Bill 3 - on the Planet of Bottled Brains (11 page)

“You are an experienced trooper, I believe, and therefore trained for hand-to-hand combat?”

“Well, yeah, I suppose so,” Bill said, remembering all the battles he had been in, the ones that he could not avoid of course. “I have had the odd experience on the field of battle.”

“Great. And you can command men?”

“Now wait a minute,” Bill said, “I'm no officer. I was one once. I had a field promotion. Then I had a field demotion. I think I have had enough of that old officer bowb.”

“Not as an officer. I mean on the squad or platoon level.”

“Yeah, sure. Lots of that. I was even a DI. But anyway, so what? You're an officer. That's what captain means, doesn't it? So you ought to take charge yourself.”

“Oh, I will,” Dirk said. “But I must stay behind the lines where I can consult with Splock. But you see, I need a commander in the field, someone who will convey my orders to the troops.”

“Now wait just a minute,” Bill protested. Knowing that even before the words had left his mouth it was too late.

So that was how Bill found himself leading the Fifth and Second (Valerian) legions against Genghis Khan and about a million of his Huns.

Since the Alien Historian had already changed the history of Earth by protecting Julius Caesar from assassination by Brutus and his buddies, many opposing political factions had sprung up. Caesar, of course, was the outstanding military genius of his age, perhaps even better than Alexander, so he had kept supremacy over most of these hordes. That was up until now.

Not that Splock thought so. “This is not going well for Caesar, Captain. Or for us.”

“You are a negative old pointy-eared bastard, but have summed up the situation with precision, Mr Splock.”

“Thank you. I have no emotions, so neither your praise nor your insults means anything at all to me. But I thank you anyhow for respecting my intellect and ignore with disdain, if I had the emotions to show disdain, your stupid remark about my ears.”

“What are we going to do?” Bill asked, easing slowly backwards away from the approaching army. His only answer was silence.

As they watched with more than a little interest, the forces of Genghis Khan advanced on their armored yaks. They bore fearsome spears and weapons of every sort and variety. They had huge kettle drums, one to each side of a horse, and cadaverous warriors beat these drums and other even more cadaverous warriors blew trumpets and howled in a thoroughly obnoxious Asiatic manner. Their armies charged along the bank of the Tiber, extending in their serried ranks as far as the eye could see. The Roman troops were looking resolute but nervous, like men who have been brought unfairly into trouble not of their own making. Some of the foremost men were already backing away from contact with these screaming, grinning devils with their horses and camels and strange weapons and their spirit of plunder and murder. Cooties and lice and maybe even crabs and spiders on their unwashed bodies and lank filthy hair.

“It isn't fair,” Dirk said. “Genghis Khan doesn't even belong in this period. How did the Huns get here?”

“That,” Splock said, “is less important than what we are going to do about them.”

“Any ideas?” Dirk asked.

“Just a moment,” Splock said. “I'm thinking. Or rather, thought being lightning-fast, I'm reviewing the thoughts I had when the problem just came up.”

“And?” Dirk prompted.

“I have an idea,” Splock said. “It's a remote chance, but perhaps we can bring it off. Hold them for as long as you can, Captain. Bill, come with me.”

“And what about me?” Illyria-cum-Chinger cried out shrilly as they almost walked on her. “You should show a little consideration!”

“Of course, sure, we didn't forget you,” Bill said, realizing they had forgotten her. “Stick with the captain. Keep an eye on him. Be right back. I hope.” He looked at Splock suspiciously. “Where are we going?”

“We are going to save the Earth as we know it.” Splock took Bill's hand and, with his free hand, made an adjustment to the miniature control panel on his belt. There was a sound of thunder and multiple flashes of lightning. Bill didn't even have time for a good gasp. Suddenly he felt space and time dissolve around him. An icy wind blew around his chops, and he felt himself lifted and carried away by a gigantic wind which was none other than the Wind of Time itself.

After a period of whirling sounds and flashing lights and uncanny smells, Bill found himself standing on a barren plain, or perhaps it was a desert. Bill wasn't too sure. It was colored brown and seemed to be composed mainly of gravel, with some larger rocks for comic relief. Here and there were a few bedraggled thorn bushes, barely subsisting in this dry, sere place. Splock was standing beside him, consulting a small map which he had taken out of the pouch at his waist.

