Nearly two years to the day of the last time Tobias had been seen in Yellowstone National Park, he stood nervously out on the field of the large Californian Army Training base he now called home. It was no Twenty-Nine-Palms or wherever, no secret meeting facility, but this particular meeting was still fairly hush-hush.

As he stood there in training fatigues, in the early hours before dawn, the cold morning air blew through his cropped blonde mess of hair, cold enough to put a chill up his spine. But it wasn’t for nothing. Three other forms approached, in the warmest gear they could find for such a task.

The rest of the base was dead asleep, as the lights approached from far above their heads. There was little time, but here there were no distractions; not at here, not at this hour. The ship approached slowly, descending with the practiced grace of an expert pilot, landing just after the four men had convened. Perfect timing, thanks to the army’s impeccable training style for keeping schedules.

“General, Major, Dr. Greaves,” Tobias greeted them with only a nod. At this hour, with the only three people who knew who he once was, there was no need for formality out here. They all nodded in turn as the alien vessel hissed just feet away from them, and a line of light began to appear from the top of a doorway, flooding the youngest of the four humans with memories of one very fateful night.

And for just a moment, it looked just like a younger Elfangor was coming out of the ship, towards them all. Just a moment. Then, Tobias smirked, and stepped forward, greeting his shorm.

Tobias! Aximili-Esgarroth-Isthil greeted broadly, actually going up and hugging him, something he’d picked up from the humans. Aximili had picked up several things from the humans, and as he aged, no matter where he was in space or on what planet, he wouldn’t forget them. Tobias hugged him back, briefly, before they all shuffled to attention, for the diplomat that Ax had brought along with him, for the deed.

May I present to you all our Electorate member in charge of Extra-Terrestrial Affairs, Jarron-Avind-Shammik, Ax introduced them, as the much older Andalite stepped out of the ship finally. His pose was regal and he had ‘no-nonsense’ written all over him…then again, that was one of those practiced Andalite grace things Tobias had seen many a time. Didn’t mean anything.

Jarron stood across from the humans once they were all on his ship, meeting in the center of the sizely fighter. His proud stance and demeanor never faultered, a true andalite warrior with his tail held high, but not in a threatening manner, about stalk-eye-level to his own body. His hoof fur showed him to be older than Aximili, by several years, possibly more than a decade, but he wasn't quite Alloran's age yet. And he wasn't a man to waste time.

Prince Aximili has briefed me on your proposition, and I must say that it will take quite a lot of negotiating and convincing on your parts to succeed in such a task. It is in the Electorate's general opinion that opening up our planet could very well be another affront to our search for peace, some fear it may be equal to that of Seerow's mistake, he looked gravely at every one of the humans. But, with the confidence of one of our youngest, brightest princes, Aximili here has at least convinced the electorate to give humans ... a shot, as he put it. Let the negotiations begin.

"We believe that we have come up with a variation on what was originally told to Aximili that may be a bit more satisfactory to your Electorate, and people. A middle ground, so to speak, between a full trading system and absolutely nothing. Lieutenant Tobias Fangor, who Prince Aximili has undoubtedly told you about, will explain his ideas," the General nodded to the younger man standing beside him.

Tobias gave what was, to an Andalite, a polite bow, as one would give a superior officer.

Tobias of the Animorphs, it is indeed a pleasure to make your acquaintance at last, Jarron nodded politely back, but barely. The humans did a great thing for their planet, yes, but the Andalites had their pride and history.

"As it is an honor to meet you and present such a potentially beneficial agreement between our peoples," he certainly had the 'talking like an andalite' thing down, and he was using that to his advantage here, in order to be taken more seriously. And to practice, of course. If he got his way, he'd get to live on their planet for a while.

"As we learned through the fight against the yeerks here, it is beneficial for the two of us to learn to work together, and it is also quite a possible situation. However, neither species as a whole seems to be quite so ready for such a mixing of cultures and, well...physical shapes, as I'm sure we can both agree. I have thought for quite some time about an acceptable alternative to risking what little bond our planets have in order to achieve an alliance of his caliber, and I have come to a series of stages in order to, theorhetically, ease into such a pact.

"The first stage, an ambassadorial group: five to ten officers which I will train, with the help of one of your officers if possible, to meet YOUR military standards so that we do not offend. I understand the difficulties with that, since we cannot train to use tailblades when we have none, but the standards should not be too difficult for us to adapt to our current practices. Once they have sufficiently lived up to those standards AND those five to ten officers have the Electorate's approval, we will, in theory, send them to your planet as representatives of our kind for what we call here a 'trial run'. The initial test to see whether or not it is an acceptable future practice. In the mean time, we would gladly accept the same amount of your trained warriors: A fair exchange. Of course, the length of the exchange term is negotiable, but it would ideally be long enough to accomodate a slightly more in-depth learning period of each others' cultural practices. And, if all goes well, such will allow those members of the first exchange to become teachers for future groups, which I sincerely hope to see happen."

Tobias and Jarron exchanged looks for a while, both calculating, thinking everything over, before they even approached the next possible 'phase' of integration.