Plot: 8/9. Sturgeon made an boring air crash an impressive mystery. I would give a higher score if Sturgeon could give more detail on the mission and the life of the man. I did not even know his name at the end of the story.

A boy explained to a sick man who buried in the sand about his helicopter. But the sick who suffered the bends now thought of the sea only and shoved the boy away. The kid knew from his falling experience that he’d better not bother the man. After a while he came back with X-15 model but the man drove him away again.

Man saw a fleck of light in the sky and recalled that his obsession with satellites from youth. The kid knew how to calculate the orbit of this satellite. The man executed this plan and waited for the time when the light was at the zenith.

Kid wanted to help the man feel better, so he told the story of his diving accident that once he almost died of his fear of death rather than the death itself. He learnt lessons and became mature after this incident. Once he saved others’ lives even if he got the bends. Therefore he was selected out for a special mission.

Fifty minutes were gone but there’s still a slice of shadow yonder. Man asked kid to show his new model. It was a rocket made up of alpha, the muscle, beta, the brain, gamma, the bird, and delta, the way home.

He found it took 59 minutes for the satellite to come above overhead and that means the period of this satellite was 7 hours 52 minutes and no satellite around the earth hit the digit. He was not on earth.

The sun rose and exposed the truth. Beside him was not the sea but a vast of sand. He saw the air crash of gamma and delta. A doll was thrown out in the radioactive wreck. It was unable to move for a long while and struggled a bit until it finally fell down and lied under a slow cascade of sand. The valley besides him clearly showed the ruins of the rocket and the footprints.

The man realized the doll and boy was actually him who was about to die of radiation on Mars. He missed the sea because only people who often drifted in the seas truly loved their Earth. His last word was, “God, we made it!”

In Brief

Man shushed the boy away because of his sickness and decided to calculate the orbit to while the time.
Boy told him the incident in the sea.
After 50 minutes passed, boy showed him the rocket.
After 59 minutes passed, man deduced out the fact that he was not on Mars and saw the diorama of an air crash.
When sun fully arose and showed the footprints and the ruins, he realized the truth and recalled everything.
Thus ended the story.

Core: 7/9. I resonate with the loneliness and despair it intended to pass and like the metaphor of the sea which represented the amoebae of fear and loneliness. I haven’t read better suspense fiction on the last thought of a sick and demented man since ever. I think one

Character: 4/9. Sorry. But I can not feel the uniqueness of the hero. I would give a higher score if Sturgeon could give more detail on the mission and the life of the man.

I did not even know his name at the end of the story. Why did a man who get a lesson of never diving alone would agree to explore the Mars alone? Why could a demented and sick person calculate out complicated mathematics?

World and Others: 3/9. His suit must be good enough to sustain temperature difference and lack of oxygen on Mars. Meanwhile, I don’t think delta was capable to send him back to the earth, so what did those who sent him to the planet think without giving him companions or resources? A suicide expedition? You call it a victory? It’s a massacre of humanity! I would give a higher score if Sturgeon gave a more detailed background on this mission.

Overall: 6/9. I understand now why Vandermeer said in the prelude that Sturgeon’s work sometimes were overly sentimental. I often fear this type of science fiction writers because they often hid their lack of wisdom with bounty of emotion. But Sturgeon was clearly not one of them. The story was worth reading again and the creating mechanism was worth borrowing.