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We use the dawn and long shadows before sunlight reach us to climb up the cliff above our hut, and we take that same hidden position in the shadow and behind vegetation up by the future lookout. We make sure we are fairly comfortable and that we can move around a bit or change spot or pee, and we have good view from the sea in the north west, over the ridge, to the high land and mountain in the east, and even see a bit of the valley and river to the south. We've brought water and food and will stay here all day and just sit and watch. Sure, this might be wasted time that could be sent on far better tasks, but it is as it is. It gives me time to think and plan as we just watch. We will definitely make a good path and stair up here, and connect the hut to the cliff work area.

This is the last day of the week, and the Star Fall showed that my vision implant work, and the damn alien bastards are just petty. So new visions can be given tomorrow, and although I still expect to not get one, it will be good to make a rough map tonight, and have Reiley help with it. She already understands the concept, but she need to help make the map as that is gathered knowledge and work done here, and it will cement how to read it. I might take reading a map to be dead simple, but that have to be taught. I just don't know if it is some accomplishment or, if our work so far will be enough.

Beside optics being a technology that should count, I would really want an old time pirate style telescopic monocular telescope, but that will be so hard to do. Melting sand with or without filtered ash to make glass in a crucible and furnace seems to work, and I've already made several crucible molds for rectangular windows that will be quite thick, as windows only need to let light in. But optical lenses are trickier and need better glass. Just melting glass to get rough pucks will be a start, but polishing it is gonna suck even if the glass will work as a lens. But I need Reiley to help with that too, for several obvious reasons. Glass doesn't really exist in her culture.

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Just sitting here and look, hour after hour, is just very very boring. The mind wanders. The eye wanders. Well, at least my mind does. Reiley seems more used to this. It's just been three hours but I'm bored as hell, and sitting here with the crossbow I can't help to want to play with it. I mean practise with it. I really want to try and use my new tools too. This might have been stupid and wasted time, since any smarter person would wait until dark to hope for the light to help them find that Star Fall. Just wandering around in the thick jungle and shrubbery on the ridges is kind of hopeless and a lot of work, and even spending a whole day will probably be quite fruitless. We hardly noticed the glowing light during the night. I also have a feeling that Star Fall was planned so we could notice it while we showered, as we're usually in the hut and can only see a tiny bit of the sky, and few others would have seen the light since it rained and was cloudy. Sure, the DAB's could have landed it closer, but they are petty bastards, and they might have a 'rule' about minimum distance or how easy it is to get to so that others are given a chance, and we did get the Star Fall on the same night that I made iron, so that might be another rule. Or they're just assholes that wanted us out in the rain and slipping on the rocks. This is the last day of the week, and if the DAB's really wanted the Star Fall to be noticed they could have made it fall tomorrow morning, when it's likely other chosen are out watching the Pillars of light.

A few rocks falling from the cliff above interrupt my thoughts and we lean back to avoid getting hit. "Nirojue!" What? A branch falls down with more rocks, and a big shadow falls in front of us, but wings spread out and we see a big bird swoop down and glide away from the cliff. We just stare as the huge bird circle back and it is... an angel?!

It is an angel looking person that looks back up at us and we here a weak repeat of 'Nirojue!' as she turns away and I glance at Reiley who is aiming her bow and tracking, but I stop her from shooting although I grab my crossbow and quickly load it. The angel makes a wide circle over the jungle ridge, but loop back around the cliff towards the flattish rocky area above our hut, and then do a graceful landing on a rock beside the steep path we took to get up here, and just stands there while quickly smoothing out her clothes and fixing her hair before trying to look regal and just looking up at us. She do some kind of large wavy gesture and shouts "Hello!" and it's again in Swedish, but with a weird and somewhat harsh accent?

What?

The angel person just stands there, completely in the open for all to see, and has greeted us and is looking up at us. And practically posing. And she came from the cliff above us. Well shit. I whisper to Reiley: "Instead of shouting and standing there in the open, we might as well climb down and introduce ourselves."

"I don't trust her! She tried to sneak up on us!"

"She did sneak up on us, but seem to have lost her footing."

"I will cover you as you get closer, but don't go too close and don't block my line of fire."