“This ought to be the place,” Splock said, frowning, his ears twitching, “Unless this is an out-of-date map. Temporal currents change without notice, so you can't always be sure —”

There was a loud bellowing noise behind them. Bill jumped straight up in the air and whirled, reaching for the weapons he didn't have strapped to his waist.

Splock turned more slowly, as was suitable for someone of his intellect.

“It's just the camel men,” Splock said.

“Oh,” Bill said. “The camel men. Of course. You didn't mention them before now.”

“I didn't think it necessary,” Splock said. “I thought you could figure out that much for yourself.”

Bill didn't bother to reply that he had had no clues. Splock was one of these very intelligent people who always have an answer for everything and whose explanations make you feel more stupid than you actually are. Or so you hope.

The two camel men, mounted on their high dromedaries, had been waiting patiently. Now one of them addressed Splock in a strange language which Bill's translator, after a moment of fumbling, managed to translate into English.

“Greetings, Effendi.”

“Greetings,” Splock said. “Please be so good as to take us to your leader.”

The camel drivers chattered among themselves in a language, or more likely, a dialect, which Bill's computer didn't have in its repertoire. Whatever it was, Splock seemed to know it, and he broke in with a few well-chosen words which left the camel men laughing in an embarrassed and somewhat respectful fashion.

“What did you say to them?” Bill asked.

“Just a pleasantry,” Splock said. “It loses a lot in the translation.”

“Tell me anyway,” Bill said.

“I told them, may your camel tracks never cross the dismal swamp that leads to the stygian darkness.”

“And they laughed?”

“Of course. I used a variant for swamp which can also be construed as meaning 'May your tailbone never suffer the multiple indignities of being kicked around the oasis by the Sultan's bodyguards.' A neat bit of linguistic legerdemain if I may say so myself.”

The camel drivers had finished jabbering excitedly between themselves. Now the elder of the two, with the short black beard and the bulging dark eyes, said, “Mount up behind us. We will take you to The Boss.”

They got up behind the camel drivers and set forth. At first Bill thought they were going toward the distant mountains. But soon he could make out a square shape far ahead, and battlements, and towers. It was a city they were going to, and a big one.

“What is that place?” Bill asked.

“That ahead of us is Carthage,” Splock said. “You've heard of Carthage, haven't you?”

“Where Hannibal came from?”

“You got it in one,” Splock said.

“Why are we going there?”

“Because,” Splock explained with great patience, “I'm going to make Hannibal an offer he can't refuse. At least I hope he can't.”

“Elephants,” Hannibal said. “They were my undoing. Did you ever try to refuel a squadron of elephants in the Alps in January?”

“Sounds difficult,” Bill said. He was interested to note that Hannibal spoke Punic with a slight southern accent, really a South Balliol Lisp. It threw a new light on this famous man, though Bill wasn't sure what it meant. Neither did his translator, which had pointed out this totally boring fact.

“I had it all there,” Hannibal said. “Rome was so cwose to being mine, I could taste it. Tasted wather armpitty and garlicky too. Victory within my grasp! And then that damned Fabius Cunctator with his delaying tactics put paid to my dweam. I could handle him now, beweive me, but at the time delay was a new military tactic. Pwevious to that, it had just been ignorant armies clashing by night and that sort of booshaw. Well, no sense cwying over spilt kvass. Now, what do you strange looking barbarians want? Speak quickly or I'll have you gutted.”

“We are here to give you another opportunity,” Splock said, talking very fast.

Hannibal was a tall, well-built man. He wore a polished cuirass and a gleaming brass and bronze helmet. They were in Hannibal's audience room at the time. It was not really a major audience room. Hannibal had suffered defeat, and therefore he wasn't allowed to use the main audience room. This was a small audience room put aside for the use of unsuccessful generals. On a sideboard there were sweetmeats, doves' tongues in aspic, french fried mice, that sort of thing, and flasks of tarry wine. Bill had already wandered over to the sideboard, since Splock seemed to have this part of the talk well in hand. There were little pots resting in wire cradles over heating elements which burned olive oil. Bill sampled one of the pots. It tasted like curried goat droppings. He spat it out; it probably was.

