FOX, Part 6: A Hero's Journey, (A Novel)
Michael Gray Griffith
A gold, heavy moon oversaw the birth, illuminating the earthy lair as it crept its weight over the crest of the world. Inside the lair, Mother’s womb, life full, ruptured. Digging her claws into the earth she yelped to the break: a wail that clung to the scrub’s leaf-rotting breath as the cubs, brunted from their liquid cell by time, poured consecutively free.
This is how Fox entered the world, unaware of the overwhelming obstacles that lay before him. . .
These links are from the first parts of the novel.
PART SIX
Article: Sydney Morning Herald
FIRST RABBITS, NOW FOXES
The CSIRO is celebrating the apparent success of its NFE: National Fox Eradication program, which has been working towards creating a genetically modified virus specifically targeting Australia’s feral foxes. The virus, called FCV or ‘Fox Claicvirus,’ is showing extraordinary results in its early stages. Across the country, both in regional and metropolitan areas, newly formed FCDs (Fox Collection Departments) are working flat out to keep up with demand.
The FCV virus, engineered by a team of scientists under the guidance of Professor Sebastian Chute, appears to be on course to thoroughly decimate the feral fox population. Many are claiming that FCV could be even more effective than the rabbit calicivirus, which has left vast sections of the Australian mainland rabbit-free.
Today, Stewart Middleton, the mayor of Newbury—a predominantly sheep-farming community in New South Wales—claimed his town is well on its way to being declared fox-free. Since FCV was released there early last week, sixty fox corpses have been collected. Middleton stated that over the years, his community had spent millions of dollars trying to keep the fox population in check. Now, after years of losing the battle, they believe they finally have the weapon not only to win the war but to do so cheaply.
At a press conference later in the day, Professor Chute was questioned about the virus’s initial name, VVCV (with ‘VV’ standing for Vulpes vulpes, the scientific name for the fox, and ‘CV’ for the virus family Claicvirus). He explained that FCV (Fox Claicvirus) was chosen because it was more user-friendly and, as he put it, “more Australian.”
“For some reason, Latin hasn’t caught on here,” he quipped.
When asked about concerns in parts of the world like Europe, where foxes are cherished, and what precautions were in place to prevent the virus from spreading there, Professor Chute replied that the only way FCV could travel overseas was if someone deliberately cultured and released it. “This is the beauty of the Australian continent being an island,” he added.
He went on to explain that the fox is Australia’s number one feral predator. By controlling or even eradicating it, Australia could save millions in livestock production, particularly lambs, while also benefiting native wildlife.
When asked whether he believed the virus could eradicate foxes completely, Professor Chute responded that in the emerging science of biological control, a 100% success rate is unheard of. He cited the rabbit calicivirus (RCV) as an example, which has been over 95% successful in some areas but less effective in wetter environments.
“Still, I certainly don’t believe a 100% success rate is impossible. We are in a new era—an era where our science and technology can rectify the damage caused by our previous science, technology, greed, and ignorance,” he said.
The press conference was briefly interrupted by a lone protester who claimed the virus could mutate and infect humans. Professor Chute addressed the concern by explaining that exhaustive human tests had been completed and verified. None of the humans tested became infected, and not one developed antibodies.
“A sure sign,” he said.
Chapter 42
Fox woke to the sound of a large animal running. Rushing to the den’s entrance, he listened to the fox tearing through the undergrowth. It ran as though it was being chased, its breath a snort of foam and pain.
Looking up, Fox found Crow. Sombre in his wings, the bird was waiting. Whether the bird was still in pain, thanks to the 'Eyes in his Head,' or whether the pain had been temporarily relieved, was a mystery. The only thing readable in the bird's face was anger.
‘Don’t glare at me,’ Fox said. ‘They trapped me too.’
‘Yeah, right,’ cawed Crow. ‘Your mother. Well, I’ve got news for ya. She’s dead, mate. I should know—I was there.’
Fox said nothing.
‘You should have died too,’ Crow cawed. ‘Remember that.’
‘Which way?’ Fox growled.
Crow didn’t move. Neither did Fox.
Finally, Crow looked away. Then, in his own time, he lifted into the air and flew off through the trees.
A few moments later, from somewhere out of view, Fox heard him caw.
Looking back at his birth den, Fox remembered the morning he left. Turning back to where the caw had come from, his mind filled with the image of his missing mother’s face.
Crow cawed again.
