The Case of the New Planet

The story you will be listening to today is The Case of the New Planet and is being read to you by Daniel. The Case of the New Planet, by Ananya Dasgupta. Every evening, Anvi peers through her telescope. On clear nights, she can spot faraway stars and planets. But she is most curious about aliens and doesn’t tire of looking for them. One night, she sees a very bright spot in the sky. The spot gets bigger and bigger. It comes closer and closer. And it lands in Anvi’s backyard. It’s a spaceship! Two red blobs peep out of the spaceship. Each of the blobs has three eyes, two noses and no hair. Anvi rubs her eyes in disbelief! Are they aliens? The blobs stare and stare at Anvi and then stretch out their hands. Anvi is curious. She walks into the spaceship, as if in a dream. The doors close as soon as she steps in and the spaceship takes off. Anvi peeps out of the window. She can’t see her house anymore. Instead, there are huge, scary purple mountains outside. Bump. Thud. Bump! The spaceship seems to have landed. Anvi rushes to open the door. She steps outside and whooooosh... She slips and falls. She shivers. The ground is covered with ice. There are thousands of red blobs marching up and down. “Where am I?” she asks the blobs. They shrug and look up to the sky. Anvi looks up. She sees a big red sun and two smaller bright dots in the sky. “It looks like there are three suns!” she exclaims. Again, the blobs don’t respond. Once more, Anvi asks her new blob friends, “Where am I?” This time they shake their heads. “Could this be Jupiter? No, it is made of gas. I wouldn’t be able to stand on it,” she thinks. “Could this be the moon of Saturn?” she wonders. “But no, where are Saturn’s rings?” The next day in school, Anvi runs to her best friend Rukaiyya. “I met some aliens last night!” she says. “They were red blobs. I went with them to their planet in a spaceship. Which planet do you think they were from?” “Oooo, you lucky thing! I read a book which said there are billions of planets outside our Solar System called exoplanets. The one closest to Earth is Proxima Centauri b. Do you think the blobs came from there?” asks Rukkaiya. “Yes. Maybe they did. I would love to visit again,” says Anvi. Meanwhile, on exoplanet Proxima Centauri b: Two red blobs are sitting on a tower. “We went into space yesterday,” one says. “I think we reached another planet. A strange-looking creature was staring at us. She followed us into the spaceship.” “I heard they’ve discovered a new planet, and named it Earth. Do you think you went there?” The End.