Richard Roe stood facing the computer.

"I know when I left home I was ten and a half years old, and now my hair has grown six and a half inches and I actually have a beard! Yet on earth it's not 2091 anymore ... It's July 18, 2385! So my question is, is today my thirteenth birthday or what?"

–It's relative.

"Well, everyone is dead now and I feel like I'm thirteen!"

–Remember that.

"Is my voice going to change?"

–It's relative.

"Do I have to be good?"

–It's relative.

"Are you from Maine or something?"

–It's relative.

The ship shuddered violently as Bill Tickton simultaneously took the helm.

"We weren't hallucinating," he said, adjusting their course. "A ship from a dream universe, identical to ours in almost all respects, has attempted to adopt an almost identical flight path."

"Almost?" Richard asked.

"We were saved," Bill Tickton said, "because their ship is a little lighter ..."

He adjusted the focus on his console screen.

"It's women," he exclaimed, "who aren't wearing clothes!"

—I hope!

"Oh, my God, I think I know why!" Richard said. "In the second-to-last section of the Field Guide to the Planet Soon it says ..."

"You're a fast study," Bill Tickton said.

"I hope," Richard said, "... I was reading it backward!"

The ship shuddered violently, and with an instantaneous rush of hot air conveying the smell of Irises, the airlock opened.