Tom Swift and His Cosmotron Express (15 page)

THERE WAS only the slightest twitch of techno muscle as the myriad of repelatrons came into play. The Cosmotron Express rose from its construction pad like an elegant ghost—or a huge white moon invading the sunlit sky.

"Where do you hide those repelling machines of yours?" asked Andor Emda. "On the
Challenger
they were all over those circular rails."

"We’re taking a new approach with the
Starward
," replied Tom, somewhat breathless with excitement. "We formerly used just a handful of the big super-repelatrons to push us along, and we had to keep reorienting the radiator dishes in order to focus the linear fields on their repulsion targets.

"But on this baby we’ve further developed a technique we first used on the subocean geotron, our underground vehicle. We have several
hundred
micro-repelatrons—a kind that can be tightly focused—embedded in the hull support frame, just beneath the composite shell, out of sight."

"Beneath the outer hull," repeated Bob Jeffers. "I guess the repelatron rays go right through, hm?"

"The spacewave fields only interact with the materials they’ve been tuned for," nodded the young inventor. "Though each tron can be swiveled a bit in its socket, we’ll mainly maneuver by activating the bank of trons that are on the side facing the desired repulsion vector. And we no longer need external telespectrometers either. The repelascan method I developed for the aquatomic tracker gives us our materials readings with much greater accuracy."

Hannah remarked, "It seems you’ve conquered the low-altitude instability problem—the repelatron lag effect that messes up your small repelatrons."

"No, the problem is still there. It’s just that we can spread-out the lag—‘dilute’ it, you might say—among a much greater number of force-emitters, giving us a steady thrust." Tom added that the repelatron bank system would be used by the smaller excursion modules as well.

"I know you have to use the trons near the earth," said Bob. "When do you wring-out the spacedriver?"

"It’s not absolutely precise," responded Tom. "About 200,000 miles or so out along a solar radius, where Earth’s gravity gradient gets a bit flatter. Incidentally, we’re dealing with the sun’s gravity-well too. On the tour, we’ll get our best speeds after we cross the orbit of Jupiter."

"Holy Macaroons!" breathed Hank. "The orbit of
Jupiter
!—like it’s just a little trip around the block!"

"That there’s what they call
progress
," Chow declared.

Tom made no comment, thinking:
And what happens when you run out of frontiers?

In contrast to the languid ascent of the Space Kite, the
Starward
crossed the ceiling of the air in minutes, its outer bubble immune to friction heat and pressure. As the sky turned starry black, Tom and Bud briefly settled into a near-Earth orbit to run a check on the systems. Then the young captain announced their next goal. "Let’s drop in on Sky Haven!"

"What’s that?" Andy Emda asked Av Hanson.

"The pet name for Enterprises’ outpost in space."

"Right." Emda nodded wryly. "The
Dyaune
’s moon flight was timed to avoid it by half an orbit."

The ship didn’t bother with freefall, but thrust itself forward on the brute strength of the repelatrons. Soon the glittering skywheel, first a distant glimmer, became the unparalleled symbol of human trailblazing that was known the world over. "I love the sight," murmured Bob Jeffers. "Never get tired of it. It’s like a Christmas ornament."

"With a truckload of Christmas stars," added Bud.

Tom exchanged greetings with outpost commander Ken Horton. "We’re givin’ you the once-over," Horton said. "Man alive, it looks like a planet has come to
us
—along with three moons!"

Tom chuckled, then asked, "Ken, what’s the latest with Dr. Goldstone’s project? Does it look like the mobies will be ready for the Grand Tour?"

"You could haul ’em aboard right now, Skipper, if you wanted to."

"We’ll keep to schedule—but please thank him."

As Tom broke contact, Bud glanced at his pal curiously. "Mobies?"

"That’s what we call the little robotic excursion labs Dad and Dr. Goldstone developed, the ones we’ll be scattering around on the big trip. Mobile Labs—
mobies
. They’re a little ungainly in shape, so we had them built in a zero-G environment, as we did with the Video Vikings."

"Yeah, the mini-drones with your 3-D telejector cameras."

"Brand my dictionary, th’
pee
-culiar names you folks like t’ hang on things!" remarked Charles Ollaho "Chow" Winkler.

Speeding away from the outpost—and away from blue Earth—Tom sent the Cosmotron Express arrowing out into the void. "The spacedriver test is next, everybody. I’ve picked a startup position at the ‘antipodes’ of the moon’s orbit—in other words, the moon will be on the far side of the earth."

