" - Citrelièses.  Um, kind of a lot; are you asking more about the hypothetical space of what citrelièv - the copying thing as a whole - can do, or in practice what's available to the general public, or . . ?"

"Oh, those are also interesting, but it keeps coming up that some people have versions that do different things and I don't think I understand what the different things are."

"Sure - um, so - it . . . lets you copy - traits and skills that other people have?  - It does have to be people, we're pretty sure, there's a lot of directions it could expand in but as far as we know that's a hard line; it's easier to test than some of the other things.  . . . I'm sorry, I - don't think I actually answered or even really understood your question."

"What's different between the different versions of the trait that lets you copy?"

"Ah, okay, it's - the thing is that's - kind of not a sensible question by itself; it's like asking what the difference between . . . people, or species of plants - plants is probably the better example there - is.  You can point at any two and talk about how they're the same and how they're different, and you can talk about traits that all plants have, and traits that groups of plants have - like maybe crops specifically, for how I thought maybe you were asking about the generally-available ones - or ways that plants definitely aren't, and - plants that could maybe exist but don't yet?  But not - that, I don't think.  - Unless I misunderstood again?  This is very complicated and I'm not a researcher - or for that matter a botanist - and I don't think I'm very good at explaining things."

"You keep saying that some versions aren't very good at this or that, what sorts of things are those and why are there versions in circulation that aren't good at them?"

"I continue to not be a researcher but - things trade off against each other?  Like, um, if I copied your arms, I wouldn't then have four arms, right?  Yours would replace mine.  And I think it's just mostly more complicated versions of that principle.  - I would be focusing on how to get myself to explain this better except I'm pretty sure they'll have you talking to lots of researchers in Chraida, and they'll be much more informed and able to answer things much more easily, and it wouldn't be very good specialization of me to change myself in that direction very much when that's going to happen anyway."

"Yeah, that makes sense, we can wait for the researchers."

"Okay.  So: toothbrushes . . ."

"Uh, something to shave with, or are we both going to have to grow beards... comb? Water bottle? Suitcase to put all the clothes in? First aid kit - maybe you have them for if people are going to travel alone?"

"Comb water bottle suitcase I can all get pretty straightforwardly.  I can - look into whether we have first aid kits, at least, definitely - um, we might put different stuff in ours, but if you know what usually goes in them there's a chance we might have it separately for other purposes or something.  Razors are not very common but I have ever heard of them and can probably rustle one up."

"Bandages, disinfectant, painkillers, tweezers in case of splinters? - I don't actually know how to shave with a straight razor, Kyeo do you -"

"No. Do you have the safety kind here?"

"I'll have to ask someone who's ever had a beard, I guess - are bandages anything less straightforward than strips of cloth?  We can definitely get you strips of cloth; tweezers I can do; I don't think I've ever heard of painkillers but maaaaaybe we'd have disinfectant for like, babies . . ."

"Rubbing alcohol? Or, uh, vodka, I guess that would probably work."

"We have vodka.  - Which one was that for, disinfectant or painkiller."

"I guess both, if you don't have ibuprofen or, uh, opiates or anything."

"We have other - recreational drugs, but I don't really know about them; I'm only thirty-four.  And I'm not sure anyone would know which ones work as painkillers - maybe if somebody had got hurt while they were already high?  But I'm not sure we could find out about that in time before you go - and come to think of it how old are you two; you might be young enough that it's not legal either, although maybe you could get an exception . . ."

"In Earth Standard I'm twenty - maybe twenty-one by now, I mark the date in Ibyabekan time."

"I'm 21 too."

" - We need to figure out the conversion between day lengths."

"You said it was how many hours to a day here?"

"We don't actually use hours; I have a general feel for how long they are from the language but we should probably do math about it.  Can you - count off seconds or something, and also tell me how many seconds are in a minute and how many minutes are in an hour."

"...I have my lens with me. I haven't been using it, to preserve battery power, but it displays what time it thinks it is in Starport in sleep mode down to the minute, and I can look at it now and then a bit later?"

" - Those are definitely some words you just said!!  Yes, you can do that - does it count seconds; I'm not great at math but I'm still pretty sure I can do it faster than it would take to usefully check later - we should work this out first but then please tell me everything about lenses - "