less training to make such an engine not function.”

Waddoch was surprised. “Sabotage? Why would you want us to ruin one of your own spaceships?”

“I want you to sabotage the spaceships of a rival company: EsconTran.”

The name obviously meant nothing to the Freemen. His two Mentat trainees were alert and attentive. Draigo tried a different explanation. “Do you not have tribes? Rivalries?”

“Of course,” said Taref. “All of us do. I am the son of a Naib.”

“The third son of a Naib,” Lillis said.

“Because of my two older brothers, I will never rule the tribe.”

“Our company has rivalries with other shipping companies. We wish to harm them.” Now the desert people understood the situation.

Taref lowered his voice, which was rich with wonder and awe. “Even if I will never be Naib, I will be the only one of my family to behold a fortune in water such as that.” He looked to the window wall. “I will be the only one to see what is out there.”

Draigo nodded. “First, let me take you and your companions to Kolhar. We will instruct you there, create convincing new identities for each of you. Because you come from Arrakis, you won’t be in any Imperial security records. Your names and identities will raise no concerns, but we need to give you eye films to cover your blue eyes, or they will draw too much attention. Ostensibly, you’ll be simple workers, proficient in basic engine maintenance, because we will give you that expertise. And then you’ll secretly make certain adjustments to critical parts and systems. EsconTran already has a dismal safety record, and with your help we can make it far worse.”

Taref glanced at his companions, then back at the faux-ocean window. When he finally turned to face Draigo, the Mentat recognized the sparkling hunger there, a longing to see new vistas and to break free from the dreary desert. “If you take us away from here and show us new worlds, Draigo Roget, then wrecking a few spaceships for you is a small price for us to pay.”