Despite half the bosses I’ve worked for being nice, or at least pretty decent, I’m with Rat on this one. Though in his case, it may be having Rat as an employee that makes them a terrible boss.
In the Wileyverse, its usually safer to assume anything involving Danae and co is actually ‘real’ unless repeatedly stated otherwise. For instance, Cap’n Eddie’s adventures are often treated as tall tales, but at the same time he has occasionally taken other people with him on those adventures, including Kate, Danae, and even Joe.
More precisely, you need to forget to land after falling – hence free-falling.