Page 168 - Kolaj Sharodiya Review Edition

The Space Exhibition on Mars

Ahir Banerjee (Age: 13 Years)

It was around the year 2120 where I landed after time travelling with my special belt. I came to know that humans had advanced and there was little or no human
enforcement on any of the work. Instead humans held their position in the society on the basis of how many robots they have. Some have hundreds and some less than ten. I
also came to know that humans have started colonizing Europa, one of the moons of Jupiter. Mars was colonized and only politicians and high level authorities could afford to
live there and no ordinary human had any access there. But there was an exception to this, only twice a year there was an exhibition of the weirdest and the most fascinating
substances and gadgets of the universe. I was very lucky to have stepped foot on the day before the exhibition was supposed to be held. I quickly went to the registration
office to register myself for tomorrow’s carnival. But to my surprise the exhibition was held on Mars and I was amazed and thrilled.

But then I thought the tickets must be very expensive and only had a quarter of a thousand with me. But they said as I am thirteen, my tickets are free. I was excited and
roamed around the future city of Kolkata the whole night. Next morning, I was feeling anxious and a little fearful of the rocket. I made my way to the station where millions of
people had lined up. As I was a single passenger and had no one with me, I got the front seats just behind the astronauts, but to my surprise at that time the people who had
the control of the ship were known as astropilots and people who conducted the mission in the outer space were known as astronauts. I quickly hopped on to a seat where I
was briefed about the safety and how to deal with any sort of emergency. The astropilots gave me and my neighbour a helmet which reduces radiation as we were seated in
front. I was excited and a little terrified at the same time.

At 10.19.40 minutes, the countdown began and water cannons started spraying the bottom of the ship. Engines iginited, poles retracted and the cover on the top were
removed within seconds. At this T-- 5 seconds, the pilots shouted, “full throttle in 3,2,1”, and the engines began roaring the windows became glaring red. Fumes started coming
out from the sides and at T+1 seconds, we were airborne. I thought the take off was the hardest part but it seems that the way out of the Earth was harder. The immense
amount of Gforce and the lightning speed of aerospace were making the ship wobble and tumble and many people threw up. But I was all okay as I had the training when I
decided to time travel. And I just wondered about how much humans have advanced. 100 years ago there was deadly virus and now we are travelling to Mars as passengers.
As we left the atmosphere and entered the ergosphere, we were relieved and could again cherish that we are alive. Humans had advanced so much that they built artificial
worm holes which could make any substance travel at the speed of light which covered 3 million miles within an hour. And to slow the ship down, a tiny ant-sized black hole
was made which was also artificial. We quickly entered the worm hole and the inside showed a magnificent representation of the past.

We enjoyed the scenary for around an hour as Mars had drifted a little away from the current position you all can see. So it’s now 6 million miles from Earth. As we approached
the black hole, I thought that they had forgotten to activate it. But stupid me, I remembered that it was the size of an ant and it can only slow down light, not absorb it. As we
approached the black hole, the show of the past stopped and we were blessed with the beautiful red planet, Mars. The scenery was so nice that I was thinking about jumping
off the spaceship and setting foot there. The ship was landing just like a plane and had reduced its speed to 30 Kmph and then I understood that the air is thinner on the part
which is exposed to space. We were quickly deboarded to an oxygen-filled staircase and we hopped on a pressurised bus. The bus took us to terminal nine where another bus
was waiting. The kids were separated and sent to another bus as everything had to be explained to them. I hopped on the bus and we were greeted with a special Martian
fruit juice which was absolutely delicious. As we reached the exhibition centre I noticed that it was fully made of Martian rocks and the entrance was made of solidified water
crystals.