"Huh. Does sitting on the front stoop work or are you going to roam campus or something?"

"The front stoop is fine as long as it's in the sun."

He looks out the window. "Should be. Tell me before you wander off, all right? In what sense are you a plant, what predictions can I make from knowing you are a plant?"

"The doctor said my cells had walls and I don't have a heartbeat and I have clear stuff instead of blood and it makes sense with not liking salt although he says there are carnivorous plants so the things I eat must be about something besides being a plant and it makes sense with the sun thing. Also my hair changed color, all at once, it faded to kinda light brownish. I borrowed some of Aitim's dye. The doctor said he would look up dyeing plants before the next time he came."

" - huh. A plant. You are an excellent plant. - also I had an idea of how we could learn your other language, want to try it while we sit outside?"

"Okay."

Out on the steps she plops.

"You recognized that you knew Tapap once I started speaking it. Do you remember how much speaking it that took? A word, a sentence? If I'd said 'no' in Tapap, just that, would that have done it?"

"...I don't remember exactly. I think a word or two. It might matter if it made any sense to say 'no'."

"Like, if I were saying that in response to a question instead of at random?"

"Yeah."

"Well. Do you want to ask me yes-or-no questions and I will respond with every phoneme I can think of and then if 'yes' or 'no' or 'maybe' or 'leave me alone' are one-syllable words in the mystery language we might hit on it?"

...giggle. "Okay. Um, is the sky blue."

He tries phonemes!!

She keeps coming up with questions.

And eventually he answers 'is up the opposite of down' incorrectly and she bursts out laughing and jabbers at him in a totally unAmentan language.

He makes an undignified gleeful whooping noise and then wants to learn her language.

Do they do the thing with the tokens in reverse now?

They can!!

This is an excellent excuse to throw tokens at her grandfather while narrating.

Her grandfather is so delighted with his granddaughter who is a plant.

Oh good.

Does the language share roots with any Amentan ones?

Maybe a tiny bit but not at all recently.

Weird!

Yup!

Afen takes detailed notes on the language. While he is doing this Lintalai's uncle Kefin comes home from school. 

"Lintalai is a plant," he says.