I fell out of the previous world with a push from a god, and landed on my feet next to a small table in a cafe’. Staggering, a bit, I was helped to a table by a dark-haired man in a suit.



He and I shared the same table, and after thanking him, I waited for the inevitable questions. The screams of “Police!” or “Burn witch!” or something other than the blase’ slurping of coffee from delicate cups oddly made so as to be quite shallow was also expected.



It felt weird to be sharing a small table with a man I did not know. With much heming and hawing, he did get around to questions for ‘the honoured extradimensional visitor’. It turned out he was a nationally sydicated reporter for the Paper of Record.



Eep!



Then I heard some shots fired, and my reporter friend had to excuse himself to go to the bathroom. He claimed proudly, it seemed, that fear affected him strongly. A very sensitive fellow.



I wandered over in the direction of the shots with an invisible TK screen up to block the small calibre bullets, or so I judged them from the sound of it.



A man was holding a woman hostage with a .22 pointed at her skull. Above them floated a heroic figure in pink and green with an orange cape that fluttered in the wind. About a dozen teenyboppers came out of a nearby store to gawk at this eyesore. They swooned in excess of admiration, and I shook my head in shock. But it was only teenyboppers who are not noted for their good judgement.



“Fear not, good malajusted citizen, we shall see you repaired of the damage done to you.” It seemed a strange way to talk to the woman hostage until I realized that the hero was talking to the criminal.



“I’m sorry, so sorry.” The woman sobbed. “I bought the gun to protect myself, and look what I have done. I have caused an innocent lawbreaker to consider violence for which I am only to blame. If only I had listened to the public service announcements.”



One…two…three…four…seconds while my mind just stuttered. Then I reached out with my tk, and wrenched the gun from the bad guy’s hand, and for good measure crumpled it into a ball.



“What type of self-hating tripe is this?” I shouted to the gathered crowd.

“And what should we do, fellow superhero from another world?” The hero in pink asked with a gentle desire to help me. Something about him seemed familiar, but I could not place it.

“Smack the bad guy.” I said calmly. The crowd tittered, and the hero smiled condescendingly.

“Ah, from one of those dimensions.” And the crowd laughed low and scornfully.

“The notion of good and evil is simplistic. Violence only begets violence.”

“You know he was using violence.”

“She started it with her gun purchase.”

“OK, ok, you say ‘good’ is outdated?”

“Yes.”

“But you used ‘good’ in calling the thief ‘good’.” I expected a line of malarkey about it being a figure of speech.

“No, I did not.” The hero said positively.

“Yes, you did.”

“No, I didn’t.” And the crowd nodded in support of his obvious lie.

“Whatever.” I said, and turned to walk away into a lamppost. Klang.

“Violence only begets violence.” The hero said, and the crowd laughed at me without a trace of pity.

I went back to the coffee cafe’ to sulk and eat pastries. The reporter showed up with some ridiclulous story about wrapping his tie around the water faucet, and nearly not escaping. He looked familiar for some reason.



Seeing as I was new to the society he offered to take me on tour. I accepted.



My first place was a museum of history which held a number of important documents proclaiming inalienable rights, but no one even bothered to maintain the lock on these cracked glass cases. But they revered their history I was assured.



My guide chose the next place. We went to the local chapterhouse of the Illuminati by various and cunning disguises which we tested by skipping out on our lunch bill, or that small portion of it that we actually had to pay. Of course, we left the tax money for it which was more than the bill because one did not, most emphatically did not want to cross the Revenue Service.



In the sacred and secret hideout with the big sign out front announcing “Real Beeswax Candles made by the Bavarian Illuminati”, I was escorted into a dark chamber where a thirty-second degree personage told me my real name, and the last four worlds I had been too, and explained how they had manipulated the gods to bring me here for a purpose that they could not reveal, but it was very important to Master Plan #14 which was a sub-set of Master Plan #5 which was maybe just a diversion for the real Master Plan #18.



The thing is they sounded like they made sense until I remembered that a secret held by three people is not a secret. I laughed and pointed this out to them.



They escorted me out to the sidewalk, and invited me to question anybody as to the whereabouts of the Illuminati. None knew even though I stood next to that sign. Then the Master told me the names of the next twenty-three people to walk around the corner, and he invited me to pick the corner for a second demonstration which he easily passed.

“Nothing happens in this city that I do not control.” And then he jumped into a stretch limo that I had not seen drive up, and he sped away to blow up in a ball of flame.

“Don’t worry, he’s fine. That was not really him that got in the car.” My guide said.



Wavering from my left to my right, I was led down the sidewalk. A nice restauraunt seemed the thing. The waiters were nice, and the food was superb, and I decided to reward them with a nice tip. This was returned to me with the waiter saying I had lost my money.

“No, its for you. You did a really good job tonight.”

“Thanks, but I could not accept it. It might make all the other waiters feel bad. Besides, I am well taken care of. My needs are few, and my skills are great.”

“From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs.?”

“Exactly.” Said the cheeful man who had worked much harder than the others who were also good, but not as good as he. “I feel guilty about being so talented. I make up for it by doing extra community service on four of the five weekend days.”

“Don’t you ever feel slighted, jealous, envious, petty?” I asked him, and he laughed and got his crew together, and asked them my question. For such emotions seemed to go with their system in my understanding.

“No, group hug.” Said one girl, and they all hugged each other with a genuine warmth that baffled me.



I left with my stomach’s churning adding to my headache. Maybe I was wrong, a simple-minded idiot. Then I noticed a man in a black trenchcoat pointing a device at me that looked like a psi projector. I chased him into an alley, and he was not there. Pulling out all the stops on finding the secret door did no good. It was unfindable even though I literally tore the alley to pieces.



The whole thing made no sense. I sent my guide away. And I lay down to sleep in the ruins of my alley. Only to be awakened by a crowd of fifty social workers, television reporters, and the President of the Nation come to ask me how they had failed me in that I was forced by inescapable bonds to sleep in the alley.



“You are in denial.” I was told when I said I just felt so depressed by the oddness of the world that I could not muster the energy to go to a hotel. I had thought they would like that one, but apparently there was a new hot theory making the rounds, and they needed examples.



It was just too much. I summoned up a forcefield to push the crowd back, and then I floated into the sky.

“You know why I slept out last night? Because I am evil. I wanted you to have sleepless nights racked with guilt about it.”

They ate it up, and called me an artist. So I went one better, I thought.

“No, you puny mortal fools, I shall take your world away from you, and you will be my slaves!!!” Boomed out with help from my Lekostian cyberware. Everybody bowed in surrender including the President. This just was not working. One last try I decided.



“You know what sickens me the most? The lack of reason or a standard of morality by which all are judged. Certain deeds are good, and certain are bad.”



They gasped, and I noticed that my favorite newsman was not in the front row anymore. The pink hero, so strangely familiar, showed up again, and without mercy proceeded to pummel me out of the sky, and to beat me to death accompanied by the wild cheers of the crowd.



I versed out of that world with gratefulness.



Taduesz