One ordinary summer morning, in a nondescript field in the Pontic Steppe, a farmer discovers a doorway-sized hole in reality. On the other side is... more steppe.
After spending several more minutes looking around, taking measurements, four of them step through the portal and walk towards the buildings on the other side. They consist of: a middle-aged man in a black collarless suit, two younger men in military fatigues, and an aged woman in cream-colored robes.
Upon their arrival to the nearest cluster, several people will attempt to ask them things! From context, likely a variant of “who are you” or “why are you here.” Upon realizing they speak a different language, they fetch several people who ask similar questions in other languages they will not speak.
The buildings are largely mudbrick and wood. One is notably significantly larger than the others. Several basic canvas tents are set up, with people chatting and playing cards and staring at some sort of glass tablet underneath them. Some people off to the side are playing a game involving running around and attempting to hit each other with long sticks. No children are visible.
Most people are wearing a simple tunic and pants, or a long dress. Most are shades of brown, but a few are shades of greens and reds. The clothing does not appear to correspond with gender. The cream robe and fatigues gets minimal attention, but a few people are openly staring at the the suit, until a (woman?) comes out and shoos them away.
One of the younger men speaks with the locals, attempting to learn their language through pantomime. He introduces himself as Rokaidim. The other three speak little and spend the time looking around, studying the buildings and landscape (to compare it to their side of the portal). The man in the suit speaks into a handheld radio.
The probably-an-administrator tells a few people to do some things, and brings them over to a table set up in the large building, where she introduces herself as Talu Ritula and the man (who is wearing a slightly fancier-than-average dress) as Rian Larutel. Rian writes out a series of symbols on a piece of paper, and spends some time pointing out various objects and writing down the words he gets, while Talu does something on her own glass device. After a few minutes of this, another person brings out a bowl of dried berries, and the Murlocians immediately take some to eat. The pantomime is attempted as well, but Rian and Talu both seem to have some trouble figuring out what concepts it’s trying to indicate.
The delegation declines all food.
After a while, a voice comes from the delegation’s radio, and (after some discussion) the third man in the delegation goes outside and walks back through the portal, returning a few minutes later with portable radio equipment. He starts making his way through the spectrum, trying to see how much radio activity there is.
The murlocians are all very concerned when they all decline food, but do stop trying new ones. Talu tries to talk to the radio in several languages, to see if their own people know any of them.
Someone does walk after him, and upon seeing the portal, freezes, blinks, swears, and starts sprinting back.
There’s a pretty high amount of radio activity! Some music, some talking, some unfamiliar signals.
He continues to collect data for a while. Once he’s gotten most of what he can, he returns the equipment to the other side of the portal and heads back to report his findings.
Meanwhile, inside the building, they’re still trying to figure out how to talk to each other. Rokaidim has learned enough words to say, "mud building" and make an exaggerated face of confusion.
"...need more words."
Rokaidim continues trying to learn their language as fast as he can. After an hour, another man, also dressed in cream-colored robes, walks through the portal. He speaks to Rokaidim for several minutes, then to the Murlocians, asking for more words and making analogies to try to figure out how to talk about more abstract concepts. He seems to be learning the language much more rapidly than Rokaidim was. His name, should they ask, is Imenrala.
Rian’s the best they have at languages, but the tablet lets them have other more naturally talented people learn it and give them translations. Some abstract concepts generally translate better than others, or have different connotations, but the translations get much better.
They call the planet Murlocia, and themselves as a species Murlocians.
Talu replies quickly.
“I’m the Home’s Administrator - I know the policies, people respect me, and I manage the supplies. I also make some choices about jobs and pay and emergencies and new buildings and whatnot - some of that is up to Council, there’s some, hm, debate on that. Generally if I suggest something, the Council agrees because I know what I’m doing and they know that, unless I really screwed something up. Rian normally gathers food-plants, but he’s the best at languages in our Home. I suppose I tell him what to do, in that if I need him to do something and ask, he will assume I have a reason and do it. I knew I wanted to be an Administrator when I was a child, and apprenticed under the former one, and then I was competent at it and became the new one when she died.”
”What are your own roles and jobs?”
"What exactly do you mean by 'Home'? It seems to refer to a settlement, but it sounds like there's more to it? How do you manage supplies? Do you manage supplies for the whole settlement?"
"Kalanit"—he points towards the robed woman—"and I are priests, Rokaidim and Paltigil"—the other man in fatigues—"are soldiers, and Alkiviad"—"is an officer. He works for the part of the government that is... probably supposed to handle portals to other worlds."
“Home refers to the large building where administration work is done, supples are stored, food is cooked and served, and the nursery is in - the types of things people can share and don’t need their own of. Generally it also refers to the surrounding buildings and land as well, though. Some places do multiple large buildings, and that gets more practical with higher populations. I keep track of the stores, make sure we’re not running out, tell people to get more of or use less of specific items if necessary (or the opposite), make trade deals, etc? For the entire Home, yes.
They make slightly confused expressions at the word “priests”, and tense significantly at the word “soldiers.”
”Is it. Customary. To bring raiders when opening diplomatic talks. For your people.”
Everyone seems pretty weirded out by Talu’s explanation of how the Homes work.
"Raider? To the best of my knowledge, the Union has done any raiding in five hundred years, at least. Soldiers would not usually attend diplomatic events, but this is not a usual diplomatic event." He talks quietly to Alkiviad for a few moments before continuing, "This group was not meant for diplomacy first, it was meant for exploration, and Alkiviad wanted to be prepared for multiple possibilities. He also says they did not bring any firearms."
"We don't have any experience, nothing like this has happened to our people before. They didn't eat your food because we don't know if we are the same... type of animal. Maybe your food is not safe for us. Probably we could get it tested, but we don't need to do that soon, we have our own food."
"In our world, most towns don't have as much communal stuff as you do. People have their own supplies, cook their own food, and usually their children live with them. They trade with each other for things too, like food sometimes. I don't know how much individual people trade with each other here."
“Huh! You seem very prepared for someone who it’s never happened to.”
“Oh, we do, mostly for luxuries and fun things, but sometimes for other stuff - if you don’t like a food and someone else does, you could trade that, or if you spend your free time making more clothes and want to trade those.”
“…if you want to talk to people from other Homes, you can do that over the internet? I suppose that some Administrators might be charge of multiple Homes, if their own Administrator died without a successor? Scientists and whatnot also often have a lot of authority, even if it’s not normally official. Clarify what you mean by “central government?”
"Our world has people who can speak for and make agreements for everyone on the planet. Do you not?"
"The central government is what solves coordination problems that everyone needs to coordinate on, like having a uniform legal system, distributing land fairly, taxing pollution, and funding research."
“…No, we don’t. Is there a very limited amount of land in your world, for that to be an issue? There are rules that the Administrators (vote, maybe? The word is a confusing translated) on, but legal systems are not all the same, except that they must follow those rules. I… we all voted that pollution was absolutely not allowed, so that’s not an issue. Research is funded through donations, but I’ve never heard of a scientist not getting enough assistants and supplies. I can see how you might get better coordinated research done with that, though, I’ll have to bring it up at the next meeting! A Home tax that goes to a science fund?”
"We have a lot of land, but some of it is very desirable, like large natural harbors or other good places to build cities. And natural resources aren't distributed evenly either. If we didn't have any taxes, then the people who got to there first and claimed the most desirable land would have a massive advantage, and it wouldn't be very fair. There used to be wars about stuff like that."
"Banning all pollution is something we wouldn't do, because sometimes it's worth it."