VISION

On the morning of April 16, 1988, twelve years before the Little War, the animals of San Francisco went mad. They howled, circled, twitched in fear…

Something was happening in the earth.

It began as a subterranean rumble, a stirring deep below the streets of San Francisco. God was clearing his throat. The rumble increased; earthplanes shifted; tall buildings swayed. Bay waters danced and rippled.

Then the people felt it—a movement beneath their feet, a rocking shimmer of motion which intensified by the second.

Earthquake!

The big one. The one all the seismologists had been predicting for decades. The San Andreas was loosing its century-stored pressures, and San Francisco was doomed.

Mass panic. Water mains erupted. Dams split. Boats were lifted and smashed against dock pilings. Automobiles were tossed like marbles from bridges and freeways.

And the sounds…The metal thunder of dying buildings; collapsing, tipping into the streets in slicing downfalls of stone and glass. The cry of tortured earth mixed with the agonized shriek of thousands as the land split wide to swallow them, their cars, their houses, their streets and their skyscrapers.

It lasted all of five minutes (although the after-shocks lingered for weeks). Atlantis-like, the city vanished beneath the iceblue waters of the Pacific, leaving only scattered island peaks as testimony that a great metropolis had once existed here.

The Golden Gate Bridge was one of these islands.

Most of the bridge was gone; under the assault of the quake, it had snapped its massive cables and whiplashed wildly, splitting its metal seams and plunging in to the Bay. But the tip of the fabled structure remained above water, an immense tombstone of twisted metal, marking the death of a city.

Logan looked down at the ragged coastline. White-frothed waves beating at black rocks, cliffs of sunwashed stone rising up from the ocean’s surge. And, just ahead, the ruins of the San Fran Complex…

As a Sandman, Logan had been taught that the only reality was the reality of the system, that the power of the Gun, was paramount over the power of the mind. Mysticism was the work of demented misfits; it had no basis in fact. Yet, now, when he should have been using this precious time to search for Jessica, he was following a fool’s dream, hoping that a blind old mystic could set him on the trail of the Borgias.

The trip from Washington had been frustrating. A mazecar would have whisked him here in minutes — but the overland flight took several days to complete. Still, the craft had performed beautifully on its long run, and for that Logan was grateful. Gyroparts were hard to come by, and any major repair would be difficult to effect.

He angled the paravane, bringing the ship closer to the water—until he was able to make out the rusted-orange South Tower of the bridge thrusting up, arm-like, two miles out to sea.

Dia saw him coming. She moved close to her father, as close as she dared. “You told me a man would come, my father, and he is here. From the sky. He comes in black, like the night. He was once a Sandman. He wears their uniform.”

“They pursued me,” said the old man. “But I escaped them. I lived beyond their Guns. Now, it will be strange, helping one of them.”

“This one is different. There are tales…He ran, fought the others, and killed many of them to save runners. He is called Logan.”

“I help whoever comes to me,” said the old man softly. “I make no exceptions. We are all one.”

“I see him!” whispered Dia, exaltation in her voice.

And she raised her blind eyes to the sky.

Descent required precision. The sharply-slanted fifty-foot segment of pitted steel offered no level terrain on which to land, and the shifting wind from the ocean struck the paravane like a heavy fist, tipping the craft at dangerous angles. If one of the blades clipped the bridge…

Logan set down, finally, cut power. The blades idled and died as he exited the control pod. He stood, chilled by the gusting ocean breeze, staring at the hut. It was metaloid, squarish, much smaller than a city-unit. Crude, in fact. Andar and his people must have built it from bridge fragments. But why out here, in the middle of nowhere?

No one came to greet him. Not that Logan expected a formal welcome, but he had been told that Andar had two daughters, one of whom was with him. And that the old mystic stayed here always.

Yet the hut—lashed to the remains of a ruptured support cable—was totally silent. It seemed deserted. He moved closer, bracing his body against the wind tides. A wrong step on the slimed steel surface could take him over the side into the iced Pacific.

The hut’s squat metal door stood open. Logan hesitated, then ducked his head and entered.

Darkness. After the glare of sky and water the dim interior seemed impenetrable—yet something glowed like fiery coals at the far end of the windowless structure.

A figure.

“Come forward, Logan,” said the glowing figure.

Logan obeyed—until Andar’s voice halted him.

“Not too close…Stop now! And do not attempt to touch me. There is no danger if proper distance is maintained. Have you been informed of my condition?”

“No,” said Logan.

