Tom Swift and His Space Solartron (4 page)

"But what caused the problem, anyway, T-man?" asked Ted.

"Power overload, and in a big way," the young inventor explained. "One of the transformers was out of sync, but Chuck has already repaired and tested it."

"Sounds like you’re back in business, skipper!" Bud offered jovially.

"Sure am," Tom confirmed. "I’m ready to pick up where I left off, with my full-power test. Come on, if you guys want to watch oxygen
and
history being made!"

TOM led Bud, Ted, and Chow to his laboratory, which had been cleaned up and restored to sterile normalcy by Chuck Thornton and the other technicians. The aluminum connector bars had been replaced and carefully tested, and the first-try matter maker was ready and waiting for its creator.

Chow addressed the machine suspiciously. "You in a good mood t’day, Matty-Matt?"

"Matty looks all shined up and ready for business," Bud remarked.

"Tom, since you want me to get the hang of this invention of yours, what exactly is the basic approach?" asked Ted Spring. "Just how do you go about
making matter?"

"That’s what I cain’t figger myself," Chow declared with a scratch to his bald head. "Sounds like you’re gonna make stuff to eat out o’ ee-lec-tricity. But boss, how’m I s’posed to fry up a bunch o’ volts and the like in my fryin’ pan? Tell me that and we’ll both know!"

Tom spoke as he began switching on the various components of the solartron assembly. "Well, you remember what we discovered deep down in the ground in Antarctica, don’t you, Chow?"

The Texan nodded tentatively. He had been a part of Tom’s historic drilling operation at the South Pole, where Tom had drilled for molten iron with his atomic earth blaster. "You mean that element stuff?"

Tom looked up and nodded. "Right. We found evidence of higher-element fusion going on in the earth’s mantle, which was completely unexpected."

"I’ll say!" muttered Ted. "I could hardly believe it when I read the news reports—and I’m an engineer, not a physicist."

"The physicists were baffled too, believe me," Tom said. "It was inexplicable, like something from a whole new kind of physics. Naturally it became a subject of intense investigation and debate around the world.

"The question had a practical side, too," the young inventor continued. "It was quickly pointed out that whatever strange things were going on under the South Pole might be an important clue to cold fusion, a potential source of almost unlimited clean electrical power. We found some more clues to what was going on under Mount Goaba in Africa. There’s a relationship between the fusion phenomenon, antiproton gas, and the ‘non-matter matter’ we call Inertite."

Ted looked thoughtful but seemed to grasp the idea. "So your solartron is sort of the next step?"

"It will be if it works," Tom responded wryly. "That conical assemblage of disks above the main chassis acts like a series of lenses, focusing a space-wave matrix field to—well, calling it a pinpoint would be at least a trillion trillion times too
large!
According to our mathematical models, the effect of the field is to lower the energy gradient of the strong nuclear force, which surrounds the nucleus of the hydrogen atom like a shell, and ‘stretch’ it outward. This allows the incoming protons to overcome the repulsion of the nucleus; it amounts to low-energy proton tunneling, a phenomenon which ordinarily—"

Tom paused, noting that Chow’s bulging eyes were beginning to assume a somewhat glazed appearance. He didn’t want to embarrass the cowpoke, but fortunately Ted rode to his rescue. "Proton tunneling—must be like electron tunneling. Particles jumping ‘over’ an energy barrier that they wouldn’t be able to penetrate head-on, right, Tom?"

"That’s the idea," Tom confirmed. "They jump the barrier, and we trap ’em! In theory we’ll be able to take atoms of hydrogen, atomic number 1 with one proton apiece, and overlay them—I won’t say ‘fuse’—to form higher, heavier elements. The goal today is to produce atoms of oxygen, which has atomic number 8. If the solartron can do that, it should also be able to generate the lighter elements in-between like helium, nitrogen, and carbon."

"Wa-aal now! That there weren’t s’hard," said Chow with pride. "You jest take the raw material an’ pile it up and make stuff out of it, right, boss?"

The young inventor laughed affectionately. "Right, pard. Nothing to it!"

"What’s fantastic," remarked Ted with awe, "is that you’ve found a way to do this at such low energy levels. In the big accelerators, you have to get the particles racing around at close to light-speed, with a
huge
energy cost."

Tom shrugged. "But don’t forget—nature got there first!"

