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- The Strange Space Story
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- It was a warm evening in the space station ZOS 5. The commander yawned, and
- woke up from his nap. He put on his blue commanding suit, and entered the
- elevator. It took him quickly to the bridge. There he met Jansson, the busy
- main investigation officer.
- Jansson was very talkative and reported quickly: "Goodeveningcommander.
- Ihavesomethingmostunusualtoreport." The commander played back the message to
- himself using his audio recorder at slow speed. Then he said: "What is it
- then?" and Jansson said: "OurfriendMaxwellhasactedverystrangelyinthepasttwo-
- weeks."
- The commander, after clicking the "Stop" button on his small recorder, asked
- "So what did he do?" Jansson answered: "Hestayedonthenewplanetwehavediscovered.
- HesaidtomehewillcomebackafterhismeetingwithJones, theofficerwhofollowedastar."
- He clicked a button on a remote control, and the huge television screen on the
- wall came to life.
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- Firstly showing Jansson's name and the stardate, it then changed to a view of
- the planet. The people seemed like pelicans with orange skin. After scanning
- the people's data it showed a very unhappy situation: two races at war with one
- another. The beings with a red suit with a mark like an upside-down 4 were
- winning the beings with a yellow suit with a mark like a fallen B even though
- their commander was not present.
- When the last yellow-suited alien waved the green-and-black flag of
- surrender, the commander saw Maxwell. He was following a red-suited alien who
- took a video message to its hand. It waved its wings, and started running at at
- least 120 mph. The screen then followed Maxwell, jumping into his space scooter
- and lining up with the alien. He asked it where it was going and whether it
- would like a ride. The alien simply snorted: "To my commander. No thanks."
- There they went, scooter and pelican, over at least 200 miles.
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- When they were there, Maxwell seemed to be sure he could hear sizzing. It came
- from the alien who was sweating, but the sweat simply boiled away, because of
- their natural body temperature of 120 degrees. But there was no time for that,
- because he saw an old alien sitting in his throne. He mumbled something to the
- messenger, and took the message. It said that the red-suited aliens had won.
- But, the commander was very surprised that Maxwell, instead of watching the
- message, hurried quickly to the messenger. It was sizzing and beeping like mad.
- Before Maxwell could touch it, its skin cooled to 40 degrees, it fell to his
- side and vaporized. It was dead. The screen closed with a boring blip and
- Jansson's video message was over.
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- The commanded sighed and said: "Well it seems that the aliens in this galaxy
- are rather mysterious. Did Maxwell give the planet a name, anyway?" Jansson
- replied: "Yes. HecalleditMarathon."
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