Now that financing has been set up, they will give the papers to Estimator Purple. Is it possible to finalize the crystal deal now?

Yup, here's the work order his supervisor drew up for them to approve!

They'll look over it and make their own assessment, but the physicists onboard will give the okay. Nenad will again do the requisite formal approval.

They would like to obtain test subjects for both wind and water magic testing. They would like subjects male and female from all castes. Preferably there would also be foreign test subjects — they definitely want at least one test subject from each country who has at least one person who won a bid for wind or water magic treatment. They want babies, children, young people, old people. A few of each, so that something like a couple hundred people.

Test subjects for water magic should be in good health for their relevant demographic. Test subjects for wind magic should not have any mental illnesses and exhibit normative behavior according to their culture; they also should not possess classified information, because it involves mind reading.

They affirm that the testing is entirely passive and that they expect very little risk during it. However, wind magic testing will involve interviews which may get into emotionally sensitive topics, so people who have unworked-through trauma or who are easily embarrassed or upset should not sign up.

Is it the custom to do pay test subjects in Amenta? If so, how much? They predict it varies by caste. 

What kinds of emotionally sensitive topics do they need to screen people for tolerance of? It is customary to pay test subjects but they are space aliens so they can charge them, if they want, and it will barely decrease the rate of fraudulent attempts to pass the criteria.

It's less about the specific topic and more that they can talk about their past experiences and emotions without having a mental breakdown. Subjects can refuse a specific question but if they refuse too many then it reduces the worth of the sample.

There's a set questionnaire for wind magic calibration! It asks about: life history, interactions with family and friends, likes and dislikes, what causes them to feel certain emotions (anger, disgust, fear, happiness, etc.), their hobbies and work, how they see themselves and describe themselves. Mindreading will be done while doing the interview and they measure the outputs of that. Interviews typically thirty minutes to an hour — it's very variable because people are encouraged to say as much or as little as they want.

Babies aren't going to be asked any questions obviously but looking at them is still useful for looking at instincts and basal drives.

Ah! Well in that case they can auction the slots in the same way as previously. They're not so concerned about fraudulence here, since once they gather enough data it will be obvious to tell that someone is unhealthy or deviated from typical in some way, although it does waste time. They're more worried about...they say or ask something that drives a wind test subject into a rage and they attack. The psions will be able to use their magic to defend themselves but of course that's going to cause an Incident.

Can they get the Tapai government to lend them cameras for the interview? So that any possible incidents can be recorded. They're going to request these for all test subjects actually, not just the wind magic ones. They request that recordings be destroyed afterwards if there are no complaints on either side for the purposes of patient confidentiality. Do they have that concept in Amenta? Otherwise they can explain.

The Amentan concept of patient confidentiality is... porous... but extant. They can figure out recording deletion with local-only storage.

What does...porous...mean. If they have different customs for it they can adjust to adopt local norms. How is it typically done?

Usually the government including the eugenics board can get your medical information if they want it. Random people can't though.

Ah. Well, that seems to be the done thing so they can do information sharing with the government.

It has come to the attention of the Asteralians that there is doubt regarding their statements that orgonic artifacts won't work without them, because Amentans can't channel orgone. They would like to dispel this doubt.

They're going to, for free, share a blueprint for the simplest lightpencil model: it only has one duration setting (5 minutes), one color setting (full spectrum white), one brush-size setting, and no erase feature. There are two parts and they need to be shaped in this way and both require alloys of common metals. The metals should preferably be as pure as possible but it's much much more forgiving than the crystal and it would work with only two nines of purity of the component metals. The blueprint is very exact but it doesn't say anything about theory or why things are the way they are. It should be trivial for Amentan industry to create.

They're going to give the delegation two lightpencils made in this way, in a transparent plastic case. They are gifts and they may disassemble or analyze or do anything that they want with them. They demonstrate that it works, and that it works if the Amentans handle it.

They explain that the reason why artifacts don't instantly stop working when they're handed to Amentans is because of an effect similar to electrical capacitance where some residual energy remains and is then used up.

In the event that they do create lightpencils according to the specifications, they assert that they are not going to work if handled by the Amentans but that they are going to work if the Asteralians do (and then would work for Amentans for a short while after due to the above capacitance effect but then soon stop working).

The Amentans will try this experiment. It does not affect public opinion very much, though, because there are other ways the Asteralians could get this effect if they were lying.

