[b]RCNS [i]Anna Karenina[/i]
Valiant class cruiser
The Starchild's system[/b]

“Picking up another transmission ma’am. It’s definitely intended for us this time, coming in on multiple frequencies.”
“What’s it say?” Captain Vissla asked.
“Computers are still trying to untangle their signal architecture, it won’t be long ma’am.”
Vissla did her best not to drum her fingers on her chair’s armrest. There was nothing her comms officer could do to speed up the process, and she didn’t want to place undue pressure on him.
“Coming in now ma’am.”

A window opened on the main holotank, displaying the foreign message. Vissla stared at the sequence of dots in confusion for a second before it abruptly clicked.
“The Dusselheim Sequence. Something intelligent is out there and trying to communicate with math.” She palmed the intership comms on her armrest. “Psionics bay, bridge here. Initiate contact protocols.” Closing the channel, she nodded at her communications officer. “You too comms.”

The [i]Anna Karenina[/i] began responding with its own signal; a simple diagram of a hydrogen atom, broadcast back on the same frequency as the sequence of dots. They could begin overcoming the language barrier later, for now it was simply a matter of establishing that they were two intelligent entities trying to communicate with eachother. At the same time, the sur’unem down in the psintegrat bay reached out with their minds--their reach extended by the ship’s psytech arrays--searching for the fires of living minds. [i]Anna Karenina[/i] continued on her way towards the mysterious planet.

The message had barely been sent when an alert sounded. “Ma’am, multiple warp flares detected. Iscandrians from the look of it, six ships, nothing heavier than a light cruiser from the power levels.”
Vissla swore. She didn’t need any complications added to this situation. The Commonwealth and the Eternal Union had no formal contact, but through independant traders they were certainly aware of eachother. Whatever the strange new intelligence had to offer, Vissla didn’t want to have to share it with the Iscandrians.