As the sun began to set, the sky lit up as a fire would in our small cabin, red fire engulfing the clouds. My eyes drifted downward towards our family barn, and the sky reflected upon the already red barn to create a deep burgundy. All of the cows mooed from the inside, harmonious in their consolidating voices.
"Johnny! Johnny!" "Yes, papa?" "Are you alright? I heard the cows practically screaming out, and I wondered if there was possibly a stampede or fire of some sort!" "Yes, papa. I'm alright, but just as confused. All I saw was a fiery sky, a burgundy wall, and then the sound of a hundred calling cows." We both had no explanation for this mysterious and markedly obscure moment. I couldn't allow myself to wonder the true causes of this event. "Johnny," papa said pithily, "I need you to listen to me. I must tell you a story. It's more important than any other." I listened, scared it would polemics about how are colony came to be and why the Natives were so horrible. I couldn't hear more of those lies about "only beasts roaming the land, having it as ours for the taking." "The year was 1524. I was just a boy, about your age, and my family had shipped me here on account of my conspicuous rebellion. I couldn't stand to stay in the muck of the city, living with the rats. I came to the New World running on hope of land and riches. They never told us that there were people, whole civilizations already living where we planned to go. It was a battle through ignorance to see past the lies they fed us. I couldn't stand to live in constant anger at another people. I would never act on my anti-anthropocentric views, but didn't understand why we had to kill to survive, when there was always the option of peace. Of course, this never flushed through anyone's mind, and they found war to be rewarding." I was shocked at hearing his story, as I thought he understood the same way as those who killed for fun. I believed for so long that he say the Indians as nothing more than a small obstacle to slaughter and forget. "Johnny, are you listening? This is important." "Sorry, yes papa. I was just thinking." "well, anyhow, one of my friends who I had met on the farm we had built that year was determined to slaughter the chief and his baby of a nearby village. I had told him multiple times not to do it, but he could never follow along to rules of those around him. In fact, he may as well have thought of himself as king. I couldn't stop him, no matter how much I yelled, screaming for sense to be sent to his brain. His impious thoughts matched his actions, as he set out with a small group of rapacious young males to burn their village, aiming to bring the chief's heart back as proof of their declension." "Papa, what does this have to do with our barn?" "I'm getting to it. When he came back, he was alone, bloodied and red, seeming as if he completely missed the village and burned himself. He spoke with a shaky voice, 'They all cried out, spoke in ancient tongues. I-I couldn't... they didn't make it.' It was as if he had seen a ghost. The next day, the clouds were dark, charcoal colored. Rain began to pour down, a never ending stream of tears, wept by those who were taken by the selfish hands of the English. As the sun set, fiery hues tinting the sky. Our only farm began to darken, seeming as though an invisible fire died for it to char. We all could hear our cows clearly screaming out in a mix of moos and ancient callings. All of our people became frightened and paralyzed by the words shouting towards the sky. I don't remember much after, although once I awoke again, I was lying face down on the dirt. I could hear moaning and groans coming from limp bodies around me." "Papa, I'm so sorry, but what do we do now? What if this happens to us?" "It won't, as long as we repaint the barn with the brightest red we can find. It must pierce through the darkness of a charcoal sky."
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