The other has white-blue wings with black lines.

They both find themselves sprawled on the floor and the second one raises his head and looks around.

They seem to be in a park, on some grass beside a swingset. There's a cool breeze around them, and a nice, calm atmosphere.

That is, of course, until a nearby person (unwinged) manages to get his voice to obey him, at which time he asks: "What the fuck?"

Blue-wings spots him, does a double-take and says something expletive-sounding then repeats it to his companion.

Brown-wings looks ashamed and doesn't say anything. He just looks at a book he was holding. It's the most stereotypically wizardly tome imaginable.

Well, in that case blue-wings stands up. Their clothing style... is not ancient egyptian, but that is the first thing that comes to mind. Blue-wings says something in his language. Dante doesn't understand it, but it could be a question.

Blink blink.

"Do you speak English?"

There's a girl standing next to him, who frowns at the visitors. (The park is otherwise quite empty.)

Apparently not. He tries a couple more words and then sighs.

He points at his head and then at Dante's, then says something inquisitive.

Blink.

Dante points at himself and enunciates: "Dante." Gesture towards his friend. "Anna."

Frown. He turns to the other and asks something. The other nods.

Blue-wings then touches brown-wings' forehead and says. "Telepathic Link!"

It's not English, they're actually not sure what language it was or even what the individual syllables sound like, but they understood the meaning. Then Blue-wings turns back towards them and holds his hand in their foreheads' direction.

"Uh," says Anna.

"I think I might be going mad?" says Dante.

He offers his forehead, though, tentatively.

"Telepathic Link!"

<Greetings. This is a two-way communicative telepathy spell. Only mostly voluntary, things you have opinions about not sharing won't be but it's only surface thoughts, so you don't have to worry too much anyway. We don't have any translation memorized between us.> Pause. <I'm Jubal Uria, where did we land?>

Bliiiiink.

<Earth.> Pause. <I hope you don't mind that I'm rather certain I'm hallucinating.>

<Oh? Are you alright? I could talk to your friend instead if you need medical attention.>

"Everything alright?" she asks.

"Um."

<I don't think I need medical attention. Or. I don't think you should think I do.>

"I suppose?"

<That is a rather ominous way to phrase that answer. Earth is on the human world or on the dragon world?>

<I – feel like there is something wrong behind that question – but this is a world full of humans? I do not know of any dragons and also you have wings.>

"… Are you talking to them?"

"Yep," says Dante, slightly high-pitched.

<Yes, we do have wings. I'm sorry for overwhelming you, but my...> there is a bundle of hard-to-disentagle concepts <coworker accidentally took us here and getting us back is going to be hard.>

The coworker sits up carefully and investigates a leg...

...which is twisted wrong. He does not whimper but how he manages it is as surprising as the wings.

Anna winces sympathetically, but hesitates to move closer.

<– Does he need a hospital?> asks Dante. <Uh, also can you hide your wings.>

Jubal turns around. His mind goes <!> and he starts talking, some of the relevant meaning coming through the telepathy: <Why didn't you say anything?> He inspects the leg, talking <He won't be able to walk. Needs healing-> more talking <only personal range healing->

Eventually, he turns back to Dante and Adrianna. <Where is the hospital. And you wanted us to hide our wings? Why?>

<I don't know what they'll do about wings!> responds Dante. <Wings: not normal. Telepathy: also not normal!>

… Hospital is vaguely thataway.

"Do I need to do anything –?"

"I don't know," says Dante. He relays the question.

<I think I can carry him, but wouldn't refuse any help. I figured wings wouldn't be normal in the human world. Is telepathy illegal or just uncommon?>

<Nonexistent. Fictional.> He moves to help carry the injured winged person.

Jubal gives him a confused look.

Injured winged person is compliant. Jubal asks him something and there is another exchange of words.

Which leaves Jubal nervous. <Herod,> this is apparently the other's name <just told me there is a chance that this is a completely different world and I feel like a idiot over not asking if 'Earth' stood for the world or for the country.>

<Earth is the world. The country is the United Kingdom.>

Jubal says something expletive. The telepathy helpfully communicates the meaning. <Well, that changes things. ...I was modelling the situation differently, if we do go to the hospital what do you think it will happen? How long until we get to a healer?>

<… Uh. It would be a doctor instead of a healer, because they would be nonmagical, because magic is widely considered fictional.>

<Which rather complicates things if we are stuck here for who knows how long.> He thinks for a moment. <Do you think the doctor is going to fix Herod's leg in less than an hour?  If not, it might be worth getting him to memorize the persona-healing spell himself instead.>

<It's not going to be completely fixed in an hour, no, all they'd do is put it in the right position to heal normally.>

Anna tugs at Dante's shirt. "Any chance I can be looped in?"

