CHAPTER 35
Love is patient, love is
kind, and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act
unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into
account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices
with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things,
endures all things.
- 1 Corinthians 13:4-7
Sarwin was having a fitful dream, in which
human soldiers chased him through endless corridors, when the incessant beeping
of his communication panel woke him. He
looked out the view port and saw an asteroid with six saucers ringed around
it. There was a empty place in the ring
and the autopilot was moving his ship was heading directly for it.
A few hours earlier, after he had
escaped the humans, Sarwin was able to send a radio message to his waiting
colleagues. Because they were waiting
on the opposite side of the sun from the World, he was not able to send a
message to them until his course had taken him to a point where the star no
longer blocked his signals.
Because of the great distance still
between him and his friends, instantaneous back and forth communication was not
yet possible. Thus, Sarwin sent a radio
message on ahead telling them he was en route and that he would be with them in
about five hours. At the speed of
light, he knew his message would get to them in only a few minutes. He told them to configure the jump for seven
ships and to start the leap procedure, so that they could jump as soon as he
arrived. He had then set the ship's
computer to mind the journey to the jump point and then he closed his eyes in
exhaustion. For a most of the ensuing
voyage, Sarwin had slept restlessly.
With a brainwave command, he turned
the monitor on and was relieved to see Kleesic's face appear on his screen.
"Glad you could make it, my
friend," Kleesic said, "We have the jump configured per your instructions
and the countdown has started. We've
configured the jump for seven ships.
The extra ship will make this jump much less risky. Let's see what we can do about getting our
home back."
"Calculate the jump to arrive
in the past one week before we arrived the first time," ordered Sarwin,
"That should give us a cushion in case we're off a day or two."
"Will do," replied
Kleesic.
Sarwin smiled at his friend, but Kleesic's
expression turned solemn.
"Did you find Siverelle?"
he asked.
Sarwin nodded. "I was too late," he replied, his
voice heavy with regret.
"I'm sorry, Sarwin," said
Kleesic, "Don't worry. We'll make
this right again. All will be as it
was. You will see her again."
Sarwin nodded once more. "I hope so, my friend."
"We've got everything under
control here," continued Kleesic, "Give us control of your ship's
navigation computer and we'll take it from here. You just relax and take it easy.
We should reach chronoleap threshold in about five minutes."
"Okay, will do," replied
Sarwin, and with a brainwave command to the navigation panel, he passed control
of his saucer over to his friend.
"I'll see you on the other
side," said Kleesic, and his image vanished from the screen.
Sarwin sat back in is chair and
relaxed a little. Out the view port, he
could see that his ship was settling into its assigned plot in the ring of
saucers that encircled the asteroid. An
uneasy feeling came over him as he looked at the all too familiar scene.
"Mass inversion field engaged," announced the
computer dryly, "Calibration has commenced. Chronoleap threshold in five minutes."
"Discontinue
audio updates," commanded Sarwin, "Reengage only for emergency
situation." He knew the drill and wanted a little peace and quiet
now.
Sarwin
sighed and his thoughts drifted
back to Siverelle, as they most often did.
It troubled him that he was not able to
bring her body back with him, but it was probably for the best. Would he want her to see her own
corpse? The morbid thought prompted a
number of questions in his mind. What
would he tell her when he saw her again?
Should he tell her what he had seen?
About what had happened to her in this other, twisted reality? He didn't know. Unconsciously, he fingered the wedding locket dangling at his
neck. In doing so, he noticed that it
was glowing and he remembered
Siverelle's locket. He had found it in
the lab. He reached into his satchel,
pulled out the dimly lit amulet and regarded it curiously. Should he show this to her when he met her
again? These were questions no one
should have to contemplate.
Sarwin decided to recharge the almost dead
charm. Once it had run out of power
completely, any of the data stored inside would be lost forever. He knew it was mostly only pictures of him
their children, probably the same images he carried in his own locket, but this
amulet and its data were special to him, because it had belonged to his wife,
so he wanted to preserve it. He would
decide what to do with it later.
Sarwin placed the amulet in a recharging
bin and ordered the computer to charge the locket. Then he sat back and looked out at the stars again. After a few moments, the computer spoke up.
