Bill, the Galactic Hero btgh-1

by Harry Harrison

  An electric sign blinking on and off drew Bi'll's attention, KWIK-FREEZ KOSHER HAMS LTD. it read-and he gasped as memory returned. By Ahriman, he had forgotten that he was a spy for the G. B. I. and had been about to join the raid on the power stationt Was there still time to get out before the counter-blow fell! Sweating more than a little, he began working his way through the mob toward the sign-then he was at the fringes and running toward safety. It wasn't too late. He grabbed the front door handle and pulled, but it would not open. In panic he twisted and shook it until the entire front of the building began to shake, rocking back and forth and creaking. He gaped at it in paralyzed horror until a loud hissing drew his attention.

  “Get over here, you stupid bowb,” a voice crackled, and he looked up to see the G. B. I. agent Pinkerton standing at the comer of the building and beckoning to him angrily. Bill followed the agent around the comer and found quite a crowd standing there, and there was plenty of room for all of them because the building was not there. Bill could see now that the building was just a front made out of cardboard with a door handle on it and was secured by wooden supports to the front of an atomic tank. Grouped around the armorplated side and treads of the tank were a number of heavily armed soldiers and G. B. I.

  agents as well as an even larger number of revolutionaries, their clothes singed and pitted by sparks from the torches. Standing next to Bill was the android, Ghoulem.

  “You!” Bill gasped, and the android curled its lips in a carefully practiced sneer.

  “That's right-and keeping. an eye on you for the G. B. I. Nothing is left to chance in this organization.” Pinkerton was peeking out through a hole in the false store front. “I think the agents are clear now,” he said, `but maybe we better wait a little longer.

  At last count there were agents of sixty-five spy, intelligence, and counter-intelligence outfits involved in investigating this operation. These revolutionaries don't stand a chance…” A siren blasted from the power plant, apparently a prearranged signal, because the soldiers battered at the cardboard store front until it came loose and fell flat into the square.

  Chauvinistisk Square was empty.

  Well, not really empty. Bill looked again and saw that one man was left in the square; he hadn't noticed him at first. He was running their way but stopped with a pitiful screech when he saw what was hidden behind the store.

  “I surrender!” he shouted, and Bill saw that he was the man called X. The power plant gates opened, and a squadron of flamethrower tanks rumbled out.

  “Coward!” Pinkerton sneered, and pulled back the slide on his gun. “Don't try to back out now, X, at least die like a man.” “I'm not X-that. is just a nom-de-espionage.” He tore off his false beard and mustache, disclosing a twitching and uninteresting face with pronounced underbite. “I am Gill O'Teen, M. A. and LL. D. from the Imperial School of Counter-Spying and Double-Agentry. I was hired by this operation, I can prove it, I have documents, Prince Microcephil payed me to overthrow his uncle so he could become Emperor… “ “You think I'm stupid,” Pinkerton snapped, aiming his gun “The Old Emperor, may he rest in eternal peace, died a year ago, and Prince Microcephil is the Emperor now. You can't revolt against the man who hired you!” “I never read the newspapers,” O'Teen alias X moaned.

  “Fire!” Pinkerton said sternly, and from all sides washed a wave of atomic shells, gouts of flame, bullets, and grenades. Bill hit the dirt, and when he raised his head the square was empty except for a greasy patch and a shallow hole in the pavement. Even while he watched, a street-cleaning robot buzzed by and swabbed up the grease. It hummedbriefly, backed up, then filled in the shallow hole with a squirt of repair plastic from a concealed tank. When it rolled on again there was no trace of anything whatsoever.

  “Hello Bill… “ said a voice so paralyzingly familiar that Bill's hair prickled and stood up from his head like a toothbrush. He spun and looked at the squad of MPs standing there, and especially he stared at the large, loathsome form of the MP who led them.

  “Deathwish Drang…” he breathed.

  “The same.” “Save me!” Bill gasped, running to G. B. I. agent Pinkerton and hugging him about the knees.

  “Save you?” Pinkerton laughed, and kneed Bill under the jaw so that he sprawled backward. “I'm the one who called them. We checked your record, boy, and found out that you are in a heap of trouble. You have been AWOL from the troopers for a year now, and we don't want any deserters on our team.” “But I worked for you-helped you-” “Take him away,” Pinkerton said, and turned his back.

