chain story

  • PART I (CARCARE - ITALY)

    Paris, ESA HQ.

    March 2025

    During a press conference, a group of representatives of ESA (European Space Agency) introduces the new project called “FUTURAMA- E+” to an audience of citizens from different European countries. The project consists of a space mission to Mars, in which young settlers are going to be sent to Mars in order to establish a model society.

    A crowded conference room. ESA director enters the hall.

    ESA D.: - “Silence, silence, please. Welcome, everyone. I am Jacques Dubois, and I’m talking as the director of ESA. Today, ESA is introducing to the world the most awaited project of history: the first manned expedition to Mars! (Applause) We have been working on this project for years and we are glad to announce you that we finally have the answer: “FUTURAMA- E+”. (Applause) The purpose of “FUTURAMA-E+” is European colonisation of Mars. In the last few decades, science has made enormous progress and our scientists have found the ideal conditions to let human beings live on another planet. Europe will be the first continent that will give its citizens the opportunity to settle on Mars and create a society based on positive values, such as equality, justice, respect, integration. Now we are looking for some young volunteers to join our expedition. Any questions? Over there, a raised hand!”

    MARGHERITA MONTALCINI: - “May I say a word? I believe in scientific progress, but there’s no point in creating a new society on Mars when we have already improved our way of living in Europe. In the last years we have been making efforts to create a more inclusive system. For example, in Italy, we worked on the problem of immigration and we have recorded many successful stories of integration. I will tell you about Samir, a friend of mine.

    Samir came to Italy from Libya in 2018, when he was 17 years old, because his parents wanted for him a better future. He travelled for some days on an old raft, risking his own life, and he finally arrived in Sicily. He started to work as an orange picker in Siracuse, then he was fostered to a family who gave him the opportunity to study. He graduated in Social Studies and he managed to open a centre in which young immigrants like him can learn Italian and have more chances to get a good job. Thanks to him and other young immigrants, the Italian government has recently simplified the procedure for fostering immigrant children. And I know that in many other countries there have been recent improvements. Does anyone want to share his/her experience with us?”

    A youth raises his/her hand.

    PART II - PŘÍBRAM (CZECH REPUBLIC)

    The raised hand belongs to Samir. The director of ESA gives him the word:

     

    SAMIR: Hello! Well.. This is quite interesting. I’m Samir and I’m here to apply as a volunteer for this mission. When I was a young boy, would spend whole evenings with my grandpa talking about the universe. We used to sit outside and watch the night sky full of uncountable dots. I always wanted to be closer, I always wanted to be an astronaut! 

    But then the war came and I had to move to Italy. I was so confused, until I saw the sky in the night. It looked the same as in Libya. That was the source of my hope.

     

    ESA D.: Perfect. You can send us your CV after the conference.

     

    REPORTER: How do you imagine the rest of the astronauts?

     

    ESA D.: My vision is something like-...

     

    Scene is changing to the training scene.

     

    Training scene: Scene splits in three rows. On the left side, there are two trampolines. In the middle we can find two chairs behind the desk and next to it there is a blackboard. On the right side there is a chair behind the desk and on the desk, we can see some space food.

     

    Sam and Irene are coming to the left side of the scene and starting to jump on trampolines.

     

    SAM: This is awesome!! So that’s what it’s like to jump on Mars...

     

    IRENE: Indeed... Are you feeling light yet, fatty? (grinning)

     

    The left side of the scene is getting silent and Ali with Maggie are sitting on the chairs. Professor is starting his lesson.
     

    PROFESSOR: (speaks fast and enthusiastically) This is the Earth. It’s rotation around the Sun lasts 365 days and 6 hours. However, Mars is rotating 1.88 times slower…

     

    ALI: (doesn’t understand) Wait, what?!  What means this number and this equation? (pointing at the board) I don’t get this one.

