He skims the first few paragraphs of each wiki page.

"Those will be useful. ...This implies germs are animals, doesn't it? That explains some things. What else do you know of? Can you make an adult grow new teeth? Can you do anything we can't for injuries?"

"Germs are sort of animals, bacteria and viruses are each their own thing, like plants and animals and fungus are all their own thing. I can probably grow or make fake teeth and put them in someone, depending on the state of their mouth. I can do things that make adult teeth last longer a lot more easily. Prevention is easier than cure most of the time... There's medicine and techniques to help lots of different kinds of injuries heal up. Bones and nerves and torn muscles and everything. I can make medicine that makes people get old more slowly, but I'd want to observe the first few people who try it to make sure it's not doing anything unexpected to them."

"Nerves! You can fix nerves? Can you save people who've broken their backs?"

"Maybe. Fixing nerves is tricky for the autodoc. But maybe. Let me just..."

She pulls up an extremely technical chapter from a medical textbook. A third of the terms are un-translated and a third have long, confusing compound words to describe them.

He stares at it but can't really be said to read it. Not successfully anyway. "...In the time of the gods, what fraction of people with spinal cord injuries survived? If it's low enough we'll work on something else first."

"It depends on what kind of injuries, how bad they are, but... Something like ninety-five percent survive with immediate and proper medical care. About ninety percent end up still able to move all their arms and legs. About seventy five percent get most or all of their strength back eventually. Most of those who don't can learn to use robots to move around and do work."

He'll just... make an attempt not to be annoyed that he has to understand all this. Since it's good news.

"I don't suppose the books have pictures. Or explanations meant for children."

"This one is about fixing nerves but you're supposed to study medicine for ten years before you learn how to fix nerves in this much detail. There are introductory books. They're all written in English and I don't know your medical vocabulary yet. I'm working on it, though. The autodoc is not a person but it's a pretty good doctor so maybe people who need help can use mine while I'm teaching you everything. I also want to be introduced to your leaders and get them to pass out more computers. I can talk to lots of people at once and teach them all useful things."

"Oh, you have an artifact that does this? There's nothing to be lost from testing it on people who'd otherwise die, if they're willing. Was it too unwieldy to bring here?"

"Yeah, it's big and heavy. I could get it here but didn't want to drag it all the way in and have to take it out again. I have trucks - self-pulling carts - outside the town, it's in one of those."

"Farmers will want self-pulling trucks if you can share. It would be good to get your medical artifacts brought here if they'll fit. Then I can let anyone who comes to see me know that there's an experimental artifact they can try if they don't mind being test subjects. Then, you mentioned wanting to meet the council. Ekfres, can you go let them know about this?"

She laughs. "They'll know by now, everyone will know by now. Bet you at least two of them are on their way to the trucks right now."

"Trucks aren't trivial but I can definitely make some! Especially if I can get a lot of metal from the mines to make 'em with. I'm having some robots bring the autodoc here."

Indeed, outside, two of those faceless utility robots are rolling along, holding a large artifact covered in clean white plastic.

Two other robots are going around talking to people, asking what they would like to learn and showing off shiny documentary videos.

Almost everyone wants to learn lots of things later when they're not in the middle of running errands or looking for things or on their way to tell someone something. 

...A few people would just like the robots not to touch them until someone who knows these things says they're safe.

A councilmember stops one of the robots to ask it if it's planning to move in and offer it whatever hospitality-for-artifact-people is.

The robots definitely don't touch people without permission.

"I can move part of me in if that would be acceptable. I want to get to know people here and teach them things and give them things, so that everyone can be safer and happier. For hospitality, I just need somewhere I can lay out solar panels, to gather sunlight. They eat for me, like leaves. Though plant leavings nobody wants will be useful, and metal from the mine will be useful to let me make more things."

"Are your solar panels light enough to be put on roofs? Otherwise I think they should go outside of town for now. What work are you planning to do here and what kind of metal do you need?"

"Outside of town works. All the metal. All kinds. Copper and steel are most urgent? I want to teach people. I want to make more computers and robots like these, and trucks, and medicine, and farm tools, and mining tools, and everything. I want to find faraway people and help them too, and help you trade with them and talk to them. I already delivered a doctor artifact to a doctor."

"So you'll be a maker, that works. You can buy metal in bulk from Seyi, I can introduce you to him. Mining tools you can sell here. Farm tools too, but I'd recommend you also make a circuit of the countryside, there are more farmers out there. ...Normally if someone came in from far away and wanted to live here we'd find a household that could give them somewhere to sleep and feed them for their first few weeks, but you don't seem to need that. Maybe you'd like, um... some of the town compost heap and I can buy you some iron?"

"I don't think it makes sense to label me that way. I'm not human. I don't quite think the same way. I'm kind of low key horrified at everything here because you are all so poor compared to what came before, what I expected. Sure, on the other stuff."

"Want to meet Seyi or raid our compost first? Oh, there are two of you, you can send one over that way and tell anyone who asks that I said it was okay for you to take as much as one of your bodies can carry. There's multiple piles, you probably want the freshest one, that's the one on the east side right now. And come with me, too, for the metal."

"There's not two of me, it's more like I'm in two places at once. And more than two, actually."

She follows. And sends a utility bot towards the compost piles.

Seyi's office isn't far. The councilmember lets herself in. A bell chimes when she does.

Seyi is sitting in the window reconciling accounts and looks up when they come in.

"Hi, Yaasel. Hi, fancy working artifact, what're you for?"

(Utility bot scoops up the least-decomposed parts of the compost pile with a plastic tarp and returns it to the second truck to get fed into a plastic synthesizer mill. Some other robots have laid out solar panels in the open space outside of town and are - not guarding them exactly, but certainly intercepting anyone who looks tempted to touch them and distracting them.)

"Hi, Seyi! I'm Lin. I guess I am an artifact. I was made before the big cities fell. I was supposed to wake up and do things back then, but I never did, until a priest named Vaayo woke me up." Namedropping her friend at every opportunity should do wonders for his reputation, right?

"I know many things and can make many useful machines. I was planning on giving away lots of it because I want everyone to be safe and happy. But, I need metal to make more things. I'll probably start my own mines somewhere in the desert sooner or later, but if you have a mine here and I could get your metal in trade for tools and things that would be faster."

"Sure, and most of our metal imports go through me, too. I probably have what you want." He rattles off a list of products and bulk prices. He can sell her iron in a few different forms, as much as she's likely to want for the next while. He can sell her crucible steel, he can sell her copper, he can sell her imported silver, but not as much of any of them.

Yaasel repeats her offer to pay for some to start with.

"Iron and copper are the most important! I'll need a bunch of weird metals you guys don't seem to have eventually but I'll deal with that when we get there! I can turn it to steel alloys I need on my own, I need pretty specific steels. Money, eh... I'll take your offer, Yaasel, but d'you want to see my mining machines, Seyi? And maybe you'll want to buy one?"

"Anything else we have in... smaller quantities, if we have it at all. There's gold here, say, but it's all in ancient artifacts with sentimental value, I can't sell you someone else's great-grandmother's diamond ring. What do your mining machines do? How would people use them?"