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"it slowly dawned on me that the landscape of science is maybe what interests people a great deal in science fiction."
- Gregory Benford
 |
| Golden Ray of Synchronized Vibrations | ||
| Disrupts matter by hurling electrons out of their energy states and scattering them. |
| Warlo raised his hand. The Murians
at the funnels barely moved. But shafts
of golden haze leaped from the funnels,
impinged on the diving bombers. Mark
cried out and swore in mingled rage and
astonishment.
 (Warlo raised his hand in 'The Return of the Murians' by Nat Schachner) The hurtling squadron, scores on scores of huge, armored planes, shimmered an instant in the innocent-seeming haze, then vanished. Once more the sky was blue and clear overhead. But the great armada was gone, and left no trace. “Your weapons, my young hot-head,” remarked Warlo, “are a bit crude compared to those of Mur, as you may have observed. Your race has evidently not yet learned the secret of synchronized vibrations, that hurl electrons out of their energy states and scatter them in space.” “Damn you! Damn you!” Mark swore recklessly. More than a thousand of his own kind had been obliterated in that act. Rone’s delicate mouth mocked him wordlessly; but Banda’s gaze was full of pity and deep understanding.
 (Golden rays from 'The Return of the Murians' by Nat Schachner) ...alas, no Earthly weapon could penetrate that web of force, so fragile seeming in its shimmering tenuity, yet so unbelievably repellent against Big Bertha shells, flame throwers, reckless, suicidal tanks alike. And time and again, those thin, vaporous, golden rays darted out and wiped out, in one huge vanishment, men and guns and tanks and planes and rocks. |
| Technovelgy from The Return of the Murians,
by Nat Schachner. Published by Astounding Stories in 1936 Additional resources -
|
Compare to the disrupter ray from The Silent Destroyer (1929) by Henri Dahl Juve, the de-atomizing ray from Crashing Suns (1928) by Edmond Hamilton, the disrupter tube from The Emperor of the Stars (1931) by Nat Schachner (w. AL Zagat), the Bethé blasters from Cities in Flight (1957) by James Blish, the annihilator beam from Conquest of Gola (1931) by L.F. Stone, the Vortex Gun from One Against the Legion (1939) by Jack Williamson.
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'And he had been sent with troops, supplies and bombs to command Russia's most trusted post, the Moonbase.'
'What is your population', I asked. 'About eighty millions.'
'THE autobus turned silently down the wide street of Hydropole. Robot-guided, insulated from noise and cold...'
'The car had no steering wheel, and no one drove!'
Now that's power walking that Hugo Gernsback would have approved.
'It was disturbing to think of the Flatline as a construct...'
'...he rewired the delivery robot so that it would serve him midnight snacks.'
'On went the electric-yacht faster and still faster.'
'...the huge vessel had spun, with a sickening lurch, through a complete half-circle, the instant the power was reversed.'
'...he realized that it was not quite a clear lens. Speckles of colored brightness swirled and gathered in it.'
