Well that's concerning but it has lots of company.

"With assistance from the neural interface, though, you should be able to get your bearings here in a reasonable time-frame."

"Yes. Well before the enemy is at our gates."

Uh-huh.

"The doctor tells me that it will be difficult for you to speak at first. If you have any questions for me, and think you can communicate them with what you have access to right now, please do so." She gives Aly an encouraging look. "If not, you can reach me later, or consult any of the staff here at the hospital. I've instructed everyone here to be completely transparent with you."

Can she say "how" or "when" or anything like that?

If she was paying attention at the right point earlier, then she has 'how' but she does not have 'when'?

Nope, if the implant can't do it on her own she has not been sparing quite enough attention to vocabulary.

She mimes writing.

“Get this young woman something to write on,” Edith says to the doctor. “Actually, get her three things, in case the first two don’t work.”

The doctor leaves the room.

She returns with paper and pencil, plus a weird glowing pane of glass, plus a box full of multi-colored block letters.

This last item draws a raised eyebrow or two, but when the doctor says "From the Children's Wing" everybody nods like that explains everything.

All of these writing options get set out on the table in front of Aly.

Aly takes the paper and pencil and starts sketching out her vocabulary, trying to extract a complete alphabet.

This works pretty well. If she works from memory alone, she can get nearly two dozen letters.

If she uses the children's toy the doctor brought out as reference, she can get the full alphabet.

She knows intuitively what sounds all these letters make.

Okay, then she can get to work on actually memorizing that and all the words she has. She runs out of things to write down and looks hopefully at the assembled parties, who hopefully know how this thing works.

The doctor has never spoken any language but her own. The other two have not spoken any foreign language in a Large Number Of Millennia. Nobody present has much of a knack for linguistics/translation.

"Your interface is currently running on its least intrusive active setting." The doctor can comment on the technological options available, at least. "We were planning to wait a couple of days before activating the advanced interface elements, but we could try them on now if you asked--they can always be turned off again if you're overwhelmed."

Nod. "I - I -" She doesn't have verbs or anything anyone hasn't happened to say in any grammatical form other than nouns. Whatever they did to her she might as well get use out of it.

A pane of glowing glass gets touched.

"How are things now?"

More letters appear on the inside of her eyeballs. Not just definitions of things she's looking directly at, full-text real-time translation of anything said in earshot.

...Nod.

"Another advanced function: if you look at a word that doesn't make sense to you, and blink once with both eyes, it'll pull a definition of that word. Blink twice quickly to dismiss all definition screens."

(It might not be immediately obvious what the woman means by 'screens' but, hey, the word is right there in Aly's field of view and she could blink at it if she wanted to?)

What a good idea. Blink.

Screen (noun): an area on an electronic device--such as a communications interface, computer, or optical cybernetics--upon which images and data are displayed

Huh. Well. A lot of those words don't make sense either.

But, uh, said words are currently being displayed on a glowing rectangle that hovers near the word she just blinked on. So, uh, probably the rectangle containing the word-definition is the 'definition screen'?

She'll go a few definitions deep, having no more efficient way to learn things right now.

Electronic (adjective describing a device): having or operating with components such as microchips and transistors that control and direct electric currents.

Computer (noun): an electronic device which is capable of receiving information (data) in a particular form and of performing a sequence of operations in accordance with a predetermined but variable set of procedural instructions (program) to produce a result in the form of information or signals.

She encounters a bunch of words!

She could probably do this all day if she wanted to, and keep hitting new words!

Sanjana sits there quietly, making no move interrupt Aly's exploration.

She does pull out a glowing pane of glass (a screen?) and start tapping away at it, though.

(Edith gives her counterpart a look, but doesn't comment on Sanjana's actions)

Aly does not comment. She's still a little low on verbs and question words but maybe she can find them if she tries.