Bill 4 - on the Planet of Tasteless Pleasure (12 page)

Rick agreed, and they continued on their journey southwards, away from the land of Absurd Fantasy and toward the doubtlessly much more worthwhile and interesting Land of Feelthy Magazines.

Unfortunately, they had no compass.

Which meant that with very little effort on their part they managed to get themselves terribly lost. Bill, who had been looking forward with tumescent expectation to squadrons of frolicking nudes, badly written yet graphic lascivious prose, as well as not funny cartoons with incredibly endowed lovelies in compromising situations, was disappointed to find himself in a new and depressing territory filled with almost unrelieved gloom.

“Arrrr!” observed Rick, looking about him at the wilted vegetation, the monochrome colors. There was an entire lack of any kind of smell to the air, be it foul or fair. The limbs of what few trees there were about drooped listlessly. The grass and the weeds lay pasted down upon the ground damply, as though they'd just been pelted by a fierce, not to say slimy, storm. Indeed, the entire glandscape had the appearance of nothing less than limpness as though all hint of life or vitality had been bled from every object.

“Zoroaster!” growled Bill. “Looks like this place has a terminal vitamin deficiency!”

“Grim, eh? Arrrr! I think we've traveled a bit off course, matey, and even now find ourselves upon the Fabled Isthmus of Impotence.”

Bill cringed, filled with instant fear. The very term was anathema to an alcohol-blooded Trooper of the Empire, striking terror deep within the much-cherished macho self-image that was the eternal legacy of male-dominated society. Or something like that. And he wasn't worried about “Fabled” or “Isthmus.” It was that terrible “I” word that got him.

“But this is supposed to be the all-powerful Over-Gland, fueled by the powerful chemical reactions of the collective overactive Ids of billions of human beings!” Bill suggested.

Rick shrugged. “Maybe it had a tough day at the office.”

“No. It must be something more than that. I've got the feeling, in fact, that it's something very important.” He scanned the stale, flat, underwhelming territory. “We have got to figure this out. Do you have any idea of what is happening?”

“In a word — no.”

“But you know, Bill,” Bill said in a strange and hollow voice. “I didn't say that,” he said, clapping his hands over his mouth.

“I heard you say it,” Rick cannily observed.

“This is your friend, the good Dr. Delazny,” Bill said again in the same strange voice. “Speaking to you through the benefit of post-hypnotic impression. If you are hearing this now it is because you find yourself in a situation that your teeny-tiny brains cannot understand or explain. Therefore I, or at least my voice, is here to help. That you have activated this particular pseudo-memory means that you are now discovering something new about human beings. Common knowledge to the medical profession, but shocking news to you dummies that even within the young overexcited stud, there is still some part that the surging hormones do not affect. This must be the symbolic part that I have mentioned to you before, though you probably weren't listening — the neo-cortex. The source of logic and reason in mankind.”

“Naw,” said Rick. “This place is much too big for that.”

Bill spoke again in his new voice, muffled a bit since he had both hands over his mouth. “You jokers will have to figure this out for yourselves since I am really not there. Perhaps you have reached the Fountain of Hormones that you were supposed to find. Get to work. Over and out.”

Rick scratched his chin. He surveyed the territory again. “What about that castle over there, Bill?”

“What castle?” he said in his usual gravelly voice. Then yipped with pleasure. “It's gone! It's me talking again!”

“Wonderful. I liked the other voice better. It had something to say. Now we're on our own again. Over there, see it? On the hill. The clouds are just lifting even as I speak.”

Sure enough, as Bill looked to the spot that Rick had indicated, he saw the cottony sheath of gray clouds lifting like a curtain on the next section of a play, revealing the battlements of a particularly flat-looking castle with stubby towers and a droopy flag dangling from a droopy mast.

“Surely we can knock on that castle's doors and ask for directions!” Rick suggested, his spirits plainly rising.

After a quick, if soggy trek, they found themselves standing before the portcullis of the castle.

“Yoo-hoo!” called Rick. “Is anyone home? We are but weary, hungry and thirsty travelers searching for a warm fire, a cold drink of — water, maybe a hot meal and simple directions!”

A door opened behind the guardian bars of the portcullis. A nose peeked out. “Who's there!” whined a nasal voice, reminiscent of a chipmunk with a bad head cold.

