BOOK THREE - CHAPTER SEVEN
 

For the first time in my life, I had found a kindred spirit: trapped by his past, being forced into a frighteningly unstable future, unable - and to a certain extent unwilling - to stop, to crawl out of the stream. Make no mistake: we both did have that option, but understood the alternative to our acceptance of the position that had been prepared for us, and shrunk back from the horrors we anticipated on that path. I disobeyed the order to kill him because I understood he could accept the position that I had been intended for. He became "the shortening of the way", preparing the universe for the one who came after. However, my vision told me that the intended course would be followed only in part. My "death" allowed me the freedom of movement to rectify this potential mistake.
-Count Hasimir Fenring, on his death bed, in conversation with his wife-
 

Idaho, Scytale, Leto and Murbella were led into the throne room simultaneously. Neither a sietch filled with Bene Gesserit and Honoured Matres nor the group of Teg-gholas protecting the Leto and his companions had been sufficient to effect their escape from the Promethean troopers.

"Welcome," their host said after the guests' escorts had left the throne room, closing the gigantic, heavily ornamented doors behind them.

Leto froze in his tracks. That voice! I recognise that voice! Buried deep within the memories of his past, this same voice resounded, warning him not to continue with his Golden Path. The voice had been much older then, having been broken by the desert, the unforgiving passage of time and billions of deaths worth of guilt. That day in the desert, Leto had been superior, both physically and mentally, the strength of Shai-Hulud and the wisdom of millions at his command. Right now however, Leto felt that the situation had been reversed, and a profound fear of what might happen next filled his mind.

Leto didn't need to ask who this powerful warlord was, so what would have been a question was now a statement of fact.

"Father."

**********

"You're a father!"

The sounds had grown from muffled and soft to sharp and loud. It had also suddenly become a lot colder. Air rushed into his lungs, painful air cutting into the delicate tissue, expelling the warm liquid from within. He found it was difficult to open his eyes, but something told him that he should.

The first blurry images to reach his retina were odd, much different from the dreams he had been used to up to that point. He remembered ... nothing. But the new impressions were definitely different. A big mound of a pinkish substance, soft and safe; a greenish liquid with a sharp smell; many tubes, rods and other devices leading from everywhere to many other places ...

And then: a voice. Controlled expulsions of air to generate sounds carrying a specific meaning within a certain context, if perceived by appropriately configured beings. "His beginnings are humble, but his deeds will be great," it sounded from far away. "He will save us all."

"Come, Hasimir," another, more melodic voice said, closer this time. "Come look at our son."

**********

"My son. After all this time, we meet again."

It can't be!, Duncan thought. The man sitting before him on the throne, his body covered by patches of silver - his many years with Leto allowed him to recognise this as the skin of sandtrout - and strange mechanical devices, looked, and sounded, terribly familiar. "Paul!"

"Hello, Duncan."

Duncan was speechless for a moment, but quickly regained his voice. "You died! Your body was taken to the deathstills. Leto showed me your water many times."

"That wasn't me."

"You're a ghola," Murbella said.

"Indeed. And I haven't been called Paul in a very long time. My people call me Adros."

"The author of the Prometheus Manifesto!"

"Very good, Mother Superior."

Leto decided to ask his most pressing question right away. "Why did you come back?"

Adros laughed. "You don't waste any time, do you, son? I was brought back to repair the damage the original Paul had caused, and to control the immense damage you would do."

"My Golden Path saved humanity!", Leto said.

Suddenly, Adros was enraged. "You failed! You failed, my son. Your inability to properly execute your plan; your arrogance, which prevented you from repairing what was rotten about it, your cowardice, which stopped you from doing what was really necessary; your weakness, which made you fly straight into your adversaries" trap; your egoism and selfglorification, which made you disregard your priorities - you haven't saved humanity from itself, you helped destroy it! Yes, child, you doomed mankind."

**********

"If this plan fails, mankind will be doomed." His father, Hasimir Fenring, had said this to his wife, and Paul had accidentally overheard it last night.

