Empyrion I: The Search for Fierra (42 page)

Together they waded into the stream and put their backs into rolling the skimmer onto its runners. They succeeded in getting it rocking and eventually managed to tip it right side up once more. Water washed over the sleek nose of the machine and flooded up through the floor to pool around the seats.

“Now what?”

Crocker peered at the craft dubiously. “You think your little magician could take another crack at it?”

“Maybe. But not for a while. She's pretty shaken up,” said Treet. “After a good night's rest, who knows?”

“Sixteen hours in the water won't do this machine any good,” Pizzle pointed out.

“You said the harm was already done. If that's true, sixteen hours won't matter one way or another.”

“Right. So, what are you suggesting?”

“We stay here for the night, let Calin rest, and try it again in the morning if she's willing.”

“What do we do while we're waiting?” wondered Crocker.

“I for one could use a bath. It's not a nutrient solution, but this water feels pretty good on this old skin. We don't know when we'll see water again; I'm suggesting that we make the most of it. Take a bath, do the wash, drink a few liters.”

“We should also rig up some way to carry water. If we're heading into minus eight desert, we're going to need every drop we can take with us.” Pizzle smiled, pleased with himself.

“Okay, Einstein, hop to it.”

Treet explained the program to Yarden and Calin and then hiked downstream a few hundred meters and around a bend so he would be out of sight of the rest of the company. He stripped off his singleton and, after thrashing it furiously in the water for a minute or two, spread it out to dry on the bank. He slipped back into the water and lay down in the sun-warmed shallows, letting the water lap over him, feeling its tingle on his skin.

No, it wasn't a nutrient bath—that most blessed of modern conventions—but it was wet and took the parched, crackly quality out of his hide. He turned his face to the sun, enjoying the warmth on his flesh and the solitude. His thoughts turned immediately to Yarden.

What a tight bundle of contradictions she was. Last night she had shown him a side of herself that she rarely revealed. Probably only a handful of others in her entire life had ever seen the warm, caring, sensitive, romantic?—yes, romantic—woman he had seen. They had talked easily together, comfortable in one another's company. And she had seemed relaxed; that transparent barrier field she maintained between herself and everyone and everything else had faltered for a time, and she had shown herself an amiable companion.

Whatever he had seen last night, there was none of it left this morning, however. Her barrier field was back up; she behaved toward him as if the evening had never happened—as indeed, nothing of consequence
had
taken place between them.

Maybe I'm just moonstruck, thought Treet. Maybe I'm inventing something that was never there in the first place. I've been wrong about these things before—like that time in Lucerne with the Contessa Ghiardelli. Women, even under the best of circumstances, were impossible to read precisely. And this insane trek was far from the best setting for deciphering the mercurial movements of romance. If Yarden was behaving slightly schizoid toward him, who could blame her?

His head heavy with these thoughts, Treet closed his eyes and dozed, listening to the water sounds as the river swept by.

He awoke only moments later, seemingly, but the sun had slipped further down in the sky, and when he looked he discovered his singleton had dried on the bank. Treet got out of the water and stood on the bank with his arms outspread, letting the easy southerly breeze dry him before climbing back into his jumpsuit. His skin felt pliant and supple for the first time in a long time.

What was it Crocker had said about this planet?
By all accounts a paradise …
Paradise, thought Treet. Yes, there was a little of that here: balmy temperatures, soft warm breezes, and the like. But the landscape was peculiarly barren—too desolate, really, to be considered much of an Eden from any biological point of view. Where were the animals? The trees and larger plants? Where were the birds and insects? Even if nothing else could exist in this place, there should be insects.

Yet, there was only the grass—thin-bladed, wiry stuff that spread over the contours of the interminable hills like a shag carpet gone berserk, seamless and unvarying in its limitless turquoise expanse.

Some paradise. No palm trees; not even a parrot. Yet the atmosphere was congenial—once a person got used to it. The first few breaths of Empyrion "air" were undiluted agony—like breathing fire. Most likely the effect was due to the high concentration of oxygen in the atmosphere in combination with other gases which were either not present or were mixed in different proportions on Earth. Whatever caused it, the result was amazingly painful for those first few seconds.

Empyrion, thought Treet, realm of pure elemental fire, home of the gods … I wonder. Someone had shown a strange sense of humor in naming the place.

He sighed and rubbed droplets from the hair of his legs and chest, then pulled his singleton on. He would have preferred underwear, truth be told; wearing a jumpsuit without shorts felt slightly decadent. At least he was out of that foolish, flizzy yos, which was an improvement.

Treet strolled back to where he'd left the others and found only Pizzle, sitting on the ground with a helmet between his knees, working on it with some odd-shaped tool that looked like a cross between a hammer and a dinner fork. Treet tapped him on the helmet. Pizzle glanced up and mouthed a few words which Treet didn't catch.

“What are you doing?” asked Treet after he slipped on a helmet. “Where'd you get that tool thing? And where is everybody?”

“Curious thing, aren't you?” replied Pizzle. “Everybody else wandered away like you to take baths, I guess. I found this 'tool thing' in the skimmer kit. These neck seals are expandable, and I'm trying to see if I can't get them to seal all the way shut so we can carry water in the helmets.”

“Good idea. Do you just come up with this stuff, or do you have to think all the time?”

“A little of both,” replied Pizzle smugly. “Thinking wouldn't hurt any of the rest of you, you know.”

“Let's just say none of us are in any immediate danger of overdosing on it. The way we act, you'd think we were on a tour of Versailles: 'Which way to the palace, my good man?'” He paused and watched Pizzle fiddling with the pliable neck seal, working it back and forth, open and closed. “They won't carry much water,” Treet observed.

“About five or six liters, I figure. Maybe more. I intend taking out all the innards.”