“Rick and Bill!” said the Supernal Hero in the friendliest, most diplomatic voice he could manage.

“Rick and Bill aren't here!”

The door slammed shut. Bill pounded on the metal-studded wood slats of the portcullis. “Hey, bowbhead. We're Rick and Bill! We need some help!”

“Please, Bill,” hissed Rick. “We need to be a little friendlier if we want to get anywhere. We're not exactly in a Trooper barracks, you know.”

Thank Zoroaster for that, thought Bill, who had taken to wearing body armor to bed after that spate of D.I. murders by recruits in the Beta Dacroni Sector. Officials claimed it was the effect of Zeta-wave radiation from the primary that had driven the killers out of their teeny-tinys — but Bill knew the truth. After all, he'd been a recruit once, under the heel of the much-loathed, always-feared, Deathwish Drang. One of his dearest dreams during those months of grueling torture, a dream undoubtedly shared by everyone else in the barracks, had been to preside over the torture and eventual execution of Drang.

The door creaked open and the nose peered out again. “Oh! You're Rick and Bill. And ye say you want directions? Well, heh-heh, you go to hell — and I'll tell you how to find that!”

“Actually,” cried Rick, desperately, “we're salesmen! Right! And we're selling Grandma Goldfarb's Old Fashioned Monkey-Liver Hair Restorer, along with a special offer, today only, on Grandpa Goldfarb's Guardia Gorilla-Gland Potency Serum! Think about that — have you ever seen an undersexed gorilla? The answer, of course, is no. And it — it —” said Rick, running out of inspiration.

The door squeaked back open tentatively, and the nose stuck out again. “Don't need hair restorer much,” it wheezed (and Bill could see from the tangled growths of hair coming from the nostrils that this statement was quite true). “But there has been a slight problem around here lately that the latter potion might resolve.” A moment of silence; Bill could almost hear the rusty gears grinding. “Very well, strangers. Put down your weapons, and I'll take you in for an audience with the master.”

Gladly, Bill and Rick removed their swords and daggers and threw them on the ground. The door of the castle swung open all the way, and a narrow man in a shapeless hat from which a tangle of limp hair hung down to his shoulders leaned out. Seeing that they were disarmed he hit a lever, and with a cranking wheeze and a rattle of chains the portcullis slowly clanked up. “Walk this way,” he said through a protuberant nose, his small badger eyes gesturing them to follow. The tall thin man spun round and stumbled rapidly away, clicking his heels against the stone floor with every step.

Bill and Rick attempted the strange loping shuffle and click, but to little effect. By the time they'd reached the courtyard of the castle, they'd given up entirely.

“Did you read that sign?” asked Rick.

“Sign?” said Bill. “What sign? I'm was too busy trying to walk this ridiculous walk.”

“Maybe it's significant. I better just run back and take a look.”

Bill continued on after the strange-looking man, stepping out into the gray daylight of the courtyard. The first thing that he was aware of was that the man who'd let them in had disappeared. The second was the dozens of unsheathed swords and arrowheads pointed toward his most vulnerable body. Connected to said weapons was a collection of the ugliest creatures Bill had ever seen in his life, and Bill had seen some very ugly things, especially after a good drink and looking into the mirror. Orcs and trolls crouched and slobbered, brandishing pointed weapons. Gnomes and dwarves raised axes and knives.

“Here we go, Bill!” said Rick from back in the passageway. “It's a bit dim back here, but I think I can read it. Says, 'Abandon ... Hope ... All ... Ye ... Who ... Enter ... Here.' Now what do you suppose they mean by that, Bill?”

Bill didn't answer. He was too busy spinning about in a circle, looking for a way out.

Unhappily, with very little success.

IN LOW DUNGEON

The dungeon was the pits. Certainly not the most pleasant place in the universe, though there was a good possibility that it was fighting for bottom place as the worst. To help alleviate his black depression Bill tried to find a good side to look upon. It took some time. He finally came up with the feeble argument that, basically, perhaps he had to admit it was better than boot camp. The swill they fed him was superior, mixed up with the occasional cockroach for protein. In fact, since the mixture had apparently been left lying around for weeks after preparation, underneath the mold he scratched off, it tended to be fermented, which left Bill with a most satisfactory buzz. Though it didn't exactly make him drunk since he was only presented with this repulsive feast at intervals, at least he didn't have to stay sober all of the time.

