"Do you just HATE TRASH CANS?!!" is my favorite line from the entire series.
The dust beast dropped me. I hit the road. I hit it hard. The concrete cracked and popped open, revealing gravel beneath.
FLASH! I was flying. I was a bird. An eagle. Going to see Tobias. Going to tell him I was going to ... to what? Something. Birds! Sudden, out of nowhere! Swarming around me. Attacking, in front, the side. Turn, turn and dive to get away! A tree! WHAM! What? What did it mean? Tobias! I had remembered a name!
I watched the dust beast re-form to go after a truck that was careening backward up the street. Careening straight into a parked car.
Then, a tiger! No, not quite a tiger. Half-human. Half-tiger. A freak! It climbed into the back of the truck.
And someone else was left behind. A girl. Short. Wearing overalls.
FLASH! The construction site. The one where the alien had landed. She was there! She was there! I knew this girl. But. . . was she a friend? Or one of them? One of the enemies?
"Rachel!" the girl yelled. "Are you okay?"
Rachel. Yes. What the deer-scorpion-alien had called me at the burning shack. Rachel. Yes. That was my name.
YES! It was my name!
FLASH! A woman saying "Rachel, I know you don't like lima beans, eat them anyway, they're good for you."
FLASH! A girl, younger than me, saying, "Rachel, Rachel, Rachel! Everything is always Rachel around here!"
FLASH! A man's voice, from nowhere. "And now, next on the balance beam, Rachel . . ."
YES! I remembered. I was Rachel.
But who was this short girl calling me? And what was I?
"Rachel? Can you hear me?"
<Who are you?> I asked.
"What do you mean, who am I?"
<Who are you?!> I yelled in thought-speak. <Tell me! Tell me, or I'll crush you!>
"Rachel, it's me. Cassie."
Cassie?
"Are you okay?"
<No. I'm not. Are you my friend?>
"Rachel, I've been your friend for years," the girl who called herself Cassie said.
<My memory ... I don't remember. Cassie? What am I?>
The girl stared at me for a moment. I could see doubt in her eyes. She looked around at the street. The first cops had taken off after the wild pickup truck. But more sirens were blaring, coming closer and closer.
"You're human, Rachel."
<No. I mean, yes, I know. But I'm something else, too. Look at me. How can I do this? What am I?>
Cassie met my gaze. Human to elephant. I guess it seemed bizarre to the frightened, sleepy people who were peeking out of their windows.
"You are an Animorph, Rachel. An Animorph. And I guess something has happened to you to mess up your memory. But right now, my friend, you have to trust me. You have to trust me."
Animorph! The word from my dream.
Trust her? Trust this girl who called herself Cassie and said she was my friend? I looked down at her through elephant eyes. Could I trust her? How could I know? How could I be sure?
<Cassie?> I said.
"Yes."
<Tell me what to do.>
Yeerks put me in a box. Not a cage, a Ramonite box with seamless walls on all sides. I was in that box for a time that spanned many Earth hours. And I felt despair. The special despair that comes from dishonor.
Visser Three killed my brother. By the laws and customs of my people, I was supposed to avenge that murder. I was obligated to kill Visser Three, if I ever had the chance.
I had just been face-to-face with him. And I had done nothing. Yes, I had been surrounded by Hork-Bajir. And because I was young and not yet a full-fledged Andalite warrior, I could say that the full burden of revenge had not yet fallen on me.
But it was a bitter feeling. A bitter, terrible feeling, knowing I had been face-to-face with Visser Three and had not struck. Had I missed my one chance for revenge?
In my mind I pictured the scene again. I had been surrounded by Hork-Bajir, but with Visser Three himself within range of my tail. Could I have struck? Could I have hit him before the Hork-Bajir fired and disintegrated me?
No. Logic said no. But I felt a sick, twisting doubt inside me. Dishonor is a terrible thing. Worse than death for an Andalite warrior.
Suddenly, one wall of my cage shimmered and became transparent. Ramonite is a metal that can stretch open or be made clear or opaque by molecular realignment.
I could see the room beyond my cage: the bridge of Visser Three's Blade ship.
The Visser stood on a raised platform in the center of a triangular room. Aligned on three sides of the bridge were various workstations manned by Taxxons and human-Controllers.
Taxxons are wormlike creatures. They have rows of needle-sharp legs, similar to an Earth centipede. They hold the upper third of their bodies erect, and along the upper body, the rows of legs become pairs of weak but agile arms.
A series of globular red eyes surround the top end of the worm. And at the very top is an always-open, circular mouth.
