A/N: Man, the days go by so fast, I intended to post this on Friday and it's Monday already! Sorry to leave you waiting a whole week with that cliffhanger from the last chapter, haha. But here's another long chapter - the longest so far, actually. Enjoy!

Chani fiddled nervously with the strap of her satchel, chewing on her lower lip in a way that betrayed her stress. Beside her packed fremkit lay her loaded rocket launcher, and her crysknife was strapped to her thigh. She was fully dressed for the open desert, her hair concealed beneath her stillsuit's hood, her filter mask hanging around her neck.

"Maybe nothing will happen", she said. "Maybe we'll be fine, and no one will find us." Her tone was firm, deliberately confident, but she couldn't hide the tension in her voice.

Paul didn't reply. She'd been repeating those words over and over for the past hours, as if saying them out loud helped making them come true. She was trying to reassure herself, and he couldn't blame her.

But he knew she was hoping against hope. He sensed the futility of it. He'd learned not to trust every vision his mind brought to him, but he knew to trust his instincts. This time, his instincts told him, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that there was a very tangible, palpable truth to the future he'd seen. It wasn't a matter of if or maybe – just a matter of how and when.

In his first weeks in the Arrakeen desert, he'd had a lot of these Spice-triggered visions, like waking prescient dreams with his eyes wide open, induced by the new psychoactive substance surrounding him. But after months of constant exposure to Spice, they had become more and more scarce. Visions mostly came to him in his sleep, as they had since his childhood. Perhaps sleep deprivation made his mind more susceptible, he thought. In any case, his intuition told him to consider this one as a warning. The last time he had chosen to ignore his prescience, it had cost twelve Fremen their lives, and nearly cost him his own. There was no ignoring it now. They had to be prepared.

And so, prepared they were, sitting back-to-back in the middle of their small tent, bags packed, armed and ready to leave. They had thrown all their supplies into their fremkits and strapped their water reserves onto them. Paul wore the spare stillsuit Stilgar had left him, which, luckily, turned out to be a near-perfect fit. It had taken him a solid ten minutes to put it on, searing pain flashing through his injuries as he slithered into it as best he could. The thick fabric felt uncomfortable and tight, and his chest and leg burned and throbbed from the slight physical effort. The effects of the injector-pen were wearing off now, making the pain gradually more difficult to ignore, but he found the sense of imminent danger acted as a good distraction. It kept his mind focused. He had no idea how he was supposed to cross the desert when the simple act of standing on his feet set his nerves on fire and made his head spin, but there was no time to worry about it – no point in worrying, either. He supposed the human body could push through pretty much anything if the alternative was death.

After the short period of frenzy that had followed Paul's vision, once all the preparations for a hasty departure had been made, their agitation had given way to a tense, almost unbearable stillness. They had decided not to leave the safety of their tent just yet – just in case, against all odds, Paul turned out to be wrong about what was coming. But they were ready to act, should any Harkonnen get close enough to pose a threat. Chani had but to extend her hand to grab her rocket launcher or her blade. Paul's crysknife was fastened to his back, but he didn't intend to use it if he could avoid it – he knew he wouldn't last a minute in a knife fight. His maula pistol, however, could do quite some damage with minimal effort. He held it in his hand, ready to aim it at any potential intruder.

In the early evening, they'd eaten another ration of canned food, then had agreed to take turns sleeping during the night, one of them resting for two hours while the other stood watch. Under the current circumstances, unsurprisingly, Paul hadn't been able to sleep a wink, and he was fairly sure Chani was even more anxious than him. They had eventually given up trying – so much for that good night's sleep Chani was wishing for, Paul mused. For the past hour, they had been sitting awake together, leaning against each other's back, keeping their voices down to a whisper. They didn't talk much, both absorbed in their thoughts. Paul reviewed all the scenarios that might play out once the vision started to unfold, his mind computing the data with Mentat-like, mathematical logic. He didn't feel good about any of the possibilities. The simple truth was that their situation was critical and their chances slim. If the Beast Rabban wanted to take down Muad'Dib, now was as good an opportunity as he would get.