"Recharge complete. There is an urgent message for Sarwin Kliat Aria."
"What?" said the startled saurian,
"Urgent message from who?"
"Author unknown."
"Well, where is it coming
from?" asked Sarwin.
"Message is located on the data
storage device currently in the recharging bin," answered the computer.
Siverelle's locket! "Play the message," he commanded.
A vertical cloud of
three-dimensional static appeared in the cabin before Sarwin. It looked like a figure, but it was
impossible to tell of what.
"Can you clear that up?"
he asked the computer.
"Recording is substantially
degraded," replied the computer, "Attempting to compensate."
The static cloud coalesced into a
form that Sarwin recognized instantly.
A jerky, translucent image of his wife stood before him. She seemed to be wearing some sort of robe that
was not of saurian design. It was
probably made by humans. The image
began to speak, its words marred by static, but still understandable.
"Sarwin, my love," she
began, "If you are seeing this message, it means two things; that you have
at last come to rescue me, as I never lost faith you would, but that you were
also too late and I am dead."
Without thinking, Sarwin reached out
to touch the image, but his hand could grasp only air.
"Siverelle...," he
whispered, "I'm so sorry."
The recording continued, not hearing his words.
"I just want you to know that I
love you Sarwin and that I do not blame you for what happened to me, or to our
world. You are probably already aware
of what we have done, so long in the past, and the consequences it has brought
upon the World in the present. I don't
know if you are able to undo this inadvertent fate, but I know you will be
trying. Regardless of the outcome, take
solace in the fact that life goes on. I
have studied my captors here at length and they are not a retched people. No more so than our own kind, anyway. Their history, which has usurped our own, is
just as rich and rewarding as the deeds and destinies of beloved saurian
heroes. Like us, they struggle eternally
with good and evil, and with questions of things bigger than themselves. Do not hate them, Sarwin, no matter what
they do to me, for they are the children of our misdeeds."
Sarwin's heart felt heavy. She seemed so real, despite the static, like
he could reach out and embrace her. The
recording continued.
"If you are unable to reset
history, do not worry about me, my love.
I know paradise can survive a change of hands of the mortal soil and no
matter who rules the World, I will sit at the table of the goddess when I am
relived of my body. I know you do not
believe such, but I am brought great comfort by this and I do not fear my
fate. My poor Sarwin... You worked so hard to discredit the promise
of paradise; but in so trying, you only fractured it. And a shard of heaven was cast from the sky, which drove a dark
dervish through the winnow of genesis.
When the chaff finally settled, we were no more. Indeed, we had never been."
"Siverelle..." sighed her
husband, quietly.
"But regardless of the fate of
our World... of our people... of our children... my feelings for you will never
fade. No stray rock from above can
erase our love, my husband. No matter
what, remember that I am waiting for you... somewhere. Perhaps in some other mortal life, lost in
another time. Perhaps in some astral
afterlife, that transcends the very scope of time. We shall see each other again, I have no doubt. I love you, Sarwin."
His wife's image dissolved again
into a cloud of static, before disappearing completely. Sarwin held his head in his hands and sobbed
quietly. Despite her forgiveness, the
guilt over what he had done bore down on him like the weight of the World. He had never felt such pain in all his life.
"I will undo what I did,
Siverelle," he said quietly aloud to the spot where she had been,
"You are right, we will be together again. I will see to it. I
swear."
"Over my dead body."
Sarwin jumped in surprise at the strange voice, which he realized came through his translator. He had never switched it off after last talking with Renoldson! He spun around in his chair and saw he was not alone in the saucer. Standing before the open door of a large storage locker, in which it had been hiding, was a human far uglier than any he'd seen thus far. It was hairy. It was horribly scarred. One of its arms was a crudely bandaged stump. With its one good hand, it pointed at Sarwin what looked to be a primitive firearm.
"You must be Sarwin," it
continued, in mock politeness, "Word around town is that you're about to
destroy my planet. You'll understand if
I have a little problem with that, won't you?"
Wearing a wicked smirk, it pulled
back on the hammer of its archaic but deadly weapon and trained it square at
Sarwin's head.