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DC Comics Presents
Nuclear Furnace Part 1

by Dan Swanson

July 1942 Ted Knight walked into a room at the University of Chicago. An Army general, who had been seated at the desk in the room, rose to greet him.

"Welcome, Mr. Knight. I'm General Leslie Groves. It's a real pleasure to meet you!"

"Thank you general. I'm pleased to meet you as well. Can you tell me why I'm here? Your invitation mentioned a secret government project, but I'm still in the dark about the purpose of the project."

"Mr. Knight, on behalf of the United States government and the War Department, we would like you to act as a consultant to the Chicago Atomic Energy Research Project. Are you interested?"

Ted's eyes lit up! "You bet! Atomic energy is a favorite interest of mine. But why are you asking me? I'm not a physicist and I've never published any papers on the subject."

"Several reasons, Mr. Knight. To begin with, you are certainly aware that the War Department has taken an interest in many of your recent inventions and developments."

Ted certainly was. The War Department had asked him to discontinue work on several of his pet projects, claiming that if the Axis was to get hold of Ted's technology, it could be used against the Allies. Ted could see the logic of this, and had agreed to table certain projects until after the war. But he was no fan of government suppression of research and development, regardless of the reasons.

"We think that your talent as an inventor can be put to good use by the Project." In the meantime, Ted added mentally, it will allow you to keep a closer eye on what I'm doing.

"Second, we know that while you don't have an advanced degree, you do have an intense interest in stars and the nuclear processes that go on inside them. So intense, in fact, that you have hired tutors in advanced mathematics and advanced physics to help you understand the latest theories. Your friend Albert Einstein says that you understand what goes on inside stars as well as any man alive. A recommendation from Einstein carries a lot of weight with us."

"Finally, President Roosevelt recommended you to the project. He didn't give any reasons, but then, he often does things without explaining. I've always found that he has good reasons for whatever he does." Ted was sure that the President's recommendation must have something to do with Starman.

"General, I'm honored by the offer and flattered to hear that Albert and the President think so highly of me. Why don't you tell me more about what you have in mind?" and the two got down to some serious negotiations.

***********************************************************************************88

January 1943 Ted worked on many of the instruments, devices and mechanisms that made the first atomic pile successful. He improved the accuracy and sensitivity of the Geiger counter, and helped build the failsafe device that would shut down the reactor if the atomic reaction started to get out of control. Usually, the project members would tell him what they wanted, and he would go back to his own laboratory to build the new devices. Coincidentally, this allowed him to continue his career as Starman, and his exploits are well chronicled elsewhere. But it turned out that his most important contribution to the project was theoretical.

Atomic theory at the time predicted that once initiated, a self-sustaining atomic reaction would continue to grow until the release of energy was so great that it exploded. What wasn't clear was what would happen afterward the explosion. Conventional theory predicted that the release of radiation from an atomic explosion would be so great that it would initiate fission in any matter that happened to be nearby. The energy released by this secondary fission would cause more nearby matter to fission in a self-sustaining nuclear explosion that would consume the entire world, perhaps in as little as only a few minutes. Many researchers, including Ted, were unhappy with the math behind this theory.

Ted worried at the math in his spare time, and eventually made significant changes to it. Today he was presenting his results to General Groves and the other members of the atomic energy project. Before the meeting, he had covered both sides of a half dozen movable blackboards with complex equations.

Indicating 3 of the boards, Ted began. "Gentlemen, here is the conventional theory. Note that in this step, we substitute an approximation for this term" he circled a term on the second board "to transform to the next step. Under low energy conditions, this approximation is valid, but I've calculated that during the ultra-high energy conditions in a self-sustaining reaction, the approximation fails."

Ted pointed to the equations at the top of the fourth blackboard.

"I've redone the analysis, starting at the point where the substitution was made. Instead the approximation, I've used the exact expression." Ted moved to the next blackboard. "You can see that in the high-energy environment of the self-sustaining nuclear reaction, the expansion of the original term introduces a factor that we have totally ignored up until now. As you can see, here and here" again Ted circled terms on the 6th board "expansion of this new factor introduces a dampening effect, which confines the reaction to the original fissionable materials."

The scientists applauded. They quickly began talking among themselves, and an excited buzz filled the room as they discussed the implications of this change to the widely accepted theory. Enrico Fermi jumped out of his chair, practically ran up to Ted, and vigorously shook his hand. "Congratulations on magnificent work, Ted!" he heartily clapped Ted on the back. "I also was uneasy with that approximation. But I've been so busy with monitoring the safety of the Pile recently that I haven't had time to do theoretical work." The 'Pile' was the first atomic reactor ever built. Everyone knew that Enrico was a fanatic about safety.

General Groves stood up as well. "Well, gentlemen, can someone tell me, in practical layman's terms, what all this excitement means?"

The room immediately became silent. Everyone in the room knew what the General had on his mind. Robert Oppenheimer responded, his voice quavering with tension. It was clear to everyone that he really didn't want to say what he had to say. "General, it means that we can finally build and use the atomic bomb without worrying anymore that it will destroy the whole planet."

Through unspoken consent, the meeting quickly broke up. Several scientists approached Ted to shake his hand and quietly offer congratulations. It wasn't every day that such an important theory was amended in such a significant way. And yet the apprehension about the atomic bomb development, which now seemed inevitable, was clearly affecting everyone.

Ted was devastated. He refused to do any further development work on the bomb. On the one hand, his country was at war, and he knew that any new weapons that were developed would help the Allies win the war. Winning the war was a goal Ted felt strongly about! But he also knew that his breakthrough contribution to atomic theory would soon lead to the construction of the most terrible, deadly weapons every created.

************************************************************************************** General Groves quickly reassigned Ted to projects that were not weapons-related. There was a lot or work to be done in a lot of different areas that didn't involve building weapons.

Ted had come back to New York City, to the Columbia University headquarters of the Manhattan Project yesterday, to deliver his latest device, the RadCAM. Some biomedical researchers wanted to investigate the effects of controlled exposure to atomic radiation, and they needed a controllable radiation source.

RadCAM stood for 'RADiation Controller And Modulator. It contained a sphere of enriched uranium, and focused the radiation emitted into a beam, and allowed the researchers to precisely control that beam. The beam could be dispersed or tightly focused, the intensity of the beam could be varied, and the beam could be modulated and even pulsed. The circuitry in the RadCAM was similar to some of the control circuitry in the Gravity Rod.

Ted set up the prototype in the lab assigned for his use, and tested it thoroughly to make sure that it had not been damaged in transit. He opened his portfolio and pulled out his schematics, blueprints and construction notes. After he demonstrated the device tomorrow, the Project machine shop was going to build 4 more of the devices for the research teams. Ted was particularly proud of the RadCAM - it gave researchers a flexible tool unlike anything they had ever had access to before.

Ted worked until late at night. He was surprised by a knock on his lab door at about 1:30 AM. He opened the door to find Jason Heber, one of the machinists for the Manhattan Project. He had dealt with Heber before, and he knew that Heber would be working on the new RadCAM tomorrow. They shook hands, and Heber walked into the lab. "Sorry to bother you so late, Mr. Knight. I was working late too, and when I saw your light on, I thought maybe you and I could go over your blueprints real quick? I want to make sure I understand everything before I get started."

Ted turned to the table where he had emptied his briefcase. Something hit him in the back of the head, and he slumped onto the table, unconscious.

When he woke up, he was lying on the floor, bound and gagged. There were two men in his lab, Jason Heber and another. They were stuffing Ted's drawings, plans and schematics into a suitcase. The case was already full of other papers and documents. As Ted watched, they studied the RadCAM. Finally the unknown man set some of the knobs and dials. He stood in front of the machine, pulled out a flask, and drank from it. "Turn on the machine!" he told Heber. Heber threw the power switch, and the RadCAM came to life!

A pale blue beam, almost invisible, flashed out of the machine and struck the unknown man. At first it didn't seem to affect him, and Heber increased the intensity. The unknown started to look uncomfortable, but he didn't say anything. Heber turned the gain up again. This time it had an effect! The unknown man started screaming and twisting in agony! The screams were as loud as any Ted had ever heard! Then they cut off abruptly as the unknown fell unconscious.

Heber panicked! He grabbed up the case of documents, and ran out the door of the lab. The unknown lay on the floor, moaning softly. As Ted watched, he gradually started to glow with a blue light! Ted recognized that the light was the same blue as Cerenkov radiation. There was a nuclear reaction going on inside this man!

