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Bill, the Galactic Hero on the Planet of The Hippies From Hell

HARRY HARRISON

DAVID BISCHOFF

Bill, the Galactic Hero on the Planet of the Hippies From

Hell

VGSF

Special thanks to Nat Sobel, Henry Morrison, Chris Miller, David Keller and John Betancourt

First published in Great Britain 1992

by Victor Gollancz Ltd

First VGSF edition published 1993

Second impression July 1995

published by Victor Gollancz

An imprint of the Cassell Group

Wellington House, 125 Strand, London WC2R OBB

Cover art by Mark Pacella

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN 0 575 05526 X

Printed and bound in Great Britain

by Cox & Wyman Ltd, Reading, Berks

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold,

hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior consent in any other form of binding or

cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition

being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

For John De Chancie

CHAPTER 1

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Bill, the Galactic Hero on the Planet of The Hippies From Hell

The poster on the wall of the galactic Bureau of Investigation reception office depicted a slavering seven-

foot-tall lizardoid creature with a human arm protruding repulsively from its fanged jaws. The Chinger

was a particularly obnoxious specimen of its breed, with razor-sharp scales gleaming with sadistic

highlights, its claws like sharpened sickles. The hideous creature's eyes glowed with satanic evil, while

saliva mixed with human blood trickled down its green body to its muscle-bulging legs and tail, wrapped

modestly in chartreuse and lightning-silver Danskins. Fierce, hypnotic evil glimmered in the diamond-

facet eyes. The thing looked like the revolting result of a misprinted copy of AC/DC sado-maso Comix,

thought Sergeant Bill of Phigerinadon II. Bill much preferred Furville Comix.

KILL A CHINGER FOR KRISHNA! declared the paisley three-dimensional letters glowing and

revolving like psychedelic barbershop posts.

Bill stared at the thing thoughtfully, while tooth-picking from around his fangs the repulsive remains of

this morning's sludge-in-a-bowl the galley had squeezed out to him.

"Pretty impressive, huh?" said the man behind the desk. A flickering holoslab labeled him as HERVIL

SKIMMILQUETOAST. "That's the new design from the Emperor's Own Office of Accurate and Efficient

Information." The guy was typical desk jockey meat, short, stupid and inefficient, with some sort of birth

defect that made him look like a crocodile: green skin, bumps, pointy teeth and all. There were a lot of

mutants in the galaxy, and as long as there was radiation, botched genetic gene-splicing and permits for

Hollywoodworld producers to reproduce even more, there always would be. But that was okay, since you

had to have people to run the Galactic Bureaucracy, and every other able-bodied son-of-a-bitch got

shanghaied into the Troopers and paid the Emperor's credit debit. As long as they had a brain somewhere

behind their alien eyes, could hunt and peck on their computer terminal and didn't short out

communications wiring with their drool, they were prime paper-pusher material. "They say they used a

real Chinger for photo-reference. Real arm, too. Bit of a scandal when it got et and they couldn't return it

to the guy who loaned it — but that goes to show you. You can't trust a Chinger as far as you can blow

them ... I mean snow them...." He took his clawed finger out of a cavernous nostril, examined it

unhappily, then pushed it back for a good root around. "Hmmm. Just what do I mean?"

There was just one thing that seemed to be normal about this specimen from the Sears and Geekbuck

catalog, observed Bill. And he leaned over the desk, giving his best Galactic-Trooper-makes-nice-nice

grin. "Nice foot you got there, greeny," said Bill.

"Huh?" The bureaucrat ceased his nostril drilling, leaned forward in his chair, and blinked hard.

"I said, nice foot. Or I guess it would be, if you didn't have it in that shoe. Mind if I have a look?"

"Uhm ... Mr. Trooper..."

"The name's Bill, buddy. Trooper Bill." Bill had to stop himself from grabbing the man by the throat and

throttling him in a friendly drill instructor/recruiter love grip. This wasn't boot camp, but — and it was

Bill's favorite game — a strange, warped variation on "Footsie."

