Question: What is the plot of the story that involves a man's struggle for survival against mechanical threats in a hostile environment?

Answer: Alan is walking when he hears a sudden crash that hangs sharply in the air. He loses his footing and trips, realizing that there is a possibility of blaster fighting. He hurries to mark an X on a tree for his position and heads back to the clearing of the temporary camp site. This place is home to the only eleven humans, with Alan, on the planet of Waiamea. Once Alan returns to the site, he observes the killer robots and praises Pete for getting them to work. However, when the robots turn on him, he realizes that the robots must have been programmed to pick up human brain waves. He thinks back to Penny, a girl he married three weeks ago who will be arriving with the rest of the colonists tomorrow. This becomes his reason to live against the killer robots, and he observes the killer robots. He fires into the undergrowth and berates himself for not loading fresh cells in the morning as the robot gets louder. He is injured by one and cries out as he feels himself dying. As the robot comes towards him again, he understands what it means to live and forces himself to keep walking. Alan then hugs the bank as pure electricity arches over him, sliding slowly and away from the machine above. The robot trembles and suddenly falls; this gives Alan an opportunity to tackle it. The two struggle, but Alan takes a hunting knife out and jams it into the robot. He wonders how Pete managed to create these robots so perfectly. Suddenly, he hears an approaching robot and realizes that they communicate with each other even if one of them is jammed. Alan decides to run towards the camp because he realizes that’s where the brain of the robots is located. Shortly after running, he finds himself lost because the camp has not appeared in sight yet. He tries to think back to where the camp could be and narrowly misses getting blasted by one of the killer robots. When he fires the pocket blaster, it cancels out the radio transmission from the computer to the robot; Alan sees this as an opportunity to go towards the headquarters building. His blaster suddenly quits, but he manages to hurl a pile of dirt and insects at the robots. He goes into the room quickly as the robot continues to blast. The robot aims point blank at him as he hurls himself towards the red-clad safety switch. Everything then fades to black. When Alan wakes up again, there is a young man wearing a medical insignia telling him that he had hit the switch three days ago. Suddenly, his wife appears, and they hold each other tight.

Answer: The main character of the short story Survival Tactics Alan conducts a solo reconnaissance clearance mission on a new jungle planet of Waiamea for the life of colonizers. Upon landing, Alan and his eleven crew members set up a headquarters from which they monitor the technological equipment. The jungle does not allow Alan to relax, making his way through thick bushes of lianas, came under attack by a puma, but is rescued by a killer robot of dangerous living creatures built by scientist Pete. However, Alan soon realizes that predators and deadly insects are not the most challenging obstacle he will have to overcome. Killer robots hunt, guided by the mind impulses, posing a threat to all living beings, including humans. Suddenly, the robots start chasing after Alan, surrounded by the dark unknowns of the jungle. He flees, thinking about how in two days, a ship with refugees and his beautiful green-eyed wife Peggy will arrive on Waiamea. Alan understands that human lives are in great danger because of insensitively programmed robots that kill indiscriminately. The explorer manages to drown one of the robots in the mud and turn off its power system by climbing on it with a pocket knife. However, before he understands the tactics of subsequent actions, the robots in the area receive a notification of the loss of one of their brethren and attack the lost Alan. He successfully reaches the headquarters in the clearing and turns off the robots' power, but the electric volley manages to hit him. When Alan wakes up after a three-day coma, his colleagues and wife stand over his bed. They all thank him for his bravery and wit.

Answer: The story starts off with the main character Alan, exploring a jungle on an alien planet. After hearing blaster shots, he returns to his ship camp only to find that it has been captured by killer robots, and all of his friends have been killed by them. The robots were created by one of his crewmates, and they were made to help the humans hunt and fight against the alien animal species on the planet, but they went rogue and started killing humans. Alan tries to find ways to beat them, because a new ship of settlers is coming in a few days, including his wife. Alan gets in a fight with one of the robots, and manages to drown it in some mud. This fight hurt him very badly, but he realizes that he needs to reach his ship and shut off the robots from the main computer. He then tries to evade the robots in order to get into the ship, but he continues getting very badly hurt. Finally, he manages to shut them off, but as he does he passes out from all his wounds. When he wakes, the new settlers have arrived, and he gets to reconnect with his wife.

Answer: A small group of colonists landed on the planet Waiamea to explore the area and prepare the jungle for the arrival of other people, including women and children. While being on a walk in the jungle, Alan, one of the colonists that just landed, hears strange noises. After walking back, he realizes that the killer robots, that his friend was building and whose main goal was to pick up animals’ and dangerous predators’ brain activity and kill them, have been programmed in a wrong way, and now they are aiming at every living creature, including humans. He sees that the other colonists in the camp were already killed, and Alan himself is accidentally saved by a predator who attacks the robot aiming at him. The metal killers are now moving around the territory, guarding it, and trying to pick up somebody’s brain waves. Remembering his wife Peggy and everyone else who was going to land on the next day, Alan decides to at least try to fight the robots and prevent them from killing everybody on this approaching ship. He runs through the jungle, bruising his arms and legs, getting bitten by insects, and manages to temporarily disable the robot by half-drowning him in the river and stabbing his metal corpus with a knife. When he hears the other robots approaching the river he realizes that they must be connected by radio and, thus, are controlled by the main computer in the camp’s headquarters. He runs back to the camp, firing with his blaster which slows down the robots a little bit. Thinking about the importance of the human species and overcoming excruciating throbbing pain in his limbs, Alan gets to the camp. He runs out of blaster cells but makes his way to the computer room. With a robot aiming right at him Alan jumps towards the safety switch and instantly loses consciousness. Three days later Alan finally wakes up with agonizing pain. A medical worker happily informs him that the switch indeed was hit. Alan embraces his sobbing-laughing wife Peggy.


Question: Who is Alan, a character in a survival story involving dangerous robots and a jungle environment, and what are his traits?

Answer: Alan is one of the men who have arrived on Waiamea. He ventures around the jungle planet but goes on the run after a programming error with Pete’s robots. Alan is thirty years old, and he married a woman named Peggy three weeks earlier. Initially, he is very afraid of death and tries to protect himself from the robots. However, he does realize his love for Peggy and sees it as a motivation to continue living. He understands what it means to live for the first time in his life, and he becomes a lot more courageous. Instead of giving up, Alan chooses to find a way to defeat the robots. He also shows himself to be intelligent, figuring out that the robots are being controlled by radio transmissions via a computer in the headquarters building. Furthermore, he is capable of using his pocket blaster and knife to defeat one of the robots, even though it could instantly kill him with a single blast. Alan is very resilient as well; he is injured and continues to run around and fight against the robots. Even when the odds are against him, his desire to be with his wife gives him the strength to continue heading towards the headquarters building and flip off the switch.

Answer: Alan is a thirty-year-old scientist and technician, who arrives on Waimea on a scout-ship with eleven colleagues. During his solo exploration, the reader learns about Alan's behavior, ingenuity, and will for survival. Although he faces numerous challenges, including attacks from carnivores, dangers of the jungle and its poisonous insects, as well as human-built robot exterminators, he perseveres. Alan's mission is to rid Waiamea of potential threats in the face of predators and other creatures to provide the planet with the safety of the life of the arriving colonizers. Throughout the story, the reader learns about the young and beautiful Peggy, Alan's wife, who should soon arrive on Waiamea. Alan, unconsciously in love with his wife, is motivated to stop the attack of robots at any cost, ensuring the safety of incoming people. His unwavering thirst for survival and endurance help the reader to recognize the weight of responsibility lying on Alan’s shoulders and empathize with the main character throughout his tedious and dangerous journey.

