The Transmission

The studio lights blazed with the intensity of a dying star, casting harsh shadows across Monica Klass’s angular face as she adjusted her neural interface headset. The quantum-encrypted signal from the Zephyrian mothership orbiting Luna crackled through the dimensional fold communicator—a technology that had arrived with their “generous” first contact package six months ago.

“We’re live in thirty seconds,” whispered her producer, a nervous man whose cybernetic eye twitched compulsively. The Global Broadcasting Consortium had paid seventeen billion credits for exclusive rights to this interview, and every government on Earth was watching. Waiting. Hoping their journalist would ask the right questions.

Monica knew better. She’d spent three decades exposing corporate lies, governmental deceptions, and the small cruelties that powerful beings inflicted on the powerless. Aliens, she suspected, would be no different.

The transmission stabilized, revealing Overlord Zyx-9 in all his crystalline glory—a being that looked like a living prism, refracting light into impossible colors that made viewers’ retinas ache. His voice emerged from speakers as a harmonious chord that somehow formed words.

“Greetings, Earth-creature Klass. I am pleased to commune with your species once more.”

“Cut the diplomatic bullshit,” Monica said, her enhanced vocal cords carrying every syllable with razor precision. “Let’s talk about your ‘gift economy.’ You arrive here offering miraculous technology—fusion reactors, consciousness uploaders, matter replicators—all free of charge. In my experience, when someone offers you everything for nothing, they’re planning to take something you didn’t know you had.”

The alien’s prismatic form shifted, colors darkening to crimson and violet. “Your species possesses a unique… quality that we value greatly.”

“Which is?”

A pause. The quantum static grew louder, as if reality itself was grinding its teeth.

“Your capacity for self-destruction coupled with your irrational hope for survival. It creates a… flavor of consciousness that we find… nutritious.”

Monica’s blood chilled, but her voice remained steady. “Nutritious how?”

“Your wars, your environmental collapse, your political chaos—all while clinging desperately to dreams of transcendence. When a species reaches this particular psychic frequency, their collective consciousness becomes a delicacy among the Consortium of Harvesting Worlds.”

The studio fell silent except for the hum of recording equipment and someone’s sharp intake of breath.

“So you’re not here to uplift humanity. You’re here to… eat us?”

“Not your flesh, Earth-creature. Your despair. Your beautiful, exquisite despair mixed with stubborn hope. We have been cultivating this flavor across your planet for centuries. Your Shakespeare, your wars, your failed utopias—all seasoning for the feast to come.”

Monica leaned forward, her augmented eyes glinting. “And the technology you’re offering?”

“Accelerates the process. Your fusion reactors will power weapons that will make your conflicts more devastating. Your consciousness uploaders will trap your minds in digital hells we’ve designed. Your matter replicators will create abundance that breeds new forms of suffering. We are master chefs, Monica Vex. We know precisely how to prepare a world.”

The camera zoomed in on Monica’s face as she processed this revelation. In the control room, emergency protocols activated. Government hotlines lit up like Christmas trees. On social media, conspiracy theorists who had predicted exactly this scenario found themselves vindicated in the worst possible way.

“How long do we have?” Monica asked.

“The ripening is nearly complete. Perhaps two of your years before the final harvest begins. Do not despair, Earth-creature—your species will achieve a form of immortality. You will be remembered as the most delicious civilization in this quadrant of the galaxy.”

Monica smiled then, a expression that didn’t reach her cold eyes. “Just one more question, Your Crystalline Excellence.”

“Proceed.”

“How do you know I haven’t been broadcasting this conversation on every underground frequency, every resistance network, every black-market neural link on the planet for the last fifteen minutes?”

The alien’s form flickered, colors cycling rapidly through the spectrum. “What do you mean?”

“I mean that while the Global Broadcasting Consortium paid for exclusive rights to this interview, they didn’t pay for exclusive rights to my mouth. I’ve been running a parallel broadcast through my own networks since before you appeared on screen. Every word you’ve said is being uploaded to quantum storage banks in a dozen different star systems by my own technology—technology we reverse-engineered from your first ‘gifts’ six months ago.”

Static exploded across the transmission. When it cleared, Overlord Zyx-9 had changed, his prismatic beauty replaced by something angular and predatory.

“You cannot resist us, Earth-creature. We have harvested ten thousand worlds.”

“Maybe. But you’ve never harvested a world that knew what you were doing while you were doing it. You’ve never tried to eat a species that could bite back.”

The transmission cut to black.

In studios across Earth, emergency broadcasts began. But in the deep networks, in the hidden channels that governments couldn’t monitor and corporations couldn’t buy, a different message spread: Humanity had perhaps two years to prepare for a war unlike anything in their history.

Monica Vex removed her neural interface and looked directly into Camera One.

“This is Monica Vex, and you’ve just witnessed the most important interview in human history. The aliens aren’t here to save us. They’re here to eat us. But now we know what they are, and knowledge, as any good journalist will tell you, is the first step toward freedom.”

She paused, her smile sharp as broken glass.

“The next step is making them choke on us.”

The broadcast ended, but the real story was just beginning.