The town of Saharanpur had little patience for dreamers. It was a place where people clung to routine, where risk was frowned upon, and where I—Aanya Sharma—had spent my life feeling like I didn’t belong.

My dream?

To be an astronaut.

To break free from gravity, from expectations, from the life that had already been decided for me before I was even born.

But in Saharanpur, a girl aiming for the stars was nothing more than a joke. As a child, I had devoured books about space, tracing my fingers over pictures of rocket launches and distant planets.

But my father, a strict businessman, dismissed my ambitions as fantasies. "You’re meant to take over the family shop," he had told me, as if it were written in the stars. "That’s your future."

I disagreed. But disagreeing in Saharanpur meant rebellion. And rebellion came at a cost.

I had once been accepted into an elite aeronautics program. It had been my chance—my one escape route. But the night before I was supposed to leave, my father locked my suitcase away. "No daughter of mine will chase such nonsense," he had said. "You belong here."

That night, I ran away, but with no money, no place to go, and a family determined to bring me back, I had no choice but to return.

My dream was over before it began.

For the next five years, I worked at the family shop. I smiled at customers. I measured grains and stacked shelves. I watched my reflection in the glass displays and barely recognized the girl staring back. My hands ached not from assembling spacecraft, but from counting coins.

And then, one day, Arjun Verma walked into my life.

Arjun had always been my greatest competitor in school. He was brilliant, sharp-witted, and—annoyingly—just as ambitious as I had been. But unlike me, he had made it out. He had gone to the city, studied engineering, and was now working with an aerospace firm. I hadn’t seen him in years, and yet there he was, standing in my father’s shop like he belonged there.

"Aanya Sharma," he said, smirking. "Still here?" I clenched my jaw. "What do you want, Arjun?"

"Supplies. I’m here for a project."

I turned away, uninterested. "Find them yourself."

But Arjun wasn’t done. "You know," he continued, leaning against the counter, "I always thought you’d be working in a lab by now, not weighing lentils."

I wanted to throw the weighing scale at him.

Instead, I gritted out, "Not everyone gets the luxury of leaving."

He studied me for a moment before pulling out a business card and sliding it across the counter. "Then leave now. I’m helping with an independent space project. We’re launching a student-built satellite in six months. We could use you."

I stared at the card as if it were a live wire. "I haven’t studied in years."

"So?" Arjun shrugged. "You were the best. You still could be."

For a second, I let myself imagine it—the weightlessness, the endless sky, the dream I had buried so long ago. Then reality crashed down. "My father would never allow it."

"Since when do you need permission?" Arjun challenged. "You ran away once. Run towards something this time."

That night, I lay awake, staring at the ceiling. The business card burned in my palm. And for the first time in years, I felt something awaken inside me. So, I did the unthinkable.

I snuck out.

Again.

Arjun had arranged everything—a hidden workspace, the project details, even the transport to the city on weekends. It felt surreal, like stepping into an alternate reality where I had never given up. The thrill of equations, the hum of machines, the smell of soldering metal—it was intoxicating.

"See?" Arjun grinned one evening, after I solved a complex structural problem. "Still the best."

I rolled my eyes. "You’re insufferable."

"And yet, you’re here."

Our rivalry reignited, but this time, it was different. Sharper. More exhilarating.

He pushed me.

I pushed back.

We argued over designs, laughed over failures, stayed up nights fixing errors. Somewhere between calculations and coffee, between victories and setbacks, something shifted. But I couldn’t afford to think about that.

The secret didn’t last long.

My father found out.

"You lied to me!" he thundered when I returned home one evening. "You betrayed this family!"

"I betrayed no one!" I shot back.

"I am finally doing something that makes me feel alive!"

His face darkened. "You leave again, Aanya, and you are no daughter of mine."

I swallowed hard. "Then maybe I was never meant to be."

It hurt more than I expected. But I walked out that night and didn’t look back.

