"Not yet, Lee, not yet. Everything's under control, you're reacting beautifully; you're really feeling fine, Lee, just fine."
"If only I could get at his throat," Lee thought. "I would squeeze the oil of that voice and never be sorry I did." He tried to stir and found that it couldn't be done; every muscle seemed tied in a cataleptic state. Then he heard the other medic speak.
"You were shown this little movie Lee in order to stimulate your mind into the production of a movie of its own. You have responded, you have answered the call. While you saw the first, the sensory tactile rays working in five layers of penetration have recorded and have carried your every reaction to The Brain. The Brain, in a very real sense has read your mind and it has retranslated these readings into visual images. We are now going to watch the shapes of your own thoughts. Here we go...."
The projector which had stopped for a minute began to purr again. As the first thought-image jumped upon the screen there was a low moan of amazement mixed with acute pain. It escaped Lee's mouth, uncontrollably as the abyss of the subconscious opened and he saw:
A monstrous animal shaped like an octopus crawling across a cotton field. Nearer and nearer it crept, enormous, threatening; and suddenly there was a sharp excited bark and a spotted coon dog raced across the field toward the monster. He heard the voice of a small boy whimpering: "Musha, oh Musha, don't, please don't." But the dog wouldn't hear and the monster flashed an enormous evil eye, just once and then it gripped the dog with its tentacle arms tearing its body apart, chewing it up between horrible sabre teeth.... As through an ether mask he heard the two medics say: "That must have been a considerable shock to him," and "With a sensitive nature like that, and at that sensitive age, such an impression becomes permanent."
The Alexander Hamilton Military Academy appeared, not real, yet more than real. It was a narrow court yard surrounded by huge walls slanting toward the inside; it was huge and forbidding, fortress-towers standing guard, it was enormous gates forever barred, it was the figure of a huge Marine pacing fiercely back and forth in front of those gates, the same ghostly Marine watching all gates so that nobody could escape....
"That's probably his father," the voices whispered behind his ears. "Yes; the archetype. He'll bring up the Mother, too, I'll bet...."
As in those paintings of the primitives where kings and queens are very tall and common folks are very small, Lee saw her now: Mother. That had been just after induction when he had brought her what he thought was joyous news. Her face filled the whole screen. It looked as if composed from jagged ectoplasms, quite transparent except for the eyes. Deep and burning with pain they were, boring into his own. And there was smoke coming out of her mouth and it formed words: "But, Semper, you are still a child. One mustn't use children for this sort of thing; one mustn't." Every letter of these smoke-written words seemed to be flying toward him on wings....
"Terrific," the voices murmured at Lee's back. "Remember the case history? She died of cancer six months after he went overseas." "Yes, I remember; he's never seen her again. He's probably built up a strong complex out of that one, too."