Far away from the two Animorphs, Gunnar was making slow progress toward the place that Darkon had told him Slade had been hidden. Gunnar wasn't moving as fast as he could have, however, since he really wasn't sure that he wanted to subject Slade to the kind of torture that Darkon was more than likely to put him through once Gunnar had taken Slade back.

So why am I out here? Gunnar asked himself again. The Teknoman sighed, that was an easy question to answer. Not that Gunnar had anything resembling fondness for his conclusion. He hated himself for being a coward; for not having the courage to stand up to Darkon, no matter what the consequences would have been.

Sighing again, this time in self-disgust, Gunnar continued his trek.

Slade and Cassie had arrived back at the barn some time ago, but Cassie had gone out some time earlier, leaving Slade alone. Slade leaned back against his stack of hay-bales, thinking about the panther he had acquired. Finally coming to a decision, Slade skittered down the ladder and started morphing.

Once Slade had completed his newly acquired morph, he took a deep whiff of the air in the barn. Whoa, this is intense, Slade thought, once his mind had finished processing all the new input he was getting through the panther's nose. Slade liked his new morph, and now he was going to try it out.

Briefly, Slade thought that he should contact Cassie and tell her where he was going, but that thought was soon pushed aside by his rather insistent desire to be somewhere else. The barn suddenly felt altogether too small and crowded for him. Without even a look back, Slade ran out into the front yard.

Of course, the front yard of the barn connected to the back yard of Cassie's family's house, so Slade wasn't in much danger of being seen. Looking around, Slade was a bit disappointed to find that his sense of sight hadn't been enhanced nearly as much as his other senses had. Of course, Slade didn't suspect that this was because his eyesight was already several times better than a normal human's.

Slade paced, getting a feel for his new body and the way it moved. He found it strange to be standing so comfortably on four legs. I think I could get to like this morph. Crouching, Slade sprung back to his feet and started running. Into the forest.

Gunnar climbed over a fallen log, scanning for Slade's mind with his telepathic powers. So far there was nothing, which both pleased and slightly distressed Gunnar. He didn't really want to find Slade, but he knew what would happen if he didn't.

So Gunnar kept walking, not particularly sure what to hope for.

Slade jumped over a low patch of brambles, kicking off the ground at a shallow angle when he landed and then turning a hard right. Slade started to tire slightly after a few more minutes of running at his top speed, and so he slowed to a brisk walk. I definitely like this morph. Turning left, Slade walked deeper into the forest.

He could smell that there was a river nearby, so Slade started to follow the scent of flowing water. He soon arrived at a largish stream, a line of waterlogged rocks straddled the stream, making it possible for someone to cross from one bank to the other simply by jumping from one rock to the next.

Slade scanned his surroundings, liking his new morph even though it wasn't that much faster or stronger than his normal form. Okay, so Cassie said that I could only stay in any one morph for only two hours. Since there's no way to tell time out in this wilderness, I might as well demorph now.

Suiting actions to thoughts, Slade started demorphing. Once he was human again, Slade started to remorph into a panther. As soon as he had finished his morph, Slade raced across the river.

Gunnar had just reached what he thought was the halfway point between the large structure that Darkon had barely seen through Slade's eyes, and the Radam base that was hidden in the forest. Gunnar had thought he sensed something out this way but now the faint signal, if it had even been there at all, had disappeared.

I suppose I could consider that a good thing, Gunnar thought morosely, looking around at the trees. Gunnar had often thought about turning around and heading back to the base, but he knew that Darkon would most likely probe his mind, at least superficially, and Gunnar had no great desire to suffer any of the more painful manifestations of Darkon's temper. Once had been more than enough.

Gunnar shook his head, and kept walking.

Slade and Gunnar were now separated by only six feet of heavily wooded forest. The two of them sensed the other only dimly, and so didn't go off their paths looking for one another. Slade, because he didn't really know what he was sensing, and Gunnar because he didn't think a signal that weak could be anything important.

The two of them passed each other and thought nothing of it, neither of them even seeing the other.