What plan? What was it that threatened humanity? These questions occupied Paul's mind while his mother led him through a tunnel he had never been in before, a dark passage deep inside the old complex of buildings that had been his home all his life - all twelve years of it.

Margot Fenring led young Paul into a dimly lit room with gray plastered walls, and ordered him to sit down on the chair that had been placed in one of the corners. Paul immediately noted the pervasive smell of Melange in the room - a heavy, almost oppressive cinnamon-like smell mixed with the acrid stench of damp, rotting waste. Over the years his body had been conditioned to tolerate greater and greater amounts of the Spice by way of the constitution of his diet - Paul suspected his parents wanted him to experience Fremen culture in all its aspects, not just from words in texts and images from filmbooks about Arrakis and its inhabitants which constituted such a large part of his education -, but at that moment he was rather overwhelmed by the strong sensation of vertigo the high dose of Melange induced in him.

"Is this part of a Fremen ritual?", Paul asked her, but she did not react.

"Do not resist," Margot said while she tied his arms and legs to the chair with shigawire, which he knew would grow tighter at his slightest movement, and were capable of cutting deep into his wrists if enough force was applied. After having checked the bonds, Margot walked over to the opposite corner of the room where she put a small package down on the floor. She returned to Paul's corner, bent over him, pointed back to the package and whispered: "More death for when the dying begins."

She moved away, and just before she exited the room she turned once more and said: "Deep down inside, you have always known that you are not my son."

The door closed behind her and the room went dark - now everything was silent around Paul, making his own confused thoughts appear that much louder. Not her son? What does she mean? I've lived with her and father all my life? Was I adopted? And why did she mention death? Am I going to die here?

"Mother? Father? Can you hear me?", he said, calmly at first, but louder and with much more despair in his voice when he repeated it.

Three days and nights he was left there in the darkness, devoid of all sensory stimulation. He knew he could not risk falling asleep - because of the shigawire bonds, any involuntary movement could lethally injury him. His mouth was dry, his stomach growled and his entire body ached from having been in the same position for too long, but he had resolved to persevere - to prove his strength.

His mother's comments - If she isn't my mother, who is she? - had planted the seeds of doubt in his mind, and the resulting growth of confused introspection mercilessly dominated his thoughts.

Suddenly, the door opposite to Paul opened, and two men entered. The lights came on, dimly illuminating the room. One of the men was tall and proud, with strong features that somehow triggered unclear memories in Paul's mind. The other was much shorter, and grossly fat, his enormous belly supported by antigravity devices. Dark memories just beyond the horizon of his perception cast their shadow over Paul's thoughts then, and he instantly hated the fat man, even though he could not say why.

The fat man raised his right hand, and it was at that moment that Paul noticed he had a weapon. A burst of energy lept forth from the gun, hitting the taller man in the back. The man whinced with pain, but did not fall. Another burst made him slump to the ground, and a third made him fall flat on his back.

Paul wanted to jump up, run over to the package in the corner - which he now believed to contain a weapon -, and kill the fat man for attacking the other in such a cowardly manner. He could hear the tall man's strained breathing, the sound of suffering and approaching death infuriating Paul. The fat man fired again, this time killing the other.

"Father!", Paul yelled. He managed to undo his ties, the shigawire cutting deeply into his wrists and ankles, and ran to the corner where the package lay. He opened it, and found a strange-looking, milky white knife inside, with graceful curves offset by razor-sharp notches.

He plunged the knife into the enormous mound of flesh that was the fat man, and felt the life leave the gross body. The kill - the first time he had taken another's life - felt strangely satisfying to him.

After the fat man had stopped breathing, Paul's adrenalin-induced high subsided, and he collapsed. As he lay there bleeding, the fatigue, thirst and hunger collaborating with the sensory deprivation, his doubt-filled introspection and the death he felt approaching, made him understand.

"I am Paul Atreides," he said to himself, and he knew it to be true.

**********

"It is the truth! All your damnable Golden Path did was perpetuate the destruction caused by House Atreides," Adros yelled. "Your goal should have been to educate humanity to take care of itself, to teach it expansion of intellect and diversion of life. Instead you taught them fear - fear of you, of leaders, of life."

