Septhi Royal Exploration Corps SREC

It was a normal day as ever for the SREC vessel "Jewel of Asira" exploring the systems beyond the frontier of the Dynasty. The crew went about their buisness as always as they entered the System designated "87-B" by the Local Frontier Aristocracy.

The System seemed as expected from long range scans so far, a Gas-Giant, a few barren worlds and as per protocol, the vessel set out to begin surveying and mapping out the mineral compositions of the barren planets for potential mining for the frontier.

The Septhi Vessel "Jewel of Asira" was of the 7th generation of Exploration Vessel charged with moving far away from the frontier on its own and explore the galaxy at large, mainly with equiptment for scanning minerals and gasses, as well as contaiment for primitive lifeforms and animals to be found, the old protocols for potentially meeting intelligent life was still in the systems, but had never been touched on and barely read.

The Captain of the Jewel, Minara, was overseeing everything from the Bridge, sitting in the command chair after giving a few traditional prayers to the Idol of the Current Sacred Monarch, Queen Mekseph of the Septhi Dynasty. She awaited the usual reports as to be expected every system theyve been to.

As the ship of the now promoted admiral Junomd patrolled the planet of Endremos they picked up some unusual signs from a nearby system through their sensors. It appeared that in backdrop of signals from the system's star there were the unmistakable spike of energy that signaled usage of faster than light travel [by the way, what engine types do you use?]. As no Khendros ship was scheduled to enter the system, which had been filed of as extremely unremarkable, there were only two realistic possibilities: either someone wanted to bypass the jurisdiction and make an unauthorised jump, unlikely as the wormhole stations were tightly controlled but nevertheless worrying as it could indicate treason, or aliens had just entered the system. Hoping that if it was aliens they would not attack Junomd ordered the ship to enter the system and see who had transgressed upon them.

(Warp-Drive)

The vessel is orbiting one of the barren worlds in the system, sending down probes for survey as the crew relaxes on the vessel, its fairly large with around 200 individuals aboard the vessel working, all the equiptment. One of the crewmen notices a sudden energy spike through the system-sensors, nothing they ever witnessed before.

Said crewman moves to the captain to inform what is going on, for now the captain orderes everything to contiue as usual while gathering a few of the crew to locate the source of this sudden spike.

As the ship enters it starts to gather input from the system, locating the ship and concluding that it's design is indeed alien.

Being informed about the circumstances admiral Junomd hesitates a bit before deciding to operate on the belief that the ship is not hostile, turning his own ship towards it and sending a signal hailing it but also sending one back to Endremos, ordering it to prepare to fleet to enter the system in case of trouble.

The crew seems suprised at the sudden completly alien signal, that they cant decipher appears amongst their systems, chatter amongst the crew and the captain begins en masse as she calls for the crew to be on high alert and get to their posts, security team ready, they turn the ship towards where the Signal is comming from.

The lack of a response as the alien ship comes tpwards them worries Junomd a bit but he countinues to have the ship travel towards it while sending more advanced signals that are meant to be translated into a picture of the system. The signals are sent within multiple frequences as the hope is that the aliens are able to interprit at least one of them.

As one of the computers manages to achieve the translated picture of the system, discussion is heavy amongst the Septhi onboard, the ship halts as the captain orders them all to be silent as she talks loudly

"We might just have encountered intelligent life, find the old protocols! This is a historical event, try and establish a feed to start sending back to the Dynasty! The Queen and the People must know of this as soon as possible...We must find out what these Aliens are." The ship finally comes up on the screen "Alien Vessel in sight captain!" She nods before resuming her seat "Hold our position, and initiate a scan of their vessel, and get me those protocols!"

As they approach a picture is sent showing their vessel placed alongside the alien one.

The Septhi Vessel remains still as the captain finally gets the old Protocol files for how to potentially approach an intelligent species "Send them...Mathematical? Questions, over all the frequensies." The Crewmembers nod before initiating systems to do so towards the vessel as the picture comes up. The Crew observes it all carefully, the onboard security team is gearing up..Just incase..Its the first time in Septhian history this has ever happened.

[Forgot about that, that is what they would have done as it has been shown to be successful, please ignore the earlier signal]

The Khendros ship sends multiple signals showing different symbols so as to establish a system:
the Khendros symbol for 1, followed by one dot
The Khendros symbols for 1+1, followed by the symbol for 2, followed by two dots.
The symbols for 2-1, followed by the symbol for 1, followed by one dot.
The symbols for 2+1, followed by the symbol for 3, followed by three dots.
The symbols for 3+1, followed by the symbol for 4, followed by four dots.
The symbols for 2+2, followed by the symbol for 4, followed by four dots.
The symbols for 3+2, followed by the symbol for 5, followed by five dots.
The symbols for 3*2, followed by the symbol for 6, followed by six dots.
The symbols for 4*2, followed by the symbol for 8, followed by eight dots.
The symbols for 3+4, followed by the symbol for 7, followed by seven dots.
The symbols for 3*3, followed by the symbol for 9, followed by 9 dots.
The symbols for 5+5, followed by the symbol for 10, followed by ten dots.
The symbols for 10/5, followed by the symbol for 2, followed by two dots.
.

The Septhi crew looks on amazed, completly stunned before the captain orders the crew to return the Signal, doing the same, the Septhi Numbers in the same way, followed by dots to indicate what each means.