“Mind if I try one of these?” he asked Hannibal, pointing to the wine pots.

“Go wight ahead,” Hannibal said. “The one in the big jug on the end is wather nice. No tar like the others.”

Bill sampled it, tasted, liked what he tasted, glugged another swig.

“Zoinks! What is that stuff?” he asked.

“Palm whiskey,” Hannibal said. “Made only in the Highlands of Carthaginia. By an awfully secret pwocess called distilazione.”

“Terrific,” Bill said, swilling more.

Hannibal returned to his conversation with Splock. This was carried out in low voices, and Bill wasn't much interested anyhow. The palm whiskey had entirely claimed his attention and was quickly destroying his cerebral cortex. He nibbled at some of the repulsive food, which was beginning to taste good, which was a bad sign, then swigged down more of the palm whiskey. Life was not looking too bad at the moment. Bleary, but not bad. Things looked even better when, in response to an unseen signal, or perhaps because it was the regular time for their appearance, a troupe of dancing girls came through the archway, accompanied by three musicians with complicated-looking instruments made of gourds and catgut.

“Hey now!” Bill said. “This is more like it!”

The dancing girls looked toward Hannibal, but he was deep in conversation with Splock and waved them away. They turned to Bill, formed a line in front of him, and started to dance. They were the best kind of dancing girls, tall, wide of hip and generous of breast, with legs that never stopped. Bill's type entirely. They danced for him with many a flirtatious gesture, like removing their veils one by one while doing a grind and a bump; the musicians grinned and pounded and strummed on their strange instruments; tumescence surged and Bill asked the cute dancer on the end nearest him what she was doing after the show, but she didn't seem to understand Punic.

The dance went on for quite a while, more boring now since they put the veils back on after noticing the effect on Bill. Long enough for Bill to get pleasantly smashed on the palm whiskey, and to burn his mouth on the little green chillies he hadn't noticed he was eating. He was about to ask the musicians if they knew a couple of old songs Bill had learned when he was a kid, but before he got the chance Hannibal and Splock seemed to come to some sort of an agreement. They shook hands and got up and strolled over to Bill. Hannibal made a gesture and the musicians and dancers packed up and left quickly.

“So, it's all settled,” Splock said. “Hannibal himself is going to come to our aid. He'll bring five of his crack elephant squadrons. I've assured him we'll handle all the details of servicing his elephants.”

“Thash great,” Bill said, with some difficulty. He felt like his tongue was wearing a spacesuit. “Didn't seem too difficult, either, neither, wazzah.”

“No, I was sure that Hannibal would want a return engagement against the Romans. There was just one trifling condition that I had to agree to.”

“What was that?” Bill asked.

Splock hesitated. “I'm afraid you might not like this. But you are so smashed I doubt if you will notice. And you did say you'd do whatever you could to help.”

“Whassaht?”

“The Carthaginians have a most interesting custom. Their aid to allies is conditional on a hero from the ranks of said ally agreeing to meet the Carthaginian champion.”

“And whossaht?” Bill mouthed dimly, barely aware of the import of Splock's words.

“The word he used was quite unfamiliar to me,” Splock said. “I couldn't tell you whom they meant. Or what.”

“You mean not man...maybe a...thing?” Bill blinked rapidly as some dim bit of meaning trickled down through alcohol-laden synapses.

Splock nodded. “This is the sort of problem you encounter when you go to the ancient world. Never mind, a trained trooper like you ought to make short work of it, whatever it is.”

“What happens if I lose?” Bill asked, sobering rather quickly.

“Not to worry. Hannibal has agreed to help even if you are killed.”

“Oh, yeah, wonderful.” Sobriety struck like poisoned lightning at this threat to mortality. “Splock, you pointed-eared son of a bitch — what have you gotten me into? I don't even have any of my weapons with me.”

“Improvisation,” Splock said, “is the first quality of a well-trained soldier. And you can lay off all the ear-insults.”

“Come,” said Hannibal, interrupting their friendly chat, “we can hold the contest immediately.”

Bill reached for the palm whiskey, then decided against it. In fact, uncharacteristically, he was cold sober and regretting it.

Now to tell of the dueling ground of the Carthaginians.