There's the magic closet alien, looking low-budget apart from the wings and tail. "Hey."

He has an arm around Peka. "Hi! Can you fly with those?"

"Yes. Wouldn't have bothered otherwise."

"You pick 'em?"

"Out of a catalog."

" - huh."

"Hell sounds like a very interesting place."

"I think I'd get bored."

"You could take summons. Summons are all about gains from trade."

"Most people don't let their demons talk."

"...why?"

"They are concerned we will talk them out of their souls."

"Their species has souls? What does that even mean exactly -"

"Oh, they don't. There's just mythological baggage. We also don't have supernatural powers of persuasion."

" - oh, it's just a collective paranoid delusion, like pollution?"

"Very like. Except taking summonses is voluntary."

"Ah huh."

"So we can do pretty well with demons just by not being awful to them?"

"Yeah, they're going to start interviewing for people who want to make a planet in a couple of weeks once the summoners are sure of themselves and the star systems are all picked out."

"You will suffer from some adverse selection if you summon randoms though."

"Hmm?"

"The ones who show up to summonses in spite of the tendency to gag demons are the ones who can get things they want that way sometimes."

"Do people also offer really lousy payment?"

"Things demons want tend to be one of: impossible to communicate via guess-and-check, or traditional things which include sexual favors and souls, or the opportunity to take advantage of a mistaken binding."

"Did everyone just collectively not think about incentives -"