Tom Swift in the Race to the Moon Read Free Page B

remember," Bud said excitedly. "So let’s send it off and see what happens!"
    With the assistance of Nels Gachter Tom fed the array of symbols into the messaging computer, which beamed it off into space via the big antenna. In moments they received confirmation that the signal had been relayed by the outpost in space.
    Then came the most difficult phase of all—waiting. As the long afternoon became longer, Tom and Bud grabbed sandwiches for a late lunch, but remained close to the communications center. At four eighteen the alert-bell rang on the translating computer, and the boys rushed up to the screen in great excitement. A cluster of the strange hieroglyphs appeared on the imaging oscilloscope’s readout monitor. Beneath the symbols appeared the computer’s tentative translation, derived from the space dictionary.
RESPONSE FORTHCOMING
    "Good night!" Bud grumbled. "All that time for a dinky message like that?"
    Tom gave his pal a friendly poke. "Patience, space cadet! Most of that time was just transit time to their base and back again. With something this complex, it may take hours or even days for them to put together—" Tom was interrupted in midsentence as the alert-bell rang again!
    Gachter’s eyes widened. "Another message already!"
TO TOM SWIFT. WE ARE FRIENDS. A CONDITION OF DANGER
    There the translation stopped and a buzzer sounded. Tom sighed. "No surprise—new symbols that the computer can’t even guess at! I’ll put them on the flatscreen and see what I can come up with."
    Tom’s experience in interpreting the space beings’ mode of thought seemed to lend skill and speed to his efforts. By supper time he had put together what seemed a reasonable continuation of the interrupted message from space, which he showed to Bud and to his father, who had arrived in the meantime and had been briefed on the developing crisis.
A CONDITION OF DANGER HAS DEVELOPED ON OUR PLANET OF ORIGIN. THE LIFE FUNCTIONS OF FORMS OF ALL KINDS HAVE BEEN IMPAIRED BY COMPONENT UNITS ALTERING MASSED LIFE STRUCTURES FROM WITHIN. ALTERNATE SOURCE ON YOUR PLANET REPLIED TO FIRST MESSAGE. IN CONSEQUENCE A SPECIMEN CONTAINER WAS SENT BY OUR ####. WE ARE NOT ABLE TO ACT TO PREVENT THE COMPLETION OF ITS SEQUENCE. CONTAINER COURSE WILL TERMINATE AT #### SEVENTEEN ROTATIONS. SOLVE FOR POSITIVE RESULTANT IF YOU ARE ABLE. NO COMMUNICATION PENDING RESOLUTION.
    "Great day!" muttered Tom’s father in grim astonishment. "A terrible predicament."
    "What about those two squiggles in the middle of the translation?" Bud asked. "What’s that supposed to mean?"
    "Untranslatable symbol clusters," explained Tom. "At least Dad and I can’t make them out on our first attempts."
    "But we do have a few likely ideas, son," Damon Swift reminded him. "The first term suggests something dominating or controlling, perhaps a word like authorities or even masters."
    "In other words, the guys in charge back home," Bud said.
    "Right," confirmed Tom. "And it seems the local group of scientists—the ones based at the Martian station—won’t, or can’t, block what the others have already set in motion. As to the second unknown term—"
    Tom exchanged glances with his father.
    "What is it? Where’s the thing going to come down?" Bud demanded nervously.
    "The most likely translation," began Mr. Swift, "is along the lines of ‘the mass in orbital period of thirty rotations’."
    "Thirty rotations," Bud repeated. "Doesn’t rotation mean a rotation of the earth—a day?"
    Tom nodded. "That’s right. And the mass in orbital period of thirty days has to be the moon—Earth’s moon!"
    Bud gaped in amazement. "Then—they’re landing that animal capsule on the moon!"
    "Precisely, seventeen days from now. Which shows considerable wisdom and foresight," noted Mr. Swift. "The sterile, airless lunar environment is a perfect place to land a vessel of animals bearing an unknown infectious agent."
    "But—but—!" For a moment Bud’s excited thoughts outraced his voice. "So