No. He wasn't going to give Rabban and his forces that pleasure. And he was never going to let them get to Chani. Knowing that he wasn't only protecting himself, but her, too, fuelled his resolve.

His train of thought was interrupted by the faintest ruffling sound.

He straightened his back, all senses on alert. The sound had been brief, almost imperceptible, but he could have sworn it came from outside the tent. Chani sprang to her feet, a hand on the hilt of her knife, giving him confirmation that he hadn't imagined it.

"What was that?" she whispered, crouched down next to him. He shook his head, listening intently.

"It could have been an animal", Chani said.

"Could have been." His tone lacked conviction.

One, two minutes passed. Paul realised he was clutching his pistol with all his strength, forced himself to relax his fingers. The sound of his own heartbeat echoed in his ears. Chani remained perfectly still, eyes fixed at the tent's entrance.

Another sound. Muffled, distant, but unmistakable – a human voice, uttering words in a language he couldn't understand, but had heard often enough to be able to identify: the Harkonnen battle language.

His eyes met Chani's, wide with shock and disbelief.

"Someone's here", she said frantically. "Someone's right outside. How – how the hell did they find us?"

"I don't know", he murmured, swallowing on a dry throat. "They must've been scouring the area for days. Or maybe they saw us out there at some point. Maybe we got careless." He paused as the distant voice spoke again, deep and guttural. "Doesn't matter now. They're here."

"We can't just go out there", Chani murmured. "We'd be killed the second our heads emerge from the sand."

"I suggest we stay put and wait to see what happens. Either they'll find the tent, or they won't. If they do…" He lifted his maula pistol. "…we'll have to act quickly. They don't know we're ready for them. We have the element of surprise in our favour."

Chani pulled her own pistol from her belt and cocked it.

"If I shoot a missile, I'll attract the attention of every Harkonnen in the sector", she said. Paul nodded. A maula pistol had the advantage of being a near-silent weapon.

The voice rose again, followed by another – then the beeping sound of a detector.

Paul froze, felt Chani do the same. If the Harkonnens used a motion detector, perhaps they had a chance to escape it by holding perfectly still. If they used thermal technology, however… At night, the temperatures in the desert dropped enough for those detectors to be effective. Their body temperature was no doubt higher than the outside atmosphere.

His fears were confirmed a short moment later, when they heard the rustling of sand behind the door.

Someone was digging, tunnelling toward them.

They lifted their guns in unison.

There was nowhere to hide now.

The layer of sand concealing the tent's entrance was shovelled aside, revealing a blurry silhouette behind the milky fabric. A second later, the sharp tip of a sword slashed across the sphincter door, cutting a wide opening into it.

A Harkonnen soldier peeked into the tent, sword raised.

Before he could make a move, Paul pulled his pistol's trigger, firing a poisoned dart right into the man's neck. He staggered backwards and fell out of view, soon replaced by a second individual that rushed toward the tent, a towering black shape against the starry sky. He didn't even get a chance to get to the entrance – Chani fired a well-aimed shot at his head, killing him on the spot.

Paul caught a glimpse of a third silhouette kneeling next to the door, lasgun pointed at the inside of the tent – then a flash of white as Chani, with impeccable reflex, slashed the man's arm with her blade. The man howled in pain and jerked his hand away, drops of crimson spattering onto the tent's canvas.

"Stay here", Chani ordered.

And then, before Paul could react, she leapt forward through the entrance and outside the stilltent, disappearing into the night.

"CHANI!" he yelled. He scrambled to his feet and moved to follow her, momentarily forgetting about his injuries. He put his full weight on his right leg, and immediately regretted it as agony shot through it like a bolt of lightning. Specks of grey flickered across his eyes. He let out a cry and fell back to his knees, cursing his body for betraying him. He crawled toward the door and peered outside, holding his pistol with both hands to steady his grip.

