"I can't open the door to your world for Glass to look at; you'll need to do it for us," says Rose.
Is singing fun? It makes pretty sounds! says Ilayse.
"Here I am, why are those people so spooked?"
Pyranir looks up at Glass. Are you her sister? he asks, curiously. He has not had this whole thing explained to him. That's okay, he'll figure it out eventually.
Ilayse is happy to keep chatting with Pen! Yay! I like playing with magic, I'm good with wind!
"I'm her alt," says Glass, squinting through the door. "We are much alike except for being from different worlds."
"It's got its share of nastiness, which is very much concentrated in the dragons, I am not sure about this project of yours. My dragons have a penchant for treasure-hoarding too, but I think these guys are literally insatiable, which can't help. It'd be a perfectly nice world if it didn't have any dragons in it at all, but I suppose picking them all up and putting them somewhere else would be a complicated project."
"The world is, nothing will happen if you just walk through the door. If you want to know if the dragons can punch through your defenses usefully, you want Aurora, not me, if you want to be sure, but - there's some metacausality I don't really like floating around them. Sort of like Callahan's attractor for invariably winning lethal contests, but toned down. They don't have to win, but if you're in a fight with them it does have to be a fight, they've got a metacausal conspiracy objecting to circumventing them completely. I really don't think I like the idea of combining that with torching when they have to share space with humans, however cute the babies are."
Ilayse jumps up and down a little. I do this! she says, and a little breeze swooshes around Pen.
Procellor glances at her, then warns, "Be careful, sweetie. Indoors that could be a problem."
Sorry, daddy, says Ilayse.
"With any luck there's a mutually agreeable situation, but finding it means negotiating with the reality that exists, not a fiction," says Glass. "For example, if we just moved all the humans in the world to some part of it that did not have any dragons or any avenue for dragons to use to travel there, I'd have fewer misgivings about immortalizing some dragons. Moving the dragons would also work but I think you guys would be harder to move. You can close the door now, by the way, I've had a good look at the world and you're right here to be a dragon example."
"Does the insatiable hoarding thing look like it admits of editing, or should we call Lazarus for a consult on that...?"
"I don't think it's attached to anything that could kill you, and I do think we could change it, if you agree - I think the agreeing is important."
"Is that sufficient to render them reasonably close to harmless, do you think? In disposition if not in theory."
"It'd go a long way. They're not inherently murderous as a species."
"It's not a direct step from here to there. You're the test subject for the procedure, but your kids will have to agree to the change too for them to be safe as immortals."