A Rooted Reality [OSC story]

Chapter 11: What's a plant without its roots?

(Gore and body horror warning!)

it had been 2 days since I had my conversation with Reed. I now sat in Ram's room; something was different this time though. I was human. Ram was watering some plants on the window veil while I sat down on the floor tossing a ball on the wall and back. Today was a day that came unexpected to me; they were going to cut me open again. This time I was forced to be in human form. I was glad I could stay in this form for a bit, but I didn't even want to imagine being cut open like this.

They have had these appointments every week since my first one but it was always in my other form. I got somewhat used to it, they would cut me open and look at my different parts. Sometimes they would take pictures and other times they would just look at me, taking it all in. Dr. Flores still did all my procedures, but Mr. Winn would occasionally watch in the background.

I looked at my chest and noticed all the stitching. It was somewhat disturbing. Close to the stitching, there was dried blood and dark bruises. It was almost black around the edges; my breathing got raspier and it almost looked like brown spikes were trying to poke out of my stitching. I felt sick, my body ached to transform back. I couldn't tell why.

A stern knock landed on the door and I jumped up to open the door. Mr. Winn stood in the doorway. As soon as we made eye contact he started walking the direction to the lab. Mr. Winn would never say anything, he just expected me to follow; So I did.

When we got to the Lab we walked in and I noticed Dr. Flores had an assistant this time. I didn't care to pay attention to them, so I just sat down on the table as I always would. It was a bit bigger now to accommodate to my size difference.

"Hello, I think this is my first time seeing you like this; correct?" Dr. Flores asked and roughly pushed me down on my back.

I nodded while moving my hands out for him to put down. He tied my hands and ankles down, his eyes still laid on my chest.

"interesting." He mumbled.

"is something wrong?" I asked but to no response, I should've expected that.

He put on skin tight gloves and put his finger on the brown spikes that peaked out of my stitching. It felt wrong; like someone was putting their finger down your throat. He undid the stitching carefully and when he did his eyes looked to be in horror yet with a tinge of fascination.

I looked down as far as I could and saw what he saw. There were roots! Inside my chest! Those brown spike things were roots trying to cover my wounds. My insides weren't like how a normal human would be. I had all my body systems and organs but around them grew roots. The roots replaced my bones, I also noticed there was a high amount of water. There was parts of me which had small pouches of water in it almost like bubbles. My heart looked normal at least, it beat slowly; I could hear the sound in my eardrums making me more and more anxious.

My human body seemed to blend with my cactus body; It adjusted to fit my transformation. It made sense, but I just never considered it. My body had to fit both ways and they were so different. A human body couldn't just grow plant anatomy; so it has to change and adapt.

I started to think what would happen if I happened to end up as another object type. If I was aquatic would I grow gills in my human form? What would happen if I was mechanical like USB? Would I just become a realistic looking robot? It was scary to think about; for the first time I was glad I was something simple. It didn't change my outside form but my inside was completely different.

After a couple of minutes of them taking pictures of my insides they stitched me back up; going around the roots that stuck out so they were covered again. The assistant thankfully cleaned up the blood on my chest; and even put medical tape around it. I thanked them but there was no response.

Dr. Flores undid my bindings and made me sit up. I stretched, still sitting on the table. He murmured something I couldn't make out then cleared his throat.

"well, Oscar Cecil, I didn't expect this at all: your insides have adapted to a way that you are aren't quite human yet aren't quite cactus either. You can surprisingly still do photosynthesis, it's just a bit harder for you now. You also still have water storage. It's quite.. weird to see a human doing these things." Dr. Flores explained sternly; he almost looked disgusted when he said the last part.

I nodded, not sure what to say. Mr. Winn glanced at Dr. Flores then at me, almost as if gesturing to do something.

"Times up for today." Mr. Winn stated and pulled out what looked like lip balm but when he took the lid off it revealed a small cactus.

I tensed up when I saw it. I understood he was gonna force me to transform; it was something I didn't wanna do yet. My body was already in pain from the surgery! I didn't need more pain from the transformation.

Mr. Winn came up to me. I slowly backed away on the table, but then he grabbed my arm tightly and pulled me closer. My boss moved the small cactus and rubbed it on my head.

I opened my mouth to scream at him but then my chest screamed louder. The pain was so much, I collapsed onto the ground, my hands still gripping on the table. Dr. Flores and his assistant stood on the other side of the room just watching. I hated this, they didn't have any reaction, not caring one bit.

The roots from my chest ripped out of a bit of the stitching working to reform my body. My flesh became tougher and turned a green hue. I started breathing heavily. Sweat beating down my forehead as my arms started changing. Short fur sprouted while my hands because a bit stubbier. I slipped onto my side as my transformation complete, my breaths were rough and raspy like I just ran ten miles nonstop.

My eyes shut slightly, I was to weak to get up. Mr. Winn looked down at me, disappointed.

"Why do you have to be so weak." He mumbled and nudged me up to my feet.

I grabbed onto his arm trying to get my senses back. My vision was blurry and I kept shaking. Mr. Winn pushed me off his arm and groaned. He grabbed me by my pot and walked out, not saying a word to Dr. Flores. The man gripped onto me like he was holding a cat.

I was half the size of him now, a bit bigger but still quite small. I was easy to carry which I didn't like much. It was so strange being held, I felt like a little kid.

Mr. Winn dropped me off in Ram's room and left muttering how he didn't like me. Something about the way I felt. I didn't blame him; it's like holding an inanimate object and you feel it's heartbeat and warmth. It must feel strange.

My mind went straight to thinking about gathering my things to bring with me to escape. I didn't have much; but I still wanted to bring at least something from home. I grabbed the journal I've been writing in since day one here. It had everything I experienced in it; even though the one who recommended me to keep a journal ended up disliking me, I still wrote in it. I opened the first page and stared at the name. my name.

I thought of my non-human friends and how they had names based on their objects. Lily told me some have non object names like mine yet I still felt so out of place. If I were to stay in that world, I should leave my past behind. I should just be called something simple. My name should be Cacti.