Into the Time Machine [Morning 1]

[Kannon]

Leida was single-minded; once she took a course of action, she never swayed. But as Kiran took her steps away from the wall, something nagging kept lingering just at the verge of her awareness that made leaving the place harder than it should be, for all its cold, foreboding dampness.

[Kiran Alsahar]

Kiran glanced behind them acknowledging that niggling feeling at the back of their head. Surely there was something...

Lore average

Net Successes: 2; Net Advantages: 0

[Kannon]

Just perhaps, it was the oldest. Kiran knew from the legends of her people what had divided the Buddhislamics - the ecumenical effort of contriving one, syncretised creed and gospel launched in the early days of the Imperium. That one that produced the Orange-Catholic Bible. Some adherents of Buddhislam compromised and rode on the ecumenical wave. Here, on Lankiveil, they was among those, as judged by a wave of Jainist concepts Leida had just flooded them with. Some purists, mostly Zensunnis and Zenshiites, rejected the compromise, and were persecuted for it. And some, like their own Muadh, were so irrelevant in the larger scope of things that they didn't register in the grand debates and were just left alone to their own unreformed beliefs on their remote world.

But the Sisterhood was also the oldest in the same way. And their own creed, laid out in the book they had received from Wanna, deviated from the OCB in many ways. From this perspective, the Gesserit were heretics from the very beginning, in need of insinuating themselves into oh so many religious communities so that their own secret tenets would slowly find ground and acceptance. Kiran now knew that they themselves were a fruit of such a heretical process. And that made her realise that without it, she would have never realised what the wall really was. It was not meant for the nun or her Sadhu. It was meant for people like them...

So, was the Azhar Book also the oldest? Were its first inscriptions the earliest contentions with the OCB? The first little sins against Corrino-sponsored ecumenism to be hidden in plain sight?

[Kiran Alsahar]

Heretical beliefs hiding among dominant groups in secret was a very old practice, as old as the idea of heresy itself. Those groups had ways to identify each other without alerting others.

Kiran unslung their bag, opening it to draw out the book. Their oath was time displaced, but it was still of a common origin. Perhaps in two oldest things of a common origin, there would be something to point the way.

[Kannon]

Leida didn't wait, leaving Kiran alone, and taking her whale oil lamp with her. Reading was possibly only with the glowglobe now.

The Azhar Book opened with the Bene Gesserit oath, but the very next one was the Litany against Fear. How could it be otherwise?

[Kiran Alsahar]

Kiran smiled to themselves, remembering childhood repetition with their mother. They knew the Litany Against Fear like they knew their own name. They had the book and however long they needed. They rose and began to input it into the "wall".

If they needed to go deeper, well... they had as long as they needed.

[Kannon]

After I M U S T N O T F E A R the wall simply parted, opening into a dark room, with a single pedestal at its midst.

And on it, a box.

Black, seamless, sleek, alien.

[Kiran Alsahar]

Kiran stepped forward, examining it. Running a hand over the sleek undoubtedly cold sides. What was it?

[Kannon]

The box reacted to Kiran's touch immediately. A hologram projected from its surface up, facing them. And on it, a silhouette. Words that followed were delivered in sophisticated, smooth and clear voice with a touch of warmth.

Tula2.png (192.71 KiB) Viewed 1931 times

"Dear Sister, I am Reverend Mother Tula. What can bring me to you across time is this thinking machine. If you are of Dorothea's Butlerian dedication, feel free to destroy it in holy rage and render this endeavour of mine futile. However, if you can trust my motives to be for the good of the Sisterhood and its sacred mission, I invite you to partake in my blasphemy and listen to me further."

And then, there was a pause, the hologram of Tula looking at Kiran, or maybe just in their direction.

[Hard Discipline with a Challenge to determine reaction to the thinking machine.]

[Kiran Alsahar]

They sucked in a breath. Even Kiran, for all their occasional cynicism about religion, wasn't immune to the shock.

Discipline Hard with a challenge

Net Successes: 0; Net Advantages: 1

[Kannon]

After the shock, there came fear. If the millennia-old Bene Gesserit was speaking the truth, here was a piece of everything humanity had sought to destroy to rebuild its civilisation from near-annihilation. Purposefully buried under the glaciers of Lankiveil for the slimmest chance of discovery.

Thou Shalt Not Make Machines in the Likeness of a Human Mind.

Why would a Bene Gesserit Reverend Mother, of all people, do something so unspeakable?!

The woman in the hologram waited in stillness. For a decision. For a word.

Would she have predicted the fear? She absolutely would. And the way to deal with it was in Kiran's own hands, in Kiran's own mind. What shall remain in the wake of its passing?

[The roll can be redone with a Boost if Litany is recited. Check statements for possible upgrades/collisions.]

[Kiran Alsahar]

They closed their eyes, focusing.

I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past, I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.

