Tom Swift and His Triphibian Atomicar (9 page)

"What about lubrication?" asked the reporter from
Today’s Vital Lubricants
magazine.

"No lubing needed! There’s no axle, no pivot—in fact the wheels aren’t even connected to the body of the car. You see, ultra-intense permanent magnets in the cowling interact with coils in the wheel, allowing it to
float
between the cowling’s sides without actual contact. So there’s no friction at all."

"Then how do the motors make the wheels turn in the first place?" demanded the skeptical, and disappointed, reporter of lubricants.

"The electric motors I’ve mentioned are of a new type. They produce an electrical flux effect that forces the floating wheels into a rotation. As for turning the wheels in steering, we can turn each of the cowlings independently—up to 180 degrees."

The crowd momentarily satisfied, next came a test run of the atomicar, with Tom the driver. This included a breathtaking demonstration of its flying and hedgehopping abilities, then a plunge into a huge tank of water with transparent walls. Tom wound up by skimming the roof of the Administration Building in full view of his audience, as the stand rocked with cheers and applause—even from Mr. Lubricant. Several of the newsmen, chosen by lot, were then allowed to try out the
Silent Streak
themselves as Tom sat in the passenger seat.

"And now," Tom announced over his public-address microphone, "I’d like to show you something very important, the atomicar’s special safety feature, which will be standard equipment on all atomicars. We’ll be putting a couple crash-test dummies in the passenger compartment, and I’ll operate the car by remote control, through the cybertron. The
Silent Streak
and a heavy truck," he went on, "also operated by remote control from the airfield tower, will be driven head-on toward each other at top speed. Let’s see if the dummies survive!"

One watcher, with a cigarette dangling from his lips, broke into a loud guffaw. "Looks like you don’t have much faith in your own invention, Swift!"

"What makes you think so?" Tom asked calmly.

"That remote steering gadget," the man taunted. "If your safety setup is really foolproof, why not drive the car yourself?"

Tom eyed the reporter coolly. "Good point. I
will
drive it myself!"

AN APPREHENSIVE murmur arose from the spectators. After ordering the driver-dummy to be removed, Tom turned to enter the cockpit. The woman sent by the
Shopton Evening Bulletin
to cover the event rushed forward and clutched his arm. "Are you sure you know what you’re doing, Tom?" she whispered. "There’s bound to be
some
risk. That guy’s just sore because he missed out when they drew lots!"

Tom murmured something to the reporter, who nodded and returned to the viewing stand. Then the young scientist-inventor climbed into the
Silent Streak
and addressed the crowd via loudspeaker. "As you can see, I’m not wearing a safety belt, or any kind of restraining harness." As he settled back into the contour seat and activated the various controls and sensor devices, Tom grinned and held up crossed fingers to the spectators. Then he rested his hands on the joystick lever to his right, and the trackball at his left.

There was no sound—not from the car, not from the apprehensive crowd.

But suddenly the
Silent Streak
and the big truck were hurtling along in rapid motion. The two vehicles sped toward each other along the narrow track, faster and faster. The onlookers gasped in horrified suspense as car and truck accelerated to startling speed!

Within inches of a crash, the two vehicles slammed to a halt as if momentarily frozen in time! Then they rebounded safely from each other. Though the front of the heavy truck was crumpled in, its windshield shattered and its doors wrenched from their frames and hanging open, the much smaller and lighter atomicar seemed utterly oblivious to what had happened!

There was an instant of awed silence. Then the spectators burst into thunderous cheers. Tom waved and flew the atomicar back to its spot in front of the stands.

"So how did you do it, Tom?" yelled one of the TV reporters as Tom exited the vehicle.

"It’s those darn repelatrons again!" he laughed. "Inside the viewdome are several very small repelatrons that are bolted to the frame of the atomicar. By means of automatic spectro-scanners they tune themselves to the body composition components of the passengers, particularly to the body’s water content, which pervades our cell structure. A mild repulsion force helps keep you in your seat, and when the cybertron senses that a crash is imminent, the system produces a
big
surge of repulsion power to hold you back safely.

"And that’s not all. The materials of the shell—the dome in particular—are made of a material called Durastress, which can be caused to be flexible and somewhat elastic. It rebounds immediately from any crumpling force."

