Jason just stood there, staring blankly at the spot in the middle of the road while considering the reality of the old man actually, truly being a sorcerer from another Earth. Fucking wow! Then he saw the broom handle lying in the road, and he dashed to retrieve it before heading for his car with many things to think about! What he really needed was a coffee! Fortunately, he spotted a Xendo drive-through coffee place and satisfied his craving.

He returned home, sipping his drive-through coffee while he thought about everything and then thought some more. He ran the recording again and could still follow every word, so the spell Urasmian had thrown on him so he could understand other languages was certainly still working! Well, he wasn’t magic himself, so he couldn’t make the spell work but imagine if he could! There really was a multiverse. Multiple versions of Earth where things had gone differently. And he couldn’t do anything about seeing them. Oh, man! But at least he knew! And magic! Like fucking hell, man!

Chapter 4

Study, study, study… wait, what?

Jason strolled into the post-grads study room or office and was surprised to find he wasn’t the first one there, despite how early he was. The title of the room varied, depending on who was describing it and for what reason. When the denizens were interviewing students about tutorial papers and such, the room was the post-grad office. If a senior academic or any university administration staff referred to the room, it was the post-grad study room.  Sharyn Williams was never usually early, so it was with some astonishment that he saw she had beaten him to school for once.

As he walked in, she glanced up from from her left-hand corner desk, where she was reading something that was large and heavy looking. She smiled at him briefly while giving him a small nod of recognition, and then she returned to the tome she was studying. As Sharyn wasn’t usually one to get in so early, he was tempted to ask the reason for this unusually bright and early start to her studies. In the event, he refrained from interrupting her, noting the intentness she was displaying in whatever it was she was perusing. He hated being interrupted when he was deep into some complicated tome, and he refused to inflict unnecessary distractions on his colleagues.

He flopped down into the chair at his desk and surveyed the small area he called home during the days he spent at the University. It was kind of nice to be back to the usual University round after the unsettling and very strange break he had experienced. Nothing seemed out of place from how he had left it two weeks before, which was just as it should be. The cleaners knew better than to touch anyone’s desk! Even so, he always left a few specially placed items here and there whenever he left his desk at the end of the day, which meant he’d know if anyone did anything at his desk. A bit paranoid, but he had once been on the receiving end of someone pinching a book he was responsible for and then leaving him to pay for a new copy when he could not produce it for the irate library people!