Ted's brief case was on the floor. He knew his gravity rod was in the bottom of the bag. Although his wrists were tried, if he could get his hands on the rod, he could get free. He started to inch along the floor towards the bag.

The glowing man stopped groaning, and started to sit up. Ted slid his hand into the bag and grasped the gravity rod. Within a few seconds, he was free!

The blue man was looking around confusedly. He raised his hands, and glowing blue beams shot from them. One beam struck a wall, and there was an explosion! The other beam struck the RadCAM, which blew up violently. Ted's gravity rod started clicking loudly and violently - he had added a Geiger Counter to the gravity rod when he started working routinely around radioactive materials. Whenever a beam exploded, it released a burst of radiation! Ted quickly erected an energy shield. He had discovered that a strong-enough shield could protect him indefinitely from radiation. But it left him less power for offense.

The building around them was starting to collapse, in flames. Ted was amazed to see that none of the falling debris struck the glowing man - it vanished in a flash of light and heat just before he would have been struck. There was some kind of heat shield around the glowing man that disintegrated anything that was about to strike him! But it only seemed to work on items that would actually strike the man, and it didn't seem to be under his conscious control - he could not have seen the debris flying at him from behind, but it was vaporized just the same.

The glowing man blasted his way out of the rubble and began walking west, towards the Hudson River. Actually, staggering would be a better term. But every time he waved his arms to help his balance, a blue beam would burst from his hand and something else would explode!

Ted realized that he needed help! He used the gravity rod to send a signal on the All Star Squadron frequency, and then he started after the glowing man. Ted was torn - he couldn't decide whether his best action would be to stop the man and prevent him from more explosions, or rescue the people in the buildings that were now burning. He had just decided to tackle the glowing man when Johnny Quick appeared beside him. "Johnny, you get people out of the buildings! I'll try to stop that monster!"

"OK, I'm off, quick like a bunny!" and, as good as his word, Johnny vanished. Immediately, Ted could see a red and yellow blur flashing into and out of the burning buildings, and with each swoop, a crowd of bewildered people was growing, well away from the path the glowing man was taking.

Before Ted could fly away, General Groves ran out of a nearby building. He was still in his pajamas and he was carrying a megaphone. He started organizing the people who were running around frantically. Relieved that there was someone taking charge of the survivors, Ted flew to the General at top speed. "General, you need to order everyone away from the glowing man! Not only is he blowing things up, but also the explosions are emitting radiation! People will get sick if they don't get out of the area soon!

Groves didn't seem too surprised to see Starman. "Starman! I'll start the evacuation, you stop that maniac!"

Another flying figure flashed up to Ted. He quickly recognized Captain Triumph! He had been hoping for Superman, but Captain Triumph was surely a good substitute. "Starman! What can I do?" Ted had continued to worry about the fires that the glowing man had caused, and now he realized that he could put out the fires if Triumph could handle the glowing man.

"Are you invulnerable to radiation, Captain?" Triumph nodded slowly, just a little doubt showing on his face. He really didn't know for sure. "OK, see if you can slow that guy down" Ted pointed at the glowing man "and I'll put out the fires. Watch out, he has some kind of fire shield around him!" Before he could say more, Triumph was gone.

Ted scooped a big ball of water out of the river and flew back to the fires. He used the ball of water much like a pencil eraser, wiping it over the burning rubble and 'erasing' the fire wherever he touched it. He finished just about the same time that Johnny finished evacuating the buildings, and together they headed for where the glowing man was fighting with Captain Triumph.

By now, there were about a dozen policemen on the scene, and the fire fighters were just reaching the area as well. Groves was warning them about the radiation danger, and they were starting to herd people away.

The glowing man seemed to have recovered from the daze caused by his transformation and having the lab fall on him, and he was shooting beam after beam at Captain Triumph. They beams didn't seem to be hurting him, but Triumph couldn't fight forward against the explosions.

Johnny immediately blurred off directly at glowing blue villain, racing to the attack. It was just like Johnny to rush into a situation about which he knew nothing!

The creature only managed to loose one force blast as Johnny raced towards him, but that was enough! Johnny ran right into the explosion and was thrown high into the sky by the blast. Ted blasted the glowing man with a force blast, and he turned away from Triumph. Triumph flew to catch Johnny before he crashed back to the ground.

Meanwhile, Ted and the glowing man exchanged more force blasts. Ted's shield held against the explosions, and his own gravity rod blasts didn't seem to have any effect on the other. This battle might go on for a long time!

"Ah, Starman! I have been hoping to encounter some of you American mystery men! For once and for all, I will demonstrate the truth of Aryan superiority!" This man spoke colloquial American without an accent. Although a large flickering blue flame surrounded him, nothing around him was burning.

"It will take more than words to prove anything to me, buddy! Who are you, anyway?" As he was talking, Ted used the gravity rod to pick up a parked truck, and he flung it at the blue figure. Just before it reached him, there was a blinding flash! A short blast of intense heat washed out from the blue man, igniting some trash on the sidewalks and charring the paint on the cars and buildings nearby. The blue man didn't even seem to notice the attack!

"Foolish, feeble American! I am the pure blue flame of the Aryan race, and I am going to scour the infestation of your kind from the face of the earth! You will fear the wrath of the Aryan Flame! Before you die in flaming agony, you will beg for our mercy!" Well, Ted thought, maybe he didn't speak such great American English, after all! Ted knew some very pretentious people, and none of them used florid language like that...

For another minute, the two exchanged force blasts, with little visible effect on either. The Flame suddenly pointed both arms at Ted and unleashed a double barrage!

Perhaps Ted had been a little careless, because, though the doubly intense explosion didn't penetrate his shield, it did throw him backward against the wall of a building. The unexpected impact from behind stunned him, and he collapsed to the ground, almost unconscious, unable to move. His shield went down, leaving him totally vulnerable to the Flame's force blasts! The Flame sneered, and took his time aiming his final blast at Ted, savoring his second victory over these feeble American 'mystery men'. He then unleashed his blast! His arrogance, savoring his victory over one enemy while others remained to be vanquished, saved Ted's life!

At exactly that instant, a red and white figure landed between Ted and the Flame, and the blue blast exploded against him! And splashed harmlessly off his mighty chest! Ted wasn't too dazed to realize that Captain Triumph had just saved his life.

"We'll take over for now, Starman!" proclaimed Triumph. Without waiting for a response, he rocketed directly at the Flame.

The Flame pointed both arms at Captain Triumph, and began blasting him, alternating blasts between his left and right arms. Whenever a beam struck Triumph, there was an explosion, and a sharp spike of radiation. Once again, Triumph came to a halt as he was unable to fight through the constant explosions.

Meanwhile, Johnny had recovered and raced towards the scene of the battle at top speed. He saw that the Flame was giving Captain Triumph all of his attention, so Johnny decided to try the old 'hit him a thousand times before he can blink' routine. He didn't know yet about the heat barrier that apparently protected the Aryan Flame from attacks.

Ted saw Johnny approaching and tried to yell, but Johnny was too fast! Suddenly there was a blinding flash, and a wave of intense heat washed over the area, and Johnny was nowhere to be seen. The horror of what he had just seen filled Ted and his adrenaline surged, and he flew from the ground and fired blast after blast at the Flame.

"You killed Johnny Quick, you Nazi beast! You'll pay for that!" The Flame was having trouble battling both Captain Triumph and Starman at the same time, and both were forcing their way through a barrage of explosions, getting closer and closer to the villain, with vengeance on their minds!

Suddenly, Johnny popped up next to Ted and Captain Triumph and said "You guys be careful about getting too close to him! There's some kind of invisible fire around him, and the closer you get, the hotter it gets! I almost got flash fried! If I hadn't been able to change directions fast enough, I'd be dead now. But they don't call me 'The King of Speed' for nothing!"

Their horror at Johnny's apparent death vanished. Triumph turned to Ted and asked him 'Who calls him the King of Speed anyway?" Ted looked equally puzzled and responded "I wonder what the Flash would have to say about that?"

Meanwhile, the Flame aimed both arms, and the ground where the 3 were standing blew up with the most powerful explosion yet! When the smoke cleared and the debris stopped raining down, Ted and Triumph were still standing in the same place, but both were floating on air over a big hole in the ground. His shield surrounds Ted, and neither man looked the worse for wear.

Johnny zipped back from wherever he had run to and said, very pointedly "Jay would tell you guys never to ignore a villain who can shoot death rays, THAT is what he would say!"

