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"[Science fiction is] anything that turns you and your social context, the social you, inside out."
- Gregory Benford
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| Flame Projector | ||
| Handheld device shoots flame. |
The earliest use of this term that I know about.
| A flame projector spat fire and a frog man was a glowing torch in the blackness. For a brief instant only was the scene lighted, but in that instant Ridge Coler glimpsed a gold-crowned head — flung back; eyes staring. And the slim body of Rita Simonds bent double in the clutching arms of a squat drylander.
 (Flame Pistol from 'Water-Bound World' by Harl Vincent) A second stabbing flame lighted the gloom. Ridge drove a hard fist into a drylander’s face. He felt the crunching of bones under his knuckles. Swiftly exploring fingers located the fellow's flame projector. Once more Ridge was armed. But he had not reached Rita. |
| Technovelgy from Water-Bound World,
by Harl Vincent. Published by Amazing Stories Quarterly in 1932 Additional resources -
|
Also called a flame pistol in this story:
He urged them forward, bringing up the rear with the white flame that lurked in his weapon ready to leap forth if they turned on him.
Nat Schachner used it in Reverse Universe (1936):
Talbot’s hand darted down toward his belt where his needle ray dangled, stopped with a jerk. A half dozen projectors were trained on him, ready to blast him out of existence.
Leaving his ugly cronies in charge of the passengers, he waved them forward with the stubby nose of his flame pistol...
They came on with a rush, filling the tiny conning tower with their hulking, unwashed bodies. Flame projectors snouted in their grubby fingers — weapons that should have been under seal in the arms compartment — and hatred glared from their half-mad eyes.
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'Their only check on the growth and development of Vulcan 3 lay in two clues: the amount of rock thrown up to the surface... and the amount of the raw materials and tools and parts which the computer requested.'
'I guess there's nobody round this table who doesn't have a Crosswell [tapeworm] working for him in the small intestine.'
'Figments of his mind in one sense, of course, for he had shaped them...'
'So the parent drone carries a spotter that it launches...'
'...nurse drones that would cruise around dumping large amounts of power into randomly selected pods.'
'It's done with a flip of the third joint of the tentacle on the down beat.'
'...for months Grantline bores had dug into the cliff.'
'I hope all those other cars are on automatic,' he said anxiously.
'It’s smart enough to go wrong in very complicated ways, but not smart enough to help us find out what’s wrong.'
