"I'll take it on trust, Depkta will keep being concerned about security. Do you want to pull more stuff from me? I assume you got the language. You might want more languages? You should take more Aeyeia, do you like to sing? You could milen energy, Depkta says I have a lot of that."

"I am more fit than you and have more energy but thank you!  I like to sing normally.  Is it smart to be more fluent in Overlap before another language?"

"I think it's Important* to be more fluent in every language!"

*A word here that combines the kind of obsession you need with a subject to do a couple Ph.Ds in it with the kind of cultural dedication you need to continue practicing a persecuted religion, and is only sometimes exaggerating. 

"But it will go faster the less I parallel."

"Fiiiiiine. Yes if you're just trying to get around Overlap is most of the way, you'll be able to talk with most everyone within a few thousand miles. Any other language has fewer users. If you want to talk to a certain kind of person though I can probably give suggestions for their language."

"Statement: I learn Overlap as fast as possible.  Then another, and then another!  Maybe the singing one first."

"Suggestion: breadth first. To orient, language is useful, self defense is useful, clients or patrons are useful, cartography is useful, trading is useful."

In a rare case, Patik uses the punctuation prefix Deptka has been persistent about. 

"Statement: I don't care about the other stuff. Suggestion: you could talk more about your languages! If they don't have any common origin with ours then recording information about them before contamination is Important." Patik is leaning forward now, practically vibrating.

"Statement:  I won't forget things about languages I know in one conversation.  Question:  how are clients and patrons useful immediately?"

"Statement: You'll want miscellaneous things like food or shoes. If someone wants you to do more of your-thing*, then they'll arrange for you to have resources you need. That's a client or patron.

Inference: A client or patron isn't a step one. It's a step two. Step three is anything else you want to do. "

*A single word that has a lot of connotative importance to it.

"Statement: Depkta does that for me."

Patik does a kind of shoulder/head wiggle, then skips forward a few steps despite the weight of their pack and the exhaustion in their legs. 

"Statement: I have a friend in my reading circle. Bas* not publicly paired."

*A pronoun that refers to the kind of person Depkta is, not the kind of person Patik is.

Hm.  The thing Patik just said is - maybe important to come back to later but it doesn't seem like worrying about being 'paired' is necessary quite yet.  (Also... she definitely isn't dating Colley anymore, according to their agreement, but thinking about that would involve having more emotions than really seem helpful at the moment, so she won't.)

"Question: what's my step one, then?"

"Question: What do you want?"

Depkta and Patik haven't stopped walking, and are still going slightly uphill back the way Zarian was first coming down. 

"Statement: If you want to be hired for your talent and get lots of nice things for it, step one is to go downhill that way-" they point down the path "-and go to the train."

Depkta hesitates for a long moment, before saying somewhat reluctantly, "Statement: If you want to spend time in the wilderness with just us, step one is to walk with us until dusk."

"Statement:  you two have been helpful so far.  Question:  is it plausible that the best way to be hired for my talent and get lots of nice things for it is to spend time in the wilderness with you?"

"No."

"Statement: We can also walk down with you and help you get to the city and help you get set up! Statement: I want to hear more of your language."

"Statement: I moderately want to spend more time in the wilderness with Patik."

"Statement: New language with no connection to any of ours? I majorly want to learn their language. Maybe massive."

"Acknowledged."

Zarian recites a short bit of Cretari poetry with a tightly-interconnected rhyme scheme.  "Statement:  I would be appreciative of some help in getting to the city and set up."

"Statement: We'll try to help."

Deptka and Patik stop, and Deptka fishes a map out from a hip pouch on the backpack before unfolding it. There's a brief debate, mostly driven by Deptka, about the best route to the train, before they turn around and start back down. 

"Question: Are you hungry, cold, or tired?"

"Statement:  I can superpower milen all of those from you!  ...But my body being warm enough when it's this cold outside is a little uncomfortable."

Patik speedwalks ahead on the trail, then unsnaps a few buckles on their bag and drops in on the ground to rifle through it for a moment. By the time Zarian and Deptka catch up, Patik has a long bright green jacket out and held up for Zarian. It's got a hood, a plethora of pockets, and goes below Patik's knees when unfolded. The material is light but surprisingly insulating for that, if not something that Zarian would use in the winter, and it blocks the wind completely which is a lot of the trouble keeping warm up here.

"Statement: I have spare pants too if you want. I don't know if they'll fit." Patik does some kind of head bob and a wave that seems friendly. "Question: Do you want to try my things or Deptka's?"

And then (after Zarian tries some pants if she wants) the pair set off back down the mountain.

"Just this is fine," she says of the jacket.  "Thank you!"  And she can babble off a limerick-adjacent poem for Patik's trouble.

"I'm sorry I don't have anything in your colour." Patik seems genuinely apologetic. 

-and then Patik dives into trying to recite the limerick, going tor as accurate a pronunciation as possible. They have a relatively good handle on a lot of the phonology, but there's still some mistakes and there's a tendency to smoosh all the sounds together. It's only after Patik has the poem mostly memorized that they ask what any of it means, and from there start playing with word order and checking if the grammar allows them to do that.

There's no small amount of detours to just play with sounds.

If Zarian's happy to keep providing corrections and occasional infusions of new material, Patik seems happy to keep working on this and hiking until Deptka decides to call a halt around sundown. If Zarian wants to talk about a different subject, this is possible, but will require blunt or repeated efforts to get Patik off the subject of Cretari for long.

The hike, if Zarian still appreciates wilderness views, is stellar. A winding trail along the mountain peaks where frequent breaks in the treeline reveal the whole of a valley spread out below, with nothing resembling a city or town or so much as a solitary log cabin visible. The line of sunset sweeps across the valley floor - this trail is on the western side of a mountain range going north-south - and with Patik's borrowed jacket the wind isn't as fearsome and Zarian has the option of enjoying the clean crisp air.