Dune by Frank Herbert – Reread (Part 6)

Hello all! If you are a regular reader of my Dune re-read you will notice that it has moved. Welcome to Gestalt Mash! The re-read has moved here permanently. It’s a cool place. We’ll be happy here.

If you haven’t been reading Dune along with me then hello! I am Rachel. You should probably go back to the beginning if you’ve never read Dune before. If you have, then read on!

Chapter 21: The Duke and the Tooth

There is a legend that the instant the Duke Leto Atreides died a meteor streaked across the skies above his ancestral palace on Caladan.

-the Princess Irulan: “Introduction to A Child’s History of Muad’dib”

What happened:

The Baron Harkonnen is hanging out in one of his ships observing the slaughter of the Atreides men hiding in the caves of the Shield Wall. He is congratulating himself on his use of artillery instead of lasguns (and thought-uttering one of my favorite quotes, “Pity should be cruel!”). Piter strolls in with poor Guard Captain Kudu and Yueh in tow. Yueh demands the Baron fulfill his end of the bargain and deliver Wanna from her torture.  The Baron thinks he’s being oh so witty when he says, “I told you I’d free her from the agony and permit you to join her. So be it.” (Sometimes I imagine the Baron as a crimson version of The Penguin) But Wanna is dead! She’s been so for a while. So when Piter sidles in and shoves a knife into Yueh’s back (HA! A back-stab for the back-stabber!)we aren’t very surprised. Thus we are freed from the continued whining of one Dr. Wellington Yueh.

Thank the Maker!

After this we get to the good stuff. Duke Leto is brought into the room chained and drugged.  Piter reports that Paul and Jessica have disappeared along with a few Atreides men, possibly Duncan Idaho (ahh, we know that last seen Jessica and Paul have some hope now). The Baron is totally pissed and demands that Kynes be located. While the Baron rants the Duke remembers the poison gas tooth Yueh implanted. The Duke has some hazy thoughts, falls asleep and comes to with the Baron demanding to know where Jessica and Paul are. Leto isn’t talking even under threat of torture (mostly because he doesn’t know) and we the readers are getting a little anxious to get to the part we know is coming.

I like to imagine the scene from Leto’s POV; the Baron’s sagging face peering close, Piter’s cunning glare just a bit closer and Guard Captain Kudu just bending over to join the glare-fest when Leto draws his last breath (full of Harkonnen halitosis) bites down on the poison tooth and exhales.

But poor Duke Leto… you screwed it up! You didn’t get the Baron. You only managed to kill Piter and the Guard Captain! The Baron realizes this while he does his “Yay, I’m alive” dance in the hallway afterwards. Turns out the Baron’s cowardly use of a shield belt blocked enough of the poison from his immediate person that he survived when the other men did not. Poor, dead Duke Leto. You even screwed up dying.

The Baron is pissed that he’s lost his mentat before the appointed expiration date, but doesn’t really give a rip about Guard Captain Kudu. He’s given a verbal spanking by the Sardaukar troops when they observe the scene, knowing that a member of the nobility was subjected to less than approved treatment (but still… a wonderfully weird still-life dinner. Someone paint that – Tooth Aftermath). Anyways, the Duke is dead and the planet is back under Harkonnen rule. Without Piter to rule the populace the Baron is forced to rely on the idiot-nephew Rabban, but his cruelty should be adequate enough to prepare Arrakis for the eventual rule of Feyd Rautha. With decisions neatly made, the Baron goes off for a snack.

This is one of those chapters where people who dislike Herbert’s tendency to dance around POVs can see the merits of the writing style. Not only do we get the self-involved machinations of the Baron, providing lovely info dumps for us readers, we also get the hazy last moments of the Duke Leto, all at one table! The Baron is always half a second away from wailing on the floor like a toddler and Duke Leto is seriously inept (though we can blame drugs for this one). The scene slows down just before the climax of the chapter and then speeds up. At the end Herbert throws in some child-rape and we’re on our way to the next scene!

