There once lived a king who ruled over an empire of unique creatures. These creatures were made of night and day, of evil and righteousness, and if you are one who takes things literally—of black and white. They have a strikingly beautiful and mesmerizing pattern of stripes and once your eye catches it, it won’t let go. Unless you get kicked by their hooves in the face, of course. Give up? I’m talking about zebras.
The type of zebras in my story were once known as the Quaggas. Humans believe these species to have been extinct since 1883 due to poaching and loss of habitat. Have you ever heard the saying, ‘Believe none of what you hear and half of what you see’? Well, the Quagga aren’t as “extinct” as you believe them to be. Animals, zebras in particular, aren’t as dumb as they seem. Who knows, they might even think we’re dumb, and they can think of simple solutions to things we find complicated, like global warming. Anyway, the Quagga were reunited thanks to the help of Madlala Winterbottom (a born-to-lead Quagga). She knew the Quagga were going to perish and die a horrible death at the hands of the ‘vile and inconsiderate’ humans, so she created a colony in Kenya where Quaggas could live in peace without the meddling and interfering of people.
The King that ruled over the Quaggas the time my story takes place was named Zoroaster. He was as evil as sin and as cruel as Medusa. He treated his subjects (even his wife) in a harsh manner. He would punish anyone who even hinted at disagreeing with him. One of his infamous punishments involved paper cuts and salt water. Another one (for lesser crimes) was tying a zebra up, and letting water drip on their head steadily until it drove them insane.
Dixie, His Royal Highness’s wife, was sick and tired of his oppressive behavior, so she set out to do something. She began plotting the King’s downfall. She decided to spy on him and see if she could find out anything useful. But how do I spy on him, she thought, without being caught?
While Dixie was taking a mud bath, she came up with a brilliant idea. She would send her flamingo friend, Carpediem to spy on Zoroaster! She jumped out of the mud, dried herself, and hurried to the marsh where the flamingos’ headquarters were. As she was leaving, she bumped into none other than Zoroaster.
“Where are you going?” he thundered as if Zeus himself were speaking through him.
“I’m going for a walk, though I have no idea how that concerns you.” She replied in a chipper tone, as if they were discussing nothing but the mere weather.
“What did you just say to me?” He said while raising a hoof, getting ready to smack her across the face.
“Um. Nothing important, Your Highness”. She already had scars and bruises all over her striped body and she was not prepared for two or three more.
Me and my smart mouth, she thought as she rubbed an almost-healed bruise on her forehead and watched Him walk away, his head held high
Carpediem readily agreed to spy on Zoroaster because he was a flamingo that was born pink for adventure. The first few days of spying were very uneventful for him, but one day, everything changed. He found out something so earth-shattering he instantly knew it would be very useful to Dixie. Zoroaster was talking in his sleep. From what Carpediem could piece together, the King was in possession of a drug called Xopezyme that could stain anyone that came in contact with it a certain color. He was planning on feeding it to all his subjects, and if there wasn’t enough to go around, he would eliminate the remaining zebras, so he would be the only black-and-white striped one in the savanna. This, in turn, would make him far superior and powerful because to a Quagga zebra, stripes meant everything. Fortunately, Zoroaster mentioned where this so-called drug was buried: behind the African satinwood tree near the waterhole.
Dixie dug out the drug and decided to feed it to the King. She gave it to Stu, the Royal Cook and a very good and trusted friend of hers. Stu was going to pour the whole drug into Zoroaster’s salad dressing. Neither of them had any idea of the effects the drug would have, but prayed, for everyone’s sake, that it would be disastrous. And indeed, for Zoroaster, it was.
A couple of hours after his lunch, Zoroaster decided to go for a walk. He had just walked past the flamingos’ headquarters when he felt a tingling sensation all over his body that caused him to faint.
He came to in a moving vehicle surrounded by exotic animals he had never before seen in his life. A leopard cat, a snow-white snake, and the thing that bewildered him the most was that his own skin was lime green! He became dizzy and then fainted again.
Zoroaster was taken to an illegal auction where the rich and the famous bid on exotic or endangered animals. Zoroaster was sold for 55 million dollars to a lady wearing a Kermit the frog dress. The scary thing was that she had a snake comfortably and nonchalantly hanging on her shoulders. She showered a miserable-looking Zoroaster with lipstick-y kisses.
Back to the savanna: Carpediem saw the poachers take a lime-green Zoroaster and went on to tell Dixie. She went on to tell the rest of the Quaggas what happened, and it was unanimously decided that she should be queen. Ever since that day, the Quagga kingdom became a matriarchic society ruled by the female. Who knows what happened to Zoroaster? He could have either died from grief or is strutting the red carpet right now. No one will know for sure.
