Dromie got up and bowed to that orange man. “King Goes, may I be a citizen of your kingdom, before we leave?” He shook all over.

His father bowed, too. “I would like to ask for all of us, before we go. Your kingdom hosted us.”

Goes bowed. “Eae. You are all now citizens of MarKu. I am very sorry you cannot stay, but I will send a diplomat to be stationed diplomat of your world.”

A young man came and bowed to King Goes. He had brown skin, like me! “I am happy to go with them, my liege! I am Lunares of Eae Funasah, and have nae family here.” Like me, he had kinky, soft black hair.

Waved for my hair to be in big curls. Since Dromie healed me, it was black, not gray, but I still looked old in my face. I earned those lines. Might as well enjoy a little tech before I go back there. Hoped we could bring food!

Goes hugged the man. “Eae Funasah! You were away, when Eriganh came?”

“Eae, Liege, on a mission to Zhea~. Nae knows me, here.” Poor fella looked sad.

“Will you be well, with nae kinsman near you? I wish to send a healer with you.”

“I will go with him.” A young orange man in white robes bowed, and Goes hugged him, too. “My family died on Pera, and I wish nae to stay here. Perhaps Father Of All brought me to Para today, because I visited Pera Prov and had much sorrow, nae to find a single relative. I am Songamar.”

Lunares hugged him. “If you lived on Pera, perhaps you teach me how to live in a barren place. This lady thinks of her world, and her daughter dreads for her mea to go there!”

Dromie’s Daddy took their hands. “We can make this world look like what you need. Now that we are citizens of MarKu, perhaps we can be a colony of it.”

Scared people were all far away from us. Even Gwen took Luna off the huge commons between all the jewel-like buildings. Goes ran to a lady with a giant platter of pastries and ran it back to us. “I will declare a festival in your honor today. We prepare a ship with more pastries and candies, and Earthan foods. Also, a server installation. You shall have a Hub. Many volunteered to supply Lady Aine.” A pretty amber ship, a saucer about the size of a van but round, landed on the Commons and people ran to it. Four people in blue uniforms walked to it and stood there.

Goes smiled. His brown curls waved in the flower-scented breeze. People kept bringing plants in clear globes to these men and they waved, and they vanished. Too many? “Lady, the plants are for your colony. There are many kinds for beauty, and food cultivation. You will have farms and a server for your needs, and to provide communication with your family.”

I smiled. We won’t be isolated, this time! Gave Dromie a hug.

He laid his head on my shoulder with a sigh. “Daddy, will you port us? I’m too tired.”

“Anything for you, son!” I blinked, and we all stood in our yard. That ship, and the four fellas, appeared in the street! They startled!

The purple fella with the sash laughed. “Oh, we’re here! Let me introduce my DS team! I am Fison Pinna, Diplomat Of Ka, Thorde, but you can call me Fis and this is Fis’ Team. Uh, I’m Thordes, and we’re the purple people in the Alliance. My world, Thorde, has tens of thousands of colonies. This is my Diplomat-In-Aid, Renapon, and he helps me explain things on missions. Any of us are glad to answer questions for you.

Renapon was a black Zheien who had blue-black skin and a short black afro. Bowed. “Berto asked us to come because you were thinking of your mother and she looks like me.”

I nodded and hugged him. If I said anything, I’d cry!

The next fella had fire-engine red skin and four fingers and toes. He did a kind of tap dance with fast rhythms and landed in a bow from the waist, looking at me with his brown eyes. “I am Wanminae, Hub Engineer of V’chsan, and I will be overseeing the hub installation. What shall we call your new Hub? We are in the Outer Siva, in the farthest star from it. Thorde is our nearest trading partner, but we are very remote.” He waved up a star map.

“Oh, I’m not an astronomer. That doesn’t look like the star chart I used to find Andromeda.” I sighed. My telescope and my star chart book were in Bubba’s apartment.

“You mean, this?” He waved and put it in my hands, open to the page with Andromeda Galaxy, nearest neighbor to the Milky Way Galaxy, ours. “We are still in the Milky Way, but in the part closest to Andromeda. Earth is here on the Orion Arm, and so is Alb. We are here. Thorde, here.” Each star he touched now had a faint red circle, as if the book publisher chose to include them. All the stars had blue circles for the Alliance and orange ones for the Unified.

Dromie’s Daddy carried him to a group of the green fellas looking through my telescope. “That’s Andromeda, what I’m named for! But, I think Aine should have our Hub named for her. What do you all think?”

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

They started a chorus of that screeching, but Dromie waved his arms in the air! “Granny doesn’t like that. We have to learn to speak softly, so she’ll like us.”

“I like all of you, anyway!” I didn’t talk loud, but they all stopped. Smiled at me with that foolish grin like Dromie has. I smiled back.

