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dive into a larger crater for cover. One more large explosion, and he leaped
out and forward again. He looked back and waved an arm to summon his comrades.
"Follow me," he shouted.
He vaulted an overturned hovercar and ducked behind it to see if they were
coming.
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Bill, the Galactic Hero The Final Incoherent Adventure
Sam and Sid weren't nearly as good at this as Bill was, but they were getting
the hang of it. Fortunately, the Imperial Troopers weren't strafing; they
weren't even attacking seriously. The bodyguards caught up, but before they
could catch their breath Bill led them on a final dash across the last few
yards into one of the few buildings still standing.
The two Eyerackians collapsed, gasping, into the nearest chairs. Bill,
however, had not yet reached his goal, and he marched up to the counter.
"Three SuperHestburgers, three double beers. Fast," he said. "To stay." He
turned back to Sid and Sam.
"What do you guys want?"
An explosion rattled the windows, and the girl behind the counter ducked for
cover. By the time she reemerged, Bill had the rest of his order. "One
Chilly-Chili, One Horse Dog, a large Tranqui-Cola."
He carried the trays over to their table.
"Gee, Bill, we were sure lucky."
"Yeah, imagine finding an open Burger Barn. I haven't had a burger since ...
since ... maybe I've never had one before. But I've seen the commercials!"
Bill washed down the first burger with the first beer, in one gulp each.
The girl behind the counter turned on the holovision. A miniature President
Grotsky, a little thinner than when Bill had met him and looking more than
ever just like Sam and Sid, stood on the counter. "The war is going about as
well as can be expected," he said, "under the circumstances. Casualties are
pretty high on both sides, and there's a lot of nasty stuff falling out of the
sky all over rockets, bombs, shrapnel, pieces of airplanes and spaceships. I
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really suggest you stay indoors. The underground malls and tunnel trains are a
good idea. Personally, I'm planning on staying in my bunker for the time
being."
"Gee, poor old Millard doesn't sound terribly inspirational, does he, Sid?"
"No, Sam, he doesn't. But he is under a lot of pressure, after all."
"True enough, Sid. But at least he doesn't have to eat at Burger Barn." Sam
poked reluctantly at his
Horse Dog. "I don't think there's even any real horse in this thing."
"Doesn't have to?" Bill said with artificial ingredients dripping down his
chin. "All this stuff is made from real processed meat-like food-type product.
You can't get anything this good in the Troopers."
Sid nodded. "That explains why they're so aggressive."
Bill shoveled the last of his meal into his mouth, chewed two or three times,
and swallowed.
"Uuurrrppp," he eructed. "That was good. What's our next stop?"
"The neutron mine. At least we'll be safe there. Everything's underground,
including the barracks where we'll be staying. Some of the bombs were a little
too close for comfort last night."
"You worry too much. They didn't even come close to the hotel." After a week
of touring in areas that were under attack, Bill had gotten blasé about it.
Since nobody was really aiming at him, he didn't take it as personally as he
did when he was still aboard the
Heavenly Peace
. Although secretly he was happily looking forward to getting into a nice,
safe, deep mine.
Sam gathered the trays and carried them over to the recycling bin, where the
trash would be reprocessed into more GungeBurgers. He stopped at the counter
to see General Weissearse's latest press briefing on the holovision.
A junior officer introduced him. "Heeeere's Wormy!"
A military band played the general's theme music, the reporters broke into
applause, and Stormy Wormy
Weissearse came through the curtains onto the stage. He let the applause go on
for a while, then said
"Thank you, thank you." As the crowd grew quiet, he continued, "How many
Eyerackians does it take to
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Bill, the Galactic Hero The Final Incoherent Adventure screw in a light
bulb?"
The press corps, right on cue, shouted in unison, "How many?"
"Only two, but they have to be really tiny."
The mandatory uproarious laughter stopped at the general's signal.
"In the last twenty-four hours, Imperial forces launched just over twelve
million missions against
Eyerack, bringing the total for the war so far to nearly one hundred fifty
million. Almost the entire
Eyerackian air defense was eliminated five days ago, but six missiles were
fired at Imperial ships from mobile launchers today.
"Our precision bombing was concentrated on defense industries today. We have a
randomly selected and completely unedited tape to show the results of one of
these attacks."
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