"But the truck never even touched the car!" a reporter called out. "How’d you manage that?"

"There are other small repelatrons hidden inside the wheel cowlings, aimed forward. As the oncoming danger will usually be visible for several seconds before impact, the sensors have time to analyze the approaching vehicle’s composition and beam out enough repulsion force to cancel out the relative motion between the two vehicles." To further applause, Tom stated that he called the technique a repelatron anticrash system.

The excited crowd dispersed until only a few were left—Bud, Chow, Tom’s father, publicity chief George Dilling—and the man with the cigarette who had dared Tom to put himself in harm’s way. Dilling was shaking the man’s hand. "Beautiful job, Art! Wonderfully effective way to make the point—and pretty entertaining, too."

Art Wiltessa, key supervisor of Enterprises technical assembly, gave a crisp nod. "Glad to help, George—though I don’t really like to think of myself as a
shill
."

"Come on now, Art, not one word was false!" laughed Dilling. "Can we help it if people assumed you were one of the reporters?"

Tom gave George a chiding look. "You may be right. I don’t like misleading people, though, even if our intentions were pure."

"Well, I’d take the blame for it if anybody found out and objected.
Hardly
a major ethical breach, Tom. And of course no one knows about it."

Tom grinned and gave Dilling’s shoulder a squeeze. "They will tomorrow. I leaked it to the reporter from the
Evening Bulletin
. Glad you’re not worried, George!"

Dilling gulped.

With Tom in the passenger seat, Bud flew the
Silent Streak
the few miles back to Swift Enterprises. "Man oh man, Swift does it again!" he cheered.

"Now that you know how to drive-fly-swim her, you’re my number one choice for official chauffer!" his pal joked.

"Any time, Skipper!"

After the atomicar was safely garaged, Bud followed Tom up to his office. He was still energized. "Say—how about if I put in a little more flying time in the
Streak
?" he urged.

"Fine with me, flyboy. You know the ropes. I won’t even say, be careful!"

As Tom ducked into his office, Bud turned to leave. Then he noticed that the Swifts’ office secretary and receptionist, Munford Trent, was standing nearby with a hesitant expression on his face. "Hey there, Mun—er, Trent," nodded the young flyer. "How’s it going?"

"Oh, fine ... " replied the secretary. "Um... but ... "

"Something wrong?"

"Oh no, no. I just― " He came closer and lowered his voice, glancing at Tom’s office door. "I’m really embarrassed to ask this, Bud."

Bud smiled. "Don’t be. Ask away."

"Well, since you’re going back up in Tom’s flying car, do you suppose I could ride along with you?"

Bud was surprised. Though he saw and spoke to Munford Trent nearly every day, the man had always seemed very withdrawn and private, and slightly annoyed with life in general—definitely not the adventurous type! "I don’t see why not, Trent. I’ll ask Tom― "

The secretary looked stricken. "No, please don’t bother him with this. It was just a thought. I—I’ve just been curious about what it’d be like, that’s all."

"Afraid he’ll say no, huh?" Bud chuckled. "Okay, man, we’ll do it on the sly."

"That’s wonderful! I’ll take my lunch hour up in the air!" Trent grabbed a brownbag from his desk.

Soon the scarlet atomicar was back in the clouds, dipping and darting around Shopton and Lake Carlopa. Trent’s face was flushed with sheer excitement. "I can’t believe how exciting this is! You know, Bud... I really don’t have the opportunity to have much fun. My life’s a little on the dull side."

"Maybe you should get out more, pal."

"Oh, I try. It’s hard to make friends. Frankly, I’m a little shy. Other guys always made fun of my idiotic first name. Matter of fact, so did Mom! But maybe they saw the truth. I guess I really
am
a
Munford
."

The secretary looked downcast, and Bud tried to express sympathy.

Presently Bud said, "Well, what have we here?" He pointed downward through the viewdome to a cluster of viewing stands, some colorful tents, and a long and twisting dirt track. A few race cars were speeding along it, raising trails of dust.

"Tryouts of some kind," said Trent. "I think I read something about a county-wide race coming up this weekend."