Answer: Alan is the main character of the story, and is part of a scouting mission sent to a new planet to test if humans could live there. When the robots that were made to help them kill his crew, he has to find a way to shut them off while fighting them. Throughout the story Alan shows a lot of resilience and pain-tolerance. Even though he is very badly hurt by the robots, he continues fighting in order to save the incoming settlers and see his wife again. He is also very intelligent, using his knowledge to defeat a robot in a mud trap.

Answer: Alan is one of the first 11 colonists that came to the jungle planet Waiamea to explore it and get prepared for the arrival of all the other people. When the killer robots murder his colleagues and become a real danger to every human who is going to step out in the jungle on the next day, he has to think and act quickly. Being fairly intelligent, Alan realizes all the risks, understands the basic working mechanisms of the robots, and even manages to destroy one of them by ensnaring the robot in a trap on a bank and disabling him with a knife. He also understands that the only solution to the problem is switching off the main camp computer that controls all the robots. He is very devoted, brave, and rational, too. Both his love for his wife and realization of his responsibility for the future of humanity push him forward and enable him to overcome pain and save everyone from being killed by robots.


Question: What are the features of the robots that were designed to assist humans but ended up posing a significant threat?

Answer: The killer robots work by homing in on the mind of animals’ impulses. However, due to mass production, robots are also capable of picking up human brain waves. The robots are also capable of firing beams from its blaster, as one had dissolved a cat creature’s entire lower half when it clung onto the robot. The blaster aim is almost always perfect unless the robot’s radio wave or discharge circuit is interrupted. One of its features is also a pickup device. The robots can move around quietly, too, as their original purpose was to guard the campsite. When Alan continues to escape from them, it is revealed that the robots can communicate with each other and the camp computer. The communication works by using radio waves, but it is possible to interrupt these waves using a pocket blaster.

Answer: Killer robots are the invention of one of the scientists from Alan's team. Their fundamental feature is the elimination of the particularly dangerous living creatures to ensure the safe residence of people on an unknown planet. They respond to brain impulses and shoot towards a live target. Although the scientists believed that robots were programmed to kill only animals, birds, and insects that lived in the jungle and carried an immediate danger to humans, Alan understands from his own experience that robots are defective. Armed with electric blasters, small exterminators move on quiet tracks for better contact with the ground, the killer robots immediately becoming the main danger for people living there. When one of their fighters falls, they can communicate via radio transmitters. Wirelessly, the robots summon new robots to the battlefield for assistance. However, during the fight, Alan deduces that the robots need a few seconds to reset the sight and debug the direction of the shot. Moreover, Alan throws a handful of dirt with swarming insects at the robot, which confuses the robot's settings, making it adjust its aim in the direction of its primary target, winning Alan a few seconds to retreat and save the planet.

Answer: The killer robots are robots that were made by the exploration crew in order to have them hunt and kill the native animals of the planet. These robots don’t rely on a camera for vision, instead they sense live creatures using their heartbeats and other types of characteristics. They can also communicate with each other, which is how Alan was found by the other robots after defeating the first one. They hold large blasters and are controlled by the ship’s main computer. Alan was able to defeat them by shutting down the computer of the ship.

Answer: Alan’s colleague, Pete,  has been assembling killer robots that would hunt animals by picking up their brain waves and quickly locating the animal. Apparently, he hasn’t excluded humans’ brain activity from the robots’ targets. Now, these metal killers are taught to kill all living flesh, including people. They have blaster barrels, move around on quiet treads, can communicate via radio, and are automatically controlled by the main camp computer. The radio transmission is disrupted by blaster static blanks which disables the robots for a few seconds. The only way to turn them off is to disconnect them from the computer or switch off the computer itself.


Question: Describe the setting of the story, which involves a character navigating a perilous environment filled with advanced technology and lurking dangers.

Answer: The story is set on the jungle planet of Waiamea. There are tall moss-shrouded trees and wrist-thick vines that hang similar to a monstrous tree-bound octopus. Fitful little plants grow straggly in the shadows of the mossy trunks, and the sun is blue. The campsite that Alan goes to houses power supplies, one central computer, and sleeping quarters. There are also a variety of animals that live on the planet. Some of these animals include feline creatures and insects attracted by the scent of blood. The planet also has a double moon when it becomes night time. When Alan escapes from the robot, he ends up in a stream of water and mud. As he runs towards the headquarters building, there is a small insect pile that he takes advantage of against the robot. Inside of the headquarters building, there is a red-clad safety switch mounted beside the computer. During Alan’s recovery, he is in a white room with a white light hanging over him.

Answer: The action of the story takes place on the jungle planet Waimea. Upon the arrival of the research ship, scientist Alan finds himself in the depths of the dark vines. Alan looks around at the shadows entwined with vines, listening to the quiet rustle and faint crackling of the branches of life in the jungle. As he made his way into the tropical forest at noon, the sun filtered through the branches. As the planet approached evening, the shadows were long and gloomy. As the planet's double moon is visible, Alan sees how the jungle flashed bright blue and then hazes in the blink of an eye. The twin moons cast pale shadows, faintly conveying what was under Alan's feet. He stumbled over hidden debris, and sharp-edged growths tore at his face and clothes while insects attracted by blood clung to his pants and shirt. His arm slipped into something sticky that spread over his forearm, causing him to scream in agony. Black spots scraped off the branches and vines, but the rest slowly spread over his arm, painfully, like hot burning acid. Retreating, Alan stumbled upon the bank of a stream in the dim light of the moons. The banks were loose and muddy. The jungle growing along the edges of the water seemed to be one shaggy whole, complementing the picture with the unknown. As Alan flees from the attacking robots, he notices stars in the distance as a sign that a campsite is nearby. After about fifty yards of grass, there was the headquarters building. Alan wakes up in a bright white room, surrounded by familiar faces.

Answer: The story is located on a planet that humans want to settle on. The planet has a very large jungle, filled with very tall trees and insects. The planet is full of these insects, with Alan using them to his advantage and distracting a Robot. The jungle has a large clearing, which is where the exploration party landed their ship, and where the robots seem to be clustered. The jungle also has a lot of bushes and ferns that have sharp edges, and hurt Alan.

Answer: The story is set in the future where people are moving to another planet called Waiamea. It’s covered in jungle forest and that’s where Alan - one of the first 11 colonists that already landed -  is when he hears some strange blaster noise. After noticing the killing robots at the camp and realizing what situation he is in, Alan runs through the jungle while being chased by a robot and ends up on a stream bank where he manages to disable the metal killer. Then he tries to get back to the camp where he can turn off the main computer controlling these robots. He overcomes different jungle obstacles and fires at robots while trying to get to the computer room. Finally, he jumps towards the switch right before losing consciousness. At the end, three days later, Alan wakes up in a hospital-like white room where he finally hugs his crying wife Peggy after learning from the doctor that he did hit the switch and, thus, the robots are not a danger anymore.


