Tom Swift and His Atomic Earth Blaster (4 page)

A short time later Uncle Jake and Bud said goodnight and left. Soon Tom’s mother and sister retired to their rooms upstairs. After they had gone, Mr. Swift turned to his son. "I’m going to have a guard sent over from the plant, at least for a night or two. And I’ll call Ames at home and give him a full report."

Finally, hours later, Tom and his father were able to snatch a few hours’ uneasy sleep. But their first thoughts upon waking had the same theme as their last thoughts upon falling asleep.

Could they defend family and friends against a determined agent like the Kranjovian known as Ivor Bronich?

If only they could be sure!

OVER A LATE breakfast the next morning, Tom and his father talked again about the possibility of a South Pole expedition in search of iron. Overnight Damon Swift had come around to his son’s way of thinking and was now excited about the possibility of Swift Enterprises participation.

"I have to fly to Washington late today, anyhow," Mr. Swift announced. "While I’m there, I’ll sound out the authorities about government backing."

"I sure hope you can sell them on the idea!" Tom said. "In the meantime, I’ll get back to work on the earth blaster. I have some further ideas on making a much more powerful machine to penetrate the earth’s crust."

After breakfast father and son drove to Swift Enterprises. Here, in a cluster of buildings and airstrips sprawled over a four-mile-square enclosure, their astounding dream would see the light of day—if it proved to be possible at all!

Tom said goodbye to his father at the main gate and hurried to one of his auxiliary laboratories, this one in a lab complex next to the main administration building. To get in, he took an electronic key from his pocket and beamed it at the lock. The coded signal was recognized and the heavy door popped open into the wide hallway.

In a cradle in the middle of the clean, gleaming room was the cylindrical form of the new-version earth blaster, which Tom had been working on since the first version had been substantially finished.. The machine was mostly incomplete as of yet, and its power was drawn from thick cables. The veranium atomic pile would not be installed until a further point in its development.

Seated on a stool in front of his 30-foot workbench, Tom quickly applied his thoughts to the job of altering and improving his original blaster design. Where to begin?

The first hurdle was the problem of heat. Tom had decided to try adapting the cooling system he had invented for his giant robot. This system used a highly paramagnetic gas which was alternately magnetized and demagnetized at the same high rate as the characteristic emission frequency of radiant heat waves. The gas was circulated through tubular interstices in the robot’s "skin" to maintain its ideal working temperature of 96.4 degrees Fahrenheit.

A similar system would be needed to protect the instruments in the earth blaster from destruction. Similar—but far stronger. At only one hundred miles down the blaster would already be coping with temperatures of several thousand degrees—hot enough to shrivel a human being to ashes in seconds!

But how could the robot’s system be made more effective? "We could convert the excess thermal energy in the coolant directly to electricity by a thermocouple arrangement," mused Tom. He made some calculations and sketches, and wrote notes to himself in his ever-present notebook.

"She’ll need a gyroscope, too." He smiled at the thought of what might happen if the machine ever veered off course. "It might burrow into some other country’s territory and swipe their ore—and the Old Man Greenups of the world wouldn’t care much for
that!"

Two hours later, while Tom was busy with his design-simulator flatscreen working out structural details of the new blaster adaptations, he became aware of muffled voices in the hall outside the laboratory door.

One voice was that of Bud Barclay, the other, as recognizable as fingerprints, was Chow Winkler’s. Chow was a Texas-born former chuck-wagon cook whom Tom and his father had virtually adopted as their personal chef and good friend.

"I know yuh’re just yankin’ my lassoo, Buddy Boy," Chow was saying. "They’s no way y’can walk around in soft dirt without leavin’ footprints."

"It’s true, Chow," insisted Bud. Tom could imagine the look of mischievous innocence on his friend’s face. "He’s got it all worked out—special spy shoes that don’t leave a mark. They don’t even sink into water!"

"Nngh,
now I know yuh’re bluffin’ me," the Texan replied. "I may be past my prime—an’ fat—and a little bit bald—"

"You want me to stop you when I disagree?"

"Stupido, I ain’t!" Chow concluded smugly.

