Tom Swift and the Mystery Comet (2 page)

"In other words, push a button," chuckled Horton. "Guess we can manage that."

There were no further incidents during the several hours Tom remained on the outpost. Eventually he and his friends boarded the spacecraft that had ferried them starward, the mammoth and mighty
Challenger
, and pulled away from the station.

Tom seemed wary and hesitant as he sent the repelatron dish-antennas sliding along the ship’s encircling rail-rings to produce the angle of push that would drive the
Challenger
toward the earth. "Now boss," said Chow with a shoulder-squeeze, "donchew let that space shiver spook you. Sometimes these blame machines jest need a little kick—then they’re fine as fiddles."

"I know," nodded Tom. "And I don’t want to ‘spook’ you two either. But remember, when we enter the atmosphere this big ship of ours will be riding on repelatron beams."

"Good night!" Bud gulped. "Are you thinking that m-maybe whatever happened to the G-emulator setup might spread to the repelatrons on the
Challenger
?"

Chow concurred with the gulp. "Aw now, brand my Texas sunspots! Why’d ya have t’ think up
that
one?"

"Don’t start worrying just yet, pard," Tom smiled. "We’re using the repelatrons for maneuvering right now and there’s no sign of any problem. But Bud—you’re right. Since we don’t know what caused the malfunction on the outpost, we have no idea whether it might spread further."

The young inventor used the
Challenger
’s quantum-link communicator—called the Private Ear Radio—to contact his father at Swift Enterprises in Shopton. "The whole thing’s inexplicable," murmured Damon Swift after Tom had concluded his account. "We understand the anti-energy refraction effect now fairly well, and how it decoheres the field beam. This phenomenon has quite different characteristics. It sounds as if the beams from the new repelatrons were
sputtering
in some way, like an overchoked car engine—repeatedly failing and then reestablishing themselves.

"But son, how can that be? The spectron linear field generated by the repelatrons is composed of self-sustaining ‘twists’ in the very fabric of spacetime—interlinked
space-knots
, as we say. For the field to just stop working―"

"I know, Dad. It would be like
space itself
blowing a fuse!"

"There must be some other cause, perhaps something simple that we haven’t run across before. Perhaps some completely unanticipated environmental factor."

Something, a ghost of ideas to come, stirred in Tom’s imagination. "I wonder... there
is
a new space phenomenon out there right now—new since we first came up with the repelatrons, at least. Could
it
be having some weird effect on the spacewave field?"

"What do you have in mind? What’s ‘it’?"

"The comet!"

Since its discovery by deep-space astronomers months previous, a comet had been streaking toward the sun from the outer darkness between the stars. Nearing Earth’s orbit, it had become a brilliant sight, a steamer of milky white stretching almost halfway across the night sky.

Mr. Swift chuckled. "Well, Tom, you’re approaching the question with good experimental logic, identifying all the relevant variables in the situation. But Comet Tarski is just the usual speck of space dust and ice—with a big long tail that’s
a whole lot of nothing
."

As Tom clicked off the PER, Bud, who had been listening attentively with Chow, said: "What’s all that mean, Skipper? Or were you just free-wheeling? Could the comet―"

"I don’t know," Tom said. "It’s just something out there in space that’s new since we began using the repelatron principle, back when we were building the hydrodome."

"Ye-aah. But boss," piped up Chow nervously, "she’s been out there fer quite a while now. Howcome all of a sudden―"

"Don’t ask me," came the rejoinder. "I just work here."

The
Challenger
landed smoothly on its special pad on tiny Fearing Island, the Swift Enterprises spaceport/seaport off the coast of Georgia. The three flew back to New York in an Enterprises jetrocopter with Bud, an experienced pilot for all his few years, on the stick. In their Shopton beds, Bud and Chow slept well that night, but Tom’s sleep was uneasy.

How could
a whole lot of nothing
cause a whole heap of trouble?

Next morning, in the administrative office at Enterprises he shared with his father, Tom made a quick PER call to the outpost. Ken Horton had further problems to report. "Sorry, chief, but it’s been happening over and over, several times an hour. Your interrupter has had to keep shutting the system down. It’s gettin’ a little
old
, making like fidgetty jumping beans."