Question: What is the significance of Alan’s realization that he must continue to live in a story where a man's survival is threatened by robotic killers on a remote jungle planet?

Answer: Alan’s realization that he must continue to live makes him become a man at thirty. Not only does it fill him with determination, but it is also what fuels him to stop the robots and end up saving everybody. He declares that no law says he has to flame-out at this age, so he continues to work his way through the jungle and against the robots. Without this realization, he would not have been motivated to use his pocket blaster against the robots and knife. Alan would also not have lived long enough to figure out the control of the robots as the computer in the headquarters building. This, itself, also lets him actually choose to go back to the area at the risk of death to find the safety button. Finally, his will to live lets him put aside his fear and goes to push the button, which ends up saving everybody.

Answer: For Alan, nothing is more important than to continue his struggle throughout the work. The researcher faces insurmountable obstacles such as fights with a puma, a sticky unknown that burns through his skin, escape from killer robots, and the difficulty of making his way through the thick jungle. Although the reader points out that it takes traits like perseverance, bravery, strength, and endurance to survive in the relentless tropical forest, Alan’s character is not the only condition keeping him motivated. The main character realizes that the overwhelming responsibility lies on his shoulders, realizing that the lives of children and women depend on his actions and tactics. Furthermore, Alan obtains a second wind when reminiscing about his loving wife Peggy; he shares that Peggy has brought light into his dark world, giving him the willpower to push through and fight for a better future. Even at the end, when his strength leaves his body, he decides to fight through the pain and stop the inevitable nightmare, clearing the jungle out of killer robots.

Answer: Before reaching the ship, Alan fought that he was going to die, and that he wasn’t going to be able to shut off the killer robots. He accepts this death, but just as the robot was going to kill him he thinks about his wife. He realizes that if he dies, the robots would kill the settlers when they arrive. This pushes him to continue fighting, and when he does the defeats the robots and saves the settlers.

Answer: As one of the first colonists of the planet, Alan realizes that he must continue to live to save his beloved wife and all the other people traveling with her on the ship right now because they are the only humans left in this world. When pain clouds his rational judgment, and he cannot walk anymore, the feelings of love and responsibility enable him to move further. He disables one robot and, after all, switches off the computer that controls all the other ones. Even though his body is in agonizing pain, his realization makes him move forward and practically save everyone who is to land on the planet on the next day, save humanity in a sense.


Question: What is the plot of the story that revolves around a character with a unique ability who finds himself in a life-threatening situation during a flight?

Answer:
On a seemingly normal flight from San Francisco to Los Angeles sits our protagonist, on his way to complete a printing order. In his initial musings, we find out that his curiosity and intuition about his fellow passengers come out of his extrasensory ability to see inside objects and human beings. The protagonist is also revealed to be able to manipulate time by stopping clocks, which he uses to his benefit with early wake-up calls. Despite his unique abilities, he laments that it renders largely useless and mundane as it often ruins surprises like Christmas gifts, requires a bit of guessing, and fails to work as gimmicks in manipulating games like Vegas slot machines.

And so with his seemingly useless but curious gaze, the protagonist ponders about his seat-mate’s purse, Amos Magaffey the purchasing agent, and rifling through luggages and identifying his own. All of sudden, his musings are halted by the discovery of a bomb in one of the luggages, with a countdown timer ticking with 10 minutes or less. The flight is still 40 minutes away from its destination and so with great effort and increasing suspicion from his seat-mate, the protagonist uses his ability to stop the ticking bomb. The flight lands safely with the bomb remaining inactivated, but the protgaonist now worries between alerting authorities - which may cast suspicion upon himself - or follow the luggage and identify who picks it up. With no one initially picking up the luggage with the bomb - the little red bag - it is delivered by the flight attendant to the rear room. Soon, a young lady arrives to pick it up. It is then that the protagonist hurries over to her in hopes of warning her of the ticking time bomb. It turns out that the likely culprit of planting the bomb is the young lady’s - Julia Claremont - husband, whose motives are unknown but nevertheless unhinged. Armed with this information and a false story about the bag’s suspicion, the pair decides to approach an airport policeman and inform them of the bomb. However, as they return to where they left their bags, they find that both his and Julia’s luggages have been stolen by a strange man entering his grey vehicle. Turning to the airport policeman in reporting this stolen luggage, they are interrupted by an explosion in a grey vehicle. Shocked and somber, Julia and the protagonist inform the policeman that they no longer wish to report the stolen luggage, and the two begin to walk away from the airport.

Answer: The protagonist and narrator of the story is a man who long ago discovered that he had an extraordinary ability: sensing the contents of different objects, like boxes and bags, and moving light things, like feathers or a watch balance wheel, without touching them. He got in trouble for naively using his gift in the fourth grade and has kept quiet about it ever since. At the beginning of the story, he is on a plane from San Francisco to Los Angeles for a business meeting with an amusement chain owner. After studying the passengers around him, checking the window view, and mentally looking through the purse of a woman next to him, he decides to find his suitcase in the luggage compartment of the plane. The narrator is going through the content of other people’s suitcases when he feels something resembling a bomb. It seems to be inside a small woman’s bag and is about to go off in ten minutes, but the plane is supposed to land only in forty. Anxious and hectic, he refuses the cup of coffee from a stewardess and decides that he has to stop the clock mechanism, at least for the duration of the flight. He does it every morning with his alarm, so it doesn’t seem impossible. After temporarily stopping it, his thoughts race ahead to the landing, realizing that he wouldn’t be able to control the mechanism forever or tell the truth to the police. But his thinking process is disturbed by turbulence - he realizes that the balance wheel is moving again. After some tugging, pulling, and shoving, it finally becomes immovable. When the plane lands, the protagonist goes to the baggage claim and tries to find the owner of the bag. After picking up his suitcase and watching how the claim employees take the bag with the bomb to the storage room, he finally sees a blond woman called Julia Claremont - he saw her on the flight - approaching the counter. He convinces her to put the bag down and pretends that he is speaking to someone in a telephone booth while deactivating the mechanism once again. When she asks for an explanation, he invites her to an airport coffee shop and tells her everything. At the end of his monologue, she starts crying and says that her husband Joe probably put it in her bag after she had finished packing the day before. That trip was Joe’s idea, but she doesn’t know why her husband would do something like that. They go back to the gate to realize that the bags they had left there are gone. The protagonist sees the thief throw their bags into his car’s rear seat and rapidly drive off. When they are ready to go to the police office to file a report, a loud explosion occurs somewhere near the airport. Julia and the narrator don’t report luggage theft and walk away.

