ZorkFox's Stories

The Replacement Condemned

2008-06-13T05:41:50Z

It was a shitty day—the day they killed me in place of the queen. “Off with her head! Off with her head!” was all they could shout. So original!

Never mind I didn’t look a thing like the queen: she has brown hair, halfway down her back, I have (or, rather, had) blond. She has this little nose that turns up just so at the end—very cute—while I had this narrow schnoz, thin as a blade. Too bad I couldn’t use it as a weapon. They put a thick veil over my face, said it was to protect the queen’s dignity as she strode to the chopping block.

Call me treasonous, but anyone walking to her well-deserved death hasn’t got a right to any dignity. Things she pulled, you ask me, she’s lucky they didn’t garrote her right there in the ambassador’s receiving chamber. But no, it had to be a public execution.

Why me, instead of her, you ask.

I’ll tell you.

Skyler of Amber

2008-06-06T06:31:55Z

Sorry I kept you waiting so long, said Mom in my head.

“I thought… maybe you weren’t coming back,” I said, unable to hide either my relief or my disappointment.

I haven’t yet, Mom replied, but if you pull me through, we can talk face to face.

I reached out a hand, felt her grasp it, pulled, and she appeared next to my bed from a rainbow-colored warp in the air: Dierdre of Amber. She wasn’t dressed for combat, as the last time I’d seen her, but rather in traveling clothes that would go largely unnoticed almost anywhere on Earth. Her black hair was still short and upswept, so shiny it almost appeared lacquered.

She held my hand for several seconds, squeezing, then touched my cheek. “Skyler, I’m so happy to see you.” And then we were hugging, and I tried my hardest not to cry, but damn it—_you_ try living seventy years without your mother, no idea what happened to her, and no way to get back home.

“What kept you?” I asked, still holding to her.

“Death.”

One Princess in Amber

2008-06-02T03:48:38Z

I woke at midnight on the day of my one hundredth birthday.

Some sound, perhaps some presence, had stirred my mind. I could see no one in the shadows of my bedroom, but that meant little. Perhaps it had been a dream. But no—I could feel into the corners of the room, into the closet, the hall, the space above the ceiling, and knew someone was near. Moreover, I knew it was someone familiar to me.

One hundred years of relative peace and quiet; now this. I couldn’t tell if the mystery visitor had eyes on me, just that someone was paying attention, the way you might apprehend someone reading over your shoulder.

I had a gun in my nightstand, a knife wedged under my mattress: I’ve had an interesting life filled mostly with whatever interests and challenges I chose to pursue, but every now and then, like the evolutionary theory of punctuated equilibrium, I met someone or something that hungered for that life.

This is not one of those times, Skyler, said a voice in my mind, familiar indeed.

“Hello, Mother.”

Footprints 2: The Quickening

2008-05-24T00:44:44Z

“The times when you have seen only one set of footprints in the sand is when I carried you.”

That was the last straw. Until now I had been polite about the whole thing, wanting to give the LORD the benefit of the doubt. “Bullshit!” I crowed. You should have seen the look on His face; you’d think the LORD would be all hip about that kind of language.

“What was that?” He asked, pretending like the sound of an incoming wave had masked my angry ejaculation.

“You heard me, Dickhead,” I said, wondering at the celestial autocorrect that kept capitalizing all references to the LORD . What kind of prick sets up a filter like that? “I said ‘bullshit’ and I meant it. ‘I carried you’ my ass.”

“You don’t trust Me?” He asked, coming to a halt, feet in the surf.

“Hell no,” I said, scowling. “You were sly about it, but I saw You teleport to that Starbucks three miles back. You told me to ‘look at the lovely colors of the sunrise’ when You did it, hoping I wouldn’t see.”

“Oh,” He said, looking embarrassed. “Fuck.”

It's Always the Person You Least Expect

2008-05-16T05:59:12Z

“Wait, wait—wait a minute, Jerry. Stop talking.” Mom never could listen straight through a story without interrupting, whether to ask a question or make tea or use the toilet. Today it was a question: “What do you mean you’re God?”

I had to wait a beat. My internal sense of comedic timing would not be denied. I nodded, spread my hands wide, said it again.

“This is a very poor joke, Jerry.”

I explained as seriously as I could manage that it was, indeed, not a joke.

“You’re making fun of me, Jerry. I know you’ve parted ways with church and Jesus Christ our savior but that doesn’t mean you can… can…. I won’t have it.”

I created tea for her out of nowhere, incidentally restoring a piece of china she’d been missing for years, and waved away the pressure in her bladder as an afterthought. “The really ironic part for me,” I said, “is that science proved my existence.You see, there was always a finite probability that I already was God.”

Unique Business Card

2008-05-12T14:44:46Z

Rachel watched him from the moment he entered the bar. She occupied a rear booth, and was accompanied by a Jack Daniels on the rocks—per usual. Her attire would have been unremarkable in an office setting except to identify her to all men as a slut. Most women would view her as a stylish knockout, but this different perspective wouldn’t have prevented them hating her.

Rachel didn’t do office work; at least not in the traditional sense. This booth was her office, and the bartender kept it open for her, as well as supplying the Jack whenever she chose to lift a finger.

This guy wasn’t her typical clientèle. He approached her diffidently; almost as if he didn’t know why he was here. He, too, was dressed for an office: tie unfastened and askew, shirt unbuttoned. His expression told her he didn’t want to talk about what he wanted.

Rachel, not in the mood for equivocation, gave the man her business card.

Rachel C. Daws
Pickpocket
Loose Woman

“What is it you think I can do for you?” she asked politely.

The Last Window

2008-05-11T04:46:41Z

It had been a long, tiring day, but it was the last one: the last day, the last window. After this he would move on to another city, then another country, then another continent.

He had decided to walk it: from Tel Aviv to Tel Aviv, all the way around the world. He’d use a boat when he had to, but otherwise it was all going to be on foot. There was no one left to get in his way: no more borders, no more guards, no more checkpoints. No more people. At least, no more people he knew about.

And that was part of the mission, really: to see if there were any more people. He had chosen his own method of locating them. He wasn’t broadcasting a radio signal, he wasn’t painting slogans on walls, he wasn’t setting off bombs or shouting from skyscrapers or driving around in a loud car, firing off rounds from an M-16.

But he had to attract attention somehow, if indeed there was attention to be attracted. He’d systematically walked the streets, found every one left.

He hefted a rock.

Flying Dragon

2008-05-10T20:01:19Z

“You wouldn’t like him when he’s angry.”

“Who?”

“My dragon.”

“I don’t see a dragon.”

“He’s on my face.”

“That’s… a tattoo, you crazy bitch.”

“Quite right.”

“If you cross your eyes, you’ll see the pinpoint from my laser sight alongside your nose. It’s impossible to miss at this range.”

“Kai-Lung can move faster than your bullet.”

“What—is that supposed to intimidate me? Keep me from killing you?”

“In thirty seconds or so, yes.”

“I should shoot you now.”

“Yes, but instead you’re curious.”

“A bit.”

“Think about the relief you’ll feel when it turns out I was bluffing and it really is just a tattoo.”

“I’ll have a good story to tell back on the farm.”

“Is that where they raise assassins these days?”

“It’s an industry term.”

“Your time is up. He’s awake now.”

“It’s still just ink, lady—as dead as you are.”

“Ignorant mortal: the ink is just a warning!“

She blinked, met his gaze with shining gold eyes.