"I have three sisters and two brothers. They're all mortals, though, and none of them would be of particular use against violent Jansai teenagers."

"I only have the one, but she is good at dealing with violent people. Mainly by hitting them until they go away."

"Yeah, I suppose that would be the way to do it. I've never actually been in a fight, partly because everyone knows better than to pick one with an angel, which is just as well because I'm not as confident as conventional wisdom that I'd be able to make any use of angel strength."

"I think I know what you mean," says Ike. "Val is not any more physically equipped to hit people than I am, at least when she's not using iethat, but mentally it's no contest."

Lucas nods. "I mean, I suppose I know the thunderbolt prayer too, but nobody uses that, which is probably why no one has noticed that allegedly all of those requests have to go through Isabella now."

"...What, um, is the thunderbolt prayer?"

"It's a song. If you sing it - at home, anyway, on the right planet - then you get a thunderbolt, aimed where you called it to. I don't think anyone's called one since the accident at Cedar Hills, and the last time one was called on purpose it was almost two hundred years ago when the Archangel Gabriel destroyed Windy Point."

"...Someone called one by accident?"

"Yeah, when you're learning the song you're supposed to stop in the middle, sing something else, then pick up with the rest. Somebody forgot."

"Oh dear," says Ike.

"That was before Isabella inserted herself between the singing and the actual thunderbolts, of course."

"Do people know she did that? I guess you said they didn't. I wonder what happens when someone tries one and it doesn't work."

"I'm not sure. Nobody knows she did that except people who know the rest of it about Jovah being a spaceship she's the captain of and so on."

"Sounds very science fictiony," says Ike.

"...Whatever that is, I'm not sure we have it?"

"You probably don't, and I am really not sure how to explain," he says.

"I have this sense that Samaria is missing out on a lot of stuff."

"If you want," says Ike, "I could give you some science fiction books, and then you will know what they are."

"...In Samarian? I'm not magicked into the common language here, I think there's some kind of effect on the party itself."

"I am absolutely sure that is a solvable problem," says Ike. "Someone could put a similar effect on the books, for example."

"I suppose. I don't think I understand to what extent magic is - available. I don't have any, the Archangel-Elect has lots, other people seem almost random in how much of it they have and whether any of it might be used in ways I'd ever notice."

"Well... I wouldn't just generally expect to be able to get books with translation magic on them, but given that we are at a Bellparty, I am very sure that there is someone here who is both willing and able to do that and the only potentially tricky part is finding them and asking nicely."

"Okay. Even if the language thing is handled, will I be able to make any sense of the stories?"

"Potentially. Some more than others. But good science fiction explains itself pretty well."

Before Lucas can reply, Glass wanders by, pauses, points at Lucas, says "Green," and moves on.