A Trip To NASA: The Search For the Astronaut King

I had managed to fool the guard and sneak past the defenses of NASA, the world’s foremost space stuff organization.

The guards countless years of abusive training were useless against my mind tricks.

“Do you have any weapons or food and drink on you sir,” he asked as I made my way through the main gate.

“Nope,” I said. My years of training were pushed to the extreme as I tried to hold back the smirk.

My twitchy face must have convinced him that I did not, in fact, have some Skittles in my pocket. And I had one of those mini multi tool things on my keyring and I think there’s a little knife on it. It is pointy at least.

“Have a good time sir,” he said. His voice was weary. Probably exhausted from the psychological warfare I had just used on him. Poor guy. It wasn’t my intent to hurt him but he stood in my way to get to the Astronaut King.

Well not really in my way. More like off to the side standing behind the rickety podium.

The main door was unlocked. Their security weaknesses astounded me. They had grown too comfortable and had allowed their mortal enemy access to their base.

“Welcome, sir. Would you like a map,” the woman soldier said.

My disguise had fooled her too. She thought I was one of them! And she offered me a map of their whole operation. This was going to be too easy.

I looked over the map but it was partially encoded. At least their security wasn’t completely useless.

I couldn’t find the Astronaut King’s lair listed on the map. My initial thought was that they cleverly called it something like Gift Shop, or Food Court in order to confuse any infiltrators. Well played your highness. Well played.

Since I didn’t have time to decode their cryptic mapping system even though I brought my decoder ring from home, I threw the map on the ground. A child looked at me with questioning eyes so I picked it up and threw it in the trash.

That young trainee may have been my enemy but he made me nervous with those weird eyes. I didn’t have it in my heart to trash his home. After all, that young soldier would probably never even set foot outside of this base.

I moved along so I wouldn’t gather any other unwanted attention.

There were so many new recruits wandering about. I hid in the shadows to observe them. They were in civilian clothes and looked like normal people. Some of them were even laughing and watching the children run around the place.

Those poor fools had no idea what their future held. Enjoy your humanity while you still have it. Before you become another pawn in the Astronaut King’s court. Or maybe some of them were jesters. I guess it would be up to the king to decide about that.

Hiding in the shadows wasn’t very successful either. Several of the recruits said ‘excuse me’ and gave me weird looks while shuffling past me. The place wasn’t shadowy enough for my taste.

I managed to blend in with the recruits while gathering intel and looking at the rockets and games they had around the place. It was pretty cool and more fun than I expected their evil base to be.

One area had a piece of the moon that you could touch. It was hard to reach and glued down really well. I tried to pry it off but the angle made it really hard to get my keys in there to poke at it.

The Astronaut King had won this round. I could not steal his little piece of the moon. A lot of other people and kids came up to feel it too and gave me more weird looks as I tried to poke at it with the car keys.

I tried using more mind tricks to find the king’s location but none of them fell for it.

“So, fellow recruit, ” I’d say, “Do you remember where the Astronaut King’s lair is? I just can’t remember and I need to talk to him.”

Their training had allowed them to act surprised and confused to my questioning. Not one of them would reveal his location. They were extremely loyal to their king. I have to admit that.

I also got some ice cream at some point. And there was a Starbucks but I was getting bored so I snuck back out, the same way I came in.

With security this poor I could infiltrate again and continue my search for the ever elusive Astronaut King.

Know that I am still searching for you, Your Majesty (imagine me saying Your Majesty in a mocking voice for this part.)

You can’t hide forever. And you can’t ignore my emails forever either AstronautKing@gmail.com

Maybe check your spam folder or something.

Anyway, I’ll get you soon enough Your Majesty (more mocking).