Face Dancer

Original series

In Dune Messiah, the Tleilaxu Face Dancer Scytale conspires with the Bene Gesserit, Spacing Guild, and House Corrino to remove Paul Atreides from the Imperial throne. Scytale orchestrates a plot centered on the ghola Hayt, a reincarnation of Duncan Idaho programmed to destroy Paul psychologically or kill him via an implanted command. Scytale also kills and replaces the Fremen girl Lichna to infiltrate Paul's household, but Paul's Bene Gesserit training detects the substitution.

All schemes fail, though Scytale's final ploy offers Paul a fully realized ghola of Chani in exchange for abdication; Paul refuses and kills Scytale. Over 3,500 years later in God Emperor of Dune, Face Dancers kill and replace nearly everyone in the Ixian embassy on Arrakis in an assassination attempt on Leto II Atreides. Though more imperceptible than before, Leto and Reverend Mother Anteac detect the impostors through Bene Gesserit observation techniques.

Another 1,500 years later in Heretics of Dune, perfected Face Dancers copy the memories and consciousness of their targets, becoming virtually undetectable except to the Bene Gesserit. They begin replacing Imperial leaders, but the plan fails as the Face Dancers come to believe they are the copied individuals, eluding their programmed loyalty. In Chapterhouse: Dune, Duncan Idaho observes that Daniel and Marty resemble Face Dancers but are atypically autonomous; they later confirm they are independent Face Dancers who absorbed enough memories to make their own decisions.

Sequels

In the 2006 novel Hunters of Dune, the original leaders of the Lost Tleilaxu are dead, secretly replaced by their own advanced Face Dancers—shapeshifters so perfect that even the Bene Gesserit cannot detect them. Their leader, Khrone, outwardly serves the mysterious Daniel and Marty in their quest for universal control, but he pursues his own hidden agenda. Khrone’s Face Dancers have quietly taken over numerous power centers across the Empire. Daniel and Marty are later revealed to be new forms of the ancient thinking machine leader Omnius and his lieutenant Erasmus.

In the 2007 finale Sandworms of Dune, Khrone and his autonomous Face Dancers plot to overthrow their machine masters. They secretly control Ix, manipulate the Spacing Guild and the New Sisterhood, and set them up for defeat. Just as Khrone claims dominance over the machine empire, a smug Erasmus triggers a fail-safe built into all enhanced Face Dancers, instantly killing Khrone and every one of his minions across the universe.