The Tindrel and Qalian-Vosh delegations were both impressive, considering the short notice. Supreme leaders were conspicuously absent on both sides. But Outremer’s civil service identified a senior official from each homeworld, each species’ administrator in charge of operations in Psi-Helios and their ambassadors to Outremer and Rothia.

It was well documented that the Tindrel carapace and wing-sets adapted in colour and texture to blend with their environment over time. So inevitably they came to be scrutinised at diplomatic gatherings such as these, to understand more about where and what each of them was doing. Sometimes the Tindrel wore their colours with pride, however in this meeting most wore obfuscating jackets which left just their saddle-shaped heads and half dozen eyes visible. The few which didn’t had obviously been in space for a long time because they were green-grey; the colour of the inside of their spacecraft.

The Qalian-Vosh floated and swam about, but the hologram always kept track and steady. Only slight movements in the background were perceptible; those too had been obfuscated. Their slick, semi-translucent bodies pulsed with colours that reflected both their position within the society and their overall mood.

“Welcome. Thank you for joining us. We appreciate this is an irregular summit, but recent developments require us to move quickly.” Joao Sequiera began. 

“We strongly object to [i]their[/i] presence here. Tindrel must accept our supervision of the system.” The QV administrator said. Without the translator, their speech would sound like a softly bubbling mountain spring.

“Bwaa! Qalian-Vosh aggression will not be tolerated! We were there first.” The Tindrel administrator squawked.