I live on the horn of Africa or as I've heard my owner call it, Somalia. I’m a Small Scaled Stiletto - that’s fancy talk for tiny blue snake. Up until today, a person named Asad has walked up to my cage and threw in a dead rat for me to eat. It’s hot here on the plains. I usually lay here all day sleeping, digesting, or slithering around in my cage while Asad leaves with a loud stick he calls a gun. Once I’ve seen him hit another human with the gun, and they didn’t get up. Every day, Asad puts my cage under a tree while he heads off into the desert. Others say to him, “You must come fight the war”. One day, Asad brought out his bigger gun. I’ve seen it hanging on the wall, but it was the first time I have seen him carry it. That day, he opened my cage, and then left with the big gun. After that day, Asad did not come home.
I was sitting in my cage waiting for him to return, it felt like a lifetime before I started considering the worst. As I thought about leaving my cage to find food, I also thought, were their other ones of me out there? I also knew I had to find Asad. After a short while, I left my small cage that I have called my home for all my life. It was scary coming out of my cage, there was these little crumbly rocks, it actually felt good to stream across them. After a while of slithering I got hungry, so I thought about eating the crumbly rocks. They taste terrible and are incredibly dry. I also realized I was tired too, so I was about to lie down when I saw a little mouse! I scrambled as fast as I could toward it but for some reason I was not getting any closer. What’s going on? I thought to myself it’s moving. Then as I got closer I saw its legs kick. It was alive! I thought if I ate a live animal that would be totally disgusting, but I also thought that I needed to eat to survive. As soon as I was close enough, I pounced and my fangs sunk into its skin, and I had a meal.
After I devoured the mouse, I felt so full that I thought I would not eat for the rest of my life. I was also exhausted, so after a little more slithering I went to some elephant grass and took a nap. Suddenly I woke up to a loud boom. It sounded like the Asad’s gun thing. There it was again, BOOM! I went toward the noise because I thought it may be Asad. I was thinking, yes, I’ve found him! As I searched further, all I found were dead bodies and other living people that looked sort of like Asad were running in the distance. I decided not to go to living ones because they were too far away.
I was avoiding the dead bodies, when I heard a hiss. I swiveled my head to see another animal like me, but much bigger and a different color. His beady red eyes were right on me. I did not know whether to slither away or give a warm hiss back. Then I realized he looked like he wanted to kill me. I whisked away as fast as I could, but he was way too fast. As he was gaining on me, I could feel the mouse in my stomach that I had eaten earlier. I was slowing down from exhaustion, so I tried to swerve behind a rock to hide. The snake tracked my scent from when I was around the dead bodies’ blood. Right there and then I thought I was dead. Then suddenly, I heard a squawk. So I turned in amazement to see a viper get a lift up into the sky in a bird’s mouth. I survived! Now I have to find Asad, so he can take me out of this dangerous and scary place. I want to go home.

Thank the Great Gods I thought to myself. As I look over for a second, time the bird looks at me as if it still wants another snake. This time I knew not to wait for this one to get close to me, and I bolted. I watch as the eagle (or so Asad calls it) staring at me from the air. I scurry into a hole. The second I get in it, I check for anything else that could possibly want to eat me. I stay there overnight and wait.
I come out of the hole with some confidence, and ready to find Asad. As I think think about him, then I hear more loud booms in the distance in the distance. I go toward them to try to find Asad. I heard another explosion but this one was much louder and it was not like the other gun sound. I kept going closer and closer. I saw men dead all over. A pool of blood covering the ground. It was terrible now even more booms coming from all directions. Then I heard a cling-cling, right next to me. Then the next second was me being blasted by a wall of sand and dirt. I had to go, so I slithered behind a body and after the blasts died down I looked at the body. It was Asad’s.
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I tried to believe that it was not him, but it was even his gun right next to him. A wound in his chest did not deny that he was dead. I cuddled up under his cold arm, hoping for him to come back. I think to myself that I want to die with him right under his arm, but I still try not to think about Asad’s death, and leave to try to survive.. On my way to nowhere I eat another mouse and take another nap. I found a puddle that I can soak in. The water felt really good on my dusty blue scales. The next thing I knew I was in persons hand and right after that I was in a brown sack.
After a while the sack opened up again and the same hand pulled me out and put me in a huge cage. The cage fit a small tree inside it and it had little boxes on the ground. As I examined the little box I saw another snake inside. I went to run from the other snake but it did not try to kill me. It sat smelled me and slithered away. I was confused yet also hungry. I searched the cage for food and it was all around there were dead mice all around the floor. It was great, but why? Then the man came in and held a long pointy needle and shoved it into me.


I saw a sign that that I could not make out but I heard a man say to children snake biologist. The next morning the man was staring at me as if I was a monster, then he picked up a pad and started making lines with a magic stick. Then the man said, “ You’ve got some scars. You must have gone through a lot.” You have no idea. You’ll be safe now in our exhibition of African Snakes.