He looks at her, then back, and asks: <Can we get my friend in on this conversation?>

<I have a version that connects everyone I'm currently touching. It can be harder to filter thoughts that way, though. But if both of you are okay.>

Dante pulls a little bit of a face, then checks that's okay with Anna.

Yes.

"Telepathic Chain!"

<It's good to be part of the conversation.>

<Hello,> she says. <I'm Adrianna.>

<Dante,> he reintroduces himself. <I think we're thinking hospital won't be useful, since they have magic and doctors aren't magic.>

<Herod, it possibly won't. I'm concerned with being too disruptive."

<I think… that's wise. Depending on what injury you have, I don't expect them to do more than just bind it into the right position and ice it if necessary – I don't have much medical knowledge. It's unlikely to help over the course of hours.>

<The bone is definitely fractured, but not broken. I have a high pain tolerance, but I don't care to heal the long way.>

<Do you have enough that you can read my self-healing spell if I write it down?>

<Yes, I do.>

<– Do you need some paper, I should have some here.> Dante slings his bag down off his shoulder and starts looking through it.

<I don't have writing implements, but I have the book->

<You mean the stolen historical artifact? Dante, if you don't mind please give me something that won't get me arrested if we ever find our way back home.>

Blink. <Uh. I don't know your laws but this should be fine under ours?> He offers a piece of paper, ripped off a notepad.

He accepts. <It is. Sorry for being a pair of overwhelming winged people. Thank you, but could I have... Actually, could you just give me the notepad? I could find a way to repay you.>

<It's mostly used up – I can give you the remaining pages though.> He tears off the first half of it, containing lots of his own scribbles.

<Hold on – stolen artifact?>

<Thank you. And yes. It was written by a historical figure a long time ago and is part of our temple's collection.>

Herod looks away ashamed.

<Did you intentionally steal it or was that just part of the whole – disappearance thing –?>

<I don't know how your legal system deals with the right not to self-incriminate but it's not a very strongly held one in the UK.>

<It was me. I needed to... go somewhere.>

<Were you trying to get to Prime?>

<I think I missed half the explanation,> interrupts Anna. <What happened, who are you two, and why are you here? I gather that it's something to do with magic.>

Jubal sends the memory of the conversation between him and Dante.

<– You didn't intend to arrive here?> she confirms. <You didn't intend to arrive on some random planet, you don't know this one?>

<No. We never heard of this place. And we would have.>

<Also, not only planet but world.>

<You're from another, what – dimension? Have you confirmed that – our planet isn't just, I don't know, several million light years from yours?>

<I don't know what a light year is but the worlds can't be traveled if you go in a direction for long enough, no.>

<And we're not a planet inside one of your worlds?>

<...I'm less sure about that.>

<Usually humans are people's first lives and I guess you could a planet in the same dimension as prime?> Jubal offers dubiously. <But if you don't have any magic at all that sounds unlikely.>

<Not that we class as such, no, but our definitions might vary in the boundaries – computers, nuclear power?>

<The Internet, flying aircraft?> suggests Dante.

<Never heard of those first three. We have flying aircraft, but they are hard to enchant.>

<We do it nonmagically. Somehow.>

<Computers are devices that do maths on very small numbers, but very fast and in parallel, then build it up to – animated interfaces that can do complicated things like play visual recordings? Or, when networked with other computers, form the Internet, which lets people communicate over long distances.> Pause. <Nuclear power is, uh, complicated.>

<All of that sounds complicated and we probably should cast detect magic on those things to be sure.>

<I don't have any magic detection, do you? -No, scratch that. We should prioritize things that are going to be useful.>

<– Right, useful.>

<Which would be…?> asks Anna. <What are you – what do you have to offer, what are you hoping to do?>

<Pretty much, yeah...>

<Do you have any quick answers to those questions? Ones that might help us figure out where to aim our efforts?>

<I think we should figure out a way to go home, which might take a while or a way to stay here for the long term. We have magic, our angelic magic is shareable even.>

<I can share spellwords' magic. I have a couple of spells memorized from years ago.>

<Angelic magic being which subset of it?>

<Angelic magic is a different kind. It involves making vows to get powers in return.>

