(Trade-ish thing for SnowSauria. Info here)

"Run run run!!"

Calf's legs carried her as fast as she could go. Past the barns and silos, following a group of startled cows. What was wrong with their faces? Why couldn't she recognize them?

What were they running away from?

Calf turned her head to look back where it was coming from. The bulls were over there, she could see their horns, but even they were running and crying out.

And then...

"No!!", Calf sat up, her heart racing.

The Endless Forest...she was in the Endless Forest. The crisp night air breezed past her, a few bullfrogs croaking in the night nearby. The trees were much different than what she was used to, she was still adjusting to them all around, unlike the pastures she lived on before.

"It was that nightmare again...", she said to herself, and laying down, she didn't want to fall back asleep. She had that dream every night, and she seemed to wake up at the same time of the night when she had it.

Her eyes turned to the distance, a light caught her eye. Calf stood and stretched for a moment, then wandered off toward the glow. The magical world was much different than she had ever really experienced. Things she could understand before were now seemingly impossible to explain. How could the deers' fur patterns change so easily? How were they able to grow and change their antlers after eating pinecones? How were they able to have symbols above their heads?

She finally found the place where the glow was coming from. A bright green orb hovered above the Pond, pulsating, moving around slowly. Calf looked for others in the area, but everyone else seemed to be asleep. They had no idea what danger was looming nearby.

Calf had to know. Was this some strange Forest magic, or was it the thing in her dream? She slowly approached, watching the green orb continue on it's aimless path. The dølafe was terrified, but tried to gather her confidence. "Hello? Are you...?", she tried to say, when she looked to the sky.

It was a trap, the orb was a way to draw out the awake animals to be snared. Above was a massive spacecraft, barely resembling the stars. Calf had seen it before, she knew that she was in danger. She felt a blast of air hit her from above, and thrown to the ground, her body was surrounded by a beam of light that made her weightless. She tried to cry out in terror, but she was zipped up from the ground so quickly that the others would never hear her scream.

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A cold, metal cage held her. A humming noise resonated through deep hallways. Calf looked around, seeing others who had been captured and in their own cages. Lions, kangaroos, pelicans, antelope...countless others who shared the same fate as her. They all seemed so calm, sleeping as if they had been tranquilized. Calf then heard a loud bang nearby, as a door opened down the hall. A large reptilian creature stepped into the room, holding a strange item in its scaly hands.

Calf turned her head. She couldn't bear to see the creature, she kept trying to convince herself that she was only dreaming, or that this was some thing that was the deer from the Endless Forest knew about. She heard the footsteps echo down the room, coming closer to her cage.

It then stopped, and she heard snarling and heavy breathing. She wanted to look, but she couldn't. And then...

A gas filled her cage. She couldn't help but breathe in the toxin being spewed from the alien's hands. The dølafe struggled to keep her eyes open, but she collapsed and passed out.

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Calf awoke and found herself strapped on her side to a cold operating table. Several testing apparatuses pointed down at her, all looking like needles and things to stab and probe her body. Her mouth was muzzled, and she looked around frantically at the room. One of the reptilian aliens was nearby, pressing buttons and pulling levers that seemed to be attached to the probes above her.

She wished she wasn't here. She wished there was a way out. She...

Her body shrank and morphed into a squirrel. Startled, she darted out of the bonds and jumped off of the table. The alien never saw her escape, and turning, was startled to see an empty space where there was a dølafe.

Calf crawled on the ground and found an air duct, running in and vanishing from sight. The rumbling sounds were much louder now, and she panicked as the change in her body was shocking and unexpected. She found a nearly empty room, and looking around, she couldn't help but sneeze.

Suddenly her body became a dølafe once again. She curled up, sobbing as she collected herself from the events that just happened. How did she suddenly become a squirrel? How was she going to escape this nightmare?

"The others...", she said to herself, "they must be suffering the same torture I just missed. How could I let this go on?"

She stood, taking a deep breath, her confidence rising for the moment. Walking to the door, it opened automatically. This startled her, and she hid at once, thinking one of the aliens found her. She peeked out, and seeing the open door, she approached and stepped out, looking down the hallways.

Nothing, the hall was clear. She breathed a little sigh of relief and walked down the hall. Where was the place with the other animals? How big was the spaceship? She lifted her nose and tried to smell for their scents...

But before she could confirm the direction, she heard tapping noises coming close. Something was coming, the sound made Calf's heart race. She ran down the hall, she had to get away from the noise. There were no other options.

She burst into the next room down the hall, where she was lucky to find the room from before. The animals were still all asleep - there were countless cages of animals, many she had never seen before. The dølafe rushed in, finding a place to hide as the source of the noise behind her came into the room too. She was able to see that it was another alien, who was holding a different thing in its hand. It looked like a weird shotgun - Calf had seen one before, she knew what they were capable of.

She quickly sneaked around a corner, behind the cages, out of sight of the alien. The reptilian sniffed the air - it knew she was close. Calf soon realized that the cages dead-ended. She was trapped!

She turned just in time to see the alien spot her. Gasping, the dølafe backed against the wall. The object in the alien's hand pointed right at her, she cringed and waited for pain. She inadvertently nudged a lever she never noticed, and a loud bang sounded.

Calf opened her eyes and saw that a cage that had been dangling above the alien came crashing down on it. She quickly climbed up on one of the cages and out of the space she had been trapped in. There were other levers on the walls. Jumping off of the cage, she studied them carefully. "One of these has got to do something...", she said.

She pulled one of them, and a large hatch beneath her hooves began to open. The cages all started to slide to the center, finding the opening and falling out. Calf could not keep her balance, as she slid down the metal flooring and fell out of the hatch. She watched as the cages toppled above her, and then vanished suddenly.

"They're free...", she said, freefalling, once again facing a painful death. She closed her eyes and felt the air rush past her fur. "They're free..."

"We've got you...", a voice spoke in her head.

Calf opened her eyes, and she was no longer falling, but laying in a soft patch of violet flowers. She was back in the Endless Forest.

Letting out a breath, she questioned, "Was that another nightmare?"

"No, it was real. You did something amazing, Calf.", someone said nearby. She looked to see Auriea standing there, smiling at her.

"You're...", Calf began to say, and the deer god nodded her head. "Auriea...I saw something terrible, it was unbearable to see those animals caged.", the dølafe spoke.

"You saved them from a life of torture. For that, we are forever grateful, and at the risk of your own life. Is there anything we can do to reward you for your bravery?", Auriea asked Calf.

Calf thought for a moment, and then asked, "Could you give me pleasant dreams?"

Auriea smiled and replied, "Of course, that is the least I could do." She bowed and vanished before Calf's eyes. The dølafe yawned and closed her eyes, taking a much needed sleep after having such a terrifying experience.

And that night, she dreamed that she was on a gorgeous ranch, with the kindest cows and bulls that lived there. Calf happily approached them, there was no pain here, no burden, just peace and harmony.

End