I guess that makes sense. I just worry that there'll be a big mess-up. I hope Stella's judgment is good. 

Also, I looked up when sunset is and it's at seven, so I ask again, what do I do between six and seven? there's fuck all around here besides the library and I don't want to get arrested for hopping a bus with no cash if I can help it. You were hoping there would be like a restaurant or something open late I could stay at, yeah? 

We definitely have some other people who believe honestly now. I've been refraining from pulling random aussies because I've already taken a risk with you and I don't want to complicate things further by taking on staff without a proper interview process, but there are some candidates I quietly have my eyes on. I'm not sure if I want to recruit on belief in me as a goddess though; I think that's the kind of complex that'll bite me in the long run, make me overlook good people, make me make mistakes. But belief in the same kinds of ideals as me — that's worth something.

Hailey nods. "Yeah. Belief in you as a Goddess isn't as nearly important as belief in the goals and principles we share in the Temple. That's the priority. Using Christianity as an example, belief in Yahweh and Jesus is not remotely correlated with adhering to ideals of charity and compassion."

The plan is to send you a list of what restaurants are open near you as it gets close to time, filtered by which ones stay open past seven. You pick one, I place a pickup order in your name after verifying they have seating, then I get you a cab to the restaurant. You stay there until suddenly you vanish and show up on the island with me. Hell, if you wanna look at the list now, I'm literally just going to be using Uber Eats and then Googling the places to see if they have indoor seating — probably just use Street View to ID outdoor seating.

I actually know a decent Indian place, it's just halfway across the city. Let me google for another closer one...

There's a pause.

Himalayan Kitchen, 5519 W Loop 1604 N #102

It's only 20 minutes away, it's got indoor seating, and it's open until ten. 

(Meanwhile, Stella is doing more or less the same thing on a grander scale — restoring people's bombed-out homes, providing food for refugees, and doing her best to help keep those who've been hurt away from those who hurt them.) 

Hailey slaps together another questionnaire, this time aimed at economists. Where are they located, do they speak English, what are their opinions on these various economic litmus test problems (to filter out the ones who make mistakes like disincentivizing housing construction and then complaining about high rents, or similar failures of thought), what are their opinions about these various principles of Stella's? She fires that off at economist emails.

Okay, that's great. I'll order you something there when it's closer to time. Meanwhile, think about what you want for lunch, and what you want at Himalayan Kitchen when it's suppertime.

I'll be okay with the sub for now. Don't think I can eat much more when I'm this nervous. Himalayan Kitchen has an online menu, I'll look at it in a bit. 

The next two-ish hours go by quickly. There's a lot of war relief to do and not a lot of time to do it in. Slowly, the shadow of the earth creeps over Africa and Europe. Stella loses the Isle of Night in the Pacific (tidying up after the letters she left there before she goes), then New Zealand, then starts losing the east coast of Australia and the north of Japan. 

She does take a moment to leave a letter with a particular researcher in Japan before she goes. Sumio Ijima is still alive, and she thinks it's most appropriate for him to hear of her interest in theoretical metamaterials first. There was a US researcher too, but, well... The US already has enough cake. 

She works on, and starts drafting her letter to the Swiss bank. That deserves some time.

Filtering through completed questionnaires is a slow process, but Maya does not mind. She approves five potential staffers and no economists, and schedules candidates for interviews with Sable to occur over that day and the next.

She begins sorting through more emails. Many of them are useless. 

Some of it is fan art. Some images inspired by the statue, and one song.

"Oh, this is lovely."

She prays for their Goddess's attention and pushes Sable back into front so Sable and Stella can enjoy the song together.

Stella wasn't really expecting anything to come in this fast, but sure, she'll listen to the song in her snatched moments.

Sable pulls the blanket snug around herself and lets it play.

"Oh Stella, this is so tender and sweet. I love it."

She hums softly along with the tune.

It's nice to get something back. It steadies her a little. 

Meanwhile, her research soon turns up that it is in fact difficult to establish a foreign bank account in Switzerland these days after more than a little crackdown on exactly whom is moving money through the famously neutral country. Once again, Bureaucracy.

I thought the Swiss didn't much care who held money in international accounts, but it seems that state of affairs has changed somewhat over the past few decades. Now Swiss banks are intended only to serve Swiss people. I'm sure there's loopholes, but fundamentally there needs to be some solution to the situation. I don't have citizenship anywhere, so it's difficult for me to act in a legitimate fashion. I'm sure there's some autocracy somewhere that'd be happy to take my money for citizenship, but let's not. 

It tempts me to start dropping gold bars on people, it really does. But I can't expect the world to have figured out what I want and need inside of twelve hours, and while I can be a little petty, crashing the world economy even harder is not going to help things. And we have no candidates right now I'd trust to run my banking apparatus other than you, Sable, and to be blunt, 1: you have more important things to do, and 2: this isn't your skillset. 

