I sat, knowing he was over the far side, and the pincers still moved steadily and swiftly towards me. I hoped it would bring Cleary out in curiosity; it did. He stood up behind the housing, I sprang my arms up and fired a burst of three bullets straight through his neck.

I leapt up, ran around the back of the housing and grabbed his gun, a Walther automatic. I gripped the gun firmly in both hands and aimed at Whalley. A crashing blow hit me in the side of my shoulder, flinging me over onto the ground. I got to my knees and the shadow of the robot arm, pincer jaw wide open and coming down at my head was right over me. I rolled out of the way, making a grab for the gun and getting it, but the arm followed; I ran back several steps, but the arm ran back; any move I made, it could make too, and almost as quickly. It made a dive at me, and I sidestepped just as the jaws clamped shut.

I sprinted for the door; half-way there, the jaws knocked me to the ground. I rolled over, got up again, the jaws smashed me down again, then came back down towards my face. I don’t know where the effort came from, but somehow I managed to fling myself sideways. I grabbed the door-handle, turned, pulled, and fell through the doorway. The arm smashed into the doorway, the pincers closed over the door, then pulled back. The door must have weighed the best part of five hundred pounds, and the pincer pulled it straight back, ripping it from its hinges, and lifting it up in the air.

I ran through the chambers, not stopping at the shower room, but carrying straight through: Tsenong was there, by the porthole, but semi-slumped, one hand on the robot controls, one hand holding an automatic. He was looking very ill, whether from loss of blood or from radiation poisoning through the massive rip in his suit along his arm, I did not know. Through his glass visor I could see his eyes; they were burning with hate, and I remembered what I had read in the psychologist’s report. He deliberately and slowly brought his gun up towards me. I pulled the Walther’s trigger twice. He jerked back sharply against the wall. The hatred in his eyes seemed to vanish, and was replaced with an expression of surprise; his eyes stayed open and he did not move.