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floor which was very interesting.
Particularly since all of the doors were locked.
"Eeek!" Bill gurgled. "We're trapped like rats."
"Don't give up, Bill! Try the window," Illyria advised.
Bill threw the window open and looked out at the straight drop below. Then at
the rain gutters. Leaning out he tested the nearest one that ran above the
window. They seemed strong enough; they were bronze and half an inch thick,
and fastened to the side of the building with heavy copper rivets. They really
knew
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Bill, the Galactic Hero on the Planet of Bottled Brains how to build in these
days.
"We're going over the roof," Bill said, climbing out.
"Oh dear," Illyria said, pausing irresolute in the window. "I don't think I
can climb. I have hooves, you know."
"But you also have a snake's body. For your life, Illyria, slither!"
The brave Tsurisian girl in the mythological disguise backed out of the window
and wrapped her tail around a stanchion conveniently located some five feet
away. Trembling but resolute, she followed Bill onto the roof.
The rooftops of Carthage presented a multi-colored display of levels and
angles. The hot African sun beat down, because it was summer, and the cold
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African sun had gone to the underworld to rest and revive himself, or so it
was claimed in the ancient annals of the city. Bill raced across the rooftops,
scrambling up the higher levels and jumping down the lesser ones. Behind him
came armed soldiers, running clumsily in their heavy armor, lances at the
ready. As Bill raced along, with Illyria close behind and staying up, he felt
a tickling sensation under his tunic next to his ribs. He realized that it was
the Chinger lizard that had formerly been Illyria.
"Can you go back into the Chinger?" Bill asked, his breath coming in painful
pants.
"I forgot about the Chinger!" Illyria asked. "I don't know, but I can try!"
"No time like the present," Bill said, because some of the soldiers had
unbuckled their heavy armor and were coming along quickly now, gaining on him.
And ahead, directly in his path, Bill saw a high wall of polished marble. The
theater of Dionysus! The god of abandon was now blocking his way.
The lizard crawled out onto Bill's shoulder, took one look at the pursuing
soldiers, and started to duck back to shelter. Bill grabbed it before it could
go out of sight.
"Now, Illyria!" Bill cried.
"Just a moment," the Chinger said. "There's something I'd better explain. This
is Illyria, speaking to you from within this alien Chinger. It's a little
strange in here. What's that? No, it couldn't be! Oh, Bill, you'll never guess
what's happened!"
"So tell me," Bill panted. The soldiers now had him backed against a wall. The
chimera was looking around groggily, unused to being back within its own body
again. The Chinger, meanwhile, had gone glassy-eyed and limp. It was still
alive, but seemed to be in a semi-comatose state, or perhaps an entirely
comatose state; it was difficult to tell.
"Illyria? Speak to me!"
No answer from the somnolent lizard, lying with its four arms crossed
peacefully on its green chest.
A soldier prodded Bill with his spear. The others moved in. And at that moment
the chimera, released from Illyria's control, resumed its existence as a
deadly and dangerous beast. It breathed out twin gouts of flame, like dragons
do, and melted several shields. Then it turned to attack Bill.
"All right!" Bill cried. "Kill it, since you want to so badly!"
It was a tricky moment for Bill. The soldiers had to defend themselves against
the onslaught of the chimera, returned to itself and filled with mythological
fury. It attacked in a manner not seen since the days of Homer, and it emitted
loud goat-like bleatings as it charged. These unnerving sounds mounted the
scale into the supersonic, set the soldiers' teeth on edge, and set their
swords to chattering against their shields. The Chinger opened its eyes and
took one look at what was going on and scampered back for safety within Bill's
shirt, seeking the snug haven of Bill's left armpit, where it was sure harm
would not befall it. The soldiers finally managed to pin the chimera to the
wooden planking of the roof with their
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Bill, the Galactic Hero on the Planet of Bottled Brains sharp spears. The
chimera's sound output redoubled as it found itself wounded. Black dots
appeared in the sky and quickly resolved themselves into long-nosed
bare-breasted women with bat wings, all of them clad in snaky black evening
gowns. These were the Harpies, called out of their mythological slumber by the
wounded cries of their fellow fabulous creature. They dived onto the soldiers,
whose ranks had just been redoubled by the arrival of a double platoon of
Varangians, sent, as Bill was to learn later, by
Splock, who had anticipated this situation and had rushed back to the future
to get some help. The
Varangians were Swedish Russians, or possibly Russian Swedes, depending on
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whose history book you're reading, and they cared not a fig for the menace of
effete Graeco-Roman mythology. They laid about them with mighty strokes,
swinging their long battleaxes in shining circles, cutting down the
Carthaginian soldiery who couldn't get out of the way quickly enough.
"Go to it, boys!" Bill shouted, his built-in translator putting out his words
in middle Varangian, which none of these fellows understood since they were
Finnish Varangians from the marshlands around Lake
U" But they liked the sound of his voice and laid about them with renewed
.
vigor. The chimera was definitely bested. It gave one last shriek, which
started a minor earth tremor in the city walls, and expired.
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