Crash Landing On You
2020
Barely halfway into the journey, Andromeda’s pod began to malfunction. Again. She was so used to this that she had figured out how to take over manual pilot once the auto-pilot inevitably failed.
“Today’s gonna be my day,” she affirmed, reaching out for the joystick.“I’m not going to crash and break everything again.”
But maybe it was too late.
Just as she said ‘crash’- well, that’s exactly what the pod did: crash into an empty space behind a two-storey residence.
This day was getting worse by the minute. First, the last-minute mission changes – the Landers knew about the mission, which meant the mission’s objective had to be changed – and now this? She stumbled out of the pod and spilling profanities at the broken machinery.
“You can crash, but don’t destroy all the equipment!” Andromeda shouted at the pod in exasperation, until there was a small explosion in one of its wing-like things.
She sat down beside it, sighing. She did not know what to do, and for now, all she could do was wait.
“Are you okay?”
Andromeda looked up to the voice. A very familiar looking guy – who Andromeda immediately recognised as the new mission objective – looked down at her. His expression remained completely neutral with a hint of concern, but there seemed to be no feeling of surprise or shock upon seeing someone literally crash land onto his backyard.
But that does make sense, Andromeda realised, when she saw the sleek black laptop in his hand, with a small gray logo that looked like the Earth on it.
“Uh, no- I don’t know where I…” Andromeda paused for a moment and took a breath. She could not mess this mission up. “Uh. I’m lost.”
“I can see that.”
“Well, could you help me… if you don’t mind…” she slowly stood up, which was hard with the dress she was wearing. Suddenly, a small black thing fell out of her pocket and everything went downhill. The guy looked closely at it, his eyes widening.
“A gun?” he exclaimed, a shocked emotion finally masking his face. “A GUN!” His stance immediately got more guarded, and his eyes shone in fear.
“What?” Andromeda immediately sat down again, flustered. She had to stop giving herself away. “No, no, that’s not a gun-“ she adjusted herself, trying to hide the very obvious gun under her dress.
“I know who you are.”
“No, you don’t.”
“You’re-“
“From the Land Above The Clouds, don’t report me-” she abruptly blurted out. This was not going as she had planned.
“I was gonna say terroris- WHAT?”
Andromeda scoffed. “Terrorist? Seriously?”
“I don’t know! You have a gun, so-”
“Ah, that reminds me.” Andromeda picked up the gun, the cold muzzle touching his forehead,, hoping her plan would work. “I’m gonna need you to drive me somewhere.”
—
“It’s really not a myth? I spent my whole life- twenty years- thinking it was all a fairy tale when all along- wait, this isn’t an elaborate prank or something?” the guy, whose name was actually Dustin, confirmed with Andromeda.
“It’s all real, it’s my home.” the card jerked, and drops of coffee stained Andromeda’s white dress.“Please drive carefully, I do not want to spill this coffee you made all over my dress.” She grabbed a tissue and dabbed at the small coffee stains on her dress. The two were ten minutes into the journey to Spring Street Road, Latham. It had also taken Andromeda the same amount of time to convince herself that she should drink the coffee.
Dustin decided to inquire further about Andromeda’s home, “So have you seen those amazing rainbow giraffes at your equivalent of a zoo? I’ve always wanted to see them.”
“That’s a bit too far… giraffes are obviously mythical creatures, so tall and all. Normal giraffes don’t exist, much less rainbow ones.” Andromeda replied.
Dustin nodded, suppressing a smile. “So Earth, or as you call it, the Land In Between, is planning to attack your home?”
“There’s some rumours and evidence, so the Cloud Council — they’re basically the…the CBI? CIB? Oh, FBI, right? They sent me to investigate. It’s supposed to be a covert mission, but my pod malfunctioned. The thing is that it always does- I’ve started to expect it- but today was different and much worse. Which is why, thank you, for helping me get to my destination.”
“Oh, no problem. It’s the least I could do.”
Andromeda began to laugh, “The way you said that makes it seem like you were the one behind the malfunctioning-”
Dustin interrupted her, “Th- that’s funny.” He let out a laugh that Andromeda could not help but think was feigned. “But it was obviously not me, how could I have done that?”
—
Dustin’s car soon pulled up outside the LaIBeC- Land In Between Council, New York office. The exterior looked like a plain white-washed building, but the inside was far from that. The Council was in charge of communications and relations with the Other Lands- and keeping Earth safe from them. Andromeda had heard how similar this office was to those in the Men in Grey — or was it Black? — films.
Andromeda walked up to the gates, looking up at the looming barricade. “Wanna hear a joke? I forgot all about going in…”
Dustin sighed. “Don’t tell me that your breaking-in tools were also destroyed in the crash.”
“See, there were a lot of last minute changes in the mission because apparently someone hacked into the system. And in the mess, I forgot about this…“
“So…now we’re stuck here?”
“Well, yeah.”
—
When Andromeda realised she couldn’t even go inside the office, she decided the next best course of action would be to scale the four storey building and enter through the roof.
If every Clouder was like Andromeda, Dustin would request they change their name to ‘very resilient to the point of insanity’. If it was just Andromeda, however, he blamed the coffee.