"That was the point!" , Leto returned. "Besides, your own actions - the things you had your troops do - teach exactly the same lesson!"

"You misunderstand, dear son. I do not teach anymore. I simply remove those parts of the body carrying the disease."

**********

"Humanity is diseased," Hasimir Fenring said, the gravity of his claim mirrored by the troubled expression on his face.

They were in the Count's private quarters, resting after a long day of strenuous excercise. Paul felt his wrists - the wounds he had sustained several years earlier had healed, but the recently installed cybernetic implants that enhanced the performance of his nervous system still itched sometimes.

Today, Count Fenring would reveal the final details of his plan to his protégé. "The Sisterhood intended me to be their Kwisatz Haderach. A ... physical deformity and the psychological consequences this had prevented me from realising my destiny, as you know, but my visions remained - a byproduct of the witches' genetic tampering that your original incarnation inherited as well."

"What did your visions show you?", Paul asked.

"Some of the same things the visions you've been having of late have taught you."

"The cloud-darkness of holy judgment."

"Indeed. And more: the rule of your son will deteriorate quite rapidly after your daughter dies."

"In what way?"

"I did not dare immerse myself in the visions too deeply - many dangers lurk in the darkness, only some of which have to do with my own mental health. I strongly urge you to practice similar restraint - the lessons the life of your original incarnation teach us should be sufficiently persuasive."

Paul considered this for a moment. My predecessor? I made the mistake of letting the visions guide my life, which were tricking me into believing there was no way to avoid the Jihad, and Kralizec beyond that. The Sisterhood trapped me - their breeding scheme and their manipulations created a teleological structure which forced me onto a certain path. They intended me to be the tool with which they would stop humanity's advance to self-annihilation, but I ended up expediting the destruction. I could have removed myself from the path, but they would have found a new Kwisatz Haderach.

The Kwisatz Haderach ... the Messiah they created for the universe's benefit - and their own. The tool with which to test humanity's human-ness ... I failed at that task!

"I was not the Kwisatz Haderach," Paul said, his conclusion definite.

With a grin on his face, the Count agreed: "We are very much alike in that respect."

After coughing loudly, he continued. "My supposed death allowed me the freedom of movement I needed to prepare my ... our plan."

"Did no one notice?"

"No. My friend - and whatever opinion you may hold of Shaddam, he was my friend - had died over two decades earlier, and there was no one left on Salusa that I considered to be anything more than an tolerable nuisance," Fenring said, a hint of sadness entering his voice while speaking of the former Padisha Emperor. "Except my wife, of course," he added quickly, jokingly looking over his shoulder to see if she was perhaps there, listening.

"With some of my closest allies, I left that planet and joined the Prometheans, with whom I had been communicating about certain matters for many decades."

"Prometheans? That is what the people who have been training and educating me call themselves."

"Yes."

"Who are they?"

"They will tell you of their own volition, in due time. All you need to know right now is that they and their ancestors have been expecting your arrival for many millennia. They've been preparing this planet for the execution of a plan that will save the universe, rebuilding it after the disaster and keeping it well-hidden from those who had scattered to elsewhere."

"Why?"

"An ancient prophecy compelled them to do so. They claim the founder is the father of your bloodline: Atreus. He was visited in a dream by two apparitions - an old man and a young boy - who told him the horrors his descendants would have to endure, and, more tragic still, would cause. He wanted to make sure his sin - the one that compelled Thyestes to curse your family - would not doom all of mankind."

"Why was Terra chosen as the place for this?"

"Don't you think it's poetic" The birth of humanity - and thus the genesis of its demise, for life is merely the onset of death - and its rebirth will occur in the same location! An added advantage is the fact very few people in the Empire know where to look for this place."

Circles, Paul realised. Here, as it is everywhere else, events circle back in on themselves. Time is moving in circles, the past affecting the future and the other way around.

"Soon, you will marry my wife's daughter - Aerope, she is called," Fenring said, changing the subject.

This surprised Paul. He knew that this wife had been picked for him, and, having heard of her intelligence and beauty, he did not mind this is how it had to be, but he had also found out about the composition of her family tree. "She's also the daughter of ..."