“I am blind, a victim of atomic fallout. My entire body surface has been affected. My skin is

radioactive. I no longer feel heat nor cold. My flesh is insensitive to pain…Yet I must remain isolated to avoid contaminating others. Only my daughters can stay in my presence for long periods. They care for me.”

“I understand,” said Logan.

“Sit down, please. Dia, prepare a cushion.”

A shadow-figure moved toward Logan; he squinted, trying to make out details, but his eyes had not yet fully adjusted to the dimness.

A bodycushion was placed near him. He sat down, sinking into it. “Thanks…” said Logan. “I—can’t quite see you.”

Musical laughter. “You have eyes, and I am without them yet I see you!”

“My daughter, Dia,” said Andar. “Both of my daughters have been blind from birth. They see, however, with the inner eye, and are thus graced.”

“My sister, Liath, is on the shore,” said Andar’s daughter. “Yet she, too, sees you, Logan.”

“Then you share your father’s talents.”

“Only to a degree,” said the girl. “Even our sight is limited. We cannot deep-read vibrational auras as Father can. His gifts differ from ours.”

Logan was now able to make out the girl, seated a few feet away from her father. A fall of long golden hair. A lean, curved body. Ivory skin. A delicate, piquant face. She wore a long robe of deep crimson, belted under the soft swell of her bosom.

“Now, tell me how I may help you,” said the old man. He squatted on the bare cold flooring of the hut, totally nude, thin stick legs crossed beneath him, hands resting, palms-up, in his lap. His eyes, deepcaved, burned white in a narrow, hairless skull, and his glowing skin, stretched loosely over his bony frame like parchment illumined from within, was grooved and ravaged by time.

He was the oldest human Logan had ever seen.

“My young son was murdered by a group of outlanders called the Borgia Riders,” said Logan. “They took my pairmate, Jessica.” He hesitated. “I want to know if she lives, and where she is.”

“And what have you brought me of Jessica?”

Logan took a small throatclasp from his tunic, started to hand it to Andar.

“No…place it at my feet.”

Logan did this. He studied the mystic intently, wondering…

The old man picked up the clasp, spidered his long fingers over it, then enclosed the throat jewel in his right fist. He placed that fist against the center of his glowing skull, held it there, motionless. You have strong doubts that my father can help you…Please, Logan, don’t doubt him. Allow yourself to trust. He will help you.

Logan heard Dia’s words, yet her lips had remained closed; no sound had issued from them. A telepath. The only explanation. But, if she is, then is he also?

No, Logan, my father reads vibrations but he does not read or send thoughts as Liath and I do. That is not his gift. You must speak aloud to him, as he to you.

Logan was confused. But I read your mind as you read mine, yet I am not telepathic.

Her answer reached him instantly. You are a parotelepath, which means you can mentally converse with one who is fully gifted, such as I am. I saw this talent in you the moment you entered my aura.

Your mind is rich and strong. It could be raised to very high levels.

These thought messages flickered between Logan and the girl in the space of a second, and human speech seemed suddenly cumbersome and unnecessary.

The old man said, “The vibrations have instructed me. I see your woman clearly.”

Logan leaped to his feet. “Jessica’s alive?”

“Sit down…listen to my words. Let me give you my sight.”

Logan obeyed, heart pounding.

Andar spoke slowly. “She is with those you call the Borgia Riders. They…treat her unkindly, yet she lives.”

“Where are they?” said Logan tightly. “Where do they have her?”

“That I cannot say,” Andar told him. “My mind does not show me their location in exact terms.”

“What terms then?” Logan’s tone was demanding. “Tell me what you see!”

Anger will not help you, Logan. Trust him. Allow him to guide you. Anger and impatience will only block the reception of my father’s vision. Logan knew she was right. But it was almost impossible for him to be calm at this moment.

“I…receive many impressions…I see…” Andar’s head fell forward on the thin stalk of his neck; he placed the tips of his fingers against his skull. His voice became high and lilting, as if in song, the words spaced and rhythmic:

“Where…the rockets die…

and gantrys tilt…

against the sky…

where the plain is wide…

you will hear their cry…

as the Borgias ride.”

Logan drew in a long breath. “The Cape!” he said. “Cape Steinbeck in the Florida Keys. They must have a base there.”

But Andar said nothing more. His head remained down, chin resting against his bony chest. His long hands were once again folded and motionless in his lap.

My father sleeps. The use of his gift has tired him. You must go, Logan. He has told you all he can.

“It’s enough,” said Logan. “I can find them now!”