—————

Six months later, standing at the launch site, I felt the same rush I had dreamed of as a child. The satellite—the one I had helped design—stood tall against the horizon.

Arjun nudged me. "Scared?"

I exhaled. "Terrified."

We watched as the countdown began.

Ten. Nine. Eight.

I clutched the railing, my heart pounding.

Three. Two. One.

A roar.

A blast of fire.

The ground trembled beneath my feet. And then, against all odds, our satellite soared.

I grinned, feeling victorious.

But the moment was short-lived. A sharp gasp erupted from the control room. The lead engineer was staring at his screen in horror. "Uh… that's not our satellite."

Silence.

Arjun and I exchanged glances. "What do you mean, not our satellite?"

The screen zoomed in. The real satellite was still sitting on the launch pad. What had just launched…was the director’s car.

Someone—likely an overworked intern—had mixed up the remote signals.

"We…we just sent a Toyota into orbit," someone whispered in disbelief.

I slapped a hand over my mouth, trying to stifle my laughter. Arjun turned red from the effort of holding it in. Within seconds, we burst into uncontrollable laughter.

"Well," I gasped, wiping tears, "at least something from this project reached space." It wasn’t the triumphant moment I had imagined, but strangely, I wouldn’t change a thing. Because for the first time in my life, I wasn’t just dreaming. I was living.

Arjun clapped me on the back, still chuckling. "So, what's next? Should we try launching the cafeteria microwave next?"

I shoved him playfully, feeling the best I had in years.

And then, the control room burst into activity again. "Uh, guys…" one of the engineers stammered. "NASA just contacted us. Apparently, the car has been picked up by an unknown satellite… and redirected toward Mars."

A stunned silence fell over the room.

Then, I grinned. "So… does this mean we just made history?"

Arjun’s eyes sparkled. "You mean, did we just accidentally become the first private Indian team to send a vehicle toward another planet?”

“Yes. Yes, we did."

I couldn’t stop the laughter bubbling up inside me. From a small town shop to the stars—my journey had been anything but predictable. But maybe, just maybe, impossible dreams weren’t so impossible after all.

————

The news of our accidental space-bound Toyota spread like wildfire. Overnight, Arjun and I became the unwitting faces of what social media had dubbed the "Space Sedan Saga."

Memes flooded the internet. Scientists were baffled. The space agency was furious.

And my father—well, he was so mortified that he refused to leave the house. "This is your fault!" he shouted over the phone. "First, you abandon the shop, and now you’ve turned into some sort of mad scientist and also a meme.”

I slammed the phone down!

—————


"I can’t believe this is happening," I muttered as we sat in the conference room of a top aerospace firm, waiting to be questioned. Arjun, annoyingly calm as ever, leaned back in his chair. "Oh, come on, Aanya. It’s not every day someone hijacks a Mars mission with a sedan. If anything, we should be honored."

Before I could argue, a suited man stormed in. "Do you two have any idea what you’ve done?" he demanded. "NASA, ISRO, and even the European Space Agency are all calling us! They want to know how we did it.”


Arjun shrugged. "Maybe it’s a recruitment offer."

"It’s a lawsuit!"

I groaned, dropping my head onto the table. "Great. We’re going to jail before we even get real jobs."

But then, something unexpected happened. The space agencies weren’t as furious as we thought. Sure, they were livid at first, but once they got past the shock, they realized something incredible: our unplanned trajectory had revealed a gravitational anomaly near Mars—something that had never been documented before.

As we sat in yet another meeting, this time with some of the world’s top scientists, I realized something else. We had done something bigger than we ever imagined. By accident, sure. But still.

"Aanya," one of the senior scientists said, looking at me thoughtfully. "We could use minds like yours on our next project."

My heart pounded. "You’re offering me a job?"

"Not just you. Both of you," he added, glancing at Arjun. "You two work well together. Even if you’re reckless."

Arjun smirked

I exhaled, looking at him. "So, what do we do now?"