He recognised Chani's slender frame in the moonlight, her elegant, effortless moves as she fought two Harkonnens simultaneously, her knife smeared in blood. By contrast, her opponents looked slow and clumsy, their heavy suits impeding their movements, their peripheral vision obscured by their helmets. It didn't take her long to overcome them, killing one, then the other with a few precise strokes.

From the corner of his eye, Paul saw a shadow move to his right – another Harkonnen, darting from behind a rock. He lunged at Chani, sword raised for the kill. She whirled around; Paul fired two darts in rapid succession. The first buried itself in the man's leg, the second in his upper back. He stumbled and fell face down in the sand.

Then the night was shrouded in silence again, Arrakis' two moons frosting the lifeless bodies of their enemies in silver light. Chani scanned her surroundings, then strode back to him, her eyes glistening with fierce triumph, a predatory smirk on her lips.

"I think we got them", she said. Her smile faded. "But reinforcements will be here soon. They know where we are now."

"Yeah." Paul grabbed the nearest fremkit and handed it to Chani through the torn door. "They'll be back. We need to leave."

Once they had gathered all of their equipment, Chani extended her hand to help him up. He took a deep breath and hoisted himself to his feet again, this time careful not to lean on his injured leg too much, then climbed out of the stilltent. He struggled to find his balance, fighting a sudden dizziness as his body got accustomed to the upright position.

He watched as Chani collapsed the tent, folded it neatly and attached it to her fremkit. She threw the backpack on her shoulders, sheathed her bloody knife and slipped her maula pistol back into her belt. Paul secured his own fremkit on his back and looked up at the sky. Judging by the moons' position, they still had a couple of hours before sunrise, before the temperatures got too high to travel.

As he pulled his mask over his face, he remembered the last time he'd found himself in a similar situation – months ago, after he and his mother crash-landed their 'thopter into a sea of dunes, stranded in the open sands, lost and grieving and with nowhere to go. Time had passed, he wasn't a stranger to the desert anymore, but he felt as trapped as he had that day, exposed and surrounded by unseen danger.

"All right." Chani walked up to him, her paracompass in the palm of her hand. Her voice came muffled though her filter mask. She pointed at the horizon to their left. "Those rocks stretch east for kilometres. We should follow them, stay out of worm territory. You're in no condition to sandwalk, much less ride."

"You're probably right", he admitted.

"Are you sure you can do this?"

"Yes", he lied. Chani gazed at him, eyebrows raised, then took his arm and draped it around her shoulders.

"Hold onto me", she said. He did as he was told and took a few tentative steps with her, trying to keep as much weight off his right leg as he could. Each step hurt, and he felt out of breath before he even got started, but he didn't have a choice.

"Thank you", he said through gritted teeth. "Let's go."

• • •

Guided by the needle of her paracompass, Chani led the way through the scape of jagged rocks as the sky slowly turned from black to grey, the stars fading in the dim light of impeding dawn. To their left, in the distance, the dark mass of the Shield Wall stood out against the horizon; to their right, dunes stretched as far as the eye could see, swept by a soft morning breeze.

Once again, she cast a worried look at Paul, who hobbled beside her, his unblinking stare focused on an invisible spot in front of him. Once again, she wondered what kind of tremendous inner strength Paul was summoning to be able to keep going the way he did.

His pale face was covered in sweat, his jaw clenched, lips pressed together in a thin line. He had pulled down his mask to ease his breathing, but it was still raspy and laboured, punctuated by an occasional cough or suppressed groan. He was limping heavily, resting his weight on her more and more as time went on. Her left arm was wrapped around his waist, her right hand holding his as he leaned on her shoulders for support. He squeezed her hand so hard it hurt, clinging onto her for dear life. She could sense he was reaching his limit – but then she had sensed it for the past hour, and yet he remained unflinching, pushing through pain and exhaustion with remarkable endurance.