     

    PROFESSOR:   So, any questions? No? Awesome. I can see you understand everything very well, that means we don’t have to repeat it anymore. (continues in interpretation)

     

    MAGGIE: What? (confused)

     

    The middle part of the scene is getting silent and the right side is becoming alive. Emily is sitting at the table and eating cosmic food.

     

    EMILY: (she sucks it from the sachet)  “*Click* Noice”...This cosmic food tastes better than what my boyfriend makes!
     

    The scene is changing to a conference in Bruxelles.

    The scene of the conference: In the middle of the scene there is a speech-table.

     

    ESA d. comes in the shot and the audience applauds.

     

    ESA D.: Welcome everyone to the last ESA conference, I am so glad to introduce our astronauts.They will rewrite the history of the entire mankind.We have given them the opportunity to set up a whole new civilization on Mars. 

    Firstly, let me introduce the captain and leader of the expedition - Ali!

     

    Applause,. Ali is coming on the scene and shaking hands with ESA d.

     

    ESA D.: This is Ali from the Netherlands. Again, he is the leader of the expedition. (Ali lines up by his right hand side) Now welcome Irene!

     

    Applause, Irene is coming on the scene and shaking hands with ESA d.

     

    ESA D.: This beautiful woman is Irene. She came from Iceland. She studied nuclear engineering. She’s the pilot and main engineer. She’ll operate the interplanetary ship, especially designed for this expedition, named Tempus [Tympus]. (Irene lines up by Alis right hand side). And our next astronaut is Maggie!

     

    Applause, Maggie is coming in the shot and shaking hands with ESA d.

     

    ESA D.: Maggie is a graduate doctor and biologist from Spain. Besides medical care she will gather various rock samples of Mars for us. (Maggie lines up by the Irene's right hand side.) The next cosmic traveller is Sam!

     

    Applause, Sam is coming on the scene and shaking hands with ESA d.

     

    ESA D.: Because FUTURAMA-E+ is a project primarily about creating a new society on Mars, Sam from Britain will stand for themain psychologist. (Sam lines up by Maggie's right hand side) The next very important role of our cosmic crew plays Emily!

     

    Applause, Emily is coming in the shot and shaking hands with ESA d.

     

    ESA D.: Emily will take care of our travellers with her culinary art. She’s one of the best cooks in her native country - France.  (Emily takes place by Maggie's right hand side). And our last traveller is Samir!

     

    Applause, Samir is coming on the scene and shaking hands with ESA d.

     

    ESA D.: As I said, the last member is Samir - he is little bit special, because he is a civilian, not an astronaut. He has always dreamed about being an astronaut,  so we decided to make his dream come true. He will send news about all improvements of creating a civilization on Mars. Also he trained in private,so he hasn’t met the others yet. (Short pause) Here they are, the cosmic cadets of FUTURAMA-E+ project. Remember those faces, they are up to something huge! Applause please.

     

    Enormous applause.
     

    The scene is changing to a spaceship scene.

    There are Samir and Sam on the stage.

     

    SAMIRI had never thought about having the opportunity to fulfill my dream before. Well, it happened! I still can’t believe that I’m one of those, who are now heading towards the stars.

     

    SAM: (Puts his hand on Samirs shoulder) I’m glad you made it, mate!

     

    Ali, Irene, Maggie and Emily are coming in the shot.

     

    ALI: Samir, I’ve heard you emigrated from Libya…?

     

    SAMIRAh, yes, yes, my life wasn’t easy in the beginning. I had to get through many obstacles in order to live a better life.

     

    IRENE(trying to get attention) My life used to be hard too! I know what it’s like to live like that.

     

    MAGGIE: I admire that, Samir.

     

    SAMGuys.. For how long did, they say, will our flight last?

     

    EMILY: I think like 6 months or so.
     