"Trooper Bill. Did I hear you correctly? You want to look at my foot."

"Yeah. I got this thing for feet. Call it a podiatry problem. Pedophilia, the shrink called it. And I got a

little foot problem, too. It's irresistible — my little toe begins to itch — I can't control myself — arrgh!"

With no further ado, Bill lifted his leg up, plopped a naked foot upon the saurian bureaucrat's desk and

scratched enthusiastically at his toe. And what a foot! It had twelve toes, gold toenails — and the skin was

Royal Stuart tartan.

The guy's eyes bugged impressively, his jaw sagged — then snapped shut with an impressive clattering of

fangs.

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"Jumpin' Jupiter Juice! That's some foot. Might I be so presumptuous as to ask — what happened?"

"I'll tell you what happened. Completely by accident I shot the original one off on a planet called Veniola,

that's what happened." He sniffed in self-pitying memory. "That's not easy to do, you know."

"But ... but ... if I may be so bold to ask —" the guy had an annoying whine to his voice, kind of like the

sound a whoopee cushion makes on its last wheeze — "why?"

"Simple. It was the only way they'd let me off the planet. They had to ship me out because they were short

of replacement feet. Eventually they just gave me a new foot and put me back on duty. But at least it was

on a different planet."

"That foot?" said Herv.

"Not this one, idiot, another one. I've had so many feet I should be a mile by now. I've had so many feet I

feel like a podiatrist's lab. I've had so many feet —"

The guy got a weird, frightened look on his face. "Oh, I get it," he simpered. "I've heard about you

Troopers, locked up on those dreadnoughts for years without female companionship. Something has to

snap — and often does, that's what I heard. So you've got this thing for feet."

Bill leaned over the desk with a menacing scowl. "Watch it, bowb. You calling me a prevert?"

"No, no, Trooper Bill," whinnied the clerk, recoiling, suddenly aware of those rolling trapezius, deltoid

and triceps that bulged from Bill's frame like an inflated scuba suit. "Look, it's just not normal for me to,

uh, show summoned agents my foot!" The guy made a conciliatory grin, but Bill was going to go for his

throat anyway. He was interrupted by a squawk over the loudspeaker.

"Skimmilquetoast! Is that the Trooper I sent for who is bellowing out his brains out there?"

"Yes sir," said Herv, looking with trepidation up at Bill.

"Just a peek, huh? I promise I won't touch it!"

"What are you two doing out there, playing 'Doctor'? Send the sphincter-muscle in!" The intercom

clicked off with a burst of static.

"C'mon, be a pal," said Bill. "I'll give you a cred-chit! I've got some Betelgeuse love beads with lots of

juice. They're yours! How about a —"

"No. No, nothing. Here, if that's all you want, just look and then get the hell into the office before I lose

my stupid job!" The clerk quickly took off his shoe and then his sock. He held up his pale green foot for

Bill to see.

Bill sighed.

It was the most exquisite foot that Bill had ever seen.

From well-formed heels to perfect arches down to pedicured toenails painted pink, it looked like a

Michelangelo sculpture or a Raphael painting of an angel. Albeit green. Bill's foot (on the other hand, or

other foot) looked like garbage can modern.

"Nice foot," said Bill pleasantly. "Thanks."

"But what about your other one. Isn't that normal?"

Bill shook his head. "Flat. Broken toes. Corns on the cob. Usual Trooper's foot. You must be a very proud

man. Cherish your foot, my friend." He wiped back a tear. "Well, I'd better see what this bowbhead

wants."

Bill squared his shoulders and marched into the main office of J. Edgar Insufledor, deputy director of Anti-

Chinger and Commupop Menace Operations of the GBI.

As soon as he marched in, he found himself directly in the sights of a Mark Thousand and Two Howitzer

Laser Cannon. This piece of artillery sprouted from the Deputy Director's desk, which was made of

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riveted gray steel.

"Halt! Or be blown apart!"

