The Society of Misfit Stories Presents...May 2019

An Oral History of the Crash of the Pisces By Kevin Deenihan –––––––– ONE: CRASH STEPHEN HUNTER: It was a really nice day out, pre-spaceship crash. MICHAEL ABRAMS: It was about ten in the morning. Clear skies, mild. Los Angeles morning. JERI O’NEAL: Just a totally normal day up until ten. Hold on. Ten oh five exactly. SCOTT BREEN [JPL-NASA analyst]: Afterwards we got a ton of s**t from everyone. A ton of s**t. I know people assume we have some kind of monitoring station like in the movies, big banks of monitors, watching the skies. Well, we don’t. ABRAMS: It would’ve been nice to have some warning. Totally clear day, you’d think someone would spot an incoming bright silver f*****g spaceship before it crashed practically at my feet. NASA, looking over at NASA right now. The Pisces came in on an eastern heading, directly towards the LAX northern runway. CAROLINE GRESHAM: I was a passenger. Well, I was supposed to be a passenger. I was at the Southwest terminal. I know that everyone gave NASA a ton of s**t for not seeing it coming, but I don’t blame them at all. One moment, normal day, the next, a bright silver ball the size of a stadium is skidding across the runway. DONALD GIORGINI [Southwest Airlines VP]: We had just put something like a billion dollars into a completely renovated terminal. We had fifteen gates going. And then a spaceship destroyed the entire runway. Which we had also partially paid for. ERIN CAPPELL: We were supposed to land on that runway. I was coming in on a United flight, from, uhhhh, I can’t even remember where. We even had the wheels down, I was looking for that big donut store with the big donut that’s right near LAX. Suddenly we’re climbing hard. People are looking around. After we get back up the pilot comes over the intercom to say “Everyone, we nearly hit a spaceship. This is not me making a joke.” Then we went back to — Phoenix. That’s where we came out of. Phoenix. The Pisces skidded across the runway, narrowly missing several airplanes, then continued through the fence onto the neighboring Sepulveda Boulevard. BREEN: Still not sure what the hell happened on Sepulveda Boulevard. We’ve got a thousand people working on the Pisces now and probably five hundred of them are on Sepulveda Boulevard. We’ve made calls to philosophy professors over Sepulveda Boulevard. THOMAS YEOMANS [Interview with LA Times, April 27th, 2017]: I am pretty confident I died, you know? Like I got — memories of it? Big grey billiard ball coming out of nowhere while I’m driving around and then — smoosh. Like I remember the car crackling, you know? People screaming? But none of that happened. CAROLINE SKILES [Air Traffic Controller]: I still get headaches about — I don’t even like to say it. Sepulveda. Yeah, it gives me headaches. First, I’m watching a big death sphere plow up my beautiful runway and hurtle towards eight lanes of traffic, the next... the roads are clear. Ow. BREEN: The red lights that held up traffic broke immediately after it happened. There are five video cameras that should have taped the area, none of them worked. So this spaceship just rolls on through, doesn’t squish anyone. I don’t know. It’s Sepulveda. LARRY BROWN: All I know is, I have photos dated 9:57 A.M. on my camera, of planes landing. I have no idea where they came from. I decided not to go plane spotting that day. I stayed home. I did. I stayed home. I didn’t go out. The ship rolled into long-term parking, destroying an estimated five hundred cars, before finally coming to a stop midway between Aviation and Sepulveda. The time was 10:07 A.M. JOHN GREEN: They eventually figured out that my car was the one it stopped on. Like, point-blank, middle of the big ball, final resting place. My 2006 Subaru. I remember turning on the TV and seeing the, you know, the geography and thinking to myself, “Did I park in Lot 1 or 2?” Steven Hunter worked at a nearby law firm as a secretary. Michael Abrams worked as an airport police officer. ABRAMS: I was not the closest one to the crash. There was a whole line of taxi drivers between me and it. They all got in and drove off. Then I was the closest one to the crash. HUNTER: My office was on the fifth floor. I had a really good view of the ship. I mean, obviously I went downstairs. I didn’t decide to walk to it until I was outside. ABRAMS: Staying close to that thing, hardest decision I ever made. And I definitely wasn’t getting closer. I don’t know. I had my car running, I figured if it moved, I could bolt. Little green men came at me. I told myself I was establishing a perimeter. That’s what you do, you establish a perimeter. HUNTER: Alright, so that’s what everyone wants to know. Why did I walk to the ship. Here’s what I realized. One of two things was going to happen. If they were hostile, I and everyone else on the planet were probably already dead. Certainly, those of us within a mile of the landing zone. If they WEREN’T hostile, then the greatest risk came from, you know, an E.T. scenario where you’ve got the various armed forces overreacting. And if THAT was the case, better they meet someone friendly, immediately. See? JERI O’NEAL: The Navy is in San Diego, of course. And Oxnard I think. The Marines, also near San Diego. I have no idea where the nearest Army base is. Oh, Coast Guard. Yeah, I’m sure they’re around but who knows where. Probably the coast. So that left America’s Air Force as the nearest agency in force, just south of LAX. And I just was on base when the internet lit up. Our nation’s military first learned of the landing when the LAX traffic twitter feed posted “UFO LANDING AVOID AREA SIGNALS ARE INOPERABLE.” BEN BROWN: For some reason we had all gathered at 98th Street [a half-mile south of the impact] to gawk at the thing. Like, that was the line. If someone