The two men were called Marius and Deep. They were both tall tall, taller than any other man there, I reckon, and a whole head taller than most. Deep was the tallest of the two and he was smiley and friendly, reaching out all the time to shake people’s hands or pat them on the shoulder. He said hello to Fox and Candy and ruffled their hair. Fox just stood there, staring up at him, stuck to the spot, with the wind blowing in and out of his little nostrils, but Candy ran back to me and buried her face in my wrap. And when Deep tried to tickle Metty under his chin, Metty began to cry. I guess that tall Earth man must have looked pretty scary to my little boy. It wasn’t just that he was so big. His skin was pale pale too, like no one we’d ever seen. The story went round the clearing for a while that he was Tommy Schneider, our father, who the old stories tell us was white.

Marius was shyer. He did his best to be friendly too, but he looked like he’d prefer to be alone, and he didn’t even try to talk to the kids. His face was less strange to look at than Deep’s, though, because it was yellowy-brown like ours. Everyone kept saying that Marius and Deep’s faces were as smooth as women’s, but they weren’t really, not when you saw them close. They did actually have beards, even in that first waking, but they were thin thin, with short short hairs that barely came above the skin. Like Gaia the two of them had white white teeth without a single gap. All three did their best to smile as the people round them cheered, and shouted, and sang ‘Come Tree Road’, and ‘Show Me the Way Home’, and ‘Swing Low Sweet Cheery Oh’. Gaia and Deep also tried to wave and show an interest when, from time to time, more new people arrived in the clearing, full of trouble and fear, only to find out what was happening and begin to shriek and sob. But all three of the Earth people, I could see, were tired tired tired. Sometimes Marius’s head would droop and his eyes would begin to close, and then he’d wake again with a jolt.