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His combat senses itching with adrenaline, Tim stepped into the darkness. He could feel the presence of the heavy man behind him. Then the door shut, and they were encased in black. He put his forearm in front of his face to guard against a head blow.

"My God!" said Pastor Tony, and then the darkness was empty.

Tim felt out with his hands. They slipped through the air, connecting with nothing. "Pastor?" he said.

Nothing.

"Pastor Tony?" he said louder.

No response.

He turned around and took two paces back and groped again. Where the door should have been, there was a vacancy that, in his blindness, for all he knew, could be the precipice of an abyss.

He ceased his movements and listened to the silence.

It was unlikely that even in the absence of light he had already lost his sense of direction. He replayed his movements in his mind. A one-eighty-degree turn, two good steps forward. He should have encountered a door or, at the very least, the tunnel wall.

Deliberately, he assumed the position of attention, pivoted on his right heel, and performed a classic military right face, turning his front ninety degrees. Cautiously, he advanced, feeling out while counting six strides. Nothing. He stopped, made another right face, this time counting three strides. The darkness continued. He stopped, made another right face, and made his way back. He stopped at six strides, this time making a clean left face.

In his mind's eye, he visualized a mental map. He should now be within a couple feet of where he had stood when he had entered this chamber of darkness, with the door, or the wall, roughly three paces behind him.

He clapped his hands once hard and listened for the echo that would indicate a wall. The sound did not return.

"Pastor Tony!" he shouted. His words were swallowed into nothing.

He ran the hard sole of his shoe across the ground and felt no friction of concrete or uneven stone. He stooped and felt with his hand—the surface was cool and smooth as glass.

He did not move. Had he heard something? He cupped his hands behind his ears and listened. He could have sworn he heard a cry, a whimper. With his hand out before him, he ventured deeper into the dark. He continued like this for what must have been ten yards, then halted and listened again. Yes, there it was, but so distant, so faint.

Hands out in front like antennae, he walked forward at a faster pace, every few steps feeling out with his foot. The fear of plummeting into a canyon lingered in his mind.

In the dark, the images of monsters on motorcycles haunted him. The horrified faces of those two boys as they ran for their lives floated like phantoms in the dark.

The cry rang out louder now. He started to jog. It grew louder. The woeful lament of a frightened child.

"Hello? I'm coming!"

The cold hand of panic held his heart. He was sprinting now, trusting in nothing that he would not fly off into the void.

"Aww," came the cry.

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He stopped. Forced his breathing into submission.

"Hello there?" he said.

"Aww."

It sounded like it was right in front of him. He got down on his hands and knees and crawled forward.

"Aww." A little to his right.

His fingers brushed against something soft as he reached out.

It pulled away.

"It's okay. I'm not going to hurt you."

The child whimpered. He reached out again and felt a small, bare foot. He squeezed and caressed it with his thumb. "It's okay. It's okay now."

He inched forward and followed up the leg. He felt what must have been shorts, then a t-shirt. The child was curled into the fetal position. He found a small hand bunched into a trembling fist and followed it up the arm until he felt fabric. A thin strip stretched over its shoulder, a tank top. A barefoot child in this dark chamber, wearing shorts and a tank top.

The child whimpered like a lost animal.

A distant memory of when he was a boy. He and Eric had been mucking through the ghettos of the BAT—on the lookout for the detritus of man that was treasure to a couple of poor kids from the Southside—when they came upon a puppy that had been cast away, eyes still sealed, by a heartless turn of fate. It was wet and cold and curled into a ball, whimpering. They had taken it home with them, dried it, gave it water. But in the morning, it was motionless and stiff. It was okay to cry, but he didn't. "Sometimes, you just can't get there in time," Eric had said.

"Hey, my name's Tim. What's your name?"

The child's whimpering stopped. A small hand sought his, and the delicate thing crawled against him. The paternal instinct of protection swelled in him, and a bonfire of rage began to kindle. He was going to take Sister Jillian's face and bash it against the rock wall until it was putty.

The child rocked rhythmically; he could hear it sucking its thumb. And then, gingerly, it began to explore him. It was fascinated by his boots. It tugged at his pants and checked each pocket. It felt his arms up to his shoulders. A little finger went to his face where it followed the ridge from his nose to his brow, then tickled through his hair and found his ears, becoming obsessed with pulling the lobes and bending the cartilage. At last, it searched his jacket until its fingers slipped into a discrete breast pocket and stopped.

"Ah!" The child emitted an audible gasp.

Tim's own fingers investigated. It was the patch of fabric from the Greta at the traffic light.

"Here. You can have it," said Tim. He fished it out, and when he did, a faint green glow—the outline of a rainbow—appeared in the air.

"Oh," whispered the child with amazement.

The child turned it over, and the rainbow vanished.

Psszt!

A flicker broke the darkness, and for the fraction of a second he saw a face. Then more quick sparks—psszt psszt psszt—then a pulsing light growing brighter as each stitch of the Greta's message started to shine.

She is frightened by the dark.

In the sharp, white luminescence, he could make out the child's face. A little girl with long black hair and wondering eyes. She observed his own features, holding up the patch so they were both bathed in its light.

"I'm going to get you out of here," he said.

The child clung to him, her warm breath on his neck. And then she pulled away and inspected the little square like it was a wonderful and curious toy. On one side, the dim glowing green of the rainbow. On the other, the Greta's vibrant stitching.

Gently, she started to pick at the patch with her fingernails until she pulled one solitary stitch; she held it up between them. It shone on the tip of her finger like a fiery little worm, intensifying until it was dazzling.

He shielded his eyes with his hand as if looking into the sun.

With a happy laugh, the child licked it off her finger, transferring the thread to her tongue where it lit the inside of her mouth so bright that he could see the webbing of the blood vessels in her cheeks. She closed her mouth and swallowed it. And the darkness swallowed him.

She was gone. He was alone. He groped on the glass foundation until his hands struck something soft—a little square of fabric with a dim and peeling rainbow of glowing glitter glue.

"Hey, man. Where are you?" shouted Pastor Tony.

Tim shoved the fabric into his pocket.

"Answer me!" the man said gruffly.

"Hello. I'm here," said Tim. He reached out and connected with a powerful arm.

"Did you see it?"

"See what?" asked Tim.

"You didn't see it?"

"No, where did you go?"

Pastor Tony let out a long, gritty laugh that prickled the hairs on Tim's neck. "You never were a believer, were you, son?"

"No, sir. I just do my job."

"Yes. And that's fine."

Pastor Tony stepped away and pounded on the door. It opened, and they emerged back into the cave where John Taylor and Sister Jillian waited. Sister Jillian shut the door behind them and dropped the board into the brackets.

They all regarded the religious man. His eyes seemed wild and unfocused.

"Sister, all my resources are at your disposal." He turned to Taylor. "Senator, I want to discuss how we're going to move forward."

"Mr. Boothe," spoke Sister Jillian. "Have you nothing to say?"

"You should get lights installed. It's dark in there," said Tim.

Pastor Tony laughed hard. "The Light is given to the faithful."