The Search for Fierra

by Lawhead, Steve

• ISBN13: 9780310205098
• ISBN10: 0310205093
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1996-06-01
• Publisher: Zondervan

Summary

Orion Treet, an itinerant and often-unemployed writer, is abducted at gunpoint. Then he is offered eight million dollars and the adventure of a lifetime. The mission? To observe and chronicle the growth of a new extraterrestrial colony: Empyrion. Arriving on the planet Fierra, Treet discovers a civilization in decline, fragmented by millennia of mistrust and hatred. To survive, he and his odd assortment of companions must unscramble the mysteries around them . . . before time runs out for the settlement. The Empyrion novels are among Lawhead's most captivating accomplishments of storytelling and adventure -- the best there is in science fiction. The Search for Fierra won the Campus Life Editor's Choice Award. Look for Empyrion II: The Siege of Dome, at your local bookstore.

Excerpts

OneThe body staring up through the translucent green of the nutrient bath might have been dead. It floated beneath the surface, open-eyed, its face becalmed, a snaking nimbus of dark hair spreading like a black halo: a saint embalmed in emerald amber.Presently a small bubble formed on the rim of one nostril, puffed up bigger, and broke free, spiraling to the surface. Plick! This was followed by another slightly larger bubble, which also spun up to the surface of the bath, drifted momentarily, and burst. Plick!A whole fountain of bubbles erupted and boiled up, and in the center, rising with them, the head of Orion Tiberias Treet, sputtering and inhaling great draughts of air, like a whale breeching after a long nap on the ocean floor.Two broad hands came up, dashing liquid from two dark eyes, pushing ropy strands of hair aside. Treet snatched up a watch from the rim of the white marble bath and held it before his face. “Six minutes!” he shouted triumphantly. “A new record.”“I’m impressed.”Treet glanced up quickly and saw a stranger sitting on the edge of the bath opposite him. The stranger had a needle gun aimed at his throat, and, contrary to his word, did not seem at all impressed with the new submergence record. Besides himself and the gunman, there was not another person in the public bath.“What do you want?” Treet asked, the skin at his throat tingling beneath the aim of the needle gun.“I have what I want: you,” replied the gunman. Cool menace clipped his words efficiently. “Get out of the soup and get dressed.”Orion Treet glared dully at the slim needle gun in his abductor’s hand as he rose slowly from the bath, took up the fluffy white bath towel the attendant had given him upon entering, and began drying his limbs and torso with exaggerated care in order to give himself a moment to think. By the time he was fully dressed he had concluded that it was probably no use trying to talk his way out of whatever it was this stranger with the gun wanted to do with him he looked like a man who was used to having his way, and was not overly shy about how he got it.“You have been a problem, Treet,” the man was saying. “I don’t like problems. In my line of work, problems cost me money, and you’ve cost me plenty. It’s over now, so you might as well relax and put that brain of yours in neutral for a while. I don’t want you taxing yourself over how to get away this time. Just stand easy, do as you’re told, and you’ll likely live that much longer. You like living, don’t you, Treet?”Treet had to admit that he did indeed like living; it was, after all, one of the things that made life so worthwhile. But he did not share this observation with the man training the needle gun on his jugular. Instead, he just glared and tried to look dutifully irritated.The man took a short step closer. The gun did not waver. “I almost had you in Cairo, and then again in Addis Ababa, Cologne, Zurich, Salzburg, Milan, Tokyo, and San Francisco. I’ve got to hand it to you, you’re a shrewdy. I don’t know when I’ve enjoyed myself more, but it’s over.”“As long as it’s over,” replied Treet evenly, “maybe you won’t mind telling me why you’ve been trailing me all this time. What do you want?” He had known since Zurich that he was being followed, but was unsure why, though several possibilities sprang to mind. Still, he felt entitled to an explanation. Wasn’t that a victim’s prerogative?“I don’t mind telling you at all, scumbag. There are some people who want to talk to you. They seem quite anxious, in fact. Personally I don’t give a rat’s hind end. I’d just as soon drop you where you stand.”At least this meant the man would not kill him outright. But who were the people so desperate for conversation? Treet ran down a list of former employers, angry innkeepers, outraged restaurateurs, and offended debtors of various sorts, but the effort proved futile. He could not come up with anyone who would go to this amount of trouble to reach him. “So?”“So, bright boy, we lockstep it to the nearest teleterm. I’m going to report in. Keep your hands where I can see them; turn around slowly and move. Outside there’s a terminal directly to the right. If you so much as deviate one millimeter from the course, you’re dead. Understand?”Treet understood. They turned and marched from the spa and out into the main corridor of Houston International Skyport. Travelers, not a few of them free-state refugees by the tattered look of them, jammed hip to thigh, swept along the moving walkway before them, and Treet entertained the notion of jumping on the conveyor and worming himself into the crowd a trick he had used in Salzburg. He started to turn his head, but felt the needle gun’s sharp nose in the small of his back.“Try it, slime ball. Let’s see how you look with a cyanide tattoo.” The voice behind him was disconcertingly close.“Don’t get your hopes up.” Treet saw the triangular sign with the distinctive blue lightning bolt on a white oval screen and stopped in front of the booth. Passengers sliding by on the walkway ignored the two men as they squeezed into the booth together.The gunman jammed a card into the slot above the keypad, and the screen flicked on. A line of blue numbers appeared in the upper right hand corner of the oval screen. Treet watched as his captor entered an alphanumeric code; the screen blanked. Instantly another code came up in the center of the screen. With one hand the man typed in two words: GOT HIM.

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Excerpted from The Search for Fierra by Stephen R. Lawhead
All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.