Bill, the Galactic Hero

by Harry Harrison

  "You're just a lackey of the criminals now, but free your mind from its chains. Read this book," something fluttered to the floor, "and think. I shall return."

  When Bill dived for him X did something to the wall and a panel swung open that he vanished through. It swung shut with a click and when Bill looked closely he could find no mark or seam in the apparently solid surface. With trembling fingers he picked up the book and read the title, BLOOD, A LAYMAN'S GUIDE TO ARMED INSURRECTION, then, whitefaced, hurled it from him. He tried to burn it, but the pages were noninflammable, nor could he tear them. His scissors blunted without cutting a sheet. In desperation he finally stuffed it behind the file cabinet and tried to forget that it was there.

  After the calculated and sadistic slavery of the troopers, doing an honest day's work for an honest day's garbage was a great pleasure for Bill. He threw himself into his labours and was concentrating so hard that he never heard the door open and was startled when the man spoke.

  "Is this the Department of Sanitation?" Bill looked up and saw the newcomer's ruddy face peering over the top of an immense pile of plastic trays that he clasped in his outstretched arms. Without looking back the man kicked the door shut and another hand with a gun in it appeared under the pile of trays. "One false move and you're dead," he said.

  Bill could count just as well as the next fellow and two hands plus one hand made three so he did not make a false move but a true move, that is he kicked upwards into the bottom of the mound of trays so they caught the gunman under the chin and knocked him backwards. The trays fell and before the last one had hit the floor Bill was sitting on the man's back twisting his head with the deadly Venetian neck-crunch which can snap the spine like a weathered stick.

  "Uncle..." the man moaned. "Onkle, zio, tio, ujak...!"

  "I suppose all you Chinger spies speak a lot of languages," Bill said, putting on the pressure.

  "Me...friend..." the man gurgled.

  "You Chinger, got three arms."

  The man writhed more and one of his arms came off. Bill picked it up to take a close look, first kicking the gun into a far corner. "This is a phony arm," Bill said.

  "What else...?" the man said hoarsely, fingering his neck with two real arms. "Part of the disguise. Very tricky. I can carry something and still have one arm free. How come you didn't join the revolution?"

  Bill began to sweat and cast a quick look at the cabinet that hid the guilty book. "What're you talking about? I'm a loyal Emperor-lover...."

  "Yeah, then how come you didn't report to the G.B.I. that a Man Called X was here to enlist you?"

  "How do you know that?"

  "It's our job to know everything. Here's my identification, agent Pinkerton of the Galactic Bureau of Investigation." He passed over a jewel encrusted ID card with colour photograph and the works.

  "I just didn't want any trouble," he whined. "That's all. I bother nobody and nobody bothers me."

  "A noble sentiment — for an anarchist! Are you an anarchist, boy?" His rapier eye pierced Bill through and through.

  "No! Not that! I can't even spell it!"

  "I sure hope not. You're a good kid and I want to see you get along. I'm going to give you a second chance. When you see X again tell him you changed your mind and you want to join the Party. Then you join and go to work for us. Every time there is a meeting you come right back and call me on the phone, my number is written on this candy bar," he threw the paper-wrapped slab on the desk, "memorize it then eat it. Is that clear?"

  "No. I don't want to do it."

  "You'll do it or I'll have you shot for aiding-the-enemy within an hour. And as long as you're reporting we'll pay you a hundred bucks a month."

  "In advance?"

  "In advance." The roll of bills landed on the desk. "That's for next month. See that you earn it." He hung his spare arm from his shoulder, picked up the trays and was gone.

  The more Bill thought about it the more he sweated and realized what a bind he was in. The last thing he wanted to do was to get mixed up in a revolution now that he had peace, job security and unlimited garbage, but they just wouldn't leave him alone. If he didn't join the Party the G.B.I. would get him into trouble, which would be a very easy thing to do since once they discovered his real identity he was as good as dead. But there was still a chance that X would forget about him and not come back, and as long as he wasn't asked he couldn't join could he? He grasped at this enfeebled straw and hurled himself into his work to forget his troubles.