The last member of the DS team bowed to me. He had three fingers on each hand. “I am Lineopin, Biome Tech Of Ishah. When we go to a world that doesn’t allow tech, I carry the biomes for Wanmin. Since our work is automated, I’ll have a lot of free time. I just learned healing for Earthans, so if you need some, I’m happy to help.”

“I feel all right, but thanks!” Bless his heart. He didn’t smile as much as the other fellas. I shook his hand.

One of the green fellas came over. “I can break something, if you want to have work—”

“Na, please, you must na do this!” His blue eyes went dark!

“I won’t do anything. Just trying to be helpful. You sounded like you want to be useful. No one thinks I’m useful.” He gave a big, dramatic sigh like Luna would.

I picked him up and hugged him. “Luna’s not useful like an adult would be, but I love her anyway! You’re funny, like she is!”

“I am?” He giggled. “I need a name. We all do, for our Unified records!”

Wanmin smiled. “Well, we need to get to w—it’s installed? But I didn’t run any checks—I’m running them all, right now!” A complicated display came up. His red skin paled to white! “It’s installed, and connected! I’m sorry, Fis! Aine Server is now registered with the Alliance and the Unified! Can we do this, without a treaty?”

Now Fis looked frantic. “Neither government will accept it, and the Alliance already registered 3,643 complaints with your government, ah—what shall I call you?”

The fella holding Dromie set him down in the gray sand. Waved on a set of beetle green robes with gold trim and a crown. “I will call myself, Andy, King Of Eda. I hereby name our world Eda, so it has the other part of Andromeda’s name.”

All the green folks cheered! If half of ‘em were female, I couldn’t tell. They were all bald like Dromie, with the sharp ears, but each pair of ears were different. Some were sharp and long, like Dromie’s. His daddy’s were angled more like cat ears. His nose wasn’t as hooked.

Fis waved up a long document and modified certain words. “I am writing the treaty framework in Elshar. Is this acceptable?”

“Yes. We don’t have a written language. It’s mostly telepathic. But I understand all the languages of the Thirteen, and those of the Padrisa. Ry’nao fears that I misunderstand a lot. There is a difference between knowing words and sounds and knowing meanings. King Goes is good with meanings. I would like to learn from him, so I asked for citizenship. I would like our colony to be a MarKuan colony, and we will all be loyal to Goes, King Of MarKu, and to Ry’nao, Emperor Of the Thirteen. May we ask for clones of them, willing to teach us?”

Fis looked very uncomfortable. “I can ask—they agreed? Berto just asked me to ask you if you would all agree for clones of you to live here. I said yes! One of my cloned brothers agreed to move here, just now. All of yours will be offered a choice if you agree.

“Ren, what do you say?”

He frowned. “If one of my brothers wishes to come, I agree! What an opportunity, to have contact with such an advanced species!”

“Good, Rennie agreed to come here, and he will bring several friends he met in MarKu. Do they need skills? One is a cloned brother of an injured man, but he wants to come anyway. He doesn’t have his host’s diplomatic skills.” Fis looked at Andy The King.

Andy smiled. “I will welcome anyone who wants to come to our colony! We can practice speaking.”

Fis still looked worried. “Wanmin?”

“If any of my brothers think they’ll be happy here, I’ll agree. Inhamar tried several tutors, even a Zheien tutor, but he doesn’t think he can learn anything! Can I send him a holo?” Wanmin paused with one four-fingered hand in the air.

Fis took a step and planted his purple hand on Wanmin’s forehead. “Talk to him. My friend’s enjoying that festival in Fig and can bring his mind to you.”

Wanmin paled, but laughed! “Oh, my brother wants to come here! He’s one of Rennie’s friends, and he says if someone as impaired as Kopar can come here, he can come. Kopar weaves colorful tapestries, and he’s teaching Inha. I’ll miss him.” The happy smile dropped.

Andy put a hand on his shoulder. “I will need a diplomat from your place. I need ‘em from everywhere!”

“I’m not a diplomat. I’m a biome engineer—”

“I’ll make you a diplomat!” He laughed and waved a diplomat’s sash on his uniform! The one pin on it was a green copy of his face!

Fis struggled not to smirk! “I’m sorry, but the Alliance and Unified require a diplomat to be educated in an Education Service school.”

“Wanmin, you studied at Sigan Mas!”

“I failed my diplomatic challenge! That’s why I changed my major to Biomes!” He paled slightly gray from bright white!

Lineopin gasped and set him in the dust! “Wanmin, don’t think about it! Be calm.” The tri-fingered man hummed and lines vanished from Wanmin’s face. He turned dark pink.

“Teach me healing?” King Andy held up his hand.

With a look of sheer terror, Lineopin held Wanmin’s head against his chest and scooted back! “I don’t want to hurt your feelings, but you’re telepathy’s very strong! I feel it! If you try to touch my friend’s mind, you’ll injure him! I have to be extremely careful when I offer healing.” His eyes went black.

“Lin, he’s the ruler of this planet. We can’t offend him or he can take us to be his slave for half our lives!”