by Pam Uphoff
Agni's voice dominated. "What sort of a name is Twicecut?"
"It's a cross between a joke and a brag, which I doubt you'd find either amusing or brag worthy." Dydit looked wholly unimpressed by Agni.
Agni tried to poke his indifference from another direction. "Since witches don't marry, I suppose she's a prostitute?"
"Don't be absurd. By witch custom, I'm her pet." Dydit glanced around. "Fortunately none of the other witches appear to have heard you say that. Some of them are . . . insufficiently diplomatic to not show you the error of your surmises."
Xen turned as Never snorted behind him.
"I really do hope we don't have to deal with that man often."
He eyed her. "Are you planning on dealing with many of them?"
She shot an exasperated glance across the plaza. "King Leano says that I'm the oldest relative with seriously strong magic, so I'd be the perfect person to represent the Kingdom, over there in the Empire. And with Dydit as very nearly my husband, I'd have strong backup on hand at all social functions."
"Oh . . . nice. Congratulations Ambassador Never."
She eyed him. "I'll have a lot of questions for you. Eventually. I suspect it'll take at least a year to work out the legal details. Most of which I'll be spending here talking to them second hand."
"Don't bet on it. They did have wars, in their past, so they must have some framework for official diplomatic missions they can dust off and use."
"I hope so. Of course on our world, embassies were also the home base of most . . . information gathering."
"Spying? Well it's not like both sides aren't spying on each other already." Xen nodded at the crowd. "Three quarters of the Ones are probably loaded down with equipment of various sorts to measure and record everything, for the analysts to analyze, back home."
"Not to mention the reporters and their cameramen? Or do they call them vid men, with these movie recorders?"
"I don't think so." Xen eyed Q, chatting with the reporter who'd been camping out down at the beach. Smarmy ass, kissing up to my little sister. It would be a complete jerk that first turned the fake charm on her.
He turned and looked the other way, before Never noticed her granddaughter chatting up a zero power Earther. "Well, I hate to tell you this, but the Empire may not let you build your own embassy building in Paris."
"Humph. We'll just see about that."
Chapter Twenty-two
11 Furkan 1400 yp
Gate City, One World
"It was the scariest thing I've ever seen."
Rael looked away from the big wall screen.
Dan smiled innocently. "And I've seen Fean drive."
Fean sniffed. "Don't listen to him."
"A team of horses."
Fean snickered. "All right maybe he has a point. But the building is not just scary, it's ongoing. I watched these witches do our embassy site's hook-up to their water system. They just looked at it and molded rock into pipes and fitted them to our pipes. The water tests so clean they've decided to not bother filtering or chlorinating it."
Rael nodded. "Yes, we've seen those vids as well. It's bad for the ego."
Ajha snickered. "You have no idea how much time I spent walking around Karista trying to find the water purification plants, their sewage treatment plants, storage and pumps to maintain the pressure. The city's four hundred years old. Cadent, the capital city of Verona is much the same, but double the age and size."
Hob nodded. "Dan and I checked them out, when we were there two years ago. We talked to a bunch of construction workers. 'Oh, there's always a break-in period with low water pressure' they said. 'Then it starts working right.' Beats me."
Rael hit the replay button and watched magical construction in action. "The sheer mass they appear to be moving is . . . mind boggling. Can it really be just the two of them? I've checked the backgrounds and crowd shots. Lots of the same people nearby, all the time. Starting with Captain Wolfson. But if he was helping with the magic, he sure didn't let it distract him from talking to people. And everyone else stayed back further."
She paused the recording with Endi . . . Captain Wolfson . . . flashing that damned grin at Director Agni. I don't care. He's the enemy. I don't want to see him again.
She blinked away tears and brought up the new data set.
"So. A cross dimensional jail break. We can call them political prisoners, but it does look like they committed some serious crimes."