<The kind we've seen is all spellwords, then?>

<Are spellwords straightforward to teach?>

<Yeah, we haven't showed you any angelic magic. And spellwords require one to re-read them each time - they are fire-and-forget - but nothing more complicated than that.>

<My vows improve my senses but you wouldn't notice that. Jubal, they might not count as relevantly human for spellwords? We could check though.>

<We seem to match to the concept, at least. How do you propose checking?>

<I can analyze magic in case you have any that is just really, really suppressed.>

<Maybe the world doesn't automatically grant spellwords, but they could use the alternative ways of acquiring. I don't know the ritual->

<- I have the spellword that brings forth spellwords and it's supposed to work on people that don't already have the kind of magic already.>

<That would be useful. Is it worth checking if we're magical first, or should we go straight to that?>

<Worth checking first.>

<As long the light wouldn't call too much attention?>

<How much light are we talking?> She looks around the park; it's still daylight, though it's darkening some. <Anything reasonable – no supernovae – should be fine.>

<Your stars explode? And a halo typically looks like this.> This time he sends a pure image.

It's a woman with wings, with a bright like shining behind her- and wow, that is sure an angelic imagery going on with the light making a halo around her head. She shines like her sun, but with blue light.

<For a simple check, I can get it much less bright than that, weaker than moonlight.>

Dante gets out his phone, toggles on the flash, and shows them how bright that is for comparison.

<Weaker than moonlight is safe,> inputs Anara.

<Less than that. Also, what is that?>

Henry looks like he wants to ask the same question, but instead asks. <Can I go ahead then?>

<Torch! On a phone. It's a specific type of technology, using electricity, and is kinda hard to summarize quickly.> She turns to Herod. <Assuming no other side effects, that sounds good.>

In that case, Herod will glow like a smartphone flash blessed by god.

Any magic in these two?

Nope!

Not in either of them.

He reports this.

Adrianna looks slightly disappointed. <So we'll need the spellword to induce the magic.>

<Yea... I need to write it down first though. Or I will forget it completely once it's cast.>

Dante has another notebook if they need more than the pieces he gave them.

<Is the word the only part of it, or are there other things you need to know?>

<It's more like a really long description of what the word is in magical language.>

Herod will accept more paper as needed. <I'm not sure if someone without the magic would even be able to read the language.>

<Are you able to speak the language? Or is it only written?>

<Only written... there is a sense where it's not really a language, as so much as a code...>

<I'm curious,> says Adrianna. <Whether a non-magical person can read it, that is. Can I see some of it?>

<Sure.>

He shows her some. It's recognizable as a written language, but with unfamiliar letters in a very peculiar style. Geometric, not all that complicated to write, but some letters are strange. There is one that looks vaguely like a square c with a long "tail" that underlines six other letters before ending with a hook. There is an hourglass sort of thing that is three lines tall. There is an entire line of circles crossed by lines at slightly different angles.

She studies it for a moment. <Can't read it,> she declares.

Dante peers around her for a look. He tilts his head at it curiously.

<I could send you what it means, but the feeling is very slippery.>

<Uh –> He looks at Adrianna. <Now is not the time.>

<No,> agrees Adrianna. <Now is instead magic.>

She realizes how short a time everything's happened over. Shortly ago, she was in the park, chatting amicably with a friend, and now… some magical, fugitive aliens have appeared, and are giving them magic.

<We have a few minutes until Herod finishes writing the spell down.>

Pause.

Dante hesitates a little. <I guess… sure, then?>

He sends... and sends...

It's not that they are not receiving it, but the entire thing feels like it's going straight from their brain to the tip of their tongue. They get the sense that the symbols represent things that the spell is supposed to do and contain a lot of information which is conditional on the previous symbols. But nothing sticks.

Dante frowns, and tries working up from some sort of minimal unit.

Are there any symbols that are simpler than the rest, concepts he can try focusing on and getting to fit?

Maybe... that one might, no wait, it references something else which Jubal didn't send... and Dante already forgot what it was.

Slightly frustrating.

<And it's straightforward to read when you have the magic?>

<Yeah... I almost want to say it's smoother reading than regular reading.>

<But it only details spellwords?> Adrianna tries to confirm. <You can't write a story in it?>

<Technically? One can't really grasp the spellwords to do something purposeful and complex like that. But if they did their story would come true.>

She nods.

Dante, meanwhile, looks confused. <I'm having trouble imagining what that'd be like.>

<Honestly, so do I.>

<…Makes sense, I guess.>

Jubal shrugs and stretches his wings a bit. Herod continues to write.