The Mirrorverse
Chapter 47

Syrhahn

Floating had become painful as the ship jarred and slammed into Syrhahn’s inert form, so he strapped himself into his chair. The primitive shields were failing, and he could see debris from the ship floating off.

We’re sitting ducks, he thought miserably. Everyone on this ship is going to die so that William can get to Xhisara and her merry band of interesting creatures without having to go through me.

It was like time slowed down as he wondered about his centre of the universe theory, that he was responsible for the ship coming under attack. But Syrhahn didn’t believe in co-incidences, and his intuitions were normally very good. His gut wrenched at the last thought, as if he had listened to it, hundreds of beings wouldn’t be in mortal danger.

Pinned to the seat by the comprehensive seat fastening system, presumably for the fabled bumpy landing that they were never going to experience; Syrhahn pondered on death.

In his youth, Syrhahn had always assumed he would die in a fight, that he would make a mistake or get out manoeuvred. It only had to happen once. In his life on Cxielo, he thought he would die of old age surrounded by grandchildren. Once he left Cxielo, his life mattered little when Viskra’s was on the line. And now that the end had come, he was left begging for more, to accomplish his mission of replaceing Viskra, killing William and to protect the innocent beings he had met along the way.

Syrhahn contemplated his final moments while the ship started to come apart and the air became hard to breathe, and he knew there was only one thing he actually regretted, and that was getting on the ship. He knew better but did it anyway. At least when he chose Cxielo to bring up his son, he did it for the right reasons, for the sole benefit of his tiny baby.

Eyes closed in meditation, so that his last breath would be as peaceful as possible, Syrhahn waited to pass into darkness. Hearing Xhisara’s voice, he thought about how much he was going to miss her, as she had been his rock since the moment she had saved his life.

I must be passing over now, he thought as he could hear Xhisara loud and clear. Then, someone was shaking him, calling his name.

Half opening his eyes warily, Syrhahn was unsure of what he was going to see, of whether he was ready to see it. The last thing that he expected was to see Xhisara bent over him against the backdrop of the ship.

“Am I dead?” he asked her, hoping she wasn’t dead too, and believing that if she was it was all his fault.

“Far from it, we caught you just in time,” Xhisara was smiling broadly as he tried to sit up but was restrained by the seat restraints.

Syrhahn looked around as Xhisara unclipped him, noticing sunshine outside the window.

“What on Cxielo has happened here?” he wondered in astonishment at the sudden change in his fate.

“A new friend gave us a lift,” Xhisara grinned cryptically. “Come on, we need to get everyone off the ship.”

Syrhahn followed his friend out into the main deck where all the people were filing out the doorway and down the ramp to the rock the ship was sat on, atop a giant canyon.

The bronze coloured rock that he walked out onto was one of the most wonderful things he had ever seen, and the most welcome. He had escaped death again thanks to his dearest Xhisara.

All the folk from the standard class were milling around, each unable to believe their eyes. Some were bent down, touching the ground to make sure it was real. Syrhahn knew exactly how they felt.

“Right,” called out Xhisara, and everyone turned to look. “We need to get you all to where you are going, so could you group yourselves...” she stopped as Syrhahn cut her off.

“They don’t speak English,” he interrupted, as Xhisara laughed, held up one finger and vanished.

Everyone gasped and moved back from the spot where she had been, as if it were perfectly normal to move a whole ship, but not a person.

Xhisara reappeared with a translation device, which the gathered people had most certainly seen before as Syrhahn had used one on their planet.

She repeated her request, which was to sort themselves into groups for their final destination, which was null and void since they all appeared to be terminating their journey at Seig.

“Wait here a minute and we’ll get you to Seig,” Xhisara instructed. After turning off the translator, she turned to Syrhahn,

“Now we’ve just got to work out how to get there,” she confided. “I’ve got people on it now.”

“I thought you couldn’t go where you haven’t been,” said Syrhahn, realising that it was the grey snouted folk who had told him that.

“You can replace anywhere from within the astral plane,” Xhisara eyed him apologetically. “I thought you knew that, I’m sorry.”

