The meeting of the Chirans and Karwen occurred under odd circumstances, just after the conclusion of the Aludran Reformation War. It was triggered by a Chiran patrol submarine spotting a pair of unknown Aludran Leviships engaging in an operation the crew could not identify, in the shallow waters off the Layahat Islands in the Strait of Huron. It was felt by the Chirans that the Aludrans might try to chase off a smaller warship with the two battleships loitering around the site, and so the 810-foot Type 03 battlecruiser Lian was deployed to survey the site and report on construction.

The prolonged patrol by the Lian revealed the nature of the Aludran operation, the first attempt to create an offshore drilling platform. The ambitious plan by the influential Emera family was to supplement Aludra's domestic supplies of oil and natural gas, using an anchored Leviship since at the time the Aludrans did not have the technology to construct a fixed platform. With Chiran command satisfied that the Aludran operation posed no threat to their own vessels, the Lian, running rather low on supplies, was ordered to return, stopping off at one of the islands to replenish water since it was known to be safe to do so. The captain chose the nearest island, Karwen-Mihan, which Etrusean maps indicated had a long, sandy beach to the North which dove into deep water almost immediately; it had already been studied for use as a harbour before the Chirans had agreed not to construct port facilities on the Karwen Islands in the Seventh Treaty of Lyle.

On that same day, a little Karwen ottergirl named Su* had come to her special place hoping that there would be foreign ships in the sea; she was fond of making models, hoping the practice would help her with her dream of becoming a woodcarver. A skilled carver is a respected and vital part of a Karwen village, making useful items like furniture and fishing equipment and even more importantly religious icons for ceremonies. Su didn't want to just end up making fishing nets like her older sister Li, much as she seemed happy with it.

Su loved exploring and was allowed to if she finished her daily chores and was careful, and two years earlier had found a derelict hut half-swallowed by the jungle, up on a hill overlooking the shimmering waters of the Strait. It was her special place to sit and think, and where she decided on her future after finding a small metal knife under a pile of broken pottery. It was a sunny day when she first saw a foreign ship in Huron, and she was fascinated by it, scampering to find a piece of wood and getting to work on approximating the shape before it vanished over the horizon.

By the time of the Chiran landing, she had several dozen model ships; when nothing came by, she would sit and imagine the adventures they had, try to work out what exactly they were for, or figure out what sort of people owned them.

On that day, she was amazed when a ship not only appeared but approached the island, dropping anchor in a bay a short distance from her. Though going too close to the north side of the island during the day was strictly forbidden, Su knew she would never have another chance to see one of the ships up close, and her fascination defeated her apprehension. Approaching it led to her realising just how big it was, and she settled on working up one end and then trying to circle around to the other without being seen.

As was normal for Chiran ships, Lian carried a contingent of crew trained as Guards, a tradition going back to the times when a port's Guards would embark on vessels carrying important shipments to protect them from pirates. Two such guards, Weiling Chen, a red panda from a farming family in the Western province, and Mei Zheng, a graceful and well-spoken lemur from a minor Southeastern noble family, were among the group sent ashore to scout out the beach, in part to see if it was safe to let the ship's Spotted Silk Moth Jia out for a flutter. They were sent ashore fully armed largely for the sake of proper caution only: as far as they were aware there was no sentient life on the Karwen Islands. That was at least until Chen picked up an unfamiliar scent in the tall grass nearby, gesturing for Zheng to come with her and move quietly.

Su did not hear the approaching sounds since she was focused on getting the shape of the ship's bow exactly right; all of her other models would need some work too, and she was running through what to do to each one as she worked, to get them looking as good as this one would.

She was shocked when the two soldiers were suddenly standing over her, but did not run; the priestess of her village had always told her that everything happened for a good reason, so she must have been there to meet whoever the strangers were. She could recognise from how they carried themselves that they were hunters**, but strange as they were, that they were still just people. The best she could think of was speaking to them.

Her name was initially reported as Mai, which is actually an extremely polite way of saying "hello" in Karwen usually reserved for important members of a village's council. Su did not try to stop them calling her that because it made them less frightening if they were being silly. Once she got over her initial nerves, she took them to see her models; though she did not understand a single word they said, she was happy to have people she could actually show them to, and who seemed interested.

While she did her best to not lead them back to her village since she knew it would cause trouble, they eventually persuaded her and were greeted by a more than slightly shocked village council. The Karwen certainly knew there were other people in the world besides them, but the two foreigners with their strange, complicated, identical clothes, enormous tails and oddly-patterned fur were unlike anything they'd ever seen or heard of.

After a time, Chen set out to report in, feeling the well-educated Zheng was more suitable for dealing with a situation like this; at the council's insistence, a group of hunters with spears accompanied her. The Karwen with her walked tall and proud, unsure of precisely what they were supposed to be doing in relation to the stranger but all wishing to show they were no lesser than her. They fell silent when they saw the Lian.

Zheng, on the other hand, was doing her best to speak with the puzzled members of the council, tracing shapes in the sandy ground in front of her as she spoke of her home and what they were doing there. It would be far longer before Chirans and Karwen could speak coherently to one another, but by the time she was done they were certain that if this woman had been sent to do them harm, they would at least suffer the most cheerful doom in history.

To her surprise Su wasn't punished, the council meeting openly since Zheng and the larger group of Guards and navy officers who had arrived didn't understand them anyway. Su sat to one side as the council debated, sending out runners to other villages; by the evening, the Grand Council of the island had assembled itself while the Chirans set up tents and a radio set just outside the village so as not to seem threatening.

Most villages were there in their entirety, children included, and so Su sat and worked on the stern of her model as best she could remember it while they talked. They debated long into the night whether the strangers should be asked to leave immediately or welcomed and perhaps persuaded that the Lahayat were bad people so they would scare them away from the Kawen's fishing grounds once and for all.

The six wisest elders sat silent as the others spoke, as tradition dictated, until finally one raised her staff for silence, her slow, creaking voice intoning that this was a good omen and the goddesses had smiled on them. Her granddaughter was sent to the Chiran tents to bring them over, and that night they shared a meal under the stars.

*The Karwen naming tradition is complicated: children are given a short name, often just one syllable, followed by their birth-mother's first name. Over their life they will add portions of the words for their trade, their position in the village, and if they marry the original names of all the wives they have sworn a marriage oath to as their middle name. Surnames are the names of their family lines (much like the "name of the blood" used by the Garamese clans), and are only ever used when making representations to village leaders, since it is extremely rare for anyone in a Karwen village to not be known to everyone else to the point such a name is unnecessary for daily use.
**In Karwen society hunters are also soldiers; they were mostly required to defend from incursions from their sworn enemies the Lahayat, another group of otters from the islands to the northeast.