Tom Swift and the Asteroid Pirates (5 page)

Tom paused before answering. "What do I think? I think something—maybe some
one
—interrupted the space transmission at a crucial point. I think our space friends are trying to warn us of a danger to the ship if we continue on course."

"Danger? Danger of
what
?"

No longer whitefaced, Tom looked Jeffers in the eye.

"Of total destruction!"

THE OTHERS on the
Challenger
’s control deck stared at Tom in shock. "Do you mean—they’re going to start shooting at us?" Bud demanded. "Or set off a bomb in space?"

"He means someone’s planted a bomb on board—like they did on the supply rocket," murmured Hannah in fear.

Tom shook his head, gazing downward through the Tomaquartz viewpane at the ball that was Nestria. "It may be something much more deadly. Let’s hope I’m wrong." He flicked on the intercom. "Join us, Hank. Got a project for you."

When Hank emerged from the inter-deck ladder shaft, Tom explained: "I think there’s something in front of us, something we can’t see or detect with our instruments, that could destroy the whole ship if we blunder right into it!"

Hank whistled. "The same thing that blew up the supply capsule?"

"Probably."

"Then what’s your idea, Skipper?"

"To do like lost hunters do when they don’t want to step into a bear trap." Tom adjusted the deck computer to bring up a current ship manifest. "We have four of the Donkeys down in the hangar-hold. Good."

"Er—just what
do
hunters do?" Hannah whispered to Bud. "To avoid bear traps?"

"They poke ahead in the underbrush with a branch," was Bud’s answer. "I see what Tom’s got in mind."

The Repelatron Donkeys were small flying platforms, elevated and propelled by single repelatrons, that Tom had used for survey work on the moon. Now Tom asked Hank to join him below in the vehicular hold, to assist him in making some quick, jerry-rigged modifications to the Donkeys’ control circuitry. When they returned to the command compartment, Hank reported: "Not much to it. Now we can control ’em remotely from the main board."

Tom rolled-up the hangar’s protective doors and the conveyors pulled the four transports out onto the exterior deck. At a signal they rose gently, then curved downward toward Little Luna, splaying out in different directions.

"So you think they’ll blow up?" Jeffers asked Tom.

"Or worse!"

The crew waited tensely, minute after minute.

The lengthy vigil was finally broken by an announcement from Tom. "Crossing the hundred-mile altitude mark," he stated. "I have Donkey number four a few dozen miles in the lead, roughly in the direction of Base Galileo—not too close, though."

"But it’s getting close to where the megascope beam started failing," Bud explained to the others.

Eyes on the telemetry readouts, Tom initiated a countdown. "Eighty-eight miles... eighty-one... seventy-six ... "

Blinding light suddenly flooded the command deck!

The crew staggered back, shielding their eyes. Tom adjusted the variable transparency settings for the viewpanes, blocking out more of the glare.

"Man,
I think we just got some data!"
Bud gulped. "You Dad’ll be pleased!"

"Hard radiation,
very
high intensity," reported Hank Sterling. He looked up at Tom. "It’s what we saw in the Space Kite. Same overall profile."

Tom gave a grim nod. "Then that settles it. This is the same phenomenon. And I’m
sure
it’s something artificial, a weapon of some kind."

They continued to study the radiation intently. But suddenly the crew gave a start as a strange thrumming sound filled the deck! "It’s coming from
outside
, through the hull!" declared Hannah in amazement. "But what could possibly—?"

"Ionized particulates, spreading out from the blast in concentric waves," Hank stated. "From Earth it must look like a fireball against black space, just like the shuttle explosion."

"And the instruments recorded an EMP effect," added Tom. "We’re lucky our Tomasite-Inertite coating protects us." He noted that the blast, impressive as it was from the viewpoint of the
Challenger
, was much smaller than the prior one. "It shouldn’t have caused the same big effect on communications and defense systems."

"Well, lemme tell ya, it was more than big enough for me!" Bob Jeffers commented.

One by one the remaining Donkeys met their doom with blazing brilliance. "It’s clear that what we have here is a spherical barrier enclosing Nestria like a bubble," pronounced Tom Swift. "Anything that comes into contact with the barrier disintegrates completely—converts to energy. Evidently the barrier wasn’t wholly stabilized when the supply rocket hit it, but as it reached its fullest extent it began to fuzz-out radio transmissions, including the microwaves my space prober uses."

