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"This is a predictive tool I've used: There are goals we've sought for ten thousand years, and we'll go on seeking them. Instant transport and travel, immortality (or at least longevity and miracle cures.), instant learning …"
- Larry Niven
 |
| Flesh Gun | ||
| A weapon that burns the skin and meat off the victim. |
| It was the usual hell in the streets; a labyrinth of horror. The streets and lanes twisted and corkscrewed, crossing each other, sometimes broken through abandoned buildings, giant heaps of debris and small wastelands. They were dotted with rotting bods, alive and dead and stinking. There were cul-de-sacs where gangs lurked, fought, and swung in Sado-Mac wars that would have astonished Krafft-Ebing. We passed one blind alley where a small mob was poised for an attack, but they were all skeletons in tatters. Burned by a flesh gun. |
| Technovelgy from The Computer Connection,
by Alfred Bester. Published by Berkeley Publishing in 1974 Additional resources -
|
Compare to the heat ray from War of the Worlds (1898) by HG Wells, the death-ray from The World Masters (1903) by George Griffiths, the
short-wave surgical knife from Boomerang (1953) by Eric Frank Russell, the
ray gun from The Black Star Passes (1930) by John W. Campbell and the
pencil heat ray from Brigands of the Moon (1930) by Ray Cummings.
See also the flame pistol from Invisible Ships (1931) by Harl Vincent.
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'the unobtrusive inspections with tiny remote-cast snoopers...'
I'm hoping that this procedure becomes a normal part of medical practice!
'... nothing was perfected until M. Pantalon announced the completion of his automatic valet.'
'...its streets were of remarkable width, with few or no buildings so high as mosques, churches, State-offices, or palaces in Tellurian cities.'
'...it was all composed of tiny, identical cubes, carefully laid to form a tilelike surface.'
'He carried on his person a triggering mechanism sensitive to his heartbeat.'
'...Anything was possible in my imaginary environment.'
