THE COSMIC COMPUTER

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Some of them were in a frightful mess; work had been suspended and
everybody had gone away leaving everything as it was. Some were in
perfect order, ready to go into operation again as soon as power was put
on. It had depended, apparently, upon the personal character of whoever
had been in charge in the end. The nuclear-electric power unit plant was
in the latter class. The man in charge of it evidently hadn't believed
in leaving messes behind, even if he didn't expect to come back.

It was built in the shape of a T. One side of the cross-stroke contained
the cartridge-case plant, where presses formed sheet-steel cylinders,
some as small as a round of[Pg 118] pistol ammunition and some the size
of ten-gallon kegs. They moved toward the center on a production line,
finally reaching a matter-collapser where they were plated with
collapsium. From the other side, radioactive isotopes, mostly
reactor-waste, came in through evacuated and collapsium-shielded
chambers, were sorted, and finally, where the cross-arm of the T joined
the downstroke, packed in the collapsium cases. The production line