The Hork-Bajir were a race of peace-loving creatures enslaved by the Yeerks. But the Taxxons chose to ally themselves with the Yeerks. Each Taxxon now has a Yeerk inside its vile head, adding Yeerk intelligence to the Taxxon's own deep evil.
Taxxons usually handle the more subtle work. Hork-Bajir are used as soldiers. The Yeerk empire was only just beginning to integrate its new human slaves into the empire.
In the air before Visser Three was a hologram. It was obviously being shot from a great distance. The scene was distorted and light-enhanced, which gave it an eerie, dreamlike quality.
<I thought you might enjoy watching this,> Visser Three said to me. <We were lucky to get a visual lock. My Veleek is closing in on another of your band. Soon you'll have company.>
The hologram shimmered and wavered, but I could see the Veleek tearing through trees in a forest. And then a sudden flash of orange and black. A tiger. Prince Jake!
<There are some magnificent animals on this planet,> Visser Three said. <I'll have to acquire one of those. Look how it moves! But it's wearing out. It's a fast killer. It can't handle the long battles
Suddenly, the tiger that was Jake shot up a tree. The Veleek was eating its way up the tree. Prince Jake leapt into the air.
I could just barely see the tiger hit the ground. It bared its teeth, but was too tired to run anymore.
In a second it would be over. The Veleek would envelop the tiger and bring it to Visser Three.
Just then, the Veleek hesitated. Visser Three stiffened.
The Veleek disintegrated and, like a tornado, swept away at extreme speed.
<What is happening?!> Visser Three cried.
Every Taxxon, Hork-Bajir, and human-Controller on the bridge flinched. One of the human-Controllers stepped forward timidly. "Visser, the Veleek must have sensed another morph."
<Why doesn't it bring me this one first?>
"Visser, as you know, our knowledge of this Veleek is not perfect. I can only speculate. I -"
Suddenly, Visser Three stabbed his tail at the cowering Controller. The blade pressed against the human's throat. <Speculate quickly,> Visser Three said.
"It... it... it... Visser, it feeds on energy. It senses energy. We have made it sensitive to the energy field created during morphing. But this bandit. . . this tiger creature has stopped morphing. So the attraction has weakened. The Veleek would still capture this tiger, only . . . only some other morph energy field must have been created. The Veleek senses this new field and goes after the new energy source."
Visser Three withdrew his tail from the man's neck. The human-Controller collapsed to his knees, sweating and shaking.
<Launch both Bug fighters,> Visser Three said. <Keep a visual lock on the Veleek.>
A Taxxon spoke in their strange tongue. "Sreen yit seewee srinyee sree -"
Faster than the eye could follow, Visser Three lashed out with his Andalite tail.
"Skkkrreeeee!" the Taxxon screamed.
The Taxxon was sliced open! Its insides sloshed out all over the floor. The Taxxon collapsed in a heap.
<This creature says it is difficult to keep a visual lock on the Veleek. Does anyone else think it is difficult to follow my orders?>
No one did.
<Clean up this incompetent filth. Launch the Bug fighters. Keep a visual lock on theVeleek.>
All this was said very calmly. Two Taxxons rushed forward and began to eat their fellow Taxxon. The others on the bridge all paid very close attention to their work.
Very, very close attention.
<I guess it isn't going too well for you, Visser,> I sneered.
He turned his main eyes on me, while his stalk eyes swept the room, looking for any slackness on the part of his creatures.
<Yes, your Andalite brothers have found a weakness in my Veleek,> Visser Three said.
<They are playing games. Morphing here, morphing there, whipping it from place to place. But you forget, my little Andalite friend: I inhabit an Andalite body with full morphing powers. I know your weakness, too. They can't play this game for long. And I am about to add to their troubles.>
He turned all eyes to me in a leering, deadly gaze. <I would like to take them alive, for my own reasons. But if I can't, I will make do with their lifeless bodies.>
You remember Wipeout? Good game. Probably not great for driver training.
So, can people think of bad guys who are good bosses? Because I''d think that would make them more effective villains.
This book has mostly been bad but for Marco's driving it's a price I'm willing to pay. The line about the police merely being surprised by elephant Rachel bursting out of the house was great too.
May I ask why you think it's bad? I thought it was a pretty strong book. There's an interesting conflict, it's got more action than the previous books, and the most memorable scene in the franchise.
In contrast, I thought the next Megamorphs book was unfocused and uninteresting, despite what sounds like an amazing premise.
May I ask why you think it's bad? I thought it was a pretty strong book. There's an interesting conflict, it's got more action than the previous books, and the most memorable scene in the franchise.
