I probably have given the wrong impression to whatever indigenous scholars that happen to stumble upon these articles I try to drop off in sealed tubes in every world that I think suitable. The versing life is terribly violent, and we are all incurable rolling stones. This is not true by any means.



I met one man who stayed in most worlds, even the violent, an average of a year. He was cautious and made contingency plans and just never gave up. There was always something else to try even in the most desperate of straits.



But, that is not what I mean. Karl Whidemeyer lived in the wildernes of “South of Nowhere” for twenty years as a hermit. Lord Cariden ruled the Perseus Arm as God-Emperor for nearly five hundred years. This is not what I mean.



I landed in an alley with the stink and smell of modern civilization assailing me. My magic did not seem to hardly function, and neither did my psionic skills. Looking around for threats to the res publica, the worst I could find was the taxes were too high.



No doppleganger of myself existed in this world that I could find, and my grandparents on my father’s side had three girls instead of three boys. Kim, Karen, and Kaitlyn instead of the “Three R’s” from my home world. My grandparents on the other side did not even exist.



My searching brought me to the conclusion that this world did not need me. I had been wanting a break, and I guess the god in the previous world thought this was the best break.



He was right. I got a job considered easy and dangerous, delivering pizzas to bad parts of the major metropolis. Enrolling in college with a major in Cultural Anthropology was a good choice. Since I figured I would be moving on eventually. And understanding other cultures would be useful when I happened upon some. This was inevitable in my life.

Then I went to my first science-fiction gaming convention in over a decade. It was nice in a weird way since there were little oddities that continually cropped up, but soon I just immersed myself in the games and enjoyed it.



A year passed, and other than my thrice weekly game, and my growing stack of novels, and a little deeper insight into other cultures, I was the same. Well, I lie. Somewhere, deep inside me, an overstressed spot was relaxing. No maniacs, vampires, world dictators, and landscapes of madness to test myself against. It was just the gamer’s life, and the occasional bit of homesickness that went with wishing that I could be back in my home reality with the ladyfaire doing just this.

But, with all the wonders I have seen, I refuse to believe there is not a gate home to my own time and place. I shall arrive the minute after I left if it takes me a hundred years and a thousand worlds.



Time slips by, and I put my hand to writing game fiction and get rejected because “this notion of world travelling after dying is just too fantastic. Do something more realistic, like vampires.”

I go back to my games and relax more. Things are learned in the slow times of life, and besides gradually my associate degree becomes a bachelor, and then a masters. Soon, I get a real job, but I resist the call to work too hard because I still have games to run.



Finally, fifteen years after I arrived, a woman reporter walks up to me, and wants to know my secret for the “Daily Searcher.” How did I find the Fountain of Youth in my searches in anthropology? For you see, versers do not age. I dodge her, but it is the beginning of the end. Within the year, the NSA has my phone tapped. Her complaints had drawn a little attention, and I had done a few weird things that stuck in records, and finally I attracted attention from the Men In Gray at No Such Agency.



I told them the truth, and they let me alone except for weekly Q&A sessions because they were mostly decent people, but eventually I could see my free and easy life was coming to an end. I was attracting a minor notoriety in my college and even the City. Too many odd things were associated with me. Then a nutcase who thought I was the organizing force behind a governmental SDI program tossed a bottle of jellied gasoline onto my house in the middle of the night. No that did not kill me, as I was gaming that night at some other guy’s house. I heard about it however, and rushed home. A drunk driver pushed me off a bridge since he had a lot bigger car than I had.



Tadeusz