Ajha nodded. "Duke Rivolte's treason was before we were doing much in Karista. The Post Head was dismissive of most of the reports of morphological changes that were reported. There was some odd entanglement with a local church. The church wound up outlawed. I wonder what ever happened to Ba'al? I . . . prowled through the ruins of the temple in Karista. It was rumored to have been damaged in a battle between the Living God and Evil witches, assisted by an evil black goat." He brought up pictures on a side window. The half collapsed, soot stained remains of a sizable temple, carved columns and a dome and some auxiliary buildings.
"The assassination took place about six months after the battle for their gate area. The Post Head—different fellow, this was two decades later—was still back here in secret meetings with the Ministry of War insiders so we had no close information on the matter. He got sent back out, as the best way to keep him quiet about the battle." Ajha's glance sheared her direction. "Which leaked anyway, but the poor sod was stuck there for years. He . . . didn't adapt well to it."
"Ajha wouldn't let us use the post building. He's a little paranoid, that way." Fean smirked. "Not that I minded not living in a warehouse in a borderline slum district a couple blocks off the very smelly docks."
Ajha just grinned. "I met the new post head . . . and he was just . . . off somehow. I never did pin down the problem. I just took over and sent him home. And moved out before the rest of the team arrived. And with me here, a complete newbie has been assigned there. Lucky fellow."
Rael looked up in surprise. They were all nodding.
Fean shrugged. "It's a nice place. Nice people. I'd love to be assigned to the embassy, if we ever have one there, so I could openly ask questions."
"He was a horse lover, and not very snotty." Ajha shrugged. "He took right to it."
Dan shrugged. "I don't know if I'd like a long posting. It could get boring. Shorter term science surveys are often a lot of fun."
Grins all around.
Rael swapped back to the almost live feed from Embassy. "So there are seven embassies under construction. Comet Fall and Arrival are nearly done. And those purple people are building a wooden fort—something from their history—and are likely to finish before we do."
Fean grinned. "Maybe we can do some field surveys on them. What kind of evolutionary history produces purple hair?"
Rael nodded. "Mutation or genetic engineering? Could they be another Exile World, like Comet Fall and Arrival? But they're allies of Earth. Hmm . . . I think I'm having a good idea."
She bit her lip. "Let's start with some genetic samples. Do they eat anywhere public? Is there anywhere public to eat? If not, we need to get a, a, food kiosk over there. Open a restaurant."
Fean snickered. "A nightclub. We can chat up the foreign diplomats, get them drunk."
Rael giggled. "Oh, yes, definitely. Where's the Subdirector gone to this time? "
Ajha grinned. "All day meeting in Paris. Ajki and Director Agni versus the Ministers. Let's write up a proposal and drop it on him when he gets back. Uncle Ajki will need a bit of cheering up."
Chapter Twenty-three
Winter Solstice 1399 px
20 Furkan 1400yp
Embassy, Gate City, and Paris
Xen eyed Agni. "Certainly. I'd be delighted to install a Gate City-to-Paris corridor. So long as you lot don't keep trying to kill me while I'm over there."
Agni scowled. "President Orde has issued an unconditional pardon. And made it quite clear we weren't to touch your precious hide." He extended two cards, his
scowl deepening.
Xen took the cards, and grinned. "An ID and a bank card. I wonder what he—or more likely you—put on the ID."
Snort of disgust. "Name, Xen Wolfson. Place of birth, HMC5623, also known as Target 42, also known as Comet Fall. Ash, section two, Foothills Province, Kingdom of the West. 1370, although that's just a guess."
"Only off a year. 1371 Year of the Prophets. The day before the Autumnal Equinox, whenever that fell on your insane calendar, that year."
Grunt. "And the bank card accesses your old account, which is no doubt overdrawn. Eighteen judges issued standard child support claims against it. No doubt you'll be hearing about how much you owe. If you survive the husbands who are out for your blood."
Xen shrugged. "Hopefully the husbands have regained some sense. I'd hate to risk killing the poor idiots."
"Confident, are you?"
