“ Termites, in certain places, make homes that can be eight meters high and only a half meter wide. They are built facing North to South to take advantages of the suns travel, maximum heat in the morning and evening and little in the afternoon. Imagine grassy plains with vertical structions facing a certain direction all over the place. Ambush? Maze? New creature? Larger structures?”
“ Some parallel worlds have different time-flows, like the fabled dwelling-places of the elves: those who visit them under the hill for a night return to find that years have passed in this world. Perhaps it is the gate leading between the worlds which causes the alteration. If a gate were 'misaligned', the shift from '| |' to '| \' or '| /' as it were would lead to that difference, much as a light-beam split and bent by a prism ends up taking a longer path. There might even be a mathematical function linking degree of misalignment to alteration of time-rate.”