"Oh, perfect," Marco said. "This just gets more and more fun."

"At least you have a raincoat," I said. "I have nothing but fur. And this rain makes it impossible to smell anything out here."

67 Cassie squatted next to me. She's just a normal-sized girl, but when you're a ten-pound cat any human being looks like Godzilla.

"Be careful, Rachel," Cassie said. And then she stroked my back. I started to move away, but she kept her hand on my back for a few seconds. Then, smiling mysteriously, she stood up.

I found I soon lost interest in Cassie's expression. Cats really don't have much interest in humans at all, unless food is involved.

"I'm out of here," I said. I took off at a medium run. Cats don't like rain. I could feel the cat brain's distaste. I'd always thought cats hated all water. But that wasn't Flufer's attitude. See, to him it was all about the smells and the sounds. Rain washes away scents. Without scents, a cat feels cut off and lost.

Almost as bad as losing smells is the fact that rain plopping all around you makes it hard to listen for the important sounds: the tiny high-pitched squeaks and the little furtive scritching noises.

Rain to cats is like being in the dark is to human beings. It just makes the whole world kind of boring.

So I ran toward the kitty door, actually looking forward to the friendly smells and sounds of home.

At least, that's what Fluffer was thinking. I was still wondering why Jake hadn't come. And I was wondering if it was some kind of bad omen. There was a bad feeling over this whole mission.

I knew my way around the Chapman home, both as a cat and as a human. And I was pretty sure I knew the routine. Last time Visser Three had made contact right at eight o'clock. If Visser Three communicated with Chapman at the same time every night, then I had arrived right on schedule.

Chapman was sitting on the couch, same as last time. And just as I'd hoped, at three minutes till eight he stood up and headed down toward the basement.

My whole plan was to go down there with him. I remembered the layout of the little secret room. I remembered the desk. I knew if I could somehow follow him down without him seeing me and then get under the desk, I would be invisible to him, and to the Visser Three hologram.

The problem was that the whole plan counted on Chapman not noticing me.

He headed for the basement door. I fell into step right behind him. The trick was to stay just inches behind his feet. From there he couldn't see me. But I had to watch his feet closely. If he hesitated, I could plow right into him. That would be a very un-catlike thing to do.

He walked. I kept pace perfectly, just behind.

He headed down the stairs. I figured this part would be easier. When people walk down stairs they usually look where they are going. They don't turn around and look behind them.

68 But one sound, one clumsy move, and I was finished.

We reached the bottom of the stairs. Suddenly Chapman stopped dead.

I leaped behind the couch. He looked around, like he'd heard a noise.

Or maybe he just sensed something.

I froze. I didn't move a muscle.

He started on toward the door. I fell into step behind him again.

"So, what's happening?"

I nearly had a heart attack.

My tail puffed up. My back fur went straight up. I almost bolted.

Chapman stopped and I nearly got entangled in his legs. His left foot moved. I dodged.

He backed up a little. I squirmed out of the way.

"lt's me, Jake. What's going on, Rachel?"

Jake?

Chapman opened the door of the secret room. He stepped through. I was right between his monstrously big feet. If he happened to glance down . . .

But he didn't. He didn't, and when he turned around to shut the door behind him, I bolted for the desk. I jammed my body as far back in the dark corner as I could.

I'd made it ... barely. I was alive ... so far.

"Rachel? Can you hear me?"

"Jake! Where are you? You scared me half to death. "

"Are we okay?" He sounded concerned.

Me, I was just angry.

"What do you MEAN are WE okay?" I yelled silently. Where are you?"

"Well ... I'm kind of on you."

"On me? Jake, this is not the time to be playing jokes. " Chapman sat down at the desk. His feet pushed beneath the desk, just narrowly missing me as I once again dodged nimbly out of the way.

69 "Sorry. I can't exactly see."

I kept my eyes focused on Chapman's feet.

Cats have incredible powers of concentration. I focused hard on those big feet, each almost as big as I was. I had to stay out of their way. That was the key to staying alive.

"Jake, we're in kind of a situation here. In like ten words or less, where are you"

"In ten words or less, I morphed," Jake said. "I'm a flea."

"Excuse me?" It would have been funny if I hadn't been so terrified. "Are you telling me you morphed into a flea? A flea?"

"Yeah. I'm on your back. Or your head. I can't tell. I don't really have eyes. At least not eyes that see anything I can understand. I mean, all I know is warm or not warm. I ... I think I can sense blood. That's about it. And I can kind of sense motion. Like when your hair stood up, I knew there was something going on around me."

"Jake, this is sick. This is beyond sick. What is the matter with you? A flea? Are you insane?

Just being a lizard made you sick. This is way worse. "

"Actually, it's kind of okay," he said. "I mean, I don't know how to explain it, but the flea mind is so limited it's not hard at all to control. All it knows is to move toward the sense of warm blood, and eat. It's like ... I don't know, like in a way I'm not even really in the flea because I can't see much or sense much. I expected it to be horrible, but when Cassie and Marco and I tested it out -"

"They're in on this with you?" Of course! That's why Cassie had made such a point of patting my head. She was depositing Jake on me.

"Rachel, we were worried about you. We figured someone should go along with you. Tobias said -"

"Ah, so Tobias is in on this, too. "

"Tobias said you were not telling us every thing. He wasn't sure why, or what it was you weren't telling. "

I sighed inwardly. I guess it's good to have friends who care about you. But on the other hand, Jake had practically made me run into Chapman. Besides, the idea of Jake morphing into a flea and crawling around in my fur just gave me the worst creeps you can imagine.

Suddenly the brilliant light went on.

Visser Three appeared in the room.

"Jake. The Visser is here in hologram. So don't distract me, okay? We're hiding under the desk about half an inch away from Chapman's foot. "

70 "Oh. But it doesn't matter if he sees you, right? I mean, he'll just figure you're the cat. No biggie. So you shouldn't be acting suspicious. "

I hesitated. Oh, well, it would have to come out sooner or later. "Um, Jake? That thing I didn't tell you? It's that Visser Three saw me in here last time. He told Chapman he should probably just . . . you know . . . kill me. He was worried I might be an Andalite in morph. " For a while Jake didn't say anything. I had the feeling he was trying to keep himself from yelling at me. He failed.

"Rachel, are you CRAZY? You came back down here after that? Are you INSANE?" But just then Chapman began to speak. "Welcome, Visser. Iniss two two six of the Sulp Niaar pool submits to you. May the Kandrona shine and strengthen you."