All in all, it wasn't that bad looking. Slade ducked back behind one of the larger stacks of hay bales and proceeded to change into the outfit that Cassie had given him. Once he had it on, Slade put his clothes back on over it.
"I think we should go back to the main floor of the barn before we start morphing," Cassie said, already starting back down the ladder.
"Why?" Rachel asked, turning around and heading down the ladder.
"I just think it would be easier for us to morph if we're not all crowded together in the hayloft," Cassie explained, already halfway down the ladder.
"Okay," Marco said, waiting for Rachel to get far enough down the ladder so that he could climb down without stepping on her hands. "That sounds like a good idea."
Slade came out to the edge of the hayloft floor, watching as Marco and Rachel climbed down the ladder. Actually, Rachel had already gotten off, and Marco was now far enough down the ladder that Slade could safely start his own descent. As he did this, Slade couldn't help wondering what this morphing thing would feel like. Would it hurt? Slade knew that that was pretty unlikely, given the fact that morphing didn't seem to have any adverse effects on Cassie, Rachel or Marco. But then, maybe they were just used to it.
Slade would have shrugged, if he hadn't been climbing down the ladder himself. If they were used to morphing by now, then it was just something he would have to adapt to. Once he was back on solid ground, Slade was quick to join up with the other Animorphs.
"Now what do we do?" Slade asked Cassie.
"Hold on for a minute, Slade," Cassie turned to look up at the rafters, where Tobias was now perched, looking out for trouble. "Tobias, are we all clear yet?"
Yeah, we're all clear. Your mom just went into the house carrying a couple bags of groceries, and your dad's truck is just pulling away from the intersection leading to the Exxon station. He'll be long gone before we come out.
"All right then," Marco said, rubbing his hands together in anticipation. "Let's get started, boys and girls." Marco quickly shed his outer clothes and stood in his morphing outfit.
"Again I have to ask," Slade said, as he too started to remove his somewhat bulky outfit. "How do I do this?"
"All you have to do," Rachel explained, since she had already gotten out of her day clothes, rolling them up inside the backpack that she had had the foresight to bring. "Is concentrate on the animal that you want to morph. Form a picture of it in your mind. Block everything else out, and focus on that." Rachel turned to Cassie. "You did set him up with a bird morph of some kind, right Cass?"
"Yeah," Cassie smiled at Slade. "He chose a raven, for some reason."
"A raven?" Marco raised an eyebrow. "You have a thing for Edgar Allan Poe or something?" Slade softly cuffed Marco on the back of his head. "Oww! What was that for? It was only a harmless question."
"Right, whatever," Slade muttered, already beginning to concentrate on the image of the raven that he had formed in his mind.
