32 Then the fear kicked in. The shrew's fear.

It hit me so hard I began to shake. I rattled with terror. I quaked with terror.

I was surrounded! Predators everywhere! I could smell them. I could see them -- huge, looming, slow-moving creatures standing over me.

"Rachel? You okay down there?" It was Cassie . She lifted the folds of my clothing off of me.

I heard the voice and sort of understood it, but it was more like distant thunder. It didn't really mean anything. At least not to the shrew.

It was looking for a way out. Its brain might have been terrified, but it was also amazingly smart. It was evaluating every possible escape route. It was measuring the distance between the three sets of legs. One set of legs moved slightly. I was off like a shot.

Running! Running!

Blades of grass seemed six feet tall. Twigs were like fallen trees that I had to scramble over.

My little feet moved with incredible speed. I scooted past a beetle that seemed to me to be as big as a dog.

"Rachel, you have to get control!"

I knew they were right. I even sort of understood what they meant. But the terror was so strong. The urge to survive was so powerful.

And at the same time there were other feelings. Hunger. I smelled nuts. I smelled dead flesh.

I even smelled the maggots squirming on the dead flesh.

And I wanted them. I know it's too gross, but I wanted to eat those maggots.

Heavy pounding footsteps behind me! I turned sharply and ducked under a bush. The steps went barreling by before stopping and turning back toward me.

They were faster than I was, but not as agile. I could get away. I could get away and find that dead smell and gorge!

"Rachel, it's Tobias. The shrew is in control. You have to assert yourself! Tell it to stop running."

Fear! Hunger!

"Rachel, listen to me. You're getting away from us. You have to take charge. " Fear! Hunger! Run!

Grass and twigs and dirt. Low scratchy branches over my head. The smell of food. The smell of a dog that had urinated on this bush.

33 More loud footsteps and far-off rumbling voices yelling. They were trying to catch me. But I was fast!

I was clever!

But not clever enough. I ran out from under the bush.

Like a shadow inside of a shadow, I felt it descend on me. Terror like nothing I'd felt before swept over me. Something deep, deep inside my shrew brain cried out.

It was the ultimate fear! The ultimate horror! It was the enemy I could not defeat!

And it was coming for me!

34 Chapter Eight

I dodged, but too slowly. Huge talons closed around me and suddenly my little feet were running in air.

"Okay, Rachel. It's okay. It's just me. I have you. "

The voice was in my head. I understood the words. It cut through the terror at last. I held onto that voice.

"Relax, Rachel. "

I looked down and with my dim shrew eyesight saw the shadows shooting past down below.

"I have you, Rachel. Try to be calm. Think about something human. Think about school.

Remember school?"

School? Yes. I remembered school.

Quite suddenly the shrew mind lost the battle for control. It was like a switch had been flipped. I was in charge. I knew what I was. I knew who I was.

"I'm okay, Tobias," I said. "You can set me down."

He circled around and landed with perfect gentleness on the ground.

"Did my talons hurt you?"

"No. I don't think so. I'm fine. "

"You okay, Rachel?" Jake's voice.

"Yes. Boy, that was totally different than the elephant brain. Or the eagle. They're both so calm and mellow compared to this mind. "

"It's like Jake's lizard," Cassie suggested. "He had a panic reaction, too. The other animals we morphed were all kind of big, dominant animals -- gorilla, tiger. My horse was skittish, though."

"Look, let's just do this and get it over with, okay?" I said. "I'm not enjoying the shrew experience." That was the understatement of all time. I could still smell death and hear the thousands of feasting maggots. And to me those things still meant dinner. I was horribly hungry.

"Are you sure you're going to be able to maintain down there?" Marco asked. I saw him peering down at me from a million miles up. "You still look a little nervous. Your tail is twitching and your little nose is sniffing like crazy."

"Yeah, I know. I'm still nervous. Let's just do this. You'll have to take me back to the tree where Fluffer is. I don't know what direction it is. "

35 Before I could object, Marco reached down and scooped me into his hands. He held me up and looked into my eyes. "I've never seen you look lovelier, Rachel. Very cover girl."

We walked down the block. Marco set me down at the bottom of the tree where Fluffer was still hiding out on a high branch.

"You guys had better back off a little." I said.

"Not too far," Jake said. "We have to be able to get between you and Fluffer fast."

"Oh, I can kick Fluffer's butt," I said, joking. I guess I felt a little embarrassed about having let the shrew take control of me.

"Uh-huh," Marco said dryly. "Cat versus mouse. Who would you bet on?"

"Haven't you ever seen Itchy and Scratchy?" Cassie asked. "Mouse, definitely. Besides, she's not a mouse."

Let me tell you something: It is no fun sitting around in a shrew's tiny body, waiting to see whether a huge cat is going to decide to climb down and kill you. It is one of the least fun things I've ever done. I had the shrew brain under control, but that didn't change the fact that the shrew was about as scared as a shrew can be. Between being snatched up by a hawk and now waiting to see if the shrew's other deadly enemy was going to attack ... I mean, the shrew was definitely in a state of panic.

She was not a happy shrew.

I was so preoccupied thinking about the shrew's hunger that I missed what happened next. I didn't even notice until I heard the sound of scraping tree bark just an inch over my head.

Fluffer was dropping through the air right on top of me!

I froze!

Jake and Marco did not freeze.

Marco grabbed Fluffer in mid-pounce. Fluffer rewarded him with a nasty slash of his claws.

Marco yelled and almost dropped the cat. Jake grabbed Fluffer by the nape of the neck and Cassie ran up with the animal carrier.

The three of them managed to stuff the squalling, hissing, slashing Fluffer into the carrier and close the door.

I was already morphing out of the shrew body as fast as I could.

"I'm bleeding!" Marco cried.

"We're all bleeding," Cassie said matter-of-factly. "I told you guys: Kitties can be nasty when you get on their nerves."

I was shooting up from the ground, regaining my normal body.

36 "Ugh! Ugh! I'm never doing that morph again," I said, as soon as I had a normal tongue and lips. I looked over my shoulder to make sure I didn't still have that creepy tail. Nothing. I was me again. I was in my morphing outfit and with no shoes on, but I was human again.

I shuddered. The memory of the shrew's brain and its fear and hunger made my flesh creep. I was fighting a powerful urge to throw up. I felt sick in a way that is mostly in your head.

Jake looked at me and shook his head. "I should have done it. I should have used my lizard morph to lure the cat down from the tree."

I shook my head. "No. That freaked you out."

"And now you're the one who's freaked out," Jake said. "But don't worry, you'll get over it.