The Announcement.
Their first attempt at direct communication with us: it scared everyone greatly. Hospitals were overwhelmed. They turned me away because I did not have any apparent physical injuries. I panicked with such intensity that I was convinced it was another heart attack. I’m not sure if I slept for about three days afterwards. They knew it would be jarring and have a staggering effect on Earth. Going back and listening to it now, their approach was the right one. They said everything we needed to know.
I had spent most of the summer in Eureka and the whole trip had a sense of somber finality to it. I wasn’t forbidden to go there, but even I knew I was getting too old for such trips that served no purpose, except to satisfy my nostalgia. I was supposed to be mature and responsible and not so carefree as to make such flighty, impulsive choices. I could play basketball anywhere. It didn’t need to be on that court. So, on my way home, I stopped at a record store in Willits and bought the new OutKast album as a sort of pity present to myself. It was the perfect soundtrack for the drive back and for my summer overall. I loved it immediately and listened to it pretty much everyday for the following three months.
I’m only telling you this so it’s easy to understand: when that transmission happened, I knew ATLiens backwards and forwards and I was absolutely sure that’s what I was hearing. And yes, definitely my memory is accurate: without the major triad, it totally started off like the opening seconds of “Two Dope Boyz (In A Cadillac).”
They said “Earth people” though, so I knew something was up.
It was midnight when the first one started. I had just fallen asleep. It woke me up immediately for two reasons: 1) It was loud and 2) I had put Inspiration Information into my CD player, not ATLiens why am I hearing ATLiens is this what overdosing on music feels like?!
I guess some people didn’t have any electronics close enough and assumed it was some police operation in the distance, probably a contributing factor to the initial skepticism. Most of my neighbors went outside to make sure it wasn’t just them that had heard it. Besides an emergency notification acknowledging it on our smartphones, there was no formal media coverage for at least an hour following the thirty three seconds of silence.
When they finally got on it, you better believe it was non-stop coverage. In some of the more ridiculous analyses, the “rational answer” sounded just like the “crazy conspiracy theory” to me. Glass and smoke was the name of the game and these were some of the shiniest of ring-blowers.
In their defense, I remember agreeing that the message itself was straight out of an old monster movie. Pretty unbelievable stuff. I was a little bit offended that I was supposed to take the sender of that message seriously at all.
And so it went for the next few days. In all of the media, we were told that it was a hoax of the most villainous variety and that the culprit would be found and punished, oh so punished. “Experts” were brought in from every angle you could bend. They all painted themselves as Holmes to the perpetrator’s Moriarty.
They’re the ones who started calling it “The Announcement.” Read straight from a script no doubt.
I remembered how well they had managed to bury Oumuamua in manipulative disinformation. I knew back then they weren’t ever going to tell us the truth, but this was much better content. Even now, I’m not cynical enough to deny that I was totally and thoroughly engaged. Things were finally getting good.
As promised, it was retransmitted. The second one began exactly ninety six hours after the first. I was hoping to hear something different. Once was enough for me, but it was even more menacing the second time.
And then the power went out about five minutes later.
I was in my bedroom and I could hear my neighbors scream and gasp through the walls. I joined them.
Up until then, most people knew it was a hoax. For a few hours I did talk myself into believing that it was “the Dutch” (or whoever was the propaganda target of the time) and I remember falling asleep as the sun was rising, while trying to listen for machines or explosions that never came.
To be honest, I felt a lot better after I woke up on Christmas day. The power was still off and nothing else had really happened.
Initially I was like, “Yeah, they’re punishing us. They always find a way”, but most of my neighbors were more open-minded and at least half of them admitted that they believed we were in the process of being contacted by aliens.
They sounded utterly ridiculous to me. Even now when I say that, I feel a bit silly. I wasn’t sure what to believe, but it definitely wasn’t that.
There hadn’t been much traffic around where I lived anyway, but it really got quiet after the power went out.
I much preferred it, though I did miss being able to listen to my headphones, especially on my walks. I taught myself some chords on my kalimba and managed to suss out the “I Want You” melody, and that was probably the best thing for me at the time.
I had issues already, but this constant barrage of mental chess matches was of no help whatsoever. I kept telling myself that it was real and that the truly insane person isn’t aware of their own insanity — as I sang makeout songs to myself, whilst awaiting the explosion of the moon, which I had been assured (twice now, thank you very much!) would definitely be happening by a voice that came from inside the radio and the TV and my headphones and my toothbrush and yes, even my toaster somehow.
