Being responsible journalists we undertook to investigate further and report back to our readers, all of whom are highly intelligent but some of whom are of a delicate and nervous disposition and perhaps easily alarmed. We have good news to report.
Professor Kirk Picard, of the University of Southern California's Trekkytrivia Department has spent the past year analysing the message in the context of all historical precedent and has published his findings.
It seems that what had been taken on its face to be a declaration of war was actually a Klingon love song. Apparently what passes for romance in Klingon society resembles world champion wrestling.
The Professor said that the difficulty of distinguishing Klingon love songs and poems from declarations of war had long been recognised and misinterpretations had in fact been responsible for most of the civil wars which had bedevilled the Klingon Empire for thousands of years.
The present case was complicated by the fact that “neighbouring galaxies” happens to be the Klingon colloquial terminology for certain prominent features of Klingon female anatomy and to really make things murky indeed, it seems that the song was dedicated by one male Klingon to another male Klingon.
As any undergraduate student of Trekkytrivia can tell you, in such a context a love song usually provokes a declaration of war in reply.
Although the message came from the direction of the Virgo cluster, this was just a line of sight illusion as the message actually came from an interposed space vessel a mere 478 light years away.
Any declaration of war by way of reply has not yet been received on our planet, so the message may well be directed the other way - towards the Virgo cluster, where, if received, it may well cause alarm and confusion in a little less than 43 million years. Let us hope our galaxy does not get blamed for all this.
Senator Head has been informed and is alert but no longer alarmed.