Answer: The protagonist finishes reading the Chronicle an hour into his flight when he sees a sea of clouds where the San Joaquin Valley should be. He observes a few passengers and sees a familiar blonde from the gate. He thinks about the printing order in Los Angeles and begins exploring the old lady’s purse next to them. The protagonist's powers allow him to explore the inside of anything, but he remarks that it is not any fun because all he does is feel the shapes and guess. He goes through the lady’s belongings and becomes disappointed when nothing is of interest. The scene cuts to the fourth-grade protagonist eating lunch with Miss Winters for a minor infraction. Miss Winters leaves for a moment and tells the protagonist to erase the blackboard. She cannot find her favorite mechanical pencil when she comes back, and the protagonist probes her purse to find it. He generally keeps quiet about their special gift but can move certain objects. The old lady wakes up again, and the protagonist begins to think about securing a printing deal with Amos Magaffey. He probes through belongings and finds a bomb in a woman’s bag. He begins to panic and thinks about what to do when a stewardess offers him a tray full of food; the protagonist cannot bring himself to accept it. The lady next to him is concerned, but he insists that he is okay and asks for a cup of coffee. The protagonist has temporarily stopped the timer, and he thinks about what will happen once the luggage begins to move because the timer will start again. As he concentrates, the old woman notices again and asks if he is sleeping. Once the plane stops, the protagonist leaves and observes the baggage being transported from the plane to find the bag with the bomb. Once the protagonist claims his baggage, he waits to see who will claim the bag with the bomb. Although he should be meeting with Amos Magaffey, he knows that he will be unable to live with himself if he lets the bomb explode. The blonde from earlier appears to claim her bag, and the protagonist stops her by saying that he has something important to tell her. He manages to stop the bomb timer again by pretending to dial a number in the telephone booth. He and the woman then go grab a coffee, where he explains the situation; she is horrified to realize that her husband Joe is the one who put the bomb in. She introduces herself as Julia Claremont, and the both of them pay the tab to leave. They realize that their bags are stolen by the dumpy man from earlier in the lobby. The redcap tells them to tell the policeman, while a loud explosion suddenly happens. The two of them decide to forego their luggage because of the bomb and walk down the street arm in arm.

Answer:
A man with extrasensory ability finds a bomb on the plane. He doesn’t want to tell the stewardess that there is a bomb because he cannot explain how he knows it without exposing his ability. His unwillingness to reveal his ability also originates from his childhood memory that his teacher doubts him as a thief when he tells her where her pencil is. During the whole flight, he uses his ability to move the wheel in the bomb not to let it count down to explosion.

After the plane lands, he goes to pick up his baggage. When he grabs his bag, he also sees the one with a bomb in the baggage claim area in the airport. He waits and hesitates to tell the truth to the airport officer. When he sees the baggage claim attendant trying to move the bag with the bomb to the rear room in the airport, he almost tells the truth, but he sees a woman come and try to find her bag. After the woman takes the bag, he approaches the woman, tells her to put the bag away, and goes to grab a coffee with her. He explains everything to her, including his extrasensory ability. The woman is startled. When they decide to tell the police to deactivate the bomb and walk out of the coffee shop, they see a thief grab both of their baggage and drive away. The police come and try to help them, but they all hear a massive explosion sound. They tell the police not to report the property stolen, and they leave.


Question: Who is Julia Claremont and what challenges does she face in the narrative involving unexpected dangers during a journey?

Answer:
Julia Claremont is a young blonde in the plane that initially peaks the protagonist's interest with her attractive profile, who later is identified as the owner of the little red bag that houses the ticking bomb. Flying from San Francisco to Los Angeles to visit her sister on her husband’s suggestion, she is the first person that the protagonist reveals his extrasensory abilities to. Despite the extraordinary tale, Claremont believes him and reveals herself that the likely culprit of the bomb to be her husband. Under the guise of putting in books for her sister to read, she surmises that her husband likely used that opportunity to plant the bomb. However, she is unable to identify the motives of her husband or more likely, she would rather not to.

Despite this shock, Claremont and the protagonist devise a somewhat likely story to alert the airport policeman of her suspicious of a bomb in her luggage in order to quickly deactivate it as well as divert attention from how the protgaonist was able to sense it. On their way over to where they left their bags, they noticed them to be stolen and identified a dumpy man as the thief, heading over to his grey vehicle to take off with them. As they approach an airport policeman to report this theft instead, they are interrupted by an explosion - the bomb having gone off. Seemingly on the same page, Claremont turns to the policeman as she retracts her desire to report the theft - with the protagonist doing the same - and turns to walk away, leaving the mayhem of the explosion at the airport behind them.

Answer: The narrator feels that there is a bomb in the luggage compartment of the plane he is on, and Julia Claremont is one of the passengers of this flight. She is visiting her sister after her husband Joe suggested it some time ago. After leaving the plane, she tries to call her sister, and it takes a while before she can go to the baggage claim. After picking up her bag, the narrator convinces her to put it down and, after some time, invites Julia to a cafe. He tells her about his gift and that there is a bomb in her bag. She cries and realizes that after she had finished packing, her husband said he would put some books in her bag as a gift to the sister. She understands that he must’ve put the bomb in her luggage, but she doesn’t know why. They walk back to the airport lobby and see that their suitcases got stolen. The protagonist chases the thief, but the man throws the bags into his car and quickly leaves. When they approach a police officer ready to file a report, a loud explosion somewhere near the airport shatters the air, apparently killing the thief and wrecking his car. They quickly lose the desire to report the theft and walk away from the airport.

Answer: Julia Claremont is one of the people the protagonist first sees at the gate. The original purpose of her trip is to visit her sister. Before leaving, her husband Joe packs some books that they have finished reading for her sister. However, he also manages to sneak a bomb inside of her bag for unknown reasons. The protagonist describes her as blonde and shapely, giving a privileged view of a trim ankle and calf. She is also described to stare moodily across the aisle and out the window. Later, when Julia comes to claim her bag, the protagonist hurriedly follows her. She is initially annoyed and then confused, continuously asking “Why?” in response to what he says. He also notices that her eyes are blue and brown-flecked. Later, she is horrified to discover what happened and begins to bawl. She has no idea why her husband would do this, and the two of them come up with a plan to tell the police why there is a bomb in her bag. Julia also explains that she arrived at the baggage claim late because of a call from her sister. Once the bag is stolen, she sees this as an opportunity to leave with the protagonist before the blame can be pinned on them.

Answer: Julia Claremont owns the red bag that contains a bomb inside. When she picks up her baggage, the protagonist comes to tell her to put away her bag. When she learns the truth from the protagonist in the coffee shop, she is startled and troubled. She realizes that her husband put the bomb in her baggage. She tries to call her sister when she arrives at the airport because her sister is supposed to pick her up, so she picks her luggage up later than other people. When she and the protagonist decide to tell the police about the bomb, they find a man who steals the pieces of baggage. They cannot catch up with the thief. When the police come to help them, they refuse to report the case because they hear the explosion. She leaves with the protagonist.


Question: Q3. Why is the protagonist reluctant to reveal his extraordinary ability in the story, which involves a tense situation on a plane and a hidden threat?

Answer:
The protagonist finds out about his extraordinary ability at an early age and quickly finds out that it is better to keep this information to himself. One incident that drove this message home occured in the fourth grade with his teacher, Miss Winters. At the time, the protagonist was sentenced to eat lunch with her as a minor punishment. After the lunch period was over, Miss Winters found herself looking for her favorite mechanical pencil, asking the class if anyone had seen it while casting a suspicious eye at the protagonist. Aiming to maintain his innocence and help out his teacher, the protagonist used his ability to find the pencil - in Miss Winters’ purse all along - and let her know. Instead, he was rewarded with a note sent home.

Ever since then, he found it to be safer to keep his ability a secret. Despite his curiosities about other potential extraordinary individuals, he recognizes that revealing any information gained from his ability would only cast suspicion upon himself from the authorities. For example, had the protagonist immediately alerted a flight attendant or the authorities about a bomb in one of the luggages the moment he discovered it on the plane, intrusive questions about how he knew or suspicions about him being the one to plant it were highly likely to arise.