This episode was starting to get very dangerous! The explosions caused by the Aryan Flame were getting stronger, apparently as he grew more used to his power, and the radiation bursts were becoming more frequent. Too many more of them and the entire population of this part of New York would be in the hospital with radiation poisoning!

Ted had an idea how to stop this villain, but he needed a few minutes to gather some materials together. Fortunately the Manhattan Project was doing atomic energy research, and Ted knew he could find the stuff he needed on the nearby Columbia University campus.

"Can you guys keep him busy for a while?" Ted asked quickly. "I'll be right back!"

"Get to it!" Johnny yelled. Triumph said, "We'll be fine. Godspeed"

Ted flew back to campus. He needed a lot of lead sheeting, and some boron. He knew that there was several tons of boron in a storage room, but he wasn't sure where to get the lead. As he flew over the domed auditorium, he remembered that the roof of the auditorium was covered in lead plates like shingles. He didn't want to wreck the auditorium, but his need was great. He used the gravity rod to tear off a bunch of the lead plates and stacked them on the ground. He then ripped the roof off the storage building and picked up a couple of tons of boron metal.

Boron absorbs neutrons, and it is used in the control rods that control nuclear reactions. The Manhattan Project was well prepared to build new reactors. But they would need to order more boron after tonight! If there was an 'after', Ted thought grimly!

Ted carried both the boron and the lead plates back to the scene of the battle. Triumph was attempting to keep the Flame's full attention, and every time the Flame tried to blast something, Triumph tried to get between the blast and its target. Johnny had discovered that whenever the blue blasts hit something solid, they exploded, even if they had not yet reached their intended targets, so whenever Triumph failed to intercept a blast beam, Johnny was trying to block these beams with pieces of rubble.

Between the two of them, they had managed to prevent total destruction of the surrounding neighborhood but the street where they were fighting resembled a battlefield! Explosions had pocked the street with smoking craters, parked cars and trucks were burning, and all the windows facing the street had been shattered.

Ted put down his materials and swooped up to Captain Triumph. "I need your help! Can you build a big box out of those lead plates? Leave the top off, and then crush enough boron to fill it, and then fill it half way with the powdered boron? I'll keep this guy occupied!"

Without a word, Triumph flew to his task. He used his super-strength to mold the lead into a big box, and filled it partially with boron. Meanwhile, Ted had enclosed the Aryan Flame in a spherical force shield. The Flame was blasting the shield continuously from the inside, and Ted knew he couldn't hold the shield for more than a few more seconds! Triumph flew back to him. "The box is ready, Starman!"

"Here's what we need to do now" Ted gasped out. "We need to get him into the box, and then bury him with the rest of the boron, and then seal the box shut! Captain Triumph, will your invulnerability protect you from the flame shield?"

"It will" Triumph was certain.

"OK, I'm going to let him go. Johnny, you distract him while I get the rest of the boron ready. Triumph, when I say 'GO' you pick him up and drop him in the box, I'll dump the rest of the boron on him, and then you close and seal the box! Got it?" Johnny and Captain Triumph both nodded and Ted said "OK, let's do this!"

He dropped his shield. Johnny started throwing pieces of debris at the Flame at super speed. As each piece of rubble got close to the Flame, it flared in a bright light and vanished. Johnny was throwing stuff so fast, that the glare seemed constant! Ted used the gravity rod to pick up the rest of the powdered boron, and then yelled, "GO!"

Captain Triumph turned invisible. Suddenly, from behind the Flame, the fire shield flared, brighter than any prior flare. The tires on the nearby cars melted, and some of the gas tanks exploded! Johnny sped to put out the fires as the Aryan Flame jerked into the air, as if struck violently from behind. Triumph dumped the Flame into the box before he could react, and Ted immediately filled the rest of the box with powdered boron! Triumph picked up the top of the box, put it in place, and then pounded the edges until it was sealed.

Ted quickly surrounded the box with a force shield. The three heroes watched for a few seconds, half expecting the box to explode and the Aryan Flame to emerge from the explosion, more enraged than ever. Nothing happened right away, and the three started hoping that perhaps this battle might be over. Ted's gravity rod measured decreasing levels of background radiation, and within a few minutes, the radiation level had returned nearly to normal. There wasn't any indication that the Aryan Flame was going to break out of the box.

Ted turned to Captain Triumph. He was covered with soot, but otherwise seemed OK. :"Are you alright? That was a pretty powerful flare you just lived through!"

"It sure was. That's the most painful thing we've felt since we became Captain Triumph! But we're fine. Do you think it's over?"

Ted lowered his force shield and responded "The blue glow around the Aryan Flame appears to be Cerenkov Radiation, which means that there was a nuclear reaction going on inside him. He seemed to be getting more powerful as time passed. I was hoping that we could dampen that reaction, and it looks like it worked.

"You see, what keeps a nuclear reaction going is the neutrons it emits. They strike other atoms, which emit more neutrons, which strike more atoms, etc. The boron we buried him in absorbs these neutrons without emitting more neutrons and instead of growing, the reaction dies down. I wish we could see inside the box! We could kill him if we keep him there long enough. But even Superman can't see through lead."

Captain Triumph looked startled, then pleased. "You know, we constantly get compared to him, and we hear a lot that "anything we can do, he can do better". We get really tired of it sometimes. But this is a situation where we can do something he can't!"

With that, he rubbed a T-shaped birthmark on his arm, and he changed. Well, he didn't change physically but his clothes did. His red T-shirt and white pants vanished and were replaced by pajamas. "Sorry, I was asleep when my brother Michael woke me up with the story of the explosions. Anyway, Michael can look inside this box." Johnny and Ted couldn't see this 'Michael' that Triumph was talking about, but they both knew his story. Ted didn't really believe in ghosts, but after meeting the Spectre, he no longer voiced his skepticism so loudly.

Captain Triumph rubbed his birthmark again, and once again, his clothes changed, from pajamas to his red and white uniform. "Michael says that he is not glowing blue any more. But he's going to suffocate if we don't help him right away!" Triumph quickly punched a hole into the lead box and quickly cleared the boron out of the way. He obviously knew exactly where the man's head was. "Starman, we can't keep this powdered boron out of his mouth! We need your help!"

Ted used the gravity rod to clear the powder away from the Aryan Flame's mouth and head. Ted and Johnny saw with relief that the Flame was in fact unconscious, no longer blue, and still breathing.

"Great thinking, Starman!" Johnny slapped Ted on the back. "You were right about the boron!"

"Say, guys, we gotta go," said Captain Triumph. "It was good to work with you. Keep 'em flying!" and away he went.

"It's weird, they way he keeps calling himself 'we', don't you think?" Johnny asked Ted. "I gotta run, I'm having breakfast with Libby later and I need a little shut-eye. Give me a holler if you need me again!"

Ted saw the military approaching, and figured it would be safe to turn the Flame over to the scientists of the Manhattan Project. Ted gave the whole story to General Groves, and Groves called up some special radiation containment equipment that was kept by the Project and took custody of the Flame. Exhausted, Ted flew back to his room and fell asleep.

**************************************************************************************

A few days later, General Groves convened everyone in the Manhattan Project to let them know what had been discovered about the Aryan Flame.

Jason Heber had not been caught. Or, more accurately, the spy who had been posing as Jason Heber got away, with the suitcase with plans, schematics, blueprints and notes for many of the projects at the Manhattan Project.

The FBI had searched for Jason Heber. They discovered that he had moved about 6 months ago, and hadn't notified the Project of his new address. Fortunately he usually rode the subway along with several other machinists, and they knew his stop. After some legwork in the neighborhood, they located his new house. Everyone expected it to be empty, but they found the real Jason Heber locked in a cage in one of the bedrooms.

Heber was sick and feeble from being imprisoned for a long time, and they took him to a hospital. It was immediately clear that it could not have been Heber who attacked Ted. An investigator spent hours talking to him and eventually put together the story. One of the FBI agents read from the report to the assembly.

"The Germans have been trying to use atomic radiation to mutate men into super-beings. The project had an early success, but aside from one soldier who gained flawed super powers, every other experimental subject died horribly. The Nazi general running the project threatened to use the researchers as the next subjects if they didn't come up with something that worked. They claimed that the problem was that they didn't have sufficient control over the radiation exposure.