Dustin had attempted to reason with her: “Even if they didn’t expect you, breaking in will tell them you’re here.”
To which Andromeda replied: “These next-gen blasters are extremely quiet. I can just…bang bang!” she imitated with her arms the shape of a gun, shooting away. “Kill everyone.”
Dustin nearly took her by the shoulders to shake the drunkenness out.
“Are you- quickly, hide!” Dustin shriek-whispered and pulled Andromeda to the side, behind his car. Someone exited the building, walking around in the car park, talking on his phone.
“Lionel…” Dustin sighed.
“Huh? You know him?”
“No- I mean, he looks like someone I know, Lionel.”
“Oh, I can steal his entry card! Great plan!”
“Andromeda, no!”
By then, Andromeda was already hiding behind a small tree, leaving Dustin- who was cursing about Clouders being naturally fast and agile creatures- alone.
Andromeda waited for her chance to strike, as Lionel circled the car park. When he came closer, she pointed her blaster at his coat pocket and looked through the eye hole. A quick scan picked up a wallet and inside it, Andromeda’s target: a LaIBeC pass. Andromeda aimed the blaster where the pass was as it made a scan of it.
In exactly thirteen seconds, an indicator on the blaster beeped and Andromeda bolted back to Dustin.
After Lionel returned inside, the two snuck to the entrance and Andromeda held up her blaster at the card scanner. It beeped…
A green light lit up.
“Yes! So, where do we go?” Andromeda cheered.
“Did you not bring floor plans either?”
“Lost in the crash.”
Dustin sighed. “So we go in blind.”
“Like a penguin.”
“A bat?”
“No, penguin. Like Penguinman, that superhero guy.”
Dustin shook his head. The coffee was definitely getting to her head. “Straight, left or right?”
“You choose.”
Dustin pulled Andromeda along, straight ahead.
—
It took the two barely ten minutes to reach the control rooms of the office.
Andromeda sat on the swivel chair in the middle of the room. “You have great guessing skills. Almost suspiciously good. We didn’t get lost or anything.”
Dustin smiled sheepishly in response
“Okay, I’m gonna have to get some of these- what is this word?” Andromeda had turned on the screens on the walls and was greeted by the phrase, written in a bold red. ‘PASSWORD REQUIRED’.
Dustin typed in something. The message ‘SUCCESSFUL’ appeared on the screen. “It’s ‘password’. It… uh… makes sure that… you’re not a robot…”
“I thought that was something else.”
“The coffee is messing with you.”
Andromeda laughed, continuing to browse through the system. Dustin awkwardly stood behind her.
“I need to find information about potential attacks… so, database…” Andromeda said to herself, as she clicked on the folder, loud enough for Dustin to hear.
She scrolled through what seemed like an exhaustive list for a long time, until she found the file she had been looking for. She opened it and prepared herself for what was probably the most imperative part of her mission.
She turned around in the chair, paused a moment for the dramatic effect and began, “Dustin Hill.”
“I can explain-”
“Agent of the Land In Between Council. You can’t- you don’t need to explain.”
“Andromeda-”
“I told you everything- I should never have even trusted you the slightest bit… What was in the coffee?”
“Nothing! I was supposed to add this concoction that would make you weaker but I didn’t.”
“Why not? I’m your enemy.”
“The coffee was already going to make you drunk, it would be too much- Andromeda, don’t-”
Whew, it’s working. Andromeda took out her blaster and aimed it at Dustin.
“I didn’t think you deserved to… perish,” Dustin continued.
“What does that mean?”
“A somewhat nicer way to say die… When I first saw you, you looked so… small. I thought that you couldn’t hurt anyone. So I didn’t add the concoction. I thought that if you turned out to be dangerous, I’d just take you out after I had the information I needed to get.”
“So, do you have everything you need?”
“Yes- but I’m not gonna hurt you. Really, I’m not.” He took his blaster from its holster, hidden under his jacket. “You don’t even know the meaning of so many phrases and words and you get drunk on coffee – you aren’t even a fraction as bad as people say Clouders are. I know you don’t have any reason to trust me but…”
Dustin carefully placed his blaster on the ground, taking a step forward. “I trust you. We can stop this enmity and attacks, together.”
Andromeda had to suppress a smile as she slowly lowered her blaster too. “You know the implications of joining me.”
“Yes. But I’m prepared. I want the best for both our worlds. Peace.”
As Dustin said that, he saw a flicker of hope in Andromeda’s eyes. At that moment, Dustin was prepared to do anything- to fight alongside Andromeda, his life-long enemy who he had realised was not evil.
“I know what to do next. We can go the higher-ups in Nevada and-”
A loud bang from the outside interrupted Dustin’s explanation of his plan. His eyes widened.
“I’m gonna check that out.” he ran out, closing the door behind him.
Andromeda confirmed she was alone in the room, then took out a small device from a hidden pocket and pressed a button. A beep.
Dustin was prepared to give up everything for her. Unfortunately, Andromeda… wasn’t. She had other priorities; she was here on a mission.
“Andromeda reporting. I know this is late. There were a few complications, but apart from that, everything went as predicted- he was expecting me and he fell right into the trap.”
She smiled. “Dustin Hill of LaIBeC has been converted. Mission successful.”