Foxy and the others were sitting around Wheel Well on the 30th of October, gazing out at the sky. It was a spectacular blue, with no clouds to be seen. "Today would be a great day to go exploring through the woods." Foxy commented, and stood up. Lightning, Sheriff, Fillmore, Mater, Ramone, and Luigi followed her lead. She led the group into the woods below the cliffs, finding an old dirt path.

As they got deeper and deeper into the woods, they looked up at the trees, commenting on all the different colors the leaves were turning. Foxy smiled and looked up at them, seeing different shades of yellow, and brown as well. The brown ones were her favorites because if they were crunchy, she'd stomp on them and release a loud, triumphant laugh, emitting a laugh from the rest of the group. Soon, she had all of them going out of their way to roll or stomp on the crunchy leaves. They had no idea that it was getting quite late, and when she looked up at an odd sound, she gasped. There were large birds circling in the sky up ahead, possibly ravens or crows from the noise. There was a shadowy form standing at the end of the road. She watched it for a moment longer, then turned to Sheriff. "Did you see them?"

"Who?"

"There was someone at the end of the road, down that way." She nodded her head in the direction she was going, and Sheriff scanned the road in front of them.

"What'd they look like, Foxy?"

"Like me, a human."

"Foxy, that's ridiculous. Ya know that there ain't any humans in this world other than yerself." He told her, and she protested, firmly believing that she had seen another human at the end of the road.

"Foxy, none of us saw anything. It might've just been your shadow." Lightning spoke up, and the others nodded.

Foxy sighed, letting the matter drop for the moment.

Abruptly, thunder rumbled overhead, making them all yelp and jump. Foxy dove underneath Mater, shaking.

"Foxy, chill. It was just thunder. Besides, we've got to keep going to see if we can get outta this before it turns to mud." Lightning ordered, and the others nodded. He rolled over, fished her out, and sat her on his hood. "Now, stay there and keep us on the road. Otherwise, we'll all be stuck out here for the night with nothing but each other and whatever animals you don't chase away for comfort."

She whined, but remained where she was, her hands gripping his fenders tightly.

He winced, and was about to tell her to let go, when he realized that it wasn't her hands that were gripping his fenders. At least, not her real ones.

There were two arms that seemed to have sprouted from her ribcage, complete with gnarled hands and dagger-like fingernails. He gasped in surprise and horror, and blinked a few times.

The two extra appendages had vanished, but the faint pain was a reminder that he had seen what he thought he had. He led the group onwards in the pouring rain, Foxy's keen eyesight the only advantage they seemed to have. Various members of the group got stuck in the ever-thickening mud, and even when there didn't appear to be any, someone would end up stuck.

Finally, the group decided that they couldn't go on any farther and risk all of them getting stuck, so they all headed for the cover of the woods, dripping wet, coated in a layer of mud and shivering slightly.

Foxy, it seemed, was the only one who was anxious about the sleeping arrangements.

"Haven't ya ever been campin' before?" Sheriff asked, seeing her scrambling onto Fillmore's roof, as far away from the ground as possible.

"Of course I have! Just… in a trailer, not on the ground."

Sheriff shook his hood, then looked up at her. "That ain't real campin', Foxy."

"What do you want from me? I used to sit at home and read books all day. I like the outdoors, just not all dark, and scary, and… wet." She heard a stifled giggle, and growled. "Lightning, shut it, before I do it for you. I'm being serious here."

"Fine. You get really pissy when you're afraid anyways."

"Ohoh, you did not just call me afraid!"

"What if I did?"

Foxy hopped down from Fillmore's roof, and marched over to Lightning, giving him a glare that could've set him ablaze. "There are only two things that a Foxy is afraid of. One: Spiders and all insects. Two: Thunder."

"Uhh… the sky, doofus?" He retorted, pointing up at the still-thundering sky for emphasis.

"Why, I otta…" She muttered, her ears going back and a snarl growing on her face.

"Enough! Both of ya, knock it off! We're stuck here for the night, so deal with it!" Sheriff exclaimed with an angry snort.

The two settled down quickly after that, and it wasn't long before the group was asleep. All except Foxy. She kept hearing rustling in the trees and bushes around her. While they might've just been animals, she kept thinking that they were something else. Something far more sinister. She decided to go investigate the noises, and set off in the direction of the most recent set of rustlings.

As she headed deeper and deeper into the forest, she began to feel the tiniest bit of fear. Not a whole lot, but just enough to lose her sense of direction. She came upon a light, and hurried towards it, hoping that it was the embers from their campfire they had made to dry off and stay warm.

What she found instead was an old railroad lantern, with a roughly-carved message in the tree trunk, the light positioned so she could read it perfectly. 'MY FOREST, KEEP OUT. IF NOT, YOUR FRIENDS PERISH BY DAWN'S LIGHT.' She read, and gasped, clapping a hand over her mouth. Her mind went into overdrive with panic, and she went to snatch the lantern to find her way back.

Suddenly, a breeze blew by the lantern, snuffing the light out in an instant.

She whimpered, and began heading back the way she thought she had come from, the wet leaves sticking to her shoes and making her slip around. There were also numerous dead sticks and branches that had fallen, and she was constantly tripping over those as well. She tried to make her way as best she could, and thought she heard a voice calling for her.

It sounded a little far off, and she ran towards it.

"Foxy… Foooxxxyy…"

"I'm coming! I'm over here!"