With a heavy heart, Fox rose and set off.
Chapter 43
The Dog-Fox growled. He didn’t like spirits. All his life, he’d had nothing to do with them, yet here they were, surrounding him.
From the illuminated pack, the Spirit Fox separated himself.
The Dog-Fox growled.
The Spirit Fox seemed pleased with this.
‘Hungry?’ he asked, his own jaws glowing despite the early morning light.
Puzzled, the Dog-Fox stopped growling.
‘Then follow us,’ the Spirit Fox said.
Chapter 44
They moved fluidly. Crow flew ahead every time he saw Fox approaching, and then, once perched, he cawed.
As he trotted along, Fox found his head filling with questions. Was there another way to find Mother? Could he trust the Spirits? Was that running fox the first evidence of the sickness? The questions were so consuming he almost missed it.
Crow cawed.
Fox stopped.
The birds, the wind, and the insects spoke as though nothing was wrong. Crow cawed again, his tone annoyed. It didn’t work. Rooted to the spot, Fox had yet to move. Eyes wide, he scrutinized the view behind him as he sniffed the air. But he was upwind, so if something were behind him, he wouldn’t be able to smell it.
Crow cawed again: short and curt. Obediently, Fox turned back and moved on.
Stone still, the Dog-Fox evaluated. The fox before him was less than half his size. If he could get close enough, he could easily outrun him. And then, once caught, it would be even easier to overpower him. The only chance the little fox had was distance. The ground below was dry leaves. He would have to tread softly, slowly—spread his weight to minimize their cracking. But the young fox was moving fast, chasing that crow, just as the Spirits had said he would. This was odd. But he didn’t care. All he cared about was matching his stride to the young fox’s.
If the wind held . . . perhaps?
And why should he fix the trails? Fox thought. He’d been left for dead. He was here because of the bird, not them. And what of the sickness? So one fox had it—what did that mean? He’d never been sick. He’d just been hungry, and he had survived hunger. He had survived everything.
Crow cawed.
Every new caw sounded more annoyed than the last. Fox crossed a human path, smelled their steps, and wanted to stop. There was bound to be food around here somewhere. Humans always left food.
A parrot squawked.
Fox swung around, his quick eyes catching the green bird as it raced off through the branches. Then he fastened his attention to the bush below where the bird had been.
He waited. Bar the buzz of the bees as they labored from one flower to another, there was nothing much else to hear and nothing dangerous to smell. Yet, despite no proof, every hair along his spine, from the crux of his tail to his head, had risen.
Crow cawed.
Fox ignored him.
Fox’s keen eyes picked out a praying mantis, nodding as it waited for prey. He heard a magpie warbling in the distance, and he heard his heart. His heart that knew something was there. His heart that disregarded all his other senses and told his head to wait.
Crow cawed.
Fox remained still.
Silence.
More silence.
Crow cawed again.
The Dog-Fox thought: If the young fox panicked, that would give him a few meters, but if the young fox froze, as many animals did, then the young fox was his. Then, as he watched the fox look for him, he suddenly realized he recognized his scent. Glaring down at his paw, he found the place where his missing claw had been—the one he’d ripped out while trying to dig his way to this fox. His jaw clenched. His eyes returned, glaring through the scrub as he found the young fox and charged.
Crow cawed, but his voice was like a memory, for Fox, stunned by shock, was staring in disbelief at the Dog-Fox bounding through the scrub.
‘Move!’ something in him yelled. He could not. He just stared, transfixed by the Dog-Fox’s eyes, which were fixed on his.
‘MOOOVVVE!’ an inner voice roared, and this time he obeyed. With fear fueling his muscles, snout down and forward, he tore past trees and plunged through the scrub. But he knew, even before he’d turned, that he’d left his run too late.
The Dog-Fox’s claws found his rump. Fox’s hind legs collapsed. He crashed into the dirt. The Dog-Fox was all over him, his jaws clamping around the back of his neck.
Fox twisted to escape, growled, scratched, and bit at the air, but nothing could shift the Dog-Fox’s jaws. Before he knew it, Fox was rolled over onto his side and felt the jaws clamping down on his throat. His breath was cut off. Desperately, he tried to inhale as every limb tore at the earth or scratched the Dog-Fox. He was after leverage, after hope, but despite all his struggles, Fox felt death approach. Dark, hungry, and well-used to its duties, it rushed towards him.
