Two shadows were slowly crawling up a hill. The bigger one was tall, but bunchy, as if it was broken in the middle. Another one was small and vivid.
With a little crunch of gravel an old women appeared. She was as strange as her shadow. A few seconds later her companion came in sight - a cute little girl with short hair.
At the bottom of the hill was an ugly mechanism rattling in the middle of nowhere.
-What is it!? - asked the girl.
-Pumping station, - answered the old woman.
-What do they pump here, granny?
-Air. To tell the truth, "they" are not here. This thing is automatic. Our Masters have nothing to do inside. They built these machines in every corner of the world. And the machines work on their own ever after.
-Every corner, - the girl repeated, - But... I've never seen it!
-Because we have nothing like this in the Reservation... I mean, in The Ourland. We just don't need them.
-And why The Masters do need them?
-Because they came from Mars. They used to use oxygen tanks almost all the time on their planet. I think they were allowed to breathe without it only at home. Hence you can see them doing the same stupid thing here, on Earth.
-But I've seen very few of them, granny...
-That's because you are young. At first, many years ago, when they arrived, there were lots of them. But only a few survived the war...
-The war?
The woman closed her eyes for a moment:
-When they landed we were free people. We lived in peace, except... some minor conflicts. Our tribe was very big. Your grandfather was The Great Chief.
Before the war Masters were called "friends". In fact, they were our friends indeed. They wanted to live in peace. Both sides wanted. Martian folks had their machinery and we had plenty of food...
We understood nature, but we didn't understand that the newcomers were going "to change" it. We didn't understand that they were going to take our land, water and even our air...
Yes, they wanted the air. They wanted it to be compressed, liquefied and sold like salt or iron. We just failed to understand the idea.
I don't remember why the war started. Maybe one of the "friends" demanded us to stay out of his "private oxygen". I also don't remember when The Rebels landed. I guess it was shortly before the war started. But I remember they were called not "rebels", but "commonists". They believed no person could own oxygen tanks and other vital things. These things should be common.
-Where did they come from? - asked the girl.
-From Venus. That's why they had always shared their air, but never had the courage to get rid of oxygen tanks. Your grandfather thought their ideas were better than... - the woman gave one last look at the noisy machine, - Anyway, as I said, very few survived the war. It was cruel and devastating for all sides...
But you are young. You have much to learn, child! Many things to do.