I think it will be universally offensive, or close to it. It will not be universally the top priority.

That makes sense.

I've been asked to make inquiries into whether we should be considering you clean - it's not very urgent if not, you aren't touching anyone and the ocean is the sort of place that can clear pollution as long as the quantity isn't overwhelming, we don't panic when a ship is lost with all its crew in a storm - but people would like to know.

I think I would be clean, but require more information about what causes and spreads and removes pollution to be sure.

Amseli looks up the formal definition on Summary Bank. Any substance a person's body rejects because it is noxious, as opposed to for other reasons, is a primary pollutant; the corpse of a person is a primary pollutant; reds, even living, are primary pollutants, but you aren't likely to have those back home. People and things that come into contact with primary pollutants are secondarly polluted until thoroughly cleaned.

He decides not to mention that he keeps feathers from those he defeats in combat, and two of those were dead when plucked.

I have been thoroughly cleaned many times since I came into contact with any corpses of people. Waste decays into nature or is incinerated. In my ship it is sequestered until it can be safely dumped and the vessel is then cleaned with fire. I occasionally autoclave myself to remove chemical residues or dust, it seems like that would be an effective cleaning method. 

Reds are primary pollutants?

Autoclaving does the trick. And yes, they've been contacting the other primary pollutants often since long before really effective cleaning was invented.

That seems inconvenient. Is the purpose of this to remove disease vectors?

Yes, that's how our pollution sense is understood to have evolved.

We don't have anything like that. Perhaps because even juveniles with any skill at all can recognize most pathogens with the song and avoid dangerous concentrations of them - with the rare exception, such as the spores of the possible rogue bioweapon I mentioned, Blueblight. But it's something my kind will not have too much difficulty accommodating, I think.

Do the reds suffer from this instinct, if they are the only members of your kind considered inherently disgusting?

My understanding is that reds are less sensitive to it. How does telepathy allow you to identify pathogens?

The song is not just telepathy. It's a sense that happens to detect something other than electromagnetic radiation, or air vibration, or chemicals in the air. What exactly it detects is not very well understood even by the wisest among us. But it is what it is. Everything that is alive and many things that aren't sing. The signs are very faint sometimes, but they are there.

That's interesting! Do you have instruments that allow you to detect things you sense that way at greater range or precision, like lenses can for vision?

Yes! There are ways to trap patterns of song so they can be sensed again later, to detect things at a distance, to create illusions in it. There are ways to channel the action we perform to use telepathy into other effects, from light to stunning prey to healing to changing something's genetics, among others. It is even possible to make things that guide one's thoughts in particular patterns if you 'listen' intently - they are good teaching tools. Many of these are techniques, but my specialty is tools.

That's fascinating, I wonder if we can see your song-photographs or if they wouldn't work the way you're able to communicate with us now.

I suspect not directly, but I can certainly bring one out for a test. Or perhaps I should send as clear a picture as I can from my own memory. I have seen that Amentan minds are shaped differently than Draak ones, and also differently than animal minds, and I have been careful to not be overwhelming. The very first thought I sent to you was more chaotic, looser. Do you remember?

I do, yes. It's gotten easier over time to talk to you.

That is because I have been learning how best to sing to Amentan minds. If I try to send you a song-photograph, it will be very much like the first moment, possibly moreso.

I'm willing to try it.

It will be interesting. But first, I will fetch one.

He closes his eyes and settles into the ocean instead of moving to go to the ship. And then the shiny robot(?) darts out and floats over, holding a deep red stone the size of a fist in its jaw. The Seeker takes it and the glowy thing collapses into a ball a few feet across and zips back to the ship, and then he opens his eyes again and holds the delivered object out to Amseli.

It's certainly a rather pretty rock...?

Should I pick it up?

If you wish. It's not fragile. Try... Contemplating it?

She picks it up and examines the facets and the way the light hits it.

To all appearances, it's just a shaped and polished rock, like something you'd find in a store of decorative knickknacks.

I don't think anything is happening.

I agree. I suspected as much, but it is good to confirm one's hunches.

Let me know when you are ready and I will try to send you what it sings to me.