You smile at the bird. "It's nice to meet you, Barclay. I'm-"
"Hold on! Wait! I don't mean to be rude, but there's some things you should know before you give your name. In the network wilderness you wandered here from, your name is a commodity. Something you're expected to just trade away for access, something that gets sold as part of a consumer profile to noisy marketers, or worse. It's different here.
"We don't need to know your name here. As you explore and interact with the tower, you'll earn a reputation that follows you around. But beyond that, we're usually not interested in your eyerel details."
"Eyerel?" You ask. "I don't know that word".
"Maybe the pronunciation isn't coming through. We're talking in the silent way, with eyes. Try sounding it out with your eyerel voice."
You spend a moment stretching the word out with your voice, and it clicks. "I get it now. You mean IRL: in real life."
"That's what I said: eyerel. The way you spell it looks like it rhymes with squirrel. I like my way."
Spell? You have an unnerving feeling that Barclay is reading the conversation, not speaking. But then again, so are you. You decide not to tug on that thread for now. "If someone needs to refer to me, what will they call me?"
"For now, probably just 'guest' or 'visitor'. Don't worry, those are terms of honor here, and it won't be too long before you earn a new title."
