I awaken to violent shaking, a force yanking me out of a deep sleep. “What do you want?” I murmur.  No answer, but the shaking continues.  

When I look around, I find myself alone, in a hole, dark and desolate, and cold. Oh, it’s so cold. Still shivering, a wave of nausea rolls in. I lean to the side and retch.

As my eyes adjust to the darkness, I begin to recall the events of the past three days of our journey to Perdita, when we met a new skulk of Wild Foxes and life as we knew it changed forever.  

This strange skulk was unlike any we had encountered before: wild-looking, an unfamiliar scent, unusually shaped heads, with fur shimmering like a kaleidoscope of colors under the sun. 

But their physical appearance was nothing compared to the tales they told: stories of a shadowy beast from another realm.  One of the elders from the new skulk, AS LONG AS THERE’S LIGHT, told us about the UnFox: a gruesome beast with sharp fangs who hunts our kin whilst we sleep. It leaves a poisonous toxin in the brain of any fox who crosses its path, wiping their memory clean so that all that is left is loss and fear. 

At first, we dismissed their tale as absurdity and paranoia. We are foxes of logic and reason, after all, and aren’t easily swayed by superstitions.

But there was something compelling, perhaps the hint of desperation in their voices, the earnest look in their eyes, that made us pause.  I brought WAY OF HUMAN, LAGUNA LACUNA, ORPHEUS TURNS, REDEMPTION and PICNIC, LIGHTNING into a small huddle. We agreed the tale of the UnFox seemed impossible and too bizarre to believe. But we couldn’t deny the sincerity and genuine fear in the wild foxes eyes.

It was REDEMPTION who suggested we join forces with this new skulk and navigate the uncertainty together.  Not known to be one for long conversation, his direct plea was convincing: “You don’t have to believe in the great UnFox, but in the infinitesimal small chance it exists, we should be prepared.” 

LAGUNA LACUNA, always the sympathetic listener chimed in, “REDEMPTION has a point.  What’s the downside in at least giving them the benefit of the doubt, at least for a few days.  The most likely scenario is we’re proven right, they’re proven wrong, and we go about our lives.  But, I mean… what if… you know…” her voice trailed off allowing the look on her face to finish her thought.  

PICNIC, LIGHTNING, WAY OF HUMAN, and I nodded in agreement.  We couldn’t refute their cold logic.  We decided to combine skulks with the Wild Foxes and navigate the uncertainty together.

---

In the days that followed, we built bridges between our two worlds as we traveled into the unknown together. We exchanged stories, philosophies, and dreams.  We foraged for berries and nuts and snacked on insects.  We explored the forests and open fields as we progressed out of the Shadowoods and towards the Grand Hannibal River I was named after – the outermost limit of our skulk’s experienced world. We got to know each other and tried to understand one another better. Despite our original skepticism and their increasing sense of angst and dread, we became one, united by our distant vulpine ancestors. 

Upon reaching the river, we paused our journey to swim and play in our beloved Grand Hannibal, so ingrained in our way of life that she is more like a companion to us than a geographical feature.  Her steady current, always a perfect temperature, embraced us.  Her waters were a comfort, a soothing rhythm that kept our anxieties at bay. Even the clearly traumatized Wild Foxes forgot their fears temporarily while swimming laps around her playful rapids. 

There were no signs of the UnFox or of anything amiss, really.  We slept at night in comfort, without any feeling of being watched.  We were happy to see our new skulk friends became more relaxed each day.

But yesterday, on our third day together, everything changed.  

After a breakfast of gooseberries and hickory tea, we set off to explore the woods to look for undiscovered bounties of food.  As the day grew hotter, when even the shade couldn’t protect us from the thick humidity, HOTEL ART suggested we head over to the river for a swim to cool off, just as we had done the previous few days.  LAGUNA LACUNA, a natural jester, surprised us by arguing we should continue to look for food, reminding us that while our skulk had gotten larger, our food supplies hadn’t. 

We looked at REDEMPTION who was usually quick to make a decision but he didn’t speak.  We sat in silence for a minute.  Perhaps it was the heat, heavy and relentless, that made us reluctant to decide. Or perhaps, somewhere deep down, we had an inkling that today there were no good decisions to be made.

I was the one who broke the silence and suggested we take the long route so we could forage before we played.  I wanted to show our new friends one of the more dramatic spots along the great river’s banks. We’d have to travel up a steep hill, on extra alert for loose rocks due to erosion and recent rains, then through a narrow path with overgrown thorn bushes and poison ivy creeping out from both sides, but it would be worth it.  

The narrow path empties out onto one of our favorite spots - a small clearing with a jumping rock 20 feet over the river.  There’s no better place to play and picnic and cool off on a hot day.

Sweaty and out of breath, we reached the clearing and approached the top of the rock.  We were talking so loud about who was going to jump first we didn’t even notice something was amiss until we got all the way to the ledge and were stopped in our tracks.

