He followed Menendez out of the building. Light sprinkles of moisture struck his cheeks. The air smelled different: clean, fresh, new. Somewhere during the night the rainy season had begun: soft rain, gentle rain, quietly pattering down. He had almost forgotten what rain was like, all these dry months. But here it was, finally. That was all right, Ferguson thought. I’ll just stand here in the rain, get myself clean outside as well as in. It seemed to be almost morning. Ferguson didn’t feel at all as though he had gone without sleep. His mind was alert, active, wide open. The horned figure was going through the same movement again and again, turning, reaching out, raising its arms, turning sideways. And turning again.
Ferguson stared. He saw the staff office building, the red building, the dark looming massive trees beyond. But all those things were misty and insubstantial, almost transparent. What had real density and substance was the shining white block and the huge figure that stood on top of it. And the red sun, and the blue one. He lifted his face toward them. Rain streamed down his forehead. He had no idea how long he stood there. A minute, an hour, how could he tell?
Then the vision faded. The real world returned, solid, visible. Ferguson looked around, feeling a little dazed.
He was standing on the front porch of the dormitory building with Tomás Menendez beside him. It was raining lightly. The sky was gray but getting brighter. A figure in a yellow rain-slicker came jogging by, heading toward the far side of the Center. Teddy Lansford, it was.
“What is it, time for pick already?” Ferguson called.
Lansford paused a moment, running in place in the rain. “No pick today,” he said.
“You kidding?”
“Not today. Not for anybody. Dr. Lewis says.”
“Why?” Ferguson asked, baffled. “What’s so special, today?” But Lansford was gone already, sprinting off into the rainy morning. Ferguson swung around and saw other figures emerging from the dorm, crowding out onto the porch as if to see if it was really raining. April, Alleluia, Philippa, a couple of the others. “No pick today!” Ferguson said to them. “It’s a pick holiday!”
“Why?” April asked.
“Dr. Lewis says,” Ferguson told her with a shrug.
Which set them all into excited discussion. Ferguson stood to one side, scarcely listening. It didn’t matter to him, one way or the other, about pick this morning. What had happened to him couldn’t be taken away. If they picked the visions from his mind new visions would come. He was fundamentally different now, that much he knew. He was changed forever. Just as well there was no pick today, he figured, because he wanted time to think, to analyze what had happened to him yesterday, how Tom had changed him. Taking him by the hands, opening him to the visions-Ferguson didn’t want to lose his memories of all that. But he realized it would be no big deal if he did. The important thing was not what had happened but who he was now, and who he was was someone else from the person who had been riding around in his head yesterday. He leaned against the porch wall. The wind picked up a little, blowing rain inward at him. He didn’t move. It felt fine, the rain. This early in the season the rain wasn’t too cold.
Dante Corelli appeared out of the mists. She looked as if she’d been up all night too. She trotted up on the porch and clapped her hands. “All right, everybody. Get yourselves up to the mess hall and have some breakfast, and then assemble in the gymnasium. Pick’s canceled today.”
Alleluia said, “What’s going on, Dante?”
“A little trouble, nothing too major. There’s a big parade, sort of, coming this way, thousands of people who have been marching all the way from San Diego. Some kind of religious thing, that’s what I hear. They’re supposed to be traveling through Mendocino today, but we think that some of them might just go astray and wind up in here and cause some difficulties. So we’re going to put up energy walls around the Center and keep them out. That’s all. Nothing for anybody to get worried about, no cause for alarm, but it’s going to be a sort of unusual day.”
Tomás Menendez, standing next to Ferguson, said as if to himself, “The Senhor is here! It is the Senhor!”
“What was that?” Ferguson asked.
“He has come here because this is the Seventh Place!” Menendez said.
“Who has?” Ferguson asked. But Menendez, his face flushed, his eyes glowing strangely, turned and walked past him, back into the dormitory, without replying. Well, okay, Ferguson thought. Like Dante says, it’s going to be a sort of unusual day.
Dante trotted off toward the headquarters building. “Remember, everyone,” she called, looking back at them. “Breakfast right away, and then over to the gym.”
Ferguson went inside to get dressed. Father Christie came up beside him. “How are you this morning, son?”
“I didn’t sleep. Fantastic stuff going on in my head all night.”
“But are you well?”
“The best I’ve ever been, Father. These visions. The things I’ve seen. I don’t know, I can’t stop—crying—crying from happiness-look, I’m doing it again—”
“Let it happen,” said the priest. He was crying too, suddenly. “These are the great days, the days of the prophecy, when He brings every work into judgment. I was up all night too, do you know? Reading the Bible, that’s what I was doing.” The priest laughed. “You wouldn’t believe how long it has been, the Bible and me. But I read right through the night. The Revelation of Saint John, over and over. The Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed us, and shall lead us unto living fountains of waters: and God shall wipe away all tears from our eyes. But first we must weep, if He is to wipe away our tears. Isn’t that right?”
“I never was able to cry, Father. But now I can’t seem to stop.”
“Go on. Cry all you like. This is the day when the seventh seal shall be opened, and the seven angels will sound the seven trumpets. Believe me, son. You aren’t Catholic, are you?”
“Me? No.”
“That makes no difference. I’ll bless you all the same when the time comes. How could I deny the blessing to anyone on this day?”
“What’s going to happen today?” Ferguson said. He felt very easy, relaxed. He was just floating along.
“The Omega and the Alpha,” said a voice from the other end of the hall. “The end and the beginning.”
Ferguson felt new visions stream through his mind. Shining worlds sprang up and blazed in him. He was floating still.
“Tom?”
“This is the day when it begins,” Tom said, coming toward him. “The Time of the Crossing. I feel it within me, the strength, the power. Will you be the first to go, Ed?”
“Me? Go?”
“To make the Crossing.”
Ferguson stared. “Where to?”
“I think, to the Double Kingdom. They are willing to receive you. I can feel it, their willingness. Their two suns burn like fire in my heart today, the red and the blue.”
Ferguson became aware that April was standing beside him, that Alleluia had appeared from somewhere and was at his elbow too. Indistinctly he said, “We’re supposed to go get breakfast right away, and then—the gym—”
Tom’s eyes were fixed on his. “Accept the Crossing, Ed. Someone must be the first, and you are the chosen one. Open the way for the rest of us. Once the first Crossing is made, the next ones will be easier, and it will get easier and easier and easier. Will you? Now?”
“You want me—to go to some other star—”