After discovering a mysterious alien artifact on the Moon, human astronauts endeavor to uncover its purpose and message from an extraterrestrial civilization.

The asteroid work crews don't have much to do but tell tall tales to each other. One man tells a particularly riveting account of an expedition where he met a strange parasitic species that inhabits human bodies and barely escaped unscathed—or did he?

Aboard a human city ship headed for Proxima b, shadows begin to haunt the sleeping passengers. An engineer commits suicide, and a psychotherapist finds that these apparitions feed on human guilt. The only way to survive is to master and confront the mounds of guilt that each human passenger carries inside herself.

In the near future, a young mother leaves behind a book for her daughter before she embarks on her space journey to the outer solar system in an attempt to communicate with extraterrestrial creatures. Sections from her book are interspersed with her husband's verbal recollections of their love story, which he addresses to their young daughter.

A young alien scientist joins forces with other archaeologists to uncover the secrets of a race that died out many years ago.

A group of alien archaeologists explores the Olduvai Gorge in Africa to learn about humanity, an extinct race. However, as they begin investigating artifacts, they discover that everything they knew about humans is entirely wrong.

All across the contemporary world, space whales are falling from the sky. They seem to be trying to deliver a message to the Earth — but as an American grassroots movement attempts to communicate with these creatures, it will face challenges from the government as well as the possible dangers of interacting with these interstellar beings.

When an alien spaceship lands on Earth in need of help, leaders of countries around the world help and house them, causing tension between humans and these costly guests.

A catalog of the tools different alien species use to read and write, leading to fundamental questions about what it means to make patterns of knowledge against the noise of the universe.

Aliens visit Earth in the near future to select a single work of art to represent all of humanity, but the artwork they choose shocks the world.