My optic lens zooms in on a few individuals in the army. My brain, now capable of processing information extremely rapidly, counts their numbers as around 3,000. They are covered head to toe in feathers except for their forearms, shins, hands, and feet, which seem to be covered in a dark bone, essentially identical in composition to the feet of a bird from Earth. Six of them carry a large box draped in thick, blue cloth.

"My bioscan indicates," says Franklin, "that these creatures, or Avors in this language, share approximately 14% of their DNA with the Corvus family, and the rest with Homo sapiens. A similar proportion can be found within the makeup of Kara's species, minus the Corvus, of course." I am about to ask Franklin a question, but he suddenly cuts me off and continues speaking. "I am detecting a recessive gene within all of the Avors under my bioscan. However, none of them seem to have manifested whatever change this gene incites. This is extremely odd, so I will run some simulations to determine what the gene does."

[RECALLING METHOD.ARTGROW...]

Okay... thanks, I guess?

The Avors are much quicker than they appear, and we are within speaking distance.

"Kneel!" Kara whispers to me sharply. "They have brought Astra!"

I attempt to get on one knee, but my body isn't exactly made for it, so I am unable to. The six Avors set down the large box-shaped object. Franklin speaks again. "I make the safe assumption that that is a sort of man-powered vehicle utilized by royalty to travel short distances, often through the cities or kingdoms they rule over. This leaves two possibilities: The first is that the Avors traveled multiple days, since my topological scans indicate the nearest largest city is about 200 miles away. This does not make sense, as they are most likely here because of you, and you've only been here about 7 hours." That can't be good. "The second possibility is that the Avors have a much more efficient digestion system than a human's, and they have much greater reserves of stamina accompanied by abnormally strong muscles. This would necessitate a very large appetite, however. I predict that this will lead to rapid evolutionary-"

Look, Franklin, you've done your job. You don't have to predict the entire future of their species for me.

"Understood. I do think you would like to know, however, that the Avor currently emerging from the vehicle has an active instance of the recessive gene mentioned earlier."

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This catches my attention, and I look up. Emerging from behind the drapes is another Avor. This one, however, has feathers of shiny gold. Her eyes scan over us until they land on me. She walks over, accompanied by several guards wielding spears. I recognize them as steel.

"Hello," she says, "I am Astra, goddess of the sky and stars." Kara and her hunting party keep their heads down, not daring to speak. I sense all of their heartrates have increased significantly.

Astra says something to the guards standing around her in a language not at all similar to Demisus. Franklin only takes a moment to decrypt their speech.

"...and make sure the rest don't follow us back."

"Follow you back where?"

Everyone among the Demisus and Avors look at me, shocked. "How did you learn this language?" Asks Astra. "Only our beaks are capable of making the sounds required to fluently use it."

"I'm not really sure myself."

Astra shrugs and walks over to Kara, placing her hand on her shoulder, now speaking Demisus again. "You knew the rules of our deal. You were supposed to bring anything that fell from the sky directly to me."

"Astra," starts Kara, her head still facing the ground, "I promise you, we were heading right to you. We were just cut off by Ret-Yas on our way here."

Astra stands up and looks at me. I gently nod. "What's that thing you just did with your head mean?" She asks.

"It means yes where I'm from... wait, both of our species kneel to show respect, but you don't know what a nod is?" I ask, perplexed. Astra looks confused.

"Lowering oneself before another is a universal sign of submission, as opposed to nodding which was developed by the culture of humans," says Franklin.

"Never mind that. Where are you taking me?"

"Personally, I'd love to have you all to myself for studying and questioning, but we have rules for this kind of thing."

This whole situation is absurd. They don't seem shocked at all; do things like my arrival on this planet happen to them often?

Franklin answers my rhetorical. "I cannot be 100% certain, but my topological scans of the planet reveal several large craters permeate in random areas. The only way I can explain this without making absurd statistical assumptions is that a nearby planet or moon was destroyed, and Ross-128b either attracted the already nearby fragments to its surface or its orbit took it through the rubble of the shattered planet. It also seems highly unlikely other spacefaring species have visited this planet."

Interesting.

"Alright, I'll go with you, but you have to answer some of my questions first." I turn to Kara. "I'll be back to visit soon enough." She looks down, and I can tell she is a mix of sad and fearful. And with that, I am led into the draped wooden box with Astra and we are carried away.