They walked on in silence. After a while he thought it safe to continue. He touched his antennae with a truhand. “Other things, too. You people smell not good.”

The smaller monster made the gesture of apology, without adding degree.

“Not your fault,” said Ryo.

“You,” she replied, “smell not like little Thranx kind all history trouble our people. You smell very good.” She halted, drew in the mud. Ryo did not recognize the species, but the flower outline was unmistakable. “Like that.”

“Your color also,” the he-monster added. “Very pretty.”

“Thank you,” he replied. “Your colors not so pretty but not so bad as your smell.”

“Your feel …” The smaller monster reached out slowly. Ryo flinched, forced himself to hold his ground. He’d touched them while demonstrating proper gestures, but neither of them had touched him since Loo had clamped five massive fingers around Ryo’s mandibles.

“Just want to touch,” Bonnie said.

Feeling like a museum exhibit, Ryo stood motionless while the monster ran its fingers under the byorlesnath fur and along his body.

“My turn now,” he said.

The monster opened its clothing, exposing itself to the air. The sight made Ryo shudder, and he had to remind himself of the creature’s extraordinary tolerance for cold. He ran a delicate truhand along the exposed surface, wondering how closely their bodily divisions and internal organs would match up. Too much botany, he told himself, and not enough zoology. Though alien design would not necessarily conform to similar Willow-wane shapes, he reminded himself.

The most remarkable thing about the body was its flexibility. He pressed in lightly. The monster did not complain or pull away. Fascinated, he watched the tip of his finger sink into the flesh. When he pulled his hand away the covering sprang back.

Such a reaction was normal for plastics and artificial fibers. On the exterior of a living creature it was stomach-turning. He pressed again, a little firmer. The exoderm changed color slightly. He could even see bodily fluids moving beneath it. Utterly remarkable, he thought. The more so when one realized that the beings inhabiting that thin envelope were intelligent.

“Strange, so strange,” he murmured. “Skeleton inside, flesh outside.”

“We find you same,” Bonnie said. “Skeleton outside, flesh inside. Very different.”

“Yes,” he agreed, “very different.”

The monsters ate three times a day instead of twice. As they were finishing their odd midday meal Ryo thought to ask a question that had been lost in the excitement of mutual education.

“Where are you going? What are you going to do?”

They looked at each other. “I do not know, Ryo,” Loo said. “We thought you were those who had attacked our ship. We thought you enemies. We were treated like prisoners.”

“Remember,” Ryo reminded them, “my people think you are allies of the AAnn. How then should they treat you but as enemies?”