Rita scrambled around the door, hoping to quickly, and preferably quietly, find a hiding spot. As she scampered down the hallway towards the stairs, she suddenly spotted a small hole in the far wall, close to the floor. The hole wasn’t nearly big enough for a human, not would it have been noticed, but it was the perfect size for a cat. Thinking she had found the perfect hiding spot, Rita made a mad dash for the hole and disappeared silently inside.
The hole, as it turned out, lead to the basement of the house. Rita squeezed herself through an even smaller hole in the wall, and immediately spotted the glow of a flashlight a few feet away. At first, Rita’s new form had no recollection of Jesse and Travis, only that they were big and scary and she should run away. Unfortunately for her, she had already been seen.
“Travis, come over here; I found something!” Jesse called out to Travis, practically sending Rita up the basement wall.
“What is it?” Travis yelled back, jogging over.
“Some sort of animal... a black cat,” Jesse answered, while shining the beam on Rita’s jet black fur.
“How the heck did a cat get in?” Travis muttered, kneeling to get a better look.
With the foreign human male suddenly so close, Rita screeched and tried to sprint back into the hole from which she had come. Clearly this was not a very good hiding place at all. But before she could even get a few feet away from it, Jesse blocked her escape with his foot. Rita hissed, showing her claws, still quite frightened.
“Aw, it almost looks like a kitten,” Jesse smiles in the dim lighting.
“Bet it came in cause of the storm,” Travis remarked.
“So what are we going to do with it?” Jesse asked, “I don’t think Adam’s parents are very fond of animals; otherwise they would own a pet themselves.”
“Yeah, good point,” Travis answered, “I guess we...”