"Unbeknownst to us, the Germans had a spy in the Manhattan Project. This spy had just reported that the Project was building a device to control radiation exposure, the RadCAM. Since the German researchers claimed that it would take them several years to develop a similar device, the Germans decided to steal the RadCAM when it was finished."

Ted considered this. He realized that if he had been starting from scratch, it might have taken him a couple of years to build the RadCAM. But because the circuitry was very similar to some of the control circuitry in the gravity rod, he had been able to complete the RadCAM in just over 7 months. The Germans must have heard about the project just when he got started!

The agent continued "By the way, we still don't know who that spy is. That's why we are now doing new security checks on everyone in this room."

This made a lot of the Project members unhappy. Not that they expected to be found out as spies or anything, but having the FBI check out your background could be an uncomfortable thing - especially since many of them had 'unconventional' pasts! But there wasn't really much they could do about it. The agent continued reading.

"The German project had succeeded in producing one super-powered human, and they decided to use him to steal the RadCAM. This soldier had mutated into a human chameleon. Not only could he take on the physical appearance of anyone, while he was imitating someone else's form, he had a kind of psychic link that let him access the mind and physical skill of that person as well. The flaw in his powers is that the only way for the spy to return to his own form, or take another form, was to break that psychic link, and the only known way to break the link was to kill the other person! This caused the spy incredible pain, but the German command didn't care. They commanded this spy to go to America, infiltrate the Manhattan Project and steal the RadCAM.

"The Germans captured an American sailor from a ship that was just about to head back to the US. The spy took his place. Once he reached the US, he deserted and contacted a Nazi bund. They notified Germany that he had arrived, and the sailor was killed. This left the spy free to find a new subject. He chose Jason Heber.

"He had to keep Heber alive until he succeeded in stealing the RadCAM. Because he had to pass as Heber, he spent many hours talking with him, and that's how Heber found all this out.

"We don't know why the Germans apparently changed their plans. The original plan only involved one person, and the phony Heber was supposed to smash the RadCAM, not use it to create another super-human. But we do know what actually did happen, thanks to Mr. Knight, and we know that the spy escaped with the plans to the RadCAM and quite a few other secret devices. We really can't tell what they got, because of the destruction of the lab buildings."

It was a wild story, but Ted was personally acquainted with Dr. Fate, the Spectre, and a blind man who could see in the dark. It sounded plausible to him. He spoke up "General Groves, if I understand this right, there is a super-human German spy around, who is a human chameleon, but who can't use his powers as long as Jason Heber remains alive?" Groves nodded. "And the Germans apparently knew in advance how to use the RadCAM to induce super-powers in human subjects? And they may have the plans to a dozen or so other top secret Manhattan Project gadgets as well?"

Groves was starting to get angry. He had already understood the ramifications that Ted was just figuring out, but he had hoped that nobody else would think of them right away. Most of the scientists didn't have Ted's experience at thinking logically under emotional stress. "What's your point, Mr. Knight? We checked closely and none of those 'gadgets' was a weapon!"

"I don't know what your point is, General, but my point is this: I solved a major theoretical problem regarding nuclear reactions, and you used that new theory to figure out how to build 'safe' atomic bombs! I built you a control system that allows us to safely build and operate the first atomic reactor, and you built another reactor to 'breed' enriched uranium and plutonium to use in those 'safe' atomic bombs! And I built the RadCAM, and the Germans have already used it as a weapon too.

"I know we are at war, General, and I know we MUST win the war. But we don't need atomic weapons to do it! I joined this project in the hopes of helping us learn to use atomic power safely, to make everyone's life better, but everything I built becomes just another weapon. My point is, I QUIT!" And he turned and walked away.

As it turned out, it wasn't quite that easy to quit the Manhattan Project, but Ted had influential friends who stood behind him. Many of the scientists, engineers and technicians on the Project felt much the same way as Ted, but were less public with their thoughts, and they wished him well. Ted went back to private life.

When Jason Heber got out of the hospital, he wasn't welcome back at the Manhattan Project. Nothing that happened was his fault, but it was decided that he was a security risk anyway. Ted met him at the front door of the hospital and offered him a job, working with Ted on whatever project Ted was interested in at the time. "And" Ted thought to himself "maybe you will be a little safer here where Starman can occasionally look in on you."

The Aryan Flame never awoke. He died from radiation poisoning. The doctors and researchers studied his body and discovered that if Starman, Captain Triumph and Johnny Quick hadn't managed to quench the atomic reaction in his body, he would probably have exploded and turned Columbia University, and the Manhattan Project, into a giant radioactive crater. This was some consolation to the Project members - it meant that simply building their own RadCAM wouldn't automatically give Germany an army of super-men. And it was a small comfort to Ted, who had to live with the knowledge that his invention had killed a man. He knew it wasn't his fault, but he had become a mystery man to help people and save lives! Not to invent killing machines!

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On July 16, 1945, 60 miles northwest of Alamogordo, New Mexico, the first atomic bomb created by man in known history (today we know things about the history of Earth-2 that they didn't know back then!) was exploded. The explosion was estimated to be the equivalent of 18,000+ tons of TNT. Men who were observing from 2 miles away were tossed through the air. Observers at 20 miles were temporarily blinded and felt a blast of heat equivalent to the noonday sun in the desert. You can read some eyewitness accounts here: http://www.dannen.com/decision/trin-eye.html and you can read General Leslie Groves' report on the damage here: http://www.dannen.com/decision/trin-rad.html (the same General Groves we met earlier in this story).

Many members of the Manhattan Project witnessed the explosion, but Ted was not invited. Instead, he read the next day in the Opal City Register that an army munitions dump had blown up in New Mexico. Most Americans realized that this was probably a cover story, told by the War Department to maintain secrecy around some new top secret weapon. Ted was sure it was a test of the Atomic Bomb, and unlike most other Americans, he had a way to confirm his suspicions.

That night, Starman flew from Opal City to New Mexico. After several hours, he approached the site of the 'munitions dump explosion'. The Geiger Counter in his gravity rod started clicking as he approached, confirming his suspicions. He erected his radiation shield and used the gravity rod to pinpoint the center of the radiation field. In a crater floored by sand fused into glass, he saw the twisted, melted remains of a structure, certainly the tower where the bomb had been suspended. (You can see pictures of what Ted saw on the Web. http://www.wsmr.army.mil/paopage/Pages/aercrat.htm is the blast crater and http://www.wsmr.army.mil/paopage/Pages/zero.htm is the remains of the tower.). He used the gravity rod to break off a short piece of one of the melted iron rods, and then he headed back to Opal City.

During the next day, Ted tried unsuccessfully to nap. The round trip from Opal City to New Mexico was the fastest he had ever tried to fly, and he had never flown virtually nonstop for over 8 hours before. So he was exhausted! He had trouble getting the images of the crater and the melted tower out of his mind. Ted's imagination usually showed him new inventions and sometimes it showed him new theoretical insights. Now his imagination was showing him the nuclear fires from the center of a star, which he understood so well, unleashed on the New Mexico desert - and it kept trying to show him this same nuclear fire burning in the middle of a city!

Whenever that picture snuck into his mind, he had to escape! He would shake his head vigorously, jump to his feet, slap himself violently in the face, and try to force himself to think of other things. Doris was more than alarmed, and she tried to calm him down. "Ted, what's the matter?! You're going to hurt yourself! Please calm down and tell me what's wrong?" she pleaded. She was near hysteria herself.

Ted walked to the liquor cabinet and poured himself a double Northern Comfort straight up. He tired to pretend that everything was normal. "Would you like a drink, Doris?"

"Ted, it's 11 AM! What's wrong with you?" Ted occasionally had a drink, but he usually nursed a single mixed drink on ice for several hours. He had been pretty wild as a rich teenager, but as he had developed a deep interest in science and technology, he found that he preferred not to cloud his mind. But he wanted that cloud now!

Ted couldn't keep anything from Doris, and as he finished his drink and poured another, he told her the whole story. Of course, she knew some of it already. Even though she didn't have top secret clearance, Ted trusted her and had told her something about his work for the Manhattan Project.

But he had kept secret his misgivings about his contribution to the A-bomb. Sometimes during this war, when other Americans had publicly expressed similar sentiments, those people had been labeled as being unpatriotic, verging on treasonous. Ted was a patriot, and in fact, he had continuously fought against the Axis, since even before the US had officially entered the war.

Even a super-powered patriot could have second thoughts about a weapon that could kill hundreds of thousands of people in seconds. Ted couldn't help thinking of what would happen if an A-bomb was dropped on the New York, Metropolis, Gotham City metropolitan area, which was the most populous such area in the world. The death toll would be in the millions!