Answer: After using his gift in primary school and getting a stinging note for that, the protagonist decides to keep quiet about his ability. Even when he has to deal with a bomb he is still reluctant to share his secret because he thinks that his life would change forever and people would never trust him again since he would be considered a prying man. He doesn’t believe that his gift can be used for anything meaningful, and ruining his life by revealing his ability definitely doesn’t seem sensible to him.

Answer: The protagonist is reluctant to reveal his extraordinary ability because it will make him look suspicious. He has learned to keep quiet about it in the past because it will only cast disbelief on him. The incident with his fourth-grade teacher’s mechanical pencil only made it seem like he had purposely hidden it in her purse. He has also thought about making money with the ability before, but it is not very useful because he can only feel around objects and guess what they are. Even though the protagonist feels panicked about the bomb, he knows that he cannot outright report it because nobody is aware of his ability. If he does, they will only cast suspicion on him for being the one who initially put it in there. Even when he thinks about calling ahead and convincing the authorities that he can stop the clock, there is no use. The protagonist knows that everybody will see him as a man who cannot be trusted once the secret is out and has prying eyes.

Answer: The protagonist is reluctant to reveal his extrasensory ability because of his childhood experience. He learns the wisdom of not disclosing his power in the fourth grade when his teacher suspects him as a thief after he tells her where her pencil is. He used to believe that many other people have supernatural abilities like him, but the truth remains questionable. He does not want to reveal his ability because he believes that people will not believe him. Even if people believe him, his life will change, and he will become suspected of a prying person who always peeks at others’ privacy.


Question: Q4. Describe the setting(s) of the story, which revolves around a character with a peculiar ability who faces a life-threatening situation during a flight. Why is it important?

Answer:
This story has two settings: first, on an airplane from San Francisco to Los Angeles and second, at the Los Angeles airport in the baggage claim and arrivals terminal. The first setting - on the airplane mid flight - is highly important to the story because it is here that the protagonist discovered the bomb in the luggage. Not only that, he discovers that bomb is on a countdown with 10 minutes remaining before detonation while the flight still has 40 minutes before arrival. It is due to this fact that the protagonist utilizes his time manipulation ability to stop the clock successfully.

In the second setting, the tensions in this story continue to rise. Despite the protagonist successfully stopping the clock in the air, it appears to continue on the ground. With both the anticipation of watching to see who picks up the little red bag and dodging suspicions from the airport policeman and workers, we can imagine the hectic and panicked energy that sometimes appears in baggage claims. Additionally, an airport is filled with many people arriving and departing, which adds to the pressure the protagonist is facing in dealing with deactivating the bomb before anyone gets hurt.

Answer: The first part of the story is happening on a plane that is flying from San Francisco to Los Angeles. When the protagonist finds the bomb in one of the bags in the luggage compartment, the plane is somewhere above the mountain range north of Los Angeles - even in theory, it is impossible to land because there are no airports around this area. He stops the clock mechanism, using his extraordinary ability. After the landing, the story continues in the building of the airport, where the protagonist finds the owner of the bag with the bomb - Julia Claremont. He tells her about the bomb and how he sensed it during the flight. She cries and tells him that her husband put it in her bag after she had finished packing. They go back to the lobby and see that their suitcases got stolen. The protagonist tries to chase the thief, but the man quickly drives off with the bags. When they decide to file a report, something explodes loudly near the airport, and Julia, together with the protagonist, walks away, refusing to report the theft.

Answer: The story first begins on a plane from San Francisco to Los Angeles. The protagonist first expects to see San Joaquin Valley, but he is greeted by a sea of clouds instead. He sits next to an old woman on the plane. A little north of Bakersfield, he finds that one of the bags on the plane contains a bomb. It is forty minutes from Burbank to Lockheed Air Terminal, and there would be no place to land the plane any time soon. Once the protagonist gets off the plane, he heads to the baggage claim at the airport for his bag. When Julia gets her bag, he leads her to a telephone booth to make the fake call. Then, they leave their bags in the lobby and go to a coffee shop. The airport policeman is across the street from the parking lot. The setting of the plane is important because it is where the protagonist first discovers the bomb. Without his extraordinary ability to feel around any enclosed object, he would not be able to detect and temporarily stop the bomb’s timer before it was too late. This is also significant because the plane would have exploded had he not found it. The airport is important too because that is where he meets Julia. He would not have figured out who the bag belonged to and the entire story without waiting at the airport.

Answer: The story's setting is in an ordinary world where no extrasensory ability is found or known. This setting is essential because the protagonist has the extrasensory ability, which allows him to see the insides of things and move some very light objects with his mind. However, since the world does not know the existence of the ability, he cannot tell anyone about it because if he tells people the truth, people either do not believe him or see him as a freak. Furthermore, since he cannot tell anyone his ability, neither can he tell people about what he finds in any bags, like a bomb, because he cannot explain how he knows what is inside of things that do not belong to him. Therefore, this inability to reveal his extrasensory ability drives the story to progress.


Question: What is the relationship between the protagonist and authority figures like the airport policeman in a story where a unique talent leads to a life-threatening situation?

Answer:
The protagonist’s relationship with authority figures - like the airport policeman in this story - is a double edged sword. On one hand, it is figures like the policeman who are the right figure to report his suspicions towards. They are the ones equipped with the knowledge and resources on how to deal with the bomb in the little red bag. More importantly, informing them is the right thing to do and would save the lives of everyone else at the airport. On the other hand, however, we can see that the protagonist has revealed that authority figures in the past often choose to cast suspicion upon him rather than appreciate the usefulness of the knowledge that comes about his ability. If the protagonist were to approach the policeman in a suspicious manner or reveal too much information about his know-how of the bomb, it is likely that they will suspect him to be the culprit and probe him on something he is unable to explain, and hence arrest him. The protagonist has to carefully consider the implications of either decision and try to optimize both the safety of others around him and his own.

The protagonist chooses to inform the policeman of a suspicious baggage situation through the luggage’s owner, Julia Clarmeont, which would deflect any suspicion on himself. However, the bomb detonates before they are able to follow through with it.

Answer: Throughout the entire story, the protagonist tries to avoid any interaction with the police because he is afraid that they will either consider him the bomber or force him to reveal his ability, thus, changing his life for the worse. Even when Julia and the protagonist were ready to file a theft report, he quickly left after hearing the explosion. Possibly, he thought that he would be under suspicion and wasn’t sure that the police would believe the real story even after he revealed his secret.

Answer: The protagonist and the authority figures share a fairly neutral relationship. On the plane, he first speaks to the stewardess by rejecting her food offer. The stewardess also later brings him a cup of coffee and takes the crushed cup away. At the baggage claim, the attendant continues to stare at the protagonist as he stares back. He is bored of his job and confused why the protagonist would ask about bags that are not claimed. He wants to tell the airport policeman that there is a bomb in one of the luggage, but he does not because he sees the clerk begin to move the unclaimed piece of luggage inside. The policeman remains unaware of the bomb. Later, when he and Julia speak to the policeman about a stolen bag, the policeman is sympathetic. As the bomb goes off, the policeman tells them that he cannot make them report the stolen bags after the two of them do not want their pieces of luggage anymore.

