Deviations: TelZodo
By Elissa Malcohn
TelZodo grinned and quickened his pace. He wrapped his fingers in greying hair and squeezed worm-coloured flesh. What was her name? Crossroads was so small now, that everybody knew each other’s names. They certainly all knew his.
It didn’t matter.
She had her exotic boy but he had her, thrusting hard while she gasped on the grass.
She spread her legs further apart, arching her back. Cried out a little, but she wasn’t there yet. She was just getting started. A virgin, this one. One who hadn’t had him before.
Then give her a good show, you bastard.
Her pants were off, crumpled, and thrown over his. TelZodo shoved his hands beneath her shirt, pushing thick cloth around her neck. Flaccid breasts, veins vanishing beneath pectoral fur. Sweat tracking to her navel. Stretch marks.
Tired of fucking Masari, are we?
She whispered, “Oh, gods,” from swollen lips.
TelZodo took his cue. He reared up, tugged on her hair, and rammed.
So much empty seed in him. So much death.
He coiled, his long limbs pinning hers. Her shirt wrapped more tightly around her neck. Purple crept up her cheeks. TelZodo grinned as she bucked beneath him, keeping up and shoving back. The old ones always did. He ground her into the dirt.
He was either her god or her toy, he still couldn’t tell. That didn’t matter, either.
He loosened the cloth when her face darkened a shade further. She ran her hands over him, clutching him to her like a magic thing. Like a relic in the flesh.
He clawed her wrinkled breasts and rode her puckered pubes. His muscled stomach lowered again, sliding against her thin skin, and thin fur. He smelled the Yata on her breath. His mouth came down hard on hers, his tongue darting out, tasting the remains of her meal.
Her squeals against him turned his belly into a rushing torrent. Lightning arced down his spine. TelZodo groaned and fountained in the deeps, spurting away everything that he was again and again and again and again.
And it didn’t matter, because everything he was, was nothing.
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Elissa Malcohn
Elissa Malcohn’s novelette “Lazuli” (Asimov’s, Nov. 1984) made her a 1985 John W. Campbell Award finalist for best new science fiction writer of the year. Her short story “Moments of Clarity” (Full Spectrum, Bantam, 1988) reached the preliminary ballot for the 1989 Nebula Awards. Commenting on “Moments of Clarity” in his review of Full Spectrum in the November 1988, Out of This World Tribune, Bruce D. Arthurs wrote, “This one story is worth the price of the entire book.”
Biography.
Elissa’s work also appears in publications that won awards in 2009. IPPY Silver Medalist Riffing on Strings: Creative Writing Inspired by String Theory (Scriblerus Press) contains her story “Arachne” (originally published in Aboriginal Science Fiction, Dec. 1988). Bram Stoker Award winner Unspeakable Horror: From the Shadows of the Closet (Dark Scribe Press) contains her story “Memento Mori.” Her story “Hermit Crabs” in Hugo Award winner Electric Velocipede (#14) and her novelette “Flotsam” in Asimov’s (Oct./Nov. 2009) made the recommended reading list in The Year’s Best Science Fiction, 26th and 27th Annual Collections, respectively.
Elissa’s work has appeared in dozens of publications since the 1970s. Covenant, the first volume of her Deviations series, was originally published by the now-defunct Aisling Press in 2007.
Elissa edited Star*Line, the journal of the Science Fiction Poetry Association, from 1986-88 and was a five-time Rhysling Award nominee for best speculative poetry of the year.
Outside the genre, Elissa won first prize in the Woodview Coffee House 2010 songwriting contest.
Member, Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America, Science Fiction Poetry Association, Broad Universe, and more. Proud participant, Operation E-Book Drop, Books For Soldiers, and Shadow Forest Authors.
Elissa Malcohn