This thought actually helped soothe Ted, ironic as it might seem. He hoped that the US could use the threat of the atomic bomb to convince Japan to surrender before they could finish their own bomb development. He had no doubt that Japan was working to build such a bomb. (Even today, it is actually ambiguous whether this was true or not, see http://www.kimsoft.com/korea/jp-hung.htm).

Ted gulped his second drink and poured a third. His story ran out and he just stopped talking. He sat slumped in his easy chair and stared dully at the wall, occasionally taking a sip. Doris was still extremely alarmed about this episode - this wasn't like Ted at all!

She slipped out of the room, and returned with her gravity rod. She wasn't about to let Ted out of the room while he was like this! She sat with him while he silently finished his third double whiskey. He didn't move or talk, just sat and stared, and eventually his chin fell to his chest and he started snoring. After she was sure that he was asleep, she used the gravity rod to gently carry him to his room, and she gently tucked him in. She asked one of the servants to keep an eye on him, and she left him.

Needing some time to herself, she put on her Starwoman costume and went out for a fly. During this outing, she was contacted by the Doris of the future, who convinced her that she had to get Ted to give up being Starman once they were married. Years later, when Doris finally told Ted the story of "the Doris of the future", she changed some of the details, because Ted would never discuss today's events, and got angry if this day was even mentioned (see: Give Up the Stars!).

Ted slept for over 24 hours. When he woke up, he ate a large meal, and then phoned Diana Prince in Washington. "Diana, are you going to be home for awhile?"

"Sure, Ted. What's up?"

"I need to see you for a few minutes. I'll be there as soon as possible" and he hung up. Diana was surprised; this wasn't like Ted at all. Ted took a shower and shaved, and then, wearing his civilian clothes over his Starman uniform, he flew to Washington DC. A couple blocks from Diana's apartment, he landed in a deserted alley and walked the rest of the way. Even in his agitated state, he knew enough to protect his friend's secret identity!

"Ted! It's good to see you! What are you doing in Washington? You didn't say much on the phone! You know, you look awful!" Ted did - he still had a terrible hangover, and he had a lot on his mind.

"Actually, Diana, I came just to see you. May I come in?"

"Surely!" She stepped aside and Ted entered the room. It was hot. Diana had all her windows open, but she apparently didn't own an air conditioner. Ted started sweating. "Can I offer you a drink?" Diana showed no effects from the sweltering heat.

"How about iced tea?" Ted responded quickly. He'd had enough alcohol for the moment! Diana poured, and Ted quickly chugged the cold drink.

"So, Ted, what can I do for you? Are you here to see me, or Wonder Woman?" she asked with a smile.

"Actually, Diana, I was wondering if you might let me use the Magic Sphere? I really need to find out the history of this..." and he pulled out the bit of corroded iron rod. He showed it to Diana but didn't say anything more.

She examined him closely. There was a haunted look in his eyes and he kept looking around, as if he expected someone to be sneaking up on him. "Ted, what's wrong? Of course you can use the Magic Sphere. While I set it up, tell me what's going on!" Diana casually moved a wooden bookcase, packed with books, that must have weighed several hundred pounds, and pressed a certain spot on the wall behind it. A hidden panel slid open. Diana reached into the compartment behind it and pulled out the Magic Sphere. She turned and put it on the table.

"The most terrible weapon in the history of the world has just been tested, Diana, and I fear the next one will be used on Japan! I have to see it - I have to know!" Ted's voice started softly, but with every word it got louder, and near the end he was screaming! Diana realized that he was on the verge of hysteria! She wasn't sure that it was a good idea for Ted to see whatever it was he was talking about.

"Ted, relax, take it easy!" she used the most soothing tones she knew. "Are you sure you really want to do this?"

Ted's chin dropped to his chest, and he clenched both fists tightly, so tightly that his arms shook with the muscular tension. He didn't move for a second or two. Then he raised his head and took several deep breaths. Finally, he looked at Diana, and she saw that he seemed much calmer now. "I'm sorry, Diana! You see, they finally tested the atomic bomb, and I was part of the Manhattan Project that developed it. If that bomb is used against Japan, their blood will be on my hands!"

"And so you want to watch the bomb test?" she asked him, thinking quickly. She didn't see how that could make things better for him. "Are you sure?"

"I'm sure! Every time I close my eyes, I see a star, one of MY stars, destroying the Earth and burning people to death! Every time, the vision gets worse! I need to see how it really was, to get this nightmare vision out of my head." Ted spoke in a monotone. He was clearly struggling to contain his near-hysteria!

Diana saw the wisdom in this. Ted should be better able to handle the reality of the event than he could the horrible dream event that he was imagining, a nightmare that was getting worse each time Ted closed his eyes!

She dropped the piece of iron into the Magic Sphere's sampler, and she and Ted watched the first atomic bomb explode.

Then they watched it over and over and over and over again. They watched it from Ground Zero. They watched it from the Base Camp, 10 miles away. They watched it from a secondary observation post, 20 miles away. They watched if from ground level, they watched it from directly overhead, and they watched it from every angle in between. Finally, even the patience and stamina of an Amazon princess was exhausted. "That's enough, Ted." she spoke gently. She was extremely shaken by the events she had just witnessed. "Surely, you've learned enough?" She wasn't really asking him, she was making a gentle but firm suggestion. She turned off the Magic Sphere. "Was it worth it?"

Ted looked at her. She saw that his eyes were clearer than before. He didn't look any less haunted, and she thought that she had rarely seen anyone who looked as tired as Ted did now. "Thanks, Diana. It's better than I hoped, and yet it's worse. It's not as bad as I had imagined it would be, but I can't fool myself into believing that my imagination was exaggerating any longer! Now, I know exactly how bad it is! I can't pretend any longer." Ted's voice was firm, and there was no longer any trace of hysteria in it. Diana knew that Ted had made up his mind about something.

"Ted, what are you going to do? I hope you are not going to do anything dangerous?" she asked. She wasn't sure what she would do if he had something dangerous in mind. Her mission in Man's World was as an ambassador of peace, and the destructive power of the atomic bomb disturbed her.

"I'm going to talk to President Truman, Diana. I have to convince him not to use this bomb!"

Diana was relieved. Ted seemed to be rational again. "Good luck, Ted!" She gave him a hug, and, after taking off his civilian clothes, Starman flew out the window, headed for the White House. By now, it was well after midnight, but Ted didn't care.

White House security was understandably perturbed when a super-powered mystery man landed on the South Lawn at 1:30 AM, and walked into the Diplomatic Reception Room.

As Ted entered, an apparently unarmed man stopped him. Ted recognized Agent John Richardson from some earlier visits to the White House on JSA cases. "Agent Richardson, I need to see the President!"

"I'm sorry, Starman. Please leave now and come back after 9 AM and make an appointment. I assure you that the President will see you, and it will save us all a lot of problems!"

"I can't wait that long. May I speak to the Agent in Charge?"

"Actually, sir, that would be me."

Ted smiled. "A well-deserved promotion. Congratulations! When did it happen?"

"Thank you, sir. April 5th of this year, actually..." There was an undercurrent of pain in Richardson's voice. Ted understood, all too well.

"It hit us all pretty hard, John. He was a great President, and it was a terrible tragedy. It must have been much worse for those of you who worked closely with him every day. I'm sorry..." Ted's voice softened, then trailed off. He couldn't think what else might be appropriate to say.

"Thank you, sir. He was a great President, and he was also a great man. Any one of us would have gladly given his life to save President Roosevelt, but there was nothing we could do." Richardson stood silently for several seconds. Then he looked Ted squarely in the eye and firmly repeated his earlier request. "Please, sir, don't cause us any trouble. If you leave now, I'll tell the President you were here and I'm sure that he will understand how urgently you need to see him."

"Drop the 'sir'" Ted suggested. "I'm not an officer. How about calling me Duke?" Ted really enjoyed John Wayne's movies.

"Duke? I th...." Richardson quickly brought his hand up to his mouth and coughed, trying to hide what he had started to say. "Sure, Duke! Thanks! Makes it easier to talk friendly, doesn't it?"

