I've got a list of names | Glowfic Constellation

Afen is disappointed in the universe. He bounds back and forth across his room explaining why to his wife, his infant granddaughter, the end table, and a reporter flabbergasted by her good luck and cringing silently against the wall in the hopes he won't remember she's there.

"There is no reason to suppose that a species evolving independently of Amentans, with their own evolutionary history and living mammalian species likely related to theirs, would end up looking like us. None. Every explanation every scientist has ventured to the press has been unimaginative and unconvincing retroactive refitting of bad models to baffling data. Aliens shouldn't look like us but with different hair colors. Aliens that are not made out of carbon at all would be unsurprising; aliens with only as much physiological dissimilarity as exists between us and animal species on our planet would be mildly surprising; aliens with opposable thumbs would be truly remarkable. This is not remarkable and biologically enlightening; this is just inconsistent with everything we understand about the universe. It doesn't teach us new things about evolution; it should make us rethink evolution. - don't quote that part, they'll take it out of context."

Reporter nods rapidly.

"All of that said, I've picked up three of the languages and I'm working on building a good machine translator, it's a challenge with as little as they've produced in the way of electronic records. I'm absolutely going there to meet them as soon as the politicians figure out what to do with themselves."

"Do you have any predictions about that?"

"About politics? Why would I have predictions about politics? They deliberately obscure relevant information, for one thing, and for another it's deathly boring."

"- I mean, sir, surely you hear from your son about -"

"I have seven children and some of them are very dense indeed but not quite dense enough to try to interest me in politics."

"I was referring to -"

"I know who you were referring to. If you want a statement from Aitim go bother Aitim."

"Thank you for your time."

"I did not alter my activities in response to your presence and therefore you can't yet be said to have wasted any of my time though you should go before you do."

...out skitters the reporter.

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"In the wilderness! So much wilderness!"

Peka Atan

touchme

"I hear the stars are great!"

They invite their grown-up kids and pack up their small kids!

Katin and Tiko will come and bring their new, fortunately orange-haired baby!

Fortunate! Off they go.

The city in Canada is beautiful! It's a little skyscraper pocket looking out on all that vast undisturbed forest.

Gosh, so much vast undisturbed forest. It's so foresty. Ana runs off to wander around in it.

Aitim comes to meet them at the end of the day.

"It's good to see you!"

(Ana has come back with a pine-sap-y wreath in her hair and commandeered her nephew by this time.) "You too!" says Elemi politely.

"There's a little creek down by the way where I think a lot of people like splashing around."

"Ooh."

And when kid is out of earshot - "so, the strangest thing happened. I'd make you guess but you won't guess, it's truly absurd."

Peka Atan

touchme

"Ummmmm, more aliens wouldn't even be that absurd... hmm..."

"There are a bunch of humans in Britain who look like us. My whole family, and there's a you-lookalike married to the Makell-lookalike and they have three kids named Catherine, Joanna, and Jeremy - don't look surprised, I have not yet gotten to the absurd part."

"How is that not the absurd part," asks Katin.

"By comparison with the next part! They call themselves 'wizards' and they are part of a secret underground magic-using human society. Which plays sports on flying broomsticks, brews magic potions in cauldrons, and attend a magical school called Hogwarts which is in Scotland and hidden from nonmagical eyes."

touchme

"What."

"I did say it was absurd!"

"How did you find out about this -"

"My double got annoyed about someone conquering his planet and came to find out who the obnoxious planet-conquerer in question was and then got distracted from abducting me by trying to convince me he really had no idea why we looked alike."

"I think the matching humans thing is weirder than the magic thing," says Ana.

"You think that because you read fantasy books," says Katin.

"I still think it."

"They are both weird but I'll confess it's the magic I've been dwelling on, it has a lot of strategic implications. One of them is that it needs to be very, very secret for now."

"Is that why you shooed Elemi?" asks Katin.

"Yes. - also, the wizards know all concerning family secrets, they are the source of that truth drug you may have heard about and took the opportunity to ask if there was anything I knew which they might want to."

"Oh," says Katin.