I had a good and fruitful discussion with Professor Ilyes on Saturday. If I am able to stay in this world for long enough, I have high hopes that she will be able to at least explain what has gone on, if not solve the problem, and get me home.

Of course, staying in this world isn’t under my control. On that score the professor seems to agree with me. Every time I have been sent it has happened at night, which is when the Project Hermes team always carried out their sendings.

This can’t be a natural phenomenon – or else why isn’t it happening to other people too? If it were some kind of wormhole, or breach in the space-time continuum (whatever that means) surely others would be falling in to it too.

No, surely I am in some way still linked to the Hermes transmitter. They must still be experimenting (or who knows, perhaps back on my Earth, they have satisfactorily completed all the experiments, and the system is now being used operationally). I know that they had previously sent inanimate objects, and then laboratory animals, entirely successfully. I sometimes forget that there were three of us in the first human test team, Kate, Tom and me – has the same thing happened to them too?

My guess is that every time they now send something – or someone – I get sent too. Or perhaps they know that I am attached to the system, and they are actually deliberately sending me (in which case I hope they are doing it in an effort to bring me home). Whatever happens, surely they must be causing the sendings to take place.

Of course, I don’t know anything about the science of this, so I couldn’t tell Professor Ilyes anything about that, but I could tell her about my experience of sending.

What seems to happen is that an area of space about two or three inches around my body physically moves when I go. That means whatever I’m wearing comes with me, as well, usually, as a slice of my bed and bedding. Fortunately this military uniform is designed to take hard wear, and to dry quickly, so I’ve been washing things in the early evening, when I can, and putting them back on before I go to bed – it’s not the most comfortable way to sleep, but at least I’ve still got most of my kit (other than my wristpad, knife and a few other odds and ends that were confiscated when I was imprisoned).

The times that I have been awake and experienced it (usually it happens while I’m asleep) it’s been instantaneous. No noise, no sensation of heat, light, falling or moving. I’m just in one place one minute, and somewhere else the next.

The professor agreed with me that time travel is out of the question. Since my first sending (and this log bears this out, as fortunately I’d set it up to record the date of each entry) time has been moving forwards in a linear fashion, and keeping pace with what I have been experiencing, as far as I can tell.

The one thing that I can’t understand is that first move. On my Earth, it was 2008 when the sending took place. So why did I arrive in a version of Earth where it was 2005?

So (ignoring that first sending, which I just can’t explain) if I haven’t moved through time, what am I moving through – is it space, or another dimension, to a series of almost parallel Earths? I’m sure that these Earths are linked. It’s not just the similarity of buildings and places (I know they aren’t identical - there are some physical differences, as well as the technological and social changes that I have seen in the different versions of Earth I’ve visited so far) but things like Kiln House and Mercury House being the same building, with similar functions.

Then there is this internet site that I set up on the first Earth I visited. How have I been able to connect with it on every version of Earth that has invented the internet? And on more primitive Earths, how was it that I was still able to write things here with my wristpad? Are all these Earths linked by the internet? Is it more than a world-wide web – does it in fact cross into other dimensions?

Or am I, in some way, something like a radio mast, able to communicate across the dimensions (or whatever it is that separates these different earths)? Is that why the Hermes transmitter is able to reach me still, wherever I am?

I have lots of questions. So too, naturally, does Professor Ilyes. I hope she can find some answers.

She says she hasn’t got time to see me this week, so she’s given me some more credits and told me to explore the country. It will be good to take a holiday, knowing that someone else is worrying about my problems for me. I’m going to see her again in a week or so. I do hope she will have made some progress.

In case I get sent again before I next see her, she has this website address, and so can at least keep up with my progress. Oh, and if you do read this, Professor Ilyes, I’ve just looked back through what I wrote last week, and I see I described you as a ‘not-unattractive redhead’. Talk about damning with faint praise! I’m not going to say any more, though, as I may just end up digging a deeper hole for myself.

I asked at the reception desk for Linda. That caused some confusion, but eventually they decided that I wanted Professor Ilyes – and when she came to find me that was the name on her badge; I assume it is Hungarian, or Eastern-European anyway; although she told me to call her Linda, I feel more comfortable calling her Professor Ilyes – she is, after all, about twenty years older than me.