Ted thought that Richardson was a little disconcerted after almost revealing that he knew Ted's real name. Best to push him now, before he recovered. "Much easier, John. Tell you what - I'm really not here to cause problems. Suppose you find out if the President would be willing to see me right now. If he's asleep or won't see me, I'll come back later"

Richardson knew he wouldn't get a better deal from Ted that night. He wasn't sure exactly how he and his men would stop Starman if he had insisted. They had some surprises available, which might help, but he wasn't anxious to find out. Besides, how could he fight a hero from the Justice Society of America!?

From the President's personal secretary, Richardson discovered that President Truman had just closed a meeting with the Secretary of War, and that he would indeed see Ted for a short time. They walked out of the Diplomatic Reception Room and into a short corridor.

At the end of corridor was a massive machine, built in the shape of an arch. Beyond the arch was an armored door. Anyone who wanted to pass through the door would have to first walk through the arch.

Ted examined the machine with interest. "That looks like a pulse induction metal detector" he commented to the agent.

"You got me, Duke. It is a metal detector, but I don't know about the pulse induction part. Could you hand me your gravity rod and your belt and walk slowly through the machine, sir?"

Ted didn't like giving up his gravity rod, but he realized he had little choice, if he was going to see the President tonight. He quickly touched several spots on the gravity rod, tapping in a secret deactivation code, then handed belt and rod to Agent Richardson. He realized that he was probably being filmed and he would have to change the deactivation code tomorrow. The rod wouldn't work again until Ted tapped in a totally different activation code. For the moment, the rod was safe with Agent Richardson.

Nothing happened as Ted passed through the arch. Richardson closely inspected his belt, particularly the buckle, and then reached around the machine to hand it back to him.

"Say, John, can that thing really tell the difference between the fillings in my teeth and my belt buckle?" Ted asked. He was starting to get an idea...

Like any master of his craft, Richardson loved to show off his tools. "Duke, It can tell the difference between a quarter and a silver dollar!" he proudly stated. He flicked a switch on the device. "Just turning off the siren. Here, catch!" and he tossed a quarter to Ted. It passed through the arch, and nothing happened. Richardson pulled a silver dollar out his pocket.

"My good luck charm" he explained to Ted. "Don't drop it!" As he tossed the coin through the arch, a bright red light started flashing. "If I hadn't turned that siren off, we'd be 4 deep in US Marines by now" the agent said with a grin. Ted understood the unspoken message perfectly. He tossed the coin back.

Even in this weird situation, a late-night unscheduled meeting with the President, Ted's attention was strongly drawn to the metal detector. He thought "It emits a sharp radio pulse and then listens for a radio pulse 'echo'; induced in any large enough piece of metal between the arches.

"I wonder if it would be possible to refine this device so that it could distinguish between different types of metal? Suppose the pulse was composed of a wide spectrum of radio frequencies, and we used a spectrum analyzer on the echo? Would different kinds of metals echo with different frequency signatures?"

Ted was totally absorbed in his new interest. "Maybe I could tune the device to distinguish different metals in an alloy?" In his mind, the new machine was finished, and he was already making improvements to it! For the moment, he had totally forgotten his meeting with the President. He realized that he may have just invented a new science, radio induction pulse spectrometry! That might be a useful feature to add to his gravity rod the next time he went to the lab.

Richardson touched his shoulder to get his attention. "Excuse me, Duke..." Ted mentally switched gears again, filing his preliminary plans for a radio induction pulse spectrometer in his mental "pending basket". He returned his attention to Agent Richardson. "Sorry, John, my mind sometimes wanders."

Richardson turned off the flashing red light, then pressed a button and the armored door slid open. President Harry Truman greeted them. Starman had met "Give 'em Hell Harry" Truman when Truman was still the Vice President, and he was shocked at how tired the President looked.

The two men, each in his own way one of the most powerful man in the world, warmly shook hands. The President offered coffee and Ted accepted. Then they got down to business.

For about an hour, Ted did most of the talking. He spoke of his misgivings about unleashing the destructive power of the atom. He spoke of his feelings of personal responsibility for the development of the bomb. He spoke of American's responsibilities to humanity and the world. He spoke of the awful devastation caused by the Trinity detonation. He spoke of the pain of radiation sickness, and he spoke of radiation-induced birth defects, generations after a nuclear explosion. He spoke of the glowing promise of cheap unlimited power from atomic reactors, and how that promise would be tainted if the first use of atomic power was as a weapon. He spoke of the judgement of history, on Truman and America, for the first use of such a horrible weapon. He spoke of the long term psychological effects on the Japanese people if this weapon were to be used against them. He spoke passionately, eloquently and with a thorough understanding of his topic.

The President listened intently. He even took some notes. He asked intelligent questions, and they discussed many of Ted's points in depth. Ted was startled to realize that, not only was the President extremely interested in what Ted had to say, that they were both was enjoying the discussion, the exchange of ideas, the investigation of ideals and principals. Ted had been afraid of being ignored, or worse, dismissed out of hand.

Finally, Ted ran down. He had said what he came to say. Now it was the President's turn.

"Son, you've made a powerful case. I've discussed this issue with some of the wisest men on Earth, and you've brought forth a few issues that they totally missed. I haven't made up my mind yet, but I promise you, everything we've discussed tonight will be considered when I do decide.

"I have some comments for you, though. I understand your misgivings and your feelings of guilt over having contributed to building the bomb. And I'm telling you, get over it! We are at war, son! We've all had to do things we find distasteful, or worse. That's what war does to you.

"This deal about dropping in on the President of the United States unannounced after midnight? Bad idea! Don't do it again. That is NOT a suggestion.

"As for you being personally responsible for the bomb, bullshit. Yes, you made some very valuable contributions, but do you honestly think you were the single man among the Allies who could have done those things? Even you aren't that indispensable! Technology advances, son, independent of any one person. If you hadn't worked on the bomb, it would have been someone else.

"Finally, consider this, son. The United States didn't start this war, but it is my duty, as President, to insure, by any way available to me, that the Allies win! I know you've fought the Japanese, so you must know that they would rather die than be dishonored, and that they consider surrender to be dishonorable.

"We must either convince them to surrender, or kill so many of them that they can no longer resist.

"We don't want to kill them all, so we must show them that the consequences of continued war will be many times worse than any dishonor they can imagine. In the meantime, I have to protect the lives of as many Americans, and our Allies, as I can.

"Projections show that an invasion of Japan will cost us over 1 million Allied troops. The Japanese losses will be much greater. The islands will be devastated and their industrial capability reduced to virtually nil. It will take them decades to rebuild, even with American help. And how many Americans will be willing to help after an invasion that costs us so much? "Put aside your personal involvement with the A-bomb, son, and tell me if there is a better way than using that bomb to end this war! Believe me, if you can show me a better way, that's what we'll do!"

Ted realized that he still had nothing more to say. "Thanks very much for your time, Mr. President!" "Son, remember this. No matter what I decide, it is my decision, not yours, and my responsibility, not yours! Now, get your butt back to Opal City, and let me get some sleep!"

He shook Ted's hand and left the room. "I guess this interview is over." Ted thought, as he walked out to the South Lawn. "Glad it's still night, so I can fly instead of taking a train!" Richardson was certainly glad to see him go.

As he later considered the night's events Ted realized that he was very glad he wasn't the President! Faced with a choice between over 2 million casualties and using the atomic bomb, would he choose right? Was there a 'right' choice, or would he be faced with choosing the best of a bunch of wrong choices? After his long discussion with the President, Ted was sure that "Give 'em Hell" Harry would make the best available choice, and then do his best to cope with the consequences.

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Shortly after Ted got back from Washington, he had the cook prepare him a big breakfast, a 3-egg omelet and a medium rare T-bone steak. She was used to this kind of request from Ted, who often spent the night at the observatory and slept all the next day. She sat with him and watched him eat - she really loved watching a man who liked to eat her cooking! As he ate, Ted told her about an astronomy project he was currently working on. He didn't say that he had actually worked on the project the night before, but she assumed he had.

Ted was involved in a project with the American Astronomical Society to map the sky. Many astronomers each took pictures of a small section of sky, and at the end of the project, all the photos were to gathered and correlated, producing the most detailed map of the sky in history! Ted was truly excited about this project. The cook wasn't quite sure what was the big deal, but she saw no reason to dampen Ted's enthusiasm. He had been moping around so badly for the last week or so that the staff had started to wonder if he was sick!

Although Ted hadn't actually been to the observatory the night before, his assigned exposures had been made as planned. Ted had invented improved devices to aim the scope, advance the film in the camera, and make exposures at the correct times. Ted needed to change the film every 3 days, and put the exposed film into the automatic developer, in order to keep up his part of the project. This left him free to spend many of his nights as Starman. The chatter with the cook was just part of his routine he had developed for concealing his identity.