"Indeed. Well, she's a ghola bred from the same cellular material - the original was killed."

"Why?"

"The timing wasn't right."

"Still, her father-"

"Remember that you are part Harkonnen as well," Fenring interrupted sharply.

"My mother," Paul realised, his voice sullen.

"There's no shame in being of that house - its members can be found amongst my ancestors as well. The bloodline contains a few very valuable elements - my wife made sure many of those would manifest themselves in your future wife. Reciprocal breeding with her will provide your progeny with many excellent and - in the context of our plan - quite necessary qualities."

"Aerope ... that name sounds familiar."

"As it should. It is a name from your family's distant past."

Paul tried to recall the origin of the name, initially with little success, untill suddenly the solution presented itself to his consciousness. "Of course: she was Atreus' wife!"

"Exactly."

"The fact you chose this name for her - is that a sign of providence on your part or proof that this plan of yours was hatched long ago?"

"Yes." Fenring chuckled, but his laugh quickly degenerated into a nasty-sounding cough.

"Friend! You need to rest," Paul said, the concern apparent in his voice. "You should go back to bed."

"I know, I will," the Count said, making dismissive gestures with his hands. Carefully and slowly, he rose from his seat and walked out onto the balcony, admiring the dark gold and red of the sunset contrasting with the green and brown of the hills in the distance. He realised this would be his last evening. He coughed once more. "I need to rest."

**********

"You knew that neither Ix nor Tleilax would rest before having found a way to implement their plans," Adros said.

"I had need of their services," Leto answered. "They did nothing I forbade them to do."

"You could have given the Empire navigation machines and synthetic Spice yourself. The method you chose ensured the survival of the Ixians and the Tleilaxu."

"Why is this such a bad thing?", Duncan interjected.

I can see my son's hand in his every action, Adros thought, observing the ghola. What a waste of such a talented Mentat!

"Those were Tleilaxu and Ixians that assaulted Garimi and her group on Terra, Duncan!", Adros explained. "Ix has ignored the edicts of the Butlerian Jihad ever since their rise to prominence. The fact these edicts were embedded within a widespread religious system caused the Ixians to be social outcasts; the human need for expansion of power and ever-present sloth ensured their continued usefulness. Understand this well: technology is dangerous. In its purest form, it is a natural extension of the human body - the ability to use tools is what makes us human, even. However, each tool creates its own space of limitation and stimulation: tools force the user to do one thing and not the other. This means that without the support of a solid ethical system, tools will control the user rather than the other way around."

"There is no need to educate me in the power balance of technology and human, father," Leto said.

"That is where I fear you're mistaken, child. In your no-chamber, you hid a number of writings which made it very clear to me that you had absolutely no idea what you were doing."

The Rakis Hoard, Murbella realised. What was in there changed the Sisterhood forever. Sifting the lies, manipulative rhetoric and half-truths from the valuable material managed to drive several Archivists mad - literally.

Adros continued. "More than once, you casually explain that the idea of a convergence of technology and man amuses you. I can tell you that being amused by such things is the most moronic thing one can do."

Leto started to speak, but was violently interrupted by Adros.

"Look at me! Do you understand what you see before you?"

Duncan did. He saw past the improved reflexes, the increased strength and data processing capacity, but also understood the terrible tragedy, the sadness underneath -the small prey trapped in an enormous web of dependency structures, in that unfortunate place only because of the necessity forced upon it by the rules of life and evolution itself. Duncan saw Paul, still pinned down by his past, as he had been so many centuries ago on Arrakis, whe he had been inable to stop the terrible Jihad.

Adros had allowed his audience a few moments to reflect, but resumed speaking, glaring angrily at Leto. "The Tleilaxu would never allow themselves to be tainted by the machine-makers of Ix. That's what you thought, wasn't it? You, who wielded religion like a sword, cutting off the head of anyone who failed to bow to your godhood, failed to understand this about religious fanaticism: whatever revulsion, belief or rule of conduct might find its ground in and grow from a certain ideological system, the prophecy that is always the centrepiece of such a system has the power to uproot such saplings."

