Jᴀᴄᴜʀᴜᴛᴜ - Tʜᴇ Cᴀsᴛ Oᴜᴛ

Omphalos wrote:There was a bit of his personality and intelligence in each worm, which was a changed form of Shai-Hulud, so that when Sheanna came along in the next book, there would be something in the worm that would interact with her and be susceptible to control.

A Thing of Eternity wrote:Does anyone have thoughts as to what (if anything) Leto intended the "pearls of awareness" in the sandworms to accomplish, and whether this was to be a part of the Golden Path or merely a by-product? Did he plan for some one like Sheana to show influence over the worms? If so to what purpose? I was left with the impression that something very big had been left unsaid by FH, and that Leto's imprisoned consciousness was going to play a part in the conflict with the Enemy of Many Faces.

SandChigger wrote:Hmmm.

Can we really be sure that the "pearls" were something Leto intended, not simply a natural result of his hybridization with the worm that he saw a way to make use of? I tend toward the latter view. (Mainly because I can't see a way for him to have effected it.)

SandChigger wrote:The BG believed that the "Dreamin' Demon" held them to his vision, thus the destruction of Rakis, etc etc. After the Scattering was underway, though, I don't really see the relevance for all of humanity. (Especially since Leto says he didn't peek, meaning he hadn't micromanaged to the end of time.)

Spice Grandson wrote:Leto II seemed to always allude to the fact that he never "looked" into the future to try and change it, only to see if his Golden Path continued. Which causes a bit of consternation for me. What, exactly, could he have known of the future if he simply 'peek-a-booed' to see if the Path continued? His "pearls" were in the worms, but could he have specifically known what that would mean to the descendants of Siona, especially since they're invisible to prescients? Or does it really matter?

I guess my point is did Leto II see someone the likes of Sheeana who would someday be able to manipulate the worms, as it were? Or was this inconsequential?

Spice Grandson wrote:Leto II seemed to always allude to the fact that he never "looked" into the future to try and change it, only to see if his Golden Path continued.

"Think on the price I pay," he said. "Every descendant part of me will carry some of my awareness locked away within it, lost and helpless."
She put both hands over her mouth and stared at him. "This is the horror which my father could not face and which he tried to prevent: the infinite division and subdivision of a blind identity."

She lowered her hands and whispered: "You will be conscious?"

"In a way . . . but mute. A little pearl of my awareness will go with every sandworm and every sandtrout-knowing yet unable to move a single cell, aware in an endless dream."

She shuddered.

Leto watched her try to understand such an existence. Could she imagine the final clamor when the subdivided bits of his identity grappled for a fading control of the Ixian machine which recorded his journals? Could she sense the wrenching silence which would follow that awful fragmentation?

"Lord, they would use this knowledge against you were I to reveal it."
"Will you tell?"

"Of course not!" She shook her head slowly from side to side. Why had he accepted this terrible transformation? Was there no escape?
Presently, she said: "The machine which writes your thoughts, could it not be attuned to. . ."
"To a million of me? To a billion? To more? My dear Hwi, none of those knowing pearls will be truly me."

"You know how you will die?" "Not how. I know only the Golden Path in which it will occur."

"Lord, I do not. . ."

"It is difficult to understand, I know. I will die four deaths. The death of the flesh, the death of the soul, the death of the myth and the death of reason. And all of these deaths contain the seed of resurrection."

"You will return from..."

"The seeds will return."

"When you are gone, what will happen to your religion?"

"All religions are a single communion. The spectrum remains unbroken within the Golden Path. It is only that humans see first one part and then another. Delusions can be called accidents of the senses."

"People will still worship you," she said.

"Yes."

"But when forever ends, there will be anger," she said. "There will be denial. Some will say you were just an ordinary tyrant."

"Delusion," he agreed.

Again, she sent the light beam along the mounded melange. Her attention was drawn to the strip of wall above the spice. More words! Still in Chakobsa, written with a cutter in a fine flowing script, there was another message:

"A REVEREND MOTHER WILL READ MY WORDS!"

