[ WP ] Humanity listens to the last 50 years of another civilization . 10,000 light years away .

The signals had finally ended. 
 
 Initially they came to us as barely decipherable audio. A strange whirring noise that took a long time to determine was a language. At first it sounded similar to the cosmic background radiation, barely distinguishable from all the other radio chatter. 
 
 Then the images came. 
 
 There were n't many who could see the images at first. So many people had moved to modern televisions that no longer broadcast the `` snow'' on their screens. It was the older generation TVs that picked up on the videos. This caused a huge rush to buy up old TV screens by the government. Scientists poured over the images being broadcast in between all the other channels. 
 
 They determined that the whirring was in fact an alien language, or at least the audible portion of it to us anyways. The signals had been broadcasting noises that were almost completely outside of normal human hearing. 
 
 The messages appeared to mostly be news segments. Scientists were able to decipher their language only after the videos came. We learned their language, recorded everything, and could determine that the broadcasts were updating us to their ultimate fate. 
 
 `` In what scientists are describing as perhaps the worst event to have ever struck the planet, a giant burst of gamma rays has destroyed the upper atmosphere, and our race will have only 50 years to deploy and build our Ark to the stars before the planet becomes uninhabitable.'' 
 
 For the next 50 years the signals updated scientists on the fate of the race, constantly updating the populace of the ark they were sending. Most of the human race felt so much sympathy for the alien travelers they began erecting monuments to their struggle. Artists created sculptures depicting the garish creatures, which looked like nothing you could have imagined. Humanity was united in its desire to help these future nomads. 
 
 The last signal ever received from the aliens depicted a map, from it we could determine they were roughly 10,000 light years away, and that they had finally completed their ark. It was a magnificent ship, able to house a small city's worth of inhabitants. It was to be a generational ship, the first aliens would never see their final destination. It was after this broadcast that the signals stopped. What was the ultimate fate of this ancient civilization? Did they make it? Where were they going? 
 Scientists poured over the data, but they did n't know where they ultimately ended up. 
 
 I woke up the following morning, and during my normal routine loaded up Reddit, and there were images of the ship plastered all over the front page. I assumed they were screen caps of the Final broadcast, but the backgrounds did n't quite make sense. 
 
 And there it was, the spaceship was in front of the fucking Moon!
