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"...a lot of people find adventure on the Internet. That's their idea of being interactive. My idea of being interactive is going on out and doing it on the street."
- Harlan Ellison

Thing-That-Spits-Lightning  
  A kind of ray device that uses a technology too advanced to describe.  

He started for her in earnest. And all at once she had something in her hand, a small silvery object that she had drawn from a fold of her tunic. Martin stopped, all else forgotten in stunned amazement.


('Lords of the Morning' by Edmond Hamilton)

Chrome steel, in this century? Perfect machining, in a culture that worked no metal? Intricate lenses, in a land where glass was undreamed of?

He opened his mouth to speak. A flash of violet light leaped out from the clustered lenses, blinding, bright. A terrific shock ran through him, and every motor nerve center went dead. Blinded and utterly astonished he collapsed on the steps.


(Thing-that-spits-lightning from 'Lords of the Morning' by Edmond Hamilton)

He felt again, in memory, the flash and shock that had ended their first meeting. "Listen," he said. "That" There were no words in the Quiche that had anything to do with electronics. Thing-that-spits-lightning was the best he could do. "Where did you get it? Who made it?

...OVER HIS shoulder he asked Aryll, “How far is the thing-that-spits-lightning effective?”

“Not far. They are defensive only.”

Technovelgy from Lords of the Morning, by Edmond Hamilton.
Published by Thrilling Wonder Stories in 1952
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