- The Control Voice: There is the silence of the oceans and the unending silence of space. There is the welcome silence of serenity and the everlasting silence of death. A cry for help is lost in the shrill noise of the world, but the faintest of whispers, when spoken in silence, can resonate across a universe.
A deaf woman's cochlear implant causes her to hear a strange alien message.
- The Control Voice: There is no sound, no voice, no cry in all the world that can be heard... until someone listens.
"You could be receiving a trope from another world":
- Almighty Janitor: A janitor reveals that he used to be an astrophysicist before he was fired for mental problems, and uses his expertise to save the day.
- Distress Call: Jennifer Winter, who is deaf, begins to hear strange noises after having a revolutionary cochlear implant installed. Although many other people including her husband Sam believe that they are nothing more than hallucinations, she and the hospital janitor / former NASA scientist Robert Vitale eventually determine that she is receiving an alien message in binary. More specifically, it is a distress call featuring instructions on how to build a high energy laser beam which can redirect the aliens' ship, which is hurtling towards The Sun.
- Solar Sail: The alien ship which contacts Jennifer Winter through her cochlear implant is powered by a solar sail.