After breakfast, Ted slept for 12 hours. He awakened about mid-evening and headed to the observatory. He put new film into the film spoolers, checked to be sure the right coordinates were entered in the aiming mechanism, and verified that all his mechanisms were still working correctly. He then ran the exposed film from his spotter telescope through the automatic developer, and closely inspected the negatives. The spotter scope didn't have the resolving power of the main scope, but it let him look for unusual occurrences. He didn't see any, so he put the film from the main scope into the automatic developer. He would meticulously examine these photos with a high powered magnifying glass sometime soon.

His astronomy taken care of for the night, Ted moved into his lab. He wanted to test some of his ideas regarding the metal detector.

The theory of the metal detector was simple Ted realized that with some fairly minor modifications, he could utilize the existing radio transmitter and receiver that were already built in to the gravity rod as a radio pulse induction metal detector.

However, using the radio pulse detector to determine the type of metal detected, or the composition of an alloy, turned out not to be practical. The computing power needed to make this device practical for a lab would be enormous, exceeding by several orders of magnitude the power of the all the computing devices currently existing on Earth (the Harvard Mark 1, the Colossus, Eniac and the ballistic calculators used by the military). (Or, about the power of the early 80386 computers, as we know from hindsight!) There was no way he could build that capability into the gravity rod.

Ted had 4 'active' gravity rods (and a few others as well). The one he used regularly, the one Doris used and the 'backup' that either of them might use if necessary, were all identical. The 4th rod was the one Ted used to test improvements. Once he had verified that the improvements built into the test rod were safe, reliable, useful and controllable, he would update the other 3 rods.

Ted worked on the test gravity rod for a few hours. Shortly after midnight, Starman took to the sky to test the new capability.

Ted was pleased to discover that the metal detecting function worked, and that it didn't interfere with any of the other functions of the gravity rod. He could point the gravity rod at something and quickly determine if it was metal or contained metal. Ted quickly realized that in most normal situations, this capability wasn't useful. He merely discovered what he already knew - that there was metal all around! He decided to add the capability to the other gravity rods anyway, because it was simple to do, but he doubted he would use it much.

Ted flew over a school, and in the grassy playground behind the school he saw a bunch of kids, probably 14 to 16 years old, fighting. All of them were male. There were about a dozen of them, each trying to take a swing at someone else. It looked like a fairly even fight so far, and nobody seemed to have knives or guns. There was a lot of yelling and name-calling going on, as well as the fighting.

Ted flew directly overhead of the knot of struggling kids. He used the gravity rod to gently insert a vertical cylinder of force into the middle of the group and then quickly, but not too violently, expanded the diameter of this cylinder to about 30 feet. Everyone was pushed away from the center by the expanding force, and the squabbling died down. Ted could see that about half of the young men were colored while the rest were white. A second ago, they had been fighting each other, but now all 12 of them started yelling at Ted to leave them alone.

Instead, Ted used the gravity rod to increase the pull of gravity on the bottom of each kid's shoes. This glued their shoes to the ground, immobilizing them without hurting them. At the very strange feeling of having their feet actually stuck to the ground, the yelling died down, but they weren't quiet for long. Ted landed in the center of the ring of kids.

Some of the people of Opal City held Ted a bit in awe, and some of the kids did too. He heard voices saying "Wow! It's Starman!" and "This is really great! Look who he is!" He also heard some grumbling. "Why doesn't he mind his own <*&^%$#$$%> business?!" "Do you know who I am? My father works for the Mayor!" Ted wasn't about to respond to any of these protests individually, but he thought privately that somebody who used to work for Hawkman and the President of the US probably outranked this kid's dad.

"OK, guys, what's the problem here?"

Nobody answered. They all looked at each other, but no one wanted to say anything. "Guys, it's clear this wasn't a meeting of your Scout troop. Most people who are awake this late at night are out looking for trouble, and you guys found it in each other. If you don't start talking to me, now, you'll be talking to the police instead."

The colored kids looked at each other and somehow silently appointed a spokesman. "It's none of your business, Mr. Mystery Man! We had some stuff to settle, and we were settling it just fine without you!"

One of the white kids chimed in "Ain't none of you so-called 'super heroes' around when somethin' like this gets started. Like he said, we don't need you here to finish it. Why don't you just beat it?"

Several of the kids on both sides looked startled, then thoughtful. Their leaders had just agreed with each other! For many of them, it might have been the first time they had ever realized that both sides might have common interests.

"Us super heroes can't be around all the time, kid." Ted was tempted to call him a punk, but this situation needed more clear thinking, not more insults and anger. "You have to learn to solve your own problems, without super heroes and without violence. Now, you guys are going to tell me what started this!"

"They started it," said the white kid. "They keep comin' into our turf, and going where they shouldn't. We don't want their kind around!"

The colored kids started to object, but Ted waved an arm at them to shush them. They looked resigned, as if they figured they would be tabbed as the troublemakers, yet again. They had seen it all before!

Ted looked at the white spokesman intently. "What do you mean by 'their kind'?" His voice was low and controlled.

"Are you blind? They're colored!"

"Why, they are, aren't they. You guys have wonderful eyesight!" Ted answered sarcastically. The colored kids looked surprised. They had just realized that Ted might actually be on their side. Didn't happen often that white folks saw them as anything but troublemakers. It wasn't unheard of, but definitely too rare. Ted turned to the spokesman for the colored kids. "What about you? What's your story?"

"You heard him! We were on our way home from Gemstone Field" Opal City's major league baseball park "after the exhibition game between the Negro League All-Stars and the American League All-Stars. I guess these guys think they own the stadium. Or maybe they couldn't handle the Negro team beating their white team! Anyway, they gave us a lot of crap. This is their fault!"

Ted didn't buy it, at least not the whole story. "They might have been giving you crap this afternoon, but you guys are all here now, hours later. If you guys hadn't shown up for this little party, none of us would be standing here arguing. You can't blame it all on them!"

Ted really didn't want to call the police on these guys. He felt a lot of sympathy for the colored kids. He had seen discrimination before, and didn't like it. If he let them all go, or turned them over to the police, the next time they got together there would be more trouble.

"Guys, it's late, and you really oughta be heading home, and I've got other things to do, too. I don't think we need to call the police here, but I want to talk to you for a few minutes. What do you say?"

They all looked at each other, and there were shrugs and nodding heads. Listen to a mystery man for a few minutes, or get picked up by the police? "Sure, man. We're listening."

"What do you say we sit down while we talk?" There were some benches near the baseball field. Ted used the gravity rod to free their feet. "By the way, don't even think about running! I've got you covered!" They trooped over to the benches and sat down. Ted was saddened, but not surprised, to notice that the benches were segregated. He sat down where they could all see him, and started talking.

"We just finished a war with Germany. In Nazi Germany, many people were killed or jailed just for having dark skin. One of our ideals is that all Americans, regardless of skin color, are equals. We don't all live up to that ideal all the time, but I think it's something worth striving for."

"Huh!" said some white kid, who was sort of hidden from Ted. "What did any colored do to help win the war, anyway?" Some of the colored kids looked angry. Before they could respond, Ted asked the colored kids a question.

"Do any of you guys have relatives in the Armed Forces?"

"Hell, yes! My dad is a career Master Sergeant in the Army, and my brother is a Marine. He was part of the D-Day invasion!" one spoke up proudly. Another was clearly very saddened by memories.

"My mom's brother was in the Army and he died on one of those little islands in the Pacific. The Army gave him a medal, and he got a Purple Cross, too."

"My brother flies for the 'Red Tails', the best bomber escort in the Army! They have NEVER lost a bomber to the enemy!" a third claimed with pride.

Ted was impressed. A pilot himself, he had heard stories about the Red Tails, AKA the 32nd fighter group. But he had never before heard that there was Negro pilots in the Red Tails. He looked into this after the war and found out that in fact, the 32nd fighter group was an all-Negro group. This was one of the Army's best-kept secrets, during the war.

"What do you guys say to that?" Ted turned to the other bench. "Negroes are fighting for the US just as much as whites, and they deserve the same respect."

The white kids had little to say. Some of them muttered, but nobody actually spoke up. Ted decided that he would change gears. "Say, I didn't get a chance to listen to the ball game today. Can you guys tell me about it?" Ted was an avid baseball fan, having met Ted Williams when both were learning to fly at the start of the war.