While Tom had been explaining his invention and activating it, Chuck Thornton and the other two technicians that had assisted with the solartron had quietly filed into the lab. "We saw you and figured you were about to put Matty to the test," Chuck explained.

"Nice job you fellows did," Tom congratulated them after again thanking Chuck for the preceding day’s rescue.

The young inventor reached for the master power switch. "Maybe we’d better stand well back—just in case," Bud said half-jokingly.

"Suit yourself." Tom smiled. "Here goes!" He flipped the switch, feeding power to the machine, and adjusted the control knobs.

There was a steady hum of current as the solartron throbbed with a flood of energy from the Citadel’s reactor. To everyone’s relief, the aluminum bars stood firm. Tom settled down to tending the dials in silent absorption. Nothing seemed to happen but the occasional flick of a meter-needle. An hour ebbed by, and the technical team excused themselves. Bud, Ted, and Chow watched in fascination as another hour passed. Finally, apologetically, they left to attend to other tasks.

To everyone’s amazement, Tom continued to run the machine throughout the night and into the next day, sleeping on a cot in the lab as the deep hum of the transformers lulled him into a restful slumber. He broke off his vigil only long enough to eat a few bites of the hot, tempting food which Chow brought him at intervals.

It was late afternoon of the next day when Tom finally called a halt, after operating the machine to the limit of its calculated capacity. Thirty hours had elapsed since the start of the test!

Bud, Chow, and Ted rejoined Tom and gathered around to watch in fascination as, breathless with anticipation, he drew off a tiny quantity of gas from the collector tank inside the machine. He analyzed it in a Swift Spectroscope, then, frowning deeply, precisely measured its mass with a laser momentometer.

Bud saw the young inventor’s face turn bleak. "Failure?" he gently asked his pal, nudging his shoulder.

Tom shook his head slowly. "Not exactly, fellows. But…" His voice trailed off in discouragement.

"What’s wrong, boss?" Chow anxiously asked Tom.

The young inventor smiled wanly. "A million watts of electrical energy! And all my invention produced was this measly amount of gas!"

Bud rushed in. "But the spectroscope—"

"Shows that it’s pure oxygen, yes. Which weighs up to exactly
one one-thousandth of a gram!"

Chow pushed back his ten-gallon hat and knuckled his balding head. "Reckon that ain’t very much, heh?"

"About enough to keep a flea alive for half a second." Tom did some rapid figuring. "Chow, with the power I used to make this much oxygen, you could run your toaster an hour a day for 120 years!"

"Wa-aal, brand my coyote cutlets!" Chow gulped. "I—uh—how—" he floundered, trying to think of some way to comfort his young boss, but words failed him. He glanced helplessly at Bud and Ted.

Bud broke the glum silence by clapping Tom on the back. "So what? Fleas need oxygen too, don’t they? Cheer up, pal. At least your machine works!"

Tom chuckled good-naturedly, a chuckle that was half a sigh. "Guess you’re right at that, Bud. But this is only a start." He paced back and forth with his hands in the pockets of his slacks, then turned to face Ted. "As an engineer you see what we’re up against. The feed tank contained only a
wisp
of hydrogen gas at the start—so little it counts as a
vacuum,
like you’d find in space. All this time and power, and the matter maker couldn’t manage to make out of it more than—that."

Ted asked if the solartron had only been able to transmute a small portion of the hydrogen atoms available. Tom nodded ruefully. "Exactly. I knew this was a possibility. I was banking on some assumptions that were always a little shaky, and as it turns out the power allotment just wasn’t realistic. It looks as if even the Citadel isn’t the place to finish this experiment."

"Meaning what?" Ted asked.

"Meaning we’ll head up to our space station and use solar radiation as our source of power."

Tom Swift’s outpost in space was a huge, wheel-shaped satellite, orbiting 22,300 miles above the earth. Tom had designed it as a factory for charging his famous solar batteries, as well as a scientific observation post and communications relay station.

Tom’s quiet announcement was greeted with a jolt of jubilation.
"Yip-pee!"
Bud and Ted yelled together, and took turns swinging their friend around the floor a couple of times.

"Hey!" laughed Chow excitedly. "Let me in on this here square dance too!"

"Put ’er there, T-man!" said Ted and pumped Tom’s hand up and down.

"Hold it, guys!" Tom spluttered with laughter, his face bright again. "This is serious business!"