Fox panicked. He clawed, twisted, kicked, and pushed until, with his lungs screaming for a breath, he saw the Spirits. At first, he tried to call to them, but then he realized it was the other pack—the larger, brighter pack—and in front of them all, the Spirit Fox sat.
The Spirit Fox looked satisfied. Fox didn’t understand and had run out of time to learn. With no other means of escape, he gave up trying and retreated to the last place of safety he knew: sleep.
In the Dog-Fox’s jaws, Fox, as though a switch had been flicked off, went limp. His tongue slipped out and dangled from his jaws.
Crow reached the battle now. Landing in the trees above, he sat, stunned, and wrapped his wings around himself. As he watched, he saw Fox’s tongue slip from his jaws and his body go limp.
The Dog-Fox held on, then, giving Fox another vigorous shake, finally released his grip and sniffed his kill.
The Spirit Fox looked up at Crow. He stared at him as though a crow was something he had never seen before. The Dog-Fox, noticing, did the same. Crow couldn’t see the Spirits, but as he watched, the Dog-Fox bared his teeth and growled. A new pain came—deep-rooted, it took over everything and left him hollow. Nothing made sense. Nothing.
In his sleep, Fox felt death approach. There were no Spirits in his sleep to help him. No comforting dreams: just a rising cold and a voice screaming at him to fight. It was a voice he recognized . . . It was his own.
The Dog-Fox turned back from Crow to take his first bite of flesh. Snakelike, Fox’s head sprang up and clamped his needle teeth onto anything he could.
Around the shocked Dog-Fox, the Spirits jerked. Before them, the Dog-Fox was floundering backward, with Fox holding onto the side of his face.
In celebration, Crow cawed.
But it was far from over. Snarling, the Dog-Fox began scratching Fox’s belly, his back claws digging and tearing into Fox’s flesh. Fox swallowed the pain. He knew, as he felt himself being pulled along, that to let go was to die. Finding every part of his being that wanted to live, he rerouted this want into his jaws and bit down harder, hearing and feeling his teeth crack bone.
To the series of small cracks, the Dog-Fox snarled and swung his head this way and that. Finally, he swung Fox against the side of a tree. The force of the collision broke Fox’s grip. Free but dazed, Fox forced himself to lunge back at the Dog-Fox. He was desperate to reattach himself before the Dog-Fox could compose himself. The lunge was without thought: an aimless rage, driven by a determination to survive. It saw him smash into the side of the Dog-Fox’s face and knock his older head up. There it was. Fox only saw it for a blurred section of a moment, but he knew what it was. It was life.
There was no snarling. No shock. The Dog-Fox was a killer; he was used to death in all its savage fortunes. Yet, for all that, he had never been held by the neck before.
From the outside, the battle appeared so fast and ferocious, so blurred by the dust each fox was throwing up, it was hard to follow who was winning. Inside, though, the fight was slow. With their separate brains slowing the action, everything was clear. The Dog-Fox was twisting frantically: his back paws tearing at Fox’s belly, and his front paws ripping the sides of Fox’s face. He was reaching for and managing to tear open Fox’s gums. Fox knew this. He could feel it, and he knew too that he had to hold on. But there was another truth he was also becoming aware of: his jaws were neither long nor strong enough to choke this larger fox. His only chance was to wound him. A wounded fox might back off rather than risk more damage being inflicted on him. But then, suddenly, he felt his canine pierce the Dog-Fox’s flesh, and he knew.
With no need to hold on anymore, he let go.
Free, the two foxes backed up against separate trees, then sat there, panting, taking the other in as they evaluated their own injuries.
Both ignored the enraged Spirit Fox and the other unsettled Spirits.
Both bled and smelled the other’s blood.
The Dog-Fox had been injured before. The wounds from the vixen he had fought had taken months to heal. Yet, despite this, he was stunned by the ferocity of this small fox’s attack. He could see, too, that although Fox was baring his teeth, he wasn’t frightened anymore.
‘Finish him!’ the Spirit Fox snarled at the Dog-Fox.
Growling, the Dog-Fox regrouped and charged, but Fox didn’t move. He knew he didn’t have to.
After two steps, the Dog-Fox collapsed.
As all the witnesses—and Fox—looked on, the Dog-Fox pushed himself up. Not only was he lightheaded, but a pool of dark blood lay where he had fallen. Bringing his paw to a numb area below his jaw, he found the area drenched in blood.
