"What castes? What ages? What nationalities? Amentans vary, a lot. For example some of us are reds. You're picking up on a real trend but I think you're, again, kind of jumping to conclusions."

"Tapai, some blues, some others. I'm not very good at telling ages apart."

Hm... something about this is annoying her and she's having trouble figuring it out...

"I think you're cri-ti-ci-zing me for coming to bad con-clusions even though I really think Amenta would look different if most people came to con-clusions that were at least as good as mine about reds. And you don't really seem to be saying what sorta things would be better con-clusions and it sorta seems like you think yours are better but I don't know why I should agree with that."

"Your conclusions are not completely off base but I'm really suspicious of your process. Which, you will observe, got a red neighborhood burnt to the ground without helping anyone in it one bit. Do you know what happened the last time there was a really big pollution hysteria incident?"

"No, I don't."

"Also I'm really sad about the burning down but. I sorta had to learn a while ago that I can't always blame myself completely when things go wrong and I don't think I burnt down that neighborhood so I'm trying not to pretend like I did. "

"And I think I disagree about whether my helping helped - I think it might turn out that my being curious and trying to figure things out and not being willing to ignore things was useful and good 'ventually. Though right now it was bad and. I wish I had made different choices so the neighborhood wasn't burnt down and people didn't get hurt."

Meelia tears up a bit. 

"It's - true you didn't burn down the neighborhood. But it's also true that, for reasons someone in your position could have foreseen with more thought, the neighborhood burned down because of your intervention, and probably wouldn't have any time soon without it. I guess it's possible that it could wind up net good just because it made it really obvious that you wanted to help reds and were very serious about it and that attracted attention from people like me but you really could have accomplished that in some less costly way. If there's a thing you want, you can just go straight for it and hold everyone else responsible for their predictable choices that may interact with that decision, but you could also... predict... the choices... and work around them."

"Sorta sounds like how Lucien solves problems."

"Lucien?"

"My problem solvey friend. He was sorta in-charge during first contact after I gathered people and helped figured out details and cares a lot about getting things right and being careful and when I left he was very excited about helping the Amentans get settled and helping people talk to each other and figuring out the best poss-ible solutions to lots of different problems. He also doesn't sleep enough but has a monster on his back to help with that."

"He - a monster on his back? How does that help?"

"It's a brown slime thing that helps him be awake and not nap too much. He uses it when he needs to be extra busy."

"Gosh. I guess if that works for him. I'd love to be introduced if we get the chance."

"I asked to be dropped off near him or Keetim. If I get dropped off near Keetim I'll prolly see about finding him soon though. Keetim is safe and nice and has Keeta but I want to talk to Lucien about fixing things s'why I'm excited to go home. Want to fix things and what I was doing wasn't helping and he's good at helping in different ways."

"We're going to land near Keetim but then I'm going to be able to get a ride to Chaspanti."

"Oh. Could I go with you to see Lucien?"

"Uh, no, you aren't allowed in Chaspanti, it's Tapai territory. He can come to you if he wants."

"I thought Lucien had his own bedroom there?"

"Probably... but... it's in Chaspanti... so you can't go there."

"Huh. I'm used to bedrooms being private spaces people who have them get to make the rules about."

"People can make additional rules about their bedrooms but they can't unmake the existing rules there, like, you can't murder people in your own bedroom."

"That sort of rules seems like a different sort of thing than the rule that I can't come in to Chaspanti, but I don't know if Lucien would agree and don't think he'd want me in his room given that rule so it's not super important I guess."

"Chaspanti includes all of the locations inside of it. It's a pretty straightforward consequence that you cannot visit the home of a person who lives in Chaspanti if you are not allowed in Chaspanti."

"I think it's more straightforward for lo-cal-ized rules over smaller places like a bedroom to override more general rules."

"...okay, well, that is the opposite of how most Amentan rules work and you should keep that in mind when trying to interpret them if you can't just ask someone."

"Okay."

Eventually Pelape has a shift change with Kessa, and so on, till they reach Keetim's outskirts and put Meelia off.