"I do! I actually am only kind of learning the language? Mostly a computer knows it. It's actually pretty cool if you look at what the computer is doing to learn the language. I'm going to have to send flying things around looking for more people. Have to help everyone, not just Iron Heart, if I can."

"If you're going to be sending them around to different places anyway, any chance you could tell us who's out there and carry messages? It's probably never going to be worth crossing the mountains but if we could talk about what goods we have on either side we could be sure of that. Or let us tell the northerners ahead of time what we have and what we want so nobody carries things all that way that they'll just have to carry right back or leaves things behind that would've gotten a good price."

"Of course! I can set up communications so you can talk to faraway people any time you want without me, too."

"That would be really good. I wonder if there are people left on other continents! I wonder what their lives are like if there are."

"I'll find out sooner or later, hopefully!"

"I'm glad you're awake. Was there anything else you wanted to know?"

"I think I'm good for now! I have to think about other things. Anything you want to know?"

"Not unless you know how people lived before. You know, what ordinary days were like, what they thought the gods wanted..."

"...Not really? Well, there's books about what the gods wanted. Someone wrote them. So I guess they're what people thought the gods wanted."

"...I'm guessing there are probably too many dead for you to know their names."

"...I have some of the dead's names. But it's a lot of names."

"Good. Do you know what any of them were like, what they did while they were alive...?"

"Do you... Want examples? Or what?"

"You're supposed to remember people after they die and tell people who never met them what they were like. And I don't know very many stories of people before the collapse. So they were probably forgotten and that's worse than just dying."

"...Donald Xavier wrote a biography in 2068. I just skimmed it. He was very smart and got rich by inventing useful things, but then his son died of malaria so he used all his money and decades of his life trying to permanently eradicate malaria so nobody would get sick of it ever again. And he did it with special-made bugs who kill the malaria germ and bred so fast they replaced all the ones that didn't kill malaria germs. Ahmed Renfield lived in a desert where people fought a lot because they didn't agree on what the gods wanted and talked to people to try to get them to stop fighting but it didn't work and eventually the fighting killed him by accident. Jennifer Simmons..."

She can keep reading off short bios about people from news stories for a while if he doesn't stop her.

He will absolutely never ask her to stop. If she doesn't run out by then he won't mention being hungry or tired, either.

After about an hour, she pauses. "We've been doing this for a while. I know you think it's important, but... You need a drink, or a break, or anything?"

"I guess it might help me remember better. How long will it take you to tell me about all the people you know about?"

"Way too long. Decades. Sorry... If there's more priests who want to hear I could maybe tell all of them some every day, and eventually someone will have heard about everyone I can tell you about?"

"That would be good. Of course the other priests will want to hear them, everyone will want to hear them, there'll be people who'd like it if you had a robot follow them to work and recite history while they're working."

"Then I can do that. When I have more robots. Which I'll need metal for. I'm working on cars and small planes so I can get started on that soon, but it's not ready yet."

"When you go for metal just tell the people at Iron Heart that you were sleeping since before the ruined city was ruined and I woke you up and now you need metal to grow stronger. They might give it to you for free if you say that."

"Of course, I'll still help them as much as I can! You can go back with me when I'm ready to go at all, it'll be fast and safe compared to walking."

"Good, I hated the trip here. ...I do have some things to pick up on the way back that I left by one of the buildings in the ruined city, will that be inconvenient?"

"Only a little, depending on where exactly they are. It'll be fine."