“More than it should be.” Eva commented, annoyed at both herself, for not getting it until now, and the werewolf before her, for ruining the majestic scene she had been enjoying seconds ago.

Misreading the fallen expression on the Kitsune’s face, Kurt spoke up. “Am I that weird or scary, Miss climbs-onto-balconies-as-a-fox?” Tilting his head to the side a bit, he awaited her response.

“Ah, no, not really.” Eva admits with a shake of her head. “You’re not even close to how weird some of the things that happened recently to me were.” After giving him a shrug, she continues with a chuckle. “And I’d be more scared of my family’s Newfoudland Dog running up to greet me.”

Ears drooping a bit, the Werewolf spoke up, still having a human voice coming out of a lupine snout. “Am I really less scary than a dog?”

“Yes. And if you had ever seen 70kg of dog running up to you at full speed you’d agree.” Eva countered, crossing her arms before her chest.

“70kg?” Kurt shouted, eyes wide open, tail sticking up straight.

“Well we are talking about dogs big enough you can easily miss a walnut stuck between their toes.”

“You sure those are really dogs?”

“Yes.” She replied accompanied by a quick nod. “But anyways, what are we going to do tonight?”

“Same thing we do every night Fuchs, try to take over the world.”[1] Kurt replied, his tail wagging, while he tried his best to keep a straight face. For a wolf at least.

After trying, and failing, to suppress a chuckle, the Kitsune spoke up again. “Okay, but seriously, what are you going to do all night?”

“Have fun, enjoy the night, jump some fallen trees.” The wolf before her replied giving his best approximation of a shrug.

“Uhuh.” came the doubtfilled response.

“Have you ever taken the time to just spend a night running around as an animal?” Kurt inquired, paws scraping over the ground. “It’s quite a nice way to just leave all the stress of the month behind.”

“Can’t say I have.” Eva admitted, tail swishing lethargical behind her. “Even if I thought of it, I doubt there’s a park large enough to run the whole night in Tokyo.”

“Ah true.” The werewolf conceded. “But we aren’t in Tokyo tonight are we?”

“So?”

“So go turn into a fox and then we go explore.” Kurt urged her, his tail flicking from side to side with vigour. “Don’t worry I wont peek.”

“As if.” Eva said as she leaned forward. A moment later she landed on all fours, once again in the shape of a white fox.”See no chance of peeking anyways.”

Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

Instead of dignifying that with a response, Kurt lunged forward. After gently squeezing one of her tails with his jaws, he ran off shouting “Tag your it.”

Before she could process what had happened, the werewolf had already vanished between the trees all around them.

“So he’s a hyperactive puppy now huh?” Eva mused as she decided to give chase, preferring the childish game to just loitering around for the moment.

While she had at times hiked through forests, running through one like she did now was a vastly different experience. Not only did she normally stick to established paths, she also had a much better vantage point from being bipedal. Now every bush, or even just larger tree roots, obscured her vision noticeably.

This forced her to rely more and more on her vulpine nose to follow Kurt instead of looking for signs of where he might have gone.

Of course, the moment she closed her eyes to focus more on the smell, like she did back when she was just human, Eva ran into a tree. Luckily she hadn’t been running at full speed and thus was more surprised then actually hurt. As she got back up again she quickly shook her head. Less to actually deal with the minor disorientation or pain, and more over disappointment in herself.

But before she could go back to trailing her friend, Kurt’s head appeared above one of the bushes giving her such trouble.

“There you are. Everything alright?”

“Yes.” Eva mumbled. “Just getting used to not seeing where I’m going.”

Before he could reply, she took a page out of his book. After smacking one of her tails into the side of Kurt’s head, Eva took off. While it was still a surreal experience to rush through the forest like this, without having to bother tracking the werewolf she at least had no issues avoiding obstacles.

For a few hours more the duo continued in this fashion, before Eva ended up falling into a small stream. On its small banks they rested for a while. Of course, after that, Kurt did his best to get Eva to continue running through the woods. To the small animals that lived here, the two predators were a terrifying threat. Even if they did only actually hunt them once or twice.

Neither of them noticed the young raven that kept an eye on them, her curved beak shining in the light of the full moon.