Many people die. Paul and the cat are whisked away. Nevertheless a kind of friendship grows between the man and the cat-woman, which culminates in an act of physical love. A continent can fill with rabbits almost as swiftly as a single field. The planets of a trillion suns can fill with spaceship-builders as quickly as those of one.
Intelligent life spreads faster than the plague.
And science grows more uncontrollably than cancer. Eventually Paul is united with Don Merriam from the Wanderer, and the two are returned safely to Earth, before the artificial planet flees back into hyperspace just three days after its arrival. The Wanderer is part disaster novel, part space opera. Leiber enriches the book by cramming in countless references to mythology, religion, the arts - and sf. The characters talk incessantly.