Ignoids will argue that my offering is not sci-fi. In retort, I have two coups de grace, both of which were published in The Best from Fantasy and Science Fiction: 14th Series (1965).

The Court of Tartary

Olsen and the Gull

Here’s my contribution to the genre:

Trapped inside the bunker of Eden with Zoran the omega man

When a rodeo clown afflicted with Mad Cow Disease assassinated Mitt Romney on the campaign trail, the Republicans quickly drafted Sarah Palin to be their presidential candidate. When Zoran heard that news he knew, without a doubt, that the End Times were upon us.

When Palin won the presidential election on November 6, 2012, Zoran knew that there were only 44 days left until the end of the world. He’d already started building his nuclear fallout shelter. Knowing that solar collectors would be useless in the coming nuclear winter, he’d erected several windmills on his rural property, and drilled down into the aquifer. Supplies of electricity and clean drinking water secured, Zoran then obtained every credit card that he could lay his hands on, and maxed them out to purchase provisions, including ten tons of astronaut food, a ton of flour, and 50 casks of tequila.

The day after the election, Barrack Obama fulfilled an ill-advised pledge he made on the campaign trail, “If I can’t beat that hockey MILF, I’ll change my name to Slappy the Clown!” The cacophonous roars of Democrat laughter abruptly ceased when Palin instantly captured the critical youth vote by naming Lady Gaga as her running mate the day after Obama’s gaffe.

Zoran’s friends laughed at him as he read and re-read Revelations, Ezekiel, Nostradamus, Dianetics and The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy during the election campaign. But Zoran knew the world would end on December 21st, just as had been prophesized by the Mayan calendar. Zoran, the omega man, would, quite literally, have the last laugh.

Two days after Palin’s election victory, Fidel Castro suffered a heart attack while trying to execute a back flip on his wakeboard. His tow boat’s driver was disconsolate to see Fidel gasping for breath and thrashing like a hooked marlin. He lost control of the boat. Castro was chopped into chum by the boat’s propeller.

Two days later, Raul Castro, in an attempt to thwart a takeover by the hated Americans, sold all of Cuba to Vladimir Putin and a cabal of Russian oligarchs. The Miami Cuban diaspora, Palin’s biggest backers, went crazy and demanded an invasion.

Putin mobilized the entire Russian navy and erected a blockade. Aircraft carriers, frigates, destroyers, battleships and submarines faced the Florida coast and pointed their nukes at America. Vlad and Raul slurped buckets of mojitos and taunted Slappy, Monty Python style. Putin laughed, “You empty-headed animal food trough whopper! I fart in your general direction! Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries.” Castro followed up by roaring, “I one more time unclog my nose in your direction, son of a window-dresser! I wave my private parts at your aunties, you second-hand electric donkey bottom biter.”

Being a lame duck, with no mandate to start World War III, Slappy did the only thing he could do: he closed his eyes, stuck his fingers in his ears and repeated, “Nya nya nya nya nya nya, I can’t hear you. Nya nya nya nya nya nya, I know you are but what am I? Nya nya nya nya nya, takes one to know one.”

America’s humiliation grew as Palin beat the war drums and implored Slappy to step aside. On the afternoon of December 20, with the backing of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and cheered on by Fox News, Palin had Slappy arrested on a mental health warrant and executed a coup d’état. With one hand on the Bible and the other wrapped around an M-16, Palin was sworn in by newly installed Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Glen Beck. Palin whooped, “YEE HAW!” squeezed the trigger and declared war on Cuba. Driving a cigar speed boat and wearing those ridiculous 80s outfits of theirs, Don Johnson and his Miami Vice sidekick, Philip Michael Thomas, lead the invasion.

Zoran watched the madness from the safety of his bunker. He quaffed copious quantities of tequila and called Lola, a phone sex girl he’d fallen in love with over the previous 42 days. In a hopeless stupor, Zoran begged Lola to come to him. When he awoke the next day, the last thing Zoran could remember was Lola laughing at him. His head throbbed. The only thing he could get on his numerous communication devices was a non-stop loop of Justin Bieber singing his version of Livin’ La Vida Loca, which Zoran considered a remarkably ironic and totally fitting note to mark the end of the human race.

And then there was a knock at the door. Scientists who claimed expertise on such things had posited that only cockroaches would survive a nuclear war. Clearly they were wrong, but who could it be? Lola! thought Zoran. But it couldn’t be, for she was, or had been, a thousand miles away, in Chicago. Perhaps it was his neighbour’s nubile teenage daughter! Adam and Eve, all alone in the Bunker of Eden, with a mandate from God himself to be fruitful and multiply! Zoran smiled.

Another knock. Zoran opened the door to find a thirty something individual of the female persuasion. “Mr. Smith?” Zoran nodded. “I’m Miss Jones from the county planning department.

“Cockroaches and bureaucrats,” Zoran laughed maniacally.

Miss Jones ignored Zoran’s curious comment. “It seems, Mr. Smith, that you did not obtain the proper permits for this little bunker of yours.”

As Miss Jones conducted an inspection, listing scores of building code violations, Zoran examined her carefully. Good child-bearing hips. She was no Lola but she was not hard on the eye. Perhaps she can cook? Zoran considered locking the foot-thick door, bonking Miss Jones on the head and going all caveman on her. Calming his animal lust, Zoran asked Miss Jones, “Did they do it? Did they push the button last night?”

“Irrelevant,” answered Miss Jones. “Rules are rules, and they must be obeyed, Armageddon or no Armageddon.” As Miss Jones turned and continued her inspection, Zoran reached for the rolling pin….