In the heart of Sriharikota, where the Bay of Bengal whispered secrets to the shore, nestled the ISRO township like a cluster of stars fallen to earth. Tall palm trees swayed beside gleaming launch pads, and the air hummed with the dreams of rockets and distant galaxies. Ten-year-old Maya lived here, in a cozy bungalow painted the color of a summer sky. Her father was a rocket engineer, sketching trajectories by day and telling bedtime stories of black holes by night. But Maya's true adventures weren't in the stars—they were in books.

Maya had a wild mane of curly hair tied with a ribbon that matched her favorite book, The Secret Garden. She devoured stories like shooting stars: one about a girl who tamed dragons, another where children built a treehouse kingdom. But in the township, where kids' days blurred into video games and rocket model kits, Maya noticed something troubling. During lunch breaks at school, her friends fiddled with gadgets instead of flipping pages. "Books are like portals," she'd say, waving a dog-eared copy of Matilda. "Why stare at screens when you can zoom to Narnia?"

One sweltering afternoon, as the sun dipped toward the horizon like a fiery comet, Maya sat under the banyan tree near the community hall. Her best friend, Arjun, fiddled with a solar-powered robot he'd built from scrap parts. Arjun was nine, with glasses that magnified his sparkling eyes, and a brain that solved math puzzles faster than a computer. Nearby, Priya sketched constellations on her notebook—eleven years old, she could recite pi to fifty digits and dreamed of designing satellites. Then there was Ravi, the quiet inventor, who at eight had rigged a rainwater collector for their school garden, and little Kira, seven, whose drawings of alien worlds won every art contest.

"Guys," Maya announced, slamming her book shut with a dramatic thud, "we're wasting our superpowers! All this intelligence, and no one's reading. Imagine if astronauts ignored maps—they'd crash into asteroids!"

Arjun looked up, his robot whirring to life. "Reading? Like, old paper stuff? But screens are faster."

"Faster isn't better," Maya countered, her eyes flashing like launch lights. "Books spark ideas that stick. Remember how The Little Prince made me want to plant a star garden? We need to launch something big. A program! 'Let Us Read Books'—to make every kid in the township a story explorer!"

Priya's pencil paused mid-star. "Ooh, like a mission control? We could assign reading coordinates—genres as orbits."

Ravi nodded shyly. "And build book launchers. Little catapults to fling stories across the playground."

Kira clapped, her pigtails bouncing. "With pictures of rockets on the covers!"

The group buzzed like a hive of fireflies. They were the township's brightest sparks, kids whose parents mapped the moon but forgot to map imaginations. That evening, huddled in Maya's room amid posters of Mars rovers and shelves groaning with tales, they plotted their mission.

First, the name: "Let Us Read Books"—LURB for short, like a secret code. Maya, as self-appointed Mission Commander, sketched a logo: a book with rocket boosters, flames trailing words like "Adventure Awaits!" Arjun programmed a simple app on his tablet to track reading logs, with badges for milestones— "Orbit Achiever" for ten books, "Galaxy Guardian" for twenty. Priya designed flyers, inking them with glow-in-the-dark stars that shone under blacklight. Ravi crafted "Book Boosters"—cardboard slingshots that "launched" paper airplanes with book quotes. Kira illustrated story maps, turning the township paths into treasure hunts where clues led to hidden reads.

But challenges loomed like storm clouds over the launch pad. The community hall was booked for adult yoga, and the school principal, Mrs. Rao, raised an eyebrow at their proposal. "Books are fine, Maya, but we have exams. Rockets don't read—they calculate."

Maya's heart sank like a failed orbit. That night, she confided in her father over dinner, as he explained how the Chandrayaan probe had persevered through glitches. "Papa, what if our program crashes before takeoff?"

He smiled, ruffling her hair. "Every mission has hurdles, beta. But passion is your fuel. Rally your team—show them the stars in the pages."

Energized, Maya called an emergency huddle under the banyan. "We improvise!" she declared. "No hall? We use the beach at dawn. No permission? We make it so fun, they'll beg to join."

The launch day dawned pink and golden, waves lapping like applause. The group had transformed the shore into Mission Central: blankets as runways, coolers stuffed with mangoes and Enid Blyton paperbacks. Flyers fluttered from palm fronds, and Ravi's Book Boosters dotted the sand, loaded with quote-planes. Word spread like wildfire—kids trickled in, sleepy-eyed but curious, parents trailing with thermoses of chai.

"Welcome to LURB Liftoff!" Maya boomed through a makeshift megaphone (Arjun's rolled-up blueprint). "Today, we blast off into stories. Priya, coordinates!"

Priya unfurled her map. "Orbit One: Mystery Manor—start with The Case of the Missing Rocket!" She handed out dog-eared detectives, and soon, a circle formed, voices rising in gasps and giggles.

Arjun demoed the app: "Scan your book, log your launch. Earn stars for sharing—tell a friend, get a comet point!"

Ravi fired a Book Booster. A plane soared, landing at a boy's feet: " 'The more that you read, the more things you will know.'—Dr. Seuss." The boy, a shy six-year-old named Vik, picked it up, eyes widening. "Can I... join?"

Kira led the treasure hunt, her drawings guiding teams to buried "story pods"—plastic eggs with mini-books inside. Laughter echoed as groups unearthed Charlotte's Web and The Magic Tree House, debating if spiders could be astronauts.

By midday, over fifty kids orbited the beach, swapping tales. Even Mrs. Rao arrived, book in hand, chuckling at a quote-plane tangled in her sari. "Maya, you've engineered something special. Permission granted—for good."

As the sun climbed, Maya stood atop a dune, watching her friends devour pages like hungry comets. Arjun's robot read aloud in a tinny voice, Priya sketched a group mural of bookish spacefarers, Ravi fixed a Booster mid-flight, and Kira hugged a new friend over Where the Wild Things Are. The township, once buzzing only with engines, now thrummed with whispers of wizards and voyages.

That night, as fireflies danced like tiny probes, Maya journaled by lantern light: "LURB isn't just a program—it's our galaxy. One book at a time, we're reaching farther than any rocket."

In Sriharikota, where dreams touched the sky, a ten-year-old girl had launched the greatest adventure: the one between covers. And as stars wheeled overhead, the children read on, their imaginations soaring boundless and bright.