crossed the street we would’ve stared at them like they were crazy. No, man, that’s too close. Get back here where it’s safe. And we’re all taking pictures. Texting. God help us. And then this guy in brown wingtips and one-hundred-percent banana republic walks across the street and heads for the thing. Five minutes had gone by. It was 10:12 A.M. JERI O’NEAL: So the LAX post is mostly coordination with defense contractors plus a bunch of satellites. And despite all our satellites we just switched on local news and saw the helicopter feed. TIMOTHY JACKSON: Lucky me, I was in the first helicopter on scene for NBC. You know what happens to helicopters in disaster and science-fiction flicks? They crash. That’s what they’re there for. Nice lil’ pinwheel. Laser blasts, fireballs, shock wave, every single time if you are in a helicopter you are a dead man. Helicopter crashes are just really spectacular. I got as close as the 405 [freeway] and then just could not get myself to go any closer. Meanwhile some i***t in weekday khakis is walking right up to it holding a notepad. HUNTER: I wonder what happened to the notepad. I know I had it when I walked up. ABRAMS: Two things happen while I am half in and half out of the patrol car, motor running, trying to get in touch with someone worthwhile on the radio. First, the spaceship opens up. Part of the ball opens up, descends, it’s now a ramp. Second of all, some guy is breaching my perimeter and walking right up to the thing holding a f*****g notepad. And he has pens in his shirt pocket. This is the guy that is going to make first contact. Pens. Shirt pocket. HUNTER: I still have the pens. O’NEAL: We’ve got a team of ten people. And the commanding officer, Major Arteste, he turns to us and says, really breathless, “we’re the only ones who can handle this. Lets load up.” And I think, load up on WHAT? MAJOR WILLIAM ARTESTE [May 5, 2019 Congressional Testimony]: My reasoning was this. The Air Force has authority over aerial threats, and we are specifically tasked with Space Command. My group had multiple astrophysical and engineering degrees. If anyone was prepared to answer this threat, it was us. O’NEAL: I mean, yes, I know a great deal about global positioning satellites. Aliens, not so much. And we certainly weren’t the best available to shoot a bunch of aliens, which is why I got very worried when the Major said, “lets lock and load, people!” MAJOR ARTESTE: [May 5, 2019 Congressional Testimony]: The rumor that I said “lock and load” or any similar comment is categorically false. If I said anything taken that way, in the heat of the moment, it was for the purposes of raising morale. HUNTER: I walked right up to the ship. No one stopped me. No one was there. It was — silver, I guess. That doesn’t quite do it. There was a texture to it. Like looking at silver, but if you moved your head, you’d see ridges and lines that weren’t there straight on. I don’t know. Texture and colors... it sounds petty when you say it out loud but something about it was... well, okay, alien. I took the door opening up as a good sign. ABRAMS: I yelled at him and he waved back at me. He WAVED at me. HUNTER: Look, I’m glad that Michael came aboard. Now, I am glad. At the time, the very last thing I wanted was someone armed on that ship. So I just ignored him. I didn’t expect him to run after me. ABRAMS: I don’t think I would’ve done it if that news helicopter hadn’t been right there. Just let him get probed. But I just pictured some meeting when the whole world is a big fiery inferno and my boss saying, so, you just let khakis walk on board and try and sell insurance to f*****g aliens. So I ran after him. HUNTER: He ran after me! ABRAMS: This guy sees me, comical look of shock on his face. Jesus christ. Big spaceship, and the thing that surprises him is a cop actually about to do something to him. White male privilege in a god damn nutshell. JACKSON: I literally made the helicopter shake, I was so worked up. Don’t go in the ship, people! You are not the authorities! O’NEAL: We’re all holding guns and we pile into two vans. The Major gets in the driver’s seat. We paused for a brief meeting, and he ordered me to “call UCLA and see who they could get to help.” I’m like, alright. Biology? Linguistics? Physics? Finally, I just called the general line and said that the military was calling and we’d like to talk to a UFO expert. Why not. ROSIE HENDERSON [Professor of Anthropology, UCLA]: Afterwards I made some effort to find out who at UCLA transferred them to the Anthropology Department, which ended up being me. If I find out who did it, I will punish them. O’NEAL: Anthropology seemed as good as anything. I asked her to come down. HENDERSON: To this day, I do not answer the phone unless the number is already in my phone. And it better read “HUSBAND” or “DAUGHTER” on the display. Anyway, I said yes. I asked if they wanted me to grab some historians and some economists or maybe a French professor while I was heading to my car. BREEN: We do have a rapid response team now. Biologist, physicist, astrophysicist, Marine response team, linguist, several doctors. Anthro... no. No disrespect meant. I, personally, studied Sociology for my first few semesters. TWO: INSIDE ABRAMS: So, I am inside a spaceship. And of course, the door slams shut. HUNTER: I got a little concerned when the door shut. PRESIDENT MCSHERRY [In “CONSIDERABLE BULK: THE MILITARY AND THE PISCES”] The door slamming shut was the first time we seriously considered use of weapons. Everything up to that had seemed so... crash-landing. This was not an ominous, Independent Day saucer hovering over my residence. Until they took two Americans on board, and the door closed. HUNTER: The last thing I had wanted was a gun on board. And now there was a gun on board. I told Michael to throw the gun away.