**********

Where lies the root of this tragedy?, Paul wondered. Everything that has happened - to me, my family, the human race; how did it commence? Why did it have to be this way?

Paul stood on the balcony looking towards the hills, and swept his gaze to his right towards a clearing in the woods, where a small shuttle was scheduled to land soon. Margot Fenring would arrive, bringing with her her daughter, Aerope - "the seed of a new mankind", as the Count had described her.

A new chapter will begin today, Paul thought. Just like the very first chapter also began here.

He panned his view along the vista again, taking in the atmosphere of the place. The history that wanders around on these hills, the unbroken chain of generations retreating into the past represented by these woods - life begetting death begetting life: inspiring! The beauty of nature has such evocative power!

The primal aspect of this controlled chaos, the force that governs it, is erotic: an interchange of power expressing the most fundamental reality of life. Everything that happens is the result of such processes.

In the distance, a small vessel approached over a hilltop - a dropship carrying his future wife.

How very Bene Gesserit of Margot to choose the hill her husband was buried on to pass over during her approach today, Paul thought, appreciating the hidden meaning his surrogate mother always managed to inject into so many aspects of her life.

The dropship descended onto the clearing, clouds of dust being blown upward by its thrusters. The door opened, and she emerged.

There she is, Paul said to himself. The daughter of the man who almost killed the original Paul. He immediately wondered why this sudden shift of perspective had to emerge in his mind. Had he not been looking forward to her arrival?

My mother was also an Harkonnen, Paul reminded himself. That makes me part Harkonnen. Seeing Aerope's beauty as she approached the house, another slight shift of perspective occured. How can a royal House which had spawned a plethora of ugly males produce such stunningly attractive females?

Paul could see a look of anticipation in Aerope's eyes as she walked up the stairs that led to the main entrance of the house, and this filled Paul with sadness. I might never be able to give her what she wants, he realised. The memory of my Chani is simply too powerful. And she's a Harkonnen.

I'm a Harkonnen!, he immediately chastised himself. I should not let either my personal past or my ancestry overpower my sense of duty. This is exactly what doomed the original Paul - he could not overcome the forces that had shaped him.

As he watched Aerope approach him from across the balcony, her smile betraying her excitement with their first meeting, Paul once more felt as if he was being swept away in a powerful stream.

**********

"A powerful force is building which, when unleashed, will sweep away all in its path," Adros said. Looking at Murbella, he continued: "The cloud-darkness of holy judgment will be a terrible stream that will carry with it all you and your kind have built up over the millennia. This stream was unleashed once before, but could be contained to a single planet - a planet that will provide the soil for new growth."

"Isn't there a way to avert this disaster?", Murbella asked.

"There is always a way," Adros answered, "but I will not show it to you, nor will I travel it. A new form of life will be given a chance. The downward spiral needs to be bent around. It's time something changed."

**********

"It is time, my love," Paul said. It was late in the afternoon, and long shadows lay across the contents of his wife's private quarters. A deep yellow glow engulfed the room, a soft, warm breeze playing with the curtains framing the open window overlooking the garden.

"Do not say such things when you don't mean them, Paul," Aerope answered. She knew this day had to come, and she had feared it ever since she learned of the plan her father and her mate had constructed.

"There are many different ways in which one can love another."

"I know this, but it is quite clear you are unable to love me the way I love you."

"I apologise deeply if I have caused you grief in any way, but know that I do love you."

Over the years, Aerope had learnt to live with the fact he still loved the Fremen who had been his wife in another lifetime. His ghola body had never felt Chani's touch, but still the memories of many a kiss or caress lingered in his thoughts.

Aerope had not expected to develop these feelings for the husband that had been appointed to her, yet she did, and the rejection she had to endure day after day, mild though it was, had not diminished her love - rather, it had strengthened it, making it painful for her to be around him, knowing that she would never experience his love. In the ten years they had been together, he had given her three children, but having access to his body without having his mind dedicated to her left her feeling even worse. Still, out of loyalty to her father she endured her pain and stayed with Paul: she knew how much depended on the successful unfolding of the plan.