Bill halted. He raised his hands in the time-honored signal for surrender, lack of weapons and requesting

to go to the little boy's room. "It's just me. Trooper Bill. Loyal Trooper. Reporting as requested. Sir!"

"You sure you're not a Chinger spy!" growled the voice. Bill could see a grizzled crewcut grizzling up

from behind the armorclad desk.

"No sir! Do I look green and seven feet tall, sir?" Bill knew full well from far too many personal

experiences that far from being seven feet tall, Chingers were only seven inches tall. True, being from a

high gravity world they were powerful little bug-eyed buggers, dangerous and crafty and killer poker-

players. But he felt it best to play along with the Intergalactic propaganda crap, apparently even bought by

its purveyors.

"Damned close! Could be a makeup job along with a tailectomy. True, you did make it in here through the

cat-scan and failed the subliminal IQ exam. You're far too stupid to be a Chinger."

"Thank you. Sir!" Bill said, going into the usual Trooper barking mantra denoting respect, honor and the

traditional raw hatred for your superiors.

"Very well, Bill." The laser cannon drooped noticeably and Bill felt a lot more comfortable. The man rose

up from behind his armor shield, revealing features that looked like a cross between a warthog and a fire

plug. A cigar the size of a starship escape pod stuck out from the side of his face. "Are you or have you

ever been, in this life or a previous life, or have you ever even wanted to be or thought about being or

might you ever be, in some future life in another dimension, a card-carrying member of the Commupop

Party?"

Bill's thick eyebrows knitted. "Is this a trick question?"

The Commupop Party!

The Well-Read Menace!

There had been Commupops back on Phigerinadon II, Bill vaguely remembered, but they'd been wiped

out by a Trooper raid when he was a little boy. He remembered that well because suddenly his Mom

wouldn't give him cherry pop sickles any more, and because Mr. Leon Trotsky down the street was

discovered hanging by his thumbs in the Town Square. This made Bill sad, because it was Mr. Trotsky

who had given him the cherry pop sickles and had introduced him to Classix Comix Agitprop Bookskis

and the whole idea of Comix, period. The real irony, said Mrs. Bill, was that Mr. Trotsky's real name was

Fred Jones and he was just a fan of Russian history and literature, not a Commupop Party Member at all.

But, as Bill would find out in his adult life, Galactic Troopers were trained in Boot Camp, not Book

Camp, and they hung first and asked questions later. Bill's response was to ask his Mom if coprophilia

had anything to do with loving policemen. Mom had muttered something about "damned intellectuals"

and just let Bill go on reading his Comix after weeding out anything educational and threatening.

The Commupop Party, of course, was the abbreviation for the Community Popular Reading Party and had

absolutely nothing to do with the Intergalactic Communist Party, or Saint Karl Marx. In fact, politically

they were quite neutral and about as threatening to the Emperor's reign as, oh, his terminally backed-up

toilet in his Rec Room on Wreckworld. However, the Emperor's rule being totalitarian and all, and the

Communist Party being such a usual historical bugaboo, his Office of Paranoia and Disinformation fell

upon the hapless Community Popular Reading Party like depleted uranium.

Thousands of hapless readers were sent to prison for reading the wrong books. A special committee was

appointed to weed through the millions of books available to the general public and to ban the ones

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considered inappropriate to the general governmentally oppressed galactic citizen. To paraphrase the

philosopher Santayana, those who do not know history are doomed to regurgitate it. The Emperor would

have been better off just ignoring book readers. His persecution radicalized hundreds of thousands, who

immediately became the revolutionaries the authorities feared they would be (albeit revolutionaries who,

after a hard day of fire-bombing, went home to curl up with a nice thick book). Hence the creation of the

Well-Read Menace, the Commupop Party.

"Trick question? Of course it's not a trick question, you idiot." The cigar bobbed obscenely and the man

leaped up and hopped around, the fat on his squat body jiggling like warm Jell-O beneath his starched

white shirt and black tie with Day-Glo polka dots. "You think I'm wasting my breath?"