"Yes. So . . . I'll need to fly to Paris. Get me a ticket. I'll need an extra half hour or so in Gate City before I head for the airport."
"What? You're not just going to teleport straight there?"
"Agni, much though I hate to give out this sort of information, most people's teleport range is less than two hundred miles. I can more than double that, but . . . "
Snort. "I don't believe a word of it."
Xen shrugged. "So when would you like me to do this?" He failed to suppress a grin at Agni's grinding teeth.
The Director tapped at his comp, briefly. "We'll have tickets on the sixteen hundred flight, in four hours. Good enough?"
"Certainly. I'll be right back."
Shower, shave, pack, put on his new suit, Comet Fall Businessman style. Eight little white pebbles. He teleported back.
Agni had acquired a black car. He looked Xen up and down, snorted. "Better than pretending to be a Oner."
The car whisked them through the gate and past the construction zone.
"We can shift the gates, to match your construction, if you wish."
Glare.
"Do you have the concept of Karma? All those centuries of superiority because Oners could do things no mere Multitude could do, and here you are, on the other end of that stick."
"Just wait until the next presidential election . . . "
Xen grinned. "I thought Orde won in a landslide, just a month ago? Think the next five years will change people's minds?"
"They'll know all about you, about how we've lost ground to the Earthers and you lot. I'm anticipating the next election."
"No doubt one of us will enjoy it."
The car passed through a security gate and stopped in front of a tall building.
"Now I'll be right back." Agni climbed out.
Xen looked up at the Department of External Relation's headquarters building and failed to resist. He tripped the lock on the car door and stepped out.
Did Agni really think he could lock me in? Testing me or just having fun?
The chauffeur leaped out after him, frowning and flexing his biceps.
Xen ignored him. Grabbed a bubble and attached it to four of his pebbles. Stuck them on the wall of the building. Stuck the other side of the bubble on his arm to drag along to Paris.
With the other end closed, the opening just looked like a rectangle of bronze.
Agni stomped out and tossed a case to the driver. Scowled at the bronze.
"The pebbles are stuck on with an ordinary spell, you can move this end of the corridor anywhere you want it."
Xen sauntered back to the car and climbed in. Sat back and watched Agni poke the bronze, recoil at its give . . . shove his arm shoulder deep and withdraw it.
Agni snapped orders to the people nearby and stomped back to the car.
"Cute. Someday I'll get to kill you."
Q was right. The Oners had managed to make flying boring. For that alone they should be banished from the Multiverse.
Urfa met them in Paris, and whisked them away to Government House. Exchanging monosyllables and sneers with Agni the whole way.
Xen did the meet and greet with the President, the Prime Councilor and a selection of dignitaries. Ministers and bureaucrats. A couple he knew. Only Izzo grinned as he shook his hand. The rest scowled, and most managed to avoid any physical contact.
While they postured, and spoke loudly enough for the ever-present newsies to catch, Xen turned to the nearest wall and stuck on the other four pebbles. The Corridor popped open to show—through a thick fog of power—the startled guards on the sidewalk in front of Agni's HQ.
Xen stepped through, Agni on his heels.
Then he just stepped aside and let the dignitaries walking back and forth find out the icky sensation of passing someone going the other direction for themselves.
President Orde joined him. "That's going to be as big a change as the gates."
"I'd recommend introducing them slowly. You'll have a lot of job losses in shipping and trucking, port workers and so forth."
"Experience speaking?"
"Yes. A lot of river barge traffic was just . . . killed. Being multiple nations, we don't have as many ocean spanning corridors. The only ones I know of are from the recent small isolated colonies in Asia back to their old homes. Not much shipping traffic, before the corridors became possible."
"Yes. A good thought." The President shook his head at the people wandering back and forth. "My poor guards. We'd better move the other end out of Government house."
"I'd recommend a place with vehicular access. Your drivers can get used to the idea while you build some proper access. I'd recommend highway access for a permanent setup. We've found it useful to pair the corridors, for one way traffic. With long corridors it's best to place them at least, umm, a kilometer apart."
