#10 Tom Swift
The Book Cage: Episode 109 - Tom Swift #10: Mind Games
Too busy to decide on a book to read. Normally, that means you fine boys and girls would get a casefile, but fuck you. This is the Year of Pain! You instead will get a random Tom Swift adventure and like it! Tom's playing with VR and you knows that means he's going to face off against the most powerfully sinister force of the imagination, Dedstorm. You know it! Find out more about Total Reality Generation this Friday, 5pm eastern.
Why is he fighting Danny McBride?
Dedstorm sounds like a Rob Liefeld character.
Coming up at the top of the hour, it's Tom Swift #10: Mind Games. Here is a preview of the exciting battle between Dedstorm and, let me just make sure, Tinker
Tinker Tailor Soldier Swift
Let's goooooooooooo!
Prepare thyself for MIND GAMES
Dedstorm and Tinker are primo 90s hacker names.
Hi, @gellaho ! Hi, @Flippant Sausage, rebunned !
yay book cage
Hi, @Tom Owns Diebel's Grave !
This sex toy is unfeasibly large.
And its the same circumference all the way around, thats how you lose things in holes.
Little known fact: That's Victor Appleton in the sunglasses
Book time!
Hi, @Velo Martingale !
Hi Shark!
We begin this virtual adventure exactly where you'd expect. Five miles underwater
hi @FancyShark !
Tom swift drowns on the first page. Good Book Cage everyone!
Way to make it all about you, Swift
it seems these Tom Swift books love the opening shot reversal
Swift saying "this is an incredible alien world" tells us the only thing we can be certain of is he isn't on an alien world
Based on how anagrams work with Tom Swift, this should really be called the DENVER
Tom Swift's one good trait is that he still has a sense of wonder after the shit he's seen.
I personally wouldnt be as impressed by the bottom of the sea after I'd time travelled.
And met a literal alien.
Also, "designed the DIVE to drill" is just A+ stuff
And that acronym is DDIVE, Tom, you asshole.
There are things in the sea besides you, Tom. Cool things! Things that swim and have fins! And maybe teeth! Maybe acknowledge those creatures if you see them!
also calling his diving machine DIVE is very strong
"I'm the first one here!" he says, ignoring all the merpeople
And we of course all know Alan. That character who has definitely been all over the first three books
Ah yes, Alan! He exists!
now with all those criticisms aside I have to say the last Tom Swift book was a very fun readalong and I'm looking forward to this one
Oh right, Alan. We all remember Alan. He did the thing.
Fuck yes, Alan
He was present!
Good ol' Alan, hero of the Second Robot War In Tom's Backyard.
Let's all tell our favorite Alan annecdotes
I remember that time Alan saved a hot lady AND a dog from the steel claws of the Robot Overlord.
Did Rick die or something?
I remember when Alan defused that bomb before it blew up London
Rick was holding out for a pay rise
GTom had to make him understand he was replaceable
I remember when Alan was like "Hi, I'm Alan, and I'm here!" classic Alan.
I choose to believe this is Alan Davies and no canon will violate that image.
Hi, @Badger (ENEMY STAND: 『POOP MAN』) !
Rick is still regrowing his skin from the last adventure.
Alan's a big fan of warm soda
it was Rick who turned into the shitty futre man right?
At some point Tom is going to have to refuse Alan and Rick into their combined form, Alan Rick-Man.
So their plan is to open up a lava pit and ask the lava to wait while they set up the generator
chef's fucking kiss
Folks I think it's time to jettison Alan into the crushing depths of the sea.
Alan compares everything to warm soda. It's a quirk of his
Also cost him two marriages
"Baby don't leave, I love you like warm soda!" He said as she slammed the door.
Ah, so we've stuck with that name
lol, what
Check out Tom's double-D vent driller!
Every time I read Megatron I wonder how they got away with that.
Hi, @Brendan!™ !
The extra D is for a double-dose of this pimpin'!
hi, Eugene!
You know how Tom's the first person to behold this sea vent? We're like that, but with this book.
Calvin Johnson's post retirement career took a weird turn
Tom really doesn't want to pull out while he's drilling
Typical teen boy.
You need an additional source of limitless energy?
"Frank? Joe? W-w-what are YOU doing here?" asked Tom, as two familiar figures leapt out from behind the coral reef, ready to fight any armed Deep Ones
How many is he up to at this point?
You can never have too much limitless energy.
Like three?
"How are you breathing out there?"
"Shut up, nerd."
Iola is a suspiciously New Englandy kind of name..........
here's a fun experiement. Let's try to name a single time in fiction that a pursuit of limitless energy did not end in disaster
If he can plug them into each other he can create a positive feedback loop.