The shock sent him back to the tree he had just left. Soon, he was leaning against it. Puzzled, he looked up at Crow, then at the astounded Spirits, before turning his attention to the snorting, bleeding, and inflamed younger fox.
Chapter 45
Fox, Crow, and the Spirits watched the Dog-Fox die. Though soon unconscious, it took another ten minutes for the tiny nick in his artery—the one Fox’s incisor had sliced open—to cease its drain. Despite his coagulation’s best efforts, it could not stop the flow. With one last convulsion, a desperate, defiant shiver, life let him go.
Fox collapsed, his own body shivering as it let him sleep.
Grave in his black dress, Crow watched the Dog-Fox’s Spirit light leave. Its light emerged like a moth from a cocoon. Head first, its transparent paws pushed the rest of it free. It was a hazier, moon-colored image of its physical self. Free, it briefly studied its own corpse before lifting into the air, where, unencumbered by branches or leaves, it faded from view as it rose in search of the missing trail.
Crow turned his attention to Fox, inspecting his wounds as Fox slept.
The Spirit Fox turned to the other waiting Spirits.
‘Stay here till he dies,’ he said, and then he left.
The day passed. Flies rejoiced, and the night came.
Asleep, Fox dreamt, and his dreams were empty. There were no baseless voices, no eyes or light—only his own presence as he travelled through his body, inspecting the injuries he could find. There were so many cuts, and many of them were deep.
A caw from Crow woke him.
Between him and the dead fox, a feral shadow was detaching itself from the greater trees. Slender, it sauntered into the dim moonlight and sat. Raising a paw, it cleaned its face while never dropping its observance.
The Spirits watched. Fox could see that they seemed pleased.
Another shadow stole everyone’s attention. The lesser shape separated like the first, then found its open piece of moonlight. Gradually, others entered. Together, they stole the clearing of the last of its silence, replacing the quietness with the subtle sounds of the dry leaves they disturbed. Quickly, it grew crowded. Agitated and hesitant, the scavengers edged toward the corpse while constantly keeping an eye on Fox.
Back in the trees, Crow watched the predators slicing into and out of each other’s shadows, their tension bursting in low growls and hisses as they all waited for one of them to take the first bite.
Around Fox, the Spirits were nodding at each other.
Then, everyone turned to the first cat—a grey tortoiseshell. It crept on its belly toward the corpse’s rump. None of the spectators moved. Within touching distance, it sniffed, retreated, then, after tapping the fox with a paw, came forward and took the first bite.
The hoard descended, grunting and growling as they squabbled over the feast.
But there were too many of them, and those scavengers unable to find a clear portion of the dead Dog-Fox turned their attention to Fox. Fox’s dried blood was discernible despite the overpowering stench of the other’s death.
The Spirits, now sitting together like a jury, turned to Fox, their faces glad.
Fox growled at them, and his growl saw all the scavengers look his way.
He stopped growling.
The ones at the body went back to eating. The ones who were still hungry only had eyes for him.
‘If I were you,’ Crow cawed quietly, ‘I’d get up.’
Grimacing, Fox rose and found his balance. The scavengers watched his every move, their natural fear of a fox underwritten by Fox’s lack of size and obvious injuries. They were, as a rule, lone hunters, but circumstances could change your nature, especially if the prize of working as one was worth it.
Backing up to keep them all in view, Fox turned at the first tree and ran.
From the trees, Crow watched them follow.
As he ran, the hunters and the Spirits kept pace. They were all around him. He could smell them, hear them.
A black cat broke from the shadows. Fox growled at it, but it would not retreat. Faster than him, it bounded through the dark, its eyes waiting.
And then Fox saw it. Past the Spirits, past the shifting shadows of the scavengers, another lone spirit was waiting in the distance. It was a small spirit—a guiding star in the trees.
‘Dint,’ Fox whispered and barged toward him, careering through the surrounding Spirits and hearing, as he did so, all the hunters follow.
As the other Spirits saw Dint, they charged toward him too, their ghostly teeth bared, their glowing hair raised.
‘Run!’ Fox barked. ‘Run!!’
But Dint did not.
The Spirits reached him.
There was no cry, no growls. As Fox closed, snorting with rage, there came a greater glow of light as the Spirits swarmed over each other and over Dint. Then, they separated, and in the parting, they were brighter, and Dint was gone.
‘Noo!!’ Fox roared, as above, Crow kept pace.
‘Nooo!!!’
