112: Tom Swift and His Megascope Space Prober Victor Appleton II

gellaho

Again, what could go wrong

Velo Martingale

Bud has the constitution of a plague victim

FancyShark

ooo, chum!

Rachel E. O. Speedwagon

Go ahead shark

Eat bud

gellaho

It's going great so far

FancyShark

:hungryshark:

Rachel E. O. Speedwagon

Nothing of value will be lost

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

Holbrook would literally rather die than get upstaged by a 17 year old

PhysicsBoart vs PhysicsBoart

"It's ok son, we'll get you a new best friend when we get home"

Rachel E. O. Speedwagon

Oh no, the ship is failing! Why didn't they take the reliable Challenger instead??

gellaho

Interesting choice to put a shittier version of the cover as an illustration

Velo Martingale

"He's too dead to talk."

FancyShark

Still imagining Chippy is a squirrel

Flippant Sausage, rebunned

When your first name is "Chippy" and its 1962 dignity is all you have.

BlindMonkey

Heheh

FancyShark

Hi, @BlindMonkey !

Flippant Sausage, rebunned

If you let some rich kids best friend upstage you, you are fucked.

BlindMonkey

Ayo

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

and what sort of time do you call this, young man

gellaho

Why would the guy in Key West be any help with this?

BlindMonkey

I'll rock when I want!

gellaho

He's probably drunk, that's all there is to do there! Especially then!

Velo Martingale

Quick! Shoot a missile at the rocket!

BlindMonkey

The zeerust radiates from this beautifully

FancyShark

They're all rocket-propelled! They can merge!

Velo Martingale

I always knew Holbrook was a French name

gellaho

Presently Clarke

Velo Martingale

It reaks of failure and excellent baked goods

FancyShark

<Excited milling>

Flippant Sausage, rebunned

"Chippy! OR SHOULD I SAY LE CHIPPE!?"

BlindMonkey

Kids shoving recording equipment at others? It'll never happen

gellaho

Cookie Chow is going to space

gellaho

For some reason

Velo Martingale

Rest in peace, Cookie Chow. You were the best of us.

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

he still needs to use his fat as a superpower

Flippant Sausage, rebunned

Cookie Chow was the worst knockoff flavor of Cookie Crisp yet.

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

maybe he can plug a hull breach

gellaho

And now they slowly mount the Prober

GDC's Quivering Thews

Chow's additional weight prevented them from reaching escape velocity.

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

also I can only imagine coyote cutlets taste disgusting

Flippant Sausage, rebunned

This is where we find out Chow is a trained astrophysicist and ace pilot.

FancyShark

Even Hank Sterling

Flippant Sausage, rebunned

Bit gamey id imagine.

gellaho

Slim's first instinct: space grapple

BlindMonkey

Cookie chow: protein bars stripped of protein

Slim is short for this world

PhysicsBoart vs PhysicsBoart

If you can't grapple it, what's the point?

FancyShark

By this point, Bud has no liquid left to evacuate

Rachel E. O. Speedwagon

Ram it!

Velo Martingale

See 'em die up close

Rachel E. O. Speedwagon

Then probe.

gellaho

Verge of Hysteria in the Radiation-Repulsion Network is the name of my Prog Album

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

I don't think anyone's died so far in this have they?

Rachel E. O. Speedwagon

Coheed and Cambria said that name was "good, but too short"

FancyShark

It's almost like sending people into space without training was stupid

Velo Martingale

"Bud you can't die now, not after what we did in the plane."

Flippant Sausage, rebunned

Dawsons Christian intensifies

gellaho

Time for a new explosion

Velo Martingale

YES

SHOOT A MISSILE AT THE ROCKET

This book is as dumb as me!

Rachel E. O. Speedwagon

Tom is a beacon for danger. He could retreat to a Bhuddist temple in the Himalayan mountains and a meteor strike would obliterate it in a week.

gellaho

Chapter XXX: Brace your men for action

BlindMonkey

Why did Vektor have to be real life shitheels, space death could have been everything

Flippant Sausage, rebunned

More likely ninjas would attack it.

