“Innie, baby,” Wolf Chan called lightly to the running ball of creamy white fluff that was disappearing rapidly towards the beach, “Not so fast!”

If the little fox cub heard him, he did not reply but Wolf Chan had to admit that he wasn’t that overly worried about what could happen to him. This island was barely less than five miles in full circumference and only held maybe a handful of other skzoo who had decided to escape from the hustle and bustle of life back in the big hectic world and live a much more simpler one on an unclaimed deserted island. There was Tom Nook and his nephews, Timmy and Tommy who ran the local store, the Label sisters with the clothes shop and Blathers in his museum and Roger and Wilbur the Dodo’s in charge of the airport. A friendly turtle by the name of Kapan came along every other day to island hop and there were various little travelling stall owners who would pop over every now and then in order to exchange the island goods for things from the mainland and they were all friendly and coherent.

The only other permanent island residents were a duck by the name of Stay and a sleepy old bat by the name of Jay, both of whom relatively kept to themselves. Stay liked to turn up with left overs because she always cooked way too much or else some spare clothes that she think would fit, as well as more recently toys to keep the baby Foxiny entertained, though everyone called him Innie. Jay could be found wandering at night with stories and songs but otherwise stayed in his little house and generally caused no problem. Wolf Chan liked them all and it was a relief to get away from the manic tension of the city and the demands that were placed on him as a wolf therein.

He didn’t want to find a mate and produce children just because it was expected of him, he didn’t want to be forced into a job that he hated with a passion because it brought in the best money and would make him rich beyond his wildest dreams. All he wanted was to have the time and space to produce his songs, find a pack of his own that he liked and make a family that way. So the island getaway package had been almost a gift from the powers above and despite the complaints he, still, received from his family back on the mainly, the wolf was content to spend his days fishing, bug hunting and doing general maintenance over the island as well as taking the time to compose his songs and run his weekly online show of ‘Wolf Chan’s Room’ where he just reached out to anyone who needed a safe space and a chance to get away from it all.

Island Life had been wonderful, peaceful, and quiet, an almost perfect paradise where Wolf Chan was happy, healthy and in a clear mind which was relaxing on so many levels.

Then a storm had brewed up one night and changed everything.

The whole population of the island had taken refuge in the Residential Services building whilst the wind howled, the rain lashed, and several ominous crashing noises came from the outside. Wolf Chan had spent the whole night awake, counting and recounting everyone in the building to ensure that no one was crazy enough to run outside, fearing for some piece of priceless furniture or anything of the like. Thankfully no one was that crazy to do something like that, though the wolf did find himself half tempted to go out at one point because his large sensitive ears picked up the sound of a baby wailing in fear and pain, but he was pulled back by Blathers.

When the sun rose the next morning, and the rain had finally pattered out into nothing but a soft silence, Wolf Chan was the first to venture out onto their island. For the most part, everything was completely fine. A few trees had fallen down, the most notable one being on the side of the museum, but Blathers mused that it wasn’t too much of a problem as he had been planning on asking an old friend of his to come and build a coffee shop there, so it made way for a nice addition to cheer everyone up once it was sorted out.

A few roof tiles were off and Wolf Chan’s garden had been partially destroyed by what appeared to be a shed which was slightly annoying, but it was all fixable. As was the missing glass in the windows and the few other things that had gone awry. But as he had gone to check on one of the pounds towards the back of the forest on the far side of the island, his sensitive ears once again picked up the crying of a baby.

Placing down the stack of sticks he had been carrying, as firewood was always handy to have, Wolf Chan made his way towards the sounds, vaguely wondering if any of the other residents had picked up on the noise but not pondering on it too much. He hadn’t really explored this part of the island much and knew very little about it, but his main concern was finding the skzoo that was making the noise because babies should be with their Mam’s and Dad’s and being looked after, not wailing their lungs out like this. It took a good ten minutes to navigate through the trees and bushes, until Wolf Chan came to the edge of a small sandy cliff which led down to a small hidden beach.

