Johnny advanced slowly, the ramp shaking with each stride no longer, but dipping and rocking constantly now, almost ready to go. Starbuck retreated, taking Diane with him. Through the doorway they went-- Out fell the faceplate of Johnny's Robot. He tumbled after it as the ramp shook, metal grinding against metal, then snapped. He leaped forward as the ramp caved in. He felt his feet shoot out from under him, saw metal dropping away, twisting, to his left. He clawed out with his hands, gripped a jagged edge, pulled himself up slowly as blood made his hands slip. He stood in what was left of the doorway, trembling as reaction set in, his heels on the brink of nothing, his bloodied hands aching. Starbuck roared and charged at him, attempting to drive him back a few inches to his death. But Johnny caught him, met him halfway with no room to evade the charge, and they grappled there, teetering on the edge. "You tricked me," Starbuck moaned. "That Robot ... was you." * * * * * A knee blurred up at Johnny, exploding in violent pain. He felt himself falling and managed to twist away from the edge of the sundered ramp. He hit the floor with waves of nausea boiling up from his stomach. He lay there, blinking his eyes. Starbuck came for him. He drew his legs up instinctively, the knees bent, then straightened as Starbuck leaned over him. His feet caught the big man squarely on the chest, lifted him, pushed-- Starbuck went over the edge of the ramp, screaming all the way down. Inside, Johnny found Diane, dazed, on the floor. He ignored her. She could wait, for now he was a man possessed. The machinery which he could never hope to understand was all about him, bank on bank of it lining the walls, humming with its strange, sentient energy, glowing and flickering with a million lights. _Kill yourself._ Two words, clamoring, insistent, inside his skull. Their final hope.... He felt himself edging back toward the doorway, and the death which awaited him just outside. He looked at Diane, huddled on the floor, her lips parted--"Johnny...." _I love you_, he thought. The words of death and those of life and hope fought inside his skull, twisting his brain, battling there for mastery.... He found something, a length of metal rod. He ripped it loose and began to attack the machinery he would never understand. He was a wild man. The strength flowed in from elsewhere, raising his arm, swinging it high over his head and down. Sparks flew as his metal club battered the crystaline tubes, the delicate wiring, the metal cases. Glass shattered, sprinkled him, brought blood from a dozen cuts on his face. Electricity hummed, then shrieked, then wailed off distantly on a register too high for his ears. Raise his arm and plunge ... lift it and bring it down, battering, the metal club part of him.... It was Diane who eased the twisted rod from his fingers, soothed him with her words. "It's finished. Easy, Johnny. You've done it."