That sounds lonely to me!

This place is super crowded to me. Animals are decent company and almost never try to kill me. It's hard to imagine so many people at once all with different personalities.

Many of the many people are taking pictures of River. There isn't an explicit security perimeter being maintained, but there are a hell of a lot of greys around, many in uniform.

I don't think anyone here is going to try to kill you.

Well maybe some of you hate and fear aliens. That makes perfect sense to me.

HI!, she broadcasts to the crowd.

Everyone jumps, mostly with excitement. "HELLO!" exclaim a chorus of voices in reply, with scattered additions of "welcome to Amenta!" and "we're so glad to meet you!"

...I can't understand what everyone's saying all at once, she sends only to the helpful yellow. I'm listening to minds not sounds and it sounded excited but that's all I could tell. Loud! Also I think I forgot your name again.

Mostly they were just saying hello! I'm Shima Mahkemiken.

Mahkemiken. It's easier to remember job names, I think. Because they were chosen. I'll try to remember. I want to talk to people and see things, but not all at once!

All right, do you have an idea what you'd like to start with?

These people can ask me a question if I can ask one too! Just... Only one or two at a time.

Mahkemiken addresses the crowd; people fling up their hands, and she calls on a purple, who wants to know if River would like to try his restaurant's frybread.

'Fry' sounds good, 'bread' doesn't, but sure! Is restaurants how everyone gets food?

It's how lots of us get lots of our food, but some people cook for ourselves at home, says Mahkemiken. The purple says something. He also has other things, frybread's just his signature dish, he can get you fried chicken?

We maintain habitats and hunt. Sometimes we do fish farming.

It's not going to hurt me, and I want interesting stuff, and can get fried chicken other places. If a lot of people are going to offer me food because I'm exciting I'd better eat small portions, though!

You'll probably get lots of offers like that, yeah!

The purple fetches her a small frybread on a paper plate.

She tries to eat relatively neatly. It's about as much of a meal as a little rabbit, she could eat dozens of those, and it's interestingly crunchy! She bets chicken will be more popular with aliens if more visit, though. Who's got the next question?

Mahkemiken calls on a blue! The blue wants to know if the train agreed with her all right.

It was certainly faster than walking! It's like nothing I've ever used before. Would have been awful if I was crowded in. Probably Draak will mostly prefer to fly places instead of using trains if they can.

Might empty cars with extra room be a thing eventually if many Draak visit?

They might! says Mahkemiken. Probably not on every train, but maybe every few will have an empty car for Draak, or maybe they'll make dual purpose wheelchair access and Draak cars, or something.

Cities are really overwhelming I'm not sure we'll end up... Living side by side? I'm a weird curious Draak.

Next question?

This grey heard she's doing a concert, is that right?

Yep it'll be something like this-

She croons a single bar from the instrumental music and sends out an image of an alien turtle swimming through alien coral.

-For an hour, apparently. Tomorrow. Maybe less, hours are weird. And probably more than one concert!

Everyone is excited about that! Mahkemiken calls on a green who asks if she's making some deal with the musicians?

I don't know anything about that! I was just going to pick some I liked from what the music-taste thing showed me.

Mahkemiken checks her everything and says the artists will get subsidy kickbacks if they're Tapai and compensation under the international artistic collaboration protocol if they're not. Then she calls on another green who asks how long River's going to be in town.