A new stage of that plan had to commence today. For the most part of the time it took for both of them to travel downward, descending staircases and riding elevators deep into their ever-expanding underground complex, she remained silent, pondering the drastic changes her mind and body would be submitted to. Finally, she addressed her husband.

"Explain it to me one more time, Paul."

"The procedure? You know what will happen to us."

"But why is it necessary?"

"The path my son has chosen is a wise one - in principle. We will emulate its strong points, and improve upon its weaknesses."

His son, Aerope thought. He doesn't often show it, but he's concerned. Concerned about what he did to him - the legacy he left him, both the genetic and the political aspect of it -, and what has yet to happen to the boy.

She understood the technical aspects of what was about to happen to them: similar to the fate Paul's son Leto had accepted, she and Paul would be saturated with the Spice, every cell permeated by the precious substance. A small worm, smuggled from Arrakis during the Harkonnen fief and kept alive underground all that time, would be forced to enter its larva stage. Their bodies would be covered in the sandtrout.

"You said Leto will slowly transform into a sandworm. Will that happen to us?"

"No. We will receive cybernetic implants which will mediate in the symbiosis between human and sandtrout, as well as an appropriately configured neural network to aid our mind in absorbing and managing the Ancestral Memory the saturation with the Spice and the symbiosis with the sandtrout will trigger. We will retain our humanoid appearance - the plan demands it."

"The breeding programm."

"Exactly. However, you won't have to carry any more children. That part of your task has been completed."

A short, but awkward silence followed.

"Will we live forever?", Aerope asked.

"No. Everything needs to come to an end at some point."

"Including House Atreides."

"In a way, yes. That is what my name change signifies: a new name to mark the beginning of the end, as well as the beginning of something new."

"Circles."

"I understand your fascination with that shape - I feel this myself. Just be sure to prevent a devolving of this fascination into an adherence to Zensufi beliefs. I will divorce you if that happens," he joked, trying to break the tension.

They stepped into the cavern that housed the worm, the Spice and the machinery that would transform them completely over the following six months.

That day, Paul Atreides died, and Adros was born - he took the first step in accepting the role that would make him reshape the universe.

**********

"The Bene Gesserit have played an important role in the development of humanity in the past millennia, reshaping history, religion and politics in the service of a greater goal. They used these things and themselves as tools, more than once deluding themselves into believing they had actually obtained full control over those tools. This is what fed their arrogance, and their arrogance caused their carelessness, their reliance on odds that carried too much risk.

However, the role of the Bene Gesserit has not been played out yet. Duncan, despite the rather heartless way in which you departed from Terra, something I don't hold you responsible for," Adros said, looking at Leto, "your mind might be put at ease by the knowledge that Garimi and her group are safe: they have found my underground base. They are well-protected there: no one will be able to find them. The grandchildren of their and my children will emerge in a hundred years, and start over. Isn't that in line with what you originally intended, Duncan?"

Idaho tried to understand these remarks, his mental searches turning up only very vague memories of what his intentions had been when he left Chapter House in the no-ship what seemed like a lifetime ago. Garimi, the Rabbi and their companions were easier to recall.

"Will those Tleilaxu not find them?", Duncan asked.

"The ones that hunted them down are mindless drones - they were there for one purpose, and one purpose only. They've done what they came there to do, and this had nothing to do with Garimi and her group. This is why they were allowed to escape."

"What were the drones there for?", Murbella asked, remembering Garimi. She was a talented one. It was a shame she felt compelled to leave Chapter House.

"You will learn soon enough," Adros replied. "All you need to know now is that Ix and Tleilax will know only a short time of prosperity. "Mabak Ghisharat" will be no more than a death-spasm."

I hope I'm correct about this, Adros thought. My vision is so unclear about what is to happen next, and I dare not immerse myself in the vision too deeply.

Thinking of what he thought was yet to happen, and realising the necessity of those events within the frame of events he had chosen, Paul felt sadness and anger overcome him.

**********

Anger and sadness flared up in Adros' mind. Despite the fact he had always claimed he did not love her in the most fundamental sense of the word, Aerope's impending death was having a profound effect on him.

