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Appendix I

Posted: 07 Sep 2008 10:02
by Freakzilla
Beyond a critical point within a finite space, freedom diminishes as numbers
increase. This is as true of humans in the finite space of a planetary ecosystem
as it is of gas molecules in a sealed flask. The human question is not how many
can possibly survive within the system, but what kind of existence is possible
for those who do survive.

-Pardot Kynes, First Planetologist of Arrakis

Pardot Kynes did not see Arrakis as a barren wasteland but an expression of energy with unlimited potential in the Fremen. He married a Fremen woman to avoid Harkonnen restrictions and began with his son, Liet-Kynes and other Fremen children. He told them that life will strive to create diversity on man-healthy planets and create more nutrients as the diversity of life increases bringing the landscape alive.

Pardot gained the trust of the Fremen by saving a band of Fremen youths from would be-Harkonnen murderers. They knew who he was, an Imperial servant, Fremen know who everyone on Arrakis are, but he killed Harkonnens. The inexperienced Fremen youths did not kill Kynes but took him to a sietch above Wind Pass where they all fell in love with his dream of a flowering Arrakis. The Fremen elders attempted assasination but the assassin fell on his own knife at Pardot's command, thus starting the legend. From then on his whim was command of the Fremen. They infiltrated the Imperial Botanical Testing Stations and began collecting water from windtraps in catchbasins. The Fremen considered him just mad enough to be holy.

Kynes estimated that the transformation would take two to five-hundred years, but this did not discourage the patient Fremen. On a flight between stations, Kynes saw the salt pan and knew there had once been open water on Arrakis. He started examining how sip-wells dried up and learned of the santrout and how it encapsulated water in the lower strata. They died by the million in each spice blow but a few survived and went into a semi dormant cyst-hibernation to emerge six years later as three meter long sandworms. The sandtrout form a pre-spice mass; the survivors turn into sandworms, sandworms scatter the spice upon which sandplankton, which the sandworms eat, grow into sandtrout, which grow into sandworms.

They began planting grass and peat-like cilia on the downwind surface of old dunes in the path of prevailing winds to lock them in place. This would cause the windward face of the dunes to grow higher and higher and they would move the grass up to keep pace, producing giant barrier dunes up to 1,500 meters. Then they would plant tougher grasses on the windward face to lock them in place. Then came deeper plants like bushes and small animals like insects, mice, foxes and birds and later food plants and trees.

Then reports came to him that the sand plankton was being killed by interaction with the plants and their moisture forming a dead zone around the plantings that even sandworms wouldn’t enter. The dead sand plankton left sulfur and nitrogen forming a rich planting bed for new plants, the plantings would advance on their own. The Fremen asked if this would change his five-hundred year timetable and he began recalculating, leaving room for the worms. A medium sized worm produced as much oxygen as ten square kilometers of greenery. Of course, they produced spice too, which they needed for wealth and bribes to the guild. The new figure he came up with was three-hundred and fifty years.

Pardot was killed in a cave-in at Plaster Basin but by this time his sone was nineteen and a sandrider who had killed over a hundred Harkonnens. The Imperial job of Planetologist passed on to his son who only had to maintain the system, until the day a hero came…

Re: Appendix I

Posted: 07 Sep 2011 02:14
by Demerzel
A thing I've noticed: the Fremen were a little too easy on Pardot. Almost to the point of being gullible.

Re: Appendix I

Posted: 07 Sep 2011 05:17
by JustSomeGuy
A lot of things just fell into place.

Re: Appendix I

Posted: 07 Sep 2011 09:10
by Freakzilla
Demerzel wrote:A thing I've noticed: the Fremen were a little too easy on Pardot. Almost to the point of being gullible.
They were set up for him by the BG MP.

Re: Appendix I

Posted: 07 Sep 2011 09:10
by Freakzilla
JustSomeGuy wrote:A lot of things just fell into place.
Lots of good stuff in the appendicies. :D

Re: Appendix I

Posted: 07 Sep 2011 13:37
by Demerzel
Oh yeah that's most likely. It'd have been great if the Missionaria Protectiva had been explored in the fifth or sixth book.

Re: Appendix I

Posted: 12 Jan 2012 14:14
by Freakzilla
Clean