For all that he was three and a half centuries old, Mint felt like a kid in a candy store with a whole year's worth of allowance jingling in his pockets. The fact that he wasn't here to have fun, that he was here as moral and physical support to his sister Anovadiell, couldn't do much to squelch that feeling. He was having the time of his life!

First there'd been the spaceship that had brought them from Chytonia--the first one he'd ever seen, much less ridden on. He would've nosed through every single corridor of the luxury transport if he'd had the time to. Then there'd been the actual, three-day space flight, where he'd spent several hours just gaping out through the viewing deck windows (seeing Chytonia from space was the first time he'd ever gone slack-jawed and completely silent in awe and amazement). Much to his pleasure, Anova seemed to enjoy the flight too. The crew provided for them with fastidious care, and in the meticulous cleanliness of the cruiser, Anova didn't have to suffer from a single one of her dozens of allergies. Then the transport had come within visual range of the space station simply called Star City, and Mint had had a merry time watching all the other ships coming and going from the spaceport, amazed at all the different makes and designs. Then their own ship docked and after he'd helped his beloved but frail little sister into her hover-chair, they were led by a ship's attendnant out through a giant airlock, and into a huge elevator-lift to be taken to one of the residential levels of the city.

It was a good thing his and Anova's luggage was being carried by a hover-drone, because Terramintin would've dropped it if he'd been carrying it himself. It was like stepping into Paradise. Well, maybe not Paradise... but something as equally gratifying and eye-popping, without the whole religion aspect.

Anova hadn't been kidding when she'd told him Star City really was a city. Unable to comprehend how an entire populace could be crammed into a giant series of disks suspended over a planet's surface, Mint's mind had stuck with a mental image of something more like a gigantic office building: corridors upon corridors, leading to nothing but hundreds of rooms of different sizes and purposes. But no, this was definitely a city! They'd stepped out of the lift and onto a sidewalk, which lined a road just as sidewalks were supposed to, and the road had buildings up and down its length just as city roads were expected to have, and there were people everywhere... just like in a city. Nevermind that there were 'people' with blue skin and three heads and far too many limbs among the more familiar humans and anthros walking about, this was definitely a city, familiar and foreign all at once.

Mint looked about with gleeful wonder, and repressed an incredible urge to head right into those crowds and find new people to meet and new friends to make. After all, he was here because Anova had a business venture to pursue--not because he was on vacation. He'd have to wait until later to go explore to his heart's content.

"Wow," was the only word he could dredge from his vocabulary, as he grinned and looked around, trying to soak everything in. "Wow."

Mint had never seen such a variety of peoples clustered in a single place, yet peaceably going about their own business. Some of them didn't even count as "people", as Mint's mind identified them. Chytonia had a dozen intelligent races of its own--humans, Calyons, Chyriths, Mazdivs, anthros, tersin... the list went on--but none as bizarre as some of the species he saw walking down the street around him. And even more fascinating, at least half of everyone he saw appeared to be half-machine! Here was a woman with arms made entirely metal, there was a canine with glowing panels of orange and green along its back, here a spidery creature had glowing lines of light entwining its legs... Mint hardly knew what to make of it all.

Then, to top it all off, a dragon flew overhead. He assumed it was a dragon, at least. It didn't look exactly like the dragons back home on Chytonia, but there were enough similarities in the winged, reptilian form for his mind to call it a dragon. But the dragons of home didn't exactly mingle with the civilized populace, so what was it doing here? Then he realized it wasn't the only one.

He tried his best not to gawk. Dragons in a city? In a space city?

Terramintin was so surprised that he almost missed the young woman who stepped out of the crowd towards him and his sister, but was glad that he didn't. She was an ordinary human, but only ordinary in the sense that she wasn't one of the afore-noticed blue-skinned and three-headed types. Her looks definitely weren't ordinary--on the contrary, she was extremely attractive, and Mint of course had to appreciate her for that. She was a brown-haired and black-eyed beauty, who had a few words with the ship's attendant, and then sent him off into the crowd with their luggage in tow, hovering out of reach of any opportunistic hands.

The woman then turned towards them and, to Mint's mixed amusement, gave him an inquisitive little look and flashed a smile at him before she addressed the both of them in their native common-tongue, without even the slightest hint of an accent.

"Anovadiell and Terramintin Tessaril-Tanzanite, I believe? I'm Deborah Falken. My father sent me to meet you."

His sister inclined her head in response. "Yes, I am Anovadiell, this is my brother and colleague Terramintin."

Mint then took his turn and swept a shallow but courteous bow, properly befitting the Tanzanite House gentleman that he was. "A pleasure," he replied with a smile.

He bowed because it was the polite thing to do, as well as an ingrained manner expected of calyon nobility, and he was quite surprised when Deborah bobbed in a curtsy that was precisely the right response for a greeting between courtiers, for all that she didn't have any glamorous skirts to sweep around herself. The lady kept her eyes on him as she stood straight again, an odd little (satisfied?) smile on her face, and Mint was mentally embarrassed when her eyes stayed on him longer than necessary for the simple exchange of courtesies. Oh, she was a lovely creature, and he was no virgin in flirtation, both in courtly game and in earnest, but this was the beginning of a potential business venture--such a lingering glance was rather inappropriate. It was a case where, if she had been in his place, and he was the one glancing like that, he likely would've gotten slapped for it.

He kept his expression pleasant and amiable, but was silently relieved when Anova spoke up and rescued him from Deborah's eyes, perhaps intentionally. He wouldn't have put it past her. Not that he minded, this time. "It is an honour to meet you and be here in your own city, and I look forward to meeting your father."

"It is an honour to have you," the lady answered with a friendly smile. "Father sends his apologies that he couldn't make it to meet you, himself, but there was a sudden meeting of the city mayors. I'm sure you know how those things are."

"Indeed," Anova agreed, nodding.

Mint stayed quietly in the background, tucking his hands behind his back like a soldier, attentive but at ease. After all, this was Anova's business trip, not his. He was just along for company.

"If you two are feeling up to it, after your trip, I could show you around the station," Deborah suggested graciously.

Behind his back, Mint clandestinely crossed two of his fingers like a little boy and pretended to be more interested in an imaginary spot an inch or two over Deborah's head than the suggestion of a tour. Though he was already making mental plans to snatch some free time for himself to go exploring this fascinating space-city, he'd likely only get lost without points of reference...

There really wasn't any surprise in the fact that Anova did accept the offer, since such proposals never really were given with the option to turn them down, but he was glad to hear her agree nonetheless.