Author: Katelyn Prince

The rolling hills and grassy fields glowed beneath the soft light of the full moon. The air was cool and clear, the breeze hardly noticeable as it brushed against the long grass. Stars lay scattered across the deep blue sky, twinkling and reflecting off the rippling, lazy lake far below. Beside the water stood an ancient willow tree, tall and relaxed, a gentle giant among the water reads and brush. The tree’s long tendrils stretched down to the lake below, creating thin ripples with every whisper of the breeze. Every so often, a shimmering fish would break through the surface to swallow a bug as it skittered along the tiny waves, its silver scales glittering in the moonlight.

In front of all that was a rabbit, soft and grey, its nose twitching at a strange smell in the air. It stood on its hind legs, paws close to its chest as its ears flicked left and right. It glanced around once more before scampering back into its burrow to the rest of its family. It snuggled down with its children who lay nestled in their snug home, sound asleep.

And off in the distance, amid the hills and long grass, a brown cow grazed lazily, alone in the grassy fields. Her soft eyes shone with starlight and the moon lit her back. Her farm stood behind the hill, hidden by the first few trees of the expansive forest that lay just out of sight. Earlier that night she had found that the barn door had not been closed completely. After she had nosed it wide open, she wandered toward the wooden fence to find her favorite spot to graze, right next to the gate. She meandered through the field, stooping down for a bite to eat now and again, not realizing she had stepped over the toppled wooden fence and had walked beyond her normal boundaries. She continued her wanderings down the hill, passed the splintered trees and deep gashes in the dirt, until she reached the open valley full of delicious grass and flowers. As she passed the strange metal structures that had not been there the day before, she heard odd beeping and mechanical whirring. Her ears flicked back, but she continued her lazy stroll down the hill, stepping around a pile of fizzing green goo.

Did she wonder where these strange things came from? Did she care that her farmer might be in danger? No. She was just a cow. She continued her midnight snack, oblivious to the enormous spaceship that had crashed into the hill behind her farm.