Agni looked around. "But not gates?"
"We'll no doubt find out eventually is there's a problem with parallel routes. Nothing so far, but Q is keeping an eye on them, watching for instabilities." Xen looked around with a shrug. "I think my part is done here."
"Indeed." Orde grinned at the gesturing ministers. "Come and have lunch with me. We might catch Paer off her horse and persuade her to join us."
Paer did, as well as Qayg, the president's assigned princess and good friend, Izzo, and Xiat, whom he'd met during his spy mission. But Paer was the only one who hugged him.
The food barely hit the table before the president opened with a question he hadn't expected. "Do you know anything about the Wolf Company? They've opened a sizable account here."
"Oh, good idea. Yes. They're a financial holding company, an insurance underwriter for large scale projects, venture capitalists and all around filthy rich company. Owns half of our largest bank. I suspect King Leano has roped them in to handle currency exchange and possibly assist in establishing our embassy here."
Urfa looked over. "How connected to the government are they? Or your magical community? Do you know anything about the stockholders?"
"It's probably the oldest company on my world. It financed the settling of the West, and the development of the infrastructure of the new nation." Xen savored a bite and let them think it over for a moment, before the next bombshell. "Wholly owned by Wolfgang Oldham. Or the Auld Wulf, as the name has evolved. God of War and so forth. One of the original Telies, a colleague of your Prophets."
"My dad." Another slow bite. "I can pass on any questions you have, or I may have signatory authority at your bank—I do back home—and can get details for you. If that's what you need to know."
Urfa and the President swapped glances.
Orde shook his head. "No . . . I think we'll just let them carry on. Currency exchange is good."
Paer frowned between father and friend. "Isn't he worried about losing all the money? Having it . . . the old term was nationalized, I think."
Xen flashed a grin. "No. He'd consider it a useful measure of your government. And an opportunity to test your legal system."
"Ouch." The President sighed. "I'll make sure the Ministry of Finance hasn't got any designs on it."
"Wow. I feel like such an amateur. Even after the serious lecture about what I could or couldn't talk to you about. Which fortunately doesn't include horses." Paer beamed. "I've seen pictures of your horse. Liver chestnut, as you said. He's gorgeous, what's his name? What are horses like on Comet Fall? Do you mind us calling it that?"
Xen grinned at her blush.
"Comet Fall is nicely descriptive, and our horses come all sorts. We started with native horses, that were crossed and recrossed with imported horses from North America which included purebred Arabians and Thoroughbreds, besides the local breeds."
Paer sat up, all bright-eyed. "That we mostly lost in the nuclear war."
Xen raised his eyebrows. "Yes, I suppose so. There was a lot of world-wide trade in horses at the time of the Exile, but two and a half centuries before that, yeah they were probably rare outside of North America."
"So tell me about them!"
A deep sigh from the president.
Paer eyed him. "It could be worse, Dad. I could have asked him why he never made a pass at me, when he was being the Super Spy."
Everyone else in the room winced.
Xen snickered. "Paer, I have a daughter who is maybe a year younger than you. And nothing, nothing, convinces a man of the absolute unreadiness of a teenage girl for any sort of emotional and especially physical relationship than having his own daughter of that age terrifying him."
Frowns turned to snickers, and a few nods.
Xiat raised her eyebrows. "I'm surprised . . . from your tactics while you were here I wouldn't have guessed you were married? Are you divorced, perhaps? How many children do you have?"
He shook his head. "I'm one of the rare male children of the witch culture. Witches would never be so subservient as to actually marry a man. They rarely have anything but the briefest relationship with . . . a good genetic prospect."
"So, you aren't actually raising this daughter, yourself?" Qayg was eyeing him disapprovingly.
"In this case, Nighthawk ran away from home at the age of nine, and I've teamed up with her maternal grandfather to finish raising her. But apart from that, no, I'm not raising my children."