In contrast, I thought the next Megamorphs book was unfocused and uninteresting, despite what sounds like an amazing premise.
May I ask why you think it's bad? I thought it was a pretty strong book. There's an interesting conflict, it's got more action than the previous books, and the most memorable scene in the franchise.
In contrast, I thought the next Megamorphs book was unfocused and uninteresting, despite what sounds like an amazing premise.
CRRRRUUUUNCHHH! SCRRRREEECH! BAM! WHAM! BUMP! Squuueeeeaall!
Out of the trees I roared, in what was left of the pickup truck. I plowed up through a ditch and onto a road, kicking up dirt and mud and gravel. It was a dark, narrow road that ran behind the housing development. I'd come full circle.
I don't care what anyone says - I drove okay. Or at least I was getting better. I was running into things less, anyway.
I began to morph. But I didn't want to give up on the truck. After all, I was supposed to get it back out to Cassie's farm when we were done with it.
So I chose the one morph I had in my arsenal that could drive.
"Time for the monkey suit," I muttered as I barreled down the road, hitting only the occasional mailbox.
I focused. I concentrated as well as I could. Fortunately, this was a morph I had done before. I was familiar with it.
But still, that first sensation of my shoulders doubling in size . . . tripling . . . quadrupling . . . It was a rush! I mean, I'm not the biggest guy in the world. I'm kind of short. I'm kind of small. But when I do this morph I am so massively powerful it's incredible.
In this morph I have lifted guys up and thrown them through the air. In this morph I have punched Hork-Bajir and they stayed punched. In this morph I could kick the butts of the entire Dallas Cowboys all at once.
Four hundred pounds, give or take a few. But not four hundred pounds of fat. No. I was becoming four hundred pounds of hard-core, bad-as-bad-can-be, don't-even-look-crosseyed-at-me, shoulders like a cement truck, neck like a fire hydrant, fists like sledgehammers, dominant male silverback gorilla.
Sweet, gentle animals . . . unless you insist on making them mad. At which point they are capable of ripping up a small tree by the roots and playing baseball - with you as the ball.
I glanced in the rearview mirror. My eyes had become little gorilla eyes. My mouth was puffing out and turning dark.
And I was scared. See, as tough as my gorilla might be, I was nothing to that dust monster.
I wasn't morphing the gorilla to fight that thing. I was morphing the gorilla to draw him on.
I was bait.
I was the bait and the creature was the shark. And that fact did not make me happy. I heard the roar of a tornado behind me.
I pressed my growing foot down on the accelerator.
I charged with trunk held high, trumpeting defiance. I ran toward the line of trees that hugged the housing development. I crashed heedlessly through yards and lawns. I was in a hurry. And lawns could be fixed.
"Your name is Rachel. You're an Animorph. We were created by a dying Andalite prince. We were given the power to become any animal we could touch."
We were running. Or I was running, anyway, with this girl riding on my back. She told me we had to get away from the homes. We had to get to the forest. The dust beast would kill innocent people if we didn't get away.
That made sense. The rest of what she was telling me seemed utterly insane.
"I'm Cassie. We're best friends, Rachel. There's Jake. He's your cousin. There's Marco. And Tobias. Tobias was trapped in his morph. He's stuck as a -"
FLASH! A terrible place, deep, deep within the bowels of the earth. A dim cave as big as a sports dome. In the center, a pool. A pool that looked like molten lead. Piers reaching into it. Cages around the edges.
The cries! The terrible cries of terror and despair!
A battle raged. I was there. I was there. I was ...
An elephant! Just as I was now. Yes, a battle against monsters. And a bird screamed down from high in the cave. It screamed down, wings back, hooked beak and terrible talons ready.
<A hawk,> I said to Cassie.
"Yes! Yes! That's it. That's Tobias."
I crashed through a flimsy fence into someone's backyard. Then crashed through it again on my way out. Open field! We were out of the houses now, and running for the cover of the woods.
I remembered what had happened in the woods.
<The old woman was yelling about Yeerks,> I said. <She was crazy. Yelling about Yeerks coming for her.>
"The Yeerks are real," Cassie said. "Look, Rachel, you don't have to remember everything at once. But we're in a terrible fight here. We need your help."
<What help?> I asked suspiciously.
"We're trying to keep the Veleek distracted. It chases after morphing energy. It's drawn to anyone morphing. So we're morphing every five minutes or so, hoping to wear it out."
<How do you know it wears out?>
"We don't.",
<This isn't much of a plan,> I said. <Are you Animorphs always this hopeless?>
"Pretty much," Cassie said ruefully. "The bad guys have all the power. Sometimes we think it's all a hopeless fight."