    PART III - VOLLEN (NORWAY)

    Samir is speaking over radio to the ESA D, Emily is making some food and Sam is interviewing Ali about his mental health meanwhile Maggie is looking at the computer obsessively. After Samir ends his rapport, Irene turns to him and asks “Why did you get this job so easily?”. “Sorry?” Samir answers. “Lots of kids every year say they want to become astronauts, why did you get the job so easily when we all had to work so hard?” Irene responds, she’s clearly irritated. “I trained too!” Samir says, offended by Irene’s rudeness. Maggie turns around and says “Irene kind off has a point” “What do you mean?” Samir asks, he’s a bit worried now. “All of us have dreamed of this since we were little, it’s not fair that you got accepted straight away when we all had to work, train, study and go through tests.” Maggie says “Sam what do you think” “not gonna pick a side here, it will only split up the group. We need to work together, remember?” Sam answers “Yeah guys, why are you so angry about this? Just be grateful we are able to do this and don’t complain so much” Emily says. Irene ignores her an rotates her chair back. Everyone who gathered around goes back to their posts. Samir feels like he doesn’t belong.

     

    All of a sudden space scrap starts showing up on the radar, and red light on the radio starts blinking. ehhhhh!!! The radar is going crazy, the radio starts beeping, and the sound is deafening. A message comes in from the space central, saying that a piece of space scrap has broken one of the antennas on the spaceship.

    Ali, we have a problem”  

    Everyone starts discussing and wossrrying. Who will be the one that has to fix it? Samir sees an opportunity for making the others to like him, and he runs towards the air lock. Everyone starts yelling at him and telling him that it's not worth even trying. Samir said he has a plan.

    He looks around and put on an astronaut suit, while the other ones are yelling at each other. He makes a decision and opens the airlock. The space is ice-cold. he looks around. He spots the problem

    Samir looks around at his surroundings. He is amazed by the stars at first, but quickly notices the broken antenna and tries to get to it. Samir realises that maneuvering through the space is hard, because there is no gravity. He still tries to move towards it. He is going to prove to the others that he isn’t useless.

    As Samir starts his crawl towards the antenna, the others realises that he is gone. They try to get him back to the spaceship, by speaking to him through the radio in his helmet, but he won’t listen to their requests and mutes the radio. He is determined to save the ship and everyone in it. At the same time Samir notices that the antenna is broken at a 90 degree angle. He tries to pull it up, but it won’t budge. Samir panics. Maybe he had overestimated himself? No, he refuses to give up.

    Samir pulls the antenna with every muscle in his body, and the antenna finally moves. The astronauts in the spaceship are surprised with his actions. Did this actually work?  “Samir! Look out, behind you!” Maggie screams. But, of course, he had muted his radio and couldn't hear her. The space scrap gets closer and closer to his head, and... BANG! The space scrap hits Samir's head and he floats unconsciously outside the spaceship. The whole group observes the situation from inside, and agree that they are going to send Maggie out to save him. Maggie quickly put on an space suit, as she jumps out in space to save him. She tries to drag him into the ship, but it's hard to move with his weight. But she finally gets him closer to the ship, and Sam and Emily drags them in.

    Emily pulls off his suit.  Samir is unconscious. Sam and Emily drags him towards the hospital wing, and Samir is bleeding from his head.

    Ali calls the ESA D to tell them what happened, and ask what to do. They tell them to go to the ISS. Maggie changes the course of the spaceship and points it at the ISS.

     

    PART IV - KĘPNO (POLAND)

    The radar has to point a way to ISS. Maggie being stressed sees that it will be heavy crossing. They already enter asteroid zone with rubbish. 'Guys we have a problem' - cried Maggie to the rest of the crew. Suddenly red light on the control panel starts blinking. They have another accident. The matter is more serious. Maggie says - "Fuel tank has been punctured!". Other crew members are with Samir, so Maggie decided herself: "We must land on the nearest planet and there repair our spaceship."