"I’ll bet," said Tom. "Ken, you’d better just kill the system for the time being and resume rotation until we come up with a fix."

"Roger that, hombre."

His creative minding working the puzzle in "background" mode, the youth began the always-formidable task of reviewing the e-messages and letters that awaited him.

When Mr. Swift came in, Tom held up one letter for him to see. "I guess people think inventing leaves a lot of free time," he snorted. "Someone’s begging me to attend a convention in Phoenix to give a talk about something or other. Tomorrow afternoon!"

Mr. Swift chuckled as he took the letter. The letterhead read:

FicVictorCon
HEROES TO INSPIRE US

"Have you heard of this, Tom?" asked Damon Swift. "What sort of convention is it? Science and technology?"

"No," Tom replied. "As I understand it, it’s mainly for science fiction fans. But not general-purpose sci-fi stuff. They’re into something very specific. Believe it or not, there’s a whole genre called
invention fiction
. I think it also includes what they call
techno-thrillers.
"

His father gave a doubtful nod. "Techno-thrillers—I’ve heard of that term. Novels with heroes who end up fighting super-machines or plotters who use computers. It often involves foreign agents, or mad scientists. Government conspiracies, too. That sort of thing. I have the impression it’s elbowed westerns aside."

"Bud likes them. I’m afraid I’ve never read any—er, knowingly."

"You and I don’t need to read a lot of fiction, son," Mr. Swift pointed out with twinkling eyes. "Our daily life is ‘fiction’!"

Tom laughed. "As to invention fiction, I’m afraid we may be the primary perpetrators. Most of the newer stories are the Runabout Press fictionalizations of my own thrilling exploits!"

"Yes—plus reprints of the old series about your great-grandfather." Like the original Tom Swift, who had invented everything from giant cannons to photo telephones in the earlier years of the last century, Tom’s own new-millennium exploits were recounted in imaginative form by writers who knew more about the mechanics of kidnapping or blows to the skull than about science and technology. Yet the series—billed as
thrilling stories of new inventions in the world of tomorrow which promise to be the great achievements of the future
—sold much better than the more prosaic accounts provided by the Swifts for the news media and the scientific journals. Written by the holders of contractual rights the Swift family had sold off long ago, the books were advertised as being designed for "science-minded boys age 10-14."

"The funny thing is," noted Mr. Swift, "George Dilling did a survey which indicated that most purchasers of the books were
middle-aged men
, and almost all of
those
were engineers. I suppose they’re looking for something lightweight and relaxing."

"In other words, entertainment that falls somewhere between literature and television."

"Or cyber-games!"

Tom took the letter and tossed it onto his desk. "I’ll ask Trent to send out the usual form-letter turndown."

His father sat down behind his desk and seemed to mull something over for a moment. "Son—I’d like you to try to take them up on their invitation."

"Really?"

"There’s a reason," said the older man. "You’ve had a pretty steady diet of stress lately. Even your vacation in Pakistan turned into the usual life-or-death situation. And since you’ve returned from the seafloor business you’ve been working away on the deep-sea aquarium, or the space outpost project, or this new device you mentioned..."

"Right, the telesampler."

"Tom, your mother and I are worried, and Doc Simpson concurs. The things you go through aren’t just a form of exercise. Your subconscious must know you’re facing death repeatedly—and if you don’t relax when you have a chance, who knows what’ll end up crossing over from your brain into your body? I don’t want you to end up with a fatal coronary, like Hank Sterling’s father."

"I know, Dad," Tom responded quietly. John Sterling had been one of Damon Swift’s closest friends.

"This convention in Phoenix is a very small matter. It might even be fun! Certainly a couple days of relaxation."

The young inventor grinned and picked up the letter again. "You’re right. I suppose it wouldn’t be hard to jet over to Phoenix for a day and a night. To tell the truth, I think I could use some mental housecleaning right now.

"And it’d not exactly a trip to Kranjovia, or down an anti-matter volcano. It’s
Phoenix
. People go there to retire! Okay, Dad—for once I’ll head
away
from danger."

But within a day, Tom’s decision turned out to be
not at all
what the doctor ordered!

"TOO BAD the girls couldn’t come along," Bud said to Tom as he piloted their commuter jet across southern Illinois. "Bet Sandy had a few, mm, thoughts on the subject."

