I landed on the ground at the base of the tree. "You guys get ready. I'm hoping Mr. Fenestre built that place with high ceilings and wide hallways^
I demorphed as quickly as I could. I stayed in human form for only a few seconds, then focused my thoughts on the rhinoceros.
It is unbelievably tiring to morph rapidly like that. You feel like your body is running on one half-dead double-A battery. But I could be tired later, not now.
The first change was my skin. It went from delicate human of the pink variety, to something like inch-thick leather that's been out in the sun for ten years. It thickened and rippled all over. I
was still human, but gray and massive. It was like wearing living armor.
My legs thickened and shortened. My fingers withered away. Only the fingernails remained and they became hard and big as irons. I fell forward onto all fours, a growing mass of gray, like molten steel bubbling and reforming.
I felt my ears crawl up the side of my head. They elongated, then curled to form open tubes.
And then, last of all, my face. My entire face simply began to stretch.
Out and out and out. The bones of my face and skull grew, multiplied, thickened. It was as if some busy crew of engineers were rebuilding my face, always saying, "We need more here, more support there, more armor, more strength."
My head was gigantic!
"What the ... what are you morphing?!" Marco asked.
And then, growing from the far end of my monstrously big head, the horns began to emerge.
A smaller one toward the back that grew, then stopped. And the larger horn. The one that grew and grew and grew. My eyesight was dim and badly focused, but I could see the horn sprout. Up and up it went. Thicker, larger, longer.
"0h," Marco said. "That's what you're mor-phing."
"How much time?" I asked.
"Maybe ten minutes," Tobias said.
I felt the rhino's mind emerge beneath my own human consciousness. It was not what I'd expected. This mind was not violent. In fact, the dominant instinct seemed to be simple hunger. The rhino wanted to graze.
But beneath that placid herbivore consciousness there was something else. Not aggression, but defensiveness. Not fear, but concern. The rhino had to be careful, lest it was challenged by another rhinoceros.
The incredibly dim and almost useless eyes searched for a shape vaguely like its own. The ears twisted and turned, aiming at each new sound, looking for the sounds of another rhino. The excellent nose sniffed the air.
No challengers. No enemies. Just some birds. The rhino was calm.
I would have to supply the aggression. Which was fine, because I had plenty. I had to save Rachel and Ax. And I had to do it right now.
"0kay, you guys stay with me, but stay back. Wait till I've cleared away defenses before you advance. Now, let's see what this horn can do." My new body moved surprisingly well. I felt almost like I was tiptoeing.
But I was a tiptoeing giant.
I trotted out from beneath the cover of the trees. I knew the gate of Fenestre's compound was right across the street. But I could not see the gate. I couldn't see anything beyond maybe thirty yards, and then, only if it moved. In order to see, I had to look first with one eye, then the other, because the two eyes were too far apart, with too much massive jaw and snout and horn separating them. It was like having your eyes in different rooms.
"You guys will have to aim me," I said.
"A little left," Marco said. "That's it. Now, forward !" I trotted. I broke into a run. I felt hard pavement beneath my surprisingly sensitive feet.
"Gate!" Marco yelled.
I lowered my horn. I increased my speed. The gate was metal bars. I saw them clearly about two seconds before I hit them.
More than two thousand pounds of rhino hit tempered steel.
WHAM!
I felt the impact in my massive, bony face and back into my shoulders.
It was like getting hit in the face with a sledgehammer! But it was like getting hit and not caring. I felt the impact. But my rhinoceros body was used to impact. It was built for impact.
"What happened to the gate?" I asked, too blind to be sure.
"What gate?" Marco said. "0kay, now straight on, veering slightly right, big guy!"
I trotted on my four Greek column legs. I felt the twisted remains of the gate as I ran across them.
ScrrrEEEET! ScrrrEEEET!
"Man, does this guy have a lot of different alarms, or what?" Tobias said.
"0kay, fence number two," Marco announced.
I kept running. This time it was just chain link. I felt something sort of tug at my horn.
"Where's the fence?" I asked.
"You just went through it," Cassie said.
"AII right. This may work," Marco said.
"Rowrrrowrrrowrr!" I heard the dogs very clearly. Smelled them even more clearly.
"Doggies!" Tobias warned.
I caught a vague glimpse of two dark shapes hurtling through the air toward me. I think maybe they tried to bite me. I'm not sure. I did feel a sort of scraping sensation on one side.
"Yow! Yow! Yow! Yowyowyowyow!"
"What happened to the dogs?" I asked.
"Doggies go bye-bye," Marco said with a laugh. "The doggies are hauling doggie butt."
"l think I like this morph," I said. "What's next?"
"Final fence, then the door."
"Look out! Guards! The guys with the shotguns^
"Holy crap!" I heard someone yell. "What is that?"
"Shoot it!"
I spotted them moving. It was like watching a very old, very fuzzy black-and-white movie on a bad TV. They were shadows, ghosts moving swiftly against a blurry background. Just enough for me to see.