Puzzles

Throughout 35 Below, there were a several audio puzzles whose solutions revealed elements of the story. The full solutions to these puzzles may be found below.

UKPK1 CQD

The signal was a 50 baud teletype transmitted in the MTK-2 / KOI-7 text encoding. This mode and encoding are typical of the real Soviet Union.

When the message is recieved by an English teletype machine set to 50 baud, it is decoded like this:

WOQ 1 18/11 1723
SRO:NAQ MSG
RAZBILSQ NA PLANETE. NEWOZMOVNO WYJTI NA ORBITU.
FAUNA WRAGI. NAVA POZICIQ 40.714 S 006 Z
II
CQD CQD CQD CQD
UNW UNW DE UKPK1 UK
SR NOWYJ-MIR /291 1 18/11 1723
SRO:NAQ MSG
RALSQ NA PLANETE. NEWOZMOVNO WYJTI NA ORBITU.
FAUNA WRAGI. NAVA POZICIQ 40.714 S 74.006 Z
I I
CQD CQD CQD CQD
UNW UNW DE UKPK1 UKYJ-.84 /291 1 18/11 1723
SRO:NAQ MSG
RAZBILSQE. NEWOZMOVNO WYJTI NA ORBITU.
FAUNA WRAGI. NAVA POZICIQ 40.714 S 74.006 Z
I I

Cyrillic glyphs in KOI-7 align with their cognates in the Latin alphabet. For example, “И” sounds like the Latin letter “I”, so it replaces it in KOI-7 compared to Standard Baudot.

When decoded properly in KOI-7, the message is:

CQD CQD CQD CQD
УНВ УНВ DE УКПК1 УК
ср новый-мир /291 1 18/11 1723
срочная мсг
раблся на планете. невозможно выйти на орбиту.
фауна враги. нажа позиция 40.714 с 74.006 з

This message is a common Soviet Naval format which includes the source, sequence number, amount of messages and date of transmission.
Translating the radio jargon and the Russian to English, the message is:

All Stations, This is a Distress Call.
My name is УКПК1 I’m trying to reach УНВ
Source: “Noviy Mir” Block #291 with 1 message.
From the 18th day of November at 17:23
URGENT MESSAGE
Crashed on planet. We cannot get back into orbit.
Fauna is hostile. Our position is 40.714 South, 74.006 West

The message repeats, over and over.

NS1NT957

The signal was bursts of 300-baud Bell 103 teletype signal. As the ship approached the light-speed object, the signal distorts until it completely degrades and is lost after impact.

NAM: NSS VICS PRIDE
REG: NANOTRASEN CORPORATION
NAT: SOL EARTH US-NY SENECA
TIM: 2025-12-11T15:00:00Z
CAP: AUTOMATED VESSEL
NUM: 555244
END IFF
START LOG
AUTOMATED CAPTAIN IN COMMAND-NO CHANGES SINCE LAST LOG.
71 CREW ALIVE OF 75. ALL SYSTEMS OPERATIONAL.
SHIP VECTOR CONSTANT EXPECT TO MEET RZ ON 2025-01-29.
CABIN ENVIRONMENT GREEN. CARGO ENVIRONMENT GREEN.
POSITION CONFIRMED BY REFERENCE POINT. ALL OK.
END LOG

2nd

NAM: NSS VICS PRIDE
REG: NANOTRASEN CORPORATION
NAT: SOL EARTH US-NY SENECA
TIM: 2025-12-11T15:01:00Z
CAP: AUTOMATED VESSEL
NUM: 555245
END IFF
START LOG
AUTOMATED CAPTAIN IN COMMAND-NO CHANGES SINCE LAST LOG.
71 CREW ALIVE OF 75. ALL SYSTEMS OPERATIONAL.
SHIP VECTOR CONSTANT EXPECT TO MEET RZ ON 2025-01-29.
CABIN ENVIRONMENT GREEN. CARGO ENVIRONMENT GREEN.
POSITION CONFIRMED BY REFERENCE POINT. ALL OK.
END LOG

3rd

NAM: NSS VICS PRIDE
REG: NANOTRASEN CORPORATION
NAT: SOL EARTH US-NY SENECA
TIM: 2025-12-11T15:02:00Z
CAP: AUTOMATED VESSEL
NUM: 555246
END IFF
START LOG
AUTOMATED CAPTAIN IN COMMAND-NO CHANGES SINCE LAST LOG.
71 CREW ALIVE OF 75. ALL SYSTEMS OPERATIONAL.
SHIP VECTOR CONSTANT EXPECT TO MEET RZ ON 2025-01-29.
CABIN ENVIRONMENT GREEN. CARGO ENVIRONMENT GREEN.
POSITION CONFIRMED BY REFERENCE POINT. ALL OK.
END LOG

4th

NAM: NSS VICS PRIDE
REG: NANOTRASEN CORPORATION
NAT: SOL EARTH US-NY SENECA
TIM: 2025-12-11T15:02:45Z
CAP: AUTOMATED VESSEL
NUM: 555247
END IFF
START LOG
AUTOMATED CAPTAIN IN COMMAND-NEW LOG
71 CREW ALIVE OF 75. ALL SYSTEMS OPERATIONAL.
SHIP VECTOR DEVIATION 1 M/S 31 DEG STARBOARD
CAUSE: GRAVITATIONAL ANOMALY DETECTED
31 DEG STARBOARD ESTIMATED MASS .24% EARTHS.
CALCULATING MICROWAVE SONAR SWEEP 30 to 32 DEG.
FUEL MUST BE EXPENDED TO RECOVER RZ TRAJECTORY.
END LOG

5th

NAM: NSS VICS PRIDE
REG: NANOTRASEN CORPORATION
NAT: SOL EARTH US-NY SENECA
TIM: 2025-12-11T15:04:02Z
CAP: AUTOMATED VESSEL
NUM: 555248
END IFF
START LOG
AUTOMATED CAPTAIN IN COMMAND-NEW LOG.
71 CREW ALIVE OF 75. YELLOW CONDITIONS.
SHIP VECTOR DEVIATION INCREASING TO 2 M/S.
MICROWAVE SONAR DETECTED NEW OBJECT
EXTREME DOPPLER SHIFT PREVENTS ANALYSIS.
OBJECT SPEED ESTIMATE >10 MILLION KM/H
ON APPROACH VECTOR. ENGINES FIRED TO
ESCAPE GRAVITY WELL.
END LOG.

6th

START IFF
NAM: NSS VICS PRIDE
REG: NANOTRASEN CORPORATION
NAT: SOL EARTH US-NY SENECA
TIM: 2025-12-11T15:07:02Z
CAP: NT-AI REPL
NUM: 555249
END IFF
START LOG
NT CORE "REPL" ASSUMES COMMAND FOR EMERGENCY.
NEAR-LIGHT-SPEED OBJECT APPROACHING VESSEL.
EVASIVE ACTION INSUFFICIENT, GRAVITY WILL
FLATTEN VESSEL. EXPECT TO LOSE ALL HANDS.
ESTIMATED TIME OF EVENT ONE MINUTE.
FLIGHT RECORDERS JETTISONED.
TRANSMITTING FULL STATION LOG BACK HOME.
WE WILL NOT MAKE THE RZ. GOOD LUCK.
END LOG
BEGIN CRYPTOGRAM NT10 FULL SHIP LOG NSS VICS PRIDE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 *garbled data afterwards*