Empyrion I: The Search for Fierra

by Stephen Lawhead

  “What’s all the excitement?” Crocker’s voice boomed in the helmet speakers. “I was taking a nap, so I turned off the radio. When I turned it back on, I heard the fight.” Crocker, his singleton still damp from its washing, came striding up. He took one look at the eel-fish in Pizzle’s hand and whistled into the mike. “Sweet Mother McCree! The catch of the day. Where did you get that … that repulsive reptile?”

  “In a hole in the river,” said Pizzle, and explained the events leading up to the capture of the specimen.

  Crocker looked properly impressed, and Treet guessed he would be a good man to have along on a fishing trip. He took the eel from Pizzle, hefted it, and looked at it more closely. “It won’t win any beauty prizes, but I wonder how it tastes?”

  “You too?” hooted Treet. “I don’t believe you guys.”

  Crocker shrugged. “You get hungry enough and you’ll eat just about anything. I must confess, however, those survival wafers are starting to taste like billiard balls. I, for one, welcome a change.” He held the eel up triumphantly. “Dinner!”

  Pizzle had heaped a small mound of skimmer fuel in a circle of round rocks gathered from the river bank. He had disconnected two wires from the generator of the skimmer and held them poised over the powdery yellow fuel. It had taken him the rest of the afternoon to get the experiment set up, and it was now almost dark. The sun had set in a silvery haze nearly an hour ago, and night was sweeping in from the east.

  “I’m almost ready. Everybody get back; I’m not sure what’s going to happen here.”

  “Any day, Pizzle. It’s getting past my bedtime.”

  “Whose fault is that, Treet? We could have been eating hours ago if you hadn’t inflicted your dumb obsession on me.” Pizzle’s voice was hoarse and ragged.

  “He is something of a monomaniac,” cracked Crocker.

  “Okay, okay—you win. Put your helmets back on if you want to. I thought you’d thank me for getting you out of those plastic prisons.”

  “Oh, no.” Crocker wagged a finger at him. “You don’t weasel out of it that easily. We’ve lived up to our part of the deal. Now it’s your turn.”

  “Will you guys stop sniping at each other? Let’s get on with it. We’re starving!” Yarden sat sideways on the seat of a nearby skimmer, Calin next to her with chin on knees.

  Shortly after Pizzle and Crocker had begun discussing how best to cook the prize catch, Treet struck a bargain with them: he would brave the first taste of alien eel if Pizzle and Crocker would take off their breather packs.

  “What is it with you and these helmets?” Pizzle had demanded.

  “He’s one of those people who can’t be happy unless everyone is exactly like him,” said Crocker. “He can’t stand it that we’re different—it threatens his security to be disagreed with.”

  “Sure, that’s it. I admit it. You’re ever so right. So don’t take them off—we’ll communicate in sign language for the rest of this trip because I find it a pain to go hunting up a helmet every time I want a word with either of you. Your adolescent obstinacy is making it difficult for us to cohere as a single working unit.”

  “Lay it back at our feet,” said Pizzle.

  “He’s right, you two,” replied Yarden, who had returned shortly after the discussion started and had donned a helmet in order to get in on it. “We all need to work together. How can we when two of us are isolated from the others?”

  In the end, with much protest and breast beating, Pizzle and Crocker gave in and the deal was struck. The next hour was spent coaxing them out of their bubbles and holding their hands while they underwent the trauma of taking their first breaths of Empyrion’s astringent atmosphere.

  Pizzle held his breath until, red-faced, eyes bulging, he had to inhale. His screams almost made Treet wish he hadn’t made such a major production out of removing the breathers. Pizzle then rolled on the ground for an hour afterwards whimpering and cursing between clenched teeth.

  For his part, Crocker faced the ordeal stoically, with an air of doomful regret—like a deposed monarch going to the gallows. He removed his own helmet, closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, clutched his throat, and doubled over while the tears streamed from his eyes. He moaned but did not cry out. When the worst was over, he perked up considerably.

  It was a long time before either one of them would speak to Treet.