The revelation about there being a hidden beach would have to wait for now, as Wolf Chan began charging down the incline to attempt to haul an upturned boat back to its right side. The craft was basic at best, nothing more than a sail boat really with a tattered sail and from underneath it came the wailing cries. There was only the smallest of crunches as the wood toppled back to the shore line in its proper direction, but Wolf Chan paid it no mind.

On the sand, wriggling unhappily on his back, was a little fox cub with creamy fur and an adorable white tummy and ears that were way too large for his head but completely adorable because of it. Only a cloth nappy covered its little body and some inner instinct made Wolf Chan scoop the little bundle into his arms and gently begin to rock the tiny little thing back and forth. “There, there,” he said patting the creature’s side and bottom like his mother had taught him all those years ago with his numerous cousins. “It’s okay, you’re going to be safe now, I’ll see to that.”

He resisted the urge to kiss the fox’s head, not because he was cruel but because he was sure that the fox’s parents would take it the wrong way and after everything they must have gone through. Though that was a point, Wolf Chan finally noted as he started to look around the wreckage of the small craft in search for the fox’s parents, who were not there. Sniffing the air, Wolf Chan felt a coldness go through him as he realised that there were no other scents other than the milky one of the tiny little baby in his arms who was squirming a little but had stopped crying.

Especially when the only thing that Wolf Chan found on the beach other than a few pieces of splintered wood, was a small chest with the word ‘Foxiny’ printed neatly on the top. The lock was easy to open and inside was a handful of baby care things, all neatly wrapped up in plastic and a small letter that had miraculously survived. It read:

“To whomever finds this, please take care of my baby Foxiny. I cannot let him stay on our island or else they will take him away. Tell him that Mommy and Daddy loved him, but they cannot ever come to find him.”

Sitting back on his haunches, Wolf Chan looked down at the fox who was now contently resting in his arms, on his thumb. A terrible sadness filled the wolf, who placed the letter down and gave into his instincts to kiss the little cub. “Oh baby, I’m glad you came home to me.”

From that day on, Foxiny or Innie as he came to be known by everyone, stayed with Wolf Chan and everyone considered the cream-coloured fox to be the wolf’s son. They looked similar enough to pass as family when they smiled with crescent eyes and matching dimples and other than the colouring at first glance it was hard to tell. Innie’s ears were the only thing that really gave him away, but Chan always joked that he would grow into them one day. The rest of the island adored Innie anyway and had helped out with bringing the youngster up just as much as Wolf Chan did. Though they were more apt to happily play with the cub until he would start to cry and then give him back to Wolf Chan to deal with but that was typically the way of dealing with young that were not your own.

Though Wolf Chan would probably punch anyone who dared to tell him that he had no right to call Innie his son. Innie would probably do the same when he was old enough to understand, but for now, the two-year-old fox cub did not know the difference and was happy in his life.

Hence why he was running towards the beach to catch fishies without waiting for his Appa because, other than possibly tripping over a stray stick or something, there was not going to be anything that was going to eat him or try to kidnap him from it.

Though there was something odd on the beach today that made the little fox shriek in a high-pitched voice and had the wolf running to his side almost faster than the speed of light, which also caused the sleeping figure on the beach to leap up with a startled squark of surprise.

“Hard to seaboard boys,” a seagull in a sailor’s suit called out loud, still clearly half asleep, “The Kraken’s coming for tea and us ain’t got no sardines ready.”

Wolf Chan let out a long exhale of relief, “oh? Good morning, Gulliver.”

The seagull the spot, “Stow the rigging, you salty sea dog! Or I’ll make yer dance with the fish!”

Innie whined at this, clinging to Wolf Chan as he had hidden behind the much bigger wolf with the hopes that he would be protected. Wolf Chan chuckled, petting the boy, “It’s okay, this is one of Daddy’s friends. Well, more menace to the beach but he’s not so bad when you get to know him.”

“You scurvy scum! I’ll have ye cleaning the poop deck for a week!” the sailor seagull continued on before seeming to fully wake up, blinking several times over and recognising the wolf in front of him, “OH! Wolf Chan! What you doing here, aboard my vessel?”