Her cybernetic implants had been taken off line, and a poison had been administered. After having been alive for longer than any other lifeform except Adros himself, Aerope would finally be able to taste the gentle release of death.

"Force yourself to not transform the poison," Adros told her. "Let it spread through your body, allow it to give you the rest you so covet."

As he watched the life flowing from her, he struggled to keep his emotions under control. I must be strong - for her sake. "Ignore the voices that scream out to you. They cannot harm you, and they will be silent soon."

Sooner than Adros had expected, it was done. Alone, he took her body up to the hill where her adoptive father lay buried. It was a beatiful, clear day, and several dozen kilometres away he could see the scorched earth where the no-ship had been resting up until several days earlier, his bionics amplifying the image.

They are still out there, wandering around, trying to build a life for themselves. Soon, they will find my base. This will be their salvation,as well as the hope of a new beginning for the human race.

He looked up to the sky. I must leave soon, and join my army. We will travel to Chapter House. It is there that the processes that have dominated the universe for so long will finally converge.

Your help was instrumental in the execution of the plan, sweet Aerope. I will not forget you in the time that is left for me to live.

Briefly, he also paid his respect to the one resting next to her. In failure - yours and mine - you found the seed of a new future.

**********

"Bene Gesserit history calls Count Fenring "the failed Kwisatz Haderach", and describes my original incarnation as what he could have been. The entire empire called Paul Atreides their Messiah, but no one was perceptive enough to understand that he too was a failure," Adros said.

"I was? I am the real Kwisatz Haderach!", Leto exclaimed.

Adros laughed. "You had the potential to perform the function the Sisterhood intended the Kwisatz Haderach to fulfill. However, instead of educating humanity, you became a vulgar megalomaniac."

"I was the living Gom Jabbar! I gave up my humanity for the sake of humanity."

"That's exactly it. The Gom Jabbar does not test a being to see whether or not it is human, but evokes fear and suppresses honesty. It is a tool of power, of which the Bene Gesserit have so many, forcing the specimen being tested to display behaviour the Bene Gesserit would like to see. The problem with this method is that what is defined as "desired behaviour" depends on the criteria of the one who tests. Your criteria were born from selfishness and insanity."

"You lie! You do not understand my Golden Path!", Leto cried.

"Oh, but I do. You aimed to overthrow the instable tripod structure of the Old Empire, and train its citizens to be independent. You chose a number of different stategies to help you attain this goal. You removed the Spice as the impetus destabilising the tripod structure, by killing the sandworms and taking control of the distribution of the leftover supplies yourself. You confiscated the Bene Gesserit breeding programme, and used it to breed a new type of human. Your crowning achievement was Siona Atreides, she who was invisible to prescient searchers. You allowed the Bene Gesserit to continue their activities, but on a much smaller scale than before, making sure the historical knowledge and wisdom they possessed in the Other Memory of their Reverend Mothers would be available to guide the universe after your death. At the same time, you rewrote history, teaching those who would come after you the limits structures of knowledge and memories can build. You sowed fear all throughout your empire: your Fish Speakers repressed all opposition. This way you prepared the explosion of supressed potential that took place in the Scattering. You allowed both Ix and Tleilax to continue their activities, even commissioning their services many times. You knew, and in some cases even stimulated, their attempts at increasing their power base, which they did by manipulating the same forces that made both Paul Atreides and you so dangerous. How am I doing so far?"

Leto was silent for a moment, but managed to exclaim: "My Golden Path is straight! It continues to save humanity to this day."

"And it certainly has been doing a fine job lately," Adros taunted. "Your Golden Path contained far too many contingencies, Leto. Your own self-satisfaction prevented you from understanding your own legacy. Alia, your aunt and my sister, understood the dangers of the path we were about to take perfectly, before she fell prey to her own inner demons. She came to me once, and made me understand something that I see you have yet to grasp. I remember her exact words. She told me that 'every organism will claim a certain portion of the available energy in a system. Every organism does so to the disadvantage of the other organisms competing for a place in the same niche. Still, no organism merely consumes - a fundamental aspect of life consists in the exchange of energy with the environment'. After this, she asked me a question: 'what is it that you extract from your environment, and what happens to the environment because of that?'. Do you have an answer, son?"

