A well managed territory is one that will consistently feed you and teach you interesting, useful things! They don't live in crowds, disease is not a common problem!

As the deadline for his return home approaches he hides away in his ship for most of three days and then emerges to give gifts to various countries. Hand-sized black rods with a ring of six green lights around a button at the top.

Rods of a Greater Song of Healing, he explains to various representatives. They will stop someone from bleeding out for a while or mend a broken leg. Six charges. Single target - touch the end opposite the button to the target and hold it for two seconds.

The Amentans wish to know how the charges thing works. Can they recharge them?

You can't. I or another Draak who can do such magic themselves can, with a companion device.

They will allocate them accordingly. Probably not for broken legs, a broken leg basically never kills a person.

Studying the effects would help them understand how Songs of Healing work in general, perhaps. The details of how magic creates or reshapes living matter could be important.

Tapa gets fifty. Voa gets forty. Tuviri gets thirty. Cene gets twenty. Doet gets ten. Most other places get two or three, and he earmarks three for Calado, giving them to the Calador ambassador to Tapa.

The Calador ambassador is delighted and appreciative that he chose to consider Calado in distributing the rods!

Most rods will be in hospitals and ambulances in major cities, and while they will probably use many charges on people of importance with acute conditions that might kill them before the doctors can intervene, they plan to try using some on other stuff and get back to Seeker with the data on how it works on chronic stuff, comas, etcetera.

Science is always interesting.

Well, almost every country he's spoken to a representative of gets at least one, and he feels a little bad that Calado seemed to be mostly left out of things so far.

I have been repeatedly warned to stay away from Calado lest trouble occur when I arrive, and what I can learn from sources outside of Calado seems to support that, unfortunately. I do place importance on gaining a wide variety of perspectives, though, and I would appreciate yours.

Personally, I love my country very much, says the ambassador. It's got a sort of entrepreneurial spirit to it that I think a lot of places lack. But I don't think 'stable' would be on my list of the first adjectives that'd come to mind, I admit that. If you'd like to arrange a visit, I can figure it out - it just might be complicated compared to visiting someplace more organizedly authoritarian.

I would like to visit, at least for a day or two. Even if there is trouble, it would very likely not cause me more harm than annoyance. I am more worried I'll be forced to use violence to protect my personal interests, which would be an unpleasant note on otherwise peaceful discussions and contact with Amenta.

What personal interests do you worry about in this context?

Theft of my tools or other possessions, danger or attacks on my person, and anyone trying to get into my ship are the things I would feel compelled to respond to forcefully.

Calado does have a higher crime rate than many of our neighbors, I don't want to downplay that and have you nastily surprised.

I understand. I will defend myself and my things, without lethal force if I can avoid it. It is up to you whether a visit to Calado seems like a good idea under these conditions.

Of course nobody could reasonably hold self-defense against you. I'll make some inquiries!

Thank you. But my time on Amenta approaches its end for now. If nothing can be arranged in the next... Three days, when I next return - another two or three months perhaps - will do just as well.

Two or three months out it is, then.

He finishes handing out the Rods of Healing and explains that he can't truly mass-produce them yet, and might want to source materials and parts from Amentan companies. Can Tapa get him a bank account and help him auction another thirty of 'em so he will have money to do that with when he comes back?

Tapa can absolutely do that. He has an account at a bank and another at an auction site in less than twenty minutes; bids start rolling in as soon as the rods are listed and the Tapai issue a press release confirming their authenticity.

Good, good. The auctions are set for three days, and he's going to leave shortly after they close. Can he get a modest line of credit? He'd like to meet up with River and do a little shopping by sitting outside of a mall and borrowing her eyes, or maybe sending in his not-quite-a-robot, before leaving.

Yep, here's a standard high-end consumer line of credit and here's where he can land near River.

He prefers to actually fly there himself instead of bringing the spaceship. Seeker's bigger-than-a-train-carriage size makes landing anywhere more confined than an airport runway a slightly tricky proposition, but the chosen spot works.

He brings the shiny robot, and it takes on an Amentan shape (technically a human one, but it's close enough), still shiny and glowing, to better navigate the mall with River and whatever escorts are sent along with them.

"A place for trade with as many people as possible seems like a good idea. There are things you would want to buy but would never know to seek out."

"Yes," says Mahkemiken, "that's one reason there are still shops we visit in person even now that it's pretty easy to order everything online, people like to browse. That and there are things you want to touch or smell before you buy them."

"I can't fit inside or use telepathy with River here, so I'll only touch or smell things I actually buy. Not a big deal. I will want to spend a lot at an electronics store. I hope large amounts of purchases can be sent to, if not the island, some place convenient for landing the Wing of Change?"

"Sure, we can have things delivered all the way to the island if you want or someplace nearer by for pickup."

I should probably spend all the concert money since I'm leaving with Seeker after this. I could buy a lot of gold and art and shiny rocks if I don't have any better ideas...