Chapter 37
Cuthbert Calculus dangled the little pendulum over his work site and waited to feel the directional nudgings. Tom Swift observed this attempt at dowsing and wondered what the professor was trying to find: a water source; a geothermal pit; seismic activity or a molten lava pool underneath the volcano bed.
The pendulum went to a pile of carelessly stacked papers.
"Aha." Yelled Calculus as he grabbed a loose document. "I found it."
"What is that Professor?" Asked Tom.
"A request form my boy. We are going to do a G-force simulation and see its effects on a human. A homunculus will be the unfortunate test subject. With this document we will formally request one from the homunculi conditioning centre.
Calculus noticed Tom's dismay upon hearing this. "I am sorry about your pilot friend. Totenkopf was out of line there. We co-operate with him because some of his genius will hopefully rub off onto us. His insanity we hope will go with him when he leaves this world."
"Are you taking it?" Asked Tom referring to the request form.
"Am I faking it?" Blared Calculus. "What do you mean lad?"
There was that bad hearing. Tom managed to settle down the outraged scientist then offered to deliver the form.
"That's good Tom. Meetings between me and that creepy Professor Hans Vergerus always go badly."
"That's probably because of your hearing."
"Because of my fearing?" Calculus frowned. "He may be a scary fellow but I practice the fine art of Savate."
The dotty professor got up and demonstrated some self defense moves by punching and kicking the air.
Calculus handed Tom a pass. "Now off with you, impudent lad."
Tom began his errand. "I would hate to be the young hero who relies on this guy's scientific expertise." He said to himself.
His trip took him through the factories: one was building tanks; another experimental planes with no cockpit; then he saw mechanical men being built.
Tom noticed that these industrial establishments had only a few workers; a small fraction of what he would find in normal factories this size. Mechanical men were seen performing industrial tasks: joining, fitting, welding and riveting. A lot of these jobs were completed sucessfully with little supervision from human foreman and no scrutiny from machinists.
"People are being taken out of the equation here." Tom whispered to himself. His observation of the industrial processes, coupled with the thought of planes being built without the need for pilots, had brought on this gloomy theory. Tom looked upon the industrial complex as a huge dutiful automaton doing the large scale bidding of a central intelligence; that being Totenkopf or whatever succeeds him.
Imperial Navy guards barred the door to the conditioning centre. Tom showed his pass but they were reluctant to let him in. Since the young American was just an errand boy, they pitched the idea of him waiting outside while they deliver the request form.
"It's Alright." Said an American lab coated man arriving on the scene. "He can come in with me."
The guards stood aside. "Yes Professor Maxon, he's your responsibility while in there."
As the doors opened, Tom remembered reading about Maxon. He was a scientist who created a dozen homunculi in biological culture vats, taught them to speak, then lost control of them. The freaky creations went into the Borneo jungle on a killing spree. They were called the Monster Men.
"You're an American, Professor. Why are you here, helping the Bosch." Asked Tom.
"Same reason you're here, brought here against my will and then seduced by the the dazzling science that is being developed here." Answered Maxon.
Once inside Tom saw experimental culture vats with grotesque organisms forming inside the foul fluid. skinless arms and legs sometimes reached out of the dense pools but could only feel the need to re-submerge. Tom even saw a nearly completed face surface and then quickly duck down again.
"That's one of them professor." Said Tom. "One of the horrors that have been unleashed on the Western Front."
"These are all experimental." Replied Maxon. "An attempt to improve the quality. The monsters that have been shipped out are cultivated en-mass in the fields outside."
"Do you know Professor, that those monsters, you help make, were recently unleashed against American soldiers; your own countrymen. Many a doughboy met a gruesome end at the claws of those monstrosities."
"It is regrettable that my efforts have been put to such horrible use, but here is where an ignored science finds its advancement. The Great War has provided the need; the ample resources the Kaiser has invested will allow it to thrive."
"All I see you doing is repeating your former atrocity."
Maxon fixed a baleful stare on the young scrutineer.
