At the great atomic plant in Kimberly, a congressional committee makes a surprise inspection raising the level of the men's tension even higher than it has been. By midday there have already been minor accidents but in the giant nuclear converters which are at the heart of the project work goes on at desperate speed. Until converter Number four fails disastrously. Jorgenson, the supervisor of the technical team and his crew had been running through a new and unstable isotope when the walls of the reactor gave way. The process of fusion is suddenly out of control...and half a continent may be destroyed in a "peace-time" disaster which will not only sacrifice millions of lives but will destroy the possibility of controlled nuclear power forever. Jorgenson, the crew chief has survived the accident and is the only man who knows how to stop the runaway reactor. But Jorgenson is trapped inside that reactor, unable to communicate. He must be found and saved quickly in a desperate race...or risk the globe itself.

The jangling of the telephone gnawed at Doc Ferrel's sleep. His efforts to cut it off by burying his head deeper in the pillow only made him more aware of it. Across the room, he heard Emma stirring uneasily. He could just make out her body under the sheets by the dim light of the early morning. Nobody had any business calling at that hour!
Resentment cut through the last mists of sleep. He groped to his feet and fumbled for his robe. When a man nears sixty, with gray hair and enlarged waistline to show for it, he should be entitled to his sleep. But the phone went on insistently. Then, as he reached the head of the stairs, he began to fear that it would stop. Reaching it just too late would be the final aggravation.
He half-stumbled down the stairs until he could reach the receiver. "Ferrel speaking."
Relief and fatigue were mixed in the voice at the other end. "This is Palmer, Doc. Did I wake you up?"
"I was just sitting down to supper," Ferrel told him bitterly. Palmer was the manager of the atomics plant where Doc worked, and at least nominally his boss. "What's the matter? Your grandson got a stomach-ache, or has the plant finally blown up? And what's it to me at this hour? Anyhow, I thought you said I could forget about the plant today."
Palmer sighed faintly, as if he'd expected Doc's reaction and had been bracing himself for it. "I know. That's what I called about. Of course, if you've made plans you can't break, I can't ask you to change them, God knows, you've earned a day off. But . . ."

He left it hanging. Ferrel knew it was bait. If he showed any interest now, he was hooked. He waited, and finally Palmer sighed again.
"Okay, Doc. I guess I had no business bothering you. It's just that I don't trust Dr. Blake's tact. But maybe I can convince him that smart cracks don't go over well with a junket of visiting congressmen. Go back to sleep. Sorry I woke you up."
"Wait a minute," Ferrel said quickly. He shook his head, wishing he'd had at least a swallow of coffee to clear his brain. "I thought the investigating committee was due next week?"
Palmer, like a good angler, gave him a second's grace before he set the hook.
"They were, but I got word the plans are changed. They'll be here, complete with experts and reporters, some time this forenoon. And with that bill up before Congress . . . Well, have a good day, Doc."
Ferrel swore to himself. All he had to do now was to hang up, of course. Handling the committee was Palmer's responsibility; it was his plant that would be moved to some wasteland if the cursed bill was passed. Doc's job was concerned only with the health and safety of the men. "I'll have to talk it over with Emma," he growled at last. "Where'll you be in ten minutes? Home?"
"I'm at the plant."
Doc looked at the clock. Just after six. If Palmer thought things were that serious . . . Yet it was the last day of Dick's brief visit home from medical school, and they'd been planning on this day all week! Emma had her heart set on making it a happy family affair.

 

The magazine version of Lester del Rey's frightening novel of nuclear reactor breakdown appeared in 1942: Three-Mile Island and Chernobyl were scarily and accurately predicted. Del Rey was an important science fiction publisher and an SFFWA Grand Master but none of his work had greater impact than this early novel.

Lester del Rey (a contraction of his real name, Ramon Alvarez del Rey) wrote of his early years in extensive autobiographical commentary to his collection, THE EARLY DEL REY (l975). A midwesterner who came to New York in the middle of the Depression years, del Rey was a science fiction reader and enthusiast who, he wrote, had thrown the latest issue of ASTOUNDING on the floor in disgust and said to his girlfriend, "I can write a better story than that and sell it." "Then why don't you do it?" his girlfriend said. Rising fearfully to a challenge he had not expected, del Rey wrote THE FAITHFUL in two hours and sent it to ASTOUNDING's editor, John W. Campbell. Several weeks later, a check for $40 - no letter, no explanation - arrived from the magazine. (Del Rey learned in due course that this was Campbell's method of accepting stories. Non-routine rejections or requests for revision commanded single-spaced letters which could go on for thousands of words.

Del Rey, who had been working at a series of unpublished-writer-type jobs - short order cook, messenger, typist, dishwasher - decided that he had made a great discovery, "I had spent a couple of hours doing something I liked and had been paid more for it than I had ever earned in a week." He wrote three more stories for Campbell, all rejected and del Rey decided that his sale had been a fluke. But then, he received a note from Campbell, "Your story, THE FAITHFUL, has gotten some very good responses from the readers and is moving up nicely in the polls. I expect you to write more." Encouraged, del Rey did write more, sold his next story to Campbell and by the early l940's had become one of the key contributors to ASTOUNDING's great first decade under Campbell's editorship. Del Rey also contributed to Street&Smith's fantasy companion to ASTOUNDING, UNKNOWN WORLDS, and in l947 sold his first book, a collection of short stories AND SOME WERE HUMAN, to the Prime Press.

After the war, del Rey worked as an editor at the offices of his new literary agent, Scott Meredith, before becoming a full-time freelancer; he also edited SPACE SCIENCE FICTION, a short lived l950's digest magazine and with THE RUNAWAY ROBOT (l952) inaugurated a series of juvenile science fiction novels for Winston Publishers which were popular and influential. He married Judy-Lynn (nee Benjamin) in l970 and with her became joint publisher of Ballantine's Del Rey books in l975. Del Rey Books under their guidance became the most important and successful of all science fiction publishers, bringing bestseller status to many writers such s Anne McCaffrey, Terry Brooks (Lester del Rey's discovery), Stephen Donaldson. Judy-Lynn del Rey died suddenly in l986, Lester del Rey presided alone until his retirement five years later.

Awarded the SFFWA Grand Master in l99l, del Rey died in New York City in l993.

 

Nerves by Lester del Rey
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