He grinned. "We say yes. We chase the impossible again."

—————

The moment Arjun and I agreed to work with the space agency, everything changed. Overnight, we went from accidental space disruptors to the newest members of an elite project. The transition wasn’t easy. The people here were brilliant, meticulous, and—unlike us—hadn’t launched a car into orbit by accident.

The first day at the facility felt like stepping into an alternate universe. Sleek white hallways hummed with high frequency signals. There were only lights and panels, wires and more wires and calculations scribbled everywhere. But this is where I belonged.

Months passed in a blur of calculations, meetings, and late-night debates with Arjun. Our project was ambitious: a next-generation satellite meant to study the gravitational anomaly we had unknowingly discovered. I had always thought science was about precision, about carefully following rules. But this—this was thrilling chaos, a puzzle we had to solve with no instruction manual.

One night, exhausted and leaning against the whiteboard full of scribbles, I sighed. “You ever think about how we got to this point?”

“Oh I do, especially working with a pain in the ass like you.” he laughed. There was something in his voice, something I couldn't put in place.

Then came the final test launch. Everything was set. Our satellite, the product of relentless effort, was prepped for deployment. The air in the control room was electric with anticipation. I had spent the last few hours running every possible calculation twice, but even so, I clutched my coffee cup like a lifeline.

“Don’t spill that on the controls,” Arjun murmured beside me, watching as I took another sip.

“I’m just trying to stay awake. Unlike you, I can’t run on sheer arrogance.”

“Sure you can!”

The launch was flawless. The moment the satellite detached from the rocket and began its journey toward orbit, cheers erupted around us. I turned to Arjun, my heart pounding. “We did it.”

“We really did.” He grinned, shaking his head. “And this time, no stray vehicles were involved.”

Just as I was about to reply, an alert flashed across the control screen. The room’s atmosphere shifted instantly. Every monitor around us flickered with strange readings. My stomach twisted. “What is that?”

The technician swallowed hard. “The signal—it’s coming from the car.”

Arjun blinked. “I’m sorry, what?”

I grabbed the headset, my heart pounding. “Patch it through.”

A burst of static filled the speakers. And then—

“Hello? Can anyone hear me? This is… this is Rajesh Malhotra. I— I don’t know how, but I’m in the car. And I’m… I’m on Mars.”

Silence.

Arjun’s jaw dropped. My brain scrambled for a logical explanation, but none existed. “Did he just say—”

“Oh my god,” a scientist whispered.

The control room erupted into chaos. Scientists scrambled, fingers flying over keyboards, equations rewritten in frantic scrawls. My ears rang with shouted theories—wormholes, quantum anomalies, impossible physics. None of it made sense.

“I— I was just getting groceries,” Rajesh’s panicked voice crackled through the speakers. “Next thing I knew, I woke up here, inside this car! It’s covered in red dust. I can see… craters. The sky is pink! I AM ON MARS!”

Arjun ran both hands through his hair.

I gripped the console, my breath coming in short gasps. “Rajesh, are you… okay? Are you hurt?”

“I… I think I’m fine? But I have no food! No water! And this car doesn’t exactly have a heater! What do I do?”

Arjun and I locked eyes. We had just made history. Unintentionally. Again.

I exhaled sharply. “Okay. Okay. Nobody panic.”

A scientist pointed at me. “You launched him! Fix it!”

I swallowed hard. “Right. Just… give me a second.”

Rajesh groaned through the speakers. “You don’t have a second.”


“We’re going to bring you back, Rajesh. Somehow.”

Rajesh’s voice wavered. “Just… tell my wife I love her. And tell my kids—”

“Not necessary,” Arjun interrupted. “You’re not dying on Mars, dude. Hold on.”

Arjun and I turned to the team. “We need a plan.”

Ideas were thrown around. None of them reasonable. Time was running out.

