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The Million- Year Picnic
A rocket lands on Mars. Inside are a family of a husband, wife, and three boys, along with a lot of food. The dad seems like he is up to something, and while the family is out looking around the planet, their rocket self-destructs. The dad wanted to bring them away from Earth so that they can live on Mars. Another family comes and joins them. They burn all of their papers that they brought from Earth, even a map of Earth, so that they can start their new life off fresh. -
Rocket Summer
It was winter in Ohio when a sudden wave a warmth came. The snow and ice melted and there was no longer the need to sled or ski because now the land was green with grass. The rocket that changed the climate from winter to summer laid there in the grass, and with every breath it took, the more summer would show. -
Ylla
Ylla dreams of a man who she has never met or seen before. He is tall with blue eyes and black hair, much different than the martians. Ylla explains this strange dream to her husband and he thinks this is all absurd, however, he acts jealous towards the unknown man. Ylla explains to him that she can hear a song that is sung in a language that she doesn't understand, and this frightens her. Yll is outraged and decides to put an end to this nonsense and kills the astronaut, Natheniel York. -
The Summer Night
The village is hearing music in a language they do not understand, much like Ylla did. The women hear a poem and the children hear a nursery rhyme. The Martians do not know why they are hearing this. Later that night, the husbands have to comfort their wives as they all have a dream that leads them to believe something terrible will happen in the morning. -
The Earth Men
Four more astronauts come to Mars on a second expedition. They want to learn more about the planet and the Martians, so they try to talk to some of the locals. The Martians are not too welcoming to their visitors and keep telling them to talk to someone else. The Martians believe that they are the only life in the universe and that Earth can't support life. They believe that these astronauts are insane and Mr. Xxx shoots all four of them and himself. -
The Taxpayer
Pritchard lives in Ohio and wants to go to Mars more than anything. He believes that he is a good tax-paying citizen, so he should be allowed to go on the next expedition. Pritchard believes that it's possible none of the other astronauts ever came back because they like Mars so much. He wants to leave Earth to see if there is something better beyond what humans already know. -
The Third Expedition
A third expedition heads to Mars with 17 astronauts. When they get there, it looks a lot like Earth during the 1950s. They learn that this is where their deceased friends and family have gone, and the men are overjoyed to reunite with their loved ones. During the night, Captain John Black gets a terrible feeling that this is a scheme set up by the Martians to destroy their unwelcomed visitors, and he wakes up to learn the other 16 men are dead. -
And The Moon Be Still As Bright
During the fourth expedition on Mars, Dr. Hathaway believes that there are no more Martians on Mars because of a chicken pox epedemic. The crew parties and fights, but once they are sober, they go and observe the town to see what they can find. Spender has high respect for alien life and returns to the crew claiming that he is a Martian. He kills 5 crew members and is determined to kill the rest, so that there is no human colonization on Mars. Captain Wilder agrees with Spender. -
The Settlers
More and more Earth men are going to Mars for a multitude of reasons. The government was supporting those who wanted to go to Mars. People were getting a disease called The Loneliness, when they would see their hometown completely change and become a foreign land to them. The United States misted away and Earth became abandoned. -
The Green Morning
Benjamin Driscoll is a man living on Mars. The air is too thin on Mars and people, like Benjamin, are being told to go back to Earth. He plants trees and grass to support the air on Mars. -
The Locusts
Rockets full of men and women are arriving on Mars and building homes. In six months, a dozen small towns had been built. 90,000 humans were living on Mars and more were coming. -
Night Meeting
Tomas Gomez is going to a party one night and he runs into a Martian named Muhe Ca. They realize that neither of them can touch can touch each other and that they can see and reach through the other. They do not know for sure who is real and who is not, but they reason that they are from different times, but they do not know who is in the what time. -
The Shore
Americans were the first to get to Mars. The rest of the world was consumed in war or the thoughts of war. -
The Fire Balloons