"Then you think the barrier may be some sort of electromagnetic field, Tom?" Sterling inquired, puzzled.

But the young scientist-inventor wagged his head. "No, Hank, although I’d guess such a field may be keeping it in place."

"Then what?"

"Antimatter."

"Huh?" Bud was aghast at the thought. "Like the matter-eating gas from the taboo mountain?"

Tom’s exploration of Mount Goaba in Africa, by means of his terrasphere vehicle, had revealed an astounding phenomenon taking place in the caves of nuclear fire far beneath the surface. By means of some complex, inexplicable atomic reaction, a mineral-like substance was releasing a gas, termed Exploron, that in turn emitted antiprotons. These subatomic particles, bearing electrical charges opposite those of the nuclei of ordinary matter, caused such matter to disintegrate in a violent flare of radiation. Bud knew that reversed-charge substances, which had previously only appeared in minute quantities in experimental settings, were called
antimatter
by physicists.

But Bud’s comment was not quite on the mark. "No, pal," Tom corrected his friend. "What we’re dealing with here is a whole lot
worse
than Exploron."

Hank nodded slowly. "You mean—true antimatter."

"That’s what I think. Look," he continued, "the phenomenon isn’t fully understood yet, but the researchers at the Goaba installation think they’ve cracked the basic sequence of reactions. Exploron gas emits antiprotons, but it isn’t true antimatter. It’s one of the two main byproducts of the reaction of an anomalous substance, which they’ve named Diracinium, with certain catalysts."

Bud observed, "Catalysts like saltwater. You’re talking about that mineral deposit at the bottom of the cavern."

"That’s it. Catalysis induces a sort of ‘nuclear combustion’—the nuclear fire—with its own ‘smoke,’ namely vaporous Exploron and granules of Inertite. But there’s one more thing that happens. The surface of the Diracinium, the part directly exposed to the catalyst, converts to a molecule-thick coating of Diracinium
in antimatter form
—actual antimatter molecules. It’s only the interspersed presence of Inertite particles in the film that damps-down the reaction. Otherwise a big chunk of Africa would be history!"

"If particles of anti-Diracinium could be dispersed in space around Little Luna," noted Hank, "the cloud might be too dilute to be detectible, but more than dense enough to destroy ― "

"
Anything
!" concluded Tom Swift. "The space friends are trying to warn us—twice now. The reference in that first message to ‘
opposed force matter
’ was their attempt to convey the idea of antimatter. Whoever caused the barrier," he went on, "may have figured I’d take off for Nestria to investigate the base’s silence, and that my ship would meet the same fate as the cargo rocket."

Bob Jeffers shuddered. "What a devilish scheme! Which happens to be Li Ching’s stock in trade."

"But wait a second," Bud suddenly objected. "Like you just said, Tom—Inertite blocks off the reaction. Wouldn’t the
Challenger
’s coating protect us?"

It was Hank who answered Bud. "The cargo rocket was also coated, Bud. Inertite is effective against most radiation, and protects against the sort of fine spray of antiprotons produced by Exploron. But in the case of something like this barrier, you’re dealing with massive grains of the anti-stuff. Evidently a little works its way through—and when you’re dealing with antimatter,
little
things mean a
lot
!"

Bud nodded, grasping the dreadful situation the Nestria team was in—totally cut-off from their world! He said to Tom: "
Whee-oh
, genius boy, your brain’s got quite a lump to chew over this time!"

Tom didn’t answer, but Bud could see that the young inventor’s brain had already taken up the task.

Soon the control readouts announced that the ship’s repelatrons were again humming with power. Tom had directed Hannah Morgensteiff to reorient the dish-shaped radiator antennas to brake the ship and send it on its long, wheeling descent back to Earth. "We’ll land at Fearing," Tom stated. "I want to test something using the big space communications gear."

"What’s your idea?" inquired Hank.

"It’s is only a theory," Tom said. "Let me hash it over a little, Engineer Sterling."

The young inventor radioed a full report to Fearing Island, but the rest of the trip was spent mostly in grim silence. Two hours later the
Challenger
was biting into the earth’s atmosphere, then dropping smoothly like a clump of feathers to set down finally at the rocket base.