She'd asked him several times if he needed a rest, but he'd merely shaken his head in obstinate silence, not even stopping to look at her. She had eventually decided not to break his concentration anymore – whatever mental resources he was drawing on, they seemed to require his full focus. Meanwhile, her eyes were all around, on the lookout for any sign of enemy presence. So far, everything had been quiet, but she wasn't fooling herself – as soon as the sun rose and visibility increased, the Harkonnens would be back looking for them. The rocks offered some shelter, and the Fremen knew how to hide in the desert, but she still felt terribly exposed. They hadn't covered nearly enough distance yet to be out of the Harkonnens' area of scrutiny.

She felt Paul stumble next to her and shifted her attention back to him. He abruptly pulled his arm off her shoulders and bent forward, ragged breaths turning into an uncontrollable fit of coughing. He dropped to his hands and knees, gasping for air. Chani squatted down next to him, a soothing hand on his back. His whole body was shaking from exertion as he struggled to take a breath, eyes shut tightly against the pain.

"You okay?" she asked once the coughing stopped, leaving him panting. He shook his head.

"No", he said hoarsely. "I can't… Shit. I need a break."

Chani perceived the frustration in his tone. She rolled her eyes. He actually sounded annoyed with himself.

"You're way past needing a break", she retorted. "You look like you're about to pass out. Sit down."

She shrugged her fremkit off her back and watched Paul slump onto the sand with concern, noticing a trickle of red blood on his chin. She rummaged through her bag and handed him the vial containing the herbal mixture they used as a painkiller.

"Here, drink this", she said. He took a swig of the potion, then a few sips from his stillsuit's catchpockets, trying to steady his erratic breathing. He touched two fingers to the corner of his mouth, eyed the smear of crimson on his glove warily.

Chani gave him a moment to collect himself and took a few steps around. A crack in the bluffs caught her eye, a few metres uphill – a narrow, vertical fissure immersed in darkness, hidden beneath a rocky overhang.

She strode back to Paul and pointed at her discovery.

"We can rest over there. That escarpment will shield us from view."

Paul lifted a haggard gaze at her. He looked drained of every last ounce of energy. His dark-ringed eyes travelled to the spot she was pointing at, and he gave her a weak nod. She grabbed him by the arm as carefully as she could to help him to his feet, felt him clutch her shoulder as he pulled himself up with a groan.

"Ow, damn it", he hissed. "My leg's killing me."

"It's okay." She paused, considered her own words. "No, actually, it's not okay", she corrected. "I should've stopped you a lot sooner. You're too stubborn for your own good, Paul Atreides."

He managed a strained chuckle.

Chani half-escorted, half-carried him to the crevasse, which, upon closer inspection, was deeper than it looked from a distance, meandering over two metres into the rock. In the back, it grew wider, forming a tiny cave, too low to stand upright in, but large enough to settle down comfortably for a while. Perfect, she thought. In there, they would be protected from the sun, the heat of the day, and enemy eyes.

Paul slid to the ground and laid down on his back without another word, arms wrapped around his ribcage. Chani pushed their gear into a dark corner, stretched her aching muscles and sat down next to him, facing the crevasse's entrance. She felt more than a little tired herself, but someone had to keep watch, and for the next few hours, it sure wasn't going to be Paul.

She heard him take a series of slow, controlled breaths, using what she knew to be one of his Bene Gesserit mind-body techniques, and soon felt him relax, his chest rising and falling at a regular pace. Before too long, she could tell he was asleep. She stared at him for a long moment in the greyish twilight of the small cave. He stirred from time to time, his eyes moving beneath closed lids. She wondered what he was dreaming about, and if they were even dreams at all. His prescience fascinated her as much as it terrified her. She wasn't sure whether to consider it a gift, or a curse. Paul certainly saw it both ways. But his visions had saved their lives back at the camp, that much was undeniable. Without them, they would have been taken entirely by surprise, and very likely killed.

Perhaps he'd wake up to more vivid fragments of the future to guide them forward. Perhaps, just perhaps, his subconscious somehow knew the way out of this mess they found themselves in.

Watching the first timid rays of sun creep up from behind the horizon, she thought: Because I sure as hell don't.

To be continued in...
Chapter 9: Mothership