Bill did exactly what he usually did when he faced a bureaucratic conundrum. "Look, I'm not going

anywhere. The colonel told me to report here promptly at eleven hundred hours today for a special duty

assignment. I ain't no Commupop Party Member, I'm a healthy reader of Blue-Blooded Galactic Comix

and horny-porny comix — when I can get them — and proud of it. So while you figure out what you want

with me, I'll just sit here and have some of the medicine that the doctor ordered me to take every hour."

He took out a medicine bottle that was really a flask of 100-proof rum (even Bill was smart enough not to

take vodka into the GBI office), unscrewed the cap and tippled a good half of its contents, leaving his

mouth open and making lots of noise.

Bill well knew that if he'd done such a thing in a Trooper office, he would have promptly been keelhauled

from the nearest deepspace freighter. However, this wasn't military business, it was GBI stuff and he was

on loan.

Instead of being unhappy, however, the Director was sniffing the air ecstatically. "I can't believe it!

You're just the man I need!"

"What? You want a hit too?" Bill offered the flask, already feeling the comforting kick of alcohol

flattening his senses.

"Uhm.... No, thank you, Trooper Bill. And now that my memory is refreshed and I reexamined my files, I

remember why you're here. Sorry about the grilling. Knee-jerk reaction. If it's not the Chingers I must

worry about, it's the damned Commupops. Bill, I got a very special assignment for you. The fate of the

universe rests upon those considerable shoulders! Or something like that. Sit down, Bill, and let me turn

off this damned machine here. Don't want to fry our most promising Special Agent, now, do we?"

Bill sat down, took another gurgle of drink, then tucked the flask back into his front pocket. It would have

been a good idea for him to have put the top back on and to tuck it into his pocket bottom first, since he

managed to spill about four ounces of primo rum onto his lap, staining his crotch and running chills down

the hairy sides of his legs.

Bill shivered and grimaced, but managed to squelch an embarrassing shriek.

"Ha! Ha!" said the Director, pointing a stubby forefinger at the Trooper. "I saw that!"

"Uhm, uh, well —"

"No need to apologize, soldier. I myself get a petite frisson when I think of performing a special task for

our glorious Emperor!" Overwhelmed by patriotism, the Director of the GBI swiveled and snapped a

snappy straight-armed salute to the Illustrious Emperor, whose three-dee chinless and adenoidal picture

hung prominently on the wall behind him. The Emperor's computerized image (the same Emperor whom

Bill had very nearly almost met or at least perhaps got close to a stand-in in his youth) responded

reflexively with a salute as well. Remarkable, thought Bill, gazing at the picture. They haven't fixed his

strabismic eyes. It was nice to know that even an emperor had physical problems. Even as Bill regarded

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the stereoscopic image, the Emperor's right eye seemed to drift over of its own accord to spot Bill staring

at him. But, of course, it was only a picture. Wasn't it? Of course it was. The Emperor was far too busy to

spy on a lowly Trooper. Right? Paranoia was okay in its place, Bill thought. But really!

"Yeah, uh, right." Bill of course had no idea what frisson meant, but he never argued with, or attempted to

understand, officers. "About the secret mission, sir." He didn't want to stay here too long, now that he'd

dumped his liquor supply.

"The mission? Oh yeah. Right. The mission." J. Edgar Insufledor took a laser-pistol from a drawer and

relit his monstrous cigar, boring a hole in the ceiling in the process. Bill could see many such holes in the

ceiling, so he presumed that the upper office was either empty or a place used for private GBI executions.

"Real simple, Bill. Barworld. Chingers." He spat the words out like he was expectorating cigar tips. "Time

Continuum Vortex Nexus Locus Chasm!"

Bill's jaw dropped. "Barworld," he gasped. "D—d—did you say? Barworld?" He didn't hear anything

else, just those beautiful, incredibly lovely words.

