How did rocky see the hail mary on first contact?

In the vacuum of space, sound can't travel, so how did rocky first send out the information about Erid or even know what the hail mary and Ryland looked like for the "puppet shows". Also how did they not have the whole "man on a horse is the same animal", if rocky doesn't know what humans look like and he only ever saw Ryland with a suit on prior to talking to him?