<A hopeless fight?> I asked. <Isn't that the best kind?>
Cassie laughed. "You may have lost your memory, but you're still Rachel. It's about time for me to morph. Let me jump off."
<No,> I said. <The beast couldn't lift me. I was too big. Stay on and morph where you are.
It will come after us, but if it can't lift me, it may not be able to get you.>
I felt her pat the back of my massive head. "My girl, Rachel," she said affectionately. "Here goes nothing."
<What are you going to morph into?>
"Something small enough that maybe the dust beast won't be able to separate me from you. A squirrel."
<We can morph into small animals?>
"Sometimes smaller is better."
I felt a strange scraping, tickly feeling on my back, as the girl who said she was my friend became smaller.
Aaaaaahhhhh! I thought, as the Veleek blazed after me.
"Huh huhh huhhhrrr hurrr HURRRHH!" I yelled.
I had a weird desire to pound my chest with my massive fists. But I stuck to my driving. I heard the tornado behind me. I shot a look at the rearview mirror. The mirror was filled with gnashing mouths!
The truck was moving as fast as it could move.
Sudden flashes of brilliant red light. Coming from the sky. Dracon beams!
Then, in my headlights: an elephant!
WHAT?
I slammed on the brakes. Too late.
Sccrreeeeeeech . . . WHAMPF!
Everything upside down. Rolling. Rolling. Pain. Suddenly flying!
Things hit me. Bushes ripped at me.
SLAM! I hit the ground hard. I was in a ditch half-filled with water. The truck was overturned on its back a few feet away. The wheels were still spinning. The headlights were still shining.
TSEEWW! TSEEEW! TSEEEW!
Dracon beams sliced the ground a few feet from my head. Bug fighters! I tried to move.
Pain shot through my head. I moved my arms. They were still in one piece. If I had been in human form, I would have been killed. But it took more than a seventy-mile-an-hour crash to kill the gorilla.
From somewhere I heard an agonized trumpeting sound.
The dust beast was over me, a tornado of mouths and blades. But it didn't want me. It was after someone else.
I could feel consciousness dimming. I had to morph. Let it take me, if it had to.
Let it take me ...
I felt myself shrink. Rachel's elephant back began to grow and grow, spreading out from me like some heaving, wobbling gray blanket.
A tail sprouted behind me. My face bulged out and grew pointed. Pale gray fur spread across my body.
I had morphed the squirrel before, of course. I knew what to expect. The body was wonderful. The senses keen and sharp. But the mind lived in a state of perpetual terror, always looking for predators. The only other emotion was hunger.
But I could control the squirrel's fear... if I could control my own.
Easier said than done. I was drawing the monster to us. The energy that was allowing me to become a squirrel was bait to the dust beast.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw headlights.
Something big was in the air behind the lights, a dark shadow that swallowed up the stars.
The beast! The Veleek!
I stopped the morph. I could feel my own fear. And if my fear met the squirrel's fear, I would never gain control.
Suddenly . . . PREDATOR!
The squirrel's terror shot through me.
Something overhead. Like a giant bird!
The squirrel's brain was screaming RUN! RUN! RUN!
TSEEEW! TSEEEW! TSEEEW!
Stabbing beams of brilliant light! Dracon beams. A Bug fighter coming in low above us.
I felt a surge as Rachel powered her huge body faster.
<What is happening?> Rachel cried in thought-speak.
But I was not morphed enough to use thought-speak. And my mouth was no longer fully human. The groaning sounds I made would mean nothing to Rachel.
TSEEEW!
Light so bright it blinded me!
"HhhrrrOOOOWWWuuhh!" Rachel screamed.
I smelled burned flesh. I blinked, trying to clear my half-human, half-squirrel eyes.
I saw a seared line of blackened flesh drawn down Rachel's side by a Dracon beam!
Headlights. Too close!
BAM!
I flew, tumbling through the air, a twisted, half-formed creature. I landed hard. But my fall was cushioned by dense bushes.
"HhhhRRRUUuuHHUUH!"
Through eyes half-human, half-squirrel, I saw a horrifying scene.
Rachel was on her side, trumpeting in painand rage. A pickup truck lay on its back, wheels spinning. Just beyond the truck, a gorilla struggled to get up.
Marco!
A Bug fighter zipped overhead.
I stopped morphing. I froze. I was a two-foot-long creature with a tail and human hands and patchy gray fur poking through spandex and flesh.
The dust beast settled above us. It spread above the three of us -Rachel, Marco, and me. I looked up into that phalanx of gnashing teeth and whirring blades and eerie, staring eyes.
