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trans_92010-03-24 06:28 am
worm-dancer.livejournal.com) wrote in trans_92010-03-24 06:28 am
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[Intended for Ghanima Atreides but open]
Thin Ridulian microfilm crackled under her fingers. The light from the shifting, slurry haze of celestial bodies through the great window shone through the letters on the page. It was the thinnest paper that could still be hand turned and preserved the sensuality of reading.
Something drew her to Leto 2's words. Parts had been played, the conciliatory figure had appeared, and the vote was soon to be called. Her setting of the whole debate in motion now crippled Sheeana's ability to persuade during the vote itself. I am Other now more than I ever have been before. She observed.
And this was a potent wisdom for this situation. Leto 2 had built a sprawling edifice of an empire, held it together with religious fanaticism, organizational genius and prescience, all to teach humans a lesson about trusting leaders. He gave them the kind of peace and safety they'd expected from a leader, all they could stand of it and more and more...
Her mind relaxed into the words as her body relaxed into the fleshy, bloblike 'chair'.
The social-alarm signals which put societies into the postures of defense/attack are like shouted words to me. As a people, you react against threats to innocence and the peril of the helpless young. Unexplained sounds, visions and smells raise the hackles you have forgotten you possess. When alarmed, you cling to your native language because all the other patterned sounds are strange. You demand acceptable dress because a strange costume is threatening. This is system-feedback at its most primitive level. Your cells remember.
Flip.
When you are together, you can share a common catastrophe. You can be exterminated together. Thus, I demonstrate the terrible danger of a gliding, passionless mediocrity, a movement without ambitions or aims. I show you that entire civilizations can do this thing. I give you eons of life which slips gently toward death without fuss or stirring, without even asking 'Why?' I show you the false happiness and the shadow-catastrophe called Leto, the God Emperor. Now, will you learn the real happiness?
Flip.
In all of my universe I have seen no law of nature, unchanging and inexorable. This universe presents only changing relationships which are sometimes seen as laws by short-lived awareness. These fleshly sensoria which we call self are ephemera withering in the blaze of infinity, fleetingly aware of temporary conditions which confine our activities and change as our activities change. If you must label the absolute, use it's proper name: Temporary.
Flip.
Oh, the landscapes I have seen! And the people! The far wanderings of the Fremen and all the rest of it. Even back through the myths to Terra. Oh, the lessons in astronomy and intrigue, the migrations, the disheveled flights, the leg-aching and lung-aching runs through so many nights on all of those cosmic specs where we have defended our transient possession. I tell you we are a marvel and my memories leave no doubt of this.
Something drew her to Leto 2's words. Parts had been played, the conciliatory figure had appeared, and the vote was soon to be called. Her setting of the whole debate in motion now crippled Sheeana's ability to persuade during the vote itself. I am Other now more than I ever have been before. She observed.
And this was a potent wisdom for this situation. Leto 2 had built a sprawling edifice of an empire, held it together with religious fanaticism, organizational genius and prescience, all to teach humans a lesson about trusting leaders. He gave them the kind of peace and safety they'd expected from a leader, all they could stand of it and more and more...
Her mind relaxed into the words as her body relaxed into the fleshy, bloblike 'chair'.
The social-alarm signals which put societies into the postures of defense/attack are like shouted words to me. As a people, you react against threats to innocence and the peril of the helpless young. Unexplained sounds, visions and smells raise the hackles you have forgotten you possess. When alarmed, you cling to your native language because all the other patterned sounds are strange. You demand acceptable dress because a strange costume is threatening. This is system-feedback at its most primitive level. Your cells remember.
Flip.
When you are together, you can share a common catastrophe. You can be exterminated together. Thus, I demonstrate the terrible danger of a gliding, passionless mediocrity, a movement without ambitions or aims. I show you that entire civilizations can do this thing. I give you eons of life which slips gently toward death without fuss or stirring, without even asking 'Why?' I show you the false happiness and the shadow-catastrophe called Leto, the God Emperor. Now, will you learn the real happiness?
Flip.
In all of my universe I have seen no law of nature, unchanging and inexorable. This universe presents only changing relationships which are sometimes seen as laws by short-lived awareness. These fleshly sensoria which we call self are ephemera withering in the blaze of infinity, fleetingly aware of temporary conditions which confine our activities and change as our activities change. If you must label the absolute, use it's proper name: Temporary.
Flip.
Oh, the landscapes I have seen! And the people! The far wanderings of the Fremen and all the rest of it. Even back through the myths to Terra. Oh, the lessons in astronomy and intrigue, the migrations, the disheveled flights, the leg-aching and lung-aching runs through so many nights on all of those cosmic specs where we have defended our transient possession. I tell you we are a marvel and my memories leave no doubt of this.