    The ship power turns off. The lights turn off. After a moment of screams and drifting in space they hear a machine voice - 'Emergency power is upon, automatic landing soon'. Everyone breath a sigh of relief and go to hospital wing.

    Everyone without Irene and Sam who watch the controls. "- Sam look! This planet is forrested!" -  screams Irene. "- it must be Martalla where a couple of years another space expedition got lost." - says Sam. They again hear women voice from the speakers - 'The distance is too small. Error. Landing sequence. Emergency. Speed is too big. Error.' The only good solution is landing between trees. Irene says 'Sam you must be a captain! Fast!' 'Emergency landing. Error. Speed is too...'

    (DEAFENING NOISE)

    Sam opens the door first -  'Guys we have human friends on this planet!' Behind him stand the rest of the crew. The natives are wearing all black clothes and holding their hands on theirs head. 'They are scared' - says Maggie. 'Hello! We come in peace, we don't want to kill you, don't worry. But we need help' - says Irene.

    Then one of natives shows her face. She is a human woman. 'I am X and he is my husband  Y. We landed here 2 years before. We came here with 100 different people for afforestation of Mars. But we, oh we lost control of our ship by flying into asteroids zone'.

    'Oh yes, I remember you X! - says Irene- We were on this same preparatory course for space expedition! Do you remember, Sam?' 'Yes! of course I remember' -  answers Sam.

     "Please stop discussing!! We have got a little time. Remember? Samir is in a bad condition. We must help him!' says Emily. 'What is wrong with him?' -  asks Y. - 'Oh our friend  from the crew had an accident. He got an little asteroid on his head when he was repairing antennas of our spaceship."

    'He is still bleeding and we do not know what to do - says Irene.

    - 'Of course we'll help you trees and plants we grow here are also used as medicines' - says Y and goes with Sam to take Samir from emergency wing.

     At this time X with Irene, Maggie and Emily are talking about next part of travel.

    COUPLE OF DAYS LATER

    They are ready to the next stage of the trip. Samir feels good enough. - 'The spaceships are repaired and ready to travel!' - shouts happy Samir. They are ready do leave this planet. Y comes to the rest of members of his expedition to tell them - 'Hey guys, we are leaving in two hours. Are you all ready?'. Suddenly, he hears from one local person - "We don't want to go anywhere. This planet is the best what has happened in our lives. Living in this place is better than Earth so why should we change it? 'Few people scream -  'Yes, he is right!' Y is nervous and surprised with his people behaviour but he makes the final decision - 'Ok then, I and X are going with this group to Mars, if somebody wants to go with us, he or she is welcome'.

    MOMENT OF SILENCE

    Y  says  - "As your commandor I must tell you something important. You know that our plants are incredible - they adapt to severe cosmic conditions and now we can plant them on any planet of the universe so we are going to take with us some seeds of trees to afforest second planet - Mars and make living there similar and better than Earth.'

    Somebody says - 'Oh no, you can't do this. We worked on that and this is our success and that will be unfair. We don't know these people and we don't want to help them!' -  'Yes, he is right!' - say other locals

    Y arrives to Samir and his friends to tell them about decision of his people. He says - "We must take some seeds of trees. If they don't give them to me peacefully I will have to steal them.

    With his group of ESA at night they carry out a secret plan. X, Y and Sam with Irene go to the forest for seeds.

    'Pst, Sam what are you doing so long time there?!' 'Oh Irene - says Sam - I found something more than seeds... What is that?' X and Y smile mysteriously - " Lets go back to the ship" says X - " Or they will catch us"

    LATER ON THE SHIP

    'Ok, if everyone is on board I hope that you are ready to change a cosmic life!' -  says Maggie

    Start for three, two, one...

    They are rising into the air.

    A few moments later

    'How are you Samir? asks X

    'good, but have you got for me something else to drink X? because I feel the pain again..'

    'Of course, I will go find something for you...

    Hey guys - scream Irene. "Look at the screen! Something is moving in the science section where we put all the seeds!!!"

