Unit 10

In the last story you read, you started thinking about setting. Knowing details about what a place looks like and feels like can help you enjoy a story. Sometimes, however, the setting is more than just something that adds to your enjoyment. Sometimes the setting is the most important part of a story.

In the science fiction story you will read next, the setting is so important that if it were different, the whole story would have to change. As you read the story, think about the details of the setting that make the story happen the way it does. Why does the story have to take place where it does?

Record your beginning and ending time.

How would you like to live on another planet? Or may be you’d rather just visit one. In the next storyyou will learn more about what such an experience emight be like.

A Bridge Through Space__________________________________

Juliana O. Muehrcke

"The spaceship's landing!" Dad called.

“Come on!”

"Do I have to?" I grumbled. "It's just a lot of tourists from Earth."

"One of the scientists from Earth is bringing his son Danny along," Dad said. "He's sixteen, just your age. I want you to make him feel at home."

"I get so tired of people coming from Earth to study Mars," I said. "They use up our air and water and food, and all they do is gawk at us."

But, for Dad's sake, I decided I'd try to be friendly. I went to meet the spaceship.

I was born on Mars. My parents were on one of the first spaceships from Earth to Mars, at the beginning of the twenty-first century.

Things have changed a lot since then Two thousand people live here now, under a huge plastic dome. The artificial air in the dome is kept at the same temperature all the time. Without the dome, of course, we'd be at the mercy of the quickly chang¬ing Martian weather.

Whenever we leave the dome, we have to wear breathing suits. The air on Mars is too thin and low in oxygen for us to breathe.

I watched the passengers climbing off the spaceship. There was Danny now. He had reached the ground and was taking big bouncy steps. His boots threw up puff of yellow sand, "It feels so funny!" he cried. "It's like flying!"

I went toward him. "That's because the gravity is only one-third what it is on Earth," I told Danny. "Hut tries not to jump around so much. It uses up air for no good reason. Air is precious on Mars."

Danny stopped bouncing, but he didn't answer. He just stared at me wide-eyed. How rude these earthlings were!

To hide my anger, I started hauling crates from the ship. Danny's eyes grew even rounder. I chuckled to myself, guess¬ing his thoughts. I must seem incredibly strong, carrying such big boxes so easily. He didn't realize that the light gravity on Mars made physical work a lot easier than it would be on Earth.

Boy, did he have a lot to learn!

He was still gaping at me —as if I were a freak. "What did you expect?" I wanted to say. "Little green men?"

Friendship with this earthling was im¬possible, no matter what Dad said. I turned my back on Danny and walked off across the sand. All around me the desert stretched as far as the eye could see, flat and barren.

On Earth, I had learned, there were mountains and jungles and great oceans. It was hard to imagine.

There were no oceans here or lakes or rivers. No water at all. No rain or even clouds. We have to make our own water here. We make it chemically, just as we make our air. We make most of our own food, too. Life on Mars is completely arti¬ficial. It's the only way human life can survive here.

What did a mountain look like? I wondered. And a cloud? How would it be to breathe real Earth air? To climb moun¬tain peaks and walk in tall green forests?

There were no trees here —only a few twisted, stumpy plants. No mountains — just an endless stretch of loose yellow sand or dry red dust.

I knew there were deserts on Earth, too. Parts of Arizona, I had read, looked some¬thing like Mars. But I still had this childish picture of Earth being all green and blue — as brightly colored as our Martian rocks.

I had hoped to ask Danny about Earth. Now of course I couldn't. He thought of me only as some weird creature to study. Anger rose again as I remembered his rude stare.

Later, I went back to the dome and sat watching the stars come out—billions of them like bright dust in the black sky. A blue-green dot glowed large and clear among them. That, I knew, was Earth, forty million miles away.

Danny came in, shivering. "Boy, it's chilly out there!"

I grunted. "Turn up your space heater if you're cold."

"Mars is fascinating, isn't it?" Danny said. "I'd love to have you show me around.

"I'm not a tour guide," I snapped.

Danny didn't take the hint. "It's a lot warmer on Mars than I expected," he said.

"It was nearly seventy degrees this after¬noon. How cold does it get at night?"

"Around zero," I said. "Of course we're on the equator here. At the poles it gets a lot colder." When would he get tired of studying me like some creature under a microscope?

"Wow! How can you live where it's so warm in the daytime and so cold at night?"

I was getting really annoyed. To think Dad wanted me to be friends with this earthling! All Danny wanted to do was quiz me. As if he were writing a geography paper about me!

Despite his lack of manners, I tried to answer politely. "We stay under the dome most of the time. Whenever we leave the dome, we adjust the heat controls on the suits we wear."

"Still," Danny said, "you must be awfully hardy to put up with such rapid temperature changes."

That was the last straw. "I'm no differ¬ent from you!" I shouted. "I may be a Martian, but I'm still a human being!"

"So am I!" Danny said, angry now too. "I've tried to be friendly, but I'm sick of your treating me like a—a creature from another planet."

"That's what you are, aren't you?" I snapped back.

I stormed out, seething with anger. Well, at least I'd gotten the last word.

All at once I felt sick and dizzy. Oh, my gosh! I'd forgotten my breathing suit!

I staggered back toward the dome. Then everything went black.

When I opened my eyes, Danny was bending over me, holding an oxygen mask to my mouth.

"Are you all right?" he asked. "Gee, I'm sorry I upset you, asking all those ques¬tions. It's just that I'm so excited to be here. All my life I've wanted to come to Mars."

I sucked in air. Why, Danny wasn't being rude, I realized. He was merely as curious about my planet as I was about his.

"Isn't it strange," I said, "that people can travel from one planet to another, but two people can't communicate any better than they could a century ago? It's too bad, isn't it?"

"Yes," Danny said. "Especially when we have so much to teach each other."

"You saved my life," I said. "That was quick thinking."

"What are friends for?" Danny said.

I smiled. "And I thought I was so smart. What a dumb thing for me to do!"

Danny smiled back. "We all make mis¬takes," he said. "After all, we're only human."

Activity 1

Fact Questions

1. Why do people on Mars wear breath­ing suits?

2. Why is physical work easier on Mars than on Earth?

3. How does the narrator feel Danny is looking at her?

4. How much natural water is there on Mars?

5. Where do people on Mars get their water?

6. Where do people on Mars get their food?

7. Name a few things Earth has that Mars doesn't.

8. What does Earth look like from Mars?

9. How far from Mars is Earth?

10. Why did Danny ask so many ques­tions

Activity 2

Thought Questions

1. What was the narrator's attitude toward Danny, even before the two met?

2. What experiences caused the narrator to dislike Danny even before she met him?

3. Put yourself in the narrator's place. Would you consider Danny's questions rude? Why, or why not?

Activity 3

Thinking about Setting

1. Where does the story take place?

2. When does the story take place?

3. In a few words, describe each of the following:

   1. the surface of Mars

   2. the plants on Mars

   3. the weather on Mars

4. How would the story change if the setting were different?