"Yeah." Said Tom. "I heard about that little experiment in the East Indies. Only this time it seems your doing it on an epic scale."
"Come with me Tom." Maxon seized Tom's arm and led him round a corner and pointed out a transparent laboratory.
Two lab coated scientists were inside. Tom recognised Jorge Vargas. Both were pointing out anatomical charts and writing down intricate mathematical equations which included chemical symbols. Large jars of fluid with fetal humanoids immersed inside were placed neatly on the many shelves.
Maxon pointed out the unnamed scientist. "That is Dr Rossum. It is he who will employ this science and create something fantastic. As soon as he finds a proper protoplasm he will create a workforce of passive bio-engineered humanoids to do all the labour in the world, so that we people don't have to.
"Imagine it Tom. A serene and relaxed civilisation without all the industrial discontent. Our work here may be disgraceful, but it brings mankind closer to that paradise lifestyle where the scientific development that produced it will be blessed and this shameful stage of that development will be ignored, if not forgotten."
Tom had heard this justification before from military industrialists, war profiteers and other driven scientists. He also knew the futility of arguing with them or at least he had not found the right words to persuade them otherwise.
"Can you take me to Hans Vergerus?" Asked Tom.
Maxon lead the young scrutineer into a what looked like a large whitewashed gymnasium. There was no exercise equipment, just row upon row of wired helmets that were placed on the heads of the many standing homunculi. Also they had a wired manacle on their right wrist. Several of the bio-engineered fiends noticed Tom approaching and seemed about to charge when a shock passed through their heads and wrists. The fierce growls were not of savage hostility but of induced pain. Similar shocks were received by those homunculi who showed hostility towards wranglers, Navy staff or those in German soldiers uniform who were dutifully walking among the wired monstrosities.
Tom could see that all homunculi were being conditioned to not attack members of the German military. Tom stood still so he could observe more conditioning. The wired helmets and manacles could also channel sensations of pleasure as well as pain. A man with a whistle was blowing his instrument whose sound Tom could not hear, but the homunculi clearly could, as they always responded. Those responses were being programmed into them by the messages of pain and pleasure.
Maxon pointed out Hans Vergerus, the behavioral scientist who masterminded this conditioning process. He was directing the whistle-blower on what messages to repeat and refine.
Two motion picture cameras were operting, one each on the gymnasium corners, both were automatic and did not require a hand crank or even a cameraman. They were filming the whole conditioning process.
These cameras seemed better than the ones Tom had seen in Hollywoodland. Ever so curious, the young scientist examined the device, turning it around so the lens pointed towards Hans Vergerus.
Suddenly there was an outcry. "Nooooo." Yelled the behavioral scientist as he rushed the tilted camera and pushed the lens away from his direction. Tom was knocked aside by this interruption but regained his feet when his hands stumbled on a mirror that was there for scene lighting purposes.
"What do you think you're doing?." Hans blared in English. Maxon must have indicated that Tom was American.
"Having a look at the camera." Answered Tom.
"You tilted the camera at me." Spat Hans. "One thing I cannot stand is seeing myself on the screen."
"Sorry." Said Tom.
"Why are you here American?"
"A request form from Professor Calculus."
Tom moved to present the document but it was in the same hand as the mirror. He accidentally cast the reflective square in Hans' face. Sheer horror overcame the behavioral scientist. His face became cadaverous and contorted with fear, he knocked the mirror out of Tom's hand, sending it to a shattering fall on the floor. This guy clearly could not stand the sight of his own reflection. Hans Vergerus remained staring at Tom, his face apparently locked in a state of morbid shock.
Maxon took the request form from Tom's hand and placed it in Hans' lab coat pocket.
"You better leave." Said Maxon to Tom as he lead the boy out fast.
Tom did notice one more thing on his way out. More homunculi were being herded onto a large gangplank. A look at the upper windows revealed the Super Zeppelin docked outside. More of those foul horrors were soon to be unleashed on the Western Front.