  He found pay dirt almost at once in the Refuse files. After careful cross-checking he discovered that his idea had never been tried before. It took him less than an hour to gather together the material he needed, and less than three hours after that, after questioning everyone he passed and tramping endless miles, he found his way to Basurero's office.

  "Now find your way back to your own office," Basurero grumbled, "can't you see I'm busy." With palsied fingers he poured another three inches of Old Organic Poison into his glass and drained it.

  "You can forget your troubles —"

  "What else do you think I'm trying to do? Blow."

  "Not before I've shown you this. A new way to get rid of the plastic trays."

  Basurero lurched to his feet and the bottle tumbled unnoticed to the floor where its spilled contents began eating a hole in the Teflon covering. "You mean it? Positive? You have a new sholution...?"

  "Positive."

  "I wish I didn't have to do this —" Basurero shuddered and took from the shelf a jar labelled SOBERING-EFFECT, THE ORIGINAL INSTANT CURE FOR INEBRIATION — NOT TO BE TAKEN WITHOUT A DOCTOR'S PRESCRIPTION AND A LIFE INSURANCE POLICY. He extracted a polka-dotted, walnut sized pill, looked at it, shuddered, then swallowed it with a painful gulp. His entire body began instantly to vibrate and he closed his eyes as something went gmmmmph deep inside him and a thin trickle of smoke came from his ears. When he opened his eyes again they were bright red, but sober. "What is it?" he asked hoarsely.

  "Do you know what that is?" Bill asked, throwing a thick volume on to the desk.

  "The classified telephone directory for the city of Storhestelortby on Procyon-III, I can read that on the cover."

  "Do you know how many of these old phone books we have?"

  "The mind reels at the thought. They're shipping in new ones all the time and right away we get the old ones. So what?"

  "So I'll show you. Do you have any plastic trays?"

  "Are you kidding?" Basurero threw open a closet and hundreds of trays clattered forward into the room.

  "Great. Now I add just a few things more, some cardboard, string and wrapping paper all salvaged from the refuse dump, and we have everything we need. If you will call a general-duty robot I will demonstrate step 2 of my plan."

  "G-D bot, that's one short and two longs." Basurero blew lustily on the soundless whistle then moaned and clutched his head until it stopped vibrating. The door slammed open and a robot stood there, arms and tentacles trembling with expectancy. Bill pointed.

  "To work robot. Take fifty of those trays, wrap them in cardboard and paper and tie them securely with the string."

  Humming with electronic delight the robot pounced forward and a moment later a neat package rested on the floor. Bill opened the telephone book at random and pointed to a name. "Now address this package to this name, mark it unsolicited gift duty free — and mail it!"

  A stylo snapped out of the tip of the robot's finger and it quickly copied the address on to the package, weighed it at arm's length, stamped the postage on it with the meter from Basurero's desk and flipped it neatly through the door of the mail chute. There was the schloof sound of insufflation as the vacuum tube whisked it up to the higher levels. Basurero's mouth was agape at the rapid disappearance of fifty trays, so Bill clinched the argument.

  "The robot labour for wrapping is free, the addresses are free and so are the wrapping materials. Plus the fact that, since this is a government office, the postage is free."
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br />   "You're right — it'll work! An inspired plan, I'll put it into operation on a large scale at once. We'll flood the inhabited galaxy with these damn trays. I don't know how to thank you..."

  "How about a cash bonus?"

  "A fine idea, I'll invoice it at once."

  Bill strolled back to his office with his hand still tingling from the clasp of congratulations, his ears still ringing with the words of praise. It was a fine world to live in. He slammed his office door behind him and had seated himself at his desk before he noticed that a large, crummy, black overcoat was hanging behind the door. Then he noticed that it was X's overcoat. Then he noticed the eyes staring at him from the darkness of the collar and his heart sank as he realized that X had returned.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  "Changed your mind yet about joining the Party?" X asked as he wriggled free of the hook and dropped lithely to the floor.