Observation made it clear that any competition below was an informal one. The various cars were feeling-out themselves and the track. "Reminds me of something, something I read," Bud remarked. "Tom gave me a Jules Verne story to read, about a man who invented something like a flying car. He barged into an auto race to demonstrate what it could do."

Trent was silent for a moment. Abruptly he exclaimed: "So?
Why not?
"

"Huh? You want me to― "

"They call you a
hot rock
and a
daredevil
around Enterprises, Bud. So now I’m daring you!" Trent’s narrow, sallow face was bright with a grin of sheer excitement.

The gulp was Bud Barclay’s. But he had never been one to turn down a dare!

With a deep breath, and not a word, he eased down the slider switch on his unicontrol lever. Like the auto-airship in
Master of the World
, the Swift atomicar plunged into full swoop!

In truth, the swoop was a bit steeper than it needed to be.
So you want a thrill, hmm, Trent?
thought Bud mischievously. He was satisfied to see the secretary’s face take on the slightest tinge of sea green. Trent’s comment on the situation was succinct: "
Aaaaaaaaaaa!
"

Bud skimmed the lead car, almost scraping its roof, and plopped down a few yards ahead of the astonished driver. Then he opened her up! There was no sound as the advanced electromotors twisted their fields of force about the suspended wheels, pulling them harder, spinning them faster. No whistle, no whoosh of cleaved air penetrated the Durastress viewdome. But the atomicar leapt ahead on the track, widening the gap with its follower as if the racer had stalled out.

"G—g—g― " choked out Munford Trent.

"Good grief?" suggested Bud.

Guided by the all-wise cybertron brain, the hidden gravitexes allowed the
Silent Streak
to take the track’s sharp, unexpected curves without hesitation, repelatron forces holding her passengers firmly in their seats. But the repulsion effect did not apply to their inner ears. The turns left them woozy.

In a matter of seconds the atomicar had completely covered the course, lapping the half-dozen others, worming through their ranks with ease. But as they approached the lead car again from behind, now at track level, the driver seemed to panic. The race car swerved aside, tilting up on its side wheels as if it were about to whirl out of control, disastrously!

With a startled cry Bud brought his lightning reflexes, well-honed, into play. The
Streak
rose into the air, adding the bite of its ultra-fast wheel-blades to its momentum. They darted off to the side of the stricken race car as it began its tumble. Bud forced the atomicar into a quarter-rotation, her nose pointing at the race car, and activated the anticrash repelatrons in the forward cowlings. For second the two vehicles, one airborne, one halfway to catastrophe, kept pace with one another as the repelatrons took hold in one direction, the stabilizing gravitex devices in the other.

The race car slammed back down onto four wheels, and ground to a rough stop in a flurry of dirt and dust.

"I—I think—that driver might be a
tad
put out," observed Trent.

Bud picked up the dashboard microphone and spoke through the car’s external speakers. "
Sorry folks! Minor malfunction! Have a nice day!
"

Neither of the passengers spoke as the
Silent Streak
zoomed back to Enterprises. Their thudding chests did their speaking for them.

As the atomicar settled down onto its parking pad, Bud wheezed out: "So Trent—enough fun for a while?"

"I—I don’t think I’ll be having any lunch today. But—thanks, Bud—buddy!"

The youth returned a wan smile. "Any time."

The next day brought a surprising message to Enterprises public e-mail, directed to "Damon and Tom Swift."

"As you may know, I had a most pleasant conversation with Ed Longstreet recently in London. I’m taking the liberty of inviting the two of you to spend a weekend at my hunting lodge in the Adirondacks. Would this coming weekend prove convenient? I believe you two dedicated inventors will find the outdoors environment most relaxing. Asa Provard"

"That’s the banker Ed told us about, Dad!" Tom said, after reading the message from his monitor. "You know, the atomicar project is in pretty good shape now. Taking a breather might be a good idea."

"As far as
you’re
concerned, Tom—I agree. But right now I can’t accept, since I’ll be flying down to Fearing Island this weekend to show off our rocket facility to some Washington bigwigs," Mr. Swift said thoughtfully. "But you go on. Have Bud take my place. If this Provard wants to talk business, he can send his feelers your way as well as mine. Go see what’s on the fellow’s mind."