  “Hit it!” croaked Pizzle now, and Crocker punched the ignition on the skimmer and engaged the generator. As the skimmer’s powerplant revved, Pizzle brought the two bare ends of wire together over the pile of fuel.

  A fizzly shower of sparks streaked out and the fuel erupted with a whoosh, sending up a ball of brilliant blue flame that knocked Pizzle on his rump and singed his eyebrows.

  “You did it!” cried Yarden.

  “Nice work,” said Crocker.

  “How long will this thing burn?” wondered Treet, watching the flames dubiously. Unlike a fire on Earth, the flames of Empyrion were pale blue, like the thin, almost transparent flames of burning alcohol.

  “Long enough to cook dinner,” squeaked Pizzle. “Here, you can do the honors.” He handed Treet a makeshift spit—a tent pole on which chunks of the gutted eel had been speared.

  “Here goes nothing.” Treet grasped the tent pole at midpoint and lowered the eel to the flames. In moments the meat was sizzling merrily, and Treet’s expectations took an unexpected upturn. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad after all.

  He turned the spit continually, careful not to let any portion get too done. The others crept closer to the fire and commented on his cooking technique, wondering aloud what the fish would taste like. When at last Treet announced that it was done, they all leaned forward expectantly, their eyes shining in the light.

  Treet raised the cooked eel to his nose and gave a studied sniff. “Slightly musky aroma,” he announced.

  “Get on with it,” the others replied.

  “Please, you asked my opinion, you’re going to get your money’s worth.” He picked at a piece of flesh. It came off in a long, fibrous strand. “Composition stringy, but not objectionable.”

  “Taste it!” they cried.

  “I’m getting to that.” With a mild grimace Treet brought the strand to his mouth, took it in, chewed thoughtfully, then picked off another piece, chewed that, and swallowed, all the while his expression deadpan.

  “Well?” asked Yarden. “What do those well-schooled taste-buds of yours have to say for themselves?”

  Treet looked imperiously at the ring of faces around the fire. “Smoked olives,” he said.

  “Smoked olives! What kind of answer is that?” complained Pizzle.

  “No,” said Treet chewing again, “it isn’t oily enough. More like mountain oysters, only saltier. Or tongue marinated in a weak Marsala. Or maybe…”

  “Treet!” Crocker interrupted the expert commentary. “Stop playing food analyst and tell us if it’s edible.”

  “Okay. Since I’m not falling on the ground in a coma or retching uncontrollably, yes, it’s edible, I think.” He handed the wobbly skewer across to the pilot. “See what you think.”

  They solemnly passed the eel around, each taking a portion and putting it in their mouths. They chewed and swallowed and peered at one another timidly.

  “Verdict?” Treet inquired.

  “Sort of a cross between chicken and lobster, I’d say,” offered Pizzle.

  “Wrong,” said Crocker. “It’s veal, definitely veal.”

  “I don’t know,” said Yarden. “It has more a poultry flavor— like duck or goose.”

  They all turned to Calin, the only one who had not offered an opinion. She glanced around at the company and said, “I can’t say what it tastes like; I’ve never eaten much meat. But I’d like some more.”

  The eel was divided up and distributed in roughly equal portions. They ate in silence, listening to the smack of lips, the flutter of the ghostly fire and, further off, the riffle of water around the drowned skimmer.

/>   They really were an unlikely party of explorers, thought Treet: a bunged-up transport jockey, a wily executive mindreader, an otherworldy magician frightened of all outdoors, a bookwormish Trend and Impact Analyst Boy Scout, and a knockabout history hack with delusions of grandeur. They were ill-equipped, ill-provisioned, and ill-guided, and right in the middle of an ill-fated mission.

  So much for reality.

  Treet licked his fingers arid flicked the last curved rib bone into the fire. “Not bad, but it positively begs for garlic and herb salt. Now, if we don’t die of some hideous toxic reaction in our sleep, we ought to be on our way tomorrow morning first light.” He stood, brushing bones from his lap. “Good night.”

