Starblood

all combinations. Klaus Margle had a limit to what he would order a man to do. Because he had been a brave man, he would not have a man perform that which he feared himself. But in his cowardice, there was no limit to what Jon Margle would ask of Baker. He could not instill fear in his Brethren subordinates through his own personality, but he could create a proxy fear by making them understand that his own dementia had no limits, that his own sadism could request and enjoy anything.
    "Baker brought up an interesting point," Margle said. "Addiction may eventually burden you, but you are getting off lightly now—even enjoying yourself, not suffering at all for Brother Klaus's murder. Baker said it less fluently, of course, but he made sense."
    Baker laughed unpleasantly.
    "So Baker wonders why we don't make you suffer now instead of letting you enjoy the PBT without a counterbalancing discipline. I tend to think he has a point. Besides, he needs a workout."
    Timothy rose on his grav-plate system, terrified—but he balanced that terror with hate, which he had found it prudent to begin cultivating again.
    "Yes, yes!" Margle said almost gleefully. "Fight like hell! It will be interesting to see what Baker can withstand when he has a grudge driving him."
    The quasi-neanderthal moved in with uncanny swiftness and delivered a jab to Timothy's neck that left the mutant gagging and gasping for air, his throat afire.
    "Open-hand blows, Baker," Margle ordered the henchman. "He may be as freaky inside as outside, and we don't want a corpse this time."
    Baker grunted acknowledgment and angled for another blow. He swung his beefy hands and slapped Ti's head several times until Timothy heard bells in his ears and his eye refused to focus.
    Ti twisted his body and shot forth with his mobility ball ahead of him. He caught Baker on the side, spinning him around. Baker snapped his head against the paneling, looked groggy for a moment. But the giant's quest for revenge was stronger than his body's urge to pass out, and he rose, staggered toward Ti, and swung a heavy fist that barely missed the mutant's face.
    Ti rolled onto his side again, accelerated, and rushed the brute. This time Baker leaped sideways. Ti skimmed past him, sliding noisily along the wall, his metal mobility cap rattling and clanging like a bell with a broken clapper. When he turned, Baker was on him, punching and stabbing with open hands at ribs and shoulders and face. Margle stood by the door, laughing…
    Ti was relieved that, if the beating had to come, they had decided to give it to him before his dose of PBT. Otherwise, without his psionic power, he would have been helpless. He directed his mechanical hands to pummel the man's back, delivering excruciating batterings—though Baker seemed hardly to notice. He wouldn't. His pain centers had been pared to a minimum so that he would experience pain only in its extremes, thereby insuring he would not back out of a fight until it was necessary either to retreat or die. He continued to work on Timothy with an insane, rhythmic movement that made him seem more like an automaton than a human being, raising his flattened hands to slap the mutant's face until blood freely flowed down the misshapen chin.
    Baker giggled, high and chillingly. His face was crimson, veins standing out, throbbing, sweat beading on his brow and running down his stubbled cheeks. He grinned fiercely, like a wolf before trapped prey. He was relentless and invincible, and Timothy was certain that the brute meant to kill him.
    Still Jon Margle watched, intrigued. His eyes contained a touch of the inhuman mania that infected Baker. It was lacquered over with education and a veneer of civilization—but it was there just the same.
    Aware that he had little time left before unconsciousness claimed him, Timothy attacked Baker's face with his steel servos. In moments, the man's bare soft facial flesh had begun to disintegrate beneath the worrying of the robotic prosthos.
    There was a long gash down his left cheek, a bloody pulp where his right ear had been, a crimson horror where the servos had torn the flap of flesh separating his nostrils. Despite the pain, Baker did not slacken his attack on the mutant. He had flattened his hands automatically at Margle's order, but now they balled into fists as the romp changed into a matter of survival. Timothy hoped for an order from Margle to stop this, but he made no effort to restrain the killer. Margle's