A few weeks had passed. They had interviewed all the children—only six in total—spread across 800 kilometers. Progress was slow. They worked steadily on a method to triangulate the pulses. Eventually, they succeeded. But just barely. Their first vector pointed northeast. They relocated, 28 kilometers away, placing the device again. After three more days, a second vector appeared.
With both vectors aligned, they finally triangulated a source. And by some luck—or something else—it was precise. A single suburban house in a small, quiet town. Their data quickly aligned: this house was a target. Texas-Arkansas border. The mother in this case was abusive—though polished in public—doting over her "perfect little angel" with violent demands. New boyfriends cycled in every four weeks. A perfect behavioral match for the entity's pattern, as far as the data suggested. They had a location now. A chance to intercept. As they drove, Tom spoke: "Should we try to trap it?" Miller shifted uncomfortably, unease sharp in her posture. "What if we can't? We should get the mother out of the house... even if she's abusive." Tom stared forward. "Who knows how this thing reacts to interference." They arrived while the mother was at work. Installed cameras. Wired the entire house. Parked the van a distance away. Scanner online. A stakeout began.
It was late—Day 3. March 12, 2013, 2:13 AM UTC-5. The mother was asleep. The child awoke. The house lights flickered... then pulsed. Alarms in the van went off. Tom and Miller snapped awake. Cam feeds scrambled. Frequency scanners flared. But this time... not a pulse. All Wi-Fi was gone. The world had gone too quiet. Instead of spikes, there was now a constant vibration—a low background hum. It grew. On screen, the living room TV turned on. The signal changed structure. "Shit—it's happening," Miller said, typing rapidly. "It's... it's in a television broadcast format. Let me see if I can pull a local stream." Inside the house, on security footage, the TV displayed a high-quality animation. Disney-like. A fox, animated, walking through a forest. Then it turned. Sat. The child stepped into the room, drawn by the light. The fox turned toward the camera. "Hello there ALL! I am Mr. Fox! I will help you learn things. Now, for tonight's special broadcast... a song!"
And it began. A song—modern, stylized. Electronic. Hiphop. Pop. A rhythmic rhyme. The singing voice was male, silky, not deep—effortlessly smooth. Far too good. "W-What is this?" Tom muttered, watching the computer record. The child stepped closer, mesmerized. The mother entered, groggy and confused. "Did you turn this on?" she snapped. "No," the child whispered. "It... it turned on by itself." She frowned. Walked to the remote. Pressed the button. Nothing. The remote was dead. On screen, the fox's smile widened. "However... a mother of a kit must follow laaaw," it chirped. "But as Alicen did not—she shall be smelling mighty fine!" The mother—Alicen—froze. Her name. On the screen. "So... run—run—run—RUN!"
The lights flickered violently. The room plunged into darkness. The mother's eyes flared with static. She froze. Unmoving. A puppet. The TV pulsed white. From the walls: shadow-foxes. Glowing. Purple. Stylized. Teeth, eyes, outlines. Cartoonish yet impossible. Animated. Unreal. Then—bang—in the TV world: a forest. Empty. A digital field. Her body appeared, but not quite her body. Animated. Expression locked in a silent scream. Mouth moving—no sound. The fox—now eight meters tall—circled her. Outside, her body remained frozen. Inside, the child stared, trance-like. A shadow moved across the wall. Into the child's shadow. From the TV's glow. Miller whispered, "H-How... is this..."
Mr. Fox didn't rush. It circled her. Singing. "From your friends, from your family; Like they're the next calamity; Cut them out like profanity; [beep] into insanity..." The voice flowed. "Running from your commitments; You're running up on the price; You better run, little woman; For you're running out of time." The fox's form shifted as it moved. Fluid. A mass of black. Glowing eyes and teeth. Energy radiating purple. "Some people fight for the noblest of reasons; Some fight for their wives and their rights; But little woman's bravery has a secret; Little woman only fights 'cause she wants to run—run—run—RUN!" Alicen ran, as the instrumental section began, with some foxes in the background playing instruments. The giant fox fractured into thousands of smaller ones. They chased her through the stylized forest. The ground broke beneath her. She fell—landing in a foot-deep pool of water. Surrounding her: darkness. A void. And thousands of fox-eyes... glowing in the black. Then—another shape. Not a fox.
She screamed. Her voice now audible. "W-What are you?! Demon!" From the dark stepped a figure. Humanoid. Glitching. Static-filled. Fox ears. Tail. And that same silky voice. "You know exactly what you did to deserve this," it sang. "You were trying to make your kit into yourself. Do not worry—you will survive this. Your kit will live on... with my help. But your sin... is on the highest level. And now, here... you will join the others. As another... fox." The song ended. A pulse. A flash. Static. The TV cut out. Darkness. Silence. Then light. Sound. Time. The TV was off. The woman... gone. Disappeared. The child collapsed. Trembling. The clock read 2:13 AM. Exactly the same as before. Logs began pouring in.
They realized: time had been paused. For everyone within that house. Except them. The signal spiked—same pattern as the others. But the event itself had been entirely isolated. Shielded. Enclosed in some impossible field. They rushed out of the van, collecting data. Police arrived, taking the child. The event was hidden from public. Tom and Miller worked through the night. Radiation detectors: clean. Radio detectors: only the golden ratio spike. Cameras within the time-stop zone recorded 2 minutes and 28 seconds of additional footage. Cameras outside showed none of it. Without proximity—they would've recorded nothing. No explanation could be found. But something—impossible—had occurred.
As data finished uploading, Miller stared at the screen. "The radius was between 20 and 30 meters," she said softly. "Temporal lock." She looked sick. Guilty. "We let her disappear." Tom placed a hand on her shoulder. "There was nothing we could do. If we had entered that house—we might be gone too."
Later that week, a classified file landed on Nick Fury's desk. Titled: Anomaly ID 10721: Class 10 Emergency Declaration. Only a verified, critical threat could allow a field agent to send something like this. Without risking termination. Fury read the report—deep, technical, unsettling. Confirmation of the entity. Real. Active. The agents—Tom Jameson and Ally Miller—were present inside a SHIELD-authorized surveillance van. The "Fox Frequency Detector" had been online. The event occurred March 12, 2013 at 2:13 AM in Texas-Arkansas. The anomaly spiked—zero amplitude to 4084.07 terajoules in 0.027 seconds. Then stabilized at 0.892 Vpp. Models could not explain it. Any signal of that energy—by known physics—should've destroyed a continent.
The report noted: such a frequency should not exist. Irrational numbers cannot be used for radio tuning. A golden ratio transmission was physically impossible. Yet it was detected. Somehow. Likely, the energy was not electromagnetic at all. Merely interpreted as such by equipment. Then: the broadcast changed. Became an ATSC standard TV signal. Full color. Sound. 4K resolution. Security cameras confirmed: TV powered on without input. All communication inside the radius was cut. All sensors dropped to zero. The area—temporally sealed. Time paused outside. Flowed inside. Possibly the reason the initial spike registered as so large—it was compressed from an external perspective.
Footage recovered showed a high-level animated sequence. Disney-quality. Surreal. Forests of ash. Dead trees. A fox with glowing, shifting features. Shadowy foxes multiplied. The child hypnotized. The mother vanished. Mr. Fox—designed with meticulous animation. Detailed fur. Anthropomorphic features. Moved fluidly between animal and human. Intelligent. Intentionally stylized. Fury frowned. Deeply.