Father Peregrine and Father Stone want to spread his religion to the Martians. They get to Mars, but realize that there religion isn't necessarily needed. There is a different kind of Martian on Mars now, that they call Fire Balloons. Fire Balloons are blue balls that just float around in the air. They have no need for physical or spiritual objects and ideals, making them somewhat more advanced than humans. The priests communicate with the blue Martians and are impacted by them positively. -
Interim
Humans are using the trees from Earth to build their towns. The churches were busy and full of people. It was like a tornado picked up a town and placed it on Mars. -
The Musicians
The children on Mars have found a new way to entertain themselves. They would hike far out into the country and go to where the corpses of those who died from chicken pox lie. They stomp on the bodies and make black leaves fly up into the air. They take the bones out from the skeletons and make music with them. They play very hard because they know that the Firemen are working to clean up all the bodies. They get punished if their parents find out they were playing with the bodies. -
The Wilderness
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The Naming of Names
Humans are beginning to name things on Mars. They name some of them after the past astronauts that explored Mars on failed expeditions, like Black River and Nathaniel York Town. They are named depending on what happened at that spot. The other towns are named after mechanical and metal names from Earth like Aluminum City and Corn Town. The Loneliness was at a minimum now and Mars was becoming more like Earth. -
Usher II
William Stendahl loves books and he has come to Mars to use his wealth and build his dream home. He has been banned from building his home on Earth by the Office of Moral Climate so he plans to build it on Mars. Garrett is from the Office of Moral Climate and comes to investigate, so Stendahl has a robotic ape kill him. That Garrett was jsut a robot, and Stendahl seals the real Garrett in an alcove. Stendahl escapes and the house disappears, so that the government never catches him. -
The Old Ones
The old people from Earth are now coming to Mars. -
The Martian
LaFarge and his wiffe, Anna, have settled in on Mars. One night, their deceased son, Tom, shows up at their home. LaFarge has trouble believing that this is really Tom, but Anna insists that it is really him. Tom is actually another shape-shifting Martian and he morphs into several people as him, LaFarge, and Anna go into town. The Martian strains himself too much and he falls to the ground, melts, and dies. -
The Luggage Store
There is now war that is going to start on Earth. Father Peregrine and the proprietor believe that the humans on Mars are going to return home to Earth. They both expect luggage sales to increase as almost every human will be returning home and will need luggage to transport their belongings. -
The Off Season
Sam Parkhill opens up a hot dog stand. It is the only hot dog stand on Mars and he is very proud of it. He has high expectations for sales and thinks that he will become rich off of selling hot dogs on Mars. The Martians approach him, and Parkhill shoots them or runs away, fearing that they are trying to hurt him. They are actually trying to tell him that they are giving half of Mars to him. The nuclear war on Earth begins that night. -
The Watchers
Humans on Mars are watching the bombings on Earth take place. Austrailia has been atomized and Los Angeles and London has been bombed. Earth is sending the message "come home" to Mars. -
The Silent Towns
Almost every single human has returned back to Earth, with the exception of Walter Gripp. He is suffering from extreme loneliness and is calling every phone number until someone answers. Eventually, a woman named Genevieve Selsor answers and they meet each other. She turns out to be extremely annoying and wants to marry Walter. Walter runs off and continues to live alone on Mars. -
The Long Years
Hathaway has been living on Mars for the past twenty years. He sees a rocket and signals for it to land, and he realizes that it is Captain Wilder that is inside. Wilder was exploring other planets in the solar system, but did not find any other humans. He joins the Hathaway family for dinner, but makes an odd observation. The Hathaway family looks just like they did twenty years ago. Williamson is sent to investigate and find the four graves of the wife and three children. Hathway dies. -
There Will Come Soft Rains
A house decides that it is time to wake up and everything in the house becomes animated. There is no one in the house, but the house acts as if there were, making them breakfast and opening the garage door. There is a wall with some silhouettes on it, but most of the wall was burned. A dog comes into the home and dies, but robotic mice take it away and clean up. That night, a tree falls into the kitchen. A fire begins and the house is destroyed, all except one wall.
