Waking up around dusk, the fox again headed out into the forest to experiment some more. Last time he had tried pushing the sensation in his head outward in a sphere, so this time he tried making it into a tendril, seeing how far he could push it outward from himself. Before he k, he had been sitting still for so long that a rabbit had wandered into his sight.

  sidering for a moment, he decided to try toug the rabbit with the tendril of energy he was trolling. As he touched it, for the briefest of moments, he could suddenly feel its health, get a tiny glimmer of what it was feeling, and tell with absolute certainty where it was iion to himself, even more so than his sight allowed. However at the same time, the rabbit jumped as if something had bit it, startling him and causing him to break the e.

  After a few quick hops, the rabbit settled down again, so he retracted the tendril of energy and raced after it. After a short chase, he mao catch it and broke its neck, settling down to feed on his prey. The odd sense of danger fred up again somewhat, but it was faint enough that he could ig and tiing.

  Upon finishing his meal, he decided to go back to experimenting, particurly testing out that odd sensation of pulling in something else. Expanding the energy outward in a sphere agairied making it hollow, then pulling it ba. This resulted in a sharp spike in his sense of danger, followed by an intense mental pain and fogging of his thoughts. Clumsily thinking to himself that he wouldn’t do such a thing again, he slowly hobbled back to his den and colpsed in pain.

  After a signifit period of time, he was able to sleep as the pain subsided. He awoke again near dawn with a pounding headache and a vague sensation of loss. His memory seemed vague, and his thoughts slow, causing him quite a bit of fear. With immense effort he put together his thoughts, realizing that the sense of dahat seemed to fre up from time to time was clearly lio his intelligence, and he shouldn’t ig like he had been.

  sidering the sensation was faintly irritating him at the moment, but reduced as he sidered visiting the humans, he decided to do just that. Once again he found himself sitting atop a hill watg the young humans pying, and once again the same human noticed him. This time there wasn’t any feeling in his mind, however. Reag out with a tendril of energy, he tried toug the oddly perceptive human, only to jump in fright as he felt thoughts that were not his own, causing him to break the tendril midway, yelping in pain. The human stared at him for a moment before starting to walk toward him. Unwilling to risk frontation, he fled back to his den as rapidly as he could.

  Fortunately, by the time he got back to his den, the feeling of danger had entirely subsided, and he was able to rest easily, though his mi going back to the odd thoughts he had picked up wheouched the human. Thinking back, he also realized he had sensed something that was almost a smell, almost a taste through the link; pig up dirt, grass, and trees along with something undefinable.

  This set the pattern for the several days; wake up, get some food, experiment with the energy he trolled, then go watch the humans. He tinued fleeing a few more times when the one young human approached. However, he eventually let them get a bit closer, watg as they sat down with their legs folded below them.

  Knowing from having watched that it took a long time for them to stand up from this position, he felt a bit safer at ing closer. As he approached, sniffing, he picked up that odd half-st of nature from them as he felt a tou his mind again, a hint of otherness. The human patted the grass beside them while saying something he couldn’t uand. Shocked by the sudden motion, he jumped backwards. As he did so, the human stopped moving, letting him work up the ce to move clain.

  Another child began to run up, shouting, so he quickly turned and fled from them, hearing the first human shouting as well, and feeling a surge of anger or annoyance from that e between them. Upourning to his den, he realized that the e was still there, though faint, and shook it off as he had the earlier feelings. He then curled up into a ball and fell asleep.

  Upon waking up around dusk, he found his thoughts flowed more smoothly once again, the fog reg from his memories. As he stretched, he found he could actually see the energy around himself as an incredibly transparent mist. Pushing out his own, he was able to see it was slightly more substantial than what was around him.

  Deg to put off experimenting for a bit, he headed back towards the human vilge to see if the childrehere still. Upon arriving, he did not see any, but his stomach told him that it was quite displeased at him skipping breakfast, so he headed back towards that strange field oher side that had mibsp; Due to his speed, he was able to catch two of them to fill up, noting that he had a faint sense of danger as he fihe sed one.

  As he headed back towards the side with the gate, he heard the voices of the young humans again. He headed back to his hill, waiting as the same human as before spotted him and headed his way. This time they shouted something at the others as they approached before sitting doatting the grass again.

  Feeling more at ease than st time, he approached slowly, stopping a few body lengths away and sitting down, feeling the ebb of the energy between them as a e formed once more. Somehow he felt safe around this human, and scooted closer, letting them touch his head. He was careful to keep fag them, and they seemed to pick up on it, scratg below his mouth where he could have chosen to bite them if he wanted.

  ‘This human trusts me,’ he thought to himself as the human moved to scratch behind his ears.

  He could feel tehrough the liween them, as well as desire to learn and teabsp; As he was sidering this, he noticed movement in the pins heading towards the city.

  He got up and walked away from the human to get a better look, seeing a rge object made of stone and wood traveling across the pins e spiked wheels. Upon it sat several rge humans, along with a massive amber colored stone. As he was watg, one of the humans looked at him and shouted at the others.

  A fsh e left the hand of one of the humans, trails of dense mist arg up into the air towards him before detonating in an ear-splitting crack, fring light throughout the area as streamers of yellow fell from the sky.

  The children screamed and fled bato the town, even as he himself shrieked in pain as his sensitive ears were assaulted by the noise. He felt shod fear through the link with the human as they tumbled over before scrambling to their feet and shouting as well. fused and terrified by this situation, he fled back towards his den.