BOOK THREE - CHAPTER EIGHT
 

My extraordinary lifespan and unusual abilities have shown me the way to a cognitive vantage point from which to infiltrate deeply into the answers to some of the most persistently puzzling questions humans have been able to ask. What is time? I do not fall victim to the usual human limitations that distort the past and the future, allowing me to see right through to the heart of the matter. I am not limited to one single perspective - the gestalt of the viewpoints of all the different intellects at my disposal filters out all traces of subjectivity my judgment might contain. To me, time is not an emergent property, emanating from the mating of the understanding of physical processes and the ability to remember and predict, but a visible and on particularly lucent moments even almost tangible substratum of sensible reality. Events materialise into the present in what we would consider an unmeasurably short period of time, emerging into the now before sliding back into the unformed matter of time, in itself timeless but the cause of all temporal phenomena. Space-time as we know is formed by the fluctuations of this chaotic stream of infinitely many zero-dimensional structures. To become one with it is to become the universe. I feel this will soon lie within my grasp.
-Leto II, the God Emperor, to Moneo, his last Majordomo-
 

Weakened by the realitystorm Idaho's rage had unleashed, the boundaries of the physical plane were growing transparent to Leto's mind. His astral body, a representation of what he had looked like prior to the symbiosis with the sandtrout, floated in a universe of amazing, unimaginable shapes and colours. Beyond the limitations of four-dimensional space-time other realms revealed themselves to him, places and non-places filled with radically new experiences and endless possibilities, their splendour beckoning him to come closer and immerse himself in Otherness.

He saw that, once there, he could ponder the taste of the different shades of the colour green for all eternity if he so wished, or create a world in which the direction left would only exist on Sundays, or give a detailed recollection of what he would say three years into the future - not even the constraints of logic would impede his omnipotence.

He sensed that his ultimate transsubstantiation was near, until suddenly he heard a voice talking to him - the voice of a child. His ascension came to a halt, and he looked down to see what was holding him back.

A young boy was there, whom he immediately recognised as his father as a six-year-old. Young Paul pulled him back, saying: "You're not allowed to go there."

Leto struggled to break free of the boy's grip, but to his surprise learnt that he couldn't. "Why not?", he asked.

"My parents said so," the young boy said.

"I'm sure they didn't," Leto said, in the most patronising tone he could muster.

"Yes, they did. They always said I should never talk to strangers, be friendly and honest and always do what's right," young Paul said, counting the elements of the advice on his fingers. "What you're doing is not right."

"What did I do?"

"You stole my body."

Next to Leto, another presence materialised. At first, the sight of him scared Leto beyond comprehension. He has followed me here! The friendly facial expression and the accompanying tone of voice made Leto reconsider.

"I can help. Take my hand," Adros said.

Sensing how close he was to realising the final stage of his plan, the excitement driving him almost mad, Leto did not care to question Adros' sincerity, and accepted the outstretched hand after a few moments of contemplation.

Paul released Leto, trusting the judment of his older, other self. Leto saw the throne room of Adros' ship rematerialising around him, Duncan's rage still tearing through the boundaries of normal space. He felt himself rising from his body, and, floating towards a vertigo of brilliant colours, saw himself dying, the humanlike upper body of the worm-human hybrid he had been toppling forward.

As he felt the power inside the vertigo, he looked back one more time, and saw Idaho collapse as well, the life having left the ghola who had aided him in his transcendence so well. The vertigo of colours came ever closer, and his excitement at entering a new stage in his existence reached almost unbearable levels.

Suddenly, he understood where Adros was sending him, and terror assaulted his mind.

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