"Harry Harrison & David Bischoff - Bill, The Galactic Hero 4 " - читать интересную книгу автора (Harrison Harry)

bottle of Old Granbowb.
"Damn, Doc. A man's gotta do what a man's gotta do. Drink. How else can a Trooper stay sane in this
criminally insane outfit? And a man needs the comforts that only a woman can bring!" Bill sniveled with
self pity, then sighed passionately as he thought about all his old girlfriends. And the young ones as well.
His battle-hardened musculature tensed as he thought about Meta, shipped out now to some godforsaken
strife-torn planet, fighting in this hellish but glorious Chinger conflict. Meta! Now there was a woman!
Those eyes! That chest! That tight, rounded rear end that put Inga-Maria Calyphigia's, back on
Phigerinadon II, to shame! But then, Meta was hardly the type of woman who would plant bare feet in a
kitchen and produce babies for the rest of her life. Meta was the kind of gal Bill's mother had warned him
about тАФ mentally, physically, emotionally his superior, with a sex drive that could power a starship, once
she got it in gear. And just as they'd gotten their relationship over the first hump, so to speak, the bowbing
Troopers had to detail her somewhere else. Bowb and double bowb!
Bill wondered if there was something going wrong with him. Had the Troopers left a shred of dignity and
humanity in his body? It didn't seem possible. Was he capable of love? Did he even know how to spell the
word? Was that what he was looking for? Was that why he was so restless of late? Was that why he'd
started smuggling TRUE SLUSHY SPACE ROMANCE comix inside the copies of BLOOD PORN
SPLATTER TALES that the recruits saw him reading?
Naw. What good was a regular woman, anyway? Like the Troopers said, a woman would make him stop
smoking, drinking to excess, swearing incontinently while lusting after anything female that strolled by
тАФ and weren't those the vital ingredients that life was really all about?
Dr. Latex Delazny looked down again at the readout from the computer. "Fascinating. Tell me Bill, do
you know anything about the endocrine system?"
"Isn't that the swamp and poison ocean worlds over by the Cassiopeian system?"
Doctor Delazny scratched angrily at the scruff on his balding head. He looked to be a man in his late
thirties, fine spiderwebs of wrinkles, as well as fine spiders, just starting to radiate from his eyes. He was
thin and distracted-seeming, as though his mind operated like a three ring circus, and he was far more
interested in the acrobatic act in the center than this clown act before him.
"No, you military moron. I'm talking about human physiology. The endocrine system, the pituitary, the
thyroid, the adrenals ... etcetera, etcetera. And of course, the sex glands. Human anatomy, sod-head! Don't
they teach you that in the Troopers?"
Bill shook his head in humble contrition.
"Important bodily functions, Bill. Particularly the sex glands. Did you know I have a PhD in
endocrinology? But do you think the Empire has any use for that? Bah. Feet and sphincters, sphincters
and feet. That's all they want me to work on. What a dreadful waste."
He was a tall, gangling scarecrow, looking as though he slept in his lab coat, which happened pretty often
anyway. But he still had certain strengths. Bill was particularly impressed by the way the doctor had been
able to put away Antarean Alkpee in the bar the other night.
Doctor Delazny mused boredly over the readouts on the table. "My goodness, Bill, talking about
secretion, your lower ductless glands seem particularly active. Most interesting, Trooper тАФ you seem to
have enough testosterone in your body to grow a beard on an elephant!"
Delazny peered at Bill appraisingly, and the Trooper felt suddenly uncomfortable at being moved to


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 Bill, the Galactic Hero on the Planet of Tasteless Pleasure

center stage.
"What about my foot, Doc? Remember, that's what I came in about."
Doctor Delazny cleared his throat, puffed out his chest and spoke out authoritatively.
"Trooper, what I'm prescribing for the time being is that you spend your sacktime and rectime here at the