Tom grinned. "I don’t know about
thoughts
, but she sure had some
words
!"

The youths’ customary double-dates in Shopton were Tom’s vivacious sister Sandra, one year his junior, and dark-haired Bashalli Prandit, who worked with her older brother at a coffee house in town called The Glass Cat. Both had been invited to join Tom and Bud on their expedition to exotic Phoenix, but Sandy had work to do in her part-time job as a demonstrator of the Pigeon Special line of miniplanes, and Bashalli was engrossed in preparing for an examination at the art school she attended. Sandy had avoided any reticence in expressing her disappointment.

The mach-plus jetcraft, manufactured by Enterprises’ Shopton affiliate the Swift Construction Company, crossed the continent like a lightning-fast flying carpet. They landed at Phoenix, where one of the convention organizers, a bald-headed man with thick glasses named Desmond Gozzamash, awaited in a very large—if very old—car. "A mint condition Imperative Motorskill Geminaut, 1963! She’s worth a lot o’ comic books, gentlemen."

"I’ll bet," smiled the young scientist-inventor.

"Maybe someday Tom’s atomicar, the
Silent Streak
, will be a valuable collectible," Bud speculated from the rear seat.

"Oh, I wouldn’t think so," replied Gozzamash.

They fought traffic all the way to the roofed carport of the Gardenia Grove Hotel downtown, a massive old structure recently refurbished. The entrance to the hotel throbbed with convention goers, most of them in T-shirts. "I
told
you you shoulda worn the blue-striped number, pal!" Bud laughed.

"I’m traveling incognito."

But even in suit and tie, Tom Swift was instantly a sensation, camera flashes erupting on all sides and picture-cellphones raised high in a waving forest of excitement. "
Tom! Tom! Over here! Reach for it, Tom!
"

One conventioneer begged to run a hand through the young inventor’s spiky blond crewcut. "M-maybe later," Tom gasped as he was jostled about.

From a few ranks back in the crowd, a sultry voice called out, "Tom Swift, you may be only a boy, but
I
am the woman to make you grow up!"

"That guy had better get a life," Bud grumbled. "You know..." he added after a moment, "I think I recognize him from my high school football team."

Tom whispered to his chum, "The Noise Suppression Conference sure wasn’t like this!"

"Yeah," agreed Bud. "It was a lot quieter!"

As they staggered into a slightly secluded part of the lobby, Gozzamash said, "But see now, Tom, you’re what it’s all
about
. You’re
it
!
You’re
the bomb! The
money
! This is basically an organized gathering of
hero-worshippers!
"

Tom smiled thinly. "Well—long as it’s organized."

The two were protectively shepherded up to their room, where they showered and girded their loins for the afternoon to come. "Okay," gulped Tom. "Down to the field of combat."

"Aw, c’mon, it’s not so bad," urged Bud with a grin. "On the other hand, this is why repelatrons were invented."

Within the convention hall itself the crowds seemed a bit calmer, preoccupied with bargains and maneuvering through the crowded aisles. Tom signed a few autographs, and one dubious moon rock, as he made his way to the table dedicated to the Tom Swift juvenile fictionalizations.

"
Jetz
!" Bud gaped. Behind the table stood a big wide figure in a blazing western shirt and cowboy hat!

"Wa-aal brand my chickpeas! Here ya are!"

"It’s a—uh—remarkable effect, ma’am," Tom murmured politely.

"Look jest like him, doncha think?" exulted the woman.

"Yes," Tom nodded. "
Jest
like."

The long table was crowded with books. There were a number of the old books that fictionalized the adventures of Tom’s great-grandfather; Tom shot a grin toward Bud as he noted the red oval on the book spines with its signature image of Great-Grandfather Tom—the "guy-with-a-hat" that had become the insignia of Tom Swift Enterprises.

And then there was the new series, already a couple dozen or so. Bud picked up one of the paperbacks and studied the front cover. "You know," he said, "I don’t so much mind that they have me talking like a guy with a major crush on himself. But even the artwork is pretty careless. Look at this, pal—if the two volcanoes in New Guinea were that far apart, you could have just flown right through between ’em in the
Sky Queen
. And you couldn’t see them in any event, because of the storm."