  “There's no justice,” Bill moaned, as the hated fingers sank into his arms again.

  “Of course not,” Deathwish told him, “you weren't expecting any, were you?” They dragged him away.

  E=mc2 OR BUST

  Book Three

  Chapter 1

  “I want a lawyer, I have to have a lawyer! I demand my rights!” Bill hammered on the bars of the cell with the chipped bowl that they had served his evening meal of bread and water in, shouting loudly for attention. No one came in answer to his call, and finally, hoarse, tired, and depressed, he lay down on the knobbed plastic bunk and stared up at the metal ceiling. Sunk in misery, he stared at the hook for long minutes before it finally penetrated. A hook? Why a hook here? Even in his apathy it bothered him, just as it had bothered him when they gave him a stout plastic belt with a sturdy buckle for his shoddy prison dungarees. Who wears a belt with one-piece dungarees? They had taken everything from him and supplied him only with paper slippers, crumpled dungarees, and a fine belt. Why? And why was there a sturdy great hook penetrating through the unbroken smoothness of the ceiling?

  “I'm saved!” Bill screamed, and leaped up, balancing on the end of the bunk and whipping off the belt. There was a hole in the strap end of the belt that fitted neatly over the hook. While the buckle made a beautiful slip knot for a loop on the other end that would fit lovingly around his neck. And he could slip it over his head, seat the buckle under his ear, kick off from the bunk and strangle painfully with his toes a full foot above the floor. It was perfect.

  “It is perfect!” he shouted happily, and jumped off the bunk and ran in circles under the noose, going yeow-yeow-yeow by flapping his hand in front of his mouth. “I'm not stuck, cooked, through, and finished. They want me to knock myself off to make things easy for them.” This time he lay back on the bunk, smiling happily, and tried to think it out. There had to be a chance he could wriggle out of this thing alive, or they wouldn't have gone to all this trouble to give him an opportunity to hang himself. Or could they be playing a double, subtle game? Allowing him hope where none existed? No, this was impossible. They had a lot of attributes: pettiness, selfishness, anger, vengefulness, superiority, power-lust, the list was almost endless; but one thing was certain-subtlety was not on it.

  They? For the first time in his life Bill wondered who they were. Everyone blamed everything on them, everyone knew that they would cause trouble. He even knew from experience what they were like. But who were they? A footstep shuffled outside the door, and he looked over to see Deathwish Drang glowering in at him.

  “Who are they?” Bill asked.

  “They are everyone who wants to be one of them,” Deathwish said philosophically twanging a tusk. “They are both a state of mind and an institution.” “Don't give me any of that mystical bowb! A straight answer to a straight question now.” “I am being straight,” Deathwish said, reeking of sincerity. “They die off and are replaced, but the institution of theyness goes on.” “I'm sorry I asked,” Bill said, sidling over so he could whisper through the bars. “I need a lawyer, Deathwish old buddy. Can you find me a good lawyer?” “They'll appoint a lawyer for you.” Bill made the rudest noise he possibly could. “Yeah, and we know just what will happen with that lawyer. I need a lawyer to help me. And I have money to pay him-” “Well why didn't you say that sooner?” Deathwish slipped on his gold-rimmed spectacles and flipped slowly through a small notebook. “I tak
e a 10 per cent commission for handling this.” “Affirm.” “Well-do you want a cheap honest lawyer or an expensive crooked one?” “I have 17,000 bucks hidden where no one can find it” “You should have told me that first.” Deathwish closed the book and put it away. “They must have suspected this, that's why they gave you the belt and the cell with the hook. With money like that you can hire the absolute best.” “Who is that?” “Abdul O'Brien-Cohen.” “Send for him.” And no more than two bowls of soggy bread and water had passed before there was a new footstep in the hall and a clear and penetrating voice bounced from the chill walls.