"I didn't say Bearworld and I didn't say Jarworld, Trooper. You heard me right. Barworld. That's where

I'm sending you. That's where some trouble seems to be. There's rumors of some kind of Time/Space

disturbances there on the Transgalactic Seismo-Grundger, and our agents say the Chingers could well be

at the bottom of the problem. And if they aren't, they're going to be! The Chingers have been looking for

the secret key to Time for years, and do you know why, Bill?"

"Barworld?" Bill could only repeat like a litany. "Barworld!" Barworld, of course, was tantamount to a

legend among Galactic Troopers! Perhaps it was a legend. But no Trooper ever got to discover the truth,

since it was a resort world, and Troopers never got leave.

"I'll tell you why, Bill. Because those Chingers, they want to sneak up on us not only behind our backs —

but the vermin want to sneak up yesterday! That's why."

"I volunteer!" said Bill, waving his black arm enthusiastically. "I'll go! I'll go."

"Those Chingers!" said J. Edgar Insufledor, foaming emphatically. "My duty in life is to rid this world of

those God-damned infernal Galactic-grabbing Chingers!"

Abruptly, the door to one side of Bill crashed open. There, lumbering toward the Deputy Director,

multiple arms thrashing and gigantic saurian face snapping snaggle-fanged jaws, was nothing less than a

perfect representation of the Chinger in the poster! Minus, of course, the human arm in its mouth.

Apparently that had long since been digested, and the Chinger was in need of fresh human meat.

Wait a moment, thought Bill in the back of his mind. Chingers don't get this big. His eternal adversary

Bgr the Chinger (who had come into his life as the lackeyish recruit Eager Beager) was only a fraction

over seven inches tall!

Still it was difficult to argue with a roaring lizard alien, hands full of knives and guns, and eyes full of the

promise of nothing but hard, hot death.

Fortunately, though, the giant Chinger was headed straight for J. Edgar Insufledor, not giving Bill a

moment's pause. The Deputy Director was ready for him, though. "C'mon you piece of deep space sludge.

Come and get it, planet grunge!" The Deputy Director pulled out a duplicate of an antique prehistoric

vintage G-man style submachine gun and aimed at the charging beastie.

"Grrrumargggggggggg!" roared the savage space beast. Bill had never heard a Chinger utter this

particular outcry before. He'd heard Chingers curse in Greek, Swahili, Russian and of course their own

hissing and eructing language. Still and all, this particular specimen uttered the cry with such complete

conviction that Bill took its word for it. Never one to question the wisdom of the hasty retreat in such

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brutal matters as these, Bill nonetheless immediately saw that an exit, albeit hasty, would put him in the

path of submachine bullets. Instead, he jumped behind the overstuffed couch.

"Take this, you foul creature!" cried J. Edgar Insufledor. When the beast was just a yard away, the

Director fired. The submachine chattered and bullets chunk-a-chunked into the lizard's green hide, kicking

up divots of flesh. The Chinger sprayed blood like a lawn-watering device. It was pushed back a full foot,

its guns knocked spinning from ruined claws. A single knife remained in its possession as it screeched

sanguinely and leaped for the director again, slashing his weapon like molten lightning.

Bill cringed helplessly behind the couch. He didn't know what was going on here, but it was certainly a

great deal deadlier than Denubian tiddlywinks.

"Aha! You enjoy eating hot lead!" the Deputy Director said calmly through gritted teeth, his still-fuming

cigar sticking up like an exclamation point. "Then have some more, Chinger!"

J. Edgar Insufledor shot off the knife hand and then put another clip of bullets in the Chinger's chest. The

creature went down like a sack of bloody potatoes, spasming and slashing still at its prey. Jaws snapping,

it pulled itself toward the Director.

J. Edgar Insufledor threw aside his Thompson. "This is a job for Deathdealer," he said, a smile crinkling

the corners of his mouth and eyes. From behind his desk he pulled out a two-handed claymore sword.

"Okay Chinger. Let me show you how a real man deals with a bowby alien."

J. Edgar stepped forward and proceeded to hack open the Chinger's skull with untrammeled ferocity.

Green blood geysered everywhere, splattering on the walls and, when he ventured a peek, into Bill's eyes.

