Far out in the unchartered backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small unregarded yellow sun. Orbiting this at the distance of roughly ninety-eight million miles lies a nothingness that should not lie there. What should lie there is an utterly insignificant little blue-green planet and its not being there caused some amount of uncertainty about the existence of the Galaxy, and also some impossibilities on the field of logic. As impossibilities always attract the attention of Philosophers, Theoreticians, Seers and of all other thinking people, beings and things that like to count themselves as belonging to one of these two, a considerable number of the greatest minds of the Universe were determined to study the absence of that planet.

Among the questions they were pondering were these: If that planet and all its inhabitants had been wiped out of existence along all the co-ordinates of space, time and probability by the Grebulons, then it was just proper to assume that, for instance, a man named Elvis could not have been abducted by what the totally non-existent people of that planet would have called Aliens. This means, among other things, that Elvis's car could not have been parked outside a bar in the Domain of the King, from which it follows that two men named Arthur Dent and Ford Prefect could not have received that car from Elvis and could not have made their trip towards Earth. Their being on that planet, whose name was just revealed, however, was a prerequisite for its complete annihilation. Yet the gap between the second and what should be the fourth planet of that planetary system existed, thus suggesting that the little blue-green planet did not, so there was a problem.

Another difficult bit to explain was the continuing welfare of the Galaxy as a whole, which could only be accounted for by the fact that the above mentioned Arthur Dent and a Terran woman named Trillian had a fairly big share in solving a crisis that, brought about by a suicidal if molecularized computer by the name of Hactar, would have sent the whole Galaxy up into flames. Although some, including a rather paranoid android called Marvin, may regret that fact, the Galaxy was still around. How come? these wondered mournfully, considering that the annihilation of Earth should have prevented Arthur Dent and Trillian from being born in the first place?

All these questions shall not be answered here. The ensuing confusion, however, could not stop Fenchurch from popping back into existence the very instant that Earth popped out of its. This momentous event shall be described in greater detail, and it shall be described so now...

"...et us a cup of tea?" said Fenchurch and found nothing unusual about that, as her memory told her that she had started by saying, "I am feeling a bit cold, don't you, too, dear, so why don't you g..." She got "... - ..." as an answer which she did find unusual because Arthur Dent, the man she so lovingly addressed as „dear", would, unless something weird was happening, or something really occupied his mind, which was in fact something weird, tea being the only thing capable of really occupying his mind, to which he normally responded by going to get some, normally respond to such utterances by going to get some tea.

He didn't.

Weird.

He was sitting by her side in a huge spacecraft. He did not react, therefor something really weird had to be happening so Fenchurch looked about to see what really weird things were happening.

They were.

Really weird.

The spacecraft they were sitting in was none. They were not sitting, but floating in what looked like a river to her, together with some fish, a reptile that grunted a friendly "Hello", a towel and a flight ticket that had, in very small print, a warning on it that advised beings from the Plural zones of the Galaxy not to have bought it.

Very slowly, Fenchurch also realised that "they" should have been "she", for she was, except for the fish and the reptile, alone. Having made these three observations, she decided to close her eyes and open them again. The same observations. Then she thought she would close just one of her eyes and keep the other open to see if things changed.

She did.

They didn't.

She went through these exercises and slight variations thereof a couple of times until the reptile got bored and swam away to find himself a girl to spend the night with, which was a change of sorts but not what Fenchurch had hoped for. At this precise point, reason told Fenchurch that she must have gone mad while Fenchurch explained to reason that madness meant absence of reason, so what did reason think it was doing trying to claim to be out to lunch and at the same time proving it was not by pronouncing that claim, so there you go.

Fine.

Still weird, though.

The fact that a short while later Fenchurch decided it was time for some action to be taken is at least partially to blame on the waterfall she was approaching rather quickly then. But before this action is taken, it should be mentioned that reptiles have little to no ability to judge time.

In fact, reptiles are very good at judging time. Their internal clocks are so accurate that most of the Sub-Etha Speaking Clock business is now located on Gatorion, a planet wholly inhabited by snakes, crocodiles and the mechanics who run the broadcast and network facilities. The only time when reptiles lose their judgement of time is when they are either sexually inactive or hyperactive. The reptile that got so tired of watching Fenchurch exercise her eyelids was, sadly for him and luckily for Fenchurch, unhappily in love with a young dust cloud, a love that should not be, and was therefor to be regarded as one of the sexually inactive. Now, this fact was known to the reptile lady he had turned to after leaving Fenchurch, hoping for a change of that pitiful state. The lady, a strict adherer to the status quo of that affair, told him to return in the evening and to leave her alone until then. He, now unable to even tell night from day, did not realise that it was already evening and that he had been had. Instead, he swam with high spirits back across the river, where in a mood of exuberance he rescued Fenchurch from crashing down the waterfall and took her safely to the banks of the river. It is of course this what above the Chronicler felt inclined to call „action to be taken". Meanwhile, the need for a finely balanced sex life on Gatorion led to the emergence of a thrashing matchmaking industry on all the other planets and moons of Gatorion's planetary system.