Then, amidst the chaos, Arjun leaned closer to me and whispered, “You know, we could just… drive another car into orbit. Aim it right this time.”

I stared at him. He was right.

I turned to the room. “We need another car.”

A moment of silence.

Then the lead scientist sighed. “Get them a vehicle.”

And just like that, we were about to break the laws of physics—again. This time, on purpose.

The world watched as we prepared for what could be the most ridiculous rescue mission in history. No one had ever tried launching a car into space with the sole purpose of retrieving a man stranded on Mars. No one had ever needed to.

News channels flashed our faces across screens worldwide. The Indian government held emergency meetings. NASA, ISRO, and every other space agency either wanted to stop us or take credit.


Arjun and I, however, were too deep into the madness to back out. Our new mission: retrieve Rajesh Malhotra, the world’s first unintentional Martian.

The plan was as absurd as it was simple—at least on paper. If we could replicate the anomaly that had sent Rajesh to Mars in the first place, we could, theoretically, reverse it. The calculations were insane. The risk of complete failure? Nearly 99.9%. But we didn’t have time to care about that.

“Are you sure about this?” I muttered to Arjun as we...


“Not at all,” he replied cheerfully, double-checking the trajectory settings. “But at this point, we’ve already broken so many laws of physics that we might as well commit fully.”

The launch site was buzzing with nervous energy. Engineers, scientists, government officials—everyone wanted to witness history. Or a disaster. Probably both.

Our vehicle of choice? A fully customized SUV, stripped of all unnecessary weight and retrofitted with life support, thrusters, and, most importantly, a hot the...


As the countdown began, I thought of my father. If he could see me now, standing on the precipice of something so impossible, he would probably shake his head, mutter something about me being a disgrace to the family business, and then secretly tell all his friends that his daughter was sending a second car to Mars.

The launch sequence initiated.

Five.

Four.

Three.

Two.

One.

Liftoff.

The SUV shot into the sky like an absurd, metal-clad shooting star. The world gasped. The inter...


We had done it. Again.

The entire control room burst into celebration—until a new alert flashed on the screen.

“Uh… you guys need to see this,” a technician called out, voice laced with confusion.

The room fell silent. My pulse spiked. “What now?”

The screen displayed an incoming transmission—from Rajesh.

A video feed crackled to life. And there he was. Rajesh Malhotra, sitting comfortably inside the Toyota on Mars, sipping from a cup. Behind him? A gleaming, futuristic Martian base. What?

Rajesh grinned. “So, funny story… Turns out, I’m not alone here.”

The control room froze. My breath caught in my throat. “What do you mean you’re not alone?”

The video feed shifted slightly, and another figure stepped into the frame. A woman. She wore a sleek, unfamiliar space suit and had the unmistakable look of someone who belonged exactly where she was.

“This is Commander Vega,” Rajesh introduced, beaming. “She’s… uh… part of a secret Martian colony. Apparently, humans landed here years a...


Silence.

Arjun blinked. I blinked. The entire world held its breath.

“A secret… Martian colony?” I echoed dumbly.

Rajesh took another sip of what I now realized was tea. “Yep. Turns out, all those conspiracy theories? True. Governments have been hiding this for decades. Oh, and their tea? Fantastic.”

I sat down hard, my legs giving out. Arjun ran a hand down his face. “So… let me get this straight. We spent months figuring out how to retrieve you, risked our careers, defied the laws of physics

Commander Vega smiled. “It’s okay. We could use a good mechanic.”

Rajesh gave a sheepish shrug. “Honestly? I think I might just stay.”

The room erupted in chaos once more. Governments scrambled, scientists demanded answers, and Arjun and I?

We just started laughing.

Because in the end, we had set out to do the impossible. And somehow, impossibility had laughed right back at us.

And my father? Well, he finally acknowledged that maybe—just maybe—I wasn’t a complete disappointment.

Because, after all, who else could say they accidentally discovered an entire secret civilization on Mars?