"Who said it wasn’t?" retorted Bud cheerfully.

"I’d say anything that finally gets me up into space is
way
serious," Ted declared with a grin.

Tom returned the grin. "Look! Some day I hope to colonize the moon. A base there would yield all sorts of valuable data—not just about the moon itself, but the earth and the rest of the solar system. What’s more, we might be able to mine valuable raw materials up there, such as that unknown hydrogen compound we detected in the spectrometer data from our moon flight."

"I know all ’bout this, boys," Chow interjected proudly. "Right from the horse’s mouth! Y’see, in order to set up shop on the moon, ya need a Texas-size load o’ air and water. An’ mebbe food, too, ceptin’ I don’t recommend it. Only surefire way from here t’ there is Tom Swift’s solar-i-tronic matter cooker-upper!"

"Got it, Chow-boy! But Tom, wouldn’t it be possible to grow plants on the moon to feed your lunar colony?" Ted asked. "Under a dome or something?"

"And maybe a few cows for Chow to punch," Bud added with a wink.

Tom shook his head. "No, because on the moon you’d get two weeks of daylight, followed by two weeks of darkness. Plants couldn’t survive under those conditions—not without a huge energy cost. And plants need water, and something to breath, just like people do."

"Okay, I’m convinced!" Bud exclaimed happily. "How soon do we head off to the outpost?"

Tom smiled. "I want to discuss the whole project with Dad first. We’ll start back to Shopton early tomorrow morning."

"Hold on now, boss," Chow spoke up cautiously. "You ain’t said nothin’ yet about
me
goin’ along on this trail drive up yonder. I mean, y’know, if’n you plan t’ jest run off your own victuals like on a blame printin’ press—"

Bud pretended to look worried. "Old-timer, we weren’t going to tell you the bad news just yet. But the fact is, crewmen with oversized bay windows won’t qualify for any more space flights. The strain is too great."

"The strain is too great?" Chow snorted indignantly. "Why, brand my space boots, didn’t I stand the strain all right when we built the space wheel and explored Little Luna and even flew clear on up to the moon? Didn’t crack up on any o’ them space trips, did I?"

"Oh, I’m not worried about
you,"
said Bud. "I mean the strain of the extra poundage might be too great on the spaceship."

A deep red flush spread over Chow’s tanned features. "I can’t help what my own cookin’ does to me," he said. "Now can I, Tom?"

"Don’t let Bud kid you, Chow," Tom said. "I wouldn’t take off without my old pal any more than I’d take off without a space helmet. Why, a good space cook like you is the most important man in the crew!"

Chow grinned in relief and threw out his chest until he seemed in danger of popping a button. "That’s shor the truth! An’ where-so-ever your food comes from, make it er grow it, somebody’s got t’ put it all t’gether and slap on on a plate for ya."

That evening, work done for the day and supper behind them, Tom and Bud joined Ted in his room for some television and relaxed conversation. They had barely settled in when Ted’s personal cellphone announced a call. Glancing at the readout panel, he commented with surprise that the call was from his mother back in Shopton. But his pleasure dimmed when he heard how worried she sounded.

"Ted, that Mr. Hampshire called again," Mrs. Spring reported. "Goodness, I just don’t know what to make of it, but I thought you’d better know."

"You’re right, Momma. What did he say?"

"Well, he asked for you. I knew that you were suspicious of him, so I said I’d be glad to pass along any message and tried to keep him talking. I had Ray pick up the other phone and listen in, to help me remember." Ray was Ted’s ten-year-old brother.

"What happened?" Ted asked, gripping the phone excitedly as Tom and Bud looked on in concern and alarm. "Did he say anything about the deal of his?"

"Yes," Mrs. Spring replied. "He said we should trust him, this is all in our best interest. He said,
‘You’re his mother—I bet you can talk Ted into doing the right thing, can’t you?’
Then he said we’d be hearing from him soon!"

Ted did his best to reassure his mother about the mysterious Mr. Hampshire. Nevertheless, the young astronaut-engineer’s brow was creased in a worried frown as he replaced the telephone and related the event to Tom and Bud.

He had barely finished the story when the telephone rang again. Ted glanced down, then back up at his friends worriedly. "Unidentified caller. What if it’s—"

Tom held out his hand for the phone. "May I?" Ted handed him the cellphone, and Tom answered with an anonymous, "Hello?"