The Spirits flew toward Fox. In a stream of light, they flew into his eyes in an effort to blind him. Closing his eyes, he kept running to where Dint had been.
Realizing Fox was reaching somewhere, the hunters broke cover. One huge cat ran close enough to leap onto him.
Should I? Shouldn’t I? flashed across the cat’s scared face. Fox was as big as him, but Fox was injured and tired. The cat focused on the side of Fox’s exposed neck. If he grabbed him right—dug his teeth and claws in and held on—he might just bring the fox down. It was too good a chance to let go. Extending his claws, he leapt for Fox and, in doing so, passed over him. Below his paws, Fox vanished.
Years ago, two men had entered the park in search of rocks and boulders for their landscaping business. This hole was the result of one such boulder being removed. Over the years, the hole had caved in with the weather, but it was still large enough to protect a fox. Spinning around, Fox growled at the cat, who, miffed, growled back into the darkness.
On the verge of collapse, Fox struggled to evaluate where the other hunters were. He couldn’t see a thing from down here, bar the lights of the Spirits as, furious, they peered into the hole.
‘What have you done with my brother?’ he snarled. ‘Tell me!’
‘The same thing, once you’re dead, we’ll do to you,’ one growled back.
Outside, Crow landed in a tree above the hole and watched the hunters drop into the undergrowth. Their panting interest turned to the hole.
Chapter 46
As the night deepened, Crow observed others arriving. Those who had been feeding on the dead Dog-Fox now snaked into view. Confident, thanks to full bellies, they sniffed the hole from a distance, then sniffed the positions of the besiegers already there.
The hole was dark. The Spirits had retreated to the trees, and from there they watched.
In the hole, the incessant pain of his wounds tempted Fox with sleep, and the worry for Dint wore at his soul. Knowing that sleeping would be fatal, Fox changed position every time he felt his eyelids closing. But as time passed, he became chronically tired, and his thoughts of Dint and the fear of those outside began seesawing in and out of importance. As he struggled to remain focused—as his brain swam, drowned, and came back to the surface—he noticed, oddly, that some of the stars he could see through the hole’s mouth were disappearing. He cocked his head as he studied the new blackness. It took him a moment to realize it was the silhouetted head of a cat peering over the rim.
Fox exploded out of the hole, tearing a chunk of flesh from the cat’s cheek with one snarling bite. The cat hissed as it retreated, crab-walking, bleeding, and hissing back into the crowded undergrowth, swiping at another cat as it did. Determined to show the others that, despite its open, bleeding wound, it was still able to defend itself.
Fox fell back into the hole. Swallowing his want to whimper, he knew he had torn open nearly all his wounds. In the earth’s hold, they bled freely.
Time passed. The bleeding eased. Drowsy, he rose to the hole’s rim and peered out and around. Except for the congealed light of the waiting Spirits, he found only darkness.
The only living soul visible was Crow, who, with private shadows ruminating in his eyes, looked at him.
Fox dropped back into the hole.
More time passed—arduous, slow—its only true clock the journeying sliver of moon.
The runner came now. Shaking the sleep from his head, Fox rose to the rim and looked to where the noise was coming from. It was a fox, running flat out as if it, too, was being chased. They could all hear it snorting. It had no regard for quietness or stealth. It ran as though in a panic, with a viciousness. And then it passed them all, a little way off beyond their view, and kept running until the silence swallowed it.
Fox looked across to the Spirits. They were talking to each other in worried, hushed tones.
Fox fell back and watched the stars.
Time returned to its slow drag. Despite being able to smell those waiting for him to die, he found it possible to believe that their existence was more fantasy than real. Alone, he closed his eyes and looked for Mother, called to her with all his thoughts, but instead, he found the dull pain of his wounds and his grief for Dint.
Ironically, though, the wounds that had brought him here held the potential to save him. To keep himself awake, he bit at them, using the sharper pain to ward off sleep. Some of the wounds were forming scabs. Others oozed a watery, bloody solution. Tenderly, wearily, he licked these ones, bathing them with his antiseptic saliva, only to bite them again as sleep attacked.
But fatigue is a patient opponent, and as the night progressed, it gained more ground without Fox even realizing.
A caw from Crow startled Fox. For a moment, he didn’t know where he was. Then the truth hit him as hard as the Dog-Fox had.
Coming to the edge of the hole, he looked up to the bird, and the bird in the tree looked down.
