Cub scout trip!  It'll do you some good to get some fresh air and sunshine.  Learn how to swim, walk rope bridges, get devoured by mosquitos, and so forth...  No poison ivy problems so far at least.  Now it's free time.  Allowed to go wherever in the campgrounds.

The bright side to this for Eli is that he loves nature. He begins exploring the paths first and discovers that the other kids' interests have led them to pretty much everywhere on camp grounds. Figuring it best he learn swimming sooner than later, he heads for the pond in his swim suit. Just as he is almost there, though, Eli gets distracted by a caterpillar and studies it.

Why is Joe suddenly too young to buy PG-13 movie tickets?  Roleplay temporal paradox.

"You know, with how slow they are that thing will probably be around once you're done swimming."  Well, unless it get's eaten. Or stopped on. Or all the assorted things that can happen to a caterpillar over the span of 30 minutes.

A sudden explosion of movement!  A rabbit bolts out of the underbrush, hopping at full throttle!  Close behind is a fox giving chase, hot on the bunny's tail.  The rabbit stops short of the pond and faces the fox.  The fox stops short, waiting to see what the rabbit will do next.  The rabbit starts hopping around, kicking and flailing wildly!  The fox is confused and backs up a few steps...

Eli says, "Uh-I guess you're righ-" BUNNY! ...FOX!

Eli cringed at first, but then heads to the water's edge. "I thought foxes were shy... I wonder how hungry it is. I don't have anything on me." he looks at his swimsuit self. Then looks at the rabbit. "But at the same time... what in the world is the rabbit doing?" He begins carefully approaching the rabbit while keeping an eye on the fox.

"Eli, as nice as it would be to save a bunny I like you better without teeth marks."

Leroy Jenkins!  The bunny charges at the fox!  The fox is so startled, it leaps four feet into the air with a yip!  Bunny takes the chance and vanishes into some thornbushes.  The fox stares in shock, ears pointed at where the scary bunny disappeared, either unaware of the kids approach, or unconcerned.

Eli is startled also and takes a step back into the water, tripping and falling backward with a splash! "Eep!"

  Now, turning your back on a wild animal seems questionable.  But just assuming Eli didn't hit his head on a rock and is about to drown in shallow water seems like the worse call at the moment (you can't punch drowning), so he turns to check on Eli.

The sploosh draws the fox's attention.  Head-tilt and tail-flick.  Sniff-sniff, but keeping distant.  It yips questioningly.

Eli sputters and sits up. He's wet, but surprisingly fine. "I'm fine..." he says bashfully. "Thanks."

His attention then turns to the fox who is just as oddly brave as the bunny. "Why didn't the fox run away...?" he says in a curious tone.

  "This is a place more frequented by kids and camp counselors than hunters."  Also, a squirrel in a warzone probably wouldn't be afraid of Eli.

  He offers a handup for Eli.

The fox takes a sip of the water then sits, watching the kids.  It whimpers a little, then licks its nose.

Eli takes the hand up. Then looks at the fox. "...speaking of being used to kids, do you think it expects handouts from us? I wonder if it'll lemme pet it..."

He begins heading towards the fox.

  "I'm pretty sure heading closer to the wild predator is the opposite of what they are trying to teach us here, Eli. It was already hungry enough to chase a rabbit, so shoving your hand in it's face is like 'please eat me'."

The fox scoots a little to face its side to the kids then head-tilts and rolls its eyes up to look at them.  Some more ear and tail-twitches and air-sniffs.
This message was last edited by the player at 06:15, Sun 04 Sept 2016.

Eli says, "What if it wasn't hungry? What if it was just playing with the rabbit? After all, it stopped when the rabbit did... sure looks harmless. Besides... if it wants to hurt me, why just sit there?"

  "I'm not exactly an animal psychologist.  But sharp teeth is something I don't want close to my friend either way, I'm strange like that."

The fox stands up and trots towards the mess hall.  It pauses, sniffs, looks at the kids, barks, and waits for them.

Eli smiles, sucking in his lower lip. "That's all good, but... don't you find it neat that a fox is trying to lead us towards the direction of the mess hall?" he begins following. From a distance, if just to make Joe less worried.

  Joe must be too young to have fully picked up on how cartoonish his life really is, at this point.

  He follows along, though refrains from sighing.