"Yes, for a flatter G gradient," declared Andy. "See? I’ve learned the lingo."

"We just want a level playing field," Hank Sterling grinned, "to keep the game honest."

Making position, the
Starward
came to a full halt, relative to Earth. "Alright," said Tom quietly. "Here we go."

"Let’s burn rubber!" chortled Bud. "So what’s the command, Skipper? ‘Energize?’ "

"How about ‘switch it on’?"

Bud did so, and the assembled team gasped as one as the Earth shrank abruptly like a punctured balloon! "Ten seconds—90,000 miles!" Tom reported. "Open her up, flyboy!"

There was no jolt, no feeling of motion, no acceleration. The world of their birth became a brilliant blue star, and then just another fleck in the crowded heavens. "We’re travelling at better than
20,000 miles per second
," Tom announced breathlessly.

"Jetz!" gasped Bud. "We could buzz Bartonia before dinner!" A planetoid bearing an Earth science colony, Bartonia was now of the far side of the sun in its elongated orbit.

"Reminds me," muttered Chow. "How’s all this speedin’ gonna affect my galley?"

"It shouldn’t have any effect at all," replied Hannah with a wide smile. "For all our speed, it’s as if we were stopped."

"Uh-huh. Stopped an’
waitin
’ fer something," Chow pronounced quietly, sneaking a glance of suspicion in the direction of Andor Emda.

Tom spent an hour putting the Cosmotron Express through its paces. The
Starward
flung itself far from the earth, then back again. "No sense scooping ourselves by starting the Grand Tour early," joked the young inventor. "Let’s make for Fearing. They’ll have some long-range data for us to look over."

Hank gave a thump to his boss’s arm. "But chief, we already know your invention is a complete success. The spacedriver may not take us to the stars, but it’s a mighty fine first step." The others cheered, and Tom gave a slight bow. In this circumstance modesty would be un-historical.

But the cheers were choked off suddenly. "What’s that?" asked Emda. "That sound?"

"We shouldn’t be hearing anything out here in space," Arv noted. "Bud, you switched off—"

Bud nodded. "The spacedriver is off, just as the Skipper ordered. Making my U-turn to head back."

A deep buzzing, throbbing sound filled the common airspace where the several decks cut across the huge viewport. "It has nothing to do with the cosmotron," grated Tom. "It’s what Arv and I heard in the Space Kite!"

Bob Jeffers had elevatored up to deck two. Leaning over the rail of the balcony that crossed the huge viewport space, he yelled down: "It’s the metallumin shell!
The whole outer shell is vibrating! Ringing like a bell!
"

As if nodding in confirmation, the
Starward
suddenly veered one way, then another. "Holy Mack!" exclaimed Hank Sterling. "The space phenomenon—" His words were cut off as the ship gave another jolt, much more powerful!

Hannah Morgensteiff scanned the instrument board. "I’m showing all-green on the repelatrons. No thrust fluctuation."

No thrust fluctuation—but the Cosmotron Express was definitely fluctuating! "What do you want to do, Tom?" asked Bud quietly. "We’ll be getting some atmosphere in sixty seconds."

"How’s the deceleration profile?" interjected Hank.

"Spotty," Tom replied. "Listen up, everybody. We’re putting the
Star
into low orbit. I’m cutting all non-vital systems—we’ll just keep the gravitexes on, for maneuvering; nothing else. Find stable positions. Brace yourselves."

"Tom—the Space Kite was able to
power
its way out of the grip of this thing," said Arv Hanson.

Tom shook his head. "This is a different situation and a very different ship. I need to get a baseline on the effect."

"Fine time fer a blame expeeri-ment!" grumped Chow.

The cabin went dark and the simulated gravity cut off. "Repelatrons out," announced Bud in an involuntary whisper. "We’re in freefall."

But freefall wasn’t free. Instantly the Cosmotron Express jolted out of orbit at an angle, swerving wildly. "Not a very useful baseline," Tom noted disgustedly. "Okay, power up. Bud, put us on a course to Fearing while I try to make sense out of these readings. But postpone re-entry penetration as long as possible. We need to regain some degree of control."