There was a knock, and Tom unlocked the door remotely with the electri-key. A picture of offended dignity, the roly-poly cook marched into the lab, Bud following. "Boss, this here cayute is tryin’ to tell me—"

"I heard, Chow," said Tom. "But he’s just passing along our cover story."

Chow nodded suspiciously. "Cover story, huh?" He glanced skeptically at Bud, then back at Tom. "I know what that is—whatcha tell folks when you think you got a problem with spies, right?"

"That’s right," Tom confirmed. "But since you’re our partner and pal, I’ll tell you the real story."

Chow was placated by the praise. "Okay, then!"

"We’re going to the South Pole pretty soon, to drill to the center of the earth with my new invention, in search of iron. But we don’t want to let it out to the public—it’s very hush-hush. There’s international diplomacy involved."

"I get it, Tom." Chow nodded sagely. "Yep. South Pole. S’all covered with ice, so’s you can’t leave footprints no-way anyway."

Tom flashed an affectionate grin that was matched by Bud from behind Chow’s broad back. "That’s good figgerin’, pard!"

Chow left, promising to return with a mid-morning snack. At the door he glanced back at Bud. "That’ll learn ya, Bud," he said. "Cain’t bluff a bluffer." He pushed the door shut behind him.

"Nice save, skipper," Bud said. "Thought I’d stop by on my way to the control tower in case you needed my advice on any new inventions."

"Advice is always welcome, Isaac Newton," chuckled the young inventor.

Bud strolled over to the earth blaster chassis and knocked on it. "This the new baby?"

"That’s it—version two. Destination, the earth’s core!"

"Or thereabouts, huh." Bud had been told of the audacious project. "Looks like you’re changing the digging spikes."

The cluster of twenty sharp spikes of various lengths which had adorned the nose of the first model had been completely removed. Instead, each of the two intake ports at the fore-end of the cylinder was bordered by a pair of tapering vanes that shone like polished gold, with a fifth vane of slightly greater length and thickness extending forward from the center of the unit. A pair of conical cowlings now flared from the rear of the blaster at the ends of the inner conduits.

"These its new teeth? They look like snail antennas, Tom—and
don’t
look very sharp."

"Don’t have to be," retorted the young inventor. "They’ll never touch rock at all."

Bud gave his pal a half-smile. "Well, we ran into ghost crows in New Mexico—now it’s ghost
teeth!"

Tom laughed and explained. "Those vanes are electrodes of a special design. An electric current—more like an electrical fireball—will arc from the big central electrode to each of the others around the perimeter."

"Little lightning bolts, huh?"

"Yes, but continuous. And it’s going to be a little warm—warmer than your California sunshine in summer, flyboy."

"How warm?"

"In Fahrenheit, try 4800 degrees!"

Bud gulped. "Not sweater weather! But seriously, how can the machine withstand heat like that?"

"I doubt it could, even with the new cooling system," replied Tom. "But that temperature is inside the electric arc-field. The arc itself won’t even touch the metal hull, and it won’t be nearly as hot where it contacts the electrodes."

Bud nodded his understanding and asked, "So what did you mean about never touching rock?"

Tom walked over to the blaster control panel and tapped it absent-mindedly. "Bud,
anything
the arc-field touches—dirt, rock, metal, anything—will be vaporized instantly. The temperature is as great as that on the surface of the sun! We’ll be
melting
our way down into the earth."

"Man alive, that’s—"

"Bud! Don’t move!
Not a muscle!"

The impact of Tom’s unexpected command brought Bud to a complete stop, as if frozen in place. "Skipper, wha—"

"No!"
hissed Tom in a forceful whisper. "Don’t talk—
and don’t move!"

His heart beginning to pound, Bud waited immobilely for his friend to explain.

Barely audible, Tom continued. "Just listen. If either of us moves, we’re dead! You can’t even twitch or turn your head… It’s the electrodes on the blaster. I’m looking right at the monitor dial—they’re powering up! Must’ve been going on for several minutes now; it takes time. But they’ve passed the redline, the danger indicator. I—I don’t see how it could have happened…"

Tom’s tense voice trailed off for just a moment; his throat had gone dry. Then he resumed the strained whispering. "Here’s the problem. This lab has a special ventilation system to suppress currents of air and maintain a constant temperature. It’s the only thing keeping us alive right now! Any disturbance of the air—even a slight one caused by somebody shifting an arm, say, or a loud noise—creates a moving pressure differential. The electrodes will arc along that differential all the way across the lab, and into any good conductors—like the human body. We’ll be incinerated!"

