Tom Swift Jr - And His Giant Robot Part 20

Back at the Citadel, preparations for a ma.s.s evacuation began the moment Tom's message was received. Mr. Swift supervised the orderly withdrawal.

ATOR'S TRIUMPH 205.

Wailing sirens sounded throughout the reserve, and soon buildings and dormitories were emptied of personnel. Trucks and trailers, lined up at the gate, quickly filled with workers, and security police in jeeps raced to outlying testing grounds to pick up stragglers.

Within forty-five minutes the plant was cleared. Mr. Swift, who was driving the last truck, gave the signal to move out. The convoy rolled slowly through the exit, then picked up speed. Soon the caravan, racing along at a fast clip, stretched out for five miles over the wasteland.

Moments after the evacuation, Radnor landed the Sky Queen vertically only a few hundred yards from the main building. The jet lifters blasted the sand beneath them into a fused gla.s.sy substance. He taxied directly to the concrete housing of the pile and Bud and Tom dropped from the plane. Dashing toward the entrance, they both stopped short. Red warning lights were on.

"The pile is in operation!" Tom exclaimed. "Raymond must have used one of his timing devices to start it. We'll never get near that oven now. If the plant is going to be saved, Ator will have to do it!"

They ran to the control house. Mr. Swift had taken the precaution of leaving the robot's control panel on stand-by, so no warm-up period was needed. Tom marched Ator to the ramp and the robot descended into the tunnel.

Transmitted through Ator's "eyes" the picture on 206 .

the television screen in the control building showed the dim underground pa.s.sage, and as Tom watched the screen, the outer opening to the atomic pile appeared. With a feeling of finality Tom activated controls to close the tunnel entrance behind Ator. The robot strode past the thick foundations in the bas.e.m.e.nt directly beneath the oven, then climbed the ramp leading to the atomic pile. He made his way past the breeder reactor and stood before the pile, facing the honeycomb wall.

Then, with Tom calling directions, Bud fed detailed instruction tapes into the panel. As they worked the automaton into position, Tom explained his hunch to Bud.

"When Raymond mentioned 'slugging' to me, it gave me an idea. The pile feeds on slugs of Uranium-238, which is nonfissionable. In the pile a portion of it is slowly converted into plutonium. Now if you feed the pile a slug containing a high concentration of plutonium, it could set off an explosion before the moderator material ever had a chance to quench the reaction. I think one of those slugs has been loaded with plutonium."

"But how will you know which one?" Bud queried. "They all look alike on the screen."

"The fake slug's weight will be different," Tom replied. "Ator's finger joints are highly sensitive to pressure. By comparing the weight of the slugs one against another, he'll isolate the bomb."

"That may take hours!"

ATOR'S TRIUMPH 207.

"It's the only chance, Bud," Tom said quietly. "Feed in two pressure- comparison tapes."

Bud slipped the punched ribbons from their containers and reeled them on the metal pin "readers." Tom directed the basic actions and Ator began the tedious process of extricating the slugs from the oven and comparing one with another.

Hours pa.s.sed as the process was repeated over and over. Precious minutes were lost when a tape broke. Tom's eyes began to sting from the strain of staring at the screen, and his fingers grew numb at the controls.

"Less than an hour to go!" Bud groaned.

Tom nodded grimly, then suddenly yelled: "He's got it! It's one of the two he's handling now. They don't balance, so all I have to do is compare them both against one we've already tested."

"The one with the odd weight will be the phony, right?"

"Yes, and there it is!" Tom exclaimed.

The isolating process completed, an equally precarious operation remained- to dismember and disperse the miniature atom bomb. No tapes were used for this task. It was handled entirely by Tom. He worked slowly, manipulating the controls with extreme caution. More than half an hour was spent while Ator, handling flasks and reagents like a veteran chemist, carefully dissolved the lethal ma.s.s. Finally he diluted it to a safe concentration with an inert salt.

208 .

The Citadel had been saved!

"You did it, boy, you did it!" Bud yelled, clapping his friend on the back.

Tom grinned in relief, then said, "But I've still got work to do, Bud. Ator will have to insert inhibitor rods into the pile. Until that's done and the pile is considerably slowed down, someone will have to stay on guard."

Tom remained at the control panel while Bud went with Radnor in the Sky Queen to find Mr. Swift and the caravan. Within three hours the Citadel was restored to full activity.

During the two days preceding the start of formal operations, Robert Turnbull briefed the Swifts on his brother's activities since his escape from Black-stone.

He confirmed Tom's theory that Raymond had used the stolen relotrol to distort Tom's control of Stan Lee, and that he had taken over the giant Ator. In his haste to move the crows' mobile control

210 .

unit, Raymond had been forced to leave the timing gear of the bank-vault door in the shack near Swift Enterprises.

With Robert's clues, police rounded up all the hirelings that had worked under the Briggin gang, including the fake magician who had wanted to rent Herbert. One of the henchmen confessed that he had dropped the small bomb on the Citadel from a highflying jet. Another admitted that he was the stowaway who had overpowered Jones and his crew on their flight west with the cybernetic arms.

Raymond was recommitted to the inst.i.tution, but specialists at Blackstone were optimistic about his complete recovery.

The day of the Citadel's opening ceremonies arrived. Tom had arranged for Phyl, Sandy, Chow, and his mother to fly out with a planeload of officials from Swift Enterprises. High government dignitaries and representatives of the Army and Navy were present as observers.

When the audience was seated before a large television screen, Tom and his father entered the control house. Mr. Swift set the cybernetic arms in operation, turning over their controls to a technician, while his son fed signal tapes to Ator's panel. Through the camera eyes of Tom's great invention, the viewers saw the nuclear quenching rods slide into place, smoothly regulating the rate of chain- reaction conversion.

"It's a complete success!" Bud cried enthusiastically as Tom and his father emerged from the building and joined the onlookers.

"Oh, Tom, I'm so proud of you," Phyl said, her eyes shining.

Mrs. Swift glowed with happiness as she looked at her husband and son.

In impressive speeches, the government officials lauded the Swifts and pointed out the tremendous advances in medicine, industry, and national defense which the products of the pile would make possible.

"Can't we see Ator?" Sandy asked.

Tom explained sadly that the now-radioactive robot must never leave the concrete-shielded pile. He would remain forever in the plant which he had helped to save.

"I reckon he's happy there," Chow reasoned. "It's home to him." The cook grinned broadly. "An" he can do his own cookin' on the 'oven'!"

"What's your next brain child going to be, Tom?" Bud asked with a grin.

Tom smiled and shrugged his shoulders, unaware at the moment that it would be his Atomic Earth Blaster and would lead him into one of the strangest adventures of his life.

THE END.

BY VICTOR APPLETON II.

No. 4 in the Tom Swift Jr. series.