A Darkness in My Soul

the procedure I had suggested.
        "Are you sure of yourself, Sim?" Harry asked. He sounded as if he wanted me to quit. But we both knew that was impossible. Only Child could develop the ultimate weapon, a weapon that would make war obsolete. I had to go in there until he formulated it-possibly urge him into it if he was unwilling. But there was no backing downnot with the world and Melinda hanging on everything that transpired in this room.
        They brought Child back in ten minutes. He was tranced and be was drugged.
        The world was heavy on my shoulders and Death was walking with me… …and… … like a cat with cotton feet, I went quietly, quietly, quietly…
        Like a ghost in an old house, I went without form.
        Like the breezes of spring, I walked softly.
        There was no echo of my steps, and the labyrinth was wanner than usual. The walls were actually unpleasantly hot to the touch, a strange change from the clinging cold that had infested the place. I rounded a bend and saw the Minotaur sitting on his haunches, unaware of my presence.
        He was reading a leather-bound Bible, completely absorbed in whatever the verses had to tell him.
        Slowly, so as to disturb nothing, I passed. He never looked up.
        Pasiphae, here is your unholy child.
        Minos, your labyrinth is ugly. It needs a paint job and some common comforts.
        Theseus, keep your weapons girdled to your hip, for there will be no killing of a sad and unpretentious Minotaur.
        The pit was a tangerine color, pulsating with mind-heat which coursed upwards, washed the rim, flowed down the stone corridors, evicting the leeching cold. The center of the pit was a fierce white dot.
        I reached out and grabbed the nearest thought. It was a weapon. But it was nothing that could cure the world's ills, no ultimate dragon as I sought.
        A formula to cause ratlike mutations in unborn babies…
        A beam that could dehydrate living tissue, make a living body into a dry, dead corpse in seconds…
        There were many of the G association thoughts, several different progressions of them which led toward one distant point whose nature I could not quite ascertain… … an inordinately large number of G thoughts. I was interested in exploring their source and their destiny, but they did not seem to be what I needed.
        Then I found it. A stray thought, the ultimate weapon.
        F… Field… Force Field capable of stopping all entry by anything, including air, permitting neither bombs nor bacteria passage… Field…
        I latched onto it and gently nudged it toward the main stream, toward the waterspout. The ultimate weapon-the weapon to make weapons obsolete.
        I thought I was being subtle, but I was underestimating Child. There was a clacking of hooves behind me.
        "Get out!"
        No. You don't understand.
        "It's you who doesn't understand!"
        He pounced. I stepped quickly aside, struck at him, and sent him flailing over the brink, into the pit…
        Far out at sea, the Force Field Theory was shot up the waterspout. Soon it would be spoken in a dark room, taped, transferred to paper, and sent by special messenger to those who might put it into practice.
        Sighing, I turned to go. But with a low, animal grumble, the walls of the labyrinth began to sway and the floor to shake and buck.
        From somewhere down in the pit, there was a scream, a deafening ululation which spread throughout the caverns, echoing and re-echoing. Clutching the edge of the pit, the Minotaur was pulling himself onto the earthen ledge. I could see that it was not the Minotaur who screamed, but I could not see anyone else.
        What is it? I asked above the noise.
        His eyes were wild. He opened his mouth, and I watched horrified as snakes came slithering forth.
        I kicked him. He fell back into the pit, all the way to the churning bottom this time.
        When I turned back to the caverns, the ceiling caved in before me, dirt and stones spilling over my shoes. And there was no longer an exit. I wasn't going to get out!
        I turned to the sea and saw the waterspout dying, withering. There was no hope in that direction, either. No hope! And the situation was so ironic, like Jesus finally sealed into his tomb. But I had given up that delusion, hadn't I?
        What, for crissakes, is going on? I yelled above the constant