The tree might have remembered the bright lights in the sky all those years ago when it had only half its current thickness—the rushing sounds of animals fleeing through the undergrowth from some disaster close behind.

But trees do not remember.

It might have known the painful sensation of nails piercing its bark, marrying it to an alien, metal object, followed by the slow years of swallowing that object, enveloping it within its bark and hiding it from the light of day.

But trees do not know these things.

It might have been aware of the booted footsteps echoing through the forest stillness now, the first such steps to be heard in these woods since the lights in the sky—or of the hand reaching out to brush the only exposed metal edge of the old sign.

But trees are not aware.

And the footsteps moved on…