“Do you intend taking off your helmet too?” Treet jibed.

“I've been thinking about that. We really should have somebody inside a helmet so in case we come up against anything really unexpected, at least one of us could still function. I don't mind wearing it, so I volunteer.”

“You don't mind wearing it!” Treet brayed. “Pizzy, my friend, you were the biggest baby of all when it came time to put them on. I distinctly remember you wimping about it. Crocker had to order you into it as I recall.”

“I've gotten used to it,” sniffed Pizzle.

“You'd get used to breathing this air too, if you'd give it a try.”

“There could be wind-borne viruses or bacteria lethal to human beings. Something could eat away at our respiratory systems, and we'd never know it until we awaken one morning hacking up blood clots big as your fist.”

“Yeah, and giant flesh-eating turtles could swoop down from the sky on leather wings with snapping jaws to gobble us up for hors d'oeuvres, too. In the meantime, I'll take my chances. Sometimes you just have to risk it or you're not really alive.”

“You think what we're doing isn't risky enough?” Pizzle whined. “Life is plenty risky the way it is; I don't feel the slightest impulse toward increasing the stakes.” He got to his feet and took up the helmet. “Now let's see if it works.”

Treet watched his slope-shouldered companion waddle into the river, take the helmet, and carefully sink it into the water. He brought it out a few seconds later, made some kind of adjustment with his funny tool, and tipped it over. The water stayed in for the most part, although it dripped in a steady stream from the gathered seal.

“I think with a few more adjustments we'll be okay.” He grinned at his own cleverness. “The main thing is it works.”

“I still don't think it's enough water.”

“Let's hear your idea, smart guy,” huffed Pizzle.

“How about one of the tents? They're airtight, which means they're probably watertight, too, doesn't it? One of those would hold a lot of water.”

“We'd take turns carrying it on our backs, I suppose. Do you have any idea how much a tent full of water would weigh?”

“No. Who cares? We could use one of the skimmers to haul it—have our own personal movable waterhole.”

“Impossible,” snorted Pizzle, striding toward the bank.

“Why—because
I
thought of it first?”

“No. The weight of a tank that size would—Hey!” Pizzle dropped the helmet and flung out his arms as he sank into the river. He disappeared with a plunk.

Treet sprang forward. “Pizzle!”

Pizzle's helmet broke the surface before Treet reached the water's edge. Pizzle's arms thrashed the water into a froth as he screamed into his helmet mike. “Help! It's got me! Something's got me!” He bucked and whirled as if fending off invisible sharks.

Treet waded in, looking for signs of whatever it was that had Pizzle in its grasp. Pizzle screamed and disappeared under the water once more.

“Pizzle, I'll get you out,” shouted Treet, sloshing toward the spot where his friend had gone down. There were dark circles indicating holes in the river bottom all around the area and Treet stepped carefully around them. Just as he reached the place where he'd last seen Pizzle's helmet, the water erupted in a jet and Pizzle came flying up with a silver something attached to his chest. His hands clutched at it as he tried to tear it off.

Treet grabbed Pizzle by the arm and jerked him forward, his only thought being to get back on dry land. The thing in Pizzle's arms wriggled and flapped ferociously as Treet propelled them all to shore. Once there, he heaved Pizzle out and fell on the thing that had attacked him.

“Wait! No, wait!” hollered Pizzle, throwing up his hands. “Don't hurt it!”

“What!” Treet stopped.

“Wait,” repeated Pizzle, throwing the thing off and rolling over. “Let's see what it is.”

“I thought you were being killed.”

“I was—at first. But I caught it,” said Pizzle. “Look!”

Before them lay a long, floppy eel-like creature with a flat, shovel-shaped head which ended in a wide, fringed mouth. Two bulbous pink eyes on top of the head stared at them as the fish writhed on the bank. It was, for all practical purposes, transparent. Its small brain, veins, muscle tissue, and internal organs could be seen all too clearly beneath its smooth, silvery skin. Its shape was reminiscent of an overfed torpedo. Two sets of fingery protrusions flexed on either side of its loathsome head, and it emitted a greasy grunt—
reet, reet, reet
—as it jerked its finless body around into the grass.

“It's ugly!” said Treet. “Did it bite you?”

“I don't think so.” Pizzle leaned forward on his hands and knees to study the creature more closely. “Just think—our first alien lifeform.”

“And it had to be an eel.” Treet grimaced. “Careful, don't get too close. It might take another nip at you.”

“Look at that soft mouth—it can't have any serious teeth.”

“Serious teeth or not, I wouldn't get too close. Maybe it squirts hydrochloric acid.”

“This reminds me of
Six Trillion Tomorrows,
where these guys find this octopus thing in a crater on this asteroid flying around this binary star.”

“What did they do?”

“Who?”

“The guys in the book with this octopus.”

“They ate it.”

“Ate it?” Treet looked at the pulpy thing quivering at his feet—it seemed to be expiring. “Are you actually suggesting we eat this … this ghastly little monster?”

“I wasn't, but it's not a bad idea. We're going to be running out of food soon. So far I haven't seen anything else around here that looks like proteins.”

“Gack! I'd rather eat the tent poles.”

“Relax. Let's skin it and cook it and see how it tastes. It might be a rare delicacy.”

“And it might send us screaming into the night.”

“I thought you were a gourmet.”

“You don't get to be a gourmet by eating whatever slithers out from under just any old rock.”

“How about snails?”

“Escargot? That's different.”

Pizzle shrugged and picked up the fish by its pudgy tail. It gave a weak flip and hung still. It was about seventy centimeters long and weighed, by Pizzle's estimation, between four and six kilograms. “We could make a fire using some of the solid fuel from the skimmers.”

“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?”