The astronaut team ate dinner in the island mess hall. Afterward, as Tom and Bud walked back to Tom’s private laboratory on the island, Bud remarked, "I can tell plenty is going on in that high-powered head of yours, pal. Feel like talking about it yet?"

"Our first job is to find out the exact nature of the disintegration barrier," Tom said thoughtfully. "So far we’re only guessing that antimatter is what’s causing the trouble. Since the barrier seems to be scrambling and nullifying our long-range instruments—even the spectroscopic scanners—we’ll have to take a sample to study in the lab."

"And how do we do that?" Bud asked in challenging tones. "How do you get a tankful of something that turns anything it touches into the Fourth of July?"

Tom grinned at his chum. "Hey, we had the same problem at Mount Goaba, remember?"

"Which you solved with Inertite. But in this case ― "

"I know. Inertite isn’t enough. But it just may be that we can bring a sample down to Earth without touching it at all!" As Bud started a skeptical, if fascinated, objection, Tom held up his hand. "That’s for tomorrow, flyboy. Right now I have something else in mind."

"Well, there’s plenty of room for it up there in that head of yours! What?"

"After I run some numbers on my lab computer, I’m heading over to Communications. If my theory is right, we’ll soon be back in touch with Little Luna!"

Bud lifted his eyebrows, creasing his forehead with worry. "Let’s hope there’s someone up there to answer!"

IN THE space communications room inside the Fearing control tower, Tom explained his idea to Amos Quezada and the chief communications engineer, Harry Lengle. "The numbers look good," he declared. "So my idea is plausible, at least."

"Which is?" challenged Quezada.

"My guess is that during the shadow-traverse every three and three-quarters days, when Nestria orbits through Earth’s shadow, the unusual mineralogy of the asteroid will be affected by the temperature drop—remember, the higher elevations stick up beyond the atmospheric envelope which insulates the lower parts. About eighty percent of Nestria is airless."

"Granted. Okay, chief, so you have a quick change in surface temperature. But what good does it do?"

"My calculations show that it makes Little Luna as a whole less permeable to magnetic forces," Tom continued excitedly. "Something is holding that barrier in place, and it may well be electromagnetic in nature. If I’m right, when the average surface temp drops, the field’s lines of force will be pushed away from the surface further out into space."

"I understand Tom’s idea," Harry spoke up. "That would tend to make the barrier thinner and less opaque—like a stretched balloon—so it’s easier for radio waves to penetrate."

"All right then." Quezada checked his wristwatch. "We’re lucky—she’ll be starting the traverse in about six hours. We can give it a try."

"I’ll be grabbing some shuteye in the cottage," Tom said wearily. "I
have
to—but call me immediately if you get through."

Tom met up with Bud, who had been chatting with one of his friends among the staff, and the two headed across the facility grounds toward the executive quarters. As he walked along, the youthful pilot gave a mighty yawn—which turned into a laugh. "Good grief, I just realized something. It’s only been twenty-four hours since we went up in the XAIP!"

Tom echoed the yawn. "
Quite
a day!"

Tom slept helplessly for hours. It was daylight when he awoke. A quick check with the communications center was disappointing—the moonlet had entered Earth’s shadow, but there was still no radio response.
But that’s not too surprising
, Tom thought hopefully.
It may take awhile for the anti-magnetic effect to build up.

Some time later, having a late breakfast with Bud, he was interrupted by a buzz on his cellphone-intercom. "We’ve just made contact with Nestria, Skipper!" Harry Lengle reported excitedly. "Come on down!"

Tom and Bud were thrilled by the news. They sped across the island by jeep and dashed into the communications office.

"Still getting through?" Tom cried.

Lengle nodded. His expression was pensive. "Their signal’s pretty weak, but we’ve enhanced it enough to make out the audio." He added into the microphone in his hand, "Galileo, here’s Tom now."

Tom seized the mike. "Do you read me? What cooks up there?" he asked eagerly.

A blur of voices could be made out through the earphones. One voice was especially prominent. "He said
cook
. He’s askin’ fer me!" The young inventor was smiling broadly as Chow came on the line. "This here’s ole Chow, boss! Brand my ― "