Leto ignored the question, instead latching on to Alia's ecology-analogy, saying: "I was the main predator in the ecosystem of the Empire! My actions generated a stabilising effect, that prepared humanity for its adulthood."

"Simply being the top consumer is not enough to create a healthy ecosystem - your great-grandfather proved that many times," Adros said, briefly glancing at Murbella. "Your egoism caused you to drain the system, and you failed to truly eradicate all diseased organisms."

"You stimulated that development," Murbella suddenly said. "We - the Honoured Matres: you helped create us!"

"Of course! And let me commend you on your perceptiveness, Mother Superior."

"Create the Honoured Matres?", Duncan asked, remembering the immense threat these warrior women had presented to himself and the Sisterhood. "Why would you do such a thing?"

"Sometimes, the only way to eradicate a disease is to let it grow to be as strong as possible. When all carriers have fallen, the disease will die out as well," Adros explained.

Duncan wanted to answer, but a quick glance at Leto made him forget his remark. Leto's eyes were glazing over and his hands were trembling - many lifetimes of memories of being around the God-Emperor enabled Duncan to recognise the signs, and fear them greatly. He staggered back in terror. The approach of the worm!

Adros was enraged at this sight. "Leto! Retain control of yourself! Stop acting like a spoiled brat!"

His father's outburst stunned Leto, and the overpowering presence of the worm's animal instinct inside of him subsided almost immediately.

"Have you not learnt the immense danger present in letting the instincts of others guide your life? The many Bene Gesserit present in your Ancestral Memory should teach you at least that."

"Other Memory is the single greatest blessing the Sisterhood has received," Murbella said defiantly.

"How ironic that you should say this, Mother Superior. Abomination has been a far bigger problem for the Sisterhood than it would ever dare admit."

Turning to Duncan, he said: "You know this too, don't you? There's one individual you have hated most in all your incarnations, and he has returned to take your lover away from you. Again."

Seeing the terrible truth take its effect on Duncan, Leto suddenly realised how the final part of his plan would be carried out. I see the presence in her eyes now, Leto thought. Duncan's love for her, and his repulsion - a powerful tension!

Murbella wanted to speak, but couldn't. Adros looked at her. "He loves you, doesn't he? My good friend and mentor loves you. He never could resist a young, firm body and inviting eyes."

Adros glanced over to Leto, and saw the expected response to the discussion of the past few minutes on his son's face. He finally understands! He thinks he knows how to complete his plan. Let's help him along.

Facing Murbella again, he taunted: "The Bene Gesserit, reprehensible as they might be in some respects, were quite correct in their assessment of your kind. The Honoured Matres really are whores, in more than one sense of the word. If they hadn't been contained, they would have destroyed humanity."

"You created us!", Murbella exploded, barely resisting the urge to attempt physical retribution for the insult, but realising the futility of and danger that lay in such an action.

"I merely stimulated a development that had already been set in motion."

"But why? I still can't understand the soullessness of such an action."

"Leto understands. Don't you, son?" Accentuating the last word, Adros released a low-yield lasgun blast from the weapon concealed below his lower left arm, hitting Murbella in the chest.

Idaho watched these events taking place, but somehow felt detached from it all, as if it wasn't really happening.

It's all just a dream, he said to himself. This isn't actually happening. Somewhere, a demented demon is dreaming all these things, perverting what he has heard and seen and read, twisting it all into a nightmare of his own devising, and when he wakes up, it will all be gone.

His mind went blank for a brief period. He shot Murbella, he finally realised. He looked down at her, seeing her pain and hearing her breathing grow shallow. This is my love, my reason for being, and he killed her.

Rage flowed into him, a sea of anger engulfing his mind, drowning the voice that called out against all hope, demanding the use of rational thought. He poured that anger outward in the way that seemed most natural to him, the way something or someone was telling him to release his rage.

Suddenly, the walls started trembling. All around Idaho, the plasteel deck plates liquidified, spastic tentacles shooting up from them. In the throne room, reality started to dissolve.

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