We see societies as living organisms. Every now and then evolution enables leapfrogs: cell specialization, photosynthesis, sexual reproduction, a new body plan, flying. Mind development. Societies behave similarly. Poleis, human rights, religious tolerance, chivalry, gender equality; no changes to DNA, but changes in values, expectations, and expressions. One may ask - how can a society maintain a model of pluralism and democracy? Once again our answer is biological in its approach: when it maintains a healthy immune system capable of neutralizing erratic psychopathic, populists, sycophants, the power-hungry. The development of societal immune systems has been a core investment in our research.
- THE ECOLOGISTS' MANIFESTO
As she left behind the door to her apartment - and to Lorain - Murbella focused on the task in front of her at the exclusion of every other concern. After all, love did burden her with heavy obligations. Coming up to a guard, she signaled him to follow and through several twists and turns she opened the door to an underground passage. She emerged moments later from the building adjacent to her apartment, dressed in the white robe of an Acolyte, hood up to conceal her face, pushing a cart loaded with clothes. The laundry girl stratagem, Teg had called it, the number thirteen on the list. The conspirators had been found, yet cautious Teg did not like to take risks. She agreed with his approach. And so it was time to lower herself to do the menial work that Mother Superior would not have tolerated. She loaded the service van for a full hour until she was joined by her bodyguard, one of Miles' men and good at disguises, who wore a janitor's coat over his body armor. She looked for a moment at his weak, slow demeanor. An intuition bugged her right then: she guessed Lorain would be great at the same skill. She huddled in the robe, musing that white on the dark background of a Central's evening would bring her more protection than what the colors themselves would suggest.
But walks in the night was no more something Murbella could afford. She sighed, mourning for a single breath that final loss of freedom, her jealously guarded secret.
The bodyguard moved slowly in his gray uniform. When all was ready, he took the seat next to Murbella, who found herself unclear as to how to start the vehicle and direct it out of the garage. The commands looked like nothing she had ever seen before. Yet Other Memories from Odrade came to help, from scores of once-Acolyte trainees who had done this job millions of times over. Truly we are multitudes, she thought, and without hesitation she led the van onto the dusty streets. "How many more of these tricks?" she asked in silence, using a variation of the old Atreides sign language that only Teg's men could understand.
"One more."
Before long she glimpsed in the light of the street lights a tall silhouette coming into view. The van entered the large roundabout that circled the towering statue of Chenoeh. The failed Reverend Mother stood twelve feet high, one hand on a recording device, the other pointing an open hand to the sky, her eyes looking up. What was that facial expression the scultor had settled on? The concentration of the recording trance, or a state of prayer she knew the real Choeneh would not indulge in? She had always wondered. With her old Honored Matres eyes the statue seemed an oddity, an object of worship placed among the very same Bene Gesserit whose daily task was to create and manipulate objects of worship; it seemed to send a message, believe your own snake oil! she told Odrade-Within, which had taken place in the seat of her mind.
"The Sister who failed is the Sister who will outlive us all", Murbella murmured, steering the vehicle away from the monument. History proves we should not make any plans to be remembered, whispered Odrade-Within, for posterity is a capricious mistress. Sister Chenoeh had died during the spice trance and never achieved Reverend Mother status, despite her impressive talents and precocious training. And yet a Tyrant's gesture of friendship had elevated her in Oral History to the God's confidante and secured her a spot in humanity's pantheon as a divine intercessor, known and believed in by untold billions.
Why didn't you demolish her effigy, Odrade? Murbella asked silently. Her busts and holo-statues crowd our spaces!
My dear Murbella, the surface reason is simple, was the answer.
Nothing with you is simple, Murbella thought.
Look at her. A failed Reverend Mother, yet one of the most successful of all. Will the universe remember Jessica Atreides, or Gaius Helen Mohiam, or Alva Mavis Taraza, and Darwi Odrade, more than Chenoeh? Not at all. Fortune passes everywhere. It's a humbling lesson, isn't it?
It is, commented Murbella. We strive, but can never predict the final outcome of our actions. But the real reason you kept this statue is...? continued Mother Superior.
Well, paused Odrade-Within, you observed how Chenoeh, however brilliant, was successful despite herself. The truth is, she was chosen. I believe the Tyrant picked Sister Chenoeh, the Divine Intercessor, so that we could laugh at us till the end of time, Odrade laughed nervously. Recall what he told her: 'The Bene Gesserit are so close to what they should be, and yet so far'.