Yay!

Chapter 22: Paul takes his first step into a larger universe

O Seas of Caladan

O people of Duke Leto-

Citadel of Leto fallen,

Fallen forever…

-from “Songs of Muad’Dib” by the Princess Irulan

What happened:

We catch up with Paul and Jessica hiding in a tent in the desert. It turns out that the ‘thopter chasing them was piloted by none other than Duncan Idaho (cue the Beatles-style screaming). Paul knew this fact, of course, because he’s realizing he can totally see the future. This is sorta freaking out his mom.

Idaho has gone off to do heroic things (like preparing Paul and Jessica a more permanent exile) and meanwhile Paul is coming to terms with his father’s death, the discovery of Yueh’s treachery and his own mentat-like cataloguing of possibilities.

Jessica is trying to be a mom and comfort her son while also explaining the goings on, like the Sardaukar posing as Harkonnen troops and the very real possibility that no Atreides men would survive this extermination. Paul is all, “I KNOW Mom, geez”. They play with the radio for a while, which doesn’t do anything except confirm their worst fears and Paul thinks it’s time they come up with a plan in case Idaho doesn’t come back.

Jessica is a little overwhelmed with the situation (oh, you mean hiding in a tiny tent in the middle of a GIGANTIC desert with bombs going off everywhere and everyone you love being murdered is overwhelming?) but Paul is staying cool. He’s assuming the mantle of the Dukedom. He realizes that the Fremen are the key not only to their present survival but their future revenge. He’s also getting a little stuck in his head (which Paul does from time to time, it’s sort of a personality point from now on) and Jessica is getting more wigged out. Paul tells her that Duke Leto never doubted her and Jessica cries because she’s totally hormonal, being pregnant and all.

Meanwhile Paul is riding the wave of REALIZATION, and POSSIBILITY. He comes down long enough to yell some stuff about being the Kwisatz Haderach and then realizes that his life is no longer even close to his own. He says some harsh stuff to Jessica in a typical 15-year-old lashing out at Mom way. Jessica pretty much tells him she had no choice but she loves him all the same and then Paul throws the lowest blow ever and tells her that he’s figured out that she’s the Baron Harkonnen’s daughter, and now they are both what they hate most.

God Paul, you are SO EMO.

Then Paul says he’s a seed, a sleeper now awakened and names himself Muad’Dib after having a vision of war and death. The two decide that the only way forward is with the Fremen.

I’m not going to belittle this chapter. It’s incredibly important. This is when Paul sees his destiny and, very importantly, rejects it. This is when he vows to not become an evil tyrannical despot who kills billions of people.

Not that I’m saying this is foreshadowing (cough, cough) but when your main character can see the future the story isn’t going to be so much about the unraveling of the plot as it is the realizations the characters come to at various points. Poetically we now stand at cross roads. We are faced with dualities. Young Paul is at once a boy without a father and a man with a vendetta. He’s a child sitting alone and afraid in the wilderness where not even his Mother can comfort him and also an almost omnipotent godling that is totally freaking his mom out. The epic and tragic dualities come to a head in this chapter. We KNOW at gut-level that perhaps this story is going to be tragic but we’re also convinced that if the boy is a super-hero we’re in for some pretty amazing action.

Thus closes the first section of the novel! LET’S KEEP GOING!

Book 2: Muad’Dib

Chapter 23: Can someone please explain to me exactly how a static compactor works?

When my father, the Padishah Emperor, heard of Duke Leto’s death and the manner of it, he went into such a rage as we had never before seen. He blamed my mother and the compact forced on him to place a Bene Gesserit on the throne. He blamed the Guild and the evil old Baron. He blamed everyone in sight, not excepting even me, for he said I was a witch like all the others. And when I sought to comfort him, saying it was done according to an older law of self-preservation to which even the most ancient rulers gave allegiance, he sneered at me and asked if I thought him a weakling. I saw then that he had been aroused to this passion not by concern over the dead Duke but by what that death implied for all royalty. As I look back on it, I think there may have been some prescience in my father, too, for it is certain that his line and Muad’Dib’s share common ancestry.

