Danielle awoke in the middle of the night. There was something strange, something she couldn't quite identify.
She realized it was quiet. The rain had stopped.
She waited a few minutes to make sure. Then she nudged Brandon.
"Huh?" he mumbled.
"It's stopped raining."
"What?"
"Listen, it's stopped."
"Yeah, let me check." Brandon yawned, stretched, and began to make his way through the tunnel. After a couple of minutes, he returned. "It's clear out there. I can see the stars."
Danielle crawled out. It felt wonderful to be outside the close, intimate atmosphere of the den, to breath fresh air without getting soaked to the skin. She curled up and decided to sleep the rest of the night in the open air. After a few minutes, Brandon joined her.
The two foxes woke up to the dawn, their bodies closely entwined. Brandon opened his eyes to see Danielle's looking back at him. The song of birds filled the air. An unspoken message passed between the two.
*Now is the time*
Danielle opened her nostrils wide to take in Brandon's wonderful scent. She felt his hard, insistent erection against her flesh. A brief memory of the urgency of male sexual desire flashed across her brain, but her own feelings now, though equally intense, was very different. She rolled over, and opened herself to her lover. No, not just her lover--her husband.
Brandon viewed the ripe, enticing body of his wife--it seemed natural to think of Danielle that way--and embraced it, reveling in the feeling of fur against fur, of Danielle's wonderful breasts against his chest, but never forgetting the urgent desire to feel himself inside her.
Now that it was actually happening, after weeks of yearning, Danielle actually wanted to take it slow, but she knew that Brandon desperately needed to penetrate her. . She reached down and guided him into her.
Brandon felt exalted, king of the world. Danielle felt fulfilled, containing the furious energy of her husband. I'm female now, she thought, and in some way I always will be. No regrets.
What seemed like a long time after, the two foxes lay together, spent.
Brandon slowly pulled away from Danielle. He gave a quick nod in the direction of the area the two had established for relieving themselves. Danielle smiled.
On his way back, Brandon noticed a strange kind of shining place in the grass. The puddles the rain had left reflected the light, but this looked different, almost metallic. He reached down, and pulled out a gold ring. The first man made object, other than the clothes they brought with them, that either had seen on this planet.
It was fate, he decided. He went down on his haunches before Danielle. "Will you marry me?" He held out the ring. Danielle's eyes popped wide open. "Where did you get that?" she gasped.
"Uh, some guy named Frodo dropped it?" Brandon replied. The two foxes laughed, and some of the nervousness between them drained away. "Of course I'll marry you Brandon." Danielle answered. "But seriously, where did that thing come from?" She took the ring from his hand and maneuvered it over her claw and onto her finger, where it clung precariously near the end.
"I don't know, it was just there, lying on the grass." Brandon answered.
"Wait a second." Danielle took the ring in her hand again. "This looks familiar." She read the inscription on the inside. "To Katy from Sam." "Oh Brandon, this is my mother's ring. What is it doing out here?"