Fabienne Gschwind - Star Map

After all the carrots, Morchen cracked the whip.

"And woe to you if you plot anything against us. Then we'll have you turned into living sculptures!"

Humans could do nothing with this threat, and Kiki could only translate it literally. Whatever it was, it must have been something to be absolutely avoided.

And yet another condition was imposed: People had to learn the Squeltrem language as a top priority. Because the Chrismaxes distrusted the translation software. Of course, people also had to learn mathematical and scientific formulas and signs. For now, they were only allowed to stay on their ship and in the areas, they were shown.

Jay agreed on behalf of the crew and affirmed that they looked forward to a future together.

With that, everything was settled. There was another photo session, and over the next few hours, people had to make handprints on various items. This was the Squeltrems' form of autographing. And that they loved photos and selfies was clear even after the two days on the spaceship.

Finally, they came together in a small group. Two language instructors would teach the crew. The head of the research department was present. He wanted to look at the aliens and talk with them a bit to see which scientist would be best to work with. Also present was a representative from the technology department, this department included technical support and maintenance of all subspace drives and power. Not to be confused with the technical service that handled life support.

The nervous chief physician from yesterday was also present. He claimed great pride in taking care of the ET's health and promised to do everything he could to make them comfortable. Also in the room were a spy empath from Squlaira's department, two soldiers from Prial and three secretaries from Mantichal to record and summarize the conversations, and a group of psychologists and ethnologists.

The health issues were quickly resolved, and the people made it clear that they could cope with the environment, even if it was too hot for them. It was also confirmed that working the required seven hours each day would not be a problem.

However, Jay mentioned that they didn't need that much sleep and that it was possible to work a second shift. But everyone waved it off, that would be too much trouble, was the reason. Jay quickly added that a short break was needed within seven hours of work. After all, they would need to relieve themselves and have a drink.

This was firmly recorded in the minutes, and people were allowed to take a half-hour break but had to work a little longer before and after. For Chrismaxes it was important that everything had to be in order. Everything was written down and listed in triplicate and signed. It was strange for people to see such an advanced culture doing everything only handwritten with paper forms.

Then they were shown spreadsheets with Gantt charts, deadlines, and milestones.

The crew soon realized that Chrismaxes were absolute project management fans. Everything was written down and it was recorded exactly who had done what and how.

The shift ended in general satisfaction, and when Chrismaxes were happy and content, they took on a slightly greenish-white color. When the body color pulsated, it was always a sign of strong emotion. The crew had now also discovered that Chrismaxes had a sense of humor and that it was very similar to the human one; they laughed at the same things. When Maxmales laughed they made a clicking sound, Chrismales also rattled their ears.

With their arms full of language books, they walked back to the ship. This would be moved to another hangar on the next shift, which was right next to the research department. This made it easier to work together.

"This is coming along nicely," Nemo said with a grin as he set his stacks of books down on the dining room table. "I get along better with them than with other people... Except for you guys, of course, you're like my family." He smiled sheepishly.

But Jay clapped his hands together. "So, everyone has a drink and then we'll exercise. We definitely can't neglect that or we'll all waste away."

Joe laughed. "Yeah, not to mention their gravity plates suck even more than ours."

The rest of the day was spent scanning the language books, and Lex teamed up with Kiki to program language learning software. Humanity has made significant advances in teaching and learning. Learning had become much more efficient, and the first thing school children had to learn was what learning meant and how best to do it. The individualized curriculum, which was perfectly tailored to each student, also allowed everyone to learn in a brain-friendly way. Teachers were no longer called teachers, but learning coaches; their job was to help children learn. The actual teaching was done by designated experts or by a special teaching AI that contained all the knowledge of mankind.

The Squeltrem language was an extremely simplified artificial language. Grammar and spelling posed no problems. However, the pronunciation of the chants and the many grunts took some getting used to.

That evening at dinner, Milo had taken up a new hobby. With the help of translation software, he had already devoured an entire physics book and was giving his first Chrismaxian math lesson.

"And this is how the Hamilton operator is written. And the integrations are written down in the following way," he scratched at the blackboard, simultaneously blaspheming about the primitive subspace technique of the Chrismaxes.

Nemo interrupted him, "Sorry, Milo, could you start with basic arithmetic, you just jumped to differentials without going through addition and subtraction…".

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