By the time he cleared his vision the Chinger was literally chopped into nuggets on the carpet, oozing and

stone-cold dead. Only the tip of its tail flickered about like a snake whose head has been lopped off.

"Bill!" cried J. Edgar Insufledor. Somehow in the struggle, the top of his shirt had unbuttoned, revealing a

clump of manly chest hair. He put a possessive foot on the largest chunk of the creature and seemed to

pose like a big game hunter. "Some tussle, eh? Wise of you to take cover! These varmints are mean

mothers!"

Hesitantly, Bill rose up from his hiding place. "You wouldn't have a shot of whiskey hiding anywhere

about, would you?"

"Nope. Don't touch the stuff. Harms my precious Puritan bodily fluids. But your taste for it and your

unusual record of service is why the GBI wants you!"

Skimmilquetoast stuck his head into the office. "Oh dear. Thank Mithra, sir! You got it. The assassin

Chinger just charged through, slapped me aside and headed straight in for YOU!" The man turned to Bill

and gave him a broad wink. Bill, nonplussed, could only gape. "Yet, once again, you have saved yourself

and the day, to say nothing of the welfare of the Galaxy!"

The Director grunted. "All in a day's work. Just get a crew in to clean this mess up. And oh — mount the

usual trophy with its head, eh Skimmilquetoast? Makes for a wonderful dinner conversation piece!"

"Yes, sir!"

"Now then, Bill. You will be dispatched to Barworld with complete instructions surgically

subcutaneously planted in your left earlobe. However, although you certainly enjoy your drink, it has

been determined that you are not sufficiently — er — alcoholic, not to mince words, for the full cover we

need." Insufledor sucked on his cigar, then scooped up a folder drenched in lizard blood and handed it to

Bill. "This contains the information on the most alcoholic Trooper still serving in the Galactic Troopers.

He shall be your companion. The first part of your mission shall be to find this man, sober him up long

enough to brief him, then bring him back. We will then send you off to Barworld to see into this very

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important matter."

"Yes, sir!" he snapped ecstatically, visions of countless bottles dancing in his head.

He didn't want to louse up a chance to go to Barworld! It was a Trooper's fantasy, and one of Bill's few

heartfelt ambitions.

"Skimmilquetoast. Show this fine Trooper out. Oh, and get a move on getting those janitors in to clean

this up. Tell security to be a little more on their toes, eh? Can't do their work for them all the time, now,

can I?"

"Yes, sir! Trooper, would you please be so kind as to aid me in hauling this disgusting thing from the

Director's office so as not to disgust him any further?" The assistant picked up one of the feet and nodded

toward the other. Bill shrugged and did so, bringing his ample strength to bear. Outside the office, the

Director's door slammed shut. The Chinger's arm got stuck in a fishhook-coated modernist wire sculpture.

Bill tugged harder and the Chinger's leg, half-ripped off with bullet wounds anyway, came off trailing

hunks of lizard flesh, veins and wires.

Wires?

Still, Bill half expected as much. There was something fishy about that lizard.

"Best idea the Director ever had — and Bureaupsych concurs. He deals every day with the threats to the

welfare of the Empire from his desk but he never gets to actually kill anything. So, every once in awhile,

we throw in a cyborg Commupop or Chinger to keep him on his toes. Old man loves it! He'll have a smile

on his face for at least a week — and will maybe leave off the ritual staff whipping for a while!"

Bill tossed the leg down and wiped his hands on his pants. "You got to give me the details on this Trooper

I'm supposed to go get, and then point me to the nearest MacRotgut's. I feel like a nice MacDTs for a

liquid lunch."

"Sure, Sarge." He handed Bill a folder and a watch with a complicated gadget on it. "Quantum subspace

radio for top-secret communications if you got any problems or questions. Oh, and by the way. Best to

keep that foot out of your mouth, eh?"

