The Return of Nathan Brazil

South Zone

“There are how many entries in the gate?”

“Between three and four hundred, Ambassador” came the reply on the intercom.

Serge Ortega settled back on his coiled tail. “All Type Forty-one, you say?”

“That’s correct, sir. What do you want done with them? We hardly have facilities for so many.”

He thought for a moment. “Keep them there,” he instructed. “I’ll be down shortly. We’ll just h’ave to do a mass introduction right there and shove ’em through the Well in shifts. Get any personnel you might need from the dry-land embassy staffs. And find me a public address amplifier.”

“At once, sir.”

He did not move at once; they would need some time to set up anyway. He flicked on a televisor screen, one of a number recessed in his curved control console. The screen showed him the great chamber where all those who happened on Markovian gates found themselves. The sight of so many Entries was stunning, even though the chamber was so large that they were still but a small dot in the middle of it. He adjusted some of the controls and zoomed in on them. The other embassies’ officials wouldn’t be able to tell, of course, but it was clear enough to him. They were all stunning human females and all looked just about exactly alike except for hairstyle and some body decorations. Like that woman, Yua, but without the tail. Olympians.

“So it’s begun.” He sighed. Slowly, still considering all the steps he might take, he slithered out the door and down the long corridor to the entry chamber.

It took very little time to brief them, a lot longer to organize the multiracial staff that would escort them in groups of ten or so to the Well Gate. The Olympians all knew what they were about; Brazil and his agents had briefed them ahead of time. But even this early, the pretense was gone—except one, of course. They all claimed that their planet was being destroyed and that a strange little man named Brazil had offered to save them.

That was bad enough. The other staff members would be rushing back to their bosses with the news that Brazil was alive, that he was actively shoving an entire planetary civilization through—and who knew what else?

It took several hours to handle the whole operation. Still uncertain as to his immediate course of action, Ortega called the Czillian Embassy, explained the situation, and advised that race of scholarly plant creatures to activate the Crisis Center at their computer-laden central research complex. The others would have to be briefed, and soon, before they started jumping to the wrong conclusions and taking even worse action unilaterally than they would collectively. A Council meeting, a great conference call of all the seven hundred and one ambassadors, who currently kept embassies at Zone, would have to be called. Ortega was about to order it when his intercom buzzed.

“Yes?” he snapped, annoyed. He needed time to set this all up, time to get everything together, and, most of all, he needed time just to think.

“Sir! It’s incredible! No sooner did we clear the last group than an identical group appeared! At least as many as before! Sir! What do we do now?”

Ortega sighed. No time, damn it all. No time at all. “I wish I knew,” he told the panicked aide. “I really wish I knew.”