And those who pray for dew on the deserts edge; shall bring forth the deluge. - Frank Herbert

I know a profound pattern humans deny with words even while their actions affirm it. They say they seek security and quiet, conditions they call peace. Even as they speak, they create seeds of turmoil and violence.

The tyranny of the minority cloaked in the mask of the majority,” Odrade called it, her voice exultant. “Downfall of democracy. Either overthrown by its own excesses or eaten away by bureaucracy.” Idaho could hear the Tyrant in that judgment. If history had any repetitive patterns, here was one. A drumbeat of repetition. First, a Civil Service law masked in the lie that it was the only way to correct demagogic excesses and spoils systems. Then the accumulation of power in places voters could not touch. And finally, aristocracy.

I live in an apocalyptic dream. My steps fit into it so precisely that I fear most of all I will grow bored reliving the thing so exactly.