I prepared to morph. I concentrated on Fluffer. It was easy to do. I had a very clear mental image of Fluffer dropping down out of that tree, ready to kill me when I was a shrew.
44 Inside my own body, Fluffer's DNA was stored, ready to be used. All I had to do was concentrate . . . concentrate. . . .
Each morphing is different. Especially the first time, when you can't even think about controlling how it happens. Even Cassie can't control the first morph.
In the case of Fluffer, it started with fur. Black fur came first, and then the white fur began to grow. The fur had almost completely grown in while I was still mostly human. I had luxurious fur on my arms. On my legs. On my face. Fur and whiskers, with everything else pretty much the same.
"Oh, that is cool!" Cassie said. She was staring at me and grinning this huge grin. "That is way cool. You look great."
Marco and Jake nodded agreement.
"It's kind of weird, but also kind of pretty," Marco said. "I'm thinking you could do commercials for cat food. You sing a little song, maybe dance a little. Forget Morris the cat.
You would rule."
I began to shrink. But it was strange, because as I shrank and my outer clothing slithered off me, I didn't feel like I was getting smaller. I felt more like I was getting stronger.
It was like I was shedding all this unnecessary stuff, these clumsy long legs, these ridiculous weak arms.
I felt like I'd been boiled down to my absolute essentials. Like I wasn't even made out of plain old flesh and bones anymore.
I felt like liquid steel.
I didn't feel the fear of the shrew. I didn't feel the total confidence of the elephant, either, or of the eagle.
This was different. There was fear, sure. But underneath the fear was confidence. The cat knew there were enemies out there, but he also knew he could handle it.
I felt . . . tough. That was it -- tough.
Then the cat's senses started sending messages to my brain.
"Whoa!" I yelled in surprise. "Suddenly it isn't nighttime anymore! I mean, wow. Talk about night vision!"
"A cat's vision at night is about eight times stronger than a human's," Cassie said helpfully. "I looked it up."
"Eight times?" Marco repeated. "Not seven, or nine? How do they measure that?"
But it wasn't just how well I saw that was strange. It was what I noticed.
45 A human being will notice colors, for exam ple. Now, a cat can see colors, more or less. He just isn't interested in colors. It's like, okay, that thing is red. Who cares?
What cats really notice is movement. If anything moves, even the tiniest bit, the cat sees it. I was standing there on the grass, looking around with my big cat eyes, and I saw nothing but movement.
I saw every blade of grass that moved in the breeze. I saw every bug that crawled across those blades of grass. I saw every bird in every tree as it fluffed its wings. And boy, did I see the mice and the squirrels and the rats.
There was a mouse no more than twenty feet away. I could see the individual whiskers on his little snout when they twitched.
Things that were not moving were boring to me. If the mouse just stayed completely still, I would forget he was even there.
"How are you doing?" Jake asked me. I had no trouble at all hearing his voice. But it was irrelevant. It had no meaning. The mouse was making a tiny little scritching sound as it worked its little teeth around a nut, trying to chew it open.
I cared about that sound. I cared about that sound a lot.
"Rachel, can you hear us? It's me, Cassie."
"Yes, I can hear you. I just can't seem to concentrate very well on you. There are so many other things to hear and see and smell. "
"Well, at least she's not running around out of control," Marco said.
Suddenly I sensed something over my head, a shape, a shadow, a figure. Lightning quick, I turned my head. My ears flattened back against my skull. The hair on my back stood up and my tail puffed out to three times its normal size. My claws extended. I drew back my mouth and showed my teeth.
It all happened in a split second. I was ready for battle.
And whatever this was attacking me, I wanted it to know it would be sorry it messed with Fluffer McKitty.
"Hhhhhiisssss!"
I was ready to fight. I was pumped. Kill or be killed.
It is so cool when you feel the razor-sharp claws sliding out of your delicate-looking pink pads.
"Rachel, take a pill, girl, it's just Tobias," Cassie said soothingly. "Tobias? I think maybe you'd better stay away," she called up to the sky. "Cats are genetically programmed to be afraid of large birds."
46 She was right. The shadow of Tobias scared me pretty good. It was strange, because it was a fear I shared with the shrew.
But it was a different type of fear than the shrew's. This was more like I was angry, too. Only that wasn't quite it, either. I guess it wasn't a real emotion at all. Basically, when I'd hissed I was just trying to communicate. And the message I was trying to communicate was, "Don't mess with me. You may be bigger than me, you may scare me, you may make me run away, but if I have to I am ready to fight."
That was my whole cat message to the world: Don't mess with me. Don't get in my way, don't try to touch me if I don't want to be touched, don't try to keep me from getting what I want.
I was self-contained. I was complete. I didn't need anything but myself. It seemed lonely to my human self, but at the same time, it was all very calm somehow.
"I'm okay," I said. "I think I'm pretty much in control. "
"What's it like?" Cassie asked.
"lt's like . . . You know those old cowboy movies with Clint Eastwood? He's a gunslinger and he walks into the saloon and everyone kind of gets out of his way? And how he's not really looking for trouble, but you'd better not make him mad? That's what it's like. It's like I'm Clint Eastwood."
"Can you do this, do you think?" Jake asked me.
"Oh, yeah. I can do anything. "
"Don't let the cat's arrogance get you in trouble," Marco advised. "Keep a little of your good old human fear." He paused. "Oh, I forgot, mighty Rachel doesn't have any good old human fear. So here's what you do: Borrow some of my good old human fear. I have plenty to spare.
"
"He's right, Rachel," Cassie agreed. "Keep focused. Between your own natural attitude and the cat's 'tude, you could get cocky."
I cast a glance back toward the mouse. He had broken into the nut at last. I could kill him. I was sure of that. He was a plump little mouse, and I would catch him easily. But I wasn't hungry. So he'd get to live a while longer.
"No problem," I said.
"We're here if you get into a mess," Cassie reassured me.
"l'll meow if I need help. Don't worry. I'm in control now. It'll be fine." But the truth is, I was lying, just a little. See, I wasn't completely in control of the cat. For some reason I didn't want to completely control the cat. I kind of liked his arrogance. It made me feel more sure of myself. And despite what the others thought about me, I needed all the confidence I could get.
47 "The morph clock is ticking," Cassie said."It's quarter to eight. Remember that."
48 Chapter Twelve