Suddenly, she paused. She hadn't recognized the voice. She screamed as something behind her tugged at her hair. She whirled around, only to find… nothing.

She took off like a shot, falling flat on her face whenever she came upon a dead branch. She hadn't realized that she was sobbing and panicking until she heard the voice again, although this time it was coming from a closer point. And directly behind her.

She took off following it, trying desperately to stop crying. 'What are you, five years old? Get it together!' She thought, fiercely scrubbing at her eyes with the backs of her hands. She continued on, towards the sound of the voice, even though it wasn't a voice she recognized.

She paused, trying to ascertain which way it went. She was turning in every direction, trying to listen, when something bumped into her from behind.

She leapt into the air, whirling around at the exact same time. There was a pair of light blue eyes staring back at her in disbelief! She screamed as loudly as she had ever screamed before, full-fledged panic settling in. The owner of the eyes screamed as well, scrambling backwards a few feet in shock, rubber squeaking on the wet leaves. Wait. She knew the voice the scream belonged to….

"Sheriff?"

"Foxy?" He flicked his lights on to see if it was her, making her cringe and shield herself with her hands. "Sorry 'bout that." He replied, and turned them on low. "Foxy, what happened to yer hands?"

She looked down, and gasped. Deep scratches covered the backs of them, forming words. She squinted, trying to read around the blood. "'DAWN IS APPROACHING QUICKLY'." She read, and gasped, beginning to shake as she remembered the message left on the tree. "

Foxy, what's wrong?"

She just shook her head, bit her lip and refused to answer.

"C'mon, camp's this way."

She nodded and followed along beside Sheriff, looking down at her hands as they went. They got back to the camp shortly, and finding that they others were still asleep, he bandaged her hands himself. "Thanks, Sheriff." She whispered after they were finished, stoking the fire to try and get it burning again. He nodded, sitting far enough away from the fire that nothing would happen. Foxy went over and sat down by his side, and he wrapped a tire around her waist, looking over at her with mild concern.

"Where'd ya go that ya got lost? I was lookin' fer nearly an hour before I found ya."

"I'm not even really sure. I was just following the rustling all around. It led me to a tree that had an old, candle-powered railroad lamp hanging in one of the branches, and there was a message carved out on the trunk. It said, 'MY FOREST, KEEP OUT. IF NOT, YOUR FRIENDS PERISH BY DAWN'S LIGHT.'"

Sheriff looked at her for a minute, then shook his hood. "That ain't gonna happen, Foxy."

"But Sheriff, I really think we should get out of here. I don't like it here, it just feels… wrong."

"'Course it feels wrong, we're lost out in the woods, Foxy."

"Not like that. I mean something darker, something evil. What it is though, I can't tell."

"Ya mean like a monster?"

"No! I'm not five…"

He chuckled, and she pouted. "I mean like a… a.. an evil spirit, or demon, or something."

"Ya don't believe in that stuff, do ya?"

She nodded, then replied, "Yeah, I do. There's a lot of things that can't be explained scientifically or logically, because ghosts aren't made up of science, or logic, or math, or whatever. They're made up of something we don't know about yet, as are U.F.O.'s."

"Oh, fer the love of… Foxy, none of them things are real."

"Then explain what's underneath these bandages. Do you really think I'd scratch something like that into the backs of my own hands? I wouldn't wish that on even Chick, let alone have the guts to do it to myself."

Sheriff shook his hood, then nudged her. "Whatever it was, ya musta done it in yer sleep. Those types of things don't just appear like that."

Foxy sighed, then leaned against his fender, giving up for the moment. A few minutes later, she went to put more of their measly stockpile of wood onto the fire, sending sparks flying up as she tried to be as quiet as possible. After that, they sat in silence for a while, at least until Foxy heard the rustling noises again. "There. Did you hear that?"

"That's just an animal. Or the water drippin' from the trees and landin' in the bushes." He replied, and nudged her with a fender. "Get some sleep, kid. The others ain't gonna be awake fer a while."

She sighed, then got more comfortable, leaning back against his fender. She dozed off quickly, and Sheriff stayed as still as he could, occasionally glancing over at her to see if she was still sleeping.

Okay, how'd everyone like that? Spooky, right? There's more to this story, so tune in tomorrow to find out what happens! Oh, another thing that I forgot to mention.

Foxy's New Child may not be updated on Wendsday, or possibly even on Saturday. You see, I'm still writing it as I'm uploading it, and doing it that way just makes me feel like I'm being rushed to finish it. Not by you guys, but by myself. I really want to upload it, but yet I'm stuck at a certain point, and I just don't know where to go from where I'm at in it. I'm afraid that if I upload more pages then I'm typing, that soon, I'll get to the point where I'll have nothing new in that story for you guys, or that it won't be as good as the story has been so far. I really want you guys to enjoy this story, and since I don't even have more ideas for it, I'm going to take two of my uploading days and turn them into 'get my rear bumper into gear and start coming up with some interesting ideas for the story' kind of days. Honestly, if I could work my forced life around my chosen one, I'd have to be an officially licensed author of fanfictions, and I'm pretty sure that sort of thing doesn't exist. Welp, that's that, now to try and come up with an idea that I'm going to judge with my high standards, then put it into that story, after my Desktop takes about half an hour to boot up. :/ See you on Wendsday with IAHGIACW, Liz