EXT. DEEP SPACE
A trillion stars.

THE MARTIAN ROCKETSHIP
Appears, gliding silently through space.

INT. MARTIAN ROCKETSHIP
In the darkened Martian ship, lit only by bright starlight that gleams through its translucent bow, McConnell remembers something. He unzips a pouch in the chest of his suit, and takes out...

HIS PHOTO OF MAGGIE
He looks at this, a long tender beat. Then something else shifts, and he reaches for that too. Looks at it, surprised. All these long, tense hours, and he'd forgotten he still had it. It's Woody's paperback copy of...

THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES
As McConnell looks down at the book, we hear his own voice.

MCCONNELL (V.O.)
"Is this then has it was so long ago? On the rim of the precipice, on the edge of the cliff of stars. In their time the smell of buffalo, and in out time the smell of the rocket. Is this then how it was...?"

McConnell looks up. In the dark, translucent hull of the Martian ship, his own features are reflected back at him. And simultaneously he can see, through the hull, the entire twinkling canopy of the universe, a trillion stars shining.

MCCONNELL (V.O.) (CONT'D)
"And she decided, as sleep assumed the dreaming for her, that yes, yes indeed, very much so, irrevocably, this was as it had always been and would forever continue to be."

McConnell smiles, gripping the book and the photo. On and on his rocketship goes, hurtling off into the great unknown. And as the starlight washes over McConnell's face, over his eyes, they are shining with pure joy.

FADE TO BLACK.