  “Salaam there, boyo, faith and I've had a gesundt shtik trouble getting here.” “This is a general court-martial case,” Bill told the mild, unassuming man with the ordinary face who stood outside the bars. I don't think a civilian lawyer will be allowed.” “Begorrah, landsman-it is Allah's will that I be prepared for all things.” He whipped a bristling mustache with waxed tips out of his pocket and pressed it to his upper lip. At the same time he threw his chest back and his shoulders seemed to widen and a steely glint came to his eye and the planes of his face took on a military stiffness. “I'm pleased to meet you. We're in this together, and I want you to know that I won't let you down even if you are an enlisted man.” “What happened to Abdul O'Brien-Cohen?” “I have a reserve commission in the Imperial Barratry Corps. Captain A. C.

  O'Brien at your service. I believe the sum of 17,000 was mentioned?” “I take 10 per cent of that,” Deathwish said, sidling up. Negotiations were opened and took a number of hours. All three men liked, respected, and distrusted each other, so that elaborate safeguards were called for. When Deathwish and the lawyer finally left they had careful instructions about where to find the money, and Bill had statements signed in blood with affixed thumbprint from each of them stating that they were members of the Party d edicated to overthrowing the Emperor. When they returned with the money Bill gave them back their statements as soon as Captain O'Brien had signed a receipt for 15,300 bucks as payment in full for defending Bill before a general court-martial. It was all done in a businesslike and satisfying manner.

  “Would you like to hear my side of the case?” Bill asked. “Of course not, that has no bearing at all on the charges. When you enlisted in the troopers you signed away all your rights as a human being. They can do whatever they like with you. Your only advantage is that they are also prisoners of their own system and must abide by the complex and self-contradictory code of laws they have constructed through the centuries. They want to shoot you for desertion and have rigged a foolproof case.” “Then I'll be shot!” “Perhaps, but that's the chance we have to take.” “We-? You going to be hit by half the bullets?” “Don't get snotty when you're talking to an officer, bowb. Abide in me, have faith, and hope they make some mistakes.” After that it was just a matter of marking time until the trial. Bill knew it was close when they gave him a uniform with a Fuse Tender First Class insignia on the arm. Then the guard tramped up, the door sprang open, and Deathwish waved him out. They marched away together, and Bill exacted what small pleasure he could from changing step to louse up the guard. But once through the door of the courtroom he took a military brace and tried to look like an old campaigner with his medals clanking on his chest. There was an empty chair next to a polished, uniformed, and very military Captain O'Brien.

  “That's the stuff;” O'Brien said. “Keep up with the G. I. bit, outplay them at their own game.” They climbed to their feet as the officers of the court filed in. Bill and O'Brien were seated at the end of the long, black, plastic table, and at the far end sat the trial judge advocate, a gray-haired and stern-looking major who wore a cheap girdle. The ten officers of the court sat down at the long side of the table, where they could scowl out at the audience and the witnesses.

  “Let us begin,” the court president, a bald-headed and pudgy fleet admiral, said with fitting solemnity. “Let the trial open, let justice be done with utmost dispatch, and the prisoner found guilty and shot.” “I object,” O'Brien said, springing to his feet. “These remarks are prejudical toward the accused, who is. innocent until proven guilty-” “Objection overruled.” The president's gavel banged. “Counsel for the defense is fined fifty bucks for unwarranted interruption. The accused is guilty, the evidence will prove it, and he will be shot. Justice will be served.” “So that's the way. they are going to play it,” O'Brien murmured to Bill through half-closed lips. “I can play them any way as long as I know the ground rules.” The trial judge advocate had already begun his opening statement in a monotonous voice.

  “… therefore we shall prove that Fuse Tender First Class Bill did willfully overstay his officially granted leave by a period of nine days and thereafter resist arrest and flee from the arresting officers and successfully elude pursuit, where upon he absented himself for the period of over one standard year, so is therefore guilty of desertion…” “Guilty as hell!” one of the court officers shouted, a redfaced cavalry major with a black monocle, springing to his feet and knocking over his chair. “I vote guilty-shoot the buggery” “I agree, Sam,” the president drawled, tapping lightly with his gavel, “but we have to shoot him by the book, take a little while yet” “That's not true,” Bill hissed to his lawyer. “The facts are-” “Don't worry about facts, Bill, no one else heredoes. Facts can't alter this case.” “… and we will therefore ask the supreme penalty, death,” the trial judge advocate said, finally dragging to a close.

