The next morning, the group wake each other up with their bodies stiff from lying down on the ground, they stretch for a while and begin to climb the heap of rocks onto the top of the roof and carefully climbed down to the ground. The map show s that the next group are in Egypt, in the continent of Africa. They travel along the Panuco River and passing the Puebla City; walking east-north east by north east direction, and arriving at the harbour of Pozo Rica. They take a yacht that is big enough to accommodate everyone. The S.S. Neanderthal has two queen-size beds, a shower and toilet, leather couches with a coffee table, wardrobe with men's and ladies' outfits, and a kitchen filled with canned food products and food zipped up in air-tight plastic bags. Since Sipho read books about yachts and other transportations, he is the only one who can drive and navigate the destination to Egypt.
When the men are fiddling with the canned food at the kitchen, the ladies are taking turns in the shower and wearing the clothes out of the wardrobe; trying on suits, dresses, skirts, and tops that were either clashing or have a good colour theme. Sitting on the comfortable leather seats and eating the not-so-fresh but edible food from the plastic bag, and from the cans. They cross the Caribbean Sea; passing Cuba, and are now crossing the Atlantic Ocean.
Upon crossing the ocean, Sipho has this sudden emotion of homesickness when coming towards Arica - a rumbling pain through his body. At first, he assumes that probably it was hunger; but, he assumed wrong because he carries past memories of the person he was cloned from. He sheds a tear; it drops down from his chin, and lands between his index and thumb fingers. He felt he was about to burst like a ticking time bomb, he is speechless and from afar Parla can see what is happening to Sipho; yet, she had no strength to confront him and confide in her. The rest of the clones are fast asleep.
They reach Africa; however, they stop at the port of Rabat, Morocco. Abandoned cars are seen parked; as if sulking for their owners to come back, searching car keys in the ignition and by some luck they find a silver six-seater hatchback model car. Turning the key the car starts and away the went, going east following the map's navigation. They drive for hours through day and night; however, the fuel gauge indicates that the car is almost out of petrol in the tank - within eighty minutes the car stops and there is no petrol station on sight. Checking the car boot for any useful resources and equipment, and fortunately they find nine sealed bottled water, only. They leave the car and begin walking to the desert seeing nothing but sand dunes cutting the horizon. The midday sun is at its peak of heat getting extremely hot by the second. The sun has set and the group are camping for the night; the cold winds are also unbearable that the clothes they wore could not even sustain the warmth in their bodies.
The following day, the sun showed no mercy, the hours seemed like a lifetime and the desert seem to go on for miles and miles on end. With such limited water supply the heat can be too much to handle, from time to time some kept having mirages and even collapsing; but, they were not giving up that easily. Soon after, they begin to see a pyramid from afar, thinking that it was another mirage they nearly lost hope until the map alarms in a beeping sound signaling thereabouts of Giza in Egypt. Finally, they arrive at Giza, catching their breaths whilst observing ancient sphinxes. Looking at the disfigured portrait of Ramses the third, the Gods Amen Ra and Seth, and the pillars that once stood the palace of Queen Cleopatra. The map states the group is inside the pyramid, and since there is no entrance they now have to find a way to get in.
They bang, smack, rub and push almost every block of stone but nothing. They walk around the pyramid a couple of times; however, without noticing it Alex finds a hinge that is protruding over the the bed of sand. He digs the hinge out and calls everyone. When they surround Alex from behind in silence, they are waiting for Alex to turn the hinge; he does anti-clockwise, the west wall of the pyramid starts to move down as if sinking in quicksand. Walking in a single line, they enter into the secret doorway, it is dark and stuffy with dust roaming in the air. Alex finds and unlit torch, June quickly tries to find another torch; instead, she finds two pebbles and starts hitting them together. This creates sparks of flame, soon enough she lights the torch; thereby, passing Sipho's torch to let it be lit, too. They walk about and checking for things that are unusual, they come to a room looking like a pharaoh's tomb. Instead of a coffin and lots of gold expanding from one place to another, there lies the three capsules.
YOU ARE READING
ISIPHO SOKUZALWA (Gift of Birth) by MINENHLE S MKHIZE
Science FictionSipho and Parla wake up in a cindered Earth from the a ice slumber - not knowing they are clones. They travel across the ash-covered world trying to find self-identity, the reason for their creation, and will there be others like them.