I think, horror of horrors, I may need to negotiate with some governments.

"Oh bother. Governments are going to be frustrating. Shame the Swiss don't let people just open bank accounts anymore." She hums and shakes her head. "Plus side, you're negotiating from a position of strength. They can't hurt you, you're keeping me in perpetual night so they can't hurt me, and the only things you want from them are banking and access to diverse perspectives of advisors. So this should hopefully be easier than it could otherwise be. Who're you thinking about talking with? My instincts say to get varied governments in different regions that way it's hard to completely cut you off from your money unless the whole world goes mad."

Comparison shopping for governments, what a concept. 

To be very frank, I have issues with pretty much all world governments. Even "upstanding" western countries supply the global arms market, or have exploitative foreign policies, and most nations are also censorious or outright autocratic in ways I dislike.

In general my impression is that most western nations are "trying their best", within the limitations of their concerns. Other nations vary from "literally ruled by a warlord and his cronies" to "genuinely trying but just Do Not Have The Resources." 

I don't believe, in my heart of hearts, that the western world is the "good guys" in an absolute sense, but compared to their major competition... They are perhaps the "relatively good guys." 

Now, some points I'd like to make: 

— I don't ultimately want to end up just handing any existing nation or collective of nations the world. Like, if I end up in a situation where I'm a signatory of NATO or what have you, I think we have gone off the rails. I don't want to end up being Just Another Edition Of The British Empire or Just Another Edition Of The United States, or conversely, ending up being The USSR or The Greater Chinese Prosperity Sphere or what have you. 

— I also don't want to overlook how the world treats its citizens. It matters to me what kind of conditions people are in. I don't want half the world to be run by warlords and criminals. 

— I also also don't want to end up with the world being effectively under occupation. While I have the biggest stick around, restructuring countries will result in its own degrees of suffering. Going In And Doing Something about shitty regimes has its own kinds of costs, especially as even at night I cannot be everywhere. Having me be the world police is unsustainable and won't work long term. And historically... Iraq, Vietnam, Afghanistan, the British Raj, Cortez, etcetera, etcetera... 

— As such I feel the role I actually want to have is as a vaguely western-aligned NGO that does primarily charitable work. However, that ship has well and truly sailed already. We're trying to do peacekeeping, we have a fuckton of manufacturing capacity, we own territory, we have truly terrifying degrees of military power — we're a nation whether we like it or not, pretty much. And that's only going to become more true as we accumulate staff. 

— There's also the unfortunate fact that my powers work on prayer. If I could just do something with no prayer needed I probably wouldn't have attempted to be a church, it complicates things too much. Nevertheless, ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

— As such, we've got a very narrow path to walk here such that we are able to cooperate with the western world while not simply handing the entire damn planet to them. 

I would love to hear your thoughts.

"No," Sable shakes her head, "not quite comparison shopping so much as... diversifying your portfolio. Banking in different countries makes it easier for a wider variety of donors or customers to work with us. Diversifying in which countries you build in-country facilities gives you a wider variety of places — and languages — to drop refugees. The more countries your non-Isles resources are in, the harder it is for any one nation or alliance to fuck you over."

She reads further, then frowns and nods. "I think you're right on all the major points there, though. The problem is that we need to strike a balance of sufficient carrot and stick to get cooperation from a wide set of opposing nations, and avoid any of them thinking we're siding with the others. I think a key way to avoid getting swept up into siding with anyone is by keeping lists of things we want each nation to improve on, and always updating them with more, that way we're never tricked into thinking any one nation is fully In The Right."

She gets up and paces, tail swishing with her intensity, gesturing as she works things out aloud.

"What we want from countries is threefold: cooperation, banking, and fixable land. You can fix poisoned land by vanishing the toxins, or vanishing the whole area and putting fresh soil in from twenty miles away. You can replace condemned buildings no one's gotten around to tearing down with Temple facilities. So what you need is either land grants or the right to acquire land. As we get more people in more countries, we'll be able to do things like operate the literal best soup kitchens and homeless shelters."

Making shelters that don't suck is definitely on the list, though I think that'll take cultural adaptation as well as financial resources. 

As for diversifying... Probably smart. I want to act legibly though. Probably I want to establish official embassies everywhere that'll take one. 

I think we need to lay out my philosophy in more detail before I start talking to governments seriously. There are costs to codifying things, though. Often moral intuitions are messy and imprecise, more felt than known, and I worry that I'll lose important pieces if I try to codify my ethics as a set of principles or laws or positions. Moreover, setting down my positions will inevitably place me on one side or the other of many, many controversies and the more my percieved neutrality is torn at, the less I'll be able to achieve in the world at large. Fundamentally I want to be there for everyone. In practice, I expect a lot of people to reject me. I want to do my best to help, nonetheless. 

