"I'm a member of a summonable class of beings typically summoned into a world with an Earth where it's 2179. I got summoned in a fluke happenstance to a world with fifteen large gods, one of whom is extremely evil, and like a million assorted smaller ones, some also evil, and a species I will call Quendi for disambiguating purposes, which includes a family composed of what seem to be as I said alternate universes of you and your kids, who were when I arrived preparing to go from their home planet Valinor to a different planet called Endorë to fight the evil god, and I went along since I have useful magical powers, and there was a war, which was very unpleasant but is now over."

" - okay. Has anyone in 2179 or the alternate planet figured out aging, because if not I still need to get the Philosopher's Stone before we can do anything interesting, time-stop or no -"

"Much improved but not solved; my world there's a disappointing but legitimate afterlife, can't say for yours."

"There's no way to check?"

"I can try conjuring from it but that'll only work if it's not, say, inherently magical in some way."

"We have no reason to expect there's an afterlife except, I guess, that your world has one."

"Mine is not obvious to the living and used to be even less so, for whatever that's worth to you."

"If you can make old notes you might be able to settle all sorts of old rumored lost magics..."

"He can make old notes? I want Flamel's, please."

"Would Flamel want you to have them?" wonders Cam.

"I don't actually care."

"Flamel's the only known creator of the Philosopher's Stone."

"I will make them searchable and look for references thereto and we can stay out of his personal life, then, how about."

"Make them searchable?"

"In 2179 print books are uncommon because it's possible to store information very small and in such a way that nonmagical conveniences can manipulate the content in various ways such as by finding bits of it that say 'Philosopher's Stone' and not 'dear Grandma, for Christmas I want socks'. This will not help if Flamel was in the habit of writing coded letters to Grandma, but it is a reasonable first step." He tucks the works of Flamel into his computer and runs a search. "If he has ever written about the Philosopher's Stone he did so in code or in some inherently magical fashion."

"Frustrating. All right. I should - take one year to learn more science and technology and then go back to that."

"Seems reasonable."

"So - where do I start -"

"Everything in that stack is as introductory as I could easily come up with without being actively misleading."

Nod. "Thank you. And, ah - it is nice to meet you - do you need anything -"

...Shrug.

He hands a book to Minor and opens one and settles in.

He casts something. "Now they can't hear us; they'll cancel it if they want to. Do you want to write up some kind of standard explanation for people who need to know - won't be a long list, but -"

"That's probably a good idea but I'm genuinely not sure how to do it without seeming either defensive or like I'm looking to brag to the kind of person who's impressed by the capacity to destroy planets. Or both."

"I was thinking we'd just not tell people who'd be impressed. What's the worry about seeming defensive, exactly -"