The Sounds of The Void (Part 1)

5 years ago, NASA and most of the world’s space agencies jointly sent out three spacecraft under project outlive. Such co-operation was unprecedented in scale and magnitude. It’s surprising how news of near imminent extinction can force people together in a desperate plea for survival.

In 1985 the world’s space agencies detected signs of the initial stages of a gamma ray burst from a star just 50 light years away. What this meant was that that the gamma ray burst had begun 50 years ago and only now the light from its initial stages had reached us. The scientists collectively concluded that in a mere 35 years, in December of the year 2020, the world as we knew it would come to an end in a blistering nova of light and destruction. The world’s governments realized that it was paramount that the public be kept in the dark about this. Such information would cause nothing short of mass panic.

Meanwhile Project Outlive was set into motion. An initiative to create two advanced, self-sufficient spacecraft that would ensure humanity’s survival for the next few centuries. Until they had found a planet conducive to humanity’s survival. I would run you through all the technology that was incorporated in these spacecraft but a large part of it is beyond my comprehension despite having worked here for years.

Today the two spacecraft are far outside the solar system, having surpassed the ort cloud a year ago.

I work at NASA and today we received two transmissions from these spacecraft that has each member of our team in a state ranging from confused to utterly mortified. These space craft are over a light year away from us. This means that the following transmissions were likely sent out around a year ago, considering the time they would have taken to reach us. None of us have an explanation for the following transmissions. Many of our researchers have resigned. I’ll let you hear them, perhaps then you’ll understand why.

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Transmission 1:

“This is the head of logistics of the SS Salvation speaking.” The man spoke in panic.

“I don’t know what happened. There was something outside. Everyone is going crazy. No not in the metaphorical way, they’re going insane.” He spoke hurriedly, the panic in his voice growing.

“We require immediate extraction from our sister ships, our survival depends on it.”

He coughed and composed himself.

“I’m sorry… I haven’t been very clear, have I?”

“Let me explain.”

“A couple hours ago the captain informed the higher ups that the ships sensors had been going completely haywire. Each one of them, from radiation detectors to the ones that determined gravitational strength.”

“The engineers had tried everything. It appeared that there could be no fault in the sensors themselves, that the values were no anomaly in the system. Impossible, I know.”

“Th- that’s when it began”, he quivered.

“The atmosphere both inside and outside our ship suddenly and drastically changed. The void outside the windows was replaced with some sort of a grey mist, impossible I know.”

“This mist was like nothing we’d ever seen or could expect seeing. It somehow seemed to emanate darkness, I don’t know how to explain it. The void it had replaced was much more welcoming that the sight of this mist.”

“It felt like the atmosphere inside the ship became thick and suffocating, somehow not letting me think straight. I’m thankful that that was the extent of it on me.”

“Th-The others didn’t have it so easy.”

“The Captain and most of the rest of the crew lost it. Some erupted into a maniacal laughter while aimlessly walking around the ship. Others just stood near the windows, each muscle of their face twitching, but their eyes stared out into the mist in full dilation and weird encapsulation. This insanity came in many different forms but the captain had one much worse. He began mumbling of re-uniting with what he called ‘the great dreamer’.”

“Then he undressed himself and masturbated as he stared into the mist that I for some reason could not look at for more than an instant” he coughed, clearly disgusted.

“It was then that the voices began. Those wretched voices… They echoed from each corner of the ship. They came from the outside in and from the inside out.” His voice grew distressed.

“All those that remained sane till then momentarily lost it. It was the voices… Those damn voices! We curled up into balls and blocked our ears from them but they remained as loud as ever."

“Jane thought she could solve the problem by shoving pencils deep inside her ears. She continued screaming of the voices despite having puncturing her eardrums.”

“I have no idea what language they spoke in but it was certainly not one from our world. We could all understand it but we didn’t want to. It’s almost as if the language was one ingrained in our primal senses. So familiar yet so alien at the same time.”

“I cannot explain it to any comprehensible extent but let me just say that their tongue was a morbid one and each wretched syllable was a nightmarish cacophony.” He choked back a sob as he said this.

“They spoke of things the sane mind cannot and should not comprehend. In the instance we heard those voices, I can say with no doubt that each of us wished nothing more than to cease to exist, to fade into oblivion where we’d be liberated from them.”

He took a moment to take a few shaky deep breaths.

“I know it doesn’t make much sense but that is what has transpired. Our ship is still encapsulated by the mist. Something inside it seems to be festering. The mist rumbles and roars, growing louder and more disturbing by the second. With it our ship shakes as well.”

“I don’t know what we’ve encountered but I don’t think we’ll make it.”

The sound of large metallic objects rubbing against each other war heard, like a naval ship was about to capsize. This was followed by screams.

The man was now crying.

“Please tell my wife and daughter I love them”

That’s when the transmission cut out.

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Transmission 2:

“The star-spawn of the great dreamer greet you minuscule beings.”

The voice was not human. It was low and condescending. The way you would talk to a pet but much darker.

The language was not English either. I now understood what the man in the first transmission had been saying about a language that was clearly out of this world yet somehow comprehensible in a vile and unsettling way. It’s as if our minds could translate from some infernal, otherworldly tongue to English while still containing all the torment and agony of it.

In those three words whatever had spoke had made my stomach want to empty its contents and placed nightmarish scenes in my mind.

“The only think matching the primitiveness of the technology on this ship is these apes that are in it.”

“See how I make them laugh!”

The sound of a crowd laughing maniacally in unison was heard. Their laughter was unsettling in an uncanny and morbid way.

“See how I make them cry!”

The sound of the aforementioned crowd now sobbing was heard.

“Enough fun. Let me get to the point. I’m here to send you a message. An eviction notice as you might call it. It’s just that you won’t have time to leave.”

“I think I’ll let your own people tell it to you.”

The crowd began speaking in unison. They spoke plainly, no emotion whatsoever.

“Before your death in light and glory the great dreamer will come to provide a death with much less mercy.”

“Don’t have much use for them anymore.” The thing let out a sinister chuckle

The sound of agonizing screams echoed as the transmission cut out.

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We don’t know what we’ve just heard. We're anxiously waiting on the data from the ships' cameras and other sensors that usually follows the audio a few days later. I must go now. I'll keep you guys posted on whatever happens.