His hole completed, Tom Swift decides to commit suicide
Ironman.
that did lead to the creation of Iron Man 2 though
Which rules
haha yeah I kinda like it more now than I used to
Double the villains for the same ticket price!
Tom is so bad at Subnautica.
Anyways Tom you need to kill Alan before you kill yourself
Tom, either make your Eternal Engine or test the drill, but don't do both at once
Rick loved destroying expensive technology. Of course, that was before the accident
what the actual fuck Tom
That motto is his epitaph
Too bad Rick died in a warm soda accident. If only we could find the culprit.
"There's not much you can do to stop me, Alan."
Tom is accidentally causing a tidal wave.
Sure. Accidentally.
Oh, no! Look at the drill hole!
Every book of this we go over makes me more sure Tom is like Cobra Commander But A Child.
"It's filling up with water!"
Who would have expected such a thing from the volcanic vent I was drilling into!
"It's erupting like warm soda that's been shaken up!"
So you absolutely designed this thing to be immersed in magma, right Tom?
Right?"
Oh no! Lava is flowing out of the lava vent he was trying to open!
Or with basic safety ballast?
It has a seat belt
Better than the Oceangate sub.
every now and then he lets the mask slip and the sociapthic capitalist monster peeks out
And he's dead
Well, cool book y'all.
Drown! Pick drown!
oh so it's another simulation
You think Oceangate guy read this book first?
Hi, @Eerie Queen Mordred 👑 !
Looks like he went with "Liquified by water pressure."
It's impressive to do this same opening twice in the span of six books
Aw Tom didn't the high score in Ocean Drill Death
IT'S ALWAYS A FUCKING SIMULATION
Tom is eventually going to raise some red flags with how many him-dying simulations he runs
If its good enough to use once it's good enough to use every time you think of it, right?
Defeated by an ergonomic chair
Thats the rule for books, isnt it?
there's something very stupid about tthis
Oh so Alan is real but being killed in a submarine isnt book?
If you die in the simulation you die in real life.
Please?
It's the words and the story they're telling.
Tom is fine, he just drank a bunch of warm Mt. Dew and has to pee so badly.
and it's that if he's testing something that's never been done before, his computer can't simulate it accurately so testing it in a simulation is pointless
When you are a ghostwriter who didn't read any of the other books? Absolutely
I'm just going to imagine Alan with a new warm soda spill every time he's mentioned
that sounds very plausible
I'm sure alan will give us more things to mock as the story goes on
FYI, your apparent ghostwriter
Hanovi Braddock?
that's a lot of awards
God damn that's a lot
Fuckin Nebula awards.
Nebula Awards: for when the Hugos have too high standards
You don't want to win the Micro Award
Okay, Bruce. Impress us
The only one they ever gave anyone that mattered was the one they gave Roger Zelazny.
One time I figured out some anagrams of my name if I decided to use one as a pseudonym.
Well I look forward to the quality he puts in this, a thing he gets do anonymously for money
Seems remarkably similar to the thing that summoned a criminal light being from another dimension
It's not Total Reality if he survived, Alan
Lego Hal
"But is it safe?" "No!"
"as long as you don't die in the simulation" is a great way to answer the question "is your simulation safe"
But he did just die
And he's not dead
Wait is the next part "If you dont die in simulation, you are fine" because that implies that this simulation being survivable is predicated on how fast your control room can hit the abort button and that is WILD.
This is a Jacob's Ladder situation
Or is he? Maybe Tom's a ghost.
but I love that they addressed my concern about simulating something that's never been done
"It's just burrowing into your brain, Alan"
no it's ok this simulation is like super good and stuff
"Dont worry, the electrodes only cause minor baldness in 2-3 years."
"Should the helmet have this many needles, Tom?"
"Yes. And so should the goggles."
jesus. "Now to shave your hair to make room for the electrodes..."
"Its the sensors on your dick that you really should worry about."
remember the movie Existenz where people make a hole directly into their spine to play the vr game?
You know how computers do
now hold still Alan or you'll never walk again
"And dont worry, we tested this on lab rats and its mostly safe when it comes to Megatumors."
Fuzzy like a warm soda
Yes, the mystical aether between binary settings
Fuck off, Bruce.
"This seems like a bad simulator."
"No. My science indicates that most sensations people feel are actually just being stabbed by robot arms controlled by a computer, and we simulate that perfectly."
"Fatalities weren't 100%. Some we never found."
"The best part is the fast forward, which definitely won't fuck up your brain at all"
"To be fair we had a hard time figuring out which rats just got cancer because rats just get cancer, and which ones got cancer because we gave it to them."
"Is this safe?"
"Oh are we at Alan Industries now? Is this room in the Alan Corp. building? No? I didn't think so."
He added "of Simulation" after his idiot friends kept pushing the button and whining they weren't faster
"Alan started screaming as he rocketed forward in subjective time."
