"Through Thorns to the Stars" by Kir Bulychev, summary Automatic translate

"Through Thorns to the Stars" is a literary screenplay co-written by Kir Bulychev and director Richard Viktorov in 1978 and published in parts under the titles "Daughter of Space" (1980) and "Angels of Space" (1981). The book opens with an extensive essay by Bulychev about Viktorov — the man, the teacher, and the artist — and then moves on to the text of the screenplay itself.

In 1982, a film based on this script was awarded the USSR State Prize. Richard Viktorov himself directed, A. Rybin was the cinematographer, and K. Zagorsky was the production designer.

A discovery in outer space

The Earth starship Pushkin discovers a damaged ship of unknown origin in space — there’s no such type in Somov’s catalog. Cosmonaut Sergei Lebedev is dispatched to board. In the laboratory, he finds numerous clones at various stages of development — frozen fetuses, the corpses of children, the bodies of adults — and among them all, one living creature: a young woman in a spacesuit. She is taken aboard the Pushkin and delivered to a quarantine station near Earth.

Niya on Earth

At a press conference, the scientists discuss the discovery. Lebedev insists: the girl is not a subject for isolation and experimentation, but an intelligent being who needs a home. His colleague, Nadezhda Ivanova, objects: the clone’s purpose is unknown and she could be dangerous. Roman Dolinin, Chairman of the Contact Commission, accepts a compromise: Lebedev takes the girl, nicknamed Niya, into his care. Nadezhda is assigned to biological control.

Niya moves into the Lebedev family’s home, where she lives with his son Stepan and grandmother Maria Pavlovna. The flyer descends over green hills, the sea, and gardens, and this landscape terrifies the girl: she belongs to a world without vegetation, without water, without open sky. The red poppy fields seem bloody to her, and the birds — stinging creatures. Gradually, living with the Lebedev family, Niya begins to find herself: she learns to speak, becomes attached to people, and develops a telepathic connection with Prul the octopus, a creature from another planet who temporarily inhabits the Lebedev family.

Where is she from?

It turns out that Niya hails from the planet Dessa, a dying world ravaged by industrial waste. The atmosphere is toxic, the forests have vanished, and there’s no clean water. The country is divided: the poor huddle in underground passages and sewer tunnels, escaping rock storms and toxic fogs; the wealthy live in armored mansions on the surface. All this is controlled by the industrial magnate Turanchoks, a cynical manipulator who gains power and wealth from the people’s suffering. It was his people who created Niya as a remote-control weapon: a signal implanted in her head forces her to obey the commands of Glan, Turanchoks’ confidant.

Mission to Dessa

Earthlings equip the starship Astra to aid Dessa. Along with the Dessian envoy Rakan, Stepan Lebedev, scientist Nadezhda, biologist Viktor Klimov, navigator Kolotun, and Niya are on board. The octopus Prul also boards the ship, searching for a way to his planet, Ocean. Along the way, Astra witnesses the destruction of the neighboring planet Silesta, devastated by a chain reaction in its nuclear waste silos — a dire warning of what awaits Dessa.

Niya vs Turanchox

On Dess, Niya hears Glan’s command signal in her head again. She almost obeys — and yet she resists. Turanchoks realizes he’s lost control of his weapon and begins to act differently: he weaves intrigues through his agents, Dessian compromisers like the philosopher Torki, who persuades the inhabitants to accept the "natural course of events."

Meanwhile, the Earthlings begin their main task — localized atmospheric cleanup. From the Astra, they fire plasma discharges into the toxic layers of air above the chosen valley. A mudslide begins — the atmosphere literally cleanses, settling in streams of dirt. And suddenly, a blue glow breaks through the splattered glass of the dugout, and a ray of real sunlight bursts into it. Viktor Klimov, unable to restrain himself, shouts into the airwaves, "There’s air!" — and Nadezhda reproachfully reminds him that he’s at work.

The finale

Turanchoks’s forces are defeated. The planet is given a chance for rebirth. Niya, who has risen from a silent clone to a person with a name, attachments, and free will, remains alive — despite being created as a tool. Octopus Prul reaches his watery planet. Astra continues its journey.