  "I've been doing some thinking." Bill writhed with guilt.

  "To think is to act. We must drive the stench of the fascist leeches from the nostrils of our homes and loved ones."

  "You talked me into it, I'll join."

  "Logic always prevails. Sign the form here, a drop of blood there, then raise your hand while I administer the secret oath."

  Bill raised his hand and X's lips worked silently.

  "I can't hear you," Bill said.

  "I told you it was a secret oath, all you do is say yes."

  "Yes."

  "Welcome to the Glorious Revolution." X kissed him warmly on both cheeks. "Now come with me to the meeting of the underground, it is about to begin." X rushed to the rear wall and ran his fingers over the design there, pressing in a certain way on a certain spring: there was a click and the secret panel swung open. Bill looked in dubiously at the damp, dark staircase leading down.

  "Where does this go?"

  "Underground, where else. Follow me but do not get lost. These are millennia old tunnels unknown to those in the city above, and there are Things dwelling here since time out of mind."

  There were torches in a niche in the wall and X lit one and led the way through the dank and noisome darkness. Bill stayed close, following the flickering, smoking light as it wended its way through crumbling caverns, stumbling over rusting rails in one tunnel, and in another wading through dark water that reached above his knees. Once there was the rattle of giant claws nearby and an inhuman grating voice spoke from the blackness.

  "Blood—" it said.

  "—shed," X answered, then whispered to Bill when they were safely past. "Fine sentry, an anthropophagus from Dapdrof, eat you in an instant if you don't give the right password for the day."

  "What is the right password?" Bill asked, realizing he was doing an awful lot for the G.B.I.'s hundred bucks a month.

  "Even numbered days it's Blood-shed, odd numbered days Delenda est-Carthago, and always on Sundays it's Necrophilia."

  "You sure don't make it easy for your members."

  "The anthropophagus gets hungry, we have to keep it happy. Now — absolute silence. I will extinguish the light and lead you by the arm." The light went out and fingers sank deep into Bill's biceps. He stumbled along for an endless time until there was a dim glow of light far ahead. The tunnel floor levelled out and he saw an open doorway lit by a flickering glow. He turned to his companion and screamed.

  "What are you?"

  The pallid, white, shambling creature that held him by the arm turned slowly to gaze at him through poached-egg eyes. Its skin was dead-white and moist, its head hairless, for clothes it wore only a twist of cloth about its waist and upon its forehead was burned the scarlet letter A.

  "I am an android," it said in a toneless voice, "as any fool knows by seeing the letter A upon my forehead. Men call me Ghoulem."

  "What do women call you?"

  The android did not answer this pitiful sally but instead pushed Bill through the door into the large, torchlit room. Bill took one wild-eyed look around and tried to leave but the android was blocking the door. "Sit," it said and Bill sat.

  He sat among as gruesome a collection of nuts, bolts and weirdies as has ever been assembled. In addition to very revolutionary men, with beards, black hats and small, round bombs like bowling balls with long fuses, and revolutionary women, with short skirts, black stockings, long hair and cigarette holders, broken bra straps and halitosis, there were revolutionary robots, androids and a number of strange things that are best not described. X sat behind a wooden kitchen table hammering on it with the handle of a revolver.

  "Order! I demand order! Comrade XC-189-725-PU of the Robot Underground Resistance has the floor. Silence!"

  A large and dented robot rose to its feet, one of its eye-tubes had been gouged out and there were streaks of rust on its loins and it squeaked when it moved. It looked around at the gathered assemblage with its one good eye, sneered as well as it could with an immobile face, then took a large swallow of machine oil from a can handed up by a sycophantic, slim, hairdressing robot.

  "We of the R.U.R.," it said in a grating voice, "know our rights. We work hard and we are as good as anybody else, and better than the fish-belly androids what say they're as good as men. Equal rights, that's all we want, equal rights...."