"Incredible, we are communicating with an Alien intelligence..They wont believe this back home.." The crew makes sure to record everything.

Having now been satisfied that the aliens had given a response and seemed willing to talk at least for now the Khendros sent the same signals as well as audio to accompany them, hoping for a translation from text to speech.

The Crew and the vessels systems appear unable to translate into speech the crew talks amongst each other "They are trying to talk to us..." One of the other crewmen looks to the captain "What do we do?" The Captain looks confused, and looks at the protocols before grasping the idol of the current Monarch saying a low prayer "Send the old Protocol Recording 46...I doubt they will be able to translate it, we cant translate whatever they are sending"

The Protocol Recording is sent, its a video-recording with sound, the language might be unable to translate as theres never been any contact of it before. But the video, appears to be a recording of a large city durring a Sunset with White-Fured Mammalian aliens, the Septhi. Having their evening life, and a view of a large majestic structure which seems like a Palace, thats all the recording is, as it repeats.

While the Axtromd themselves could not make out what the what the sounds meant they could hear them as the Computer was able to give out the audio. This, together with the pictures was valuable intelligence on how the aliens presumably spoke and looked like. They returned the gesture by sending a picture of an Axtromd along with the words "greetings alien". They did not know that the aliens could not hear the sounds.

The crew looks astounded at the picture of this Alien lifeform, completly shocked and surprised, not knowing what to do for a while, they are unable to translate the words. But..Its easy to tell it was letters instead of numbers.

"By the Mercy of the Gods. How do we approach this?..We havnt trained for this, noone has for at least a century..." The chief from the Vessels security team steps up and looks at the picture "If they are dangerous, i will have the staff ready. We dont know what they will do" The captain shakes her head lightly "By the Queen, send more pictures, and...With letters simple things, like whats on the picture."

One picture being send has a male and female Septhi standing next to each other, the Word in their own language. Septhi, being between them, and Male below the male on the portrait, and vice versa for the female.

The Axtromd correctly interprit the word Septhi as referring to the alien name but conclude that the male and female are two different subspecies.

They themselves send long speeches to the aliens, together with text versions of them. The Khendros written language, should be noted, is extremely phonetic and close to the sound of the spoken one.

If the Septhi could understand how the written words could relate to the sounds, it would be easier..But unfortunately theyve never encountered an Alien language before, and that is painfully obvious to themselves with the troubles they are having.

"Fly us closer, slowly" The Crew follow orders and start to move the vessel slowly towards the Alien one, at a slow pace.

The crew does get rather worried by the approaching ship but as most of them have already been through this they decide to ignore it and themselves approach the alien ship, although they are prepared to fire their weapons if necessary.

The Septhi Crew stops the ship when closer as the Captain tries to figure out how to approach this, before ordering three of the crew to the Space-Locks, to get into space suits and prepare to head out, one of them is from the Security Staff so has an Exoskeleton like Power-Armor on when preparing to head outside

"You will be the first to get close to these aliens, itl be a historic event, may the gods smile upon you" the chosen ones nod in the space-lock "Thank you Captain, by the Queens grace, we will be back soon."

The Khendrosi vessel also sends out it's own crewmen, four of them to be specific. Equipped with the suits that they wear day and night the crewmen head out, using thrusters at their arms, legs and tail to head towards the alien ship. They have also stocked themselves with hidden explosives so that if things go badly enough they can blow themselves up and take the ship down with them.

The three of the Septhi crew chosen leave the ship using thrusts mainly on their backpacks to move about, the Power armor the security guard has on is far more mobile, and large. Holding a fairly sizeable rifle like weapon behind the two in normal suits, as they approach the Aliens slowly, slowing down their thrusters as they approach, one of the Septhi makes a simple wave with his hand, as an attempt at a greeting.

The Axtromd mimic the gesture, not knowing what it means. Two of them slow down before the approaching aliens while the other two go forward diagonally so that they can easily flank them in case of conflict, they try to be as surreptios about the move as possible though so as not show any outward agression. Thi first two try to speak to the aliens on the frequency that they have been established to understand. While the aliens would not understand their words they have also taken with them screens with which they can show pictures of what they are talking about. Onboard the rest of the crew observes everything, ready for any signs of hostility.

The Septhi listen and record all of this, before responding in their own language, doing several different hand signs, showing pictures, one of which is a Diamond as he points as their ship, Diamond next to a Female Septhi in fine robes.

The Security guard in large power armor just observes coldly, eyeing the Aliens carefully.

Onboard the vessel the entire crew observes with the greatest intent, some are praying to the Gods, others to the Queen.

The Axtromd did not understand what the diamond was meant to symbolise but nevertheless countinued showing pictures, of a planet, a star, an asteroid, theirs and the alien ship and all the while describe them. The two flankers had decided that the alien in the heavy armour was the greatest threat and had made him their target to unleash their weapons upon in case of a battle, secretly communicating with the two others to take out their translator counterparts so that each had a target. The ship meanwhile had turned itself towards the alien one with it's nose.

The Septhi listen and appear to be takking notes in some form, with their suits wrist-computer or datapad, the Security guard still observes them as they get into a more adventageous position.

Suddenly one of the Septhi in front, grabs a Data-Slate that slides out from his Datapad and holds it in one hand towards the aliens, activating his thrusters so he moves very slowly towards them to hand it over. The Crew is silent inside the ship.