Finally, in a beautiful pale shade of violet, the dawn came. As the sun followed, Fox knew he was safe.
But then, as the day aged, the hunters remained. Too weak to move, Fox fought on against the tide of sleep, surviving, as he did, three more breaches of the hole.
Night came again, and as Fox watched the stars return, he knew that this night would be his last.
Chapter 47
‘Here he is, everybody. Professor Chute! The man who saved our lambs!’
The applause was enormous. Standing on the hall’s stage, a younger Queen framed on the wall behind him, Sebastian wasn’t sure whether to bow or to wave. In the end, he didn’t have to decide because the mayor, Stewart Littleton—a man who looked like a beanbag that had lost a few beans—dragged him in front of the town rag’s photographer.
Other local farmers also wanted their picture taken with him. But Stewart hadn’t finished. Grabbing his wrist, he pulled Sebastian from the crowd and out the side door of the hall, where a small crowd had gathered around a circle.
Inside the circle, in a pyramid of sorts, lay the foxes.
‘And this is just after two days,’ Stewart said, then called the photographer over.
‘Come on, Gabriel,’ he said. ‘Get some pictures of the two of us with the foxes.’
The photos were taken—photos of everyone.
Later, in the pub, a sheep farmer with dust and wire ingrained in his eyes told Sebastian about the lambs he’d found that the foxes had left.
‘Nasty killers, foxes. Worse than dogs. I had this one lamb once—found it running around the paddock with its intestines hanging out. It had its legs tangled in them. Poor little thing.’
Around them, other farmers straightened their cracked lips and nodded.
‘Before your virus came,’ another farmer joined in, ‘it was nothing for me to spend half my week in the paddocks hunting the bastards. That’s the thing with a fox, see. It doesn’t hide out there,’ and with one sinewy arm, he swept the bar. ‘It hides in here,’ he said, prodding his head.
The group nodded again.
‘If you shot one, then you’d shot a dumb one. We couldn’t prove that, of course, until your virus spread through them. In one week, I found three times as many foxes on my property as I thought I had. And not just young foxes or cubs—old ones. Some were missing over half their teeth.’
Other farmers joined the conversation: some agreeing, some scoffing, others just laughing along.
All had horror stories about what foxes had done to their lambs.
All had been surprised by the number of foxes they’d found. Many had found their corpses floating in their dams.
‘Water again?’ Sebastian thought, as he remembered the reports of foxes in backyard pools.
On the way back to the local airport, his driver—who, along with a faithfully restored FJ Holden, had been provided by a local limo company—would not shut up.
He not only knew who owned every farm but who had owned them previously and what had happened to those farmers: drought, drink, or just plain useless.
As he listened, Sebastian observed the passing dams and imagined the dying foxes running into them. But why?
Then, as this puzzle turned over in his puzzle-loving mind, he imagined not only the lamb tangled in its own intestines but also moved inside its terrified mind.
‘Have you ever seen a lamb after they’ve been attacked by foxes?’ he asked the driver.
‘Oh yeah. Heaps. They’re bastards. Just bastards.’
The driver smelled of cigarettes and had a blurred, amateur tattoo on the back of his hand.
The moment made Sebastian smile as he thought of the places and situations this virus was taking him.
‘Hold on,’ the driver said, planting his foot and overtaking the truck.
The rush of speed surprised Sebastian. Grabbing and holding onto the dash, he turned to take in the road train they were passing. It was carting sheep. Both trailers had three floors, and on each floor, he saw squashed, shorn sheep, their eyes wide and terrified.
‘And what farmer bought them?’ he turned back to the driver and asked.
‘Farmer? No farmer, Professor. They’re off to the works.’
‘Oh,’ he said, shifting in his seat. He looked over his shoulder and, furrowing his brow, studied the now-following prime mover.
Chapter 48
The fox could not see where it was running. In truth, it could see, but its brain was unable to process the visual information coming through its eyes. A year old, its body was on fire. It felt like the whole forest was on fire, and wherever it ran, it only found more flames. On it stumbled, rose, and ran, banging against trees and tripping over the forest’s rubble as it did. Soon, its claws were torn, and the fur on its front legs was ripped away. But it couldn’t feel this, for the pain of the flames was too great. So great, all it could do was try to escape it. All it could do was run.
The Ranger heard it. Grabbing his rifle as the dog began barking, he ran to the front of the house in time to see the fox falling onto its face as it tripped over the bricks lining his long, graveled drive.
