The Mirrorverse
Chapter 36

Syrhahn

“How could they be so callous?” raged Syrhahn for the nth time, pacing forwards and backwards through Xhisara’s kitchen.

“Calm, friend,” she requested in her holier than thou voice, which served only to infuriate him further.

“Calm? Calm?” he raged. “They are the only beings in the multiverse that can help replace my son, and they won’t help because they don’t get involved in lemna disputes.”

He leant on the final words, so that they came out as a sneer, surprising even him. Xhisara had explained earlier that lemna were simply the beings of the multiverse, excepting the Spectrals and some others, whom she didn’t go into.

Syrhahn inhaled deeply, and joined Xhisara at the table where he fixed her with an intense gaze.

“Where now?” he asked, still riled for a fight.

“There are places I must go, people I must speak to,” Xhisara informed him calmly. Something told him he wasn’t accompanying her.

“And me?”

“You wait here and stay out of trouble, I will return as soon as I can.”

Syrhahn bristled at being told to stay out of trouble like a petulant child, but held back his temper. Xhisara didn’t deserve to be at the receiving end of it, it wasn’t her fault that her detached composure made him want to strangle her.

Needing to let off some steam, Syrhahn Jumped up from the table, nodded to Xhisara and let himself out of the wooden cottage.

He walked straight into the trees, not caring if he ever found his way out again. He felt pleasure as his leg muscles stretched and contracted into long strides between the giant trees. He felt like an ant, his insignificance weighing down on him as it took four or more strides to walk past a single tree. In response, he lengthened his gait, failing to banish the feeling of hopelessness as his comparatively tiny presence waded unnoticed through the ancient testament to nature at her finest, and at her least caring.

Syrhahn realised as he strode through the almost non-existent undergrowth that he didn’t know how big the forest was. He didn’t know if it was the size of a continent, whether he would arrive at a beach, or was it a world without sea? Arriving by portal certainly put one at a geographical disadvantage.

His back and stomach muscles started making their presence known as he continued on his path. The more his body screamed, the less his head span. Retaining some semblance of a self-preservation instinct, he started scoring the bark of trees that he passed with one of the knives he carried.

Syrhahn needed to return to clarity. All hope rested on that. If he got himself killed, who would spend the remainder of their days searching for Viskra? Xhisara? He didn’t doubt her resolve, merely her lack of parental bond with the boy she had never met. He knew it was possible he was selling her short, that she could have a plan, that she would replace a way. In the meantime, he had to stay alive, and sane.

Stopping suddenly, he leaned against a tree taller than any building he had ever seen in his life. His side cramped at the abrupt cease in motion, followed shortly by the rest of his muscles, some he hadn’t been aware of their existence until that point.

And then it returned, control of his mind. It just clicked back into place. He slid out of an emotionally overwhelmed state existing in past, present and future, into the peaceful here and now state of mindfullness that he had exited at some point on his journey through fatherhood, and experienced briefly during his rampage through Earth. Syrhahn felt the trees, felt the ground he was walking on. He was there, a man amongst nature, a transient being flowing through time, existing wholly in that moment alone.

Syrhahn took stock of his surroundings as he focused on the pain in his muscles, telling them that pain wasn’t real until it ceased to be real.

There was nothing but trees. No settlements, clearings, rivers, lakes, nothing. The forest appeared to be as vast as it was unnervingly tall, the canopy sailing high on the sea of trees. For the forest to exist there must be water somewhere, but the sky had been pure blue in the clearing, and the ground was bone dry. Syrhahn settled on the assumption that there must be a rainy season.

Slower, but still moving reasonably swiftly, he retraced his steps back to the house as the dusk set in. The clarity of mind that had returned to him still possessed the same goal as the muddled one it superseded. Retrieve Viskra, kill William and anyone that gets in the way.

It was later on that same evening, and Syhahn was standing around a large fire in a very large clearing. They were surrounded by citizens of the planet and allies of Xhisara’s, who had converged for the occasion. Many were not human, and thus it was by far the most multicultural gathering Syrhahn had ever witnessed.

The clearing was encircled with wooden houses, similar to Xhisara’s house. Syrhahn had yet to work out how they obtained food as it certainly was not grown there on the dry, bare earth where little light penetrated through the canopy to the forest floor.

He was stood on the periphery of the convergence of men and women who appeared to be from every corner of the multiverse. He watched the tentacled converse with quadrupeds using handheld translator devices, speaking in strange tongues and pitches.

Then he saw Xhisara, talking animatedly with a skittish looking brown biped with eyes in the back of his smooth, lightly scaled head. Xhisara was looking radiant, the flames reflecting off her even complexion. This was all her, she had arranged a great meeting of folk, lemna’s, from all the places she had made allies over her long years.

Syrhahn knew he owed her an apology, but he also knew it wasn’t required. The paranoid chap locked eyes with him, immediately alerting Xhisara to his presence. She beckoned to him to join them.

The nervous alien spoke to Syrhahn directly without using a translator. “Hello, I am Shkridjnirx,” or something to that effect, Syrhahn wasn’t quite sure on the name as it sounded more like someone vomiting while tensing their larynx than general speech.