Cruel fate! Would he never have a chance to see his cherished Irma again?

Bill despaired of the very hope of it, muttering and moaning damp-eyedly to himself in self-pity. It was very cathartic.

The one thing that irked him the most here though, were the chains. There were rings around his neck, his wrists and his arms, and these were connected to thick, heavy chains that were in turn connected to the wall. When he was sleeping or when he was just sitting, they weren't too bad, but they made moving around very difficult. Since it wasn't likely that he'd be able to get through the non-existent windows, or the narrow bars, he didn't see the purpose of the chains, so they were particularly annoying. He complained about them every time the hunchback came to feed him and change his slop-bucket, but since the bent little dwarf seemed to be deaf, as well as simple, it did little good.

Too bad about that business in the courtyard.

By hindsight, 20-20 hindsight, it looked like it really hadn't been such a great idea to come to this particular castle after all. It had seemed such a harmless enough castle, and who could have predicted the army of creatures awaiting them in the courtyard. If only they hadn't come up with that Gorilla-Gland business — then the shambling servant wouldn't have let them in, and they wouldn't have had to try and prove its efficacy, with dozens of weapons trained on them. Naturally, since it did not exist, Rick had the really wonderful idea of pretending that his flask full of wine was the special medicine they were hawking. “To be rubbed on locally,” he'd explained. “Arrrrrr! As a matter of fact, this is a sample. Why don't you just keep it and use it at your leisure. Meanwhile, my companion and I must push off and be about our business.”

Unfortunately, the assembled bestiary had insisted upon a demonstration of the efficacy of the medicine then and there, stripping their captives of their trousers and then splashing the “Gorilla-Gland” fluid on the appropriate parts.

Predictably, the results were less than impressive. If anything, the chilled wine had the reverse, shrinking effect. The muttering grew in volume, nor were they at all convinced when Rick shouted out that it sometimes took a while to take effect.

Alas, not one troll, not one dwarf, nor even an orc, bought this line. The duo were dutifully marched off to separate dungeons without even the dignity of the return of their trousers.

So here was Bill, rotting away in the dark. He'd no idea at all how many days had passed, since there was no difference here in the smelly hay-strewn cell between day and night. There was just the occasional serving of fermented swill to mark the crawling passage of time.

Oh well, thought Bill. This wasn't exactly the Vulcanian Riviera, but at least he could loaf around all day on his back and get some much-needed rest. For as long as he could remember, his life had been just go-go-go! If there wasn't a group of raw recruits to train and mutilate, it was some hare-brained emergency to deal with. Besides, here he could actually do something that he hadn't done much in years and years.

Sleep.

Ever since that recruiter had come stumping along with that one-robot band and signed him up for the service, Bill had forgotten how very much he truly enjoyed a good bit of the good old sack time.

Now, without electronic reveille electrically juicing up every fiber of his being, not to mention his body, at some repulsive early hour of the morning, he found that he could drift in the restful pools of somnolence for delirious long stretches, and so for awhile he did just that, putting paid to his sleep debt. But when Bill got his fill of sleeping, it really did get boring after awhile; he realized that there really wasn't much else to do down here!

Fortunately, after the first day or two (three? five? twenty?) of mildly alcohol-numbed tedium, Bill remembered that he'd brought along a book. Or rather, many books, come to think of it! Yes! For still there in his sinus cavity was the BLEEDER'S DIGEST he had so fortuitously lifted from the Terminal Ward at the Hospital on Colostomy IV.

And one of the books, it turned out, was a very large shared-universe theme collection entitled HERETICS IN HADES. As Bill had thoroughly enjoyed a previous shared-universe anthology he'd read entitled DEBTOR'S WORLD, he dove into the spine-connected readout with great glee:

HERETICS IN HADES

“Gilganosh Meets Two Pulp Fiction Writers”

by

Robot Goldilocks

“War is Hell”

Popular military expression.

If Gilganosh was truly born with the dead lo! so many centuries ago, then now he truly was bored of the dead.