"The existential terror as reality was peeled back and revealed to be false was tremendous."
Yes, the ultimate video game. Drilling a single hole and dying
"Alan discovered six new ways to shit himself that day."
Even that game has countless obnoxious ads on youtube
oh ok I think they're setting something up
the simulation makes you act differently for some reason
makes you weirdly obsessed with drills
This whole books is just Tom's elaborate plot to kill Alan and nothing will convince me otherwise
Alan is going to go Game Crazy, big deal, we all get there.
Wait, maybe that is the ultimate video game. Look at Minecraft's popularity
Man Tom Swift books really suck
Hi, @sexdick jakesy !
Year of Pain indeed
YOU TAKE THAT BACK
Speaking of video games, have you considered stealing IP from the unfortunately named kid in our class?
Galaxy Masters is no JD Masters
Hahahahaha Toms school has a huge nerd population.
that's such a long paragraph to write about a video game and give no indication what kind of game it is
Just like Over The Top, we won't learn what a double-elimination tournament is here, either
I'm back! Did the submersible crush this horrible rich child?
The kind that an adult man in the early 90s would think an RPG is.
It did! But it was a simulation!
It's like football, except not at all like football
Is Tom not an adult?
So, soccer?
Dedstorm
Nope, Boyteengenius.
from Image Comics
So he's recreated the Gold Box Buck Rogers games.
Well I still hope he kills Alan
But I don't feel as good about it anymore
Alan is certainly going to forget who he is and start doing a Tom Hanks in Mazes and Monsters but with Dedstorm.
He just created those 4v1 games
Right this is literally just if Dead by Daylight was D&D
And also Tron.
Gary Guantanamo
I see a couple flaws in this indistinguishable simulation that will kill you if you die in it.
I don't really understand how he's a part of a team when he's the lone villain, but sure
"Man I hate when Gary plays Dedstorm, he always waterboards us and stacks us in a gay BDSM pyramid and says things like "In 10 years the US military will do all this."
Or does each team have their own Dedstorm to play against an opposing team?
I don't follow
btw, @gellaho , I appreciate how your avatar has gotten closer and closer to the camera each week
I think that's it
Alan goes back into the simulation
Called it
Alan's dead
"Wow, Alan must be having a great time!"
Good job Tom
Welp, time to put Alan's brain in a robot dog body.
"Hey, Legal, Tom here. Yeah I need an alibi for the whole day. Soon as possible please."
Gary Gitmo is my new favorite war criminal
"Hey and put a call down to Human Resources, and tell them to fire up the cloning vats."
Hello, is this the Nobel Prize for Literature? I have a submission
"We need someone to take the fall? What's Rick up to?"
A tall man as tall as several short men
"Was the simulation safe? I'm sorry are we at Legal Industries?"
For god's sake, Tom. It's static electricity. Don't oversell it
"Tom was sure of it because electrocuting brains was what Tom had designed the device to do."
Well, his brain is still working, so I'm sure he's fine
"Oh god Alan you shit your pants AND smell like burnt bacon, I'll be skipping breakfast tomorrow for sure." Tom said to Alans corpse.
And apparently completely unaware he was electrocuted
"Oh god, the voices are talking to me in the day now!"
"OH GOD MY REALITY! FRACTURING! IM NOT REEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAL!"
"Alan: Wake!" screamed Tom at his video game.
on the plus side, the CIA will pay any price for this one
Tom runs out of more best friends\test subjects this way.
MK Ultra 2 sponsored by Tom Swift
RIP Alan. We'll always remember how you were here, and you were named Alan
These magic words are lying to me!
"i am your God now, Alan."
DIVE TRG
"The piss in my seat, the feel of warm soda in my belly, my love for drilling! All of it is REAL TOM! YOU CANT TAKE IT FROM MEEEEEEEE!"
Wait, when was this published? And was the Unreal Engine a thing yet?
the dream has become his reality now, Tom
who are you to say it is not?
"The safeguards are so you only get electrocuted a little bit"
How many generators deep do you think you can get before the inceptions become 8-bit?
Well Tom, now that you've irretrievably fractured Alan's sense of reality, its time to go play an early alpha videogame!
"I picked a hell of a day to quit drinking warm soda"
1992
"Tom!" screamed Alan, "If that's really you, mod my physics so I can glide over the city like a GOLDEN GOD!"
ah, six years too early to be ripping off Unreal then
so Megatron tried to kill Alan, that's not better
Hot and sour fish may just be the most disgusting phrase I've ever read
I love how this computer can perfectly recreate reality but cant prevent power surges from flowing thru the brain of a test subject.
Really ruined the name Megatron for everyone else.
and this is the engine that's running the video game you guys are going to play later? This simulation which just unstuck Alan from reality?
Who doesn't love a sour fish with frotted onions?