ATREIDES,
LETO II,
Journals of.
ATREIDES,
LETO II,
Journals of.
The collection
of 2,126 ridulian crystal volumes, secreted in a primitive Ixian no-room, contains
the preserved writings of Leto II, the God Emperor; this is the central find
of the library discovered at Dar-es-Balat and known as the Rakis Hoard. Each
of the Journals consists of one thousand 50 x 30 cm sheets of ridulian crystal
paper imprinted by an Ixian dictatel and bound between covers of ridulian-based
hardboard. Owing to the extreme thinness of the paper (ridulian crystal can
be processed into sheets only several molecules thick) the volumes are only
1.5 cm thick from cover to cover. Static charges prevent the pages from touching
each other and aid the automatic page turner embedded in the spine. In sheer
size-each of the ridulian crystal originals requires forty paper volumes of
ordinary size to reprint-such a single-author collection is awe-inspiring; given
the nature of that author, however, it becomes historically overwhelming. First
to last, these books record 3,500 years of history and autobiographic ruminations
set down by the one being who has survived such a period of time. Their importance
cannot be overstated, as is evident from their frequent citing as source material
throughout this encyclopedia.
It is impossible to summarize, no matter how briefly, the contents of even a
fraction of the Journal volumes. Until such time as it becomes possible to issue
a full translation (and a hundred-volume set of excerpts will not be ready for
publications for a minimum of three years) overviews such as this one will have
to suffice. Regrettably, only the most significant items can be discussed in
so short a space; deeper analyses are certain to come later.
Perhaps the most fascinating revelations contained in the Rakis Hoard are those
pertaining to the God Emperor himself. Because of the Oral History and the teachings
of the Church of the Divided God, humanity has already been given two views
of Leto II: inhuman tyrant and omnipotent God. Now his Journals offer a third
view, one that will undoubtedly be difficult to reconcile with those preceding
it. The Lord Leto, it appears, did not possess infallible prescience; he could
suffer distortions of his future vision not only when dealing with the "missing"
persons his breeding program produced, but also when attempting to view the
extreme future as well.
He also feared that time would distort his reputation. Many references show
his anxiety to explain himself and his reign, as we read in a soliloquy from
Rakis Reference Catalog I-A42:
You, encountering my chronicles after thousands of years, beware. Do not feel
honored in reading the revelations of my Ixian storehouse. You will find much
pain in it.... I am not sure what the events in my journals may signify to your
times. I only know that my journals have suffered oblivion and that the events
which I recount have undoubtedly been subjected to historical distortion for
eons....
Much of the material making up the Journals was composed in the same introspective
mode, and by studying samples taken at random from the collection, we can observe
a trend in the Lord Leto's writings. While the earliest writings noted even
the most trivial events-minor rebellions quelled, for example, in cities whose
names became meaningless within the God Emperor's lifetime-later volumes contained
more autobiographical material and anecdotes concerning the "inner voices,"
or ancestral memories, with whom Leto often shared consciousness.
Another shift can be observed when such excerpts are carefully read. For several
centuries after his acceptance of the sandtrout skin which changed his form,
the God Emperor avoided writing much about the transformation itself, or about
his own reaction to it. Self-descriptions become more frequent in those writings
covering the second and third millennia of his rule, and remain clinical until
well into the third. Not until the volumes written during the last two hundred
years of Leto's reign does the reader discover the God Emperor's own feelings
about his changed body. One of the best examples also comes from RRC I-A42:
I have ordered all mirrors removed from the Citadel. My servitors wonder at
this, but say nothing; they know the foolishness of questioning God.
How much greater their wonder would be if I had followed my initial impulse
after catching a glimpse of myself in the great entry hall mirrors yesterday,
and smashed them to slivers with a single blow from this many-segmented body
which traps me! But this grotesquery has its purpose, as surely as do the centuries
I have spent this way. They prevent a greater smashing, an irreparable smashing.
I must remember that.
As more evidence of the God Emperor's slipping humanity comes to light, his
reference to his Journals causing pain for their reader may well be proven right.
It is difficult to avoid sympathizing with one who could fear his own reflection
although he controlled the known universe.
Information concerning other members of House Atreides-in particular, the God
Emperor's father, Paul Muad'Dib, and his aunt, the Lady Alia-has also surfaced
during the Journals' translation. Leto reveals, for example, that he was not
the first to be shown the Golden Path or to be offered the transformation he
accepted. His father, he states, faced the same choice several years before
Leto's birth but picked a different way. (The effects on humanity of Muad'Dib's
Jihad and Leto's Peace may have to be evaluated before an informed opinion of
the better choice can be offered.)
He also delivers one of the few sympathetic opinions of Lady Alia Atreides.
He was in a better position than any other historian to do so: not only had
he escaped the possession that befell his aunt by forging an internal alliance
in which he was the controlling force (a method which differed from hers less
than might be supposed), but he had access to the same ancestral personality
that had ruined Alia. In Leto's community of voices, the Baron Harkonnen was
kept firmly under control, but Leto could appreciate how his aunt had been taken
over.
As a treasure trove of historical data the Journals are completely unparalleled.
For example, the Oral History abounds with descriptions of the Atreides descendants'
extreme sensitivity to melange and its effect on their ancestral memories. The
reason for this sensitivity had been shrouded in mystery since the earliest
centuries of the Lord Leto's reign (at least from the general public; the Bene
Gesserit Sisterhood, it was said, never forgot it) and not until the Journals
were discovered was it relearned. A full description can be found in the entries
pertaining to the God Emperor and to his mother, the Lady Chani, but the phenomenon
known as Pre-birth was brought about by a combination of genetic factors and
maternal addiction to melange. Because the were descended from one who had been
pre-born, all of the later generations of Atreides possessed the ability to
achieve contact with their "inner voices' when under the influence of the
spice. Records found in the Journals indicate that this forced awareness was
part of the testing Leto conducted when choosing his Atreides administrators,
and that nearly a third of those who underwent the spice test died or went mad
when the new awareness was thrust upon them. (This percentage dropped only slightly
through millennia of careful breeding, and Leto therefore kept a number of second-choice
candidates in re- serve whenever testing one of the breeding lines.)
The eventual publication of all the Journals, and the influx of new findings,
will not only affect the scholarly world but also the Oral History, which has
served in conjunction with the Stolen Journals as a basis for law and custom
on all of the known worlds, will undergo probing reconsideration. The Church
of the Divided God, and by extension its billions of followers, has already
been profoundly affected by the information unearthed at Dar-es-Balat, as witnessed
by its new directives concerning the status of Holy Sister Quintinius Violet
Chenoeh and Nayla the Betrayer.
The full effects of the Rakis Hoard on society as we have known it will not
be seen in our lifetimes-and possibly not in the lifetimes of many generations
of our posterity. As regards their continuing effect, a still- popular Bene
Gesserit expression comes most readily to mind: "Each day, sometimes each
hour, brings change."
C.W
Further references: ATREIDES, LETO II; ATREIDES, LADY CHANI;
ATREIDES, LADY ALIA; RAKIS FINDS, DISCOVERY; DICTATEL; CHENOEH, HOLY SISTER
QUINTINIUS VIOLET; NAYLA; STOLEN JOURNALS; Alan Bartke, Survey of Ixian Technology,
10900-13500 (Finally: Mosaic)-, T.B. Jones, Past Horizons: The Discovery of
the Imperial Library on Rakis, Arrakis Studies 1 (Grumman: United Worlds); Adib'I-Haddad,
I Fell Into the Past, Arrakis Studies 17(Grumman: United Worlds).