Sandworms of Dune - Brian Herbert [176]
In the old crone guise, Erasmus reached out like a curious child and touched, but the wrinkled hand passed through her image. “So many of the most interesting humans are women,” he mused. The robot experimentally waved fingers through her ghostly likeness, stirring without altering it. She ignored him.
“Duncan Idaho, you have finally come to your realization. Kwisatz Haderach, I tried to protect you. Before you, Paul Muad’Dib and his son Leto the God Emperor were imperfect prophets. Even they realized their flaws. Now through a confluence in the cosmos, the nexus of all nexuses, you have become the singularity in a bold new universe, the vital point from which everything flows outward for the rest of eternity. The hopes of humankind—and much more—are distilled in you.”
Still taken aback, Duncan asked, “But how? I don’t feel that different.”
“The Kwisatz Haderach is a ‘shortening of the way,’ a figure powerful enough to force a fundamental and necessary change that alters the course of future history, not just for humanity but for thinking machines as well.”
“Yes, you have the power, Duncan Idaho.” Erasmus sounded just as encouraging as the Oracle. “I rely on you to make the correct choice. You know what will benefit the universe most, and you know that thinking machines can enrich the entirety of civilization.”
Duncan marveled at the awareness of his new identity and the unfolding of his thoughts around the astounding truth. Finally, after so many attempts at life in ghola form, he knew his destiny. His mind was fully awakened.
He saw time as a great ocean stretching across the cosmos, and with his awakening powers he envisioned being able to analyze each molecule, each atom and subatomic particle. Perfect prescience would come, but not yet, not too fast or it would induce the same crippling paralysis that had befallen Paolo. Already Duncan’s mind could go much faster than a Mentat’s, and he sensed he could make his body move at speeds that would have astonished even the Bashar.
I am the ultimate Kwisatz Haderach. There will be no more after me.
The Oracle’s image flickered, shifting her shape back to that of the beautiful woman. “After you died the first time, Duncan Idaho—as a soldier fighting to save the Atreides, fighting to save the first Kwisatz Haderach—the powers of the universe compelled your resurrection as a ghola, and many times afterward, over and over. The original God Emperor understood some of your destiny and played an unwitting role in bringing about this moment. The end point of his Golden Path is the beginning of something else.”
“I am linked to the Golden Path?”
“You are, but you are destined to go far beyond it.”
Paul seemed to be swiftly recovering his strength. Beside him, Jessica said to the otherworldly visitor, “But Duncan was part of no formal breeding program! How did he develop into a Kwisatz Haderach?”
The Oracle continued, “Duncan, with each rebirth, you came closer to completion. Instead of being developed in a breeding program, you went through a process of personal evolution. With every successive incarnation you acquired more knowledge, skills, and experience—as if a sculptor with a tiny chisel was chipping away at a large block of hard stone, slowly, ever so slowly, fashioning a perfect statue. In your one body, you manifested a tachyon evolution, a hyperfast developmental journey that propelled you toward your destiny.”
Duncan had lived his life repeatedly for thousands of years. Not only had the Tleilaxu tinkered with his genetics to give him abilities to fight the Honored Matres, they had combined his cells so that he retained all of his previous lives, every one of them. With all those memories, he possessed a breadth of experience and wisdom that no one could match. This Duncan Idaho had more knowledge than the most advanced Mentat or the evermind Omnius, and more understanding of human nature than even the great Tyrant Leto II.