Then I began using my telepathic power like a radar to sweep ahead of me through the heavily wooded park. I must have walked along the concrete paths for almost ten minutes before I picked up the thoughts of a young girl whom I could not see because of a rise between us.
As I focused my mind more closely on hers I realized that she was riding a new bicycle along the paths of the park. She had been doing this every morning and evening, before and after school, since she received it as a gift for her thirteenth birthday recently.
I stopped walking in order to concentrate all my energies on telepathic contact with the girl. I waited right where I was, since I felt she would soon be riding into view over the ridge nearby. The trees stood sharply black against the cold morning sky. A recent thaw had melted most of the snow, leaving isolated dirty little piles around clumps of shrubbery or beside walkways.
Suddenly my mind contact with the little girl chilled my bones. She was being harassed by two men on motorcycles.
I visualized my body as feather-light and started a grotesque hobble-run that soon brought me to the top of the ridge. I looked down upon a wooded path and saw the girl running through the trees followed by two shaggy-haired young men in grimy motorcycle togs, just as they had appeared in my vision.
The little girl had left her bicycle behind in hope of finding protection among the trees, but the men had abandoned their cycles and were fast overtaking her.
I reached out to touch their minds and encountered lust and menacing glee as the tall one with a long droopy mustache caught a handful of the girl's long blond hair. I watched with mounting horror as this dark-visaged man slammed the girl to the ground, then, clasping both hands about her waist, lifted her like a banner high in the air.
His pudgy companion grabbed her and began slapping her with huge hamlike hands as they both ripped at her clothing.
Suddenly red waves of rage crashed through my mind. I slipped back in time and became, once again, the Indian medicine man fighting white soldiers who were raping and killing the women and children of my tribe. I found myself running faster and faster toward these monstrous invaders.
Suddenly my elbows dug into the hard wet ground and I cursed my crippled body for failing me. I was still some thirty yards from the enemy.
The little girl's heart-rending scream of anguish snapped me back to the present, and I shouted at her assailants as I struggled to my feet.
They looked up at me with surprise. The pudgy one laughed at the audacity of a one-legged man trying to interfere with the two of them. I headed toward him. When he was within ten feet I launched myself at his legs, managing to knock him down. We rolled about on the ground as this pudgy-faced youth tried to get room to slam his fists into me. I tried to stay close and harkened back to my army hand-to-hand combat training. I felt his huge fist slam against the side of my head, and for a couple of moments was lucky just to be able to hold onto him. My rage had made me clumsy, but now with cold angry ferocity I began slashing at his face and throat with short powerful karate chops.
With a scream of frustration and pain he broke away from me and got to his feet. They were shod with heavy lethal-looking boots. I telepathically picked up his murderous thought of stomping the life out of me with them. This gave me the split-second margin I needed, and the boot whizzed harmlessly past my face. I grabbed it and with a sharp twist brought him to the ground. Before he could recover I began slamming my fist into his jaw with all the strength of my rage. How long I kept at this I don't know, but another scream from the girl brought me to my senses and I realized that I was beating at an unconscious face. As I looked up, the tall fellow was sprawled on top of the little girl mauling her small round breast with one hand as he tore at the last bits of her clothing with the other.
I was up and bounding toward him, my voice shrieking madly at the top of my lungs. He leaped to his feet and came charging toward me shouting obscenities. Again I threw a body block and we fell to the ground, but this time my opponent was too quick for me and I found myself pinned to the ground with a leering mustached face bending over me as two powerful hands dug into my throat slamming my head into the ground again and again. I redoubled my efforts to break loose, but his hands were like manacles and his arms like heavy steel. Things were getting blurry... there was no air, and only one hope. I let my body go completely slack.
For a moment the iron grip on my neck continued, then with one last painful thrust, relaxed. As I tried to maintain some degree of consciousness I felt his hot face above mine. My thumbs leaped for his eyes and scored two agonizing hits.
With a piercing scream he fell backward and began rolling about on the ground in frantic pain-driven frustration. I tried to breathe deeply to recover as much strength as possible, then as he rolled toward me I raised both my arms and with every ounce of desperate strength slammed my hard wrists down on the back of his neck.
There was a sharp snap and his body went limp.
I staggered to my feet and hobbled wearily to where the girl lay naked on the cold wet ground. She had either fainted or been knocked unconscious, but she had not been raped.
I dressed her in the torn clothing, then wrapped her in my top coat and began reaching out for her unconscious mind. When I contacted the fear and terror there I sent powerful reassurances that all was well and that she was completely safe. Using PK and clairvoyance I worked with her body to speed up the healing of her bruises. Soon her eyelids began to flutter.
As she opened her eyes I began speaking softly but confidently about how she was all right now and would be able to ride her bicycle home without any trouble. I helped her to her feet and made sure that her own coat was buttoned as well as possible with its remaining buttons, before retrieving my own. With both my vocal and telepathic reassurances she mounted her bike, thanked me for helping her, and rode quickly off toward her home.
I had considered having her call the police and confront her attackers at the police station, but decided to spare her that ordeal. Instead I decided to deal with her assailants myself. What I was going to do with them I wasn't sure, but I decided to start by taking them back with me to our fourth-floor. apartment, which was vacant. There I could confine them till I decided what to do with them. First, however, I would have to heal them and set up hypnotic control of their actions so they would obey me.
I walked back to where my last adversary lay sprawled out and began my clairvoyant examination of his injuries. It didn't take long to realize that he was dying from a broken neck. I began working to repair the damage before it was too late. I had learned from C.I. that the healing powers of the greater mind are unlimited if used properly. The problem was to stop the struggle of the patient's micro self so that the healing process could take place. In less than thirty minutes I succeeded in completely healing his neck. While this would have been considered very slow by 2150 standards, I was satisfied, having done the very best I could. Before permitting him to regain consciousness I planted powerful subconscious suggestions of obedience to me. I sensed that his name was Griff.
His pudgy-faced companion, Judd, was still unconscious with a broken jaw, so I resumed my healing efforts. Again I was able to reach deep into his mind and still the unconscious struggle. Then working with his gland and nerve centers, I released the great healing forces. His jaw was soon healed and his mind had accepted my hypnotic control of his actions. He demonstrated his obedience by quietly getting to his feet and going to his motorcycle.
Returning Griff to consciousness, I started him toward his, motorcycle also. Then, with me-riding behind Griff and directing him, we made our way back to the apartment building with Judd close behind. Entering the seldom-used rear door, we made it up to the fourth floor without being seen. Once inside the apartment, I told them they could not leave without my permission and suggested that they go to sleep until I awakened them. Walking down to my third-floor apartment, I took my weary body to bed.