TOM SWIFT and the Space Battering Ram
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TOM SWIFT and the Space Battering Ram BY Thomas Hudson & Leo L. Levesque A Joint Thackery Fox & Assoc. / Levesque Publishing Empire Publication. Made in The United States on America 1 ©opyright 2013 by the authors of this book (Thomas Hudson and Leo L. Levesque). While some of the characters in this story have appeared in other books and collections of books, published by other entities, it is believed that all have fallen into Public Domain status. Fair use under U.S. Copyright Law provisions for “parodies” is claimed for their inclusion in this story. The book authors retain all ownership and copyrights to new or substantially altered characters, previously unpublished locations and situations, and to their contributions to this book and to the total story. The characters Damon Swift, Anne Swift and Bashalli Prandit were created by Scott Dickerson and are used through his incredible largess and understanding that they are superior to those they ultimately replaced. He also invented the TeleVoc communications system which our Tom uses in this story. Multaj dankon! This book is a work of fan fiction. It is not claimed to be part of any previously published adventures of the main characters. It has been self-published and is not intended to supplant any authored works attributed to the pseudononomous author, Victor Appleton II, or to claim the rights from any legitimate publishing entity. 2 Tom Swift and the Space Battering Ram By Thomas Hudson and Leo L. Levesque What begins as a kidnapping of an employee’s family quickly turns into one of Tom Swift’s most difficult challenges. The trouble really begins when Harlan Ames is taken hostage by a brother and sister bent on creating their own personal paradise, something that would mean also killing Tom. But, this is just the beginning of our inventor’s troubles. As he works to develop an autonomous group of small spaceships, able to locate and move space debris out of any potential collision path with Earth, an incoming comet is detected. Temporarily trapped in a wobbly orbit around some of the larger asteroids, nobody know that the megalomaniacs are working toward being able to control it, and any other object out there, to be used as weapons. Now, Tom must double and redouble his efforts to perfect his little tugs before disaster can happen. But, can he also save Harlan who has been spirited off the Earth and is nowhere to be found? _______________________________________________________ This book is dedicated to people who donʼt sit around. Like Tom Swift. It is also dedicated to Leo Levesque who allowed me to be a part of his Thomasina Swift world recently, plus his first “real” Tom Swift novel, and who suggested this dual author approach. It is anti-dedicated to the news media for their attempts to force or make their own news rather than reporting events. Oh, it isnʼt all of them, but the majority donʼt seem as inclined to just show up and tell us about what they saw, they seem to be looking for that “BIG STORY” that will put them on the map, whatever the heck that is. Oh, and to both our wives. ”In front of every good woman is a man…” 3 TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE Forward(s) by Both Authors 5 & 6 1 Imminent Destruction 7 2 Of Asteroids and Rats 14 3 Revelation 20 4 Attack, Avoid or Accept? 26 5 Investigation and the Wild Ride 32 6 Push It or Pull It… or Both? 39 7 Test Flight For One 47 8 First “Real” Flight 53 9 Meanwhile, Back on Earth… 59 10 Just Like Old Times 66 11 Surprises 72 12 Pinning All Hope 78 13 Victory Within Their Reach 84 14 Coming to Grips 90 15 The Old Heave Ho! 96 16 “I Don’t Like the Looks of That!” 103 17 The Reluctant Astronaut 109 18 Incoming 116 19 The Space Battering Ram 123 20 When Push Comes to Shove… 129 4 Tom Swift and the Space Battering Ram FOREWORD — Tom Hudson Beginning way back in 2009 I got involved in writing fan fiction revolving around the world of Tom Swift. I grew up with the Tom Jr. stories and was more than pleasantly surprised to find that a few other authors—mostly near my age—were putting out better novels than the final three series had been under the auspices of Simon and Schuster. They hooked me and I have been adding to the canon ever since. In case you don’t immediately recognize my name that may be because I generally write under the pseudonyms of Victor Appleton II and T. Edward Fox. Late in 2011, Leo Levesque emailed me with an idea for a new sort of Tom Swift story and wondered if I might like to write it. While intriguing, I was so involved in finishing my 6th novel at that time and working simultaneously on novels 7, 8, 9 and 10—plus about a half dozen compact stories (also known as novellas) that I politely passed and suggested that he try to write it himself. Cue the proverbial feather and then picture me being knocked over with it. What he did write wasn’t what I expected, but… His first draft of part one from his proposed five-part Thomasina Swift saga was compelling. Since that first email I have had the pleasure of working behind the scenes on his stories as his impromptu editor and sounding board. It is a real blast and has me looking forward to each new installment. So, when Leo suggested that either all of the fans out there who love Tom Swift create a “round robin” story—where one person writes a bit then turns it over to someone else who writes a bit, then… well, you get the picture—until someone declared it to be "finished," or to possibly do a tandem book write with just the two of us, I jumped at the chance. Since so many of the fan authors are off doing their own thing I believed that it would be doable only if we kept it between just we two. We may live on opposite sides of the country, and communicate exclusively via email, but the process of writing this story has run more smoothly than I might have imagined. It has been a case of two minds meandering down a path and discovering interesting things neither of us anticipated at each turn. It has been fun as well as challenging, and I mean that last in the most flattering and positive manner. What you have here is our dual effort; a bit from one of us, a little rewrite from the other so the next part works plus a new little bit, and then repeat until complete. It might sound like a complicated way to write a book, but it certainly was fun. Enjoy the fruits of our combined labors. !omas Hudson 5 Tom Swift and the Space Battering Ram FOREWORD — Leo Levesque The fruit of our combined labors is a misnomer. Tom labored and I just confused the heck out of him. He would get us going down one set of train tracks and I would switch us to another set of rails. He was always heading east toward me and I would corkscrew us to the Pacific or a side trip to Mars or just run a round with my head cut off. How Tom kept sane and led us to accomplishing this story is beyond me. But he’s a good writer and knows where he is at all times. The train finally made it to the station and he is a proud engineer on doing so. For me, I’m in the caboose sleeping away and dreaming of another adventure. L L. L 6 Tom Swift and the Space Battering Ram Chapter One: Imminent Destruction The ancient comet was nearing perigee… it was seemingly nothing more than a ball of liquid gases and dirty frozen water mixed with primordial matter from the beginning of the solar system. By a freak chance of nature, and for the first time in its ‘life,’ all the solid particles and rocks congealed together, dense, heavy and weakened by millennia of exposure. As the old comet edged away from the Sun, slower and slower, part of the mass of dirty gray debris was slowly pulled out. At first, nipple-like, then globular, drawing off more and more of the old comet. Finally it snapped off, and then there were two. The mother comet had given birth to a mass of primordial matter with a dollop of the mysterious ‘Dark Matter’ that was no longer readily found in a developed star system, but still was believed by many scientists be obtainable in deep interstellar space. But it was something more sinister. Like a baby, it stayed with its mother and followed behind, millennia after millennia. Together, they swung silently around each other, forming their own small orbiting system. Once, the baby broke away and the old comet continued her eternity-long inward and outward swings, delicately balancing between gravity fields of the planets in a celestial ballet that repeated every fifty-three point seven years. And then the baby came back and plunged deep inside the mother. At least three observatories recorded the collision and the ever-so-slow pivot the comet now made before, seemingly, only the mother headed back toward the center of the solar system. It was an insignificant event in their eyes. Had they been observant—and checked their data—‘they’ would have known that something was different.