The life of a cactus (kane chronicles)

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hihi! welcome to a small collection of short stories i wrote over the summer. hope you enjoy!!

As a cactus, one can really appreciate life from the same spot throughout their entire lifetime. Take my family for example: we've been living alongside each other in the same oasis just as our ancestors have for generations before us. I get food and water without having to move a single muscle and the scenery is divine. However, as much as I genuinely enjoyed not having to do anything and being able to survive as a healthy teenage cactus, I longed for some sort of adventure, much to my family's dismay.

"Don't jinx it!" My sister hissed.

"You'll end up like your uncle Bernie," My father stated.

My uncle was a handsome cactus and longed for change as much as I had. Unfortunately, a week after he told the family, a couple of stragglers came by and chopped him up for the water inside him. It turned out that humans could not survive the harsh conditions of the desert. Apparently, they lived in fields full of grass and snow, and the sand corroded their feet, making it impossible for them to move; the water was their only antidote.

My family expected the worst to come and braced themselves for losing me. Personally, I found it dramatic and a little comical, but I most certainly wasn't the one laughing when the magicians came.

It began on the calmest day of the year: the first Tuesday of September.

Two cotton-clad people arrived at our oasis on camels just after midday and boy did they look strange. One was a female with blond hair and purple highlights. She wore jeans and a jacket over a blue top and combat boots: not very fit for the desert in my opinion. As for the other, he was an African American boy wearing a black muscle tee and basketball shorts. On his neck were several golden necklaces and amulets. He didn't look very traditional, but better than the girl. The female human's face was a deep shade of red, and she looked very much like my distant cousin Roberto who was a tomato.

The man, seemingly oblivious to the fact that his companion looked an unusual colour for a human child, scanned each of my family members until his gaze landed on me. It was then that I took in his physical appearance. His shoulders were hunched as if his muscles and amulets were too heavy for him to carry. His brown eyes were sunken and unsettlingly deep-as if he were staring into my very soul.

"This one looks better than the others," he suggested to the girl. Even his voice had a tired rasp to it, like the action of speaking was too draining. The girl, whose face had returned to a peachy colour, glanced at me and nodded at her friend.

"Perfect, now we just need to get it out of here without harming a single root under its stem," She clapped her hands once. "That shouldn't be too hard," She returned to her camel to retrieve what appeared to be a long ivory stick that reached her shoulders when touching the ground. A staff, I believe it was called. She walked over and spoke a command word in an ancient language, and I felt myself being lifted into the air. She spoke another and I floated into a holder on her camel. I could feel my spikes scratching the surface of the camel's skin, but it didn't seem to affect the animal.

We travelled for what seemed like hours, and finally stopped at the Great Pyramid of Giza. I learned that the two humans were called Sadie and Walt, and that they were magicians travelling to the House of Rest, wherever that was. When we reached the pyramid, they hopped off of their camels and levitated me off as well. From there, we walked towards an old boat, like one of the boats they might have used way back in the BCEs. Walt and I settled into the boat, but Sadie stood in front of it with her staff and started chanting in the same language she did when she plucked me out of the ground.

I watched awe-struck as the air opened up into a swirling vortex of sand. If I had a jaw, I was sure it would be on the ground. She then hopped into the boat as it rowed itself into the portal, breathing heavily. I didn't understand what in the name of the Sahara Desert was happening, but I got the adventure that I dreamed of, and it was amazing. It was magic.


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