Read Bill 4 - on the Planet of Tasteless Pleasure for Free Online Page B

and a stream of lightning shot down, hurtling between his legs and blasting the ground not a yard from Bill's butt. “Move further and kiss the family jewels goodbye!”
    This sounded anatomically improbable, but Bill nonetheless decided it would be best to heed the command, since the smell of charred lamb and garlic in the air was a heavy reminder of Bruce's fate. “I'm convinced!” he shrieked. “I'm not moving! Don't zap me!”
    The ladies murmured amongst themselves, then one leaned down off the cloud, scrutinizing Bill, distaste edging suspicious anger. “My name is Hymenestra, leader of the Furries. Guardians of the Doves Above! Our mystical needles have hopped off their moorings! We have reason to believe that one of our sacred charges hast been stricken down, yea, unto Death! Knowest thou ought of this, mortal?”
    Bill grimaced, trying to keep the dead dove hidden behind his back. “No, gee. Absolutely nothing!”
    One of the other ladies leaned over the edge of the clouds, peering down upon the ground. “My name is Vulvania. Whyest do I seest bird feathers strewnest about yon area?”
    “Uhm,” said Bill. “Bruce and I, er, uhm.... We were having a pillow fight. Yeah! That's what was happening!”
    The third lady leaned over and pointed a stiff finger. “My name is G-spotstra. Whatest is that you are obscuring behindest thy posterior, mortal?”
    “Hmm? Oh, this? What's that doing here?” Bill took out the dove. Its wings and head hung down pathetically; somehow the letter X had appeared over both of its eyes. “Oh! Yes, Bruce.... Remember? The satyr you cooked over there. Yes. He asked me to hold on to it. Old Bruce smells pretty good. You ladies wouldn't have some pita bread and some lemon on you, would you?”
    The ground seemed to shake with thunder as Hymenestra roared. “Lying male abomination! Of coursest, that isest the general description of thy breed! Thou hastest killed one of our Doves! Oh woest uponest thou head!”
    More thunder crashed, more lightning flashed. The ladies conferred amongst one another, muttering vile imprecations. Bill decided that the heat of a pulsar beam battle between Chinger dreadnoughts and Empire cruisers was a far preferable place to be.
    “Very wellest!” cried Hymenestra after the lengthy conference. “We chargest thou with guilt, pure and simplest! Thou hast killed a sacred Dove! We perceive that you are a man of war! How like all men! So eager to perpetrate death and destruction upon thyest neighbor at the slightest provocation! Very well, you have brought our curse down upon you, insect! Be-est thou visited with the Grime of the Aging Marinator!”
    The ladies suddenly heaved up great masses of glop from the bottom of their cloud and chucked these at Bill. His Trooper reflexes jerked his body away from the first splash of glop, but the second caught him full in the face, and he could feel the third striking him in the midsection. The stuff had the consistency of pureed roc guano and had the astringent stench of bilge water at the bottom of a sea-cruiser after a week-long rum party below-decks. Bill felt himself being hurled about willy-nilly by forces of which he had no conception.
    When the shaking had ceased, he found himself face first staring at trampled grass, quite dirty and quite confused. He heaved himself up off the ground, and wiped the odorous stuff from his face and body. In doing so, his hands hit upon something that hung from his neck. Very quickly, he determined that it was the dead dove, its breast pierced by a leather thong, which in turn was tied around his neck.
    Moreover, the dove was beginning to stink.
    Bill, of course, made to take this off. However, the knot in the leather thongs seemed to have defied his mud-slippery fingers.
    “Beholdest thou the Curse of the Grime of the Aging Marinator!” bellowed the voice of Hymenestra from On High. "Thou canst not remove the dead avian until thou satisfiest two conditions. Onest:
    "Thou