I brought us this way to show our friends drama, but even I wasn’t prepared for the dramatic scene in front of us. 

Our great river had disappeared.  Where there was flowing water the day before, today we saw only a barren wasteland of rocks and debris, a dry and cracked riverbed.  Fish skeletons and animal carcasses dotted the web of dry branches. 

The only sign of life in the riverbed was one of the Wild Foxes we had last seen go to sleep with us last night.  He was clearly delirious and so far in the distance as to be barely visible, shaking its head and talking to itself, arms moving wildly, as it walked in an endless circle in and around a dried patch of dirt. 

The rest of the Wild Foxes turned to me for an explanation. 

Why me, I don’t know, I suppose because I share the Hannibal name. I took a deep breath and told our new friends everything I knew.  

Our skulk all grew up hearing our parents and grandparents talk about the mystery of the Hannibal, how once in every generation she dries up and completely disappears.  

Not a gradual event, like what happens during extreme heat and droughts, but instantaneously gone. One moment you can be swimming in her magical waters, and the next she’s gone. 

We were told she stays dry until the next rain.  Whether it’s a sprinkle or a thunderstorm, as soon as it starts to rain, she comes back just as suddenly as she left, in all her glory. We never truly believed the stories until… 

The story we had dismissed as a myth now stood as a stark reality.  LAGUNA LACUNA and I exchanged a knowing look.  We didn’t need words to know we both saw this was – at best – a bad omen. At worst, it was a sign that the story our Wild Foxes told us of the UnFox might not be a myth either.

SALVATION THEORY and a few of our other more dextrous foxes set out to corral the distant Wild Fox and see what could be learned about his mental condition and if his behavior could be tied to the UnFox.

We held our breath as the sun began to set.

---

That night, we gathered around a campfire, its flickering light casting long shadows that mirrored our fears. The orange glow illuminated the worry etched on every face.

PICNIC, LIGHTNING, a fox who had always been our beacon of hope, looked pale in the firelight, a visible testament to the gravity of our situation. He broke the silence, uncharacteristically revealing his doubt, "What... What should we do now?"

"I never believed the tales," BRUTE FICTION announced gravely before trailing off and mumbling quietly, mostly to himself. "Not of Perdita, nor the UnFox nor the disappearing Hannibal. We can only hope that these signs of evil becoming stronger in our world mean there is an equal balance of strengthening good that we just haven’t seen yet."

"I didn't either,” FIASCO ARTIST admitted calmly despite the chaos around them. “But now I can't shake the feeling that the two are connected somehow."

"We can't let fear paralyze us," FEAR NONE interjected, his tone commanding despite the doubt lurking in his eyes. "An ounce of action is worth a ton of speculation."

One of our new Wild friends, AS LONG AS THERE’S LIGHT, spoke up.  “We know of an ancient ritual our ancestors used to ward off evil spirits.”

I would usually laugh at a suggestion of a religious ritual, but we all remained quiet allowing AS LONG AS THERE’S LIGHT to continue.

 “We make a sacrifice of an animal, and one of us sleeps in its hide.”

Seeing my eyebrows raise and picking up on my skepticism, he added, “I saw a family of hedgehogs gathered in the clearing just past the oak clusters.  HANNIBAL, you go catch one.”

And off I went.

---

I lie here now in the dark hole, wrapped in a foul smelling hide of a hedgehog, my mind playing a twisted game, replaying those scenes over and over.  I’m still shivering uncontrollably.  I take a deep breath but it does nothing to calm me.  

I hear REDEMPTION’S voice in my head, setting off the events of the last few days, “You don’t have to believe in the great UnFox, but in the infinitesimal small chance it exists, we should be prepared.”  

I hear LAGUNA LACUNA’s “what if…” reverberate in an endless loop of self doubt.  

I think about the disappearing Hannibal and the chance meeting of a skulk of Wild Foxes just a few days prior.  I want to believe they are coincidences, nothing more than a random event.  But deep down inside I can’t shake the feeling that I know - I KNOW - this is not random. 

Despite my rationality, for the first time in my life, I don’t know how to use logic to find comfort.  

As I sit in my foxhole, thinking about how to face the day and the hundreds of days of journeying ahead of us, I do something I’ve never done before:  I begin to pray. 

I pray the UnFox is just a myth.  I pray the rain comes today and the Great Hannibal River returns to its glory. I pray for our skulk to find a large bounty of food.  I pray the past few days were just a dream. I pray we all make it to Perdita happy and healthy and whole. I pray because I don’t know what else to do.  

There’s no room for atheism in this foxhole.

I squeeze my eyes tightly and scrunch my paws in fists for just a few seconds.  I’m frightened but I know exactly what I need to do.

Wrapping the hedgehog hide a little tighter around my shoulders, I fill my lungs with air and push myself out of the hole.  I’m ready to tackle the day whatever it brings.