"...I assume 'looks out onto a park' is also at a premium, but what kind of premium?"

"Maybe another 5-10%? This place is mostly used for people who love the forests, so they don't really put that much premium on a park. Other places like having parks built near the outskirts, because land is cheap so you can make them big, but here we chose to have tons of forests that are good for hiking instead. So you'd have to be closer to the center to find a park here, actually. It's really unusual in that way."

"I can't say I'm terribly keen on forests, although I imagine they're much better without wolves. Or with wolf-resistant clothing, or whatever you have to deal with the problem.

So. Compromise solution - somewhere central-ish that looks out on a nice park, the more flowers and - formal garden-y elements, the better. With a sensible bath. And as small and cheap as it gets with those constraints. Am I narrowing things down too much, I don't know what availability is like?"

"I'm sure we can find somewhere that's just right for you, yes. Well, let's look at a few places?" Ron uses his phone to find a few places fitting Judith's prescription, before ending up somewhere with a fair-sized courtyard, that's full of bright flowers of all kinds of colors, together with some trees for shade. "I think this is probably the best flower-filled park? The rooftop park also has its own garden with lots of flowers. And here's a unit that just has an above-average sized shower enclosure, as well as a bathtub, rather than anything too extreme. If you live next to a hospital, you can get a balcony that has its own garden. But they always have fairly large units, so that'd maybe make them not fit you too well."

"I don't think I actually want my own garden, I'd have to take care of it! I much prefer other people's gardens...

I'm still not keen on showers, but maybe I'll get over it, and the bathtub looks good.

What's the next step on actually moving here?

Oh, uh, given everything here is unnaturally excellent I'm assuming there's not, like, anything particularly bad about some neighbourhoods or parks or anything? I'm sure you'd have mentioned it... I guess if everyone's rich enough to eat well and cash isn't carried around with you, there's less reason for petty crime to happen, although I'd think some people would be bored enough for, bar fight type behaviour?"

"I'm not sure what would be particularly bad about neighborhoods or parks. I think it looks quite nice, if you're asking if it's bad in some way? And people bored enough for bar fights can just enjoy sparring! So they do that. And for moving there, well... you put up an advance, so you'll always pay rent to live there 2 months. But you have plenty of money, so it's not remotely a problem."

"I guess people who have these empty are keen to fill them? So we transfer the money to their account, they give us the - lift code, the thing you use at the bottom of the building to get in - and then it's ready to move in and I can just go there? And arrange with you and Mr H when I need other things?

Presumably someone has to be told that they need to - clean delivery things that stop there - if I'm going to wander around it without the suit?"

It sounds a lot like getting a room at an inn, but apparently they all live like this all the time. And the 'rooms' are usually unnecessarily huge.

"Well, yup. There's really not more to do, than just getting the key to your unit, and asking me or Mr H whenever you need something. And I'll tell the relevant authorities, that any robot used to deliver stuff to the apartment needs a quarantine clean. It's a bit of an annoyance, but..."

"Is there anything I can do to make it better? Like, I could be out of the main room and... run the air cycle thing, and then the delivery bot could show up and just leave what it's delivering there, and I could come back in for it? Or is the air cycle thing not installed everywhere?"

"Well, you have to pick stuff up from the delivery bot, it can't drop things off itself. So I think you wearing your quarantine outfit, when you get stuff from the bot, that that's the most helpful thing you can. We have something like that air recycle thing everywhere, yes. But it doesn't stop things like your breath or sweat drops getting on the delivery bot."

"Right. That doesn't sound too bad, it's only for a few more days, hopefully..."

"Yup, yup. All that annoying PPE, you're not gonna need for many more days! And then you can just enjoy our beautiful little city."

"It is kind of odd that you do everything with money, but I suppose that's just the way it works when you have an awful lot of people in a small space - it's more efficient than everyone trying to get to know each other."

"Very much so! Just think about how many different relationships between just two people there are, and how many you'd need to put together for something like... a building. It'd be just about impossible to know all the different people you'll need to put it together, right?"