She nods, still pacing, still swishing.

"It sucks. If we come out and say that conversion therapy is wrong, we'll piss off Evangelical Christianity and Russia. If we say genital mutilation is wrong, or infant circumcision, we'll piss off other religions. I don't think that situation's acceptable."

She frowns and keeps going. "I think the problem here is that just about every group is doing at least some shitty things. We can't hold back from calling them out on it, otherwise we become what we hate. Maybe what we do is tie every objection back to the core principles? And actually update if someone ever gives us a coherent and correct argument that we're wrong about one? And state that we'll do so?

"It's not like a country can really stop you from operating there. Even if they tried to attack a Temple facility, tear it down, kill the people, you could just resort to keeping the people out of the country during daylight and rebuilding the structure at night. They can't win. And that should carry some weight in the negotiations, at least among countries whose leaders don't respond to that by doubling down out of fear and pride."

Another sharp turn, tail whipping through the air with the about-face. "But yeah, we need to get the philosophy down in detail. You're right about that."

I could prioritize and compromise. Say I'd work only on the big things, like ending war and privation and making the world economy better than it's ever been. I could do a lot of good that way. Lifetimes worth of it, even. 

But I don't think the person I am would survive that. Not in the long run. There's going to be immense pressure on me from all quarters to look away from just this one thing, just this one problem, and frankly I'm already doing more of that than I think I really should be. I set aside the situation with North Korea already — when am I going to get back to it? This week? This month? This year? This decade? This century?

It's irresponsible for me to pick and choose my causes on anything other than how much damage is being done each day. But it's impossible for me to maintain that in the long term. I am not a world-saving robot, I am a person. I have foibles and personal desires. I want things to be better rather than worse for my presence in the world, but at some point I need to listen to what my heart wants and not the brutal mathematics, because if I make myself a thing of brutal mathematics I will collapse and be no help to anyone. 

This is, ultimately, selfish of me. To care more about some people than others. To work on some problems more than others. But it's more sustainable. I didn't, ultimately, decide to be this being, this Stella, this creature that can save or doom others with a moment's thought. But if I'm to stand against the world, better for me to be myself as honestly and sharply as I can. 

And what I am is — I want everyone, every person on earth, to be safe, and happy, and free, and whole. I really mean that. How on earth I'm going to manage that is a tall fucking order but it's the goal. 

I have a weakness for the persecuted, I guess you could say. At my heart I am there to be a refuge. I want people to have somewhere to retreat to, somewhere genuinely safe. I'm prioritizing keeping people from dying because I can't fix it if someone dies but I am and have to be more than just keeping people alive.

There was a woman early in the first night. Who wanted me to repair a football trophy that she had broken, for fear of her husband. 

There was a world where you'd have had to live marked out, lost, separate from everyone else. 

That, I think, is the thing I hate most. The cutting away of people from humanity. Saying they don't count. It's why my harshest punishment is visible marking-out. If you say others don't matter, I would like you to experience that from the other direction. This is petty of me. But it's what I did, by instinct.

I want people to always have a way out.  A real way out. I think a lot of people stay trapped of their own volition, out of fear or love or hurt or hope — but for those who have the courage to go, I want their escape to be made manifest.

Sorry, I'm rambling now. 

Sable nods firmly. "I completely agree. You're not a healbot. You have to live to keep doing all the good you do. You have to thrive just as much as you're hoping to see others thrive, or it won't be sustainable." She keeps pacing.

"And beyond that, I agree with being a refuge. That's important. That's a very important kind of good. And sure, marking people out for doing horrible things is petty. It's not ideal. But even you have to triage. And some people are going to keep dragging the world down unless they get a quantity of healing we can't yet provide."

She shakes her head. "Everyone deserves love. Deserves safety and joy. But I'll forgive us for prioritizing the ones who aren't othering and hating and murdering to help first, when it's clear-cut."

She flops back into her chair and looks up at the stars. Goddess they're fucking beautiful with her new eyes.

"Being a refuge is a beautiful thing. It's part of what I love about you. And I'm glad to help you do it. We're not going to give up on our dreams of a better world. We're not going to give up on making help and safety available even to the inconvenient. And if some government wants to throw a fit about the Temple helping persecuted people rather than the powerful, too fucking bad. Yes, we'll keep working to do lots of large-scale good, but we're going to keep helping the individuals too, because those little reactions are what keep us going in this draining work."

Alright. Priorities, then.

Any minority suffering from persecution. Ethnic minorities, sexual minorities, gender minorities, religious minorities. Disabled people, whether from physical or mental disabilities. The world's poor. Those who are being exploited in serious ways. 

