Tom Swift and the Visitor From Planet X (2 page)

Soon there was nothing more Tom and Hank could do at the disaster scene but get in the way. Pausing to catch his breath, Tom suddenly broke into a faint grin. "Hey, here comes our ride back to Shopton."

A high-sided, strange object, glinting in the setting sun, was approaching rapidly at a height of about one hundred yards, slowly descending. "The paraplane!" Hank exclaimed happily. This was a combination jet and helium dirigible that Tom had developed to test and perfect a balloon-bag safety system.

In minutes the compact passenger cabin, dwarfed beneath the big liftbag, was bumping gently along the broken runway. The door-hatch swung open and Slim Davis, an experienced Enterprises pilot, leaned out with a nod. "Limo for Swift and Sterling!" he announced humorously.

Tom was pleased and grateful. "We’ll be back home in minutes."

It took eight jet-driven minutes, in fact, before they set down on the airfield at the four-mile-square experimental station where Tom and his father developed their many amazing inventions. After thanking George Dilling and Jilly Lamm for their prompt assistance, Tom accompanied Hank to the plant medical office and infirmary where the Enterprises physician examined them both.

"Fine way to greet me back after my vacation," gibed Doc Simpson, the young medico who was a good friend to both. "But as usual we’re only dealing with a mere head injury, which we Swiftonians just shrug off—over and over." He exchanged Hank’s hasty bandage for a better one, then pronounced both fit.

At Tom’s urging Hank immediately called his wife to assure her that he was safe, then handed the phone to Tom. The young inventor called home and spoke to his sister, Sandra.

"What a relief!" Sandy gasped. "We heard a bulletin about the quake over the TV!"

"Don’t worry, sis. Tell Mom and Dad that Hank Sterling and I are fine," Tom said. "Doc even cleared me to drive. I’ll be home in a jiffy—with a big post-quake appetite!"

In the late, dimming twilight, Tom drove his two-seater sports car to the pleasant, tree-shaded Swift home on the outskirts of Shopton, only minutes from the Enterprises main gate.

Mrs. Swift, a slender, petite woman, tried not to show concern when she saw her adventure-prone young son, bruised and disheveled. "I’m so thankful you and Hank are both safe!" she murmured as Tom greeted her with a kiss that contained a hint of apology.

Blond, blue-eyed Sandy, who was a year younger than Tom, had invited her friend—and Tom’s—Bashalli Prandit to the house for dinner. Bashalli, a pretty, dark-haired girl born in Pakistan, was as much upset as Tom’s mother.

Tom laughed. "I’m not a stretcher case, Bash," he said. "Doc Simpson checked me out."

Bashalli looked very relieved, but groaned teasingly. "Why did you have to go and spoil it? I was preparing my cool soothing touch for your fevered brow!"

"You got away this time without getting conked, but
I
feel like conking you for always getting yourself in trouble," declared Sandy with a mock frown. "Honestly, big brother!—if it isn’t a meteorite or a hurricane or a torpedo attack, it’s a gosh-darn
earthquake!
And who ever heard of a quake around here, anyhow?"

Tom’s face lost its apologetic smile. "Actually, San, that’s a big question. The whole event was odd in many ways." It was obvious to Sandy that her talented brother had something on his mind.

Mr. Swift came into the living room just then and told Tom, with a wink, how worried Mrs. Swift and Sandy had been. "Of course I tried to assure them that you and Hank can take care of yourselves in any crisis." He smiled guiltily as he added, "But I must admit I was more than a little concerned myself."

As Tom grinned, the resemblance between him and his father was very evident. Both had the same clean-cut features and deep-set blue eyes, although Tom was lankier and taller.

After Tom had showered and changed his ripped and soiled clothes, Mrs. Swift served them a delicious hot meal. While they ate, Mr. Swift managed after some difficulty to get a call through to the central hospital in Utica, where the worse-off earthquake victims had been rushed after initial treatment in Thessaly. Damon Swift’s face was grave as he hung up.

"Mark Faber is not expected to live," the elder inventor reported. "And the prognosis for Munson Wickliffe is discouraging as well. A pity. Munson has his human flaws, but he’s a great scientist and technical engineer."

Tom nodded unhappily. Sandy, to take her brother’s mind off the disaster, glanced at her father and said, "Daddy, tell Tom about the visitor who’s coming."