I sling the crossbow on my back and we climb down, and it's not that graceful, but the woman waits. I hope she is a woman as she seem to have breasts, but she also have wings, so big chest muscles should be important. As I get over my shock and look closer without staring, I would say she is about 150cm tall, and she is kind of ugly. Arms and legs feels unhealthy thin, but she have a disproportionately large chest and huge wings folded up behind her, and well; she plainly isn't a human woman with wings, and she do have grey-light blue feathers on the back of her head instead of hair, and her skin is light greyish with some blue-violet colouration. And she is dressed in some kind of swirling sparkling silver-green leotard with a bit of skirt, and she carry a knife on her hip in a belt. I really hope she isn't one of the damn alien bastards trying to be some kind of mentor. Reiley stay in the back with the lowered bow and stops about 10 meters from the woman and higher so she have a free line of fire, but I walk a couple of meters closer and introduce myself:

"Greetings."

I give a little bow on my head, while keeping my eyes on her. The woman bow back. Yeah, this is awkward.

"You can understand what I say?" The woman is slightly surprised or unsure, and there is a big lag from her mouth moving until I hear her voice.

"Yes, I can understand you. The Alien's - you might know them as Spirits - that brought us to this world have given us implants in our heads. I hear you speaking my language, and my companion her you speaking her language. You're likely to hear us speaking your language with different accents, and there will be a delay from my mouth moving until you hear our voices."

She seem relieved.

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"I am Xuela Yge no Zhara." She say that regally and proud like it should mean something to me while making that flourishing gesture. Xuela Yge something, yeah, at least remember Xuela. Xuela. Xuela.

"My name is Arne Svensson. My companion is Reiley of Clan Tomol."

"Hello to you."

"So, Xuela, how is your day?"

"I am Xuela Yge no Zhara, Consort to Triumvir Eigyl."

"Arne Svensson, King of Sweden." She do really weird head and eye movements.

"King?" Xuela gives me a haughty and disbelieving look. Why the hell do facial features and such even translate between species? But she is obviously not buying it.

"If I am or not, have no meaning since we are not on my planet, and if you never seen the planetary rings in the night sky before or the moons, we are not on your planet either, and hence who you are consort to doesn't matter, since you can spend the rest of your life travelling around here and never get back home. You might be the only one of your kind on this world. So, call me Arne."

"Arne. Call me Xuela." She makes a little bow, conceding to my point. She posingly stretch and continue: "I suggest an alliance."

"What kind of alliance?"

"This is a dangerous... world, and working together would be safer."

"Are you talking for yourself, or are you a messenger for a larger group?"

"I speak for myself."

"Then I agree that working together can be safer and more productive. Been long since you woke up here?"

"Yes." I stay silent and just look at her. "I've lost track of days, but I believe we woke up on the same day."

"And how do you know when I arrived here?"

"I had just woken up and was trying to find my way home when I saw you run down there. You had a strikingly pretty bright yellow and black jacket you took off."

Yeah, if she knows that she must have seen me, as I haven't really used that jacket since for obvious reasons. There is a much bigger lag when Xuela talks than Reiley, and there are large gaps between sentences, so I guess Xuela's language differs a heck of a lot from mine. Reiley did say that some people have more lag than others.

"So, Xuela, what have you been doing since?"

"Flying around trying to find my way home, or find more of my kind. But it is as you said, and I don't recognise anything, and there are very large and dangerous animals down there." She points toward the lower ground with a disgusted grimace.

"Reiley calls them Dragons, but my kind hade such animals tens or hundreds of millions years ago on my planet, so I call them Dinosaurs."

"Hundreds of million of years?" That same haughty and disbelieving look.

"Let me guess; you have a religion and worship gods, and that religion have a creation myth about how your world was created, and that timeline is, say, a few thousand years or so?"

"The worlds creation was 3437 years ago."

"Yeah, don't get aggressive or mad, but unless your religion truly explain what you've been experiencing the last 15 days with all the different people, planetary rings, moons or dinosaurs, you have to admit that belief is probably wrong on a few things." Xuela is quiet, but eventually gives me another small bow with some kind of hand gesture. "So, that alliance: What do you want out of it, and what do you bring to it?"

"I would like a house like the one you built below, on the top of that cliff over there, with a proper bed, furniture, pottery, water and food. I can fly around and scout. I don't do hard work, but I play music, sing, can sew and do embroidery."

