"Rick! You look done in. What on earth is wrong?"
He smiled feebly. "I'm a sissy, Professor. The only other times I've flown into Washington I landed at light-plane airports outside the city. This morning I got right into the middle of the big kids. Honest, the traffic was worse than Times Square. I was so scared I'd lose position and bang into someone that I almost swiveled my head off."
Tom Dodd looked back and grinned sympathetically. "Don't feel badly. Even the commercial pilots sit up straight and keep bright-eyed on the Washington approach. Airwise, it's one of the most crowded cities in the world."
As Tom steered the big sedan expertly through the traffic en route to downtown Washington, Rick asked his father, "What were you and Professor Weiss talking about? You lost me just about the time we got air-borne."
The scientist shook his head. "This time, Rick, I can't help much. Ask me again when you've completed your undergraduate work in college."
"I'm afraid your father is right," Weiss agreed. "When one gets deeply into the physical sciences there are no longer simple mechanical analogies; there are only equations that I'm afraid are beyond you for now, Rick."
Rick sighed. "A lot of help I'm going to be on this project!"
"You're not supposed to help," his father corrected. "The project is entirely for the purpose of developing principles for the system. The final product will be the equations with which the technologists can begin actual system design. In other words, we are working only on the first theoretical step."
"But the newspaper article said the scientists were affected by a gadget," Scotty objected.
"The article was wrong. Paper covered with mathematical computations can scarcely affect anyone," Hartson Brant said decisively.