‘Back, devil!’ he yelled, and barking, the dog pulled itself up.
‘Get back now!’ he cried, and as the dog returned to his side, clearly confused, the Ranger strode to the fox, which was struggling to rise.
The fox’s hind legs were scraping the gravel as though they thought they were still running, but its front legs were wrecked and unable to lift it. It seemed to either not care or simply be unaware that a man was here, a rifle in his hands, half-raised.
The dog barked.
‘Shut up!’ the Ranger yelled.
The dog whined.
‘I said, shut up!’
Sulking, the dog paced along the line the man’s voice had drawn in the gravel.
The Ranger studied the fox’s face. Above the blood-stained foam bubbling out of its lips and nostrils, its eyes, wide open, were glaring ahead, almost as though it was blind.
Scanning the dark trees, the Ranger wondered how many others, like this, were out there now.
The virus was a miracle: a cleansing gift, mercilessly and voraciously healing the land.
Turning back to the fox, he traded in this brief smile for a surprised frown. It was as though he had opened a door in himself and found something he didn’t expect to be there. He wanted to touch it. Stroke it. And the surprise of this want stayed with him even after he brought up the end of the barrel.
Chapter 49
The gunshot made them jump.
Becoming delirious, Fox had managed to survive so many attempted breaches of the hole that he now growled at things that weren’t there. The hole reeked of his blood. In places he couldn’t reach, through weariness, the cuts and puncture wounds were becoming septic. Strangely, though, the pain was fading, transforming into an overwhelming desire to sleep—a need so desperate that the thought of giving in to their hunger was more a relief than a fear.
And where was the Spirit Vixen, or any of her pack? The only spirits here were those the Spirit Fox had ordered to stay. Stay until he dies.
Dies. To be dead. The concept was odd. Would he be with Mother? Would he be . . .
Ker-thump, went his heart, despite the approaching, silent paws.
Ker-thump, it beat, lulling him to sleep.
Ker-thump, ker-thump, ker-thump.
Crow cawed now—loud and hard.
Fox opened his eyes. Before him, everything was blurred. Enchanted, he watched the triangle-eared head blocking a portion of the hole’s mouth as if it were part of one of his dreams.
Groggy with sleep, Fox closed his eyes again and searched the coming sleep for Dint and for Mother.
Trembling and ready to leap out of the way, the cat remained and studied the still fox. Inhaling deeply, it sniffed and watched Fox, waiting for movement.
There was none.
Another cat was close behind it, its tail flicking, its eyes sucking in the night. But it was the first one who finally took a step inside.
As Crow cawed to no avail, the dry earth of the hole crumbled beneath its paws.
Crow cawed.
Drowsily disoriented, Fox barked himself awake.
The cat retreated, its every sense strategically judging . . . waiting.
Unable to sustain consciousness, Fox fell back to silence—to sleep.
The cat entered again, ignoring Crow’s voice as it descended slowly, step by pausing step.
Behind it, the other followed.
Fox felt the weight of the first cat’s paw as, inquisitively, it touched his side. Fox sensed, too, the other cat entering the burrow, but sleep sang to his heart . . . Sleep . . . Sleep.
He did not. Bristling awake, he transformed the hole into a churning pit of gnashing, hissing, and scratching.
A third cat, outside the hole, moved back from the battle. Hair raised, it listened, evaluated, then suddenly hissed and vanished back into the bush as, over its head, Vixen leapt and dropped into the hole. Her disappearing body was lit by an astonishment of Spirits.
The first cat that had entered the den collapsed onto Fox, crushed beneath Vixen’s weight. The second cat, frozen in shock, was grabbed by the back of its neck and wrenched, snarling, out of the hole.
Outside, it realized the Vixen had let go and tried to run, but it couldn’t. It lay there, paralyzed, its spinal cord severed.
In the den, Fox had clamped onto the first cat’s leg and was holding on. Hissing and scratching, the cat turned to the attacking Vixen and snarled. Vixen was prepared, powering past its swiping front claw. She clamped her teeth around its neck and began shaking. Hissing, sadly growling, it felt the coming of death. Its spirit light illuminated the den, allowing Vixen to see all the damage Fox had suffered. After tossing the dead cat aside, she came to Fox’s mouth and licked his tears.
To this, Fox lifted his head and studied her.
‘Mother?’ he said, then, before she could reply, he closed his eyes and left this realm.
. . . .More soon
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