Answer: The protagonist holds the worry about the explosion of the bomb, but he cannot tell the airport authority about it because he cannot explain how he knows it. Meanwhile, the airport authority works as they usually do without knowing the bomb's existence. They can see the protagonist constantly hovering around the place and looking worrisome and anxious. Still, the only thought they have is probably to regard the protagonist as a strange person that needs help. When the protagonist’s baggage is stolen, the policeman comes and asks if he needs help. After hearing the explosive sound, the protagonist tells the policeman he does not want to report the case. The policeman allows him to do so.


Question: What is the plot of the story that explores a world where inhabitants are confined to a ship, unaware of their destination, and one individual begins to question the nature of their existence and the changes occurring around them?

Answer: The story starts off with the main character, Rikud, watching space from a viewport that is located on what seems to be a spaceship. Rikud is part of a group of men that live on the spaceship under a strict set of unspoken rules. Rikud then connects with other characters named Chuls and Crifer while getting a bath of health-rays, an example of the high technology in the ship. After the stars in the viewport start changing, Rikud doubts the way of living that the men have taken. He starts to doubt the fact that they have a set span of years, and that they have to live separately from the women (even though he doesn't know what women are). When the view of the viewport changes to “gardens”, Rikud begins to question more and more, and ends up finding the machine room for the ship, as well as a control center that has another viewport. Unsuccessfully convincing the others to go outside with him, Rikud becomes enraged and breaks the machine room of the ship. After realizing that Rikud has messed up the buzzers that control the actions of the people, they begin to hurt Rikud and chase him through the ship. Rikud ends up opening the door that leads outside from the control room, and they discover a new world where they can live freely with the women.

Answer: Rikud has come to watch the great changeless sweep of space for a week. The steady whining of the world that he has heard for all twenty-five years of his life have grown. Space looks different to him today because the stars are not as bright, and there is more darkness except for one very bright star that has set itself apart. Old Chuls approaches him and chides him for staring at stars when he is almost ready to foster children in five years. Rikud is nervous because no other man has these thoughts about who the Calculator will select as their mate. Chuls says that it is time for his bath in the health-rays, and Rikud goes with him. When they get to the health-ray area, Rikud feels the urge to see the stars again. The machine tells him fifteen minutes under the tub. Crifer, who is in the tube on his left, brings satisfaction to Rikud through his lame foot because it is proof that the world is not perfect. Crifer tells Rikud that he has been reading about astronomy lately in the library and stars. When Rikud tells him that the stars are changing, Crifer offers that variability may contribute. He later goes to see the stars again, observing how they make his eyes hurt and are paler than before. Rikud then sees a new shape appear in the form of a big sphere. He tries to get Chuls to see it too when the old man tells him it is time to eat, but Chuls sees and hears nothing. After a while, Rikud becomes fascinated with the gardens in the viewport. The view does not change for an entire week, and Crifer also agrees that the view looks like a garden. When he brings the conversation back to the stars appearing and disappearing, Crifer once again brings up variable. Rikud believes he has a bigger purpose in life; he decides to investigate the door at the back of the library while Crifer reads another book on astronomy. He sees another door that explains how this ship is a self-sustaining world, but Rikud cannot understand the words. He then has a traumatizing experience about going out to the garden because it is completely foreign to him. Three or four days later, Rikud feels comfortable enough to tell Crifer about what happened. He tries to convince Chuls too and grabs his blouse. Others in the crowd copy Rikud grabbing Chul’s blouse, but a buzzer goes off and it is time for them to retire. Rikud then decides to break the buzzer, and everybody hates him. Nobody wants to go out with him, and they all decide to begin attacking him for breaking the buzzer. He tries to escape them, and all of them end up going into the garden. The story cuts to them realizing how beautiful it is outside, and the women begin to appear from the ship as well.

Answer:
This story follows Rikud who lives aboard a ship that is self-sustaining and separated by men and women. He first encounters a unique feeling when he looks through the viewport and notices that the space around him has changed. The stars in particular, previously speckled and scattered, have now been replaced by a singular bright star.

While undergoing his bath in the health rays, Rikud laments his life on the ship. Noting the lack of authority - the closest being the automated buzzer - he ponders the perfectness of life around him and realizes he is assured by Crifer’s limp because it demonstrated that not everything was perfect. When talking to him, Crifer reveals that he has begun reading again in lieu of the normal evening activity of chatting to other ship passengers. In return, Rikud reveals that the stars in the viewport are changing and Crifer suggests that it may be due to variability - a concept newly introduced in his book on astronomy. While Rikud and Crifer contemplate the meaning of variability and the connection between the concepts, Chuls interrupts by denouncing variability as a contradictory term. Once the buzzer sounds again, they all continue with their daily routine.

As Rikud looks again at the star, he finds that the landscape has changed to reveal a sphere with brown and green, just like the garden aboard the ship. Despite the hesitant acknowledgment and adamant denial from Crifer and Chuls respectively, they are unable to explain why the garden is in the viewpoint. Continuing with his exploration, Rikud enters through a set of doors no man has gone through. As he enters through each door, he receives warnings from the buzzer and encounters stranger noises. By the time he attempts to reach the third, Rikud is overwhelmed with a sense of fear and runs back. In explaining his discovery, Rikud begins to hold Chul’s blouse and sets off a chain of reactions with the other men as they begin to mimic his unfamiliar but exciting activity. However, once the buzzer sounds again, the men forget their behavior. Frustrated with the buzzing, Rikud finds a metal rod and smashes all the machinery on board - destroying the buzzer and the machines that provided the ship with light, food, and water. Disrupted by their routine and lifeline to the buzzer, Crifer and the other men begin to riot against Rikud, chasing and beating him. In running away from them, Rikud finds himself at the third door and while uncertain about the potential of life beyond the door, he chooses to open it to reveal the garden and the blue-white globe.

Through the door reveals fresh air, plants, and running water. Rikud and the others step out and bask in this strange but comforting new landscape, and as the women on the ship stepped off as well, Rikud noted a sense of contentedness in a world away from the buzzer and the machines.

Answer:
The story talks about a distant future where people left Earth long ago and now are living on a spaceship that is traveling through space. The ship is divided into two parts: male and female. People of two different sexes meet when they turn 30 after the so-called calculator defines their future partner.  Everyone on the ship lives by the buzzer - a sound that signifies the beginning or the end of any daily activity. They do not understand the concepts of change, world, space, authority, just living with the same schedule. They do not understand sickness since now they can take a bath in the health rays that provide them with immunity.

Rikud is a 25-year-old inhabitant who enjoys looking at the viewport that shows the changing stars. Sometimes he chats with Chuls, a 90-year-old fellow inhabitant of the ship, who doesn't show any traits of nonconformity and is satisfied with his regulated schedule. We meet him at the very beginning when he joins Rikud who stands near the viewport gazing at the stars. Together they go to the health rays’ room. While waiting for the procedure to be over, Rikud thinks about different arbitrary notions, like authority, history, human will. In the same room lies Crifer, another inhabitant of the ship. He’s short and has a lame foot which reminds Rikud of the world’s imperfection. Crifer says that he found an interesting book about astronomy during his visit to the reading room. Rikud says that stars may be changing and Crifer claims that the book mentioned their variability, Chuls protests but their conversation ends quickly. Later, Rikud, during his visits to the viewport,  witnesses a rapid change in the stars, their form, location, and even experiences a novel feeling of pain while looking at one of them without breaks. Amazed, Rikud stands there and asks Chuls about the differences in the viewport and in the sound of the engines, which, as Rikud noticed, had become quieter, but the old man gives an unsatisfying answer. Later, apparently after landing, Rikud sees a huge garden in the viewport and this image doesn’t change for a whole week.

