Soft come the dragons

for the physical structure of the church and its ceremonies, or for the more basic reason of beliefs and moral codes. My own religious development was from non-Catholic to Catholic, and swiftly to agnosticism in which I rejected most all established codes and beat out, through a torturous process in my own head, what seemed like common sense codes. Fortunately, Gerda has gone through the agonizing steps of this process at the same times as myself. And though many might consider us immoral, we have easily spent a hundred times more thought and hours in establishing our own codes as anyone who accepts one established for him. But through this long, aching time of working out our society-taught hang-ups, there were very black moments inside my head, moments when I almost went beyond agnosticism toward atheism (though now I think only an uneducated man could truly be an atheist). I have a clear picture now of my god (you may have yours), and he or it or them is a sort of easy-going power/ person/force that doesn't care what we do down here— as long as we don't hurt each other. But in those bad days, there were some odd thoughts in my head. This was one, and the title speaks for itself. . . .
     
     

I
     
     
    I wonder if Dragonfly is still in the heavens and whether the Spheres of Plague still float in airlessness, blind eyes watching. There is no way to find out, for I live in Hell.
    Men have asked questions about Time and Space, and some have found answers. But there are questions which should/remain unanswered, riddles without tag lines . . .
    I am a digger into minds. I esp. I find secrets, know lies, answer questions. I esp. Some questions should go unanswered, but they do not always. And now there is a darkness in my soul . . .
    It started with a nerve-jangling ring of the telephone.
    I put down the book I was reading and answered the strident mechanical scream. "Hello?"
    "Simeon?" He said it correctly (Sim-ee-on).
    It was Harry Kirshire. I esped out and saw him standing in a room that was strange to me, nervously drumming his fingers on a simu-wood desk.
    "What is it, Harry?"
    "Sim, I have another job for you."
    He had long ago given up his legal practice to act as my agent.
    "Why so nervous? What kind of a job?"
    "A mountain of money. That's all I can say."
    "More than the mint?"
    "More than Midas."
    "Say no more."
    "We'll expect you here at the Artificial Creation building in twenty minutes."
    "I'm on my way." My stomach fluttered. The Artificial Creation Building. The womb.
    I slipped into overshoes and a heavy coat. Without Harry Kirshire, I would most likely be imprisoned at the moment—or in what amounts to a prison. When the staff of Artificial Creation discovered my wild talents, the FBI attempted to impound me and use me as a "natural resource" under federal control. It had been Harry Kirshire who had fought the legal battle all the way to the Supreme Court. I was nine when we won the case—twelve long years ago.
    It was snowing outside. I had to scrape the windscreen of the hovercar. One would imagine that, in 2004, Science could have dreamed up something to make ice scrapers obsolete.
    I arrived at the AC building and floated the car in for a Marine attendant to park. Inside, I was ushered through a door into a cream-colored room with hex signs painted on the walls, a small, ugly child sitting in a leather chair, and four men standing behind him, staring at me as if I were expected to say something of monumental importance.
    The child looked up, and his eyes and lips were hidden by the wrinkles of a century, by gray and gravelike flesh.
    His voice crackled like papyrus being unrolled in an ancient tomb. "You're the one," he said in dust whispers. "You're the one."
     
    "That's the situation," Harry said nervously.
    The child-ancient's eyes squinted out at me like burning coals sparkling beneath rotten vegetation. I could feel the hate consuming there, hate not just for me, but for everyone, everything. He, more so than I, was a freak of the Experimental Wombs. The doctors and supporting congressmen could gloat again: "Artificial Creation Is a Benefit to the Nation." It had produced me, and twenty years later, this warped super-genius. Two successes in a quarter of a century.
    "I don't know if I can," I said at last.
    "Why not?" asked the uniformed hulk known as General Morsfagen.
    "I don't know what to expect. He obviously has a very different mind. Sure, I've esped army staff, the people working