Derek Echevaro, a gifted mathematics student at the University of Cincinnati, is haunted by a childhood sight of a UFO. In 2017, a strange craft briefly appears over Cincinnati International Airport and plunges the ATC broadcast into electromagnetic interference. Initial cover stories point to a UAV, then a Gulfstream IV, but Derek’s calculations soon undermine the airport’s explanations. He decrypts the interference and concludes that the signal encodes the fine-structure constant in 14-digit chunks, a finding that reframes the mystery as a deliberate, language-like message rather than mere noise.
Derek’s obsession deepens when an unexplained executable appears on his computer, nudging him to reformat the interference into binary code. The pursuit of the truth begins to fracture his friendships and living situation, straining ties with his friends Lee and Natalie as his focus pulls him away from everyday life. The investigation catches the attention of Franklin Ahls, a senior official with the clandestine FBI Committee on Aerial Phenomena. Ahls is in Ohio with a team of scientists who are covertly monitoring the incident, convinced the message originates from at least an extraterrestrial Type 1 civilisation and could reveal humanity’s place in the cosmos.
Believing time is of the essence, Derek seeks help from his professor, Dr. Hendricks. Though wary at first, she collaborates on the problem, examining how the cell phone disruptions during the incursion relate to the broader signal. She eventually accepts that something crucial has been left out of the mathematical framework. During a lecture on eigenvalues and eigenvectors, Hendricks identifies the missing unit of measurement: 21 centimeters, the wavelength of neutral hydrogen, a key clue that could unlock the coordinates embedded in the message.
With the new insight, Derek borrows Lee’s car and heads to the coordinates, catching a brief glimpse of the UFO as it emits another signal before vanishing again. The sequence of events leads to a tense moment of detainment by armed operatives, after which he is released into the custody of Ahls. In the car, Ahls confirms that the operators embedded the fine-structure constant to forge a shared mathematical language, a step toward deciphering a common frame of reference.
Ahls warns that the message is more intricate than before and likely contains 3D coordinates pointing to the extraterrestrials’ location. He also conveys a hopeful revelation: humanity is not alone in the universe. With that sense of possibility, Ahls proposes recruiting Derek to help refine the FSC and ensure the computed position is precise enough to locate the visitors in space. The story unfolds as a careful blend of science, suspicion, and awe, inviting readers to consider what it means to communicate across vast distances using the universal language of numbers and constants, all while Derek weighs the cost to his relationships and his future.