While visiting the reading room with Crifer, Rikud decides to open the door that he finds there. It leads to a room where he hears a voice saying something about unauthorized visitors. The next room is full of wires, gears, and cogs. The third one has a small viewport showing the same garden from a different side. When no one believes him later, infuriated, Rikud comes back and destroys the wired room, which he suspects to be the buzzer. Now it doesn’t go off and the food mechanism is not working, leaving the ship's inhabitants confused and hungry. They become angry and try to chase Rikud. The sense of danger forces Rikud to open the little viewport from the third room and finally leave the ship. Everybody goes out into the world and finally sees the garden.


Question: What is the setting of the story that explores themes of change and discovery in a world where the inhabitants grapple with their existence and the unknown?

Answer: The story is located in space, inside of a large spaceship. The ship has a viewport that looks outside of the ship, and is where Rikad spends most of his time. The ship also seems to have high tech, showcased in the med room. Here is where the men go to stay healthy by being showered under health rays. The ship also has a library, which is where Crifer and Rikud read about astronomy and stars, and where Rikud started to doubt more and more about their lifestyle. The ship then arrives at a planet, full of lush greenery, making Rikud more and more suspicious of the changing view. After exploring the back of the room Rikud finds a series of rooms. These rooms include both a machinery room that is full of gears and tubes as well as a control room that has a smaller viewport. The story ends in the new planet, after Rikud opened the door that led outside, knowing that they would be able to survive after he compared the new planet to the gardens that the ship had.

Answer: The story is set on a self-sustaining ship. Rikud starts off observing the space sky from the viewport. Inside of the ship, there is a health-ray bath area; people lie naked under the ray tubes. It is also impossible for people to injure themselves; for example, Rikud was cushioned by something soft when he hurled himself at the wall. There is a library too, but nobody reads anymore so it is covered in dust. There is also a dusty table and a door at the back. Outside of the viewport, a garden soon appears. It is larger than the entire world, with plants that Rikud has never seen before. Later, Rikud confronts Chuls in a room where other people gather as well. There is also a sleeping area for them to rest when the buzzer goes off. The buzzer dictates their entire life. Rikud later goes to a room full of machinery, with cogs and gears that constantly spin. There is also a bright metal rod that he tugs free from the wires that hold it in place. The women’s quarters are located on the ship too, but they are separated from the men. Once they go outside, the air is more fresh than any air Rikud has breathed before. There is also a blue-white globe on the horizon. The water does not flow from machines either, and there are plants everywhere.

Answer:
This story takes place on the inside of a ship that is described to be self-sustaining, with food, water, healthy heat lamps and social interaction all provided and guided by a buzzer. On this ship, the characters are led by a routine in which the buzzer will sound a buzz and the next step in the daily routine will commence. The daily routine occurs in a set number of rooms whereby the ship inhabitants eat, sleep, lay amongst the healthy lamp rays, chat amongst each other after dinner, etc. The only doors on this ship are between the men and women, and for rooms like the library or sleeping quarters - besides the ones that Rikud discovers that leads to the machinery room and the outside world. However, the ship itself is a perfect world, where inhabitants are protected from injury. The ship continues its journey and maintains its automation until the supposed journey ends a thousand years from the occurrence of the story - or until its inhabitants find something better.

The ship floats amongst space and houses a viewport in which characters like Rikud are able to look outside the ship and into the vastness of space and its stars. By the end of the story, the setting transitions to the outside of the ship with the lush greenery, fresh air and water.

Answer: The story is set in the distant future where people live on a big spaceship cruising through space. The ship is divided into two parts: the male and female sections, the readers follow the life of the male character, Rikud, a twenty-five-year-old man who enjoys thinking about life and looking at the viewport where we find him at the beginning of the story. Then together with the other ship inhabitant Chuls, an old man who doesn’t like thought-provoking ideas, Rikud goes to the health rays room where they get the required scheduled dose of immunity, and we also meet another character - Crifer, a short limping man who occasionally likes reading in the reading room. Rikud gets back to the viewport a few times, noticing how the stars change their form and then surprisingly disappear just to be replaced by an image of a garden - this puzzles him. Later, in the reading room with Crifer, Rikud opens a mysterious doof, leading to a room with a voice that prohibits his unauthorized presence. The next room turns out to be full of wires, cogs, and gears - apparently, it’s the buzzer - the sound system that controls the ship’s inhabitants’ daily life. The last room was a tunnel with a small viewport at the end. When no one believes Rikud, he comes back, upset and angry, and breaks the mechanism in the second room, turning off the buzzer and the food system. Hungry and violent, people chase Rikud who runs back to the small viewport door he found and opens it, leaving the craft. Now everybody was in a large garden, apparently, on some new planet their craft landed on.


Question: What is the significance of "variability" in a story that explores themes of change and self-discovery in a seemingly static world?

Answer: Variability is a big part of the story. The inhabitants of the ship have always lived the same routine, the same life, and when things start to change they don’t know how to react. First, when the view of the ship starts to change, Rikud doesn’t understand what it means, and begins to think about the meaning of change. These thoughts are enhanced when Crifer told him that he had been reading Astronomy, and that stars are variable. When the ship lands on the new planet, and Rikud begins to explore, he starts to think about the variability of doors, and the meaning of going through doors and how it relates to the viewport. In the end, the change from having the buzzers to not knowing how to act is what sparks the violence of the men towards Rikud. This is due to the fact that he changed their routine, and having never experienced it, they don’t know how to react to change.

Answer: Variability signifies the change to the lifestyle on the self-sustaining ship. When Crifer brings up the variability of the stars, Chuls is quick to refute the idea and says that nothing is variable. In the story, variability exists when Rikuld begins to notice the sweep of space and the stars. While the others are perfectly content with their lives and believe that they will not leave the ship, Rikuld differentiates from the rest. He wants to explore the greater world and does not believe that their only function is to live on the ship, conceive children, and eventually grow to die. The variability that is he believes he has a greater purpose, and this differentiates him from the rest. It also motivates him to see the world that the ship has landed in once the landscape does not change for a week.

Answer:
The concept of variability is significant because it exists in contrast to the world that is presented in the story. The ship, the routine, and the characters that follow the routine are not variable. Everything is premeditated and controlled, with no room for change. However, the changing landscape outside the viewport and Crifer’s base understanding of the astronomy book introduces this idea of variability, which Rikud in particular latches onto as the potential answer for the dissonance he is experiencing. The stars, the sphere, and the garden that they see - could it be due to variability?

As the story progresses, Rikud begins to better understand the meaning of variability and finds that many concepts around him are in fact variable, like Crifer’s feelings towards him.