But control had fled. "Skipper, it’s fighting over every inch!" Bud called out. "Every time I counteract a pull, it switches to pushing! The tron banks just aren’t powerful enough. The gravitexes don’t have enough tug to steer us." The Cosmotron Express was careening wildly, a mad dance at the edge of space!

"We can’t land her safely," stated Arv Hanson, trying to brace himself. "And it’s not letting us stay in orbit. We’re going down uncontrolled—total ballistic."

Hannah called out, "Tom, what about using the spacedriver—maybe just a small burst to get us out of here?"

Tom thrashed his head negatively. "This deep in Earth’s gravity field she’d twist herself to death—and us with her." He stared at the wavering dials for a long, sad moment, bracing himself against the violent rocking of the deck. His companions awaited his words in wincing silence.

"All right, everyone," he said dully. "Abandon ship! Head for the escapods in two’s—you all know the drill." He cut off the protests with a brusque chopping motion of his hand. "That’s my decision. The automatics will try to set her down in the water, but I won’t risk lives to see if the system can handle it."

"
It
will surely find it easier to grab a handful of those little space lifeboat-capsules than the entire
Starward
," Andor Emda pointed out. "Your ‘life caps’ could start disappearing just like the Nestria capsule did."

"I’m betting the atmosphere will block the effect—and that’s the
only
bet I’m willing to make!" snapped the young spaceman. "Get going!"

The mammoth
Starward
was the first Enterprises spacecraft to carry a freight of dedicated escape vehicles, called escapods. They were midget craft, narrow and pointed with flattened bottoms, somewhat resembling overturned canoes. Backswept fins extended from each side, and they were equipped with one of Tom’s emergency reentry systems. Each pod was designed to hold two—in a pinch, three—passengers.

Each escapod, standing upright in its sealed bay like a waiting elevator, was embedded within the outmost hull layer that contained the structural support beams and the repelatrons. Holding back until the others had sealed themselves in, Tom and Bud threw themselves into their pod, pressing flat, chest forward, against the cushion and grabbing handgrips as the hatch clicked into place behind them. Tom grasped a Spektor com-control unit inset into the cushion and detached it. He thumbed a button. "Okay, everyone, command routine EJ-30—
now
!"

Even as Tom barked out his order, the
Starward
lurched violently into a rolling movement, endangering the ejection maneuver. Thrust out magnetically, the pods slid downward into space through their open hull panels, then rotated automatically. The cushion, contouring itself to each body and virtually enclosing the occupants, was now "down" toward Earth. They would ride on their stomachs, as if on a toboggan.

Control was almost entirely automatic. Tom and Bud endured several minutes of crushing G-forces as the escapod’s tiny gravitex unit put on the brakes and dragged them from orbit. Tom’s duratherm wing apparatus popped open and expanded almost instantly in a powerful surge, providing a streamlined, flexible wing beneath each pod to steer them down to a safe landing while shielding them against the fierce heat of reentry.

The curving viewpane that wrapped around the prow of the escapod was covered over by the wing material, but Tom was able to use the screen on the Spektor to track not only the three other pods, but the Cosmotron Express itself, now miles distant. "She’s wobbling into the atmosphere, but slowing," he reported to Bud. "I think the trons are taking hold, but she’s sure to hit with more force than us fragile biologicals could have survived."

"Will she break up, Tom?" Bud asked.

"I don’t know. She can withstand quite a bit."

"Like you, genius boy."

As they reached the lower, denser air, slowed constantly by both a parachute effect and an electromagnetic system that "gripped" the passing airstream, a section of the wing was allowed to burn away, giving them a dizzying view through the forward pane. They could see, just above the distant horizon, the fiery comet that was the
Starward
. "She’s slowed down a great deal," Tom declared. "But she’s not designed for aerodynamic flight. The computers have managed only a limited degree of control."

The fleet of escapods fled space for the blanket of the ionosphere, then the lower stratosphere. Passing into the troposphere that rests upon the Earth directly, the last sections of the wings were ejected and allowed to disintegrate safely in mid-fall. Now air-cushion repelatrons, like those on Tom’s flying atomicar, took over. The pods could now be directed and "flown" to some extent, but the thrust was not sufficient for re-ascending. Even relatively level flight was in reality a continuation of descent.

Tom kept the fleet of four close together, working their way toward a view of the fate of the Express. They were over the Atlantic, about 300 miles southeast of Fearing Island, which had been notified of the crisis by Private Ear Radio. A mantacopter was on its way.