Tevun-Krus #62 - Best of 2018

Type 2 Civilization - @JeffreyVonHauger - Final Contact

Type 2 Civilization

A Final Contact story by JeffreyVonHauger

The red square snapped and the buzzing stopped. The computer was unusually excited.

"Dr. Greene, there is a small object of interest, 40,000 km port of our flight path," said a British and somewhat motherly voice.

Nathan R. Greene rubbed his chin and tried to make heads or tails out of it. "We haven't passed anything since that debris field 15 years ago. What do you mean an object of interest?"

"At first, it appeared to be a solid carbon asteroid, but since we've got closer it began broadcasting a signal."

"What kind of signal?"

Greene sat down next to the long broken pilot robot and tuned in. It was too weak to be a space marker of any kind. He cut the engines and drifted towards it and locked his vast sensor array on the tiny thing. The computer spouted off details.

"Diamond nanofiber surface. One meter in diameter. Unknown internal mechanisms. Broadcasting a data stream in what appears to be over 70 thousand different languages. No apparent defense protocol nor known contaminants."

Greene ran it through his translation matrix and scanned for an option his computer might comprehend.

"There appears to be... what might work... an interface uplink. Let's bring it in."

"Dr. Greene, I suggest you try the neural transmitter."

Greene took an odd metal headset out of a drawer and placed it across his forehead like a crown.

The small research vessel slowed to a stop next to the round object. It's mechanical arm reached out, gently grabbed it, and placed it in an open cargo bay. The door closed and the arm retracted.

Greene walked to the back of the ship. As he passed the empty cryotubes, he felt the scientists he had outlived might be missing out on yet another potential discovery. When he was the last he decided he would just keep going. The computer kept him company as he continued the mission of charting the rare find of a relatively new stellar nursery.

He opened the inner door. Sitting on the floor was an angled sphere made of hexagons and squares, a kind of truncated octahedron. His scanner told him nothing new besides the name of the odd geometric shape. Its outer surface was clear like milky plastic with an inner pink glow that pulsed with dancing light.

Greene moved the object into his research lab. He was an exobiologist by training but he'd have a go at this alien technology.

"I'm going to try to connect." He had a real habit of telling the computer everything he did before he did it.

He closed his eyes. Lightning flashed in his mind. He could see the interface. Endless scrollable lines in languages he didn't understand. He opened his eyes back up after scrolling for ten minutes straight.

"I'd like to try to upload our language matrix."

"I've sent it to your headset, Doctor," replied the computer.

He closed his eyes again. His language was at the top of the list. The thing learned quick. He selected and could read the entire index, which was massive in itself. He wasn't sure where to begin. His eyes settled on something familiar, a complete humanoid DNA code. It was titled #EE71A7. The sequence came with instructions to replicate it that began with an RNA strand. He'd never seen such details. It was like reading the language of an exobiologist god.