The Whisper Sought

On the eve of the year twelve hundred and forty, a whisper was heard outside the dark recesses of our habited systems. It was a small sound and it was alien, different. This delighted the colony nearby, for it is our way to discover and explore. Many ships were dispatched and with great anticipation our people sought after this whisper.

As our ships raced towards the whisper, it grew louder. Soon enough it was not just a faint trace, but a shout that broadcasted its location to all who would listen. Our ships grew closer and closer to this signal and the signal recognized something coming, it spoke to us and we responded. This was monumentous, it was proof that we were not alone. It was proof that there were others. Most of all, it was proof that there was more to discover.

Over the months that it took to travel to this signal, intercourse was exchanged. With effort and the help of the signal, its language was translated and we were able to announce that we could understand an alien language. All over the colonized world, our tongues were learning this new language and speculating on its origin. We discovered the language was not just one, but many. It contained languages both spoken and written, few that could not be spoken and some that didn’t seem to have any direct meaning.

Our ships grew yet closer to the signal, and it was now able to be visually seen by our ships. It was small, too small for any of our kind, and seemingly unmanned. It was determined that this was a probe, a device to find others without the need of a crew, much like the sort we sent out by the millions. Its outer shell was covered on one side with symbols of stripes, letters, and colors. On the other side were words, a list of names in many languages, they all read; ‘The Discovery’, ‘Earth’, ‘Humanity’. So we learned of the others: Humanity.

Our ships eventually came to meet this probe firsthand, and the probe allowed itself to be brought into our custody. By that, it did the act itself, activating its engine to match the course of the discoverers and made docking preparations all on its own. Once in our custody, the work of discovery was begun immediately, and the probe helped us immensely. We attempted to interface our computers with it, and it obliged. It went so far, to our marvel, to reconfigure itself to integrate with our machines. Once connected it seemed to learn our machine language and then transmit great amounts of data. All is cherished and spread throughout our realm.

It contained detailed dictionaries of languages, spoken, written, and machine. It gave us languages both current, as it informed us, and past and all these languages are spoken and pondered by all our kind. The information of the languages alone was so large that the entire discovery fleet’s computers, neigh seventy ships, could not contain even a fourth of the content. The probe requested more space, and we were happy to oblige. The anticipation was even greater than on the trip out to the whisper, and the discovery fleet sang of new things all the way back to home. These ships were met by perhaps the greatest gathering of ships and people in recorded time, and a great party was held as the machinery required to store the granted information, for it was enough to fill a thousand ship computers, was brought to the planet.

The data was examined, copied and spread by all means. The probe obliged all requests for data and even formatted it into mediums most useful for us. So we discovered its origin, its name and many things about those who sent it. Its name was The Discovery, it was an explorer and an invitation. The Discovery was sent by Humanity, to all those who would accept the invitation and meet them for the first time. It contained music, all of which has already been sung on many of our worlds. It contained stories, the favorite of our people were those of their early sailors, traveling over their ocean of water to new lands to live and people to meet. Our purpose was similar, if not the same as ours, to discover and explore. Before we even interpreted the maps of the Humans, it was decided that we would accept their invitation and give them the same wealth of knowledge about ourselves as they had given about themselves.

Soon enough the plans were drawn up, distances calculated and ships began to prepare themselves. The word went out to all the worlds that any who had the means to travel to Earth would be invited to do so. Anyone who joined was told to bring information of culture, song, history. Every day hundreds of ships arrived at the staging grounds, a world that was renamed to Journey for this very event. Each ship was filled with books, instruments, scholars, wise men and whoever was able to make the journey to our distant neighbors. The trip would take five years, and the total of ships brought for the Journey was five thousand three hundred and eleven. Great parties were held, and songs were sung across our space. Songs of discovery and exploration were sung mixed with the songs of the Humans. The merriment lasted four weeks as the final preparations were concluded. On the eve of the embark, the heads of the clans brought forth their books of those who made the final expedition, the books of all the ships who perished in the act of discovery. The reading of these lasted all night. Morning came and the Journey began.

The morale of those on the journey was much the same as during the preparation. The partying was not so extravagant, but shuttles buzzed all around the fleet. It was a great reunion of our kind and much was exchanged. The size of the fleet was of great advantage for this journey, many ships would break down but there was always enough supplies. It was an expedition like any other that had been conducted before by our kind. However, the tone was far greater in magnitude and the anticipation was deafening. Human culture, human song, human story was the exclusive talk. Many would recreate Earth landscapes from photos in paintings and drawings. It became one of the most popular pastimes of those in the fleet, to view or listen to an artist or a storyteller recreate human art. Many stories of the old Earth oceans were passed and changed from one telling to another. The thought of a vast ocean of water being conquered by a vessel of plant material was especially fascinating to our kind. So we studied and explored human culture the entire length of the trip.