Cooper indeed kept his promise. Exactly two hours and forty-six minutes after his... conversation with Lilith, an official summon arrived at the Gardners' flat. When Lilith, her mother, and Rhaena showed up at the MI6-Headquarters, they definitely did not go unnoticed- mostly Rhaena, who grew sick of being stared at by everyone they met in the corridors of Vauxhall Cross's building, so Lilith passionately kissed her in front of everyone. This diversion worked because everybody looked away. Well, everybody, except Mrs Gardner who was frankly giggling.

They then attended a meeting with none other than UNO's General Secretary and several british senior officials and dignitaries. Rhaena had a bit of trouble relaxing in front of all these men in suit and tie and looking stuffy, but when agent Cooper, Owen of his first name, grinned and waved at Lilith, and seeing last mentioned smirk and wave back, the young alien felt more at ease.

During this meeting, Rhaena had been particularly annoyed : every single person here (except Lilith and her mother, of course) talked to her like they had a stuttering child in front of them. She quickly put them in their places by showing them her perfect fluency in English, which made Lilith smile. The young human had felt... pride ? Yes, it was the word, she was proud of her lover.

After a long, very long assembly that lasted three hours and twenty-seven minutes (definitely, Lilith actually had a clock in her mind) during which the young women told everyone how they met, showed their skills in each other's language, and arbitrated a debate about "are Lyreans a threat or not ?" (that got Rhaena off the ground) ; the officials decided to try and meet the other Lyreans. Lilith and Rhaena had exchanged victorious glances, then chose to head back to the flat. In the corridors, Cooper, litteraly running after them, caught up with the three of them.

"Hold on, hold on ! Excuse me ! Can I have a word, please ?"

"I don't think we have been introduced, I am Evalyn Gardner.", Lilith's mother said with quite a charmer's voice.

"Oh oh, don't tell me she's having a crush ?", Lilith thought, not knowing whether she should be happy for her mother or not. Generally, Evalyn's "crushes" ended pretty badly, and Lilith spent the following week going after her mother in nearly every pub in London, and took are of her mother when she got wrecked.

However, Cooper didn't seem to have noticed- or didn't want to notice, which seemed more plausible considering the fact that he was working for the MI6 as an agent trained to recognize every possible tone in human's voice, and body language ; Lilith thought. He took out his card and solemnly introduced himself.

"Agent Owen Cooper, MI6, Madam. But you can call me Owen, that'll do. And Miss Lilith already does it."

"Lilith will do, no need of the "Miss". Owen.", the young human rectified.

"Right, yes, that's better, indeed. I just wanted to ask you.... How did you do that ? I mean, learning each other's language and everything, just the two of you ?"

"I estimate my IQ at 190, more or less, but I already told you that, and I think Rhaena's even smarter than me.", Lilith answered.

"Then, a book about linguistic for Lilith and a wee bit of mutual curiosity and that's it !", Rhaena added.

Owen looked truly impressed, and asked the young Lyrean if he could learn her language too. The young alien nodded, looking quite amused, and it made the agent's already joyful grey eyes sparkling even more.

Two days after this assembly, the Lyreans could come down from their ship again, and this time everything went well. The humans had eventually accepted the presence of beings coming from outer space among them, and Aegar- Rhaena's mentor- came in the flesh in the flat at Powell Estate. Lilith truly liked him, and understood why her love cared so much about him. He was even smarter than the young women- without bragging, that was saying something- but wasn't as socially awkward as Lilith could be sometimes. On the contrary, he was warm-hearted, very careful in every gesture he made and every word he said, and was quite effusive. Seeing the effusions between the Lyrean and his protégée, Lilith caught herself doing something she hadn't done in years : she thought about her father. She wondered how would their relationship be like, if he was still alive. One thing's for sure, Evalyn wouldn't be the barfly she became and maybe Lilith could've had an actual childhood. Who knows ?

Lilith stopped there this train of thought that wasn't leading anywhere. It wasn't like her, by the way. Usually, her brain was operating at full capacity at every hour of the day and night, elaborating logical and quite callous reasonings about more or less every subject that could draw the young woman's attention.