The fox hops about happily to see the children following it to the food place.  It hops up onto one of those campsite trashcan thingies that is firmly in place with bolts impeded into a concrete pad then pokes its head inside, tail swishing.  It then looks over at the kids with an empty sandwich bag in its mouth, whimpering sadly.

Eli meeps. "It is hungry... and it's asking us to feed it. Let's get it something."

He rushes inside the mess hall to look for some sandwich fixings. Namely any meat.

  Joe figures it would need to have a purple dress to prefer a BLT over just throwing one of those ingredients at it.

  Still, this is highly preferable to his initial worries.  "You are lucky Eli is so nice."

Happy fox is happily dancing about, panting excitedly.  It occasionally stops to look around and sniff, then resumes tail-wagging and pacing.

Fixings aren't easy to get at, even for human children.  But Eli is clever and can figure out how to get at the stuff that the grown-ups didn't bother locking up because kids are too short to reach.

Once Eli has enough to feed Joe, himself and the fox, he heads back out and sits on his feet, holding up the yummy meat while nomming some himself. "Brought enough for all three of us, Joe."

  Yes, definitely much better than expected.  See, Joe could go for being wrong more often when it's like this.

  "Thanks, Eli."

The fox gladly noms the offered snack then tries to thank Eli with a cheek-lick.

Eli giggles from the licks and pets the fox in return. "Do foxes swim? I'm still a little wet from earlier and was looking to swim, but if foxes don't swim, I'll need to get changed back into my uniform or something."

  "I have no idea, though they probably prefer not to get dunked if they can help it."

The fox is so happy being pet, it tries to climb onto Eli's lap.  It looks over to Joe inquisitively and motions with its paw in an almost obvious, "Aren't you going to pet me too?" gesture.

Eli giggles and cuddles the fox, enjoying the body heat. "This fox sure knows charades."

  "I think for the moment I'll stick to compliments, like how cool the fox looks.  Besides, it would feel a bit crowded leaning over them while you are trying to hug as much of them as possible."

The fox gets that contented, eyes-closed look animals get when cuddled by a boy they love.  The tail wags against Eli's face.

An adult approaches from the direction of the pond, watching the kids in surprise.

Far be it from Eli to accuse another boy of being shy. He simply nods in acknowledgement to Joe.

As the adult approaches, Eli smiles and says, "Hello Mr Haverson. This fox sure is friendly."

  "I spent a good five minutes of paranoid lecturing before it turned out the fox wasn't a jerk."

Mr Haverson chuckles.  "Depends on how you define jerk.  That fox is a cunning little con artist that charms campers into feeding him.  But I've never seen him get so cuddly...""

Eli says, "Oh? Well... I did feed him and he licked me and curled up on my lap."

  "Honestly, 'will be cute for sandwhich' despite being such a low bar, seems surprisingly hard for some people to pass on the Jerk, Yes/No? front."

The camp counselor shrugs from Eli's comment.  "Maybe you just have an honest face the fox trusts?"

He chuckles from Joe's comment.  "Sad but true.  Either way, I figure if you two are keeping an eye on him, he'll be staying out of mischief.  If he starts digging in the trash just holler.

"Be careful with the other kids, though.  Some will throw rocks at him, and if that happens he'll bolt and stay away for quite a while."

Eli says, "Wh-...why would anyone throw rocks at him?"

  "Because sometimes, boredom leads to cruelty.  Just look at the basis of every road trip movie."

The grownup shrugs.  "I dunno.  Same reason they throw rocks at people, I guess.  Only small woodland creatures tend not to have parents who can find out where they live."

The fox was a little nervous about the adult at first, but since the conversation hasn't gotten angry sounding, he just enjoys the pets, occasionally licking Eli.

Eli looks at Joe a little confused, unsure what he means.

Eli says, "Do you know much about foxes, Mr Haverson?"

  "I'm sure some of them would be dumb enough to throw rocks at medium to large creatures too, unfortunately."

The man rubs behind his head sheepishly.  "Very little, to be honest.  I know some interesting fox facts, though.  There's 48 sub-species of fox, they have whiskers on their legs as well as around their faces, heir eyes glow green when light is shone into them at night, they cannot chew their food like humans can, they have to tear it up into small pieces, and so on."

He nods to Joe.  "If you see something like that, yell for an adult."