Wolf Chan affectionately rolled his eyes, clearly the seagull had swallowed way too much seawater once again or was it frog ale this time, “You’re on the beach, Gulliver, did you have a party and throw yourself overboard again?” Or more likely got yourself thrown off your ship by your Captain once again he thought to himself but kept his mouth shut.

For a second or two Gulliver seemed to be undecisive on how to respond before taking a look around and realising where he actually was. Immediately he started squawking and complaining about how the sea was an unfair mistress and beginning to search for his communicator which was probably broken into loads of pieces once again as he never learned his lesson. Turning to Innie, Wolf Chan knelt next to the cub and rubbed his nose against him, “You okay?”

“Yeah,” Innie responded, watching the seagull with confusion, “Why he upset?”

“Because he fell off his ship, again, and has probably lost his communicator and we’ll have to dig up the pieces to get him off the island,” Wolf Chan said.

“Digging?” Innie replied, his little face lighting up because if there was one thing that Innie liked to do, it was simply to dig.

Wolf Chan nodded and grabbed the seagull to stop his ranting, “All right, I’ll help you find all the parts, again. Though tell Innie about what they look like so he can help us find them faster.”

“Innie?” Gulliver asked, looking down towards the indicated fox cub and letting out a large squark of surprise, “OH MY GOSH! Isn’t he the cutest little thing ever!”

The fox cub was back hiding behind his Dad in a flash, not overly fond of loud sounds at the best of times.

Wolf Chan rubbed at his face with a sigh, glaring at the seagull, “He is, but no more shouting, kay? He doesn’t like that.”

“Oh, sorry,” Gulliver replied, in a much more normal voice. “But he is adorable. Though since when have you had a mate? I’ve not seen any cream wolves around you.”

Dipping his ears slightly in annoyance at that statement, Wolf Chan didn’t have to answer because Innie took up a firm but shy hold of his hand, almost hanging off the elder wolf as he turned his big brown eyes up towards the seagull. “Daddy says that I was delivered to him by a stalk cause Mammy is in a far away place where I cannot go to see her yet but will do one day.”

Gulliver blinked and got the hint that there was no means to disprove this to the cub who innocently accepted the words as the truth of the situation. He smiled, “That’s lovely! I’m sure she’ll be waiting merrily for that day. Now, I heard someone likes digging?”

Innie nodded, a little dimple smile showing up on his face as he listened to the description of the missing pieces before leaping into the sand to start digging for them.

Gulliver turned to Wolf Chan, “So, how did you really come across him?”

“He washed up on the hidden beach after a bad storm,” Wolf Chan whispered, keeping his voice low, “Someone had sent him off in a boat with a chest of things to help him and a note saying that they’d never come for him, but they loved him.”

The seagull winced, “That’s rough.”

“Yeah, it is,” Wolf Chan smiled when he saw the cream ears just poking themselves out of the top of a hole that was dug, “But he’s with me now and I wouldn’t trade him for the world.”

“Wah! Daddy! Help! A big scary thing is trying to eat me!” came a cry from the hole. It turned out to be a sandworm who was just as frightened of Innie as he was of it. Wolf Chan still gently cradled his baby boy in his arms, cooing sweetly at him and gently groomed his too large ears to calm him down.

Gulliver giggled at the sight and tried to take a photo with his broken communicator, which did not go down well. Though Innie did indeed find all the pieces for the seagull and helped him fix it so that he could get his picture taken though, in true pup fashion, he tried to the camera as thanks.

Wolf Chan had howled with laughter at that but had wisely picked up his cub and started down the beach to go catch some fishies otherwise there was going to be nothing for tea and hungry cubs were one of the worst things in the world.

Innie waved bye bye to Gulliver and promised that he’d come and play with him again soon. Gulliver smiled and nodded in return, before sitting down to await his shipmates coming to get him again. Yes, Innie was the right fit for Wolf Chan, and he’d hopefully bring him up all good and proper.