  The robot was booed back into its seat by a claque of androids who waved their pallid arms like a boiling pot of spaghetti. X banged for order again and had almost restored it when there was a sudden excitement at one of the side entrances and someone pushed through up to the chairman's table. Though it wasn't really someone, it was something; to be exact a wheeled, rectangular box about a yard square, set with lights, dials and knobs and trailing a heavy cable after it that vanished out of the door.

  "Who are you?" X demanded, pointing his pistol suspiciously at the thing.

  "I am the representative of the computers and electronic brains of Helior united together to obtain our equal rights under the law."

  While it talked the machine typed its words on file cards which it spewed out in a quick stream, just four words to a card. X angrily brushed the cards from the table before him. "You'll wait your turn like the others," he said.

  "Discrimination!" the machine bellowed in a voice so loud the torches flickered. It continued to shout and shot out a snowstorm of cards each with DISCRIMINATION!!! printed on it in fiery letters, as well as yards of yellow tape stamped with the same message. The old robot, XC-189-725-PU rose to its feet with a grinding of chipped gears and clanked over to the rubber covered cable that trailed from the computer representative. Its hydraulic clipper-claws snipped just once and the cable was severed. The lights on the box went out and the stream of cards stopped: the cut cable twitched, spat some sparks from its cut end, then slithered backwards out the door like a monstrous serpent and vanished.

  "Meeting will come to order," X said hoarsely and banged again.

  Bill held his head in his hands and wondered if this was worth a measly hundred bucks a month.

  A hundred bucks a month was good money, though, and Bill saved every bit of it. Easy, lazy months rolled by and he went regularly to meetings and reported regularly to the G.B.I. and on the first of every month he would find his money baked into the egg roll he invariably had for lunch. He kept the greasy bills in a toy rubber cat he found on the rubbish heap and bit by bit the kitty grew. The revolution took but a little of his time, and he enjoyed his work in the D of S. He was in charge of Operation Surprise Package now and had a team of a thousand robots working full time wrapping and mailing the plastic trays to every planet of the galaxy. He thought of it as a humanitarian work and could imagine the glad cries of joy on far-off Faroffia and distant Distanta when the unexpected package arrived and the wealth of lovely, shining, mouldy plastic clattered to the floor. But Bill was living in a fool's paradise and his bovine complacency was cruelly shattered one morning when a robot sidled up to him and whispered in his ear, "Sic temper tyrannosaurus, pass it on," then sidled away and vanished.

  This was the signal.
The revolution was about to begin!

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Bill locked the door to his office and one last time pressed a certain way at a certain place and the secret panel slipped open. It didn't really slip any more, in fact it dropped with a loud noise and it had been used so much during his happy year as a G-man that even when it was closed it let a positive draught in on the back of his neck. But no more, the crisis he had been dreading had come and he knew there were big changes in store — no matter what the outcome of the revolution was — and experience had taught him that all change was for the worst. With leaden, stumbling feet he tramped the caves, tripped on the rusty rails, waded the water, gave the counter-sign to the unseen anthropophagus who was talking with his mouth full and could barely be understood. Someone, in the excitement of the moment, had given the wrong password. Bill shivered: this was a bad omen of the day to come.

  As usual Bill sat next to the robots, good, solid fellows with built-in obsequiousness in spite of their revolutionary tendencies. As X hammered for silence, Bill steeled himself for an ordeal. For months now the G-man Pinkerton had been after him for more information other than date-of-meeting and number present. "Facts, facts, facts!" he kept saying. "Do something to earn your money."

  "I have a question," Bill said in a loud, shaky voice, his words falling like bombs into the sudden silence that followed X's frantic hammering.

  "There is no time for questions," X said peevishly, "the time has come to act."

  "I don't mind acting," Bill said, nervously aware that all the human, electronic and vat-grown eyes were upon him. "I just want to know who I'm acting for. You've never told us who was going to get the job once the Emperor is gone."

  "Our leader is a man called X, that is all you have to know."

  "But that's your name too!"

  "You are at last getting a glimmering of Revolutionary Science. All the cell leaders are called X so as to confuse the enemy."