Hey, sorry about my absence; life has this funny way of continuing to happen!
I'm working on a post right now :-)

[u]Edit:[/u] Also, I think that part of the issue I'm having is that I didn't realize that the communication would be seen as taking more than a few seconds, so I didn't really specify anything for the illusion to be doing (though it seems, to me at least, that any experienced illusionist would actually have something for their illusions to be doing, in order to preserve their effect), which may have made it seem to you that it was just sitting there for the span of a few minutes, since that's how long it sounds like you're saying the brief exchange took.
I'm actually having trouble coming up with a post that doesn't either seriously break character or contradict the timeline/continuity that you've laid out, so if anyone has any suggestions, I'm open to ideas.