"It shouldn't be harder than contacting the other Vanyel, since I've met this one."

"Right. So our plan now is - you will help him sleep, if he is ready before you go to bed, and you will try to reach the older Nayoki, and you will ask Vanyel if he is willing to speak with Leareth?" 

"Right."

"Thank you. Again. For everything." 

"You're welcome."

She decides she will ask the local Nayoki for tips on how to address her counterpart safely - "it closes distance both ways, if she decides I'm scary I might have a problem."

"Does the other me know about your existence? If I am startled I might react with hostility." Nayoki thinks. "I wonder if it would be safer to contact a different person on Leareth's staff first. Probably Tadri is not, in the other world, he only ended up working here due to circumstances around your arrival, but I could ask around and probably we can find someone who is likely to still be here in fifteen years' time."

"A couple of them, maybe, in case the first doesn't work. I'm not actually clear on how good lines of communication are between older Vanyel, who knows about me, and his Leareth's staff."

"It is quite possible they are not in direct communication. You could ask him?" 

"Yeah, I'll do that too. But knowing who else I could try to talk to first in case they're not can't hurt."

“If you can wait a few minutes I will ask around now.”

"Thanks!"

Nayoki is back twenty minutes later. “Do you need to meet them in person? I have some candidates but they are among the mage-scholars who we moved to elsewhere when we decided to keep the other Leareth here.”

"Talking to them for a few seconds by earcuff would do."

Nayoki can give her names, and let her read off memories of what they look like if that’s necessary.

It helps. She goes down the list telling each one that she's orienting to the staffing situation here to make it easier to get in touch with people in the alternate Velgarth.

They are cooperative with this and do not make any comments about how weird it is. She can get a list of five or so people, in order of descending likelihood they think they would still be on Nayoki's research team in fifteen or twenty years. 

And then she can talk to local Vanyel about whether he would be willing to visit a traumatized alternate Leareth who is apparently fairly well acquainted with the other Vanyel.

That is such a surreal question to be asked! Vanyel is trying to imagine how his past self six months ago would feel about the scenario, and completely failing because it's so weird! 

:Um... Sure, I guess? If he wants to talk to me: 

I think he'd prefer his but his doesn't have an earcuff.

:Right. Er, I'm kind of worried that I won't have any idea what to say and then it'll just be really awkward?: 

I think that's okay, he isn't going to be a very engaged conversationalist right now.

:That makes sense. I'll try talking to him and if it seems like he hates it I can just stop. Um, did you mean now?: 

No, not today, just next time he asks for me I can suggest bringing you if you're up for it.

:All right:

And she calls other Vanyel to ask about whether he's in touch with Leareth's people.