"Yeah."

"We should write this down to test in the future, anyway, it could help with space colonisation."

Write write.

"If you use magic to colonise space that'd be, like, the best of both worlds. Sci-fi and fantasy!"

"I think things that happen in real life aren't either of those."

"Well, I'd have to relabel everything I grew up thinking was imaginary, it's easier to just call 'the things muggles don't know about' fantasy and 'the things muggles know about but can't do yet' sci-fi."

"I guess."

"But not everything you grew up thinking of as fantasy exists, and not everything you think of as sci-fi will ever exist, either, so it's still not a very good set of categories. Not that they're very good for categorising fiction anyway, soft sci-fi is basically science-themed fantasy."

Shrug. "I suppose, but I don't have a better idea."

"What's wrong with 'magic' and 'technology'?"

"Well, technology works, I guess, but 'magic' also includes a lot of stuff I still think doesn't exist."

"So does 'fantasy', that's half the problem."

"Exactly! That's why I don't have anything better, 'magic' is exactly the same as fantasy."

"No it's not, because 'fantasy' implies 'not reality'."

"...I gueeeeeess."

"It does, that's what it means! It's only even as a book genre that it means magic in particular."

"Well, okay, then, combining magic and technology still sounds cool. Magitech!"

"That would be neat."

"Enchanting spaceships to not need fuel. Terraforming planets using Transfiguration. Shielding charms to hold an atmosphere in place."

"But first we have to discover the hexons and phlogistons and so on."

"The who now?"

"Hypothesized magic-generated particles that interfere with technology."

"Oh." Pause. "That actually makes sense. I wonder if I could do magic around one of Dad's sensors and see if they pick anything up before they break."

"Well, I wonder that, too, but if you want to do it legally you have to wait until you're seventeen."

She sighs. "That's really annoying."