Shut up and dance (with me)
By EvelynHail
The mammoth bowl of the radio telescope obediently, guided by the programmed operation of the electric motor, followed the apparent course of the sky, fixed continuously at the same point in the star mosaic.
The axes of the thousand-ton steel structure spun imperceptibly slowly, mimicking the Earth's rotation, and the wind whistled through a forest of metal, branching from housing beams into the gentler and gentler branches, at the ends of which a wire nest was woven.
Right in the middle, in the focus of that cyclopean flower, rose the antennae apex like a pestle into which all the scents of space reflected from the metal petals around.
For weeks, this pride of technology has been persistently staring day after day at its metal retina into the electromagnetic lightning of a particular area of space, hoping to discern clear logical impulses from that cacophony.
Twenty-eight years ago, a stream of signals flowed from that radio telescope in the same direction, moving in a rectilinear beamed sequence of vibrations toward a star system 14 light-years away, announcing to its hypothetical inhabitants that they were not the only ones in space.
Homo sapiens had proudly raised its snout to some of the nearest stars and howled mathematical evidence of its existence. Then he waited for a possible answer.
But the stars were silent. Still.
Now the answer was coming from one of them.
The first electromagnetic shock flooded the radio telescope's bowl like a sea wave when it covers a recess in a coastal cliff breaking on its flanks, turning into a returning pillar of foam.
Bouncing off the walls of the parabolic antenna, united in a single scream, the pulses danced around the small antenna tip in focus.
The receiving electronics of the radio telescope accepted the stimulus from its prominent tentacles, releasing whispers of energy that now, like an increasingly powerful electronic avalanche, caused by a silent echo from the depths of space, roared through the maze of radio receivers.
A day later, the whole world learned the contents of the message.
Grammatically flawless, logically clear, short, it has been repeated several times in several world languages:
YOUR SIGNALS ARE UNNECESSARY. WE KNOW ABOUT YOU, BUT YOU ARE NOT RIPE FOR CONTACT YET. SHUT UP AND KEEP DEVELOPING.
YOU ARE READING
Tevun-Krus #100
מדע בדיוניTevun-Krus #100 - The Ultimate Reading Experience! 100 stories, poems and artworks from the best SciFi writers the orange Multiverse has to offer. We got coffee & cookies. We got cake. We got beer. Don't miss out!