-”In My Father’s House,” by the Princess Irulan

What happened:

So Paul and Jessica awake that evening in their tent (now buried under sand) with no sign of Duncan Idaho (can’t you hear the screams of lust?). The radio isn’t picking up squat and Paul is mostly sick of sitting in the dark pondering the blood-revenge and the father-death nightmares (woe!) so they decide it’s time to get moving. While Paul prepares to exit their buried tent Jessica is having her own moment (give the lady a break ok, the love of her life just got murdered, her son is a total freak of nature, she’s pregnant and stuck in the desert and their only plan is “join the Fremen and steal Harkonnen spice”).

Paul uses a “static compaction tool” to dig a hole to the surface of the desert (what? HOW DOES THIS WORK?) The two crawl through their little tunnel wearing their shiny new stillsuits, bringing their supplies with them, and then the two idiots go and crest the top of a sand dune AND JUST STAND THERE STARING AT ENEMY BOMBINGS HAPPENING LESS THAN A MILE AWAY.

They have a stupid discussion about how the fire they are seeing could either be Harkonnen troops or Atreides survivors (no really? What are the other possibilities? Klingon invaders?  Aquaman and his dolphin-friends?) before they decide that maybe they need to seek cover.

The chapter ends with the two, once again, being chased by ‘thopters.

There’s not much to discuss here. Jessica and Paul were under the sand in a tent waiting in the last chapter… now they’re out of the tent, in the desert, and running away! (run away!). THE PLOT. IT MOVES.

Chapter 24: Thufir Hawat makes a water decision

My father once told me that respect for the truth comes close to being the basis for all morality. “Something cannot emerge from nothing,” he said. This is profound thinking if you understand how unstable “the truth” can be.

-from “Conversations with Muad’Dib” by the Princess Irulan

What happened:

Thufir and some heavily injured, but miraculously surviving, Atreides men have joined up with a group of Fremen. They are somewhere in the desert cliffs observing more of the same bombings that Paul and Jessica just were. The Fremen and Thufir have a common enemy so right now they have joined forces. The leader of this unit of Fremen tells Thufir that there has been word that Gurney Hallack has joined with the smugglers. However, Thufir is preoccupied with getting his injured men some medical assistance.

Thufir and the Fremen go back and forth with this idea. The Fremen are confused by this request, they basically believe that in the midst of battle if a man is too injured to go on, rather than risk hampering his comrades he should kill himself and offer his water to make the other men stronger.

Thufir and his men are appalled by this. Meanwhile the Fremen are interested in information. They want to confirm that the troops they have been defeating are actually Sardaukar (which Thufir confirms) and the Fremen go on to explain that they have been easily defeating them but remain impressed with their training. They have also captured some of the Harkonnen artillery. Thufir is thunderstruck by all of this casually revealed information, but the Fremen are confirmed to the reader as a planet-wide league of batmen. Poor Leto, if only he had harnessed himself some desert power maybe he wouldn’t be so dead.

After some more talking, one of Thufir’s men dies. Thufir allows the Fremen to take the man’s body for its water, thus forming a water bond between the two groups for the rest of the fighting and securing his men some fremen “protection”. The Fremen are revealed to be using bats for coded communication. This is totally cool b/c this just means that the Fremen know the desert’s secrets. The new party-time bond is broken when more Sardaukar/Harkonnen troops show up. Thufir witnesses the Fremen absolutely decimate the enemy in minutes with ruthless tactics. Hawat, he of the coolest name ever, is suitably impressed. But before he can get some Harkonnen-killing tips from the Fremen, more enemies show up.

Ahh! But it is a trap! Sardaukar troops hit them from behind, killing the Fremen. Thufir barely has time to draw his blade before he is taken out.