And she knows about our home, and might have visited it. Shit. I knew that was a chance, but well, it is not nice to hear that. Flying people is a heck of a problem because they can move around without being hindered by Dinosaurs or terrain, and move damn fast too. And if there are more of the same kind, they would be able to easily link up and form a group that would be damn powerful. It would be very useful to have a flying scout, but at the same time Xuela seem subtle like a hammer and visible from far away. Although admittedly I hadn't really noticed her. And she clearly expect that we should just build her that home and get her food. She might know her value. Or the danger of not having her as an ally.

"I cannot speak for my companion, and Reiley, your free to speak up..." Reiley quickly signs 'Kill' out of sight from Xuela when I glance at her. "... but that is not acceptable to us. This is a harsh dangerous world and we all have to do what we can to help. Building that hut took a long time and was very gruelling work under dangerous conditions. You can't expect us to work long days for two weeks while you just wait and relax. Getting enough food each day will be an ongoing danger and work. You can not expect to just sit back and watch."

"I am very good at watching. I have excellent eyes."

"Let me guess; sight is a bit sharper than it used to be?" Yeah, she doesn't really have a good poker face. Which is good. "The Aliens - also known as Spirits - tweaked your eyes so they can give you special orange light visions." Oh, yes, she have one of those too. "Still, the fact remains. If we are going to have an alliance and you live beside us, you have to help with work when you can." She really doesn't like to hear that. "You have to help gather food and process food, and there is very limited options in food. What do you eat?"

"Meat, and some vegetables." There is a long pause before she gives me that haughty look and stretch into that pose. "I can take my offer to other people."

Shit. No really good signs, and I can't hide 'Kill' like Reiley did, so I just sign 'Be ready' and 'Attack' as discrete as I can. "Might I ask why you haven't? We're just two people, and you must have seen more attractive alliances."

"Some of those beings, are not even close to people. Others kill and plunder. Most live on the ground in wooden huts with vegetation roofs, in trees or in caves." That last part seem to really disgust her, but she does fly. "You live high on the side of a cliff in a proper home, wear proper clothes when not trying to hide, and I saw you rescue you companion. You seem to have a loving relationship even though you are not the same."

"You really have been watching haven't you?" I pretend to give up. "We will not give a definitive agreement, since there is a lot of details to go over, especially about the hut since I haven't even seen the spot you want, and you will help to build it. But I don't like standing out here in the open any more than I have too, since it is dangerous and you are very visible. We should sit down and work out the details, and we might as well do it in the hut over a meal since you know about it. Hungry?" I hold out my hand towards Xuela, and she just looks at it. "In my culture hospitality is important, and when greeting or a deal is made, you shake hands." Xuela looks at me a bit suspiciously, and looks at my hand. "You just take my hand in you right hand, we claps hands and shake it up and down twice, then let go." She can't weight more than 50kg, and she have hands with pretty much short nails and not claws, and her feet might be more bird like with claws, but those knees should limit her leg movements. I don't think she can fly with me hanging on at the front and choking her, and her powerful wing muscles shouldn't be able to reach me there. She might just try to fly and crash with me, but we can't let her leave. I would prefer to get information from her, but accept that we might have to kill.

"In my culture a guest should bring a gift, especially when an alliance agreement is made. I will come to your house at noon."

She quickly bow her head as she unfold her wings in a wingspan that must be 5 meters, and dive out over the jungle and glides away as she flaps her wings. I just look at Reiley who didn't shoot, and at the quickly disappearing Xuela that use the wind and thermals to gain air and height. Yeah, with those wings she is subtle like a hammer unless she is very high and harder to see. I guess that huge bird I've seen wasn't actually a bird. Or it was, and I've just missed Xuela. The sky have not been my biggest worry.

"Reiley, why didn't you shoot?!"

"You told me to wait!!"

"Didn't I sign 'Be ready' and 'Attack'?"

"NO!! This is 'Be ready'! You signed this which means 'Wait'! I though you meant to not attack her now!"

Some of the signs are quite close, and it's far from my only sign mistake.

"Shit. My mistake. We can just hope she comes back."

"But... then she will be our guest." Reiley's opinion is clear, and Reiley just had to have cultural traditions about that, didn't she? Shit. I look at my smart watch.

"Some cultures from my world have that tradition, others don't. There is also the issue about not bringing harm or danger to your hosts and so on."

"So, what do we do now?"

"Now we get the hell out of here. We might have a guest. Shit, we might have more unwelcomed guests if other people seen her or us, or if she lied about being alone. We need to prepare."

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