FancyShark

Arv! Stop fingertutting!

PhysicsBoart vs PhysicsBoart

Or he could hide in a crater on the moon and... oh wait

Flippant Sausage, rebunned

"Brace yourselves! FOR ACTION!"

GDC's Quivering Thews

What's the odds of it happening twice?

gellaho

Tom gathers Chow might be referring to the combatants

BlindMonkey

I loved seeing something in real time and knowing it was our parachute pants

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

nah maybe Chow was talking about somebody else

Velo Martingale

This is exactly how Call of Duty: Ghosts starts

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

maybe a pig

FancyShark

NOW IS NOT THE TIME TO MARVEL AT THE INTRICACIES OF HUMAN LANGUAGE, TOM!

gellaho

Oh, right, my repel-rays

GDC's Quivering Thews

Chow has an unhealthy fixation on branding.

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

"how, by all the gophers I hole dear"

FancyShark

Chow doesn't invoke gopher holes without reason

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

"why, explode my varmints! That sure was a close call!"

GDC's Quivering Thews

Gopher holes are ... Special to him

gellaho

Exactly what I said

BlindMonkey

Fund this American Pie sequel

FancyShark

God, you suck at branding so much, Tom

Velo Martingale

"We're still in space, everyone, don't forget that."

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

of course to create repelatron rays you need refined unobtanium

BlindMonkey

There's also a magnum condom ad here somewhere

gellaho

Shit, are we starting some kind of Star War?

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

it didn't look american made

PhysicsBoart vs PhysicsBoart

Flippant Sausage, rebunned

And a line of premium sex toys.

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

it had a furry hat and a vodka flask

or a beret and a cigarette

gellaho

Pick a back, any back

FancyShark

Watch the back, watch the back, find the back, you're wrong

Yeah, he repels the earth alright

gellaho

Earth can't sleep without its air blanky

GDC's Quivering Thews

Remember when they casually mentioned that Tom was communicating with aliens?

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

...no?

gellaho

I feel like you'd see the shape of Florida before you started making out rivers

Velo Martingale

Did that happen?

gellaho

Yes, the ones they've been in touch with for years from Planet X

FancyShark

That's why the two bases are so close. Florida in this world is one road

GDC's Quivering Thews

If their calculations were perfect they wouldn't be landing in Florida

PhysicsBoart vs PhysicsBoart

A regular Tesla

gellaho

I know you guys were distracted by the glory of Chow at the time, but you gotta pay attention

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

well brand my butterballs, the fella was just so interesting

gellaho

Looking good, Bud

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

uncon what? UNCON WHAT?!

PhysicsBoart vs PhysicsBoart

Wait are they getting to Venus or not?

Velo Martingale

Oh no the Space French killed Bud!

gellaho

Just to show the aliens in Chapter 4

Flippant Sausage, rebunned

Oh cool Tom was talking to the Mi-Go.

Rachel E. O. Speedwagon

My phone crashed, why is Chow still alive?

gellaho

Yeah, I guess

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

no one in this world dies until Tom Swift gives them permission to

Velo Martingale

Gumption and tarnation

Rachel E. O. Speedwagon

Tom is kind of dumb for a genius, huh?

GDC's Quivering Thews

He had a severe head injury early in the book

gellaho

Luckily the crimes were solved off page

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

like most geniuses written by non-genius writers, he's more just a guy with lots of gadgets lying around

PhysicsBoart vs PhysicsBoart

Geniuses are too busy being geniuses to write geniuses, I guess

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

this is sounding like a wrap-up

gellaho

He confessed to being a scientist, that bastard

PhysicsBoart vs PhysicsBoart

"It's all fine, your friend was just roofied"

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

"guilty of competing with Tom Swift. Seentence is death"

"To be carried out by Tim Swift in the manner of his choosing"

gellaho

I doped out a ray gadget

Flippant Sausage, rebunned

All this for a pretty useless kind of radio technology.

