"... Would you like to come inside?" he asks, because he doesn't know what else to say, but it should probably be said inside.
"You mentioned you had the eclipse?"
Kib sits on the other one. Doesn't want to make it weird. "A little of it. Talking about getting apprentices to teach. Ones who could already read."
"I, you, what's. Your life been like, are you okay? Happy?" That last part seems to be of the utmost importance.
"Okay," he murmurs, relaxing a little. Because that was the most important thing.
"...the story of my life actually gets even more implausible than that but I thought I'd start with the important part."
"Yes, thank you. We are - already quite implausible, how else are you implausible?"
"Therrrre was an unexplained snake monster with a mirror for a face and it put some people through its face and I was one of them and instead of digesting me like any self-respecting snake monster it transported me to an alternate universe. So far I am the only snake victim to find a way back. The tall pointy-eared people who accompanied me here are from the alternate universe."
"Okay."
Is this his life now? It might be his life now. Or he might be hallucinating. Does he have any drugs that could cause this sort of hallucination...?
"You should be able to independently verify the snake monster part if you want, I'm a little surprised it didn't make it out here but maybe everybody thought the witnesses were making it up?"
"It is also possible that I am something of a shut in," Aydanci points out softly.
Nod.
"Um, anyway, the place with the tall pointy-eared people, who are Elves, also has legit actually-walk-up-and-meet-them deities, who are Valar, and the Valar can transport people to and fro. And one of them was kind enough to slow down my aging by a factor of a thousand while an Elf engineer works on a more permanent immortality solution. So. That's a thing. We could bring you back long enough to get factor-of-a-thousand-ed if you want."
"I, uh, sure?" He might have declined, before, what with the Pox very fucking dead, but now it's - more complicated than that. If he's not hallucinating. Which he might be. "I. Will need some time to get some affairs in order if I'll be departing."
"It wouldn't take that long if - that's the only thing you want to do there. Day and a half to Wrebb, there's a portal, there's a Vala a reasonable walk from there, day and a half back to Wrebb."
"'If that's the only thing I want to do there'?" he echoes, a bit perplexed.
"...It's mostly a pretty nice place. I moved in. The Elves can't servantmake, they're very prosocially inclined, they don't have material scarcity - uh, you should bring the stork design, I don't have it yet and wouldn't have it perfectly memorized anyway - they can do the chassis and etching parts and I'll just wake the storks, uh, and tell the storks to drop off money the Elves are accumulating off at creches so they can handle the increased volume..."