People at immediate risk of death first, then those in intolerable long-term situations — whether that's starvation or being in a war zone or being a slave or being a persecuted minority or being abused or what have you. Then those who need someone to help make their lives fairer — those who are poor but not in poverty, whose who are trans but on hormones already, those who are a minority but not being actively abused, etcetera. Then ordinary people. Then and lastly those in positions of power. It is easier to get leverage from helping the rich and powerful; accordingly, let them buy aid rather than recieve it for free. In short, I think we're adopting a sliding scale model of intervention, here. I don't want to Harrison, Burger's Son* the world, but I think the day will take care of that to some extent. 

How to summarize that as a statement, though, is a little more difficult.

*[sic]; she means Harrison Bergeron

She nods, smiling. "I like it, but you're right that summarizing it will be the hard part. Hmm, what about..."

Her fingers dance across the keyboard.

Stella's — and the Temple of Night's — priorities are first and foremost to provide safety and freedom to the weakest among us, especially those facing persecution: ethnic minorities, sexual minorities, gender minorities, religious minorities, people suffering physical or mental disabilities, the impoverished, the exploited. We hope to become a refuge for people in need, a haven where any can turn to seek safety and freedom to be oneself. First is immediate risk of death, then intolerable long-term situations like starvation or living in a war-zone or slavery or abuse, then those who need help to make their lives fairer or better, then comforts for the lives of ordinary people, and lastly those in positions of power and wealth. This will not, however, be adhered to perfectly. All of us here at the Temple are people, even Stella, and taking time for smaller and less-pressing joys like giving a child a toy and enjoying someone's smile are necessary forms of self-care to keep us doing this work for a long time to come. Wealthy and powerful people who wish to make use of Stella's attention out of this order will soon have the opportunity to do so monetarily, once we have bank accounts, payment processing infrastructure, and finance professionals. All money received through such means will be used to support the Temple's goals, whether through purchasing utilities and communications services for Temple facilities, or commissioning the design of objects for Stella to conjure.

"How's that look?"

Looking at it laid out like that...

Some deep part of me yells "sellout" there. "Objectively" it's correct to accept money for our work so we can do more of it, but I dislike it. It reminds me of buying indulgences in the old Catholic church. It's a dirty compromise. I particularly dislike only offering the opportunity to buy miracles to the wealthy and powerful. It should be available to everyone or no-one, no special-casing. 

We could try and work entirely off donations, but in some ways that makes us more beholden to large donors, not less. You've seen how large charities work around rich people. 

I genuinely think we need to engage with the economy, therefore, "no-one" is not an option, therefore we must make the option available to everyone. Miracles on a sliding scale basis, separate from answering prayers, Stella has the right to refuse transactions, prices not yet established but expected to be based on a combination of need and income. 

That'll be a whole-ass mess in the long run and require a bunch of staffers, but I'd rather be honestly mercenary in the hope of helping more people with the funds raised than pretend principles I don't have. This is fundamentally admitting to being bribable on goals that I find ethically neutral, and I don't want to sugarcoat that to you even if we never say it explicitly outside this room. 

Fundamentally this is a compromise with the existing economy. Do we honestly believe that it will help us help more people than the realistic alternative of never offering any miracles for hire? 

... That's not an easy call, but I do think it would genuinely help significantly. I'm just worried about the long-term ethical hazard of becoming the church-in-splendor rather than the church-in-service. 

What do you think?

She hums for a moment and nods. "I think you're right. I don't think I like making miracles available for money much more than you do, but sliding scale miracles are an efficient way to acquire currency, and we do need to interact with the economy. Fundamentally we'll need things you can't just conjure: comms, commissioned designs, real estate, and utilities, to name a few examples. We'll be much more efficient with those at our disposal than without, and we can't get those without money."

She updates the draft.

Stella's — and the Temple of Night's — priorities are first and foremost to provide safety and freedom to the weakest among us, especially those facing persecution: ethnic minorities, sexual minorities, gender minorities, religious minorities, people suffering physical or mental disabilities, the impoverished, the exploited. We hope to become a refuge for people in need, a haven where any can turn to seek safety and freedom to be oneself. First is immediate risk of death, then intolerable long-term situations like starvation or living in a war-zone or slavery or abuse, then those who need help to make their lives fairer or better, then comforts for the lives of ordinary people, and lastly those in positions of power and wealth. This will not, however, be adhered to perfectly. All of us here at the Temple are people, even Stella, and taking time for smaller and less-pressing joys like giving a child a toy and enjoying someone's smile are necessary forms of self-care to keep us doing this work for a long time to come. Miracles outside of the normal prayer process will be available once we have bank accounts, payment processing infrastructure, and finance professionals, priced on a sliding scale based on need and income. Stella reserves the right to refuse any request. All money received through such means will be used to support the Temple's goals, whether through purchasing utilities and communications services for Temple facilities, commissioning the design of objects for Stella to conjure, or other things as needed.

"Better?"