Why? Murbella thought. But I can picture him: 'thousands of years of Missionaria Protectiva work, and yet I can elevate your failed Reverend Mother to saintly status and you don't have a say in it.'
Look at our powers! Odrade-Within responded. And yet the Missionaria cannot take control of the Chenoeh cult! And he chose one he found amenable, and gave her eternal life. And we dare pretend that our inner lives make us similar to Him! Yes, that's Leto's big joke on us. And I always appreciate a good joke, especially when hidden in plain sight.
"But I see another meaning," commented Murbella aloud, startling her body guard.
"What do you see?" he asked, confused.
"Did you notice the statue? It's the Tyrant telling us through the centuries: to the Bene Gesserit Sisterhood, never, never for a moment presume that my Golden Path needs you, or that I gave you a part to play in it."
The body guard shook his head, confused, shifting his attention back to the street. Odrade-Within laughed.
But do remember, intervened Taraza-Within, that we neutralized the oracular power of the divided god, infused into Rakis' many worms, when I nudged the Honored Matres to obliterate the planet.
"A master move," Murbella replied, slightly skeptical. She could not ignore Odrade's comment as the vehicle veered left into a side street: That was our best guess, Murbella, no more. Has the Tyrant buried more inscriptions on secret walls somewhere in the Universe beyond Tabr? Are you ready for the cosmic treasure hunt?
It was Taraza's turn: He paid the courtesy to warn us that without a radical change, the Sisterhood would have disappeared. And he was complicit in dissolving his own plans. Paving the way for you, Murbella.
Not before his sandworms found and brought us Sheeana! replied Odrade, still livid for the loss of her Sister to the Scattering. She was in Leto's plan! Then Leto agreed to annihilate his own worms! His prescience made it real!
"Do you know what Bellonda would say to all this, dear Mother Superiors?" replied Murbella aloud, cutting through her inner voices as the van headed toward the service quarters. "Bellonda would say: You are mistaken. You assume that the Kwisatch Haderach planned the future only with prescience, and not with his wits. The Sisterhood's cardinal sin: to assume to know anything about Kwisatch Haderachs."
Yes! Not even the killing of the sandworms, which broke the Tyrant's oracular stranglehold on humanity, may spare us from the consequences of his mischievous plans, agreed Odrade.
I am glad you both appreciate the penetrative nature of Bellonda's sarcasm, rebuked Taraza-Within gloomy. We will never avoid the suspicion that the Tyrant is still touching us from the past.
"We are all here, Taraza, heretics in the end," Murbella concluded.
She parked the van and for the next half hour she suffered through the duties of loading the washing machines. An Acolyte was supposed to wait until the drying was done, but time was of the essence. She changed into a janitor's uniform and grabbed a toolbox, slipping out through a different exit as she walked slowly toward the Nurseries the way Teg had taught her, heavy and rhythmical instead of catlike as she was generally seen in public. The Nurseries were lit brightly against the setting sun. As she came in through the door, she strode to the second floor in a room oriented to the west, felt the red of the sunset warm her face. It was kids' dinner time. The low pitch voice of Governess Suifa boomed across the room: "Behave, girls, a Reverend one is here." Murbella smiled, considering whether to break the orderly discipline of supper. At the governess' invitation, she sat at the table next to her and quietly ate what was served, thankfully not a fish stew. The girls, all of them, whispered quietly under the vigil eye of their educator. It was only after the meal was over, and in a separate room reserved for rambunctious play, that eight girls of various ages surrounded Murbella, excitedly jumping on the floor. Murbella hugged each one of them separately like they were all their children. Then she turn to face the Governess: "Suifa, it is always a blessing to come here."
"They have been asking about you every day this week!" she exclaimed above the noise.
"Reverend Mother, will I become like you when I grow up?" a little child about four years old sat on her lap on the couch, dark hair and green eyes.
"Maybe. It takes many years of training and apprenticeship," Murbella answered giving her a gentle squeeze
"But I want it now!" the girl frowned.
"Very well Dairadne, first, start with this," Murbella extended a hand, while the girl mirrored her.
"Well?" the little thing asked.
"Practice moving each finger, in turn, separately from the others." Murbella demonstrated.
"Yes! But wait, I can't move my ring finger alone!" wailed the little girl.
"Just start. Practice on your own. You will show me next time."
Something landed on her knee, warning her of another child coming. "Reverend Mother, me too!" jumped in another girl, ruffled dark hair.
"Very well, Lemanjá. Put your hand on mine," Murbella responded by offering her palm.
"And?" she asked delighted for the attention.
