Chapter 5 - Cows

Several days had passed, and Kitty was starting to enjoy herself. Between her nightly hunting of the tiny birds, and her constant failures, she was getting rather decent at her slow descent out of the tall trees.

Today, though, she was determined to get better at flying, because she had spied a group of squirrels and was really wanting to reach their nest. The only way she could figure to get there, was to either learn to run and jump through the trees like a squirrel, or learn to fly. Since she was most definitely not going to become a squirrel, that left her the only option to learn to fly.

She currently was sitting on her branch, overlooking the small area she had come to think of as her own. The edge of the water where she had defeated the water monster, next to the tall grass where she hunted her tasty crunch bugs, all the way to the bramble bush at the base of her old home, encompassed the entirety of her domain.

Crouching down, she envisioned her plan of action. She was going to jump off the branch, spread her wings and flap them a couple of times, then land gently on the thick grass, where she would celebrate her newfound skill by eating several bugs while they were stunned from her incredible abilities. Nodding to herself, she prepared to jump.

MOOOOO.

The loud noise, startled her so much, as she went to jump, that her wings flew out, catching the air immediately. She swung through the air, off to the side, and flapped her wings like mad, trying to stop herself from crashing into the trees that were reaching out to grab her.

One of the metal poles near the edge of the trees swung out, and she narrowly managed to avoid it, but ended in a heap in the tall grass next to it. Breathing hard, she scrambled to her feet, looking around for the dangerous creature that had just tried to kill her.

She looked around, squinting, wondering why she didn't see anything. Could it be an invisible monster? Her heart started pounding as she slunk low in the grass.

Suddenly, a shadow obscured the sun, and she glanced up, expecting it to be a bird about to kill her, but instead a large black head from a monster of a creature was coming towards her for the kill. Screaming in terror, she dashed back to the safety of the trees, hoping she would make it before the huge feet of the monster pounded her into the ground.

Pausing at the base of a tree, safely hidden under a thick bush, she turned to see if the creature was following her. To her dismay, several more of the things had been attracted by her scream. They didn't seem interested in following her to the trees, but were definitely guarding the grassy area.

Deciding the tops of the trees were safer than under her bush, she scrambled up the tree, and sat on a branch to view her new encounters. They were huge, and black, darker then even her fur. And as she watched them, they began hunting for things in the grass. She assumed they were also eating the tasty bugs, but soon realized in horror that they were eating the grass!

Shaking her head, she looked back to see that they were still eating the green stuff. She was starting to wonder if she had hurt her head. Surely large monsters like this didn't eat grass? Watching them for an hour convinced her though. They were indeed munching happily on the vegetation. Maybe that was why they chased her away from it?

It all made perfect sense to her then. These things were the guardians of that grassy place because they ate it. Afraid that she would eat it all, they had chased her away. It was a pity that they wouldn't share the space, because it would have been nice to practice flying without the fear of hitting a tree.

Sitting up on the branch, she decided she needed to find something to eat before continuing her flight practices. Looking around to make sure there weren't any large birds to attack her, she aimed for the grassy place with the large rocks that she considered her own, and jumped, not to fly, but to glide instead. She was prepared if one of the black creatures cried out, but they didn't. To her delight, she was able to glide perfectly. Flapping her wings, however, as she neared the rocks, was a horrible idea. Her beautiful glide ended up in an uncontrolled mess of a fall.

After untangling herself from the rocks, which are not suitable for landing on at all, she settled on the tallest rock to evaluate her injuries and what could have gone wrong. Scrunching her face in concentration as she remembered each moment in detail, she was just on the verge of discovering the secret to her future success, when a grasshopper landed on the rock, inches from her nose.

All seriousness disappeared in the blink of an eye. The next couple hours were completely lost to her hunting down the offending bug and crunching it in retribution for distracting her. Unfortunately for the bugs, one wasn't enough to satisfy her displeasure, or her hunger.

Settling back onto the rock after satisfying her hunger, she watched the cows eat their grass on their side of the fence and soaked up the last of the sun's rays. As a shadow made it's way across her rock, she sighed and decided she should probably get back to learning how to fly.

Stretching every muscle, she sat up and thought that maybe she was doing this all wrong. Instead of starting in the tree and trying to fly down, maybe she should start on the ground and work her way up. After all, if she fell from the ground, it wouldn't hurt as much. Maybe…

As the sun settled onto the horizon, she practiced jumping into the air and flapping her wings. The cows watched her for a while before deciding she was crazy and moving off. She didn't care what they thought, as long as they didn't come into her trees to her grassy place, they were unimportant to her.

Panting after a particularly difficult practice session, she heard the dog before it arrived. Why did this guy think he could keep causing trouble? Despite her annoyance at his intrusion, she still wasn't ready to take him on, since he was so much bigger than her, and quickly dashed to the nearest tree. She was relatively certain by now that she would be safe on the lowest branch, because she hadn't ever seen him climb a tree before.

He surprised her though, and jumped at her once he got to the tree. As his teeth closed shut just inches from her tail, which happened to be hanging down, the traitor, she quickly decided the tallest branches of this tree looked very inviting and investigated them hastily. Hearing him whine in displeasure, and then start his peeing all over the place, made her roll her eyes in annoyance. What an idiot.

Sitting on these branches was the highest she had ever ventured into a tree and she took a moment to look around in the early evening twilight. The field that the cows claimed, stretched a lot further than she thought it had, looping around her trees and ending by several structures unlike anything she had ever seen before.

She gazed at the structures, wondering what they could be, when lights appeared from within one of them. Since the only light she had ever seen at night was lightening, other than the moon and stars, she was momentarily frightened, waiting for the following thunder. But none came.

Once she was certain the lights were not the onset of a storm, she calmed down, and looked around more. It was hard to see very far in the darkness, but she thought she could make out movement near some of the structures. With a yawn, she decided to make her way back to her tree for a nap before starting her night hunting for birds and squirrels. She hadn't caught any yet, but she was certain if she kept trying, eventually, they would all succumb to her awesomeness.