    PART V - WROCŁAW (POLAND)

    The crew moved towards thelab. After they  had crossed the doorstep of the room,  they had a suprising view: a part of seedlings had turned into weird creatures, some of them had twigs popping out of their ears. The earthers turned to X and Y: "What is that supposed to be?"- Irene asked. The Marraige was unbothered with the occuring situation. "Most evidently after having left the Martalli's atmosphere some details changed..." Intrigued with the situation, Maggie came up to the creatures, carefully watching them from each side. Wanting to feed weird intruders, Emily and Sami left the lab to come back with a tray full of snacks just a while after. the Creatures threw themselves into food with the spark in their eyes.
    Everyone was stumped when creatures tastefully started to eat the plastic tray. Ali crouched down: "They can be fed with plastic" he noticed. "Just think what it can mean for the Earth!" Maggie shouted.
    Everyone had the same thought. They were in possession of
    creatures capable of removing the littering from earth, especially plastic from the oceans.They could clean the environment and save the blue planet from total extinction. However, the most important thing was that the settlement on Mars would become insignificant and humanity would be able to stay on the beautiful planet, and they would return to their families. They couldn't restrain their joy. They left X and Y with the little monsters and went to the control room, to connect with ESA D. Ali sat down at the computer, made a connection and turned on the screen. Sam, Emily, Maggie and Irene stood excited in front of the camera, Samir a bit at a side. 'Why did you run so far away? Asked Irene reaching out to him.
    The boy, confused, grabbed her hand and stood a bit at a side. Ali joined the others. "We are a team," - said Sam, smiling slightly. The troubled face of Jacques Dubois appeared on the screen. "You did not come to the ISS, we could not get in touch with you." Ali described the recent events mentioning default, emergency landing and unexpected meeting. He ended with news about the discovery and its significance for the Earth. "Your goal is Mars," replied the director. "Earth is not within the scope of your duties. This expedition cost us years of preparation and a huge sum of money. None of you shall set foot on Earth. "  Before anyone could protest, darkness flooded the screen. The silence expressed the moods brutally changed. Everyone, except for Samir, dropped resigned to the floor. The boy, embittered by the destruction of scarcely enveloped signs of understanding, got filled with motivation. He faced the gathering. “I know, we are all different. We came from different parts of the world, specialize in different things and like different flavors of ice. But we all love the Earth. We all want to use the chance, we get and save our planet”. “Samir is right” said Sam, while patting him on the shoulder. “We must take action in our one hands”. The others nodded their heads and stood up. Since they can’t get any help from the government, they will find it somewhere else. They decided to contact Samir's friend, Mieszko, who had often been in the immigrants centre where he worked with disabled people. He was blind himself. His activity had reached whole Poland, even beyond its borders. Mieszko answered. He heard Samir out. Samir, in big shortcuts, talked about the trip, its progress and some surprises and changes of the plan. Learning about the breakthrough with plastic, Mieszko felt it was the time to act. He noted down the details on a sheet of paper and promised to keep the team updated. The ship's crew breathed with relief. They were not alone.

