The Crystal Hare

In a deep cavern etched into the side of great Appalachia, water ran cold around the crystalline foot of a glass hare. He scratched behind his ear, both leg and ear shifting silently in form. The tunnel the hare found himself in was quite spacious, with slits in the ceiling for rain and streams to trickle in from. But not light. That was left far, far closer to the entrance to the cave, completely swallowed by the endless rock and dark. This did not inconvenience the glass hare; far from it. Light meant refraction, which meant a massive, rainbow beacon to any suspecting predators. And so, like any other good crystal beast, the hare sat in the cool stream, licking at the salty rock, and lapping from the crisp water. However, as he sat their, enjoying the rush of water, the hare was blinded by the sudden appearance of a headlamp being turned on not 30 feet above him. The tunnel exploded with a flash of colors, dancing across the walls as light moved through the hare. His feet thumped against the rock, splashing the water in a violent display of fleeing, as two humans descended into the cavern below, each carrying burlap sacks and mattocks. The hare easily outran the humans, yet could not escape the blaze of their headlamps, always casting beautiful rays across the rock face. Without substantial crevasse to scurry through, the hare could be tracked throughout the entire cave system. His feet stumbled against the rocks, overgrown lattice peaking through the hare’s feet and causing him to trip. The cavern was filled with sound, the rushing water still competing for dominance against the approaching shouts and hollers from the humans, or the pounding of boots against unstable rocks. As the hare slipped through a crack in the floor, dropping nearly ten feet, he recoiled in terror as he landed at the feet of a human, headlamp blazing. As he tried to run down the tunnel he just fell into, lattice slipping against smooth, wet stone, the human grabbed the hare by his glassy scruff, lifting it off of the ground, and rendering him limp and useless. Unbeknownst to the crystal hare, the human who had just caught him was not, in fact, associated with the men with mattocks, whose intentions are quite clear to prey. No, this human carried a chisel and a hammer, with a leather satchel across their chest. The human knelt down, situating themselves against the wall, as they inspected the hare. The prismatic glow was gorgeous, making the textbook images at the library look like children’s drawings. They slipped an eccentric looking loupe, one that strapped to the head for a hands free experience. The human gently rotated the hare onto his smooth back, examining the kicking feet, and the clear lattice growth. holding the hare still with one hand, the human gently nicked at the vein on the foot, chipping the growth out of the foot without damaging the hare, and slipped the lattice into their bag. The human gave the hare a few rubs on the head and back, itching right behind the ear, as all crystal beasts enjoy, then set him off down the tunnel, the hare never turning back as he thumped deeper and deeper into the earth.