"You think they're Martians?"
"Stupid! We ain't the first ones went on the Nowhere Journey."
"What are we waiting for? It sure will feel good to stretch your legs."
"Let's go!"
"Look out, Mars, here I come!"
It would have been just right for a Hollywood epic, Temple thought. The rusty ochre emptiness spreading out toward the horizon in all directions, spotted occasionally with pale green and frosty white, the sky gray with but a shade of blue in it, distant gusts of Martian wind swirling ochre clouds across the desert, the spaceship poised on its ungainly bottom, a great silver bowling ball with rocket tubes for finger holes, and the Martians from Earth who had been here on this alien world for seven-hundred-eighty days or twice seven-eighty or three times, and who fought in frenzied eagerness, like savages, to reach the descending gangplank first.
Earth chorus: Hey, Martians, any of you guys speak English? Hah-ha, I said, any of you guys....
Where are all them canals I heard so much about?
You think maybe they're dangerous? (Laughter)
No dames. Hey, no dames....