“So what’s happening to them? How is April, what about all the people on your world, I figured William knew where you were, and he sent the spies to kill me accidentally.” Syrhahn thought of the relief to be telling Xhisara that in this life.

“We have evacuated to a world we should be safe in for a while. Syrhahn, I’d like you to meet Maya,” Xhisara put her arm out towards the young woman, who stood over two feet shorter than Xhisara, her face level with the taller woman’s navel.

“Heya,” said Maya, a little shyly, feeling like a midget.

“Hi,” greeted Syrhahn, thinking how much Viskra would have loved this beautiful tiny dark haired girl. “Was it you that moved the ship?”

“A joint effort I think,” she smiled a smile that spread to her eyes and made them sparkle, something not missed by Syrhahn, making his heart contract even harder at the loss of his son.

His musings were interrupted by the arrival of the green triped man he met around the fire on Holy World. However, the much higher pitched voice indicated it was a female. It was hard to tell the aliens apart.

Once Xhisara had reactivated the translator, the green person told them that she had located Seig and could now take them there, if they were willing to step through a portal.

“Why don’t you take me to Seig, then I can come back and take them without a portal. It might be a lot less hassle,” Maya interjected, making a very good point. Plus Syrhahn really wanted to see how she was going to do it.

The green lady looked at Xhisara, who nodded her acquiescence. Maya and the green lady stepped through a portal Syrhahn could not see and vanished, reappearing only seconds later.

“Okay, so who am I taking?” asked Maya, looking a little apprehensive.

“Can you do them all in one go?” Xhisara replied. “It would be good practice for you.”

Maya nodded as she stared at the expansive group of over fifty people stood around the wrecked ship.

“But what if it’s different when I don’t know each one?” Maya asked Xhisara.

“Just try,” and bowed her head in her characteristically solemn ‘no more questions’ pose.

“Here goes,” and with that, their surroundings vanished and they found themselves standing in a field.

“Are you sure we were supposed to come too?” Syrhahn wondered as Maya’s cheeks flushed.

“Well done,” praised Xhisara, looking around at the large body of people. “Wait one moment.”

And she was gone, presumably to check the entire herd had arrived. The people were disorientated, though seemed to be taking it better than their first teleportation. At least this time they weren’t about to die.

Once back, Xhisara spoke to the crowd of people, telling them that they were on Seig and safe to go to their destinations. A number of people came up to Xhisara and Maya, thanking them for saving them, however it was that they had managed it. Others nodded or bowed, slipping away from the group in the direction of the city boundaries which were visible not far away.

After receiving their thanks, Maya and Xhisara turned to Syrhahn and the green lady, before portalling back to the ship. Maya vanished, reappearing moments later.

“So how come you can move other people too?” Syrhahn asked Maya, not wanting to just blunder in and ask her if she was pregnant. It was very tactful for him.

They were sitting with their legs dangling over the edge of the sheer drop down into the canyon. Syrhahn had never been great with heights, but he felt totally safe with the three ladies who were his company. He was sure they could grab him half way down if he fell, which gave him more confidence than he would normally have.

Maya and Xhisara had returned the ship into space so it didn’t clutter up the awesome landscape.

“I don’t know, since I was given the gift I’ve had a scary amount of control over it. Before, when it was stolen and forced upon me it was a bit haphazard to say the least. But after it became mine, I just, you know, stopped opening portals,” Maya told Syrhahn earnestly whilst he looked sideways at Xhisara who shook her head minutely to tell him to shut up. Clearly they hadn’t tackled the baby thing yet then. The pretty girl was going to be in for a surprise.

Syrhahn thought again of Viskra and him never fathering a child, of what William had taken away from him.

From then, they sat in silence, admiring the most stunning scenery Syrhahn and Maya had ever seen. They watched the patterns in the rocks change colour in the late afternoon sun, accompanied by people from different universes and planets. Syrhahn began to feel at peace, becoming positive for what the future held for him and his son. Because if those women could teleport a spaceship, what else could they achieve when they put their minds to it?