"In this hypothetical do I have to worry about getting squashed by gods or unsummoned or anything?"

"Does that limit your creativity too much? Not having to worry about gods feels like...not having to worry about gravity, to me."

"Oh, then we should definitely go to the moon, I can turn the gravity off in between."

"Going somewhere else is a fine way not to worry about the gods, but you've got to worry about them while you're here."

"Fair enough. Well, I lack the specific emphasis on women's rights - a worthy cause, but not my single issue, and I think it will mostly improve secularly on its own as other metrics are handled - so I would aim at ending material scarcity, same as last time, it worked out so well."

"I don't see why it'd improve as other things do, especially. Last time - you mean, in the world of humans you're from?"

"Yes, that. I think contraception in itself will help enormously, and enough wealth that women aren't economically dependent on forming a household unit with someone who works outside the home while they do household-sustaining labor."

"I mean, yes, that'd help a lot, but I can't see why men would let it happen, in the places where they don't already? If you're a man it's convenient if women are economically dependent on men."

"I mean, sure, you could say that, but they're all currently free-riding on lots of other factors pointing that way. If there's enough wealth flying around, then anybody who wants to offer opportunities to women - Calistrians, folks from Andoran, anybody with a profit motive, other women - you personally if you're not all talk - any of those people can, y'know, afford it. Then all the women with all those opportunities can have their interests more represented in whatever locales. And individual families or even communities can be repressive and abusive in the face of this pressure but it's not in the interest of, like, Taldor men as a class, to swan in and force their neighbors to oppress, say, Galtan women as a class, it's mostly going to be operative on a more local level and therefore relatively tractable to rich entities with an interest in the subject."

"Most people never leave their hometowns. I guess if they were rich enough it was really easy maybe that'd change. And if things were lawful enough it was safe to travel."

"Yeah! Most people on my original planet don't have shuttles like this one, they take buses that movers carry, but that's much faster."

"I guess we'll see how it works out."

Someone moves in the mirror. Carissa stiffens. 

"Can they hear us by default or are you gonna Tongues a sign language or what?"

"They can hear us."

"I can hear you," a dry woman's voice confirms from the other side. "And we ought to assume, I think, that other people can, too, though not on my end."

"You must've noticed I'm not very scryable."

"I did notice that, and am pleased to learn it's not because you have been destroyed utterly, unless you have and I'm talking to someone else."

Well, the state of the art where he's from for secure comms is chiplocking but who knows if even that would hold up to a concerted attack here.

"You're talking to the person with the apsel, in any event."

"Yes. I am satisfied of that. What observable effects on the world are your plans going to have in the next couple of weeks?"

Well, that's very direct. Not as rude as asking what her plans are, but still. "Sorry, what am I getting out of this?"

"Well, in your place I wouldn't get myself killed, and you're probably going to, and if it seems better for you to be alive I can probably effect that, and if it seems better for you to be dead I am not particularly positioned to effect that, so it's mostly upside for you, I think."

" - I'm going to think about that for a minute."

"I don't take tea until nearly four."

Cam finds a little app for multiple time zone tracking and sets it to handle various salient metropolises and puts the widget on the screen.