ith your hands. You can
relax because you can get tired. Not us, by God. Not us!"

"I envy you, George," Loveral said through his teeth.

"Oh, like hell you do. You treat us like we were helpless infants. You
feed and clothe us and do all our work, and you're so happy you damned
near split your guts."

"I'll take that, if you don't mind," Loveral said, reaching for the
hammer, his voice suddenly icy cold.

Atkinson slammed back against the table. "No, you won't. You won't take
anything more at all. You've taken our spirit and our pride and the
strength right out of our spines. You won't take anything more!"

"George?" Loveral said, but not moving any further.

Atkinson slid the hammer back of him onto the table, and his hands were
searching among a dozen scattered pieces of metal and wood. He watched
Loveral as he worked. "Let me show you what else I've made," he said.

"I'd hate to do it," Loveral said, "but I can stop your food, your
water, everything."

Atkinson's hands moved swiftly, assembling the pieces. He nodded. "You
can, but you won't."

"I have the only keys to the storage units. I control everything,
George."

"Correction," said Atkinson, holding an assembled revolver in his hands.
"You _did_."

* * * * *

Loveral looked at what Atkinson had in his hands. He blinked.

"You're nearly dead," Atkinson said.

Loveral looked at Atkinson, into his eyes. "If you wanted to kill me,
you could have done it some other way."

Atkinson shook his head. "Just this way. Just with something that took
me dozens of days and nights to make. With something that made me sweat
and swear to get. It was difficult--with no tools or proper
materials--but that made it all the better. Now I've got it finished,"
he said, pushing a bullet into the chamber, "and ready to use."

Loveral stood frozen, then he turned. "My dear," he said to the woman
who moved her mouth as though her voice had been pumped out of her. He
reached to touch her shoulder. She recoiled, as though his fingers held
poison. "George," he said, turning back to the black-eyed man.

"This is a great moment," Atkinson said, lifting the muzzle of the
revolver. "When I squeeze the trigger, it'll be like blowing the lock
off a prison door. I'll go yelling to the others, and we'll smash down
the whole goddamned place. We'll smash it down, so we'll have to rebuild
it. We'll pull apart every robot you've got. We'll tear apart th