The Vortex Blaster

The Vortex Blaster is a collection of three science fiction short stories by author E. E. Smith, published in 1960. The stories included are The Vortex Blaster, Storm Cloud on Deka & The Vortex Blaster Makes War, and they all bear the stamp of unmistakable quality to be expected from the old sci-fi specialist Smith!.. The hero of the collection is Neal "Storm" Cloud, a nuclear engineer with an amazingly mathematical mind. In his universe there is something we have apparently don't have in ours, self-sustaining vortices of atomic energy. These are like a small piece of the heart of a star. A churning vortex of heat and light that grows while consuming whatever it is in contact with. In theory they can be blown out by a precise amount of explosives, placed at an exact spot in the vortex, at exactly the right time. The problem is, it takes the best computers available hours to calculate the factors needed, and only seconds are left to get the correct amount of explosives on target...