Bud made a soft sound in his throat, as if he wanted to speak. "Go ahead," said Tom. "Softly, like me."

"Okay," whispered Bud in a strangled voice. "There’s a screwdriver on the counter about three feet away. Maybe I could edge over to it at snail-speed and toss it—"

Tom interrupted him. "I know what you’re thinking. But tossing a screwdriver won’t divert the arcing effect away from us. It wouldn’t be grounded.
We’re
not grounded very well on this floor, but the arc will flash to the best conductors around, and we’re
it!
Besides, there’s no time to sidle up to the counter: the electrodes are still powering up.
In a minute it won’t matter whether we move or not!"

"Then I—I—maybe—"

At the corner of his eye Tom saw Bud’s muscles clenching under his t-shirt.

"Don’t!"
Tom ordered sharply. "You’d be throwing your life away, and it wouldn’t make any difference—whatever hits you gets me too. We’ve got to think; and one minute to go!"

Just then came the clop of boots and the sound of a twangy voice in the lab building hallway. "Hey, George, Marty—in the mood for some fancy early eatin’? Give ’em a try!"

"Chow!" breathed Bud in despair. "Tom
—did you lock the door?"

"No."

"Then when he opens it—"

"We’re cooked!" Tom finished. "Literally!"

PERSPIRATION trickled down Tom’s face as he thought harder—and faster—than he ever had in any moment of his life, knowing that this could well be the
last
moment of his life!

He carefully shifted his gaze downward to the top of the workbench on which the earth blaster controls had been mounted. The kill switch, which would cut all power to the machine, was more than two feet distant.
Too far!
But only a few inches separated the tips of his right-hand fingers from a small battery-powered soldering iron in the shape of a thick colored drafting pencil.

He sensed, somehow, that the soldering iron was the solution. His subconscious had begun to work the problem through, the final result not yet displayed to his mind’s eye. But he could already feel his muscles aching to move toward the implement and switch it on.

His hand, trembling, inched through the air as slowly as the rising mercury in a thermometer tube. He barely heard Chow knocking on the lab door, so intent was he on his task; barely heard the metallic click of the door latch as his fingers brushed the activator button and he stabbed down hard.
One chance!
he said to himself.

The soldering iron took a second or two to heat up.
If Chow were to barge on in—!

But even before the seconds had elapsed, the tip of the iron had begun to glow orange with heat. When Tom had pressed the button, he had gently nudged the device forward along the workbench a half-inch or so, forcing its tip against the fold in a blueprint. Now, almost instantly, a single minute spark of flame puffed up from the paper.

What followed was a split second of chaos!

A spray of water jetted down from the overhead sprinklers. Before it even reached the floor, the lab was rocked by blinding flashes of light and a series of high-pitched cracks like the roaring of a machine gun. Chow, beginning to open the lab door, flinched backwards with a shriek of alarm.

As if mesmerized, Tom saw bizarre fireworks erupting in midair, like blazing snakes striking upward toward the ceiling. And at almost the same moment, a powerful force thundered against his side and slammed him down to the lab floor. Bud had tackled him like a training dummy!

"Down, boy!"
gasped Bud next to Tom’s ear. The thudding of Bud’s heart kept time with his own.

"The kill switch!" Tom choked. He wormed his way out from beneath his friend’s heavy muscular bulk and felt blindly around the top of the bench. Finally he found the kill switch and depressed it.

He and Bud sighed with relief. The lightning display was over.

"Boss?"
came Chow’s cautious voice. "What’re you boys doin’? One o’ your experiments?"

Water still spraying down from the ceiling sprinklers, the two drenched youths were grateful to be alive. The air was full of steam, smoke, and the pungent odor of electrical fire. The sprinkler above the nose of the earth blaster was blackened, smoking—and partially melted.

"Whataya mean, Chow?" panted Bud, struggling to his feet. "Nothing going on in here!"