  FORTY-FOUR

  “Hold it! Not so fast,” said Crocker with a voice that sounded like he’d swallowed live sparrows. “Sit down, Treet. I want to propose a change in our evening activities.”

  Treet sat. Crocker, having caught everyone’s attention, went on to explain quickly. “I had an idea while we were all sitting here that this is a cozy little group. We’ve been through a lot together. And, Yarden, I admit you were right about the breather packs—it is better without them. Now then, since we can all talk to one another like human beings once again—”

  Treet opened his mouth, but Pizzle cut him off before he could speak. “No wisecracks. Let’s listen to what he has to say.”

  “Thanks,” continued Crocker, “the same goes for you. Anyway, it occurred to me that all of us had different experiences while captive in the colony—we’ve each seen a slightly different view of things there. I thought it might be interesting to compare notes, you know, share impressions. Since I spent most of my time flat on my back in a floater, I’d especially like to know what went on with the rest of you.” He looked across the fire. “Okay, Treet, you wanted to say something?”

  “Only that I think it’s a good idea. It would help pass the time.”

  “More than that, we may get a few clues to what we’re up against here. Our survival could depend on it.”

  “I agree,” remarked Pizzle. “And I think Treet should start.”

  “Me?” Treet raised his eyebrows.

  “Sure. Apparently you were the only one free to roam around. The rest of us were drugged most of the time. So, with the exception of Calin here, you know the most about it.”

  “Maybe we should have Calin tell us all she knows,” said Treet.

  Yarden protested quickly. “No. She should speak last—after we’re all through. Otherwise, what she said would color our own perceptions. She’s lived in the colony all her life, and we would begin to see our own experiences through her eyes. I think we need to be as subjective as possible.”

  “Don’t you mean objective?” asked Pizzle.

  “Subjective. Look, we’ve all had different experiences, and we interpreted them in different ways. But it’s the interpretation that matters—the gut-level feelings we got, the conclusions we arrived at, what the events meant to us.”

  “We certainly don’t want our perceptions blunted by reality,” scoffed Pizzle lightly.

  “She has a good point,” replied Treet. “Who can say what the reality of Empyrion is? It’s too big, and we know too little of it and its past to speak with total objectivity. All we know for certain is what we experienced and what those experiences meant to us at the time. Let’s get those out, share them around, and then we can begin to construct the big picture.”

  Yarden nodded at Treet over the campfire. Treet noticed that the fire made blue shadows in her hair and eyes. Her smile puzzled him. What did I do to earn that? he wondered.

  “Agreed?” asked Crocker. “Okay, Treet, the floor is yours.”

  Treet held up his hands. “One more thing I’d like to suggest— that we postpone the start of our campfire stories until tomorrow night.”

  “Aww!” complained Pizzle.

  “No, I mean it. I’d like each of us to spend tonight and tomorrow thinking about what happened and how we want to tell it. That could be important, I think.”

  “Fair enough,” said Crocker. “Everybody agreed? Fine. Tomorrow night we begin.”

  The sun was already up when Treet emerged from his tent. He’d stayed awake a long time after retiring, thinking about how he wanted to tell his story the next night.

  He had finally fallen asleep undecided—there was so much to tell, he didn’t know the best place to begin.

  Pizzle and Crocker were already up and were standing by the shore, looking at the waterlogged skimmer out in the middle of the river. “Any hope?” asked Treet as he joined them.

  Pizzle wagged his head dismally. “Not a chance in a zillion. I say it’s ruined.”

  “We’ve got to find out one way or the other, which means we fish it out in any case.”

  “Maybe we could pull it out with one of the others.”

  “No rope or chain or cable or anything to tie ‘em together. I already thought of that.”

  “Oh.”

  “The way I see it, Calin is our best bet.”

  “You saw what happened yesterday. I think Yarden would have something to say about her using her psi like that again.”

  “We need that vehicle,” Crocker reminded them. “There’s a desert out there somewhere and if we’re going to get across it, we’ve got to have every available resource.”

  “So we ask her,” said Treet.

  “You ask her. Yes, you. She trusts you.”