I told her straight away that I recognised Kiln House - because it is the same building that is called Mercury House in my Earth. This has got to be more than a coincidence.

Professor Ilyes is, it seems, carrying out research into the breaking-down of objects into their constituent atoms, and attempting to re-assembling them (I think I got that much right – I really can’t grasp advanced physics). I cannot believe that it is purely chance that work on such similar areas is being carried out in the same building on two different worlds.

The tests she wanted to do on me were medical, and basically involved a swab, and standing under some form of radiation counter. We met again after lunch, when she’d got the results, which seemed to convince her that there is some element of truth in my story. Apparently my background radiation, and other trace chemicals in my body, suggest I come from somewhere totally different to Norfolk at least.

She didn’t have time to tell me much more then, because she was too busy, but we’ve arranged to meet for lunch on Saturday.

I explained my perilous financial state, and she charged my card with enough to see me through the next week – she says it’s possible she could employ me as a research assistant. Apparently money in the department has been tight for many years, but recently they’ve had a big grant, following the last election, now that Tony is Prime Minister, and is making a big push to get more people into universities.

I told her that Blair had become PM years earlier in my world, when New Labour came into power – she looked blank at me, and asked who he was, and what was New Labour. After a confused conversation, I discovered that the PM here is a chap called Tony Benn. That wasn’t a name I recognised – but I’ve never been that interested in politics.

I was 23 when I was sent first (which means, I think, that I’m now 25) so of course I haven’t had the chance to vote yet, which means I’ve only ever been interested in the bits of politics that directly affect me – like when the Liberal party said they’d abolish conscription. I suspect that is a shame, because things do seem very different here, and I might have been able to get a better feel for things if I could see the differences, and understand the nuances. I guess, for a start, that if Labour have been in power for decades, then there was no need to re-invent themselves as New Labour.

Anyway, with a bit of money, and someone who is at least interested in my story, and possibly can do something about it, I do feel just a little more hopeful than I have done for a long time.

Well, I did go to the café, and I have to report that my little plan has been more successful than I could realistically have hoped.

When I arrived, Julie was already there, with a half-drunk cup of coffee in front of her. To be fair to her, the first thing she did was to apologise for the television coverage. She says she believed me, but she had no say in the editing of the story. She’d arranged for a friend to meet us – Linda (I didn’t catch her surname) who is a scientist at the University of Norwich.

I don’t remember much about what was said – I feel really hampered by the loss of my wristpad. Normally I would have recorded our conversation, and could then play it back and transcribe it. Having to remember everything that people say to me is hard – particularly when they are a pretty young blonde, and a not-unattractive redhead.

If I can’t recall our conversation in detail, perhaps I can describe the people.

Julie, as I say, is blonde; I’d guess early thirties. I’m 6’2”; she’s definitely shorter than me, but as we were sitting down most of the time, it is difficult to judge. She looked vaguely French, in a grey felt jacket and a black crocheted beret-type hat.

Linda looked about a foot shorter than me as she came in; as I say, a red-head, wearing a completely black outfit, the details of which escape me for now. I’d guess mid-forties; middle-aged, definitely.

I’m really not very good at observation, it appears.

So, what can I recall from our conversation? Well, Linda was, quite naturally, sceptical about my story. Fortunately she hadn’t seen the television clip, so at least she came with an open mind. She had to go after about twenty minutes, but was interested enough to ask me to visit her at her laboratory. She says there are some tests she’d like to carry out. She’s in the Physics Department building, which is in Kiln House, somewhere in the Pottergate area. I’m seeing her tomorrow at 10.30.

Julie left at the same time, and I rather suspect I’ll not see her again – but anyway, my objective has been achieved: I have met a scientist, who hasn’t instantly assumed that I am mad. Perhaps – no, I don’t want to build my hopes up too much, but it would be good to feel that, just possibly, this may be a start to helping me find my way home.

Julie, it turns out, isn’t the Science Correspondent at all. She’s the weather-girl.

It was treated as a big joke.

Still, they did let me say the important things I wanted to, so who knows, if there is anything like Project Hermes in this part of this world, maybe someone heard it.

