Space Odyssey: Spectre

The stars were bending around them as they raced through space. Jace stood up from the pilot's seat after the warp stabilized. He glanced at his copilot, who ended up being Asana the Issuin. She glanced at him and nodded.

Jace nodded back and moved to a panel. He pulled the datachip out of a pocket and plugged it in. "So what is the plan?" Vana asked from one of the seats as he began interacting with the screen. It was typically used to show a flight path and other information regarding the ship. But now he was using it to try and decode the message.

"The plan is to investigate, which is what I am starting with. Why is this so familiar?" Jace asked as he played the message. "It is switching between three things. A single beep, a longer beep, and a stop."

"Is this a human thing?" Uti asked.

Jace shrugged which probably looked a bit silly while he was wearing his armor. "No… yes, maybe." Jace switched his answer, "I do not know for certain but it is familiar." Jace pointed out.

"It sounds like that journal you have." Vana pointed out. Jace looked at her feeling conflicted between betrayal and bewilderment. "Well aside from the writing that is clearly in some type of coded language. The pictures in that journal of yours had something similar."

Jace shook his head, "no that is something different. It relates to ancient archeological-" Jace stopped mid-sentence as he realized something. He then smiled and manipulated the screen. "Dash dot dot space dot dot space dot dot dot space dash dot dash dot space dash dash dash space dot dot dot dash space dot space dot dash dot space dash dot dash dash."

"What?" Nila asked in bewilderment from her seat. "Does that mean something?"

"It is a simplified version of a language from ancient Earth." Jace explained, "I do not actually know it for certain. But even now most soldiers learn in history about the basic message for an emergency which consists of dot dot dot then dash dash dash and dot dot dot. Which also means SOS."

"So this might be a human thing after all?" Uti grunted out while he leaned back in his seat. "Then maybe we should go and rejoin the others."

"Uti," Jace looked at the ola. "It might be a human thing, but it is a human thing out in the depths of Victorium space. Not to mention it is a type of emergency code that has not been taught in centuries. One that is not actually completely known or used anymore."

Uti frowned and looked around, "I am not following."

"Jace is saying and while simultaneously trying not to show his excitement that this thing we are going to investigate is so old that it has probably been sending out this message for centuries but all Victorium communications and sensors were too advanced to pick it up." Ulin informed their non-human compatriots. "Basically whatever this thing is likely from before the Age of the Expansionist War."

"Age of the Expansionist War?" Jul'an asked while looking between the humans, "What is that?" Jace smirked as he began a process to decode the message on the screen. It would take a day, they would likely find it before the translation and decoding process completed. Fortunately he had two of the letters to start off the process.

"It is the time labeled as when humans arrived in this galaxy. During this time humans expanded and fought each other for control. A large amount of records and history were destroyed. Fortunately human and Earth history were preserved, unfortunately how we got to this galaxy and a large gap between when humans began exploring space and when we got here was completely lost to history." Charlie began explaining getting looks of awe from the Victorium races while getting looks of surprise from Ulin and Vana.

Jace on the other hand just quietly chuckled. He was already expecting that response from Charlie. All of their files were quite specific and detailed. Charlie had a draft detailing her interest in the Age of the Expansionist War. "Charlie is somewhat of an expert on that period of time." Jace told them.

"I am starting to think I understand what is going on." Nila nodded in understanding then looked over at Jace. "You believe this signal is coming from something that predates or was from the Age of the Expansionist War?"

"Correct," Jace moved back towards the pilot chair and sat down. "Keeping that in mind it might be a mission where we do more investigating than fighting. But also keeping that in mind, we might come across a more primitive human generation that will almost definitely kill everything on sight."

Jace began checking the sensors and saw the signal getting picked up still. The signals they were currently encountering could be from years ago or just the last hour. It was too primitive of a signal for them to tell the difference. But he was currently adjusting the sensors so they could follow the signal that is being sent out.

Vana mentioning his research journal earlier had brought an idea to mind. The primitive drawing of the map. He had been theorizing that they might figure out how to read it if he could access ancient human records. Unfortunately there were not any he could use. But now there was the possibility of bridging the gap if this ship was from before the Age of the Expansionist War.

"The Age of Expansionist War lasted roughly a thousand years. During this time humans spread out as much as possible and increased their populations. They eventually fought against each other and drew lines between them. Genetic alterations and other things were appearing during the time, all to make a better soldier. Then eventually three leaders came together to declare peace and set up the borders between the countries…" Charlie began explaining in the back as Jace slowly adjusted course so they were going closer to the source of the signal.