"Oh, shit," said Foxeris.

        Nutsy just chittered.

        Kathalla cracked her knuckles and turned to Freyhla with a grin,
"What would you say that 'droid's construction consists of?"

        The crystal answered almost immediately, *Hull metal, no
question about it.*

        Kath gave a short, barking laugh.  "I've always wanted to try
this, but I figured someone'd get pissed if I flattened Penny."

        She turned towards the Brian-construct and spread her arms,
making a squeezing motion.  The 'droid just grinned back at her.  Three
seconds later, it stopped grinning as what would be its ribcage, if it
were human, creaked and started to cave in.

        "Wait, you can't--"

        *Freyhla, back me up!* she shouted, *If this thing's failsafe
blows, I'm not sure I can cover all sides.*

        Her caution turned out to be unwaranted.  There was no explosion
and little sound as the construct crumpled, folding in on itself until
all that was left was a 6-inch sphere floating between Kathalla's
outstretched hands.

        Sweat was soaking her fur, and she could hardly remain standing
as she asked, *Someone stabilize this thing, I can't keep it this way
forever...*

        Either Freyhla or Foxeris must have managed something, because
there was a refresshing lack of hard radiation and fission explosions as
Kathalla slumped to the floor.

* * *

        The doorbell rang.  Cursing the timing, Brian scrambled for a robe
and, with an unmistakable "I'll be back" glance at the vixens on his bed,
rushed to answer the door.

        <snap-click> <creak> "What the fuck?!?  You're supposed to be..."

        "Dead?" asked Kathalla.  "You really should take more care of
your toys," she said, holding up the 'droid-sphere, "they're awfully
fragile, and it's probably because of poor maintenance..."

        "But how..."

        She laughed, "I'll leave you to figure that one out for yourself.
For now, you have bigger problems...  Like the fact that the stasis spell
on this hunk of well-beyond-critical-mass junk is failing rapidly, and I
only have one thing left to say..."

        She grinned what had to be the most self-sattisfied grin Brian had
ever seen, "You have two minutes to reach minimum safe distance..."