"Yeah, we have rather smaller buildings and they're a lot less complicated! And people still generally do get paid for working on, like, fortifications. I guess most of the cultures of my world also do this, it's just the Highborn tend to gather in Chapters and do all the money stuff at the group level, rather than the individual so much."

"Well, is doing money stuff at the group level really that vastly different? It sounds like the same general idea, finding a way to make things work with fewer relationships. It doesn't sound too different from how we use money for everything."

"I guess not. You wouldn't buy a place to live in Highguard unless you were just passing through or you were, like, a total outcast, though? You would join a Chapter and they would own places and you'd live in one of those."

"I'd be terrified if getting a place to live would require me to join something, as opposed to spending money I could earn in any number of different ways!"

"There are a number of especially accepting Chapters for people who have various problems that stop others taking them on - rehabilitating people is seen as a great good work - but I suppose you would probably not actually want to be rehabilitated, either..."

"Well, no. I'm perfectly healthy, and don't need any kind of rehabilitation. I'm kind of rehabilitating people now, actually. Although I'm not in an order."

"Anyway, Judith. There's a subway station that leads conveniently close to the new apartment; please follow me."

Henry walks a few blocks before entering a door built into one of the skyscrapers. It has a simple pictogram of a train on it, and he reveals that it hides a set of stairs leading down. He takes Judith down the stairs, revealing that the door was hiding the subway. A train arrives some thirty seconds later, creating a rush of wind that blows over the two of them. Henry steps inside, revealing spacious (as always) seats. It takes 7 or so minutes, flying past several empty stations, before they're taken to their station. Walking out, they can see an incredibly tall building, with a window taking up nearly the whole first floor, across the street from a beautiful garden.

Henry sends the money Judith earned towards the landlord, and he gets a picture of a storage locker that he saw in the station that he just came from, together with a combination for the lock. He quickly runs back down into the station, where he opens the storage locker that with the key, before running back and putting the key from it in Judith's hands. Then he opens a normal-looking door, walking inside the building. There's a charming cafe on the ground floor, next to the elevators and emergency fire stairs. There are several elevators, including one leading to Judith's new apartment. Henry pushes the button to call it down.

He pushes the 2 buttons that lead up to Judith's room, with a door that fits her new key. The door instantly reveals a main room with a view of the garden from high up, as well as the door leading into the bathroom and bedroom. The bedroom has a king-size bed and a big closet next to it; it also has a wide window looking out into the main room, with a view of the garden, but mostly the main room. The bathroom is fairly humble; there's a tub with a shower, a toilet that looks totally normal and uninteresting, and a white porcelain sink with a fascinating, grey pattern all over it.

"Hey, where are you going?" calls Judith when he runs off, but she hangs around and shortly he comes back with the key.

"Oh, it's nice there's, like, actual stuff at the bottom here!"

Judith's eyes widen at the view. "It's almost like being in a Spire! And this isn't all that high up for you, I guess...

Oh, and the bedroom - looks straight through the main room? I guess that makes sense if only I'm living here!"

She manages to look away from the excellent view to peruse the rest of the area, sitting on the bed to determine how squishy it is. "There's so much bed! You could fit three people in this!"

Venturing into the bathroom, she nods approvingly. "I'm sure Mr H can tell me about all those controls..."

She heads back to the main room and asks, "How do I get Mr H - summoned? connected? - here, then?"

"Well, we don't call him Mr H yet."

Henry furiously clicks through several menus on his phone.

"Mr H, are you operational?"

A robotic voice replies.

"Personal Assistant System ending Delta-Foxtrot-Three-Charlie operational. Ready to respond to Mr H."

"I think you should be able to ask Mr H for help like you did at my place, now."

"Oh, does he answer to whatever name you pick, then?

...I've kind of been meaning to ask, what is Mr H? I thought he was just a front for a group of servants that were always available and trained to be interchangeable, but that first bit sounded more like how some heralds talk, rather than like humans do..."

"Mr H is an AI system! He's a huge pile of computer code with the ability to put together what you tell him and what there's available to know on the Internet to answer questions and create useful information for you."