The Mirrorverse
Chapter 28

Syrhahn

Syrhahn and Xhisara were sitting on the edge of a clearing in a forest with the largest trees Syrhahn had ever seen. He was leaning against one, its girth greater than Syrhahn’s whole house on Cxielo. It was early evening and there was still warmth in the air despite the sun having set.

“What just happened?” he shook his head in disbelief, as Xhisara laughed, having finished displaying her ability to appear and reappear all over the clearing, and even in a tree.

“Teleportation,” Xhisara replied simply.

“Yeah, you know, I got that much,” replied Syrhahn sarcastically.

“Well, where do I start?” asked Xhisara rhetorically. “I met William when I was twenty seven. He was charming, intelligent, just the perfect charismatic gentleman. We zipped around the multiverse enjoying ourselves for a while, before I fell pregnant.

“William had always disappeared off for work matters, of which he was rather vague. When I became pregnant, he started disappearing more, before failing to come back at all as I reached about five months gone.

“I gave birth to Angel on Earth, and held her in my arms only once. William and a very dark skinned woman with jet black hair appeared and took her from me.”

At that point, Xhisara paused, her face contorted with pain. Syrhahn waited for her to continue.

“I knew William did dealings with the Slavestri’s, so I went to them. I travelled through walls into the Slavesti study, demanding to know where my baby was.

“Estrali’s grandfather ordered me shot so I spontaneously travelled out of there, something I’ve been able to do since I was pregnant with Angel. I named her Angel, you know? They changed it to Angelli, but she was my Angel.”

“So how did you and Estrali become friends when they helped take your baby?” asked a shocked Syrhahn, as he leaned back against the enormous tree.

“I met Estrali when he was nineteen,” started Xhisara, tracing a line in the light coloured dry dirt with her finger. “He was just a boy when I entered the study, I barely even noticed him standing there.

“I was lost, didn’t know where to turn, so I visited the mirror Estrali to ask the first Estrali where my baby was, but he genuinely didn’t know. Communication since has been through holy men leaving me messages on the astral plane.”

“Mirror? The astral plane?” the more questions that were answered, the more Syrhahn didn’t understand.

“Yes, all universes have a single direct mirror, where everything down to the three dimensional structure of molecules is mirrored.”

“So good is bad and bad is good?”

“Nope,” she replied. “It is a physical mirror only. No-one knows why universes are always paired, but they are.”

“So I have a mirror?” Syrhahn was thinking of there being another Viskra more than anything else.

“Indeed. I can’t guarantee you are alive in your mirrorverse, but I can tell you that your life would have split off the moment you met Angel.”

“Why?” His breath caught in his throat at the thought of there being another Angel, of seeing her one more time. Xhisara must have seen the expectancy on his face, as she looked grave and shook her head slowly as she answered.

“Because there was only one William in our mirrorverse, and only one of me that became pregnant.”

“Which one of these is William?” Syrhahn pulled the picture out of his inside pocket of the tiny men taking Viskra.

“That one,” she pointed to the man with the short brown hair. “That was Angel’s father.”

“Why did William take Angel?”

“I do not know to this day,” Xhisara looked aggrieved.

“When did you replace out about Angel?”

“Estrali told me the adult Angelli was mine when she vanished, as that was when his father told him. He sent me out to replace her, but my search was fruitless. I interrogated the crew of the Achernar, but they claimed to know nothing. I knew they were lying, but I didn’t know why. They resisted some pretty heavy incentives to tell the truth. You must have put more than the fear of death into them,” she glared at Syrhahn, as if he did it deliberately to piss her off.

“I swore to Angel that I would keep Viskra from her family,” he replied, idly turning a stick over in his hands. “So why do you live all the way out here?” he looked beyond her to the wooden cabin in the ancient forest.

“Well, the wonderful William teamed up with the Slavesti’s and had me framed for an act of terrorism that killed twenty nine people,” her tone was dark, and Syrhahn was shocked at the lengths they would go to, to separate her from her baby.

“Who did kill those people?” he didn’t want to know the answer, but felt compelled to ask.

“Who do you think?” she raised her eyebrows, before going on without waiting for an answer. “William. He planted plenty of evidence that it was me, I didn’t stand a chance.”

“So you’ve been out here in exile?” Syrhahn was incredulous as the injustice of the woman’s life, and amazed at how calmly she was able to handle discussing such painful memories, despite the obvious discomfort.

“Yes. The multiverse is still mine to explore, with the exception of that mirrorverse, which happens to have been my home,” she sighed. “But here I have a home, and others that wish to learn to access the astral plane, and the wisdom that is to be found there. Also, we assist in the rebuilding of worlds damaged by travellers.”

“Damaged?”

“Travellers upset the balance of the worlds, it is easily seen from travelling through some of the mirrorverses what havoc have been wreaked on them by careless or power hungry travellers before the Spectrals got their proverbial hands on them.”

“Spectrals?”

“Transcendental beings who basically police the multiverse.”

“Why haven’t they caught William?” Syrhahn thought about telling her what he knew of Viskra’s work, but something made him hold back.

“He’s got a tracker, he can hide his trails as he travels.

“Portal’s leave trails?”

“Indeed.”

“So the Spectrals cannot follow.”

“Exactly, looking for William,” Xhisara paused and looked up through the clearing in the canopy of trees to the sparkling stars. She looked at Syrhahn with eye’s identical to Angel’s, leaving him in no doubt of her being Angel’s mother. She sighed deeply. “Is like trying to reach one of those stars with that stick.”

“I refuse to believe it’s hopeless,” snapped Syrhahn, trying to break her out of the despondence she was sinking into. “We will replace a way. I’ve come so far. I’m in a different universe for fuck’s sake. Viskra is out there, I know it.”

It wasn’t like him to swear, not at all. But given the bizarre circumstances he found himself in, he didn’t really feel like himself anyway. He was with Angels mother, who looked the same age as him, on some strange planet in a strange universe, further away from home than he had ever thought was possible.

“Why are you so young if you are Angel’s mother?” wondered Syrhahn out loud.

“Advanced technology. I have the whole multiverse at my fingertips, why age?”

Xhisara sat up with her head in her hands. “We need a tracker,” she said heavily.

“But why if we can’t track William?” he asked, not understanding her move.

“He and the tracker can’t be tracked, but others who deal with him can be. We need to speak to the Spectrals.”

She leaned back on her outstretched arms, contemplating their next move, while Syrhahn remained leaning against his tree, trying to piece together the incomprehensible turn his life had taken.