Thus the Fremen are revealed to be both unbeatable warriors as well as arrogant idiots. Dichotomies! Perhaps Thufir was just rubbing off on them? Oh snap! Maybe I should lay off Thufir, I mean… he IS really old.

Nahhhh.

At least we know that the Fremen are totally capable of doing what Paul wants them to do for him and that Gurney and Thufir are still alive.

Chapter 25: In which Duncan Idaho is unjustly killed off-screen

Muad’Dib could indeed, see the Future, but you must understand the limits of this power. Think of sight. You have eyes, yet cannot see without light. If you are on the floor of a valley, you cannot see beyond your valley. Just so, Muad’Dib could not always choose to look across the mysterious terrain. He tells us that a single obscure decision of prophecy, perhaps the choice of one word over another, could change the entire aspect of the future. He tells us, “The vision of time is broad, but when you pass through it, time becomes a narrow door.” And always, he fought the temptation to choose a clear, safe course, warning “That path leads ever down into stagnation.”

-from “Arrakis Awakening” by the Princess Irulan

So we are back to Paul and Jessica running around in the desert attempting to escape gigantic flying machines. PSYCHE! It’s just Duncan again. That scamp! Oh, and Idaho has also set off a sub-atomic bomb! Double fun!

The three are joined by Dr. Kynes and they go hiding in a nearby cliff face where the Fremen have created a defensible holding. It turns out to be one of those Imperial testing stations Duke Leto asked about so many chapters ago… but who cares we’re getting shot at.

The Fremen shut down all their machinery in an attempt to hide themselves from Harkonnen sensors while Paul and Jessica have spice coffee with Dr. Kynes. The Fremen refer to Kynes as Liet and the Atreides realize that Kynes is their most needed ally in gaining the support of the Fremen as a whole.

The three discuss politics but most importantly Kynes recognizes Paul as the Duke and tells Paul he can very likely provide him with solid evidence that the Emperor aided the Harkonnen. They also skirt around the Fremen prophecy that seems to indicate that Paul is their coming messiah. Paul exhibits persuasive and charismatic personality.

Meanwhile Duncan is out in the hallway being killed by invading Sardaukar. See, they detected the Fremen machinery before they could shut it down all the way. But Duncan being all brave and noble (ahhh, the lusty hordes!) is protecting his Duke and the Lady Jessica. He warns them through the door and then uses his own body to block the invading troops. The last glimpse we get of him is of his totally bodacious backside as the door slams on it and he is murdered.  Paul and Jessica escape through a hidden door that leads to a passage that Kynes says will further lead them to a hidden ‘thopter. He decides to stay behind because he is ridiculously stupid.

Paul and Jessica run to the hidden ‘thopter, take off, and proceed to fly it straight towards an approaching sand storm in their only option for escape.

I love that Herbert sets us up for good revenge times and then totally doubles back. By removing Kynes and Duncan as protectors he’s isolated Paul and Jessica once more. Couple that with the previous chapter’s info that Gurney is on his way out and Thufir is captured or dead- Paul and Jessica are well and truly without friends or allies. They’re going to have to convince the Fremen to help them without Kynes and they are going to have to protect themselves without Duncan.

WHATEVER WILL THEY DO?

Perhaps they will capitalize on their religious roles? Would that be dishonest?

I don’t know, if you could be a god… would you be?

Ok ok… what if I said I would kill you unless you were a god?

Hold your answer please.

Anyways, poor Duncan. How unjust is it that he is killed behind a door? But, it’s ok ladies and gents… we’ll just bring him back a thousand times. He’s too good looking to let him be all dead. You might have to wait a little while though.

That brings us to the end of Part 6 of the Dune re-read. While you are waiting, mentally trapped in that approaching sandstorm, just repeat the Litany of Fear a few times and read the next five chapters. (26-30) Stop when you get to “Prophecy and prescience…”

See you next time!