Sigh. It ultimately doesn't matter as long as they can get the crystal. But they're going to go on the internet again and see what the opinion is regarding the experiment and what possible ways they might demonstrate truthfulness, since this is passive and costs little.

Some people would be convinced with more technical information about how orgone works, where it comes from, what about the Asteralians allows them to manipulate it, etcetera. Some people are pretty sure they ought to be able to turn Amentans magic, or have half-Amentan magic babies, or something, because it's magic and magic ought to work that way. Some people will buy it once some Amentans trans-species themselves and report back.

They are going to refrain from attempting to address these doubts for now.

Also, given that they're going to be interacting with the General Public with the treatments (even if it's a very selected public), they would like to receive copies of civil and criminal law of Tapa. Do they have a civil law or common law system?

They're not acting on behalf of their government given that...they don't have contact with their government. So they assume they don't have diplomatic immunity — do Amentans have that concept?

They would appreciate some sort of legal liaison or lawyer who could have attorney-client privilege with them and could consult on law issues. They assume Mekapi doesn't count as that. Do Amentans recognize attorney-client privilege.

It's more like a civil law system, though obviously it has no historical continuity with anything on Earth. Here's a copy, first-pass organized by what might have anything to do with them (they are not going to go fishing in international waters in the Apta Desert, they are not operating a school, they are not applying for child credits).

They do not have diplomatic immunity, but Amenta does have the concept.

Amenta hasn't invented adversarial justice and as a consequence does not have a robust form of attorney-client privilege.

Huh. The Asteral Accord also has an inquisitorial system, in that the judge is also involved in information gathering and calling of witnesses, but it does have the concept of having legal advisors who are sworn to secrecy. Anyway, thank you. They affirm their intention to follow Tapai law while in Tapai space.

Given that the spaceship is immovable and much equipment is, while technically portable (basically all the nonportable equipment has been destroyed), is incredibly difficult to move, they expect that all of the people will be transported here. How will they be so transported? Also with helicopters?

They want to receive standards for Amentan air traffic control and airstrip requirements to see whether or not they might be able to fashion together something so that non-VTOL aircraft could come here. (This proposal may have been given more because the stone and fire magineers are feeling useless and sad.)

(Also, they are making progress on clearing out rooms and are likely to be able to make space inside for guests. It's not going to be very comfortable but it's might be better than camping...wait they're going to refrain from offering this actually because the plumbing systems are broken and they've just been using their magic to stay clean rather than bathe. Very much like the pioneers. But they predict the Amentans would be So Upset about this.)

Yeah, if they were going to permanently be a spaceship-town in the desert they'd build out a train track but since it's temporary they're doing helicopters and some sand-adapted cars. Amenta does have planes that need runways, that's just not what they do when they're going to somewhere that is not an airport, and the desert is not an airport. Their legal code copy has the aircraft code in there, though it has been sorted toward the back because they weren't expecting that.

Nenad does not approve the plan of using what stone magic resources they have to build an airport.

They want to discuss the possibility of sex work and pornography as another means to earn money. They anticipate that it will earn much less than the wind and water magic but there's probably going to be extra expenses that they're going to incur so better to have extra than to have not. Also it's fun and they genuinely want to do it!

How do these two industries work, in Tapa?

Seeing clients is orange, filming porn is grey, not that that applies to them. They can hire film crews and just go to town if they're writing and directing their own stuff, or source scripts from somewhere if they're not feeling it, lots of companies would be happy to put in submissions. If they want to include Amentan actors they should probably go with an established company and collaborate on the choreo.

Seeing clients will impose a lot of screening overhead - like, this is a sensitive installation, they don't want people whose qualifying feature is "hasn't yet been kicked off Marmalade" showing up in case they do crimes - but if they want to do that, there is no particular reason they should not have people over and fuck them for money.

Does Amenta, or Tapa, have copyright? The Accord doesn't have it or recognize intellectual property at all, and creatives make money by selling official copies, merchandise, and patronage — the Accord does recognize claims of authorship and provenance (it's classed as fraud or false advertising) and you can sue if someone pretends to be official/endorsed by the original creator when they're not. They also recognize trademarks.

What is Marmalade. Also, that makes sense. They think they'll wait on that and see how the test subjects work out first.

Amenta in general and Tapa in particular has copyright with some irritating fuzziness about translation and international stuff and whatnot.

Marmalade is a website for hiring prostitutes.