Bashalli smiled. "And this time, representing the Pakistani branch of the extended family of Swifts, I know this news even before you do, Thomas."

"A visitor?" Tom looked at his father. "Who? Is Cousin Ed back from some corner of the world?"

"Oh no—our guest is coming a much greater distance than that," replied Mr. Swift, as Sandy and Bashalli stifled giggles.

Tom was mystified. "Okay. From where?"

"No place special," answered Tom’s mother, in on the joke. "Just from
another planet!"

"A-ANOTHER—!"
Tom was so amazed and excited he could barely speak. "Wow! And you’re not kidding?"

Mr. and Mrs. Swift and the two girls all solemnly shook their heads. Tom gasped and his questions tumbled out in a torrent. "Male or female? Human or animal?"

Mr. Swift’s eyes twinkled. "None of those," he replied as his son stared, heart thudding, bursting with unbridled curiosity. Although the astounded world knew that the Swifts had been in radio contact with entities from outer space for many months now, this was the most exciting news yet!

On one occasion, the unknown, never-glimpsed beings had moved a small asteroid—the phantom satellite Nestria—into orbit about the earth in an attempt to study the earthlike environment Tom was able to create there. Seeking to overcome some mysterious factor that prevented their survival upon our world, they had sent samples of the strange plant and animal life of their planet, to be analyzed by the Swifts. These extraterrestrial scientists, dubbed the space friends, had also helped Tom a number of times when his life was at stake while on daring voyages beyond the earth, recently attempting to warn the young space venturer of a dangerous cosmic storm, an event recorded in
Tom Swift and The Cosmic Astronauts.
What was their latest intention? It was certain to be fantastic!

The telephone rang and Sandy went to answer it as Tom barraged the others with questions, all of them parried with teasingly evasive answers.

"For Pete’s sake, Dad," Tom pleaded, "don’t keep me in suspense! Who or
what
is this visitor?"

"That was Bud," announced Sandy breezily, re-entering the room. "I told him we were having a family conference and just
couldn’t
be disturbed."

Bud Barclay was Tom’s closest pal. "What did he want?"

"To make sure you’re all right, and to tell you he plans to beat you to a pulp tomorrow for not calling him at home right away!"

"Oh boy," Tom groaned. "He flew back from Mexico City this afternoon! Forgot all about it. Earthquakes can be a real distraction! But
anyway—
!" He turned menacingly toward his father, and everyone burst out laughing.

"Don’t be offended, Thomas," commented Bashalli smoothly, "but really, don’t you deserve this? You’ve rather neglected us lately, what with all your running around to Yucatan, to the underwater city, to the Arctic ocean—"

"And almost to Venus, don’t forget," Mr. Swift added. "In a good cause, of course."

Tom held up his hands. "I apologize to everyone for everything I’ve ever done in my entire short life. Now
give,
before I explode!"

In reply Mr. Swift stepped over to a table and took up a large sheaf of fanfold paper, covered with printing. "Son, all this came through the magnifying antenna just minutes after you and Hank left this afternoon. Omicron Kupp and I, and the rest of the translation team, have been working on it since. This seems to be a fair approximation, though many of the symbols are new—not in the space dictionary. Still, it foretells an astounding event. It will be the biggest scientific challenge we’ve ever faced!"

Quite a pronouncement! With a gulp Tom took the sheet and spread it out flat on the dinner table. It was covered with rows of clustered figures which Tom knew represented mathematical and logical concepts—a universal language the space friends utilized to exchange ideas with the human species. Beneath the array of symbols was the tentative translation into English.

TO EARTH CONTACT SWIFT. WE ARE TRANSMITTING TO YOUR SOLAR VICINITY AN ENERGY BRAIN TO ASSIMILATE DATA ON PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENT AND HABITAT PRINCIPLES OF EARTH. WITHIN PLANETARY LOCUS IT IS BEYOND OUR CONTROL AND WILL FUNCTION INDEPENDENTLY. WE WILL TRANSMIT TO YOU PARAMETERS FOR CREATING STABILIZING CONTAINING UNIT TO SUSTAIN THE ENERGY MATRIX FOR DURATION. YOU WILL SOLVE FOR SENSOR AND MEASURING INSTRUMENTATION PARALLEL TO PROCESSES ACCESSED BY LIFEFORM HUMAN. ENERGY BRAIN WILL RETURN TO US AT COMPLETION. IF YOU INDICATE ACCEPTANCE WE WILL PROVIDE REQUIRED INFORMATION.