BlindMonkey

I hope we hit this freestyle slang one day

gellaho

That space missile was real zany and cooky

BlindMonkey

I assume everyone here is a low grade telepath and the words are just polite

Velo Martingale

I KNEW IT WAS THE FRENCH

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

there's a frood who knows where his towel is

gellaho

Lol, I almost died

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

how could a scientist be bad?

GDC's Quivering Thews

They did a 'fire ze missiles' thing decades before that became a meme.

gellaho

I've also been called a prize flop

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

all right I gotta go pick up some stuff, I'm sure the ending of this was gonna be great

FancyShark

"Also, Bud, you break it, you buy it."

gellaho

And we end with a teaser for the next book, including the name of the sequel

gellaho

Which I've never seen before

FancyShark

Take care, @Tom Owns Diebel's Grave ! Great riffing!

Velo Martingale

FancyShark

Tom, you last adventure was copyright infringement that led to corporate espionage. Get a hobby.

Velo Martingale

We have to stop the pirates before they steal all the asteroids!

gellaho

We have defeated The new TOM SWIFT Jr. Adventures: TOM SWIFT and His Megascope Space Prober

Velo Martingale

WOOOO

TAKE THAT, THE FRENCH!

Rachel E. O. Speedwagon

Wooo!

FancyShark

We did it!

gellaho

that is the motto of The Book Cage

Rachel E. O. Speedwagon

The real hero of the book: the invincible spacecraft the Challenger!

FancyShark

Thank you, @gellaho !

Rachel E. O. Speedwagon

CHALLENGER FOREVER

FancyShark

Great riffing, everyone!

gellaho

So concludes the 112th edition of The Book Cage

Rachel E. O. Speedwagon

I love you all.

And by "you all" I ofc mean Shark.

FancyShark

I love you all, too

gellaho

May all your atomicars be triphibious

BlindMonkey

Good ish

I'm new to Appleton but he clearly lived the right kind of life

Freestyle sci-fi

It's like a jam band

GDC's Quivering Thews

Well done everyone.

FancyShark

Oh man, Dennard. If you haven't seen Tom Swift or the Hardy Boys reads here before, you need to check out gellaho's website

Velo Martingale

Congrats everyone! No fatalities (except Chow, who faked his death to go on and form a new life for himself as an Asteroid Pirate)

gellaho

The Year of Pain shall conclude with something painful before the Steeliversary celebrations.

Velo Martingale

STEEL?!

PhysicsBoart vs PhysicsBoart

CHOW LIVES

FancyShark

:SteeleYourself:

Has it really been a full year of pain?

How did we survive

PhysicsBoart vs PhysicsBoart

A year of soreness after the years of COVID pain

gellaho

Not sure what, though. But I'll make sure you don't like it

Velo Martingale

I've never experienced a non-pain book cage, what are they like?

FancyShark

See for yourself!

https://www.gellaho.com/

gellaho

It's mostly Hardy Boys to be honest

Velo Martingale

So it's rad as hell?

gellaho

Well, the rest is still painful, but you get breaks

PhysicsBoart vs PhysicsBoart

When I was a kid, it seemed that whenever I read Hardy Boys we'd get a tornado warning. It happened so often I stopped reading them

Velo Martingale

Did the tornado warnings stop?

PhysicsBoart vs PhysicsBoart

No, but they were no longer correlated with reading Hardy Boys

But I still get a wave of nervousness when Hardy Boys are mentioned

I find it hilarious

FancyShark

How about movies with them?

PhysicsBoart vs PhysicsBoart

Never tried - yet

FancyShark

Gellaho's movies are well worth your time

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

well I didn't miss much, did I. Late thanks to @gellaho , I hated that one. Bring back the 90s Tom Swift who turns his friends into cavemen and future incels