Answer: The story describes the life of people of the future: they live on a big spaceship with a regulated daily schedule consisting of health ray procedures, eating, and limited free time. No one questions the limits of their world, so no one understands the phenomenon of change as it has never occurred in their lives on the craft. Rikud, a young inhabitant of the ship, analyzes the changing views of the stars and tries to explain them. His friend, Crifer, tells him about the stars’ feature called variability that he read about in an old astronomy book. They both do not really understand this concept, neither don’t they understand change, but Rikud needs to rationalize why stars become brighter and change form. His attempts are also hindered by Chuls, an old man who actively claims that both change and variability are useless terms with no real meaning. When the views change again, and the image of a garden replaces the stars, Rikud is even more puzzled. Crifer mentions the variability of stars again, explaining their disappearance, and Rikud starts thinking about the concept of change. He uses the word variable to label everything that is not functioning normally or is unknown to him, including doors, the rooms he finds near the reading room, and people. The term both serves as a stepping stone to an understanding of changes and as an independent notion that explains the differences in behavior, environment, etc. After all, seeking the explanation of change and variability, Rikud opens the viewport-door and enables the others to step outside and see the garden that their craft landed in.


Question: Describe the relationship between Rikud and Chuls, two individuals navigating their existence in a peculiar world where change and understanding seem elusive.

Answer: At the beginning of the story, the relationship between Rikud and Chuls seemed like a mentor-mentee or like a father-son relationship. Rikud was a young forward-thinker, and Chuls was an older man who had already lived a lot and tried to guide Rikud on how he should live. As the story progresses more, Rikud seems to stray from Chuls’ guidance and tries to figure out what to think on his own. When Rikud tries to explain his reasoning, Chuls doesn’t understand because he has lived so much time inside of the ship and its routine that he can’t seem to doubt it. This led to Rikud getting mildly violent at Chuls because he couldn’t understand why Chuls didn’t believe him.

Answer: Initially, Chuls is very dismissive of Rikud’s ideas. He does not listen to Rikud much, instead telling him to take a health-ray bath and eat. Chuls is content with how he lives, but he does care for Rikud when he tells him to eat. Rikud, on the other hand, does not like that Chuls is content with how he lives his life. He is angry that Chuls is so dismissive of his ideas and thinks that all the other man cares about is eating. When Rikud asks Chuls to come to see the garden, he refuses and thinks about eating again. Rikud is furious and grabs him by the shirt; everybody else copies this action. Although Chuls is not as angry as Crifer when Rikud breaks the machine, he is sad because he does not have a purpose of living by the buzzer’s announcement.

Answer:
The relationship between Rikud and Chuls is antagonistic. Rikud is presented as the wild card who sees the changing star, who begins to question the routine aboard the ship and who ultimately incites new and unfamiliar behaviors and feelings amongst the other men on the ship. On the other hand, Chuls is an old man who follows the rule without question and content with the life he lives.

For example, when Rikud and Crifer begin to discuss the word “variability” and the potential of the changing stars being variable, Chuls quickly shuts down this idea by adamantly declaring that the word itself is a contradiction - and that they should go eat. When looking at the changed landscape of the star through the viewport, Rikud and Crifer begin to question why the garden is in the viewport, but Chuls simply says that it is the viewport. Therein lies the tension between these two characters, with Rikud constantly questioning and probing and Chuls remaining steadfast in his routine and knowledge of the world.

Answer: Rikud and Chuls are two inhabitants of the same spaceship where people now live while traveling to their new home. Rikud is a young curious man, he thinks about the future and the past and sometimes thinks outside the box. Chuls, on the other hand, is an old man who got used to the same regular daily schedule that everybody lives by. He is not seeking answers and has no urge to understand the world or see anything beyond the walls of the spaceship. When Rikud notices the changes in the viewport he tries to find an explanation and define the term ‘change’. Bur Chuls is consciously ignoring anything that reminds him of change, he can see the same view, though the stars changed their size and location, hear the same engine sound, though in reality, it became quieter. Rikud even becomes angry for the first time, grabbing Chuls’ blouse when the man doesn’t believe that Rikud found some new rooms with another viewport. Admitting this would mean admitting the reality of change and Chuls can’t do that.  When Rikud breaks the buzzer, the sound mechanism that controls the ship’s inhabitants’ daily life, Chuls cannot realize that eating is possible without it, again showing how dependent he is on the ship’s regulated way of life.


Question: Describe the significance of the viewport in the story about a man's exploration of strange feelings and changes in his environment aboard a ship, where he grapples with the nature of existence and purpose?

Answer: The viewport is one of the most important parts of the story. Rikud goes to the viewport in order to get a break from his routine life inside the ship. The changing stars that he could see through the viewport is what inspired Rikud to think more about the changes going on around him and to explore hhhhhhhe ship. Ultimately it is the viewport that showed him the possibility of a new life on the planet. The viewport essentially lead Rikud to breaking the engine room and to opening the door of the ship.

Answer: The viewport that Rikud looks through initially shows a great changeless sweep of space. He believes that there is a greater purpose for him in the world, even if he has spent his entire life on the ship. There is a bright star that Rikuld sees through it, and it bothers him nonstop. When he looks through the viewport again, he sees that the bright central star has become a blue-tinged globe of light. This is extremely significant because what Rikud is observing is actually the ship’s landing on a new planet. This motivates him to investigate further, and he finds that the scenery has not changed for a week after a garden begins to enter the viewport’s field of vision. The viewport also serves as a reason for Rikud to break the ship’s buzzer announcement system; this stops everybody from living their pre-programmed way of life and to leave the ship for the more mysterious world outside. Without the viewport, Rikud would have never noticed the changes in space and as they eventually land on the planet.

Answer:
The viewport in this story is the only portal in which characters in this story are able to look beyond their perfect, constructed world aboard the ship. It is the only window into what exists outside of the ship, and throughout the story, we can see that it is where change and a variability in landscape is seen.

It is significant because what Rikud sees through the viewport is what begins to create dissonance in his relationship with the world around him. It is only when he begins to notice the change in the stars, the appearance of a sphere with blue and green, and a bright light that he further questions why the men live on the ship and not outside. Additionally, it is significant because the viewport is one-dimensional in that all information is one-way. Whatever Rikud and the other men see through the viewport can only be explained by them, and so they have no way of knowing if it is true or not. As seen in the story, many times the other men are reluctant to even wonder what it is or simply shrug and move on.

Answer: The story talks about our distant future. Humans left Earth long ago and now live on a spaceship that has been traveling through space for centuries. Everyone on the ship lives by the buzzer - a sound that signifies the beginning or the end of any daily activity: eating, sleeping, free time. They do not understand the concepts of change, space, because their life is limited to the rooms of the ship. The main character, Rikud, is a young man who enjoys looking at the viewport - it allows him to see the stars surrounding the ship and the cosmic blackness. He spends some time every day contemplating the view and notices when the stars change in size and location, disappearing from the view. This observation makes him think about variability and change, what these terms mean. When sometime later Rikud sees an unchanging image of a garden instead of cosmos in the viewport, he starts questioning the space he’s so long lived in. His attempt to rationalize this makes him more curious, and soon he finds another viewport that also looks like a door to the outer world. A different angle of view surprises him since he has always thought that there’s only one possible viewpoint on this ship. After days of chaotic thoughts and revelations, after breaking the buzzer and causing the inhabitants’ anger, Rikud finally opens the small viewport and sets foot in the garden, allowing everyone else to leave the ship, too.