"Hi," says Ranae. "Do, uh -"

"Quendi."

"Do Quendi shake hands?"

"Some do," he says, and shakes her hand.

Shake shake. "I'm Ranae. Ranae Swan. It's very nice to meet you."

"Welcome to our city, which is yet unnamed, and its world, which is also unnamed."

"We should really name those. In at least one language."

"Pax, probably, if it's going to be the main one spoken here."

"There's arguments for Pax and English and Davlian and Quenya. Not all humans in Materia speak Pax, not even a majority, although that's most of what we'll get if we start with my parents and go by word of mouth. English makes us an easier refuge for genetic engineers and other people who want to leave the Federation, which interests T'Mir. Davlian because by the numbers they're the most populous founding members of the Elendil. Quenya because we're sort of modeling it off Valinor Only Better."

"Genetic engineering seems the most important of those considerations."

"And nothing says people can't speak whatever they want for miscellaneous purposes, but English for official business - with translations generated - seems like a strong contender."

"What's a suitable English planet name? If we're playing up the refuge-for-engineers angle, perhaps?"

"I think English speakers don't like to name most things in English. Sometimes but not with common words. They like dead languages and stuff. Anyway, T'Mir would be a better generator of names than me, I'm still working on English."

"Fair enough." He smiles at Bella, at Bella's mother, then walks off.

Bella takes Ranae to introduce to T'Mir. It is moderately awkward. She makes Ranae a bungalow near her own and helps her unpack into it.

And Materia immigration slowly begins.

The Quendi dress up for the occasion. Hello, Starfleet away team. Does the Federation know yet how they get around?

We, too, brought our linguist. He looks like he's five but our species grows up really slowly. He speaks English just fine but would be happy to teach your linguist Quenya, or if she speaks other Federation languages he's only had the chance to learn about fifty of them.

Fëanáro is happily explaining Quenya and Pax and Davlian and everything else he's been trying to pick up since his home world made contact with Davlia - he knows not to say 'since I developed planar shifting' - and no not all Quendi pick up languages as fast as him but most of them are pretty fast at it, they have excellent memories. He's nearly a hundred and twenty one Earth years but yes, by the standards of his people he's a kid.

He's mostly been listening to sound samples and learning ones that are pretty but he's also been trying to learn ones that the Elendil might need.

The linguist's personal opinion is that the prettiest language is Japanese.