Yet still, it could not stop the tremble of their hands, the prickle on the edges of their eyes as this thing that had nearly destroyed humanity faced them. When they considered the idea of Bene Gesserit heresy before, they had never considered this.

And yet.

And yet.

What an animal thing it would be, to destroy out of fear. What an obsequious bow to the forces that conditioned their minds not to question. What an abandonment of the question that guided them - what does it mean to be human.

They clenched their teeth, heart pounding. The fear still screamed like they faced a tiger in the jungle in humanity's distant past.

Finally, they said, "S-speak, then." They couldn't quite keep the trembling from their voice.

Discipline Hard with a challenge, retry with statement upgrade

Net Successes: -1; Net Advantages: 1
Boost

Net Successes: 0; Net Advantages: 0

[Kannon]

"Very well. More precisely then, I am Tula Harkonnen. In the time I am creating this mnemonic box the Sisterhood is run by my born sister, Valya. Her choices are paving the path for the Sisterhood to follow for millennia. But you know as well as I do, dear Sister, that any road followed precisely to its end leads precisely nowhere. I had followed my sister's commands in everything until a time came when I, as a mother and a Reverend Mother, no longer can. And so, I decided to make this mnemonic box into an act of my unlikely rebellion. So unlikely that it might have never been discovered. But you have discovered it. Hence, I have come a step closer to subvert the inevitable. I can't know what the Sisterhood is in your time, but if you deplore what you have heard, here is another chance to destroy this vessel of my thoughts and silence me forever."

[The check is now at Average.]

[Kiran Alsahar]

"I must not fear," they repeated to themselves, this time under their breath. What she said qas calming at let Kiran get ahold of themselves. Finally, the fear passed through them, leaving only themselves behind.

They shook their head. "I won't destroy this mnemonic box. I have seen what the sisterhood is now, and glimpses of a path that make me wish to hear you out. This is... a thinking machine, so I assume you can hear and understand me."

It felt like their life took a very sudden left turn.

Discipline, average, upgrade from statement

Net Successes: 5; Net Advantages: 0

[Kannon]

There was a small smile.

"Very well. You have passed my test. In return, I am lending you my mind. I have let it be encoded into the thinking algorithms of this device through countless hours of querying. This simulacrum is as close to having the thoughts and experiences of Tula Harkonnen as it was possible through this method. You can take the box. It will only ever respond to your touch. If it ever falls into the hands of other Bene Gesserit it will be of no use to them unless you unlock it for them. The box will destroy itself if ever tampered with."

Tula's smile turned a bit wry.

"I was one of the first Proctors on Wallach IX. I have cared for my acolytes to be at least as independent thinkers as they were supposed to be obedient. So far in encoding the box, I have overcome my instinct not to answer a question that has not been asked. But it ends now. The answers you will get from me from now on, dear Sister, will only be as good as your questions. I leave it in your hands to decide how deep you want to delve into my mind for the sake of a different path."

With that, Tula went silent, with a slight tilt of her head, waiting without a quantum of impatience.

[Kiran Alsahar]

"I am Kiran, part of the Muadh people of Caladan. We're a very minor part of the Buddhislamic diaspora. While my education has many Bene Gesserit concepts and practices, they were filtered through my people's beliefs. Things might require a little more explaining because of that," they explained. "You mentioned that a road followed precisely leads precisely nowhere. What was that road, and what was the intended end goal? Is it related to the prevailing attitude of self-discipline as the sole defining marker of humanity?"

[Kannon]

The explanation was not a question. Until the question, Tula had remained still. Kiran would need time to figure out the most effective use of the construct in the mnemonic box.

"For the Sisterhood, any form of control, over yourself or over others, is but means to an end. The end is defined in your very vow; to keep humanity's ability to write its own story in the universe. We therefore exist to serve homo sapiens in the most general sense; we are the strategists of its survival. This also means we task ourselves with curbing the most self-destructive instincts of our species and channelling its development beyond current evolutionary frailties. For the Butlerians, thinking machines were the mythical doom of humanity that we vanquished. All their precepts are therefore prohibitions against mistakes humans have already made, not preparedness for the mistakes humans shall keep making. We, the Bene Gesserit, know that the Butlerian Jihad wasn't the last nor the most definite of humanity's crucibles. We want to prepare for the next one. Where I diverge from Valya is on the method, and what we shall be ready to sacrifice on the way. If anything can be considered a sole marker of humanity's essence, it might be self-awareness."

[Kiran Alsahar]

"What is Valya's method and sacrifices and what are yours?"

[Kannon]

"She has done and commanded and will do and command everything it takes to make the future she seeks secure. Her ambition has been to make the Sisterhood the guardians of this plan for millennia to come, no matter how high the cost."

A pause.

"For me, some costs are too high. I have my own little precept: 'Thou shalt not create monsters'."

[Kiran Alsahar]

Monsters... Kiran shivered a little... although in a sense, they were speaking with a sort of monster. "What monster was her plan going to create?"