"You're welcome."

"What do I need to do?"

"I'm waiting until I've done enough interviews to know whether it's worth it to set up a class or just do individual tutoring."

"When will that be?"

"A little less than a month from now."

"All right."

They go through a few more interviews of various country and caste; an orange from Anitam and a purple from Tapa. A purple from Rivik and a grey from Evalee are rejected.

The next interviewee is a green from Voa. They're meeting at her dorm room; she's a university student, apparently.

Illia gets some gawkers on the way through the dorm but nobody bothers her.

The university student opens the door and--stares.

"...When they said the aliens looked like us that wasn't what I thought they meant."

...The looks were weird enough, but she sounds like Odette too.

"You bear a striking resemblance to my twin sister."

"That's funny, you bear a striking resemblance to mine. You even sound like her, modulo language and accent and so on."

"Same. And you said on your application you expected to have a strong Sympathy resistance--Odette has a phenomenal Sympathy resistance--"

"This is bizarre. Are you fucking with me."

"I'd ask you the same thing except that you have no way of finding out relevant things about us and mimicking them, whereas we are magic aliens who could plausibly do that. Uh. Regardless I promise I am not fucking with you?"

"...I'm not completely sure I believe you. It's a simpler explanation."

"Okay but this would be a pretty dumb way to fuck with you. I mean, surprising you with it sure, but if I was an asshole sister-imitating alien I would've fessed up when I got caught, by this point it'd have long since stopped being funny."

Giggle. "Granted. If I were important enough for it to be worth worming into my trust I'd have more reason to be suspicious but okay. Wow. Alien sister!"

"Alien sister!" Hug.

Hug. "Wow, you even hug like her, if there are aliens capable of mimicking her to that extent I am waaaaay too outclassed to be worrying about it."

"Fair. Also, wow, this makes the interview process waaaay easier."

"I guess it would!"

"Yeah. ...It's still hard to guess how being Amentan makes you different."

"I don't know enough about aliens to be able to begin to guess."

"Fair. Uh, we don't spring, we're fertile year-round and we mostly seem to feel like Amentans do when it's not spring. I mean, not exactly, but."

"...Well, that's one major difference. I spring pretty badly. I mean I've only done it twice but still."

"...I'm sorry to hear that."