I did think of not meeting her for that cup of coffee later on this afternoon, but what the heck, it’s still good to have someone to talk to – it’s been a long time since I’ve been able to talk openly to anyone about what’s happened to me.

Mind you, if she says anything like ‘men are from Mars, women are from Venus’ she may find she’s washing coffee out of her blonde locks.

Well, amazingly, I managed to get myself taken seriously at the BBC - eventually. It took a lot of talking, but finally I got an interview, on camera, this afternoon. It was with their Science Correspondent (a bubbly blonde young lady, not much older than me; Julie something-or-other). I had been hoping for a seriously-suited older man, but still, I’m happy to take what I can get.

Anyway, the interview went quite well. She started off with a bit of a giggle, and I could see she thought I was doing this for a laugh, but by the end I think I’d convinced her that I am serious, and I’m not a nut-case.

She even agreed to meet me for a cup of coffee tomorrow, which I am taking as a very positive step. Having told her practically my entire life history, perhaps she’ll do a bit more of the talking tomorrow.

She said the interview will, depending on other news items, be broadcast tonight. My landlord has a TV set in his living-room; I’ll see if I can persuade him to let me watch it this evening.

Now, though, I need to do something about finding some kind of work, as the credits I’ve earned so far have pretty well all been spent. This may be a problem. I suspect from what I’ve seen that there are very detailed electronic records affecting every part of life here, and of course I’m not in the system. Even my payment card is a bit suspect – it seems to work, but clearly it’s not registered to me.

This world seems close, technologically and date-wise to my own world (what I think of as the real Earth – if I lose sight of that, I think I may go mad again) that I’ve thought of turning myself in to the authorities. Maybe they’ll even have a Project Hermes of their own.

In fact I’ve just checked the name on a search-engine, and found there is a site: it’s run by The Imperial Communications Union (‘linking the nations of The British Empire electronically’).

But how could I convince the authorities that I'm telling the truth? I really need to speak to government scientists, but how do you get hold of them? If I went to the police they’d either laugh at me, or if they thought I really believed myself, treat me as insane and lock me up (not too much of a problem – the next sending will get me out of any institution). I could try to prove my credentials by telling them something that’s going to happen in the near future – like Norwich United winning the 2007 FA cup – but this world is different in so many ways that I can’t guarantee that events I remember will actually take place here.

I went to the library, to try to find out more about the history of this place – but I found that the lovely old red-brick building near the station had been knocked down; the library’s now in a new building in the Market Place. It cost me a pound to get in to use the reference section, but at least the internet is free here.

I’ve been ploughing through history books, but things don’t look that different in the past – I think it was in the 20^th century that something must have changed, although I can’t see where time-lines altered dramatically. One thing I have spotted, though, is that Labour seems to have been in political power for the last forty years; I suspect you could call this Britain a socialist state.

There aren’t many cars about. Buses are expensive (I thought a trip across the city would be a shilling or two – I was shocked to find my card had been debited a whole two pounds). That’s another thing, what happened to shillings? They seem to have just pounds and pence here. Odd. Perhaps it’s to do with the change to electronic money. Very little cash is used here – nearly everything is paid by electronic cards.

I suspect motoring is so restricted because oil prices are so high – I passed a filling station yesterday and I was shocked to see that petrol is £15 a gallon. That probably explains the rickshaws I saw at the station – I had thought they were for tourists, but they seem to be everywhere.

I’ve just had a thought. Sitting here in the library, I can see the local BBC studio in one wing of the building. Perhaps they might broadcast me – as a ‘human interest’ story of course. OK, they will probably treat it as a Nutter who thinks he’s been abducted by aliens story, but if there is anything like Hermes out there, my story might just get to the ears of someone who can do something about it. What have I got to lose?

In the months I spent in the dungeons, as I said, I had time to think.

I believe there are several possible explanations for what is happening to me, and I’ve tried to work through them logically:

1. Whatever happened to me, when the team sent me that first time, I didn’t actually go anywhere. What did change affected my brain, so what I think I’ve been experiencing for the last couple of years hasn’t actually happened. I’m in an hallucination. My body, presumably, is still at the base in Norfolk. If that’s the case, there’s nothing I can do to change things, so I might as well ignore that option.

