Starblood

Strangely, the thought of murder did not repulse him, though he had always been extremely nonviolent. He' had reached that time in his life—as most men eventually do—when powers greater than he had so relentlessly and ruthlessly backed him into a corner and begun shredding at the fabric of his life that no response was too excessive. With many men, it is the government, a king or a dictator or a president. With others, it
is
a large corporation, a blank bureaucratic monolith without a single shred of humanity. For Timothy, it was these men who took the law. into their own hands—with the blessings of the authorities who earned part of their living from them.
    Fury. It was worthwhile sometimes. Now, as he waited for the arrival of Klaus Margle, he did everything possible to nurture it…

CHAPTER 4
    He stood at the window, nervously watching the night. Time ticked by like water dripping from a faucet.
    Behind him, there was a pistol from his collection propped between a stack of books, aimed at chest-level on the door. He could trigger it with his psionic powers when the time came. In his servo-hands were two more weapons. There was no use asking for police help. All calls would be routed to Modigliani, and that would be a dead end. These lethal devices were all he had to stop them from killing him as nonchalantly as they had killed Taguster.
    He heard them as they entered the courtyard behind the house. They made no attempt to keep silent, blundering noisily along to let him know they had no fear. Footsteps on the pavement. Then a soft burst of laughter…
    The door rattled, shook. It crashed inward as the Hound, yet another one, smashed through in a cloud of wood splinters. Ti had not been expecting this at all. His guns were absolutely useless. He turned into the dining area, dropping the pistols and calling his servos after him. He had been expecting men, not machines. Now what? He heard the Hound in the kitchen, but by the time he reached the living room, it was humming into the dining area, on his heels.
    Don't panic, he told himself. Don't panic—just hate. It's only the hate that will save you.
    The Hound entered the room, sensed his presence, sought him with its cameras and radar grids, ascertaining if he were the proper quarry or not. It would only need a split second to make that decision…
    He sought an escape route—though he realized that the great house which was equipped to sustain him in luxury was not equally appointed to preserve him from death. The place would be surrounded; the doors were useless. Suddenly, he remembered the Revolutionary War cellars upon which the house was built. If he could get into those, there were countless outlets to other places on the mountain.
    The Hound fired three pins.
    Ti slammed down on his mobility sphere speed controls, streaked into the hall, through the cellar door and down the steps (there for the convenience of his legged guests). He crossed the Tri-D room and went into the shooting range, slamming the heavy door behind him. It was monstrously thick, resurrected from the Tory cellars. It was a munitions storehouse door, plated in lead. Even the Hound would require some time to break that down.
    He floated along the left wall where the cellars lay behind the thin skin of his house, stretching far back into the mountain.
    After the first four or five, which were man-made, the caves were rough and fortified. When he reached the end of the room, he used his servos to rip loose the half-round that filled in the corners of the plasti-wood paneling. Metal fingers gripped round that paneling, he proceeded to pry it away from the wall beams. He looked through, seconds later, into the cool darkness of the Tory cellars.
    Behind, the Hound struck the leaded door, hard.
    Unable to squeeze between the beams, Ti shifted his grav-plates so he lay on his side, then moved ball-first through the gap and into the darkness. Once inside, he shifted to vertical position and sent his servos back to restore the panel as best they could. It might confuse the demon machine for a few minutes, though it could not be a completely successful ruse. The Hound would be after him soon enough.
    Through the partition, he heard the door to the shooting range give; then it crashed inward to admit the Hound.
    He moved forward slowly, letting his eye adjust to the lack of light. Soon he could distinguish the outlines of fallen beams and broken tables, of rotted and shattered chairs, a few