"Retract your hand faster than I can catch it," she smiled mysteriously.
"That's not fair! I almost can't see your hand move!" the new girl squealed.
"Practice with your sisters. Athena and Bella will show you the way I already taught them. I will come to check on your progress next week."
"Liar! Last time you promised the same but had us wait two more weeks!" protested the girl, raising an accusatory finger."
"Sometimes mom has to take care of the people outside of this building, too," Murbella soothingly responded. "But I will be back."
If I return alive, she thought.
Murbella stayed for bedtime, reading them stories, and then as the girls fell asleep in the dorm room, she came back out to the desk where Suifa had turned on a light globe.
"They all adore you, Mother Superior," she commented, "even the other girls all want to be your children, you know."
"But the four who are mine are my concern. All Sisterhood's daughters, yet you are forbidden to reveal their parents' names except to Miles Teg. Understood? How is their education going along? Any signs of precocious gene expression?" she asked. Duncan's traits, waiting to manifest themselves, laid latent in her four daughters. Lightning fast reflexes would only surface with puberty, but she was interested in the latent capabilities of this version of Duncan Idaho.
Like all her visits, she lingered a bit too much, a little bit longer.
Tomorrow I must depart.
It was upon retracing her steps - through more disguises - to her office, that the first message from Teg jumped her back into reality. She was a mechanic, now, her suit stained with dirt, belaboring on one of their new ornithopters. She flinched as somebody tripped on her while she laid on the ground under an orni she was pretending to fix vehicle inside a hangar. Murbella hurt and cried out, then looked up.
"Why are you here?" she asked her aide Tairasu, white on white Acolyte robe flapping in the breeze that swept through the open building, shocking the girl with the intensity of her outrage: "Are you a servant?"
"I serve the Mother Superior," Tairasu, replied meekly with the startled look of a wild animal. "I was told to find you..."
"Wrong! You serve the Sisterhood. The next time you are told to find me while I am in disguise, you should think of a disguise for yourself! Don't you think your presence here will raise attention? Did they send you out without warning?"
Tairasu's body seemed to shrink in her own robe as she bit down her tongue hard not to shriek.
This former Honored Matres acolyte acts like a scared cat, thought Murbella.
She lashes out like for the worthless piece of muck I am, Tairasu thought, feeling hurt and rage and shame all at the same time. You are not Bene Gesserit material, Tutor Gammala had said. "Mother Superior," she whispered.
"Have you considered that spies could be listening in at this moment?" she snapped. The aide Angelika had forced on her did not know how Murbella carried one of Teg's interferometer with her, but it didn't matter. "Too late for that now. Say something sensible now or I will cut your tongue with my nails."
Tairasu bit her tongue twice, breathing heavily. She smelled like fear, and took a full thirty seconds to compose herself. Murbella detected a subtle smell of spice. Surely she is not getting on the spice regime to become a Mother yet?, she thought.
"Mot... I was chosen because I come here often to look at the ornis."
"Free time! What is the reason?"
"They are beautiful, Moth.. Murb.. aheam," the aide smothered her own desire to speak.
"So you followed an existing pattern, I see. But what is the reason," Murbella continued, not unkindly, "for your presence here now?"
Tairasu took a hand out from her robe's pocket and delivered an old piece of cellulose. It wsa greasy and folded many times over, in an ancient fashion, so that the resulting square would be sealed by small bits of paper itself, while marks made across the folds and creases would make it hard for a spy to open and reseal the message.
Murbella eyed the Acolyte suspiciously, then asked: "How long are your visits to this place on average?"
"Twenty minutes."
"Time yourself and don't look where I go."
Tairasu only nodded. Internally, she feared for her life. Mother Superior is as Sutica had warned - as cruel and vicious as any Great Matre!
Murbella grumbled. Tiny progress. "And tell Miles Teg or whoever briefed you to send somebody up to the task next time." She left Tairasu in the hangar near the ornis, a tiny prey in the universe at large, and got to work. She got rid of her uniform while the garbage truck stopped inside the garage. She slipped inside the small empty area in its belly, broke the letterlocking and quickly decoded Teg's message:
"The answer to your first question: a cipher on letterlocked paper. Something a modern spy will not be equipped to deal with."
"Departure to the Gammu rendez-vous: anticipated to tonight."
"High security alert: we did not get to the true conspiracy leaders. They remain at large. Assume moles and spies are watching you at all times."
"Be prepared for violence."
In the darkness of the huge hangar, Tairasu's eyes flickered as awareness of her poor performance turned into consternation, then shame and finally a burning anger.