Then they will call down a suitably sized vehicle, and it will arrive about an hour later, and the greens will be equipped with very emphatic instructions on how to shower, translated redundantly to make really sure.

The soaps are pretty different from Sesati soap, though Sesati soapmaking is close enough that Elu has specific, concrete questions about the differences.

It's so much showering. Elu concludes she shouldn't ask whether the aliens showered like this before coming but one of the soldiers asks instead.

"For longer! On our land place thing we have better water tube things and can use more water. Before we got on our big vehicle we showered more than this to make so sure we brought nothing bad on the vehicle."

For some reason this seems to please the Sesatis.

Partway through the long shower ordeal Elu asks about etiquette for meeting the others.

"We have two names each. In this kind of meeting, you use the second name. We stand about this far apart," gesture between this green and the next one, "in our part of our land place thing but it is okay to stand farther. Please not shouting. Is that the thing you mean?"

"Yes, thank you."

"If you are more questions please ask! And questions about showering, also! And if it would help to watch that is also etiquette-yes."

"To watch what, conversations or showers?"

"Showers. We are all right to be watched showering if it helps."

Sure, why not.

They will demonstrate all the steps. They have humanish anatomy all the way down despite the weirdly androgynous builds.

Of course they do, the fair folk often do in stories. Not that anyone points that out to them. They shower.

Once everyone is totally clean, up they go! The view is amazing. The trip is a little nauseating but they have had longer to iterate on shuttles than on FTL so it's not that bad.

A couple of of them gawk. A lot. Most of them, including Elu, at least seem impressed.

And then they approach the big vehicle, which is frankly ludicrously huge. It's divided into a bunch of sections, radially symmetrical in three dimensions, and they slot right into the end of one. Once they're fully matched in momentum with the big ship the artificial gravity kicks in - the shuttle has some, on its own, but not a full g - and the hatch opens up and they can walk right in.

There's a constant background hum, fans and engines and pumps and all awhir, and the surfaces inside are gleamingly smooth and brightly lit, with alien writing on various bits of it and also several screens currently displaying various landscape photography. An alien with purple hair is just ahead of them in the hall, dry-mopping it in advance of their arrival, and nods to the party and speeds up a little.

"Welcome to the Venture!" says a voice, and around the corner comes - a blue! She beams at the visitors. "We're so glad to have you here!" She has a rectangle and earbuds like the greens do but appears to have practiced these two sentences enough to have them smooth. "I'm Sakasta Mashu."

"I'm Elu - our names are structured differently from yours and it's fine to call me Elu. I'm pleased to be here and to meet you."

"May I show you around the Venture?"

"We would be honored if you would."

So they can see this chunk of the ship! It has a galley and quarters and bathrooms and various technological doodads covered in blinkenlights and there's that view again and there's a cargo bay.

Elu chooses her compliments... oddly. What lovely color coordination in their quarters. What a simple yet elegant shape that technological thing is. Isn't that a lovely view, they have such good taste.

That is sort of strange! Perhaps while they are walking around they can probe for an explanation of their etiquette, in case she is willing to decode this at a bit of a remove where she won't explain directly.

Elu has a lot to say about etiquette. For example the use of status-marking pronouns and these five different honorifics and personal space under different circumstances and fundamental human rights like the right to have as weird a sleep schedule as you want.

It does not seem to be clear to her exactly why they're asking this now but she doesn't ask about it, just looks obviously bemused.

Well, none of that is about compliments but it's good to know anyway!

They brought up their hors d'oeuvres samples and can show the locals the lab they will use to look at them. The shuttle science equipment is way less comprehensive.

Elu would really, really like to see that. That sounds fascinating. She has lots of questions but, unlike soap, this isn't really something where Sesat's state of the art is such that her questions can be very specific. Just lots of variations on "how does that work?" and "why do you do that?"

One of the soldiers is also really obviously interested, but letting Elu ask the questions for now.

The greens are happy to explain, though the translation is not really up to most of the details. It's good for vocab elicitation, anyway.