Bill was tempted to put the foot somewhere else a good deal more satisfactory than his mouth, but he

decided that since he was going to have to rely on this bowb-brain for information for a long time, he'd

better not do anything quite so enthusiastic.

He went for that drink he'd been promising himself, hoping to encounter no cyborg Chingers or

Commupops along the way.

CHAPTER 2

Bill was in complete total and utter bliss.

Well, not precisely complete. Or utter. What little that remained unobliterated in the way of deep human

emotions in Bill twinged ever so slightly, lifted their heads feebly from the abyssal depths of depression

and, like frail shoots in April lured on by the siren promise of spring, began to flower with weensy buds

of hope.

Barworld!

For all the years — it seemed like centuries — that he had served in the Troopers, in the grueling grapple

of combat and the even worse conditions in boot camp on both sides of the boot, stationed on pustulating

planets and in stagnant starships that made him want to flip his cookies just thinking about them, doomed

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to a dark bleak existence of hard beds, hard heads and no hard creds ... for all those years, the concept of

R&R was strictly verboten in the Service; leave had long since left. A Trooper's duty was to serve his

Emperor twenty-four and a half hours a day, three hundred and sixty-six days a year — and that under the

shrunken Galactic Disgustan Calendar, only half as long as the Augustan. The only joys in a Trooper's life

were two-credit/two-minute ladies of the morning (the ladies of the evening were far too expensive), and

in smoking de-tarred and de-nicotinized cigarettes (in the hopes that they would shorten their miserable,

wasted lives in this dubiously pleasurable fashion), Comix (albeit jam-packed with subliminal loyalty

reinforcement, like Chingers and Commupops generally being the bad guys) and, of course, booze.

However, even the simple joys of Trooper life tended to be watered-down and tepid. The doxies were old

and bored and tended to use their creds as down payments on powered wheelchairs. The cigarettes were

made of dried tobacco stems, since the real stuff was reserved for the officer classes. Comix doubled for

toilet paper; the ultimate literary criticism.

And the booze...

To say that the booze was the pits was to insult underarms and coal mines all over the known universe. It

tended to be repulsively flavored, cheaply manufactured ethanol, rumored to be from Undertakerworld, so

that in lieu of alcohol embalming fluid was often used.

Bill hadn't known the difference for a long time, but whenever during his various adventures he'd actually

tasted some real beer, some real wine, and most of all genuine unsynthetic whiskey, gin and rum, he knew

that he wanted to dedicate his life to finding a world where he could sample again the fruits of this

delicious alcoholic vine.

Such a world, it was whispered in the darkness, was Barworld.

And the Galactic Feds were actually sending him there!

That was if he could only find this guy whose dossier had been given him in that vanilla folder. (He knew

it was vanilla and not manila because he'd gotten drunk at his liquid lunch and eaten it.)

As it happened, the Trooper that Bill had been dispatched to find — Lieutenant Hardtack Brandox, Jr. —

was at this moment right here on the same planet as Bill, the main location of Galactic bureaucratic

matters and center for the manufacture of women's underwear, Drawerworld.

A good deal of red tape, filing of requests and crossed communications later (to say nothing of stop-offs

at bars and latrines to research Brandox's famous drinking habits and, perhaps, maybe a snort or two for

himself), Bill found Lieutenant Brandox's squadron to be on jinx Ether Force Base.

"Make it fast," snarled Captain Quarterpounder, looking up suspiciously at Bill from a mountain of

paperwork. "Lieutenant Brandy? What a boozer. Sweats pure ethyl. But you're too late, bowb-brains.

Should have been here a day earlier. He's just been reassigned to Some Godforsaken Planet."

"Which planet?"

"Some Godforsaken Planet, bowb — don't you hear very well? That's the name. That's what they call it.

Deathworld 69 to be more specific. One of the several hundred slaughterhouses of combat between

humans and the Chingers, along with the rest of the filthy ETs in the universe, Ahura Mazda rot their

alien green bones!"

"Well, perhaps you can call him back. I am on official business." Bill showed him the ID bracelet that the

GBI had given him, strapped on the wrist under his communicator.

