American Ultronic Science

: The Airlords Of Han

Our own engineers, working in shielded laboratories far underground, had

established such control over the "de-atomized" electrons as to dissect

them in their turn into sub-electrons. Moreover, they had carried

through the study of this "order" to the point where they finally

"dissected" the sub-electron into its component ultrons, for the

fundamental laws underlying these successive orders are not radically

dissimilar And as they progressed, they developed constructive as well

as destructive practice. Hence the great triumphs of ultron and

inertron, our two wonderful synthetic elements, built up from

super-balanced and sub-balanced ultronic whorls, through the

sub-electronic order into the atomic and molecular.



Hence also, come our relatively simple and beautifully efficient

ultrophones and ultroscopes, which in their phonic and visual operation

penetrate obstacles of material, electronic and sub-electronic nature

without let or hindrance, and with the consumption of but infinitesimal

power.



Static disturbance, I should explain, is negligible in the

sub-electronic order, and non-existent in the ultronic.



The pioneer expeditions of our engineers into the ultronic order, I am

told, necessitated the use of most elaborate, complicated and delicate

apparatus, as well as the expenditure of most costly power, but once

established there, all necessary power is developed very simply from

tiny batteries composed of thin plates of metultron and katultron.

These two substances, developed synthetically in much the same manner as

ordinary ultron, exhibit dual phenomena which for sake of illustration I

may compare with certain of the phenomena of radioactivity. As radium is

constantly giving off electronic emanations and changing its atomic

structure thereby, so katultron is constantly giving off ultronic

emanations, and so changing its sub-electronic form, while

metultron, its complement, is constantly attracting and absorbing

ultronic values, and so changing its sub-electronic nature in the

opposite direction. Thin plates of these two substances, when placed

properly in juxtaposition, with insulating plates of inertron between,

constitute a battery which generates an ultronic current.



* * * * *



And it is a curious parallel that just as there were many mysteries

connected with the nature of electricity in the Twentieth Century

(mysteries which, I might mention, never have been solved,

notwithstanding our penetration into the "sub-" orders) so there are

certain mysteries about the ultronic current. It will flow, for

instance, through an ultron wire, from the katultron to the

metultron plate, as electricity will flow through a copper wire. It

will short circuit between the two plates if the inertron insulation is

imperfect. When the insulation is perfect, however, and no ultron

metallic circuit is complete, the "current" (apparently the same that

would flow through the metallic circuit) is projected into space in an

absolutely straight line from the katultron plate, and received from

space by the metultron plate on the same line. This line is the

theoretical straight line passing through the mass-center of each plate.

The shapes and angles of the plates have nothing to do with it, except

that the perpendicular distance of the plate edges from the mass-center

line determines thickness of the beam of parallel current-rays.



Thus a simple battery may be used either as a sender or receiver of

current. Two batteries adjusted to the same center line become connected

in series just as if they were connected by ultron wires.



In actual practice, however, two types of batteries are used; both the

foco batteries and broadcast batteries.



Foco batteries are twin batteries, arranged to shoot a positive and a

negative beam in the same direction. When these beams are made

intermittent at light frequencies (though they are not light waves, nor

of the same order as light waves) and are brought together, or focussed,

at a given spot, the space in which they cross radiates alternating

ultronic current in every direction. This radiated ultralight acts

like true light so long as the crossing beams vibrate at light

frequencies, except in three respects: first, it is not visible to the

eye; second, its "color" is exclusively dependent on the frequency of

the foco beams, which determine the frequency of the alternating

radiation. Material surfaces, it would appear, reflect them all in equal

value, and the color of the resultant picture depends on the color of

the foco frequencies. By altering these, a reddish, yellowish or

bluish picture may be seen. In actual practice an orthochromatic mixture

of frequencies is used to give a black, gray and white picture. The

third difference is this: rays pulsating in line toward any ultron

object connected with the rear plates of the twin batteries through

rectifiers cannot be reflected by material objects, for it appears they

are subject to a kind of "pull" which draws them straight through

material objects, which in a sense are "magnetized" and while in this

state offer no resistance.



Ultron, when so connected with battery terminals, glows with true light

under the impact of ultralight, and if in the form of a lens or set of

lenses, may be made to deliver a picture in any telescopic degree

desired.



* * * * *



The essential parts of an ultroscope, then, are twin batteries with

focal control and frequency control; an ultron shield, battery connected

and adjustable, to intercept the direct rays from the "glow-spot,"

with an ordinary light-shield between it and the lens; and the lens

itself, battery connected and with more or less telescopic elaboration.



To look through a substance at an object, one has only to focus the

glow-spot beyond the substance but on the near side of the object and

slightly above it.



A complete apparatus may be "set" for "penetrative," "distance" and

"normal vision."



In the first, which one would use to look through the forest screen from

the air, or in examining the interior of a Han ship or any opaque

structure, the glow-spot is brought low, at only a tiny angle above

the vision line, and the shield, of course, must be very carefully

adjusted.



"Distance" setting would be used, for instance, in surveying a valley

beyond a hill or mountain; the glow-spot is thrown high to illuminate

the entire scene.



In the "normal" setting the foco rays are brought together close

overhead, and illuminate the scene just as a lamp of super brilliancy

would in the same position.



For phonic communication a spherical sending battery is a ball of

metultron, surrounded by an insulating shell of inertron, and this in

turn by a spherical shell of katultron, from which the current radiates

in every direction, tuning being accomplished by frequency of

intermissions, with audio-frequency modulation. The receiving battery

has a core pole of katultron and an outer shell of metultron. The

receiving battery, of course, picks up all frequencies, the undesired

ones being tuned out in detection.



Tuning, however, is only a convenience for privacy and elimination of

interference in ultrophonic communication. It is not involved as a

necessity, for untuned currents may be broadcast at voice-controlled

frequencies, directly and without any carrier wave.



To use plate batteries or single center-line batteries for phonic

communication would require absolutely accurate directional aligning of

sender and receiver, a very great practical difficulty, except when

sender and receiver are relatively close and mutually visible.



* * * * *



This, however, is the regular system used in the Inter-Gang network for

official communication. The senders and receivers used in this system

are set only with the greatest difficulty, and by the aid of the finest

laboratory apparatus, but once set, they are permanently locked in

position at the stations, and barring earthquakes or insecure

foundations, need no subsequent adjustment. Accuracy of alignment

permits beam paths no thicker than the old lead pencils I used to use in

the Twentieth Century.



The non-interference of such communication lines, and the difficulty of

cutting in on them from any point except immediately adjacent to the

sender or receiver, is strikingly apparent when it is realized that

every square inch of an imaginary plane bisecting the unlocated beam

would have to be explored with a receiving battery in order to locate

the beam itself.



A practical compromise between the spherical or universal broadcast

senders and receivers on the one hand, and the single line batteries on

the other, is the multi-facet battery. Another, and more practical

device particularly for distance work, is the window-spherical. It is

merely an ordinary spherical battery with a shielding shell with an

opening of any desired size, from which a directionally controlled beam

may be emitted in different forms, usually that simply of an expanding

cone, with an angle of expansion sufficient to cover the desired

territory at the desired point of reception.