The Invisible Universe

Part 3

I mean after all, the stuff was invisible! It could be any colour and texture it chose. Hell, it could be a completely new, incomprehensible colour that nobody could possibly imagine in their wildest dreams. The building blocks themselves could also be placed in a series of incomprehensible structures meaning what looks like simple rock in the telescope could actually look more like a strange energy blob in reality.

"I cant give you a definitive answer to that, we don't know enough about how this stuff interacts on a small scale. However it seems to have the same structure as our matter on a large scale at the very least." Thomas continued. "It still forms planets and stars. The empty areas of space where light begins to bend, is where we can find entire galaxies of the stuff. Just think of that! Entire galaxies, millions upon millions of stars that are completely invisible to our eyes! Here take a look at these!" Thomas said as he stood up from his chair and grabbed his coat.

After fumbling around in the pockets for a few seconds he produced a collection of slightly damp pictures that had been taken by his telescope only hours before, showing planets, stars and indeed whole galaxies floating motionless in the dark sky.

William gazed upon them with amazement, as if seeing into a dream world, because for all intensive purposes he was! Another side off existence that he had missed his whole life.

All of a sudden William exploded with energy, standing up so quickly Thomas thought he was about to go into low altitude orbit. Taking the picture in hand he beamed at Thomas with similar enthusiasm.

"Well I have to say Thomas this is incredible! You have to tell people and I don't just mean myself! This it's going to be massive, in fact why not publish your findings! I can have a word with a few people from work and before you know it, everyone will be reading about the fantastic discovery of Dr Thomas Clark!"

William chuckled to himself as he lunged forward to give Thomas a bracing hug, which Thomas awkwardly endured until the ordeal was over.

"I can see the title now." William continued. "The Ghost Dimension. A best seller! Book of the year! Book of the century! You will make a pretty penny indeed! Well done my friend!" William praised, cycling through the multiple pictures, unable to take his eyes of them.

Despite his dearest and only friend being so high within the publishing world, Thomas hadn't thought for one second about making a book for the common man. He had been satisfied with the idea of sending his findings to a scientific journal to be spread among the scientific community only; to finally see his own work in one of the publications that he had given so many hours of his life into.

But now the idea had been planted, it very quickly grew into an exciting prospect. The whole world captivated by the brilliant mind of Dr Thomas Clark! He did see the appeal, a small smile grew across his face.

William continued to cycle through the crude pictures, spreading them out onto the table in front of him forming a colourless collage of black and white. Eventually he reached a picture that looked considerably different from the rest. It was another planet, hanging in the empty void of space, only this time instead of being the usual mix of light and shade showing a relatively featureless world, this one had distinct lines and dots painted across its surface. Williams's heart skipped a beat as his mind pieced together what those lines might be.

"Is that? What it looks like? Are they what I think they are?" William gasped, his mind racing with possibilities. Not being sure what he wanted the answer to be. Thomas meanwhile looked like he was ready to burst, so the excessive energy of his reply wasn't out of place.

"Absolutely! They are lights! Millions of them! Covering the planet!"

William almost fell over. Even he, a man who cared more about the money in his wallet than the inner workings of the world, understood just how rare life was in the universe. Let alone intelligent life; and the idea that he was now looking at an alien city both excited and terrified him. His mind filling him with such delight that standing still seemed like torture. (This definitely was the most exciting thing ever!)

"And you are sure? This isn't just some trick of the light or some example of extreme other worldly weather? Or something wrong with the equipment as you say! You are certain this is not natural?" William checked with his friend.

"I'm certain." Thomas said with a stern look on his face.

"But how do you know?" William replied, grabbing Thomas's shoulders gently.

Without saying anything, Thomas pulled out a small silver device from his roughly folded coat, held it up to the side of Williams head and clicked play.

Suddenly the room and indeed everything around it faded away into nothing, the gentle sound of the rain and the wind disappearing into the void, as they were replaced by the unmistakable sound of music.

Filling the room as the two men became the first in history to listen to alien radio.

The singing that was coming from the small silver device was strange and not like anything William had ever heard before, but one thing was for sure. It wasn't a natural sound. It was beautiful.

"This very signal is coming from that planet, along with many others!" Thomas stated after a few seconds. "I've taken multiple recordings like this. Most of them playing various types of music but some sound like discussions, obviously in an unknown language, but all of them just as bizarre as this one." Thomas beamed. Once again neither of them said anything for a while, letting the foreign notes and voices fill their ears. Confirming in their minds that despite the vast emptiness and hostility of the cosmos, the beautiful truth was that they were not alone in the universe.

And so it came to pass that the human race was discovered.

Thomas and William were not as you might have been imagining, two ordinary men sitting in a rather expensive front room discussing the findings of a lifetime. No, they were not ordinary, they were not even human.

And that picture of the shining planet, that was covered in dazzling lights, was not a bustling alien home world, it was a picture of Earth.

And the music that filled the room and confirmed the existence of other life in the universe, wasn't coming from an alien source, but from a completely normal, Earth-bound radio broadcast.

At least, that is what you, or anyone else on this Earth would say, as from our perspective, Thomas and William are the aliens.

That being the best translation of their names into English, both Thomas and William were two alien men who were made of a mysterious type of matter that would make them invisible to any human who tried to look upon them.

It seems ridiculous to think that the first two intelligent races to come into contact with each other, where not even made from the same building blocks as one and other. Wouldn't it have been so much easier that both races were at least made from the same type of atoms? The universe is big and complex enough that finding other life is next to impossible without having to cross the inter-matter barrier. But then again, like everything else, it all comes down to perspective.