"Tough termites, Trooper. That bit of bureaucratic bowb means nothing here. Brandox is well on his

alcohol-sodden way to the lift-off fields."

The captain gloomily examined a chronometer. Satisfied that the chrono was still metered, he examined

file:///G|/Program%20Files/eMule/Incoming/Har...Planet%20of%20The%20Hippies%20From%20Hell.htm (9 of 91) [10/15/2004 5:51:10 PM]

Bill, the Galactic Hero on the Planet of The Hippies From Hell

the standard issue Trooper Clock bearing the scowling face of the Beloved Emperor. "Should be blasting

off in about two hours. If you move your butt you might just catch it." He grinned with cheerful sadism.

"Or you can maybe go along for the ride. I hear that Deathworld 69 is really in this year for suicidal tours

of duty."

"No thanks. I've got something to live for!" said Bill enthusiastically.

The captain eyed him suspiciously. "Something wrong with you, Trooper? You're supposed to die doing

your duty. Come home with your shield or on it. You know the bowb."

"No sir! I mean yes, sir!" Bill realized with horror that he'd almost spilled the beans about being on his

way to Barworld — a definite no-no, since not only was the mission top secret but the captain would

probably shoot him from sheer jealousy. "I think it was just a spasm of pure joy from beholding our dear

Emperor's face there smiling away on the bulkhead."

"Yeah? Well, stow it when you are around here, buddy. It's bowb-your-buddy month here on

Drawerworld and we've only got one month per year. Understand?"

Bill sneered, showing his fangs in his best DI manner. He saluted with both his right hands. "Yes sir!"

He trotted off for the takeoff fields to find Lt. Brandox before the starship made its lift-off.

The Happy Trails Takeoff fields were about two hours away by grav-car, but Bill, through breakneck

speed, high-reflex steering and the sacrifice of a few dogs, cats, a little old lady and a second lieutenant,

managed to make it to them in just a little over an hour and a half.

As always, when he approached the mighty Imperial launching pads Bill gasped an appreciative gasp or

two at the sight of the towering behemoth starships reaching imperially toward the sky, their shiny

impervium sparkling in the sunlight, the silvery needles of their bows pointed upward toward challenge

and adventure.

Then, as usual, he experienced a depressing mood swing as he was admitted by the checkpoint guard past

the ceremonial holo-facade of these imaginary vessels into the grungy and smoggy reality of the true

Imperial takeoff fields. Greasy smoke poured up from cracks in the ground. The smell of diesel fuel and

sulfur permeated the air. Blackened technicians trucked around in dilapidated service vehicles looking

like recently nuked worker ants. There were maybe twenty starships in various states of disrepair rising up

from the ground like twisted mushrooms in a bed of mold. Their skins were pitted by the craters of

interstellar dust, spattered with the bird droppings of countless worlds.

The question was, which one was Brandox's?

Bill stopped a gray-skinned Trooper wearing corporal's stripes on his eyepatch and inquired.

"Deathworld 69? That's like a really hard question. We've got maybe three starships getting ready to

heave up mightily through the atmosphere. Hard to tell them apart." The corporal, Bill noticed, had the

telltale scars on his forehead of a jobotomy. That was why he wasn't being shipped off himself; he'd

probably been a trouble-maker or attempted to go AWO (there was no AWOL or Absent WithOut Leave

in This Bowb's Army, since "leave" was a foreign concept). A jobotomy was like a lobotomy, only they

stuck a little programmed computer in the place where there used to be about half the gray matter; it kept

the victim in line and gave him a preprogrammed duty. The corporal sighed. "Wish I could go with them

into glorious battle. Alas, I am but a ground jockey. Gotta serve my Empire here amidst the dirt and

gravity. But like the Emperor says, 'They also serve who stand and wait!'"

"Wait? Wait for what? Just knock off that pseudo-romantic bowb and tell me which ship it is."

The corporal just grinned, glassy-eyed.

"Never mind," said Bill. "I'll find it myself."

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