  “Why do I get the feeling there’s something distasteful about this?”

  “Survival is distasteful to you?”

  “That’s not what I mean, and you know it.”

  “Just get her to do it. We’ll all thank you later,” said Pizzle.

  When Calin and Yarden joined them a little later, Treet took Calin aside and explained the situation to her. He ended by asking, “Will you do it? Crocker’s right; it could make the difference between life and death later on.”

  Calin’s expression was one of pained reluctance. “I—I can’t do it.”

  “What do you mean? You did it yesterday; we all saw you.”

  “I can’t use my psi. Yarden told me that it’s not good for me. It’s dangerous. She made me promise never to use it again.”

  “She did what?”

  “She told me many things I didn’t know about it, and I promised her never to turn to it—to use it is weakness.”

  “Well, maybe just this one more time.”

  “Yarden said there will always be one more time, and then one more. I have to stop and never go back.”

  Treet stomped back to where Pizzle and Crocker waited. “It’s no go. She won’t do it.”

  “You’re joking. Why not?” Crocker demanded.

  “Yarden has given her some story about how using psi is dangerous and unhealthy. She made Calin promise never to use it again.”

  “Oh, great,” sighed Pizzle. “Well, you can kiss one skimmer good-bye and maybe one or two of us as well.”

  “Stop being melodramatic.” Treet frowned at Pizzle.

  “Right. I forgot you volunteered to walk across the burning waste. We have one skimmer to carry the water, and we need the other two for passengers.”

  “You laughed at my idea for hauling water.”

  “I changed my mind.”

  “We’re not getting anywhere this way,” grumped Crocker.

  “Have you tried driving it out?” The men turned to see Yarden watching them, arms crossed, chin thrust out, daring them to laugh at her. Calin stood quietly behind her.

  “Well, no, we haven’t,” replied Crocker diplomatically. “There didn’t seem to be much point.”

  “Why not?” Yarden came to stand with them as they stared out across the water to the skimmer—an island all its own in the slow-moving current.

  “Why not? Uh, tell her why not, Pizzle,” said Crocker.

  Pizzle shot a venomous glance at Crocker. “It’s my belief that the water has damaged the circuitry, or at least sh
orted it out. There’s no point in trying to drive it out of there because it will never in a million years start while it’s sitting in water.”

  “Do you know this for fact?” Yarden turned her eyes on him and bored into him. Treet enjoyed the show.

  “Well, no. But, I—”

  “Why not try it and see? It seems to me that any vehicle made to traverse the desert can probably take a little water.”

  “Yeah,” echoed Treet, “why not try it and see?”

  Pizzle rolled his eyes and harrumphed, but Crocker said, “What have we go to lose? Give it a try.”

  Without a word Pizzle walked into the water and out to the skimmer, climbed onto the seat, and pressed the ignition. He nearly fell off when the machine started up at a touch.

  “Pizzle, you’re a genius!” hooted Treet. “Only trouble is, Yarden is a bigger genius.”

  She smiled acerbically and looked at the men with a smugly superior expression on her face. She and Calin walked upstream, leaving the men alone.

  Pizzle drove the vehicle slowly out of the river, grinding the runners over the rocks. When it finally reached dry land, it gave a sputtering jolt and died. “Okay, so the motors and circuits are sealed. How was I supposed to know that? It would still be a good idea to let it dry out before running it again—just in case.”

  Treet raised his eyes to the sky. The sun was climbing rapidly, spilling light over the hilltops and into the valleys. Another perfect day—like one more perfect pearl added to the string. “Shame to waste the day,” he said. “What shall we do while we wait for that buggy to dry out?”

  Crocker spun toward him. “I was just thinking the same thing. You know what? I think we should go fishing.”

  “Fishing!”

  “I’m serious. That eel last night tasted pretty good, considering. And since none of us expired during the night from any unknown toxic effects, and since there are bound to be more where that one came from, I say we go after them.”

  Pizzle brightened, and Treet saw the computer chips that Pizzle used for a brain light up. “We could catch a million to take with us into the desert! I should have thought of that yesterday.”