When I next opened my eyes, it was pitch dark. There were very large, heavy raindrops falling from the sky. The ground was already wet. As I moved, a furry object close to my head squeaked and jumped about six inches straight up into the air. It landed, and immediately disappeared into a hole in the ground.
The little creek was now widening fast, and I gathered up my blanket to move back from it. Around the corner of the bushes came a myriad of tiny lights swarming through the fog. I heard a man's voice. "Where are you?!" he called. He bumped into me. "Oh!" He said softly, "There you are." He was apparently holding some kind of tarpaulin over himself, and now he held it over me as well. "Are you okay? We can't leave you out in the rain! What kind of welcome would that be? Here, take hold of my arm...here's your blanket. Ready? I will follow the fireflies. They are some of the only ones who can navigate in this fog. Them and the moles." And he began to walk, guided by the gentle and patient lights of the fireflies. "I should have thought of this earlier," he said, " But you can only see the fireflies at night anyway."
"And the moles," I asked, "Was that the--thing--that squeaked--?"
"Yeah!," the man laughed, "The poor little guys can be high-strung, but they are very friendly, and they are invaluable in this kind of weather. They located you quite quickly, and were keeping an eye on you."
"Do they...?" I didn't want to sound crazy.
"Do they talk?" he volunteered. "Yes, they talk. You may have heard them plotting your movements. We did not know whether you wanted to be disturbed. You could have been on somekind of 'vision quest,' or something. Were you?"
"No," I said.
Hazily, I could make out the dark form of a building of some sort. "Step up," the man said "Home, sweet home. At least for tonight, eh?" And he opened the door into a dark, warm room, where I could finally see the things around me.
2:30:43 PM 
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