“You humans speak so much of love, I would like to see it” the Alien asks, their eyes settling on you in a vaguely unsettling way.

They must have been informed that eye contact was considered important amongst humans, along side ‘love’, clearly.

“Well, love isn’t isn’t something physical to see,” the human hesitated. Explaining the concept of love was something they hadn’t realised they had signed up for when agreeing to volunteer as a human and alien community integrator. Alien, they decided was an apt description of this new race of people, it was much harder then they expected trying to teach something that seemed so simple and familiar to them.

“Love is an emotion, something that is felt or expressed, like anger or sadness,” they felt themselves smile as the aliens ears fell back in a way that the human now unsterstood meant confusion.

“Love is to care for someone, and to want them to be happy and healthy,” the human paused trying to find a way to apply it to what they new about the alien.

The alien tilted their head in affirmation, “do they love you as well, is it shared? This is how your teammate said you reproduce, I do not understand how an emotion makes you reproduce,” the alien quizzed, this alien was young and seemed quite interested in the process of human reproduction, clearly it was viewed as a very different process for them.

The human laughed, they could guess who on their team had said that, and whilst they understood the sentiment, it wasn’t very helpful in this situation.

The human grinned, “yes, love the emotion often results in reproduction, but it is not the innate function. Or perhaps we humans don’t view it that way.”

“Love can be between anyone, and unfortunately it is not always returned. Love can be different between different people as well,” the human hummed, as the aliens ears drew back again.

“You care for the health and safety of your collective you travelled with, just as you care for the person uhm, well- alien I guess, who reproduced you, and your companion who you wanted to share living space with,” the human surmised, really hoping that this was in fact true for the alien. They honestly had no idea what the alien experiences, but hopefully this made sense.

The aliens ears drew down this time, and the somewhat unnerving eye contact was dropped “I assure you that how I feel about my collective, companion, and my reproducer are very different.”

They were embarrassed, the human mused, “ yes, the same for me, I do not treat my companion the same as my mother, nor my team the same as my companion,” the human couldn’t help but laugh a little at the insinuation.

“But they are all important to me in different ways, and I care for their safety, and happiness and health. That feeling when thinking of your important people, or -um, you know aliens, is love,” the human shrugged, watching as the aliens ears returned to normal and unnerving stare returned.

The aliens head tilted in affirmation, “I believe I understand that emotion, I do not understand how that makes offspring,” their eyes scraping over the humans body is curiosity. Human biology was curious to them, they were very alarmed the first time they saw a pregnant human.

The human laughed again, nodding “the person who explained reproduction to you did not explain that love is sometimes a reason to reproduce,” the humans hesitated, trying to remember how old this alien was relative to human age.

Sighing, the human felt themselves grow hot, “when loving your companion you want to make them… feel good, yes?”

The aliens ears dropped again, but their stare remained “very much so”.

The human grinned at what looked like an enthusiastic ear flick and wobble, “well, although there are many different ways to make your companion feel good, and of course human biology does factor into it, It does often result in offspring.”

The aliens ears curled forward as they laughed, or well, their version of a laugh, “I see why there are so many humans.”

The human huffed, “ yes well, many people create offspring just via making each other feel good, not always on purpose.”

The alien ears seemed to curl forward further “I do not have offspring yet, I would like four, as it is the recommended number. However, I fear that if we reproduced as humans do we would have dozens of offspring,” the alien mused, causing the human to burst out in surprised laughter.

“Do you have any offspring ?” The alien queried, their ears drawing back.

“Oh no,” the human laughed, “I think there are more than enough of us, besides me and my companions biology do not allow for it.”

The aliens ears curled forward again, “well, you must make each other feel good with no restraint.”

The human grinned, “oh yes, don’t you worry about that.”