Something cold settled in Odrade's guts. She moved to her right with the light, plowing through an empire's ransom in melange. There was more to the message:

"I BEQUEATH TO YOU MY FEAR AND LONELINESS. TO YOU I GIVE THE CERTAINTY THAT THE BODY AND SOUL OF THE BENE GESSERIT WILL MEET THE SAME FATE AS ALL OTHER BODIES AND ALL OTHER SOULS."

Another paragraph of the message beckoned to the right of this one. She plowed through the cloying melange and stopped to read.

"WHAT IS SURVIVAL IF YOU DO NOT SURVIVE WHOLE? ASK THE BENE TLEILAX THAT! WHAT IF YOU NO LONGER HEAR THE MUSIC OF LIFE? MEMORIES ARE NOT ENOUGH UNLESS THEY CALL YOU TO NOBLE PURPOSE!"

There was more of it on the narrow end wall of the long chamber. Odrade stumbled through the melange and knelt to read:

"WHY DID YOUR SISTERHOOD NOT BUILD THE GOLDEN PATH? YOU KNEW THE NECESSITY. YOUR FAILURE CONDEMNED ME, THE GOD EMPEROR, TO MILLENNIA OF PERSONAL DESPAIR."

The words "God Emperor" were not in Chakobsa but in the language of the Islamiyat, where they conveyed an explicit second meaning to any speaker of that tongue: "Your God and Your Emperor because you made me so."

Odrade smiled grimly. That would drive Waff into a religious frenzy! The higher he went, the easier to shatter his security. She did not doubt the accuracy of the Tyrant's accusation, nor the potential in
his prediction that the Sisterhood could end. The sense of danger had led her to this place unerringly. Something more had been at work, too. The worms of Rakis still moved to the Tyrant's ancient beat. He might slumber in his endless dream but monstrous life, a pearl in each worm to remind it, carried on as the Tyrant had predicted.

What was it he had told the Sisterhood in his own time? She recalled his words: "When I am gone, they must call me Shaitan, Emperor of Gehenna. The wheel must turn and turn along the Golden Path."

Yes -- that was what Taraza had meant. "But don't you see? The common people of Rakis have been calling him Shaitan for more than a thousand years." So Taraza had known this thing. Without ever seeing these words, she had known. I see your design, Taraza. And now I know the burden of fear you have carried all these years. I can feel it every bit as deeply as you do.

Odrade knew then that this warning sense would not leave until she ended, or the Sisterhood vanished from existence, or the peril was resolved. Odrade lifted her light, got to her feet and slogged through the melange to the wide steps out of this place. At the steps, she recoiled. More of the Tyrant's words had been cut into each riser. Trembling, she read them as they moved upward to the opening.

"MY WORDS ARE YOUR PAST,
"MY QUESTIONS ARE SIMPLE:
"WITH WHOM DO YOU ALLY?
"WITH THE SELF-IDOLATORS OF TLEILAX?
"WITH MY FISH SPEAKER BUREAUCRACY?
"WITH THE COSMOS-WANDERING GUILD?
"WITH HARKONNEN BLOOD SACRIFICERS?
"WITH A DOGMATIC SINK OF YOUR OWN CREATION?
"HOW WILL YOU MEET YOUR END?
"AS NO MORE THAN A SECRET SOCIETY?"

Odrade climbed past the questions, reading them a second time as she went. Noble purpose? What a fragile thing that always was. And how easily distorted. But the power was there immersed in constant peril. It was all spelled out on the walls and stairs of that chamber. Taraza knew without having it explained. The Tyrant's meaning was clear:

"Join me!"

Freakzilla wrote: However, he does mention that people are trying o communicate with the pearls in the Minority Report at the end of GEoD.

Freakzilla wrote:I think FH may have intened something for the pearls in the latter books.

SandChigger wrote:

Freakzilla wrote:I think FH may have intened something for the pearls in the latter books.

He obviously didn't include it in the outline for "Dune 7".