  “Are you going to waste our time with an opening statement, Captain?” the president asked, glaring at O'Brien.

  “Just a few words, if the court pleases… “ There was a sudden stir among the spectators, and a ragged woman with a shawl over her head, clutching a blanketwrapped bundle to her bosom, rushed forward to the edge of the table.

  “Your honors-” she gasped, “don't take away me Bill, the light of me life.

  He's a good man, and whatever he did was only for me and the little one.” She held out the bundle, and a weak crying could be h eard. “Every day he wanted to leave, to return to duty, but I was sick and the wee one was sick and I begged him with tears in my eyes to stay…” “Get her out of here!” The gavel banged loudly.

  “… and he would stay, all the time swearing it would be just for one more day, and all the time the darlin' knowing that if he left us we would die of starvation.” Her voice was muffled by the bulk of the dress-uniformed MPs who carried her, struggling, toward the exit. “… and a blessing on your honors for freeing him, but if you condemn him, you blackhearted scuts, may you die and rot in hell…” The doors swung shut, and her voice was cut off.

  “Strike all this from the records,” the president said, and glowered at the counsel for the defense. “And if I thought you had anything to do with it I would have you shot right alongside your client.” O'Brien was looking his most guileless, fingers on chest and head back, and just beginning an innocent statement when there was another interruption. An old man climbed onto one of the spectator's benches and waved his arms for attention.

  “Listen to me, one and all. Justice must be served, and I am its instrument. I had meant to keep my silence and allow an innocent man to be executed, but I cannot. Bill is my son, my only son, and I begged him to go over the hill to aid me; dying as I was of cancer, I wanted to see him ne last time, but he stayed to nurse me…” There was a struggle as the MPs grabbed the man and found he was chained to the bench. “Yes he did, cooked porridge for me and made me eat, and he did so well that bit by bit I rallied until you see me today, a cured man, cured by porridge from his son's loyal hands. Now my boy shall die because he saved me, but it shall not be. Take my poor old worthless life instead of his.

  … “ An atomic wire cutter hummed, and the old man was thrown out the back door.

  “That's enough! That's too much!” the red-faced president of the court shrieked, and pounded so hard that the gavel broke and he hurled the pieces across the room. “Clear this court of all spectator
s and witnesses. It is the judgment of this court that the rest of this trial will be conducted by rules of precedence without witnesses or evidence admitted.” He flashed a quick look around at his accomplices, who all nodded solemn agreement. “Therefore the defendant is found guilty and will be shot as soon as he can be dragged to the shooting gallery.” The officers of the court were already pushing back their chairs to go when O'Brien's slow voice stopped them.

  “It is of course within the jurisdiction of this court to try a case in the manner so prescribed, but it is also necessary to quote the pertinent article of precedent before judgment is passed.” The president sighed and sat down again. “I wish you wouldn't try to be so difficult, Captain, you know the regulations just as well as I do. But if you insist. Pablo, read it to them.” The law officer flipped through a thick volume on his desk, found his place with his finger, then read aloud.

  “Articles of War, Military Regulations, paragraph, page, etc. etc…… yes, here it is, paragraph 298-B… `If any enlisted man shall absent himself from his post of duty for over a period of one standard year he is to be judged guilty of desertion even if absent in person from the trial and the penalty for desertion is painful death.” “That seems clear enough. Any more questions?” the president asked.

  “No questions; I would just like to quote a precedent” O'Brien had placed a high stack of thick books before him and was reading from the topmost one. “Here it is, Buck Private Lovenvig versus. the United States Army Air Corps, Texas, 1944. It is stated here that Lovenvig was AWOL for a period of fourteen months, then was dicovered in a hiding place above the ceiling of the mess hall from whence he descended only in the small hours of the night to eat and to drink of the stores therein and to empty his potty. Since he had not left the base he could not be judged AWOL or be a deserter and could receive only company punishment of a most minor kind.” The officers of the court had seated themselves again and were all watching the law officer, who was flipping quickly through his own books. He finally emerged with a smile and a reference of his own.