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The planet looks like an ideal spot for colonization from a distance. Covered with a range of biomes, from lush forest to long coastlines to roaring rivers. However, when the Amentans arrive they quickly notice anomalies on their scans.
A population of humanoids lives on the planet, scattered - sometimes individuals are spotted alone and other times they appear in groups of up to a few thousand. They appear similar to child Amentans, except for a general lack of bright hair colors. Civilization appears primitive - in some cases so primitive that it's confusing how they survive at all, with small groups managing to survive in environments as harsh arctic tundra huddled around campfires, in sandy villages in a desert with a single well. A small number of cities exist, most without obvious sources of sufficient food to support them.
As the Amentans investigate further they notice more anomalies of a far less consistent nature. There's an aurora in the northern hemisphere that shines continuously, day and night. One of the cities appear to change subtly in composition and position constantly, with no obvious construction visible. A group of the humanoids appear to live underwater, alongside a gigantic manta ray, hundreds of feet in breadth. A giant skeleton statue of green crystal seems to be moving. A blur of feathers and wings zooms across the planet like a missile at one point. Except for the humanoid species, none of the anomalies repeat.
These are just the anomalies they notice easily from orbit, more may be found on closer inspection.
It was really hard and took them a long time to figure out, yeah! If it's okay with the amaliens the research team would like to wrap up the things they were doing to study the Cryptophasia - they can keep the phone line open and talk about it while they do that, but preferably out of earshot of the landing team - so they can make a determination about whether they want to recommend using it for general communications with locals.
The poetry writing green notices a really elegant rhythmic scheme that lends itself towards writing a poem around staying to write pretty words and sing pretty songs with a friend.
Awwwww, the poetry linguist is fond of you too, Cryptophasia.
What will happen to this poem and all the other stuff they wrote down if they close the channel and the amaliens "keep" Cryptophasia?
They won't be able to understand it till they learn Cryptophasia again.
(Also in Cryptophasia the word "keep" doesn't exactly apply to the situation, more grammatically relevant would be "Cryptophasia stays with the Amaliens".)
(The more flowery poetic form actually has the subtler connotation "Crytophasia stays with friends such as the Amaliens and possibly including other friends".)
The Amaliens explain that the Aurorite is a smart monster and can't normally talk that easily but can learn Cryptophasia which can pay attention to other people who are speaking it and appear a way that passes messages between them.
The obvious construction of "Aurorite and Cryptophasia" uses a version of the word "and" that connotes occasional closeness of friends but not dependence or constant companionship.
Oh, okay. How many people can Cryptophasia be among at once? It seemed a little slower to respond when they all started working on it in parallel.
The term "language monster" is apparently an abbreviation for the longer phrase "language that only has a few attention threads to have relevant apparently reactive features with but can be learned by (excited happy inflection) a very large number of people as long as they are not very communication-wise distant".
It is apparently impossible to say the word "internet" in Cryptophasia in any way other than "INTERNET!!!!!!"
Okay! It wants the internet! The greens are hopeful that when everyone is convinced that it isn't dangerous to learn Cryptophasia it can have an internet and all the settlers here can learn it. There seems to be lots of space the amaliens aren't using, right? Would they like new neighbors?
Amaliens rhymes with "friends" but it's awkward to construct sentences which start with "Amaliens would definitely say".
The amalien girl with leaves in her hair opens her mouth to answer but closes it when the tired looking boy makes eye contact with her. He whispers something in her ear. She nods a few times.
"We can talk about that with you!"
"- uh, us specifically, no, we're linguists, but once everyone's calmed down about the Cryptophasia we can talk to the representatives of - our group of Amentans."
"I think we should probably talk with them. What sorta calming could we help with?"
He feels a bit awkward about being this cold to new people, but he knows that some amalien needs to be cautious and careful with things that might become scary and he's trying really hard at it because that's his job.
Fluffeld, who has been on this beach the whole time, is disappointed with the lack of attention he is getting. Belly rubs??
"- well the trouble is you can't talk to them because they don't want to learn Cryptophasia while they're still nervous, but it would help if you all taught the linguists who are down there in the camp more of your not- Cryptophasia language that's just a language and not magical."
Sure, this purple has nothing to do right now and will belly rub Fluffeld.
The girl with the wooden sword and mouse on her shoulder pipes up.
"Could we do that by saying things and then trans-lating them to Cryptophasia and then you could figure what the your-language is for that?"