    A few weeks later…

    Mieszko sent regularly information about the Earth condition, government’s activities and progress of his mission on the Earth. Many disabled people got involved in his action, they became its main strength and the loudest voice. They organised a lot of pickets, designed websites introducing the issues and presenting the chance for the Earth guaranteed by discovered creatures. They also organised many performances, concerts, festivals and advertisements. Originally small community of disabled people started to grow, encouraged by Mieszko and his group activities. They gained publicity, support and sponsors. Meanwhile, the group of astronauts was still flying to Mars. They started to care about each other, aversion and awkwardness were gone. They remembered the most one moment from their space trip: one day, they were standing, observing stars and speaking about their ambitions. They mentioned together why they had wanted to be a part of this trip. All of them regretted in some way that they had spent entire life dreaming about the mission which did not give them happiness. This space mission to Mars took them their hapiness and time away. They were remembering the Earth. The wind on their faces, birds singing, the sound of the Ocean.. This last one was the main topic of Irene and Samir’s talk. Emily felt that the atmosphere became sad so she made Sam, Ali and Maggie prepare dinner. X and Y were controlling the spaceship flight. Samir mentioned the time, when the whole team had been doing standard spaceship inspection. When Maggie, Ali and Sam were joking together, Emily and Irene were discussing the creatures with X and Y. They were distracted by an incoming call and Mieszko's face on the screen. Everybody quickly stood before the camera, after Ali had picked up the call. The View sharpened. Mieszko wasn’t alone, he had a company of some people, which was propably the reason why he was using the camera. ,, We succeeded in achieving a lot. The whole world has been supportive but the government is still skeptical about your return. Thanks to you, we have understood that we have great strength and we have crossed the boundaries. If you are convinced of your decision, it is the perfect moment for you to return."
    The crew looked at each other. The sudden answer, they had been sure of, became their most difficult choice. Continue the mission, dreams and make a leap into the unknown or return to the beloved Earth and save her, breaking the ties with the universe?
    "My dears ," Emily began, "the time of the final decision.
    Earth or Mars? "
     

    PART VI - AURICH (GERMANY)

    Samir looks worried and tells the group that it has always been his biggest dream to be an astronaut, thus he wants to finish the mission. Emily doesn´t agree, but before she can explain her opinion, loud sirens ring out and red light flicker. The team starts screaming fearfully and the group of creatures squalls into the room and they shout many not understandable words, probably alien language. Then they start to spray slime out of their hands and shackle the team. The team realizes that the aliens are taking over the spaceship and that there is nothing they can do to stop them. The aliens start to do their traditional dance and they laugh about their success. The aliens decide to change the direction of the spaceship to their home planet Ornena. They arrive and put humans into cages and treat them like animals. Everyday the team loses more hope that they will ever get back to earth, but then, one day, everything changes. When Unana, the leader of the alien group, goes to the cages to feed the humans with their daily food ration, he realizes that one of the humans is crying. It is Sam. Unana wants to know what his problem is, but he isn’t able to speak the language of the humans, so he opens google translator to start a conversation with him. Sam tells Unana that his wife was pregnant when he left the earth and that he promised to be back within one year at the latest and that he really wants to meet his child. The alien feels sympathy for him and goes back to the other aliens to report to them what he has just learnt. The others also feel compassion, therefore they make a new plan. They go back to the human cages to make a suggestion (with the help of google translator again, of course). First they explain to them why they had to treat them like they did: “Since we developed our technology well enough to create UFOs, we´ve been observing your activity on earth. We saw how industrialization began to change your way of life. And along with the positive changes in areas of production there also came up negative changes human behaviour . A lot of you realized that they have bigger chances to make profit by making advantage of things or other creatures than humans that couldn´t protect themselves. And humans started to like the idea of earning more and more. What´s going on on your planet is cruel! We tried to contact you first in a polite way, but then you also tried to use us for saving the problems on earth you´ve caused! “ The spaceship team is shocked. They have never realized that something like that has been happening around them for years and that they even seem to be part of it. They begin to feel very sorry about it, and the aliens decide to let them fly back to earth, if they promise to act in a different way than the stereo type of human behaviour, and if they try their best to make others act in a better way. And so they do.

    Back on earth, everyone of the team has changed. Now they appreciate everything much more. They decide to found an organization which helps poor people and animals who cannot help themselves. Also, they make presentations all over the world in big companies to explain to them what they are doing wrong and that money is not the most important thing in this universe. They also underline that it might seem weird but that it works pretty well, and that soon the world will be completely changed. The humans will take care of their planet and of every creature living on it. The ESA stops sending people to Mars after this mission because even they realize that they first need to save their own planet before they can take over other planets.