“ 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.”
“ A race of beings actually IS invunerable while in adolecence. They age, but cannot be killed. A miniority of the race (1 in 20) does not become invunerable, but rather becomes immortal at some point in thier adolecence, and ceases aging while being vunerable to death in all the normal ways. Another minority (also 1 in 20) Permanatly becomes invunerable after adolecence, but ages twice as fast as the race normally does. There is no known way to test for which of the three traits an individual manifests and the three traits cannot mix, as they are tied to the same gene, as it were.”