"Well, that'd be really great if I knew things about DNA but I don't."

"Hmmmmm." Dareni checks if Amentans seem to have bird-style WZ chromosomal sex determination because that'd be nice and convenient.

They do not.

"Well, I guess the best you can probably do is to hire someone to look at places where your DNA disagrees with your other DNA and try to guess if any of them are safe to make agree with each other. It probably won't work and will probably be a long, expensive project. I can look but I don't know about DNA either, the best I can do is compare it to mine and see if we're similar enough for knowing about local people's DNA to help much..."

"I don't see how that would even help - I guess it might make me less likely to get cancer?"

"It'd be a way to use your DNA to get different DNA."

"I think I have or at least am supposed to have the same DNA all over."

"My kind of people have two sets, one from each parent, and we can also sometimes have - a few small pieces that came from a sibling if our mother was pregnant with us both at the same... time..." Dareni checks whether Peka is diploid and whether she has any cells that seem like they could plausibly be the same species but genetically different. "...Uh. You would definitely know if you were pregnant right now, right?"

"Oh. Fuck."

"Not better than a clone, huh?"

"I'm sure the baby'll be lovely."

"We're gonna set up a ward on the house so no one else can just show up like that. So even if he follows you he won't follow you here. - Do I understand?"

"Yeah. I don't think he would. Even if he could. Which he can't. Probably."

"If you want a hug, you can have a hug."

"I'd take a hug." She holds out her arms.

Hugs seem to be about the same on this planet.

That's nice. It'd be so sad to be on a planet where they hadn't invented hugs.

"So. I guess this is a fine time to ask you what you need."

"Well, we should probably figure out if your food is going to poison me, I guess."

"Yes! What kind of things are your food on Amenta?"

"Uh, meat and grains and milk and eggs and fruits and vegetables?"

"You're so similar to us, it's really weird! We drink milk as babies too. And we can eat some meat and some grains and maybe all eggs and some fruits and some vegetables. And some other things that are like grains and - anyway, you can eat things and find out if they're good for you. That's grains." She gestures at the remaining oatmeal.

"Grownup Amentans can drink milk." She will, presuming it is obvious how, serve herself a taste of oatmeal.

"Huh! Why?"

"...well, why not? - we drink milk from farm animals mostly, not, like, people milk anymore after we're about a year old."