“Syrhahn,” he replied genially, bowing. The alien reached out and touched his shoulder, while Xhisara indicated that he do the same. Syrhahn had encountered many cultures for which the greeting involved bodily contact, but was always relieved that his didn’t, on Cxielo and Earth a bow was sufficient. He had never felt comfortable touching another person, excepting his Angel of course.

“Shi,” Xhisara motioned to him, “Hasn’t seen William in a few years but had many problems at his hand.”

“William attempted a rebellion by underground extremists not intent on law and order,” Shi informed Syrhahn with a rasping accent, but understandable. His English was excellent, surprising Syrhahn greatly.

“We overthrew them,” he continued. “But at great cost. Our civilisation has yet to recover.”

His tone and demeanour opposed the skittish effect Syrhahn had observed from behind, and he would have thought he was mistaken if it wasn’t for the man’s right eye occasionally flicking off around the clearing before returning its hypnotic gaze to him.

“Are you the leader of your people?” asked Syrhahn after debating whether asking the question was a good idea, while being distracted by Shi’s giant hazel irises.

“No, no,” he laughed a scraping sound while moving his cheeks in a strange motion. “I am what you call a holy man, I can access the astral plane at will, which is where I met Xhisara and some of these lemnas that surround us.”

At that point they were joined by what appeared to be a triped, although the third limb at the rear also seemed to double as a tail. He was a very dark green colour, which he later explained was due to the vegetation that his race consumed as their main source of nutrition. It darkened their skin, protecting them against the rays from the very hot sun on their planet.

“William did not stand a chance in our planet, we are peaceful people,” the translator in the green man’s hand informed them all in a monotone. “He can only turn man against man if they already have the disposition to do it.”

“Agreed,” said Shi and Xhisara while Syrhahn grunted something he hoped was taken civilly. Excusing himself, he wandered between the guests who were spread out around the fire.

Without warning, Syrhahn was joined by a large furry quadruped, who seemed reticent to speak while being highly interested in him. He was unsure whether it was a sentient being, or someone’s pet.

“Hello,” he greeted the beast, bowing to it. Immediately, it lunged at his head, and started eating his hair.

“Youch!” he cried as someone came and dragged the offending beast away. Feeling to see if there was any hair left, he realised the entire crowd were either laughing or staring.

As he stood there feeling like a complete idiot, a beautiful but tiny humanoid woman with wings approached, smiling warmly. He sighed deeply, shaking his head slowly, while still rubbing what was left of his hair.

“Don’t you worry,” she said in the most beautiful accent he had ever heard. “Those things will eat anything, good thing it didn’t set its heart on your whole head!”

“Wow, now I suddenly feel better,” he muttered sarcastically, which she took literally.

“I like to help people,” her words were like liquid silver tripping off her tongue. In Syrhahn’s experience, if someone seemed too good to be true, they usually were. The only exception was his Angel.

The woman skipped and glided at the same time to join a group of interesting looking people. Gills, tentacles, the works. She beckoned Syrhahn over and he slowly acquiesced. He thought of the hundreds of people he had killed, and how much more comfortable and confident he had felt in the act of eliminating each of them compared to how he felt at that moment.

“You are seeking William,” a translator dictated.

“Yes,” he replied out loud, nodding to affirm this.

“He obliterated my race,” spoke another translator, while its owner made strange guttural sounds. Syrhahn looked up to see a stern looking grey face with an extended proboscis, unlike any he had ever seen. It appeared up to be a prehensile snout, not entirely unlike the wolves of Cxielo, though lacking in hair and moving independently.

“Our planet has been heating due to our sun heating up. It will become a red giant, but not for much time. Our people had moved to the pole that was still cool enough on which to reside. Our people were simple creatures, no technology, only blades and javelins. So when William arrived out of nowhere and claimed he was God, they believed him.”

The grey creature stopped and breathed in deeply before continuing,

“He gave them weapons, told them to fight for him before leading them through portals with his red haired assistant. I was just a boy, and I stayed behind with the unbelievers. I knew that he was not god, and I knew what he was doing was wrong.

“None returned. Those of us that survived were not of a great enough number to procreate successfully. My grandfather was able to travel to the astral plane, where he turned for help. Travellers assisted our small population to come here, to the land of the lost.”

“Are you all still here?” Syrhahn wondered in awe at the destruction of the gentle creature’s people.

“There are few around,” he swept his arm around the gathering to reveal similar visages to his. “But our gene pool is too small to last long, and we have been unable to hybridise with other species.”

He looked so profoundly sad that Syrhahn wanted to kill William just for him at that moment.

“He will suffer,” he assured him. “For both of us.”

Syrhahn then nodded and walked away, as the rage rumbling inside him threatened to take away his cool.

He stood alone by the fire, more out of his depth than he had ever been. Stories of William’s destruction, from planets, universes, everywhere. The psychopath was everywhere and yet nowhere all at once. But he was still only a man. And a man could be killed.