"Love."

Lilith looked up, coming out of her thoughts, staring right into the turquoise and golden eyes of her favorite alien girl as her cheeks turned light red.

"Angel ?"

"Aegar just thought about something.... interesting.", she said while turning completely violet. Well, that was a first.

"And what is it ?"

"Erm... Well... Remember the day when I told you about the fact that we can only fall in love once and forever ?"

"How could I not ?"

"Well, a lyrean tradition is to celebrate this... combination of our souls. A bit like what you call "marriage", I think."

"Ahaa.... Interesting indeed... And what does that entail ?"

"We, erm, we must get bound by blood. That is to say : we prick our fingers and blend our bloods together. And then, we are officially a couple."

"Oh. Well then, I suggest we also mix traditions. When do you wanna do it ?"

"You... You... Agree with it ?"

" 'Course, yeah !"

"Oh." Rhaena grinned, the way that made Lilith melt. "The sooner the better, isn't it ?"

"Alright. What do you think of.... tonight ? 'Gives me time for what I want to do. We could do it on the rooftop."

"Great idea ! But what exactly do you have in mind ?"

"Spoilers. You'll see tonight !"

Rhaena made an intrigued face, then smiled and turned around to tell Aegar what they just told each other. And at that moment, a detail intrigued Lilith....

"By the way, angel, I don't see you with this ammoniac respirator of yours anymore... And your mentor isn't wearing one either."

"Oh, we had time to get used to the terranian atmosphere. Now, we don't need them anymore !", Rhaena answered, beaming.

When the night came, the young women went on the rooftop, joining Aegar and Evalyn who looked completely overtaken by the events. She just smiled vacantly.

Lilith had dressed up a bit : she was wearing a black shirt that sculpted very well her slim silhouette, with a tie- also black. As for Rhaena, she was still wearing her white tunic, but colourful patterns had been added to it. The Lyrean had told her love that these kind of patterns were only were allowed on a novice's tunic only for very special occasions.

Without a word, Aegar handed them in turn a thin dagger that had a shimmering blue glow, engraved with strange but splendid glyphs. The brides-to-be - because it was the nearest word- pricked their fingers on it, then joined hands, still silenciously. Aegar then said a few words in Lyrean, and now they would be together until the end of times. Rhaena came closer to her Chosen One, but Lilith raised a finger to stop her. She fumbled a bit in her jeans' pocket and took her clenched fist out wih a victorious look. She unfolded her fingers to reveal.... Two rings. Two white gold rings, simple, with engraved in the inside...

"Haveess. Always", Rhaena read as her cheeks turned ultramarine blue.

"I know it's a bit sappy, but if we are to officialise our couple, let's do it in the manner, right ? That's how we do it here", Lilith precised, a bit awkwardly, her cheeks pink.

"I love it !"

"For real ?"

"Yes ! And now, I understand where you've been all afternoon !"

Lilith softly chuckled, and the young women put a ring on each other's finger. They exchanged glances for a few seconds, and kissed each other like never before. They kissed at length, only noticing that Aegar and Evalyn had gone back to the flat when they let go on each other, short of breath. Staring right at each other, they instantly knew they were thinking about the same thing. But Lilith, pragmatic, asked anyway, just to be sure.

"Wedding night ?"

Spotting the slightly puzzled but feverish look of her angel, Lilith slipped right against her pointed ear, and explained her. Rhaena turned even bluer, and riveted her turquoise and gold gaze in the brown eyes of her love.

"Wedding night !", she said.

A few weeks after that night that was- by far- the happiest of Lilith's whole life, other meetings (this time hosted by UNO) occured. Cooper was now quite good at speaking Lyrean thanks to the two lovebirds' lessons ; Aegar and other Lyreans- who were now almost fluent in English too- had also taken part in the negociations, and the Terranians had jumped hundreds of years forward in terms of technologies. Enormous black energy canons were now standing all around the world, flying cars were actually existing, almost every available fighter aircraft could now go into space and fly at faster-than-light speed, and some diseases than could not be healed before had now a cure and a vaccine. But that was only a little example.