Within ten thousand years, the planet became an intense emitter of radio waves from TV, radar. Then the First Expedition. “Might be useful idea,” Zuminski said, and got up to change clothes.

She sat rigid in her chair. Follow your nose, her mother had told her. Go after what smells right.

She began speaking an email for Earthside.

“Before we go in,” Rachel said to Zuminski, “let’s have a strategy.”

They were outside Hassan’s office, which for some reason was the largest in the habitat. What was that military saying? Rank has its privileges.

Zuminski said, “Tell Fraq the truth. That often disarms people.”

“Fraq isn’t people. I’ve never really understood him.”

“Honesty may be a startling approach, then.”

They went in, and there was Fraq with his translator. They went through the ritual greetings Fraq expected. This took over ten minutes, including a strut-dance Rachel had to do, awkwardly—she had learned it for fun on the Aldrin. Rachel studied the alien as he sat beside Xiaoling, trying to read the shadowy yet golden eyes like rounded rectangles. His nose was a large, protruding cone between the eyes, flaring as he spoke in his chirps and singsong lines. He wore clothes of a greenish hue here and sat like an elegant human, shoulders back. The hands were four-fingered with retractable talons. They moved in an oddly multijointed way as Fraq made rapid gestures, uttering his gravel sentences. He turned his head in elaborate arcs, and then sat absolutely still, like the large, watchful predator he was.

Rachel gazed into the unreadable glittering depths of his eyes—which swiveled to follow her. She was fidgeting; she stilled herself.

Silence was one of the ways to deal with the Ythri, she had discovered. She had learned to resist temptations the media folk did not, as they raptly responded to his tidbits of alien philosophy.

Rachel decided to begin by shaking up the alien. “We found your child.”

But Fraq barely registered surprise, eyes narrowing and his slit mouth tightening. “How.” He used Anglish better now.

“By accident,” Rachel said.

“In my kind this is private matter.”

“We appreciate that. You did not tell us of it, so it was a surprise.”

“Private.”

Rachel said sympathetically, “Yes, but hiding it away like that endangered it.”

Now Fraq’s mouth twitched and she glimpsed his yellow teeth, incisors front. He had learned to hide his emotions, but now he was losing his steely grip.

“Was… best place.”

“Perhaps so, but now that it is out in the open, we can all take care not to harm it.”

“That would be good.” Fraq attempted a strange parody of a human smile. “I am sorry if my, our ways offend your kind.”

Hassan frowned, grimaced, said, “I don’t follow this. You two were concealing this information, weren’t you?”

Rachel said, “Yes, while we tried to understand it.”

“We?” Hassan pressed.

“Zuminski and I.”

Hassan said, “This issue is enormous—far beyond your learning and capabilities. Neither of you is a Mars-trained biologist.”