Both groups responded eagerly. Seems that it had been a really exciting game, with great pitching and defense on both sides. Cool Papa Bell had won the game with an inside the park home run in the top of the 12th inning and an incredible leaping catch against the center field wall which took a home run away from Hank Greenburg.

Both the All Stars from the Opal City teams had good games. In the 6th inning, Mort Jackson, the big first baseman for the Opal City Hawks of the Negro National League had hit a two-run homer that had at the time put the Negro stars ahead by 4 to 0. The American League team tied it in the bottom of the 7th with a Grand Slam by Catcher Frankie Paschall of the Opal City Skysox.

All the boys seemed to love baseball, and after a few minutes, they were all talking noisily to each other, and it seemed that they had forgotten each other's skin colors, or that they had been fighting not a half-hour before. Eventually, the discussion, as all discussions between baseball fanatics do, got around to which group's favorite team was better. Both teams were having good years.

After watching a few minutes of good-natured give and take, Ted added his 2 cents. "It's not likely we'll ever find out, guys..."

One of the colored kids spoke up mournfully. "It's not fair!" One of the white kids added, "How will we ever know who's the best if they can't play each other?"

Ted had never thought of himself as a social reformer. He normally didn't get into situations like this. Somehow, Ted felt different about the world tonight. Last night he had discovered that there were things even a super-powered mystery man couldn't change. Tonight he was realizing that there were a lot of important things he could change, things he had never paid much attention to before.

These kids had been trying to hurt each other less than an hour ago, and now some of them were talking about trading baseball cards. It was the kind of success Ted had needed tonight, he realized. He wondered what he could do to encourage these kids to develop friendships? All the baseball talk gave him an idea. He would look into it further after he got some sleep.

"Say, guys, I don't know how you got out this late without your folks catching you, but I'm sure all of them will give me hell if they ever find out how long we've been sitting around talking. Suppose we all go home and sneak in without getting caught? If you can tell me where to go, I can drop you off. Have any of you ever flown before?"

Ted used the gravity rod to pick them all up. They took to the air, and one by one he dropped them off near their homes. He saved the two kids who appeared to be the leaders of each group for last. When the three of them were alone together, he landed and talked with them. "Guys, I don't know your names. I have a project in mind and I would like the two of you to work with me on it. But I'm not comfortable calling you 'hey, you' or 'you there!'. My name is Starman, and I'm pleased to meet you!" Ted stuck out his hand to the colored kid, who was flattered to be treated like an adult by a famous mystery man.

"My name is Jack Chisholm, Mr. Starman. It's an honor!"

Ted turned to the white kid, who also shook his hand. "I'm Don Sherman, but my friends call me Sherm!"

"Glad to meet you, Sherm! I'd like to introduce you to Jack Chisholm." The two kids looked at each other, then shook hands. Ted thought, "They're learning..."

"If you joined me on this project, you would have to work together. What do you say?" Both were intrigued, and wanted to hear more. Ted gave them the whole idea. They were interested, but doubtful that it could work.

"I don't know, Starman," said Jack. "Sounds like it will take a lot of money..."

"Yeah, and there are gonna be some folks who don't like the idea of whites and coloreds together like that! Not me! But some people are still like that." This was from Sherm, who seemed to have forgotten that only an hour or so before, he had been one of those people!

"I have a friend who has enough money to make this happen. In fact, if she's interested, I'll have her give you guys a call tomorrow. And don't worry about what people think. I think you'll find that we have a lot of powerful people on our side!"

Ted dropped off the last two kids and headed home. He was so tired he didn't even stop for his customary breakfast, but just headed for bed. Just before he conked out, Ted called his personal secretary and asked him to order flowers for the cook. She sometimes took it as a personal insult when he skipped one of her meals, and she was much too good to take chances with!

When he woke up just after lunchtime, he called Doris. "Say, honey, are you still interested in being the chairman of a non-profit organization? I've go an idea but I need some help."

"Ted, you darling! Of course I am, if it's for a good cause! Tell me more!" They talked for awhile, made some plans, assigned some action items, and hung up so they could get started.

Ted's made a series of phone calls, to some of his friends in the All-Star Squadron, and then the owners of the Skysox and the Hawks, and finally to the Mayor of Opal City. They knew who he was, of course, as he was rich and a 'leading citizen' of Opal City. They were a little skeptical of Ted's idea, but he promised them each free publicity, which helped convince them to go along with the plan.

Doris, in turn, called the law firm that she and Ted kept on retainer, and started the paperwork for setting up a non-profit organization. She then called Jack and Sherm, introduced herself, and offered them part time jobs with her new non-profit. It wasn't actually in existence yet, and certainly didn't have any funding in place, but one of the benefits of being rich is to not have to worry about trivial things like money!

Secure in the knowledge that Doris was in charge and everything was in motion, Ted went off to the observatory to do his microscopic examination of the new plates. He didn't find anything unusual so he bundled them up and had them shipped to the AAS. He checked his mechanisms, then ate a small snack the cook had packed for him, and then took to the skies as Starman again!

Ted was extra busy that night. He stopped a robbery, prevented an accident when someone ran a red light, broke up a drunken brawl at a bar on the riverfront, helped firefighters evacuate a burning building and then put out the fire, and cleared an obstruction in the sewer that was causing a backup into the street near City Hall. The city workers who would have had to go down into the sewer to manually clear the blockage were thrilled! Ted felt he'd done a good night's work.

He didn't sleep long the next day. He got up about 10. He seemed to be filled with some kind of manic energy - he had to be doing something! He checked with Doris regarding the special project. "It's all set up, Ted, for August 24th and 25th. I'm working on the publicity now, and Sherm and Jack are out drumming up interest!"

He then headed to his lab. There were a lot of projects that he had tabled because he was too busy, but now he found that he almost felt compelled to work on them. He spent hours, working on many different projects. He found he couldn't stick to any one project very long. So he worked on: his design for an improved flashlight battery; his new radio garage door opener; an ultra-sonic TV channel changer; improving the miniature vacuum tubes he had invented for the gravity rod; a device to keep animals from leaving the yard without a fence around the yard; an electronic bug repeller; and a theory he was developing regarding the collapse of stars once they burned all of their hydrogen. Eventually, he found he couldn't concentrate any more, and he was still filled with this unusual energy, so he changed to Starman and went out on patrol again.

Tonight was even busier than last night! He freed a whale that had somehow wandered up the river and got stuck on a sand bar. Two kids in hot rods were playing chicken, and the brakes failed on one of the cars. Ted almost didn't get there in time - he just barely was able to life one car just before it slammed head on into the other one. Unfortunately, he originally picked up the one with the working breaks, and he had to set that one down and frantically chase after the other car to prevent it from slamming into the crowd of kids that had gathered to watch. He made sure the crowd scattered. None of the kids from the other night were in this group - they seemed to be 2 or 3 years older than the other group.

A water main broke and pressure for the fire hydrants fell so low that Ted had to carry water from the river to help put out the fire, then he fixed the broken pipe. An airplane trying to land at the Opal City Airport had problems with the landing gear, and Ted helped land it safely. A tanker had leaked oil while offloading at one of the docks, and Ted cleaned up the oil slick. Once again he headed home exhausted.

The next day, the Opal City Register ran a piece on the Op Ed page about Starman. Most of the stuff he had done over the past 2 nights was really not his style. Starman tended to concentrate on the issues that required super-powers, and he usually left the 'ordinary' stuff to the appropriate authority, agency or department. The author expressed strong concerns about Starman not letting these people do their jobs, and wondered what would happen if the city grew to depend on him too much, and suddenly he wasn't there.

Also in the paper there was an article about the new non-profit organization in town, started by Doris. Called "The Sky's the Limit Foundation', the organization's purpose was to work for the end of discrimination, and promote racial harmony. TSTL Foundation's first fund-raising activity would be a 2-day baseball fantasy day camp for kids between 8 and 18. It would be held at Gemstone Field. Players and coaches from the Hawks and Skysox would give clinics on hitting, fielding, pitching and base running, and there were going to be several 'special guest' instructors. The 2-day event would then close with the first annual exhibition game between the Hawks and the Skysox for the Opal City Cup, donated by the Mayor.

Ted was well pleased with himself that day. Doris was incredibly busy, working out all the details for the fantasy camp. Jack and Sherm were talking up the big event among all their friends. It was almost possible to forget there was a war going on!

Continued in Nuclear Furnace Part 2

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