“One hundred billion stars in the Milky Way and you’re telling me we’re the only planet with intelligent life?”
Don’t get Luca Tumlin started. In between swiping rewards cards, writing names on plastic cups, and blending up drinks with one shot of this and two shots of that, he likes to pretend he’s an astronomer. Other days it’s a philosopher. Or a paleoanthropologist. He’s under the impression that he’s got a brain bigger than an elephant’s and it’s filled with useless knowledge and strong opinions. He could rant for hours about the various conspiracy theories he subscribes to, and he does. By the end of a long shift, he’s got half his coworkers convinced. At least it’s entertaining. Sometimes.
His new biggest project is some kind of radio that he’s sure can communicate with extraterrestrial intelligent life. Aliens. As if his degree in English Literature somehow prepared him to build a machine even NASA has only dreamed of. He’s building the thing with scraps from garage sales and his parents’ basement. No trillion-dollar budget here, folks. Just Ned Tumlin’s old transistor radio, dismantled and reimagined.
“Tonight is the night,” he tells us during closing. “I’m running my first test. Anyone want to come and experience the magic?”
“I thought it was science you were doing, not magic,” Aliya calls.
“Maybe you should livestream it,” Rylan suggests.
Luca shakes his head seriously. “It might interfere with the signal. I’m not taking any risks.”
He’s certainly not. He puts his phone on airplane mode and drives to a field, as far away from civilization as he can get before midnight. He parks the car on the side of the road and sets up the contraption about fifty feet away, checking all the connections as he goes. No wire can be out of place. But Luca is confident. This is going to be incredible.
It takes him a while to set up, but by twelve-thirty, he’s ready. He flips the switch.
The radio thing emits a soft red light that allows him to read the piece of paper in his hand, which lists different potential codes an alien might use to communicate. He gives it a few minutes to fire up, fiddling with switches and dials until he hears a satisfying buzz of static.
This is it. This is the moment. He presses a button and says, “This is Luca Tumlin from Earth. I have no affiliation with any government-funded agencies. If you can hear me, please respond.” After a moment, he veers from the script. “I just want to talk.”
He repeats the message in Morse Code through a beeping system. He’s not sure if anyone’s listening, or if they are, whether they will understand, but he has to start somewhere.
Luca waits for about ten minutes, perking up at every blip in the static, but nothing comes through. He sends the message out again, in both mediums. He even tries a blinking laser beam, even though the nearest planet is lightyears away and one tiny laser beam is probably impossible to see even from our own moon.
Some hours later, Luca’s phone is dead and he has no idea what time it is. He’s about ready to give up for the night. He’s got the opening shift in the morning and it’s hard to do his friendly customer service voice when he’s running on two hours of sleep. He sends out the message one last time and waits, hardly hopeful anymore.
He’s literally reaching to turn the switch off when the radio static crackles louder than he’s heard it. Eyes wide, he reaches to adjust a knob. There’s a voice—someone’s communicating back!
“Luca.”
Is that his name? He fiddles with the thing again, and the voice becomes clearer.
“Luca Tumlin from Earth. Greetings.”
He’s too shocked to even think to respond. How do they know English? They must have some crazy technology that can replicate a language after he’s only said a few words.
“Luca Tumlin from Earth. We have heard the communications from your planet. We do not want any relations with your government-funded agencies. We have ignored their messages. We respond to you. Tell your people to stay on your own planet. This is how it is meant to be. We want neither war nor peace. We want no connection. We will communicate no further. Good-bye.”
Luca scrambles to grab the speaker. “Wait! What planet are you from? What’s it like there? How long have you known about us? Are there others?”
His voice trails off when he realizes the steady stream of static has returned. The voice is gone.
He should have livestreamed it.
He writes down everything the voice said, as best as he can remember. His coworkers won’t believe it. It had been almost too easy. His contraption had worked on the first night, and he just conveniently had no way to prove it? No other witnesses, no video evidence? Right. He wouldn’t believe it himself. But that won’t stop him from trying to convince everyone that he, Luca Tumlin, had communicated with extraterrestrials. And that they wanted nothing to do with Earth.
As he packs up, miles away, I sit in my apartment, with a laugh hidden behind my hand. Before me is the simple radio I started building when Luca first mentioned his new obsession. It had taken me a while to find the dinky little channel he was using, and even longer to write the perfect script for my response, but it was worth the late night. I just can’t believe he didn’t recognize my voice. I can’t wait for opening shift.