The others within Leto began to reassert themselves. Without the solidarity of the colonial group to support his identity, he began to lose his place among them. They started speaking the language of the constant “IF.” “If you had only . . . If we had but . . .” He wanted to shout them into silence. “Only fools prefer the past!” Leto did not know if he truly shouted or only thought it. The response was a momentary inner silence matched to an outer silence and he felt some of the threads of his old identity still intact.