"Good night!" Tom whispered. "I’ll say it’s a challenge!" He looked up at his father. "But Dad, do you realize this message isn’t from our space friends?"

"Huh?" reacted Sandy in surprise. "Do you mean it’s a fake?"

"Not at all," Damon Swift responded. "It’s just not from our usual communicators, the scientists stationed in our solar system."

Tom explained. "Those folks usually begin any initial contact message by using the symbols that we translate as ‘we are friends’. This message doesn’t."

"I’m assuming it comes directly from the X-ians," Mr. Swift pronounced. "That’s a reasonable conclusion at this stage, anyway."

"And
who
are these
X-ians?"
Bashalli asked.

"Well," said Tom, "it’s a little complicated, Bash. You already know the basics, of course."

"Yes, for once
do
skip the part about the first missile with the inscriptions, and how you began using the—what is it? The radio device?"

"The imaging oscilloscope." For some time, as in the present instance, the space beings had sent their symbols to Earth on an established radio frequency, the signal input translated into visual form by computer.

Initial contact had been with a friendly group of scientists who, it was thought, had a scientific base in orbit around the planet Mars. But these beings did not originate on Mars, or even within Earth’s solar system. They were expeditioners from a distant, unidentified world circling another sun somewhere in galactic space. The Swifts had arbitrarily translated the symbol for this home planet as "Planet X," and its inhabitants inevitably became known as the X-ians.

"We’ve always assumed our space friends—the neighborhood crew—are of the same species as those on Planet X," Tom continued. "But the exact relationship between themselves and the X-ians is one of the many things they can’t—or won’t—explain to us."

Mr. Swift now picked up the thread of explanation. "We learned, in connection with the
Challenger
moon mission, that the space friends regard the X-ians as dominating or controlling them with something like absolute power—the symbol they use can be translated as something like ‘our superiors’ or even ‘our masters’! The local scientists do not always approve of the methods of the Masters in their pursuit of knowledge about our Earth and our human species."

"The X-ians seem to have little regard for what we think of as our own well-being," added Tom soberly. "And that means this new project may involve real danger to Earth."

"But surely you can decline their offer, can you not?" Bashalli objected. "They seem to be giving you that option."

Tom shrugged. "
‘Seem’
is the key word, Bashalli. It may be a nuance wrongly introduced by a faulty translation. What if they didn’t really say
if,
but
when?
We
do
know from previous instances that once the Masters set something into operation, our space friends are prevented from blocking it even if they want to."

There was a long moment of thoughtful silence. Sandy was no longer lighthearted, but uneasy and vaguely frightened. "When that rocket-capsule flew over Shopton, the one you went after in your seacopter, we were all pretty scared," she said softly with a glance at her mother and Bashalli. "This may be worse!"

"Yet it’s an incredible opportunity for science, and for humanity," her father pointed out. "It would be hard to justify not moving forward with it."

Sandy nodded. "I know, Daddy. Don’t mind me. I’ll be a ‘Swift’ about it—you’ll see."

"We know you will, darling," declared Mrs. Swift reassuringly.

"As despite all efforts I cannot quite manage to be a Swift, I intend to be a mere ‘Prandit’ about it," Bash stated with a wry look. "But what will this visitor be like? What is an
energy brain?"

Tom shook his head. "No clue, not yet. The message doesn’t say how, or in what form, the energy will arrive. It must be some sort of artificial device—a thinking computer of pure energy, maybe. And we’ve got to give it a ‘body’ of some kind, a container to sustain the energy in a stable form, and to allow it to collect impressions of Earth just as we humans do. And to allow it to communicate with us directly—just imagine!"

"We’ll learn further details after we transmit our acceptance," Mr. Swift declared. "Which sounds like a job for tomorrow."

A concluding segment of the received message had indicated how the response was to be transmitted. The Swifts’ grateful acceptance passed through the magnifying antenna and into interstellar space first thing the following morning. "I can’t understand how our radio signals, which only travel at the speed of light, can reach a planet in a star-system light years away," commented Nels Gachter, Enterprises’ chief of communications science who was assigned to the space oscilloscope monitoring setup. "Yet it seems they know what we’re saying within hours—even minutes!"

"The X-ians have learned how to control space and time in ways we can’t imagine," Tom replied. "For all we know, Nels, they may receive our messages years in the future—then send the reply back through time to the present!"