2. Hermes certainly wasn’t about time travel, but about moving objects, but I appear – at first sight – to have travelled in time (jumping both backwards and forwards – but interestingly never up to my own time, 2008, and certainly not ahead of that). However, the past I have landed in has been subtly different to the one I can remember from the history books.

The version of Earth I’m in now appears to be 2007, but it’s got very many differences from the way of life that I remember from my last year in Norwich.

So either Hermes has changed the past in some way – either from what I’ve done (or may be going to do, if my next sending sends me even further back into the past) or the effect of the objects they sent before they moved on to human guinea pigs – or else time travel isn’t what’s happening here.

3. As I say, Hermes was a project to move things around physically. So perhaps that’s what’s happened – it has physically sent me somewhere else. That somewhere, though, isn’t on the Earth I know, but in some kind of parallel Earth; maybe I am spatially in the same place, just shifted sideways by a dimension or three?

In fact, then, it’s not just one parallel Earth, but a whole series of them, each time that I send.

Presumably history has developed differently on each version, so that I haven’t really been travelling into the past at all, merely to an Earth that hasn’t developed as fast, or in the same way. That would explain why, now, for instance, is so different to the 2007 that I remember.

I can understand some versions of Earth still being in the Middle Ages – and I didn’t have a calendar then to look at then, so although they may have had medieval civilisation/ technology, perhaps the actual date was the 21st Century. But twice I’ve arrived at places that are almost contemporary with my Earth – and the years I was in were 2005 and, now, 2007. Why is that?
Why not 2008? Or 2010, which it presumably is by now, back at base?

When I was in prison, I’m sure I came up with four options, but I can’t remember what the fourth one was. I’ve been racking my brains, and I can sense there was some brilliant idea there, but for the life of me I can’t bring it back.

Well, at least I’ve got this record now, of three possibilities.

How it helps me get back home, I’m not sure.

OK. It’s been a long time since I’ve been able to write anything – it feels like a year, although I can’t be sure about that. I see the date of my last posting here is shown as July 2005, and the calendar on the computer I’m now using says it’s February 2007 – but between those two dates I’ve been in a couple of different worlds/time-zones or whatever is going on, so who knows?

I’m in what’s called a cyberbooth in Norwich travel centre (sort of combined rail/bus and rickshaw station). It doesn’t look much like the Norwich I remember. I’m not sure how long my credits will last, so I’ll keep going as long as I can, but may have to get back to you later.

A few weeks after I last posted I was arrested by the local warlord – I think I hadn’t kowtowed low enough, or something. The worst thing was that they took all my possessions – including my wristpad. So in a stroke I lost all my technology, and my main way of communicating with you.

At least the time in the dungeons gave me the opportunity to think, and I believe I’ve worked out four options for what’s happening to me. Whether I can do anything about it, and ever get home, is another matter, of course.

I got out of the cells when another sending took place. I ended up in a version of Earth which was, I would guess, about 18^th-19^th century. I’m not hot enough on history to be sure. Anyway, I got some labouring work and made a bit of money.

Then I was sent again to here – where the pennies I had on me weren’t going to get me very far. Then I had a brainwave – they might only be pennies, but they were two hundred years old, but still in mint condition. I took them to a coin dealer, expecting to get quite a bit of money. He laughed at me. He pointed out that they aren’t old at all – they are all dated from the turn of the twenty-first century. I may have been in a world which had technology from a few hundred years ago, but the date, it seems, was still the same.

A further shock came when he told me they were worthless anyway, because they are clearly forgeries. They show King Charles’ head on them, and apparently the monarchy has been abolished on this earth. They should have a footballer’s head on them, or something.

So, no coins. Anyway, the dealer explained (he was being very gentle with me – I suspect he thought I’d escaped from some sort of institution) that they hardly ever use real money these days. Apparently it’s all credits on a card. He was good enough to offer me some work, heavy labouring for him (carrying boxes a couple of miles – he doesn’t seem to have a car of his own) and then he gave me a temporary card until I can set up a bank account and get a proper one.

I’ve just seen that this computer seems to be eating up my credit faster than I thought, so I’m going to stop now. Get back to you as soon as I can.