Alien Hunter

NEW MEXICO, DESERT 1947

You have to consider

that they had a break during the war.

And last year Saint Louis

gave them a real good run for their money.

So this year

the Yankees are gonna get whupped.

You're crazy, Osier.

Brooklyn ain't ever gonna beat the Yankees.

- Never beat them yet, never gonna.

- You watch and see.

This is the Dodgers' year

now that they have Jackie Robinson.

Them bums couldn't beat a dead horse

with or without that Negro.

And you know what? I'm willing to bet

some hard-earned cash on it.

I might just take you up on that.

How much are you proposing?

Quiet down, Rex.

I said quiet.

- Hey, Wally, it's Osler.

- What's going on?

I got this weird pulse coming in

on my frequencies.

- It's all over mine right now.

- You, too?

- It's weird.

- What do you think it is?

I think it's the pinkos doing something

with our radios.

It's not a communist conspiracy.

What the heck's the matter with you, boy?

I thought it was coming from White Sands

but now I think it's coming from Roswell.

Maybe I'll drive up there and take a look.

- Call me if you find something.

- Yeah.

Talk to you later.

That is it.

I don't see anything out there, Rex.

Hello!

Come back. Come here, boy!

What the heck is that?

Oh, my God!

ANTARCTICA 2003

AXXON RESOURCES STUDY CORPS

What the hell is it?

Could be a rock or some sort of fossil.

We picked it up in the Landsat satellite.

First we thought it was a cap deposit,

but the resolution is definitely solid.

How deep in the ice is it?

- Four, maybe five meters.

- What do we do about it?

I talked to the NASA research station

at Rundell Peak.

They'll take it until it melts,

and then decide what to do with it.

All right. Dig it up.

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY

Language is a signalling system that uses

sounds to convey thoughts and emotions.

What makes humans unique

is our ability to introduce into language...

thoughts about the past,

present, or future...

at any point in time and space.

He'll call you back.

Not all language is based on sound.

We communicate in other ways...

that are much less overt

than the spoken word.

So do animals.

The only difference between them and us

can be summarized in one word: novelty.

When an animal gives a warning

that danger is imminent...

it uses a series

of fairly predictable calls or signals...

that animals of its kind have used before.

This is decidedly not the case with humans.

Oxford English Dictionary

lists 615,000 words...

in the English language.

That's 3,000 more than five years ago...

and thousands less

than a few years from now.

On the other hand...

there's little or no novelty

in animal language.

Tragically, English cows

make the same sounds as French cows.

- Julian.

- Sam.

Listen. Bachman called.

He wants to see you right away.

- Why?

- I don't know.

Did he sound like there was a problem?

Come in.

Good afternoon, John.

Come in, sit down.

A certain matter has come to my attention.

John, about the student, right?

I've been meaning to talk to you about her.

I don't think I want to know about that.

No, look, do you know

who Alexie Gierach is?

Stanford Genetics.

Yes, I met him once

at a faculty thing when I was there.

Two years ago, he went to the Antarctic

to head up a new research project for NASA.

Yesterday, I received this from him.

A satellite imaged an unidentified mass...

in the ice shelf down there.

It appears to measure approximateiy

At first, they thought

it might be a rock slag...

or a fossilized whale.

But now they're not so sure.

Why?

Well, station telemetry

identified some sort of radio signal...

- Being emitted from it.

- Really?

They burned a spectrogram of it on this CD.

I thought you might like to look at it.

- Plain or with cheese?

- I don't care.

- Look at this.

- What have you got?

Look at that.

- Nonrandom?

- Definitely.

Fixed-length pulse groups,

discriminate text...

consisting of prime numbers

repeated over and over.

What about a meteorite?

A meteorite as big as this would've

left a mile-wide crater in the ice shelf.

It would explain an electromagnetic pulse.

Not a Nonrandom signal. Check this out.

That's a kickass frequency.

The dish transmitter at Arecibo

is 1,000 feet in diameter.

The most powerful on earth.

This signal's stronger and it's coming

from something the size of a pickup truck.

- You said it was Nonrandom?

- Yes, with a fixed pulse device.

You mean some sort of new search signal?

It's possible.

But search text is always

diverse samples with mathematical data.

This has no parallel plain text.

Like a tracking signal.

We're talking about a target signal

of 30,000 light years.

- We don't have that technology.

- Not that you know of.

I know what's on this disk.

I gotta see this up close.

Too many people

know about your past with SETI.

They'd read something into it.

You say that it may be a Russian satellite,

and I wanna run cryptanalysis on it.

All right.

But you do anything

to embarrass this institution...

you're gonna spend the rest of your days...

teaching communication skills

to the penguins down there.

Thank you, John.

RESEARCH LAB, FALKLAND ISLAND

- What is that bloody thing?

- I don't know.

I'll record it and we'll pass it on

to the Yanks at Kitt Peak.

Maybe they'll know.

There's a transport ieaving

Edwards Air Force Base tonight.

Stops in Panama

and South Georgia Islands.

Then they'll decide

whether to go Rundell Peak...

- Why not?

- Antarctic weather at this time is bad...

- And sometimes you can't get in or out.

- Great.

Kitt PEAK OBSERVATORY

TUCSON, ARIZONA

- Where'd you get this?

- From a radio tech at the Falklands.

One of their satellites intercepted it

two days ago.

- Where is it originating from?

- Antarctic.

It was somewhere in the Ross Ice Shelf,

then it moved farther inland.

- Moved?

- That's what they said.

- What can be boosting it?

- Haven't a f***ing clue.

Let's pass it on to NASA.

Okay.

Here. You're going to need this.

The wheels are down and locked.

We're going in.

Gear's down and locked in place.

Let's lock it up.

We're coming in too hard.

I can't see a damn thing.

The lights, I see them.

We're right on top of it.

Welcome to the South Pole.

RUNDELL PEAK, ANTARCTICA

Mr. Rome.

I'm Nyla Wurtsen.

Getting here this time of year is difficult.

Surprised they let you fly in.

McMurdo weather grounded everything

an hour ago.

- They did?

- Yes, indefinitely.

- Here.

- No, I got it.

Sure? Hold on, let me take this.

- What's your name again?

- Nyla.

How far underground are we, Nyla?

About 20 meters. We're on the third level.

There are two more below us:

the genetic labs and the fields.

- What the hell is that?

- It's a glacier shift.

Happens all the time, Mr. Rome.

- It's safe, right?

- Yes, it's fine.

I'm going to take you to the living quarters.

Dr. Gierach is waiting for us there.

He thought you might want some rest

after the flight.

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