Introducing Parric: an ordinary civil servant being ground up in a mill of paperwork, who is given a chance to work on an experimental government project—to live secretly in a town entirely populated by androids—whose very existence, if it were known, would disrupt society—something the repressive society does not want. But Parric is happy in his secret village, protected by a force-field from outsiders, in contact with only a few others in similar positions in other secret villages. Protected, until war breaks out and civilization outside calls in the horrifying Plaguewind. Then the experimental androids, affected by the plague in strange ways, become killers! Parric must escape his village, then trek across the desolated countryside, in danger from the surviving mobs of plague victims, to the control center of the secret android project, in an attempt to join other men in starting a new civilization.

Dorrin Parric is dead, and his son Orion has sworn to avenge him. But first he must run a gauntlet of human assassins, blood crazed androids and aging, paranoid dictators. Petty tyrants rule the few straggling settlements, where mankind holds out against the darkness. Time and again Parric eludes the strange traps set for him by the forces of decay. But his luck is running out. At the end of the road is Philayork, a bewildering metropolis wracked by fear and evil. Whatever had killed Orion Parric's father was also waiting for him in the ruins of earth's last great city.

Science fiction-third in the future history of Parric-the village had been called town central, where people learned to live with androids, and androids learned to live like humans. It had been an experiment to bolster a dying population, and it might have worked given the chance but there was the plague wind. And there was the dying...