Chapter 01

Moderator: Freakzilla

Post Reply
User avatar
Freakzilla
Archivist
Posts: 3453
Joined: Fri Dec 07, 2007 12:56 pm
Location: Duluth, Georgia, USA
Contact:

Chapter 01

Post by Freakzilla »

A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the balances are
correct. This every sister of the Bene Gesserit knows. To begin your study of
the life of Muad'Dib, then, take care that you first place him in his time: born
in the 57th year of the Padishah Emperor, Shaddam IV. And take the most special
care that you locate Muad'Dib in his place: the planet Arrakis. Do not be
deceived by the fact that he was born on Caladan and lived his first fifteen
years there. Arrakis, the planet known as Dune, is forever his place.

-from "Manual of Muad'Dib" by the Princess Irulan

An old crone comes to visit young Paul in Castle Caladan, she's let in the side entrance by the boy's mother, Jessica, and shown to his room where he's sleeping. She asks Jessica if she thinks he's the Kwisatz Haderach. She notices that he's awake and listening to them, she tells him to rest well for tomorrow and her gom jabbar, he'll need it. They leave and he lies awake wondering what the gom jabbar is, and how strange the old woman was. His family is about to move. For eighty years their mortal enemies, the Harkonnens have had a CHOAM contract to mine the spice on Arrakis. Now they are to replace the Harkonnens, an appearant victory for his father, Duke Leto Atreides. He is popular in the Landsraad and powerfull people are becoming jealous.

He falls asleep and dreams of water dripping in an Arrakeen cave. He knows he will remember this dream, he always remembers the ones that are predictions. He wakens and wonders if there will be people to play with on Arrakis since the class system isn't so ridgid there. He decides to practice a mind-body lesson his mother taught him until dawn. His mother enters and hurries him to meet the Reverend Mother. He says he's dreamed of her before. Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam awaits, damning Jessica for not bearing a daughter as she was ordered to do. She tells Jessica to leave and before she does tells Paul to remember he is a Duke's son durring this test. Mohiam tells Paul that his mother was once her serving wench and orders Paul to come to her, he feels his muscles compelled to obey her. She shows him a box and orders him to put his hand in it. As he does, she lifts a needle to his neck, the gom jabbar, with a drop of poison on the tip. She tells him not to draw away or she will kill him. She touches his neck with a finger and Paul doesn't flinch, he passed the first test. She tells him there is pain in the box, he must withstand the pain to pass the test, if he withdraws his hand he dies. Paul endures more pain than any male child ever, Mohiam thinks she wanted him to fail, she withdraws the needle and tells him to take his hand out. It is unharmed. It is a test of his humanity, to see if his mind can override instinct. Paul sees the truth in it and tells her that he knows when people are telling the truth. She thinks he may be the one, she calls Jessica back in and she's relieved to see Paul alive. Paul asks why they test for humans. Mohiam says it's to set them free, once men turned their thinking over to machines hoping this would set them free, but it only allowed other men with machines to enslave them. The Great Revolt took away the machines an forced humans to develope their minds, forming the Great Schools. Only two remain, the Guild and the Bene Gesserit. The Guild practices pure math, the Bene Gesserit, politics. The Bene Gesserit was originally started to seperate the humans from animals to breed them. He asks about the Kwisatz Haderach. Mohiam tells them how Reverend Mothers can remember the pasts of their female ancestors. One day a man will come who can remember both masculine and feminine pasts, the Kwisatz Haderach. This is unlocked by a dangerous drug and all men who have tried it have died.
They were destroyed because they lied pretentiously. Have no fear that my wrath
will fall upon you because of your innocent mistakes.

~Leto II, God Emperor
Post Reply

Return to “Dune”