The Signal

It was a hot day in New mexico at the VLA, (also known as Very Large Array) Dust blowning aroung from another season in drought. Mike Hagon, one of the dozen radio astronomers working there. He wipes his face clear of sweat and slowly drips down between his eye and nose, which sucks cause it makes you itch. A little aggervated, Mike Hagon looks over to his cheerful caleague, Maranda Bright. He has always had a crush on her from day one when she started 4 years ago. He always refered her as his wind man. Mike Hagon looks at the data on the computer as he does every day for the last 8 years. He turns to Maranda Bright, and says," I guess they will never fix this dam AC because it's not in the budget are they. It's so dam hot". Maranda turns to him in her swivel chair, " Mike, it's much easier for you men to deal with it, cause you guys can shed cloths, we can't, if we girls shreeded off our cloths cause it was hot, you men would never get any work done". Mike laughed and said true, I bet we would miss E.T. calling.
There were mountains of data from the night before, possibly more than there has been in the last few weeks. They had search part of the sky the night before by Orions Belt. There were Pulars, Quazars, White Dwarfs, same stuff, nothing new. But as Mike and Maranda were sifting through the mountain of data, a strange sound was coming through, very distinct then the other. Mike hears it first. He looks at it again, eyes wide open, looks at maranda. He grabs the headphones next to him under the desk, in a box of other catch all crap he saved all the years. Mike plugs the headphones in, and turns up the dial. It's like a clicking, and a strange sound. Best descibed as blowing through a straw in high and low pitches.
Mike looks at Maranda and tells her to put them on. Her eyes widen with excitment, Mike starts to yell at her" You hearing that!" She gets antcy in her chair. Maranda yells to mike to grab the red book. The red book is all the numbers for the other dishes around the world, contacts numbers, and the White Houses number. She As Maranda swifty opens the book, moving the pages to Austraila, Mike rools is chair to the other side of the room to the control board of the Arrays. He turns the Arrays 12 degrees, they loose the signal, he pans back the 12 deggres and they get the signal. "Conformation made Maranda!" Maranda calles Austraila. A older man awnsers, Maranda says, " this is New Mexico, Turn your Arrays toward Orions belt!" The older gentalmen askes her why,"Just turn the dam thing!" Theres silence for a secound, but feels like an enturnity. the older gentalmen is estatic," what the bloody hell!" Maranda tells him to turn the arrays 12 degrees and then back again. He does so. The older gentalmen in Austraila hears it again. " I hear it!" the older gentalmen says. " Thanks" and hands up on the man." Confermation conformed there as well Mike!".
As the excitement builds, there is a embeded code withen the message. It ends up taking them weeks to desipher some of the info. It is coming through as 1's and 0's. And ticks as, 1 tick pause, 2 ticks pause, 3 ticks pause, and on. They find a message of their DNA, and it has cylicone with it. Never would have thought that one. They find a message as well of them sending back bits and pieces of words from the voyager probe we sent 30 years ago. The meassage went as follows," Children of earth, Man of earth, woman of earth, we come". Mike and Merranda look at each other. They cantact the White House. Not more than 3 hours later, black SUV's show up, and men in suits, and 2 scientist come walking in. One on the men, a tall skinny man with a gotee looks at them" Were is it coming from" Maranda speaks first with excitement." Orions Belt" " They have to be close for us to recieve this signal". Mike gets hold of NASA to tune the
Nasa tunes Hubble in Orions Belt, but sees nothing..................
Following that night, the signal stops. Mike and Maranda panic, as well the people from The government. Almost 2 weeks pass, and 16 large ships decloke over the earth. They are the size of Los Angeles. They managed to get past our satilites and radars. Now the only question is, Is this a frendly, or hostile meeting of 2 races. But for one thing now, we no we are not allone in the universe.