He took one final look around at the aggressive future, then rotated via the Davis Equation back into Dormammu-space, or D-space as he was already mentally calling it.

Your body is unique. Your cells are infinitely plastic. And you contain within you a library of forms. The genomes of all the mosaics ever spliced. You can recreate them at will. And other shapes as well.

In itself, this transformation of his newspaper boded no ill. Such things happened millions of times daily around the globe, thanks to proteopape. And since Bash himself was the much-lauded, much-rewarded inventor of proteopape, he was positively the last person in the world to be astounded by the medium’s capacity for change.

In the middle of the circle, a foot or two above the grassy curb-girdled plot right where the Harkleys had planted a rosebush, someone had cut a large hole in the sky.

When the partitioning of the country was first being adjudicated, New Austin had managed to claim an irregular circle of land some sixty miles in diameter around the urban core. This allowed the city to retain many natural attractions and resources, not the least of which was The Salt Lick BBQ Restaurant in Driftwood.

In other words, there was a Creator, and He or She or It had populated the galaxy with His or Her or Its designs. (Let’s call that bastard God Him from now on, for convenience.)

The population of Antikhthon continously produced doppelgangers of Earth humans. Or vice versa. In either case, there was a convergence of individuals.