It would take whoever drew it by morphing.
It would take me ... if I morphed.
And if I did nothing ... if I just closed my eyes and hugged the dirt and did nothing . . .
The dream! Evil had come, to choose between me and another. Just like in the dream.
I heard the Veleek's tornado roar. It had found its prey.
I closed my eyes.
I watched it all in the wavering, shimmering hologram.
The elephant running. The truck racing, with the Veleek in hot pursuit.
The picture suddenly became much sharper. We were now seeing the scene through the gun camera of one of the Bug fighters.
A flashing light came on, an indicator that the Bug fighter was preparing to fire its Dracon beams.
Red beams lanced toward the elephant.
The elephant ran in terror. The truck hit. In a flash, it was all over. The elephant lay sprawled across the side of the road. The truck was overturned. The Veleek was hovering over the scene.
It dropped swiftly down, enveloping a ditch. It rose with something concealed inside it. The Veleek arced swiftly toward the sky, out of range of the Bug fighter's cameras
.
<Come to me, my little pet,> Visser Three crowed. <Bring me my second Andalite bandit.>
Visser Three turned his stalk eyes toward me. <You'll have company soon.>
I felt a sinking sensation. Who had the Veleek taken? Rachel? Cassie? Marco?
<Call the Bug fighters,> Visser Three said. <Tell them to land. Hold that large creature. The Veleek can't carry it until it demorphs into something smaller.>
"Visser. . ." one of the human-Controllers said timidly. "The Bug fighter has a crew of one Taxxon and one Hork-Bajir. May I suggest we contact some of our Earth-based human- Controllers? They will be less ... ah, conspicuous . . . than Hork-Bajir."
<Do it,> Visser Three ordered. <But tell those Bug fighter crews they will contain that beast. They will not let it go. Or I'll see that they become the main course at the Taxxons' next meal. I'm going to my quarters. Call me when the Veleek arrives with my prize. Blank the Andalite's cage.>
My cage wall became opaque. I was alone again, unable to see out. I was left to imagine the fate of my human friends. I have never felt more worthless. More powerless.
I felt a sudden, sharp pain on my arm. What had Marco said they were? Fleas? I swatted it absentmindedly.
Wait!
A flea? Hadn't I heard Jake say he had done it? Yes. I was sure it was a flea. He had morphed a flea!
And he was, after all, just a human. Surely . . .
I reached for the flea. Easier said than done. It hopped away. I found it again. Again it escaped. On the third try, I caught it.
I squeezed the flea carefully between my fingers. I focused on the flea.
Yes! It might just work. We had very few animals that small on my own world. Perhaps the same was true of the Yeerks. The Visser would not expect me to morph something so tiny. In which case, I might have one slim chance.
I had morphed a fly. And I had morphed an ant. But as small as they were, they were not small enough. An ant is far larger than a flea. Many times larger. But a flea is nearly invisible.
It was time to get very small. Time to morph.
I began to shrink at a startling rate.
Each morphing is unique. Things don't happen logically. Some parts of your body change in shape when they are still far too large in size.
Other times the parts of your body shrink down, becoming very tiny and only changing shape at the last minute.
This explains why, even as I was still a couple of feet tall, I suddenly felt two long tusks come shooting out of my mouth. Two long teeth. And I knew immediately what they were used for: These were what the flea used to pierce my skin and drink my blood.
Why a flea should have a taste for Andalite blood is a mystery. But now I knew how the little monster did his dirty work. And I really did not want to dwell on that image.
My legs and arms began to segment. Joints appeared where they should not have been. Primitive joints that scraped as I moved.
My tail withered away and my body swelled. I was bloating up. At the same time, my blue and tan fur gave way to an exoskeleton - a shell. I could hear my bones dissolving. I could feel sickening lurches as my internal organs all disappeared. My complex Andalite hearts became something that was barely a valve. Long, spiked hairs shot from my jointed legs. A sort of shell helmet fringed with backward-raked spikes replaced my face.
And all the while, the floor of my cage grew vastly wider. And closer and closer. I felt I was on an endless landscape of smooth black glass.
My stalk eyes went blind as they became short, stubby antennae. My sight in my main eyes dimmed and shattered into a thousand points of gray light.
I was almost blind. What I could see was nothing but shades of gray. Dots, not shapes.
I could not hear in the usual sense, but I could pick up subtle vibrations through my antennae and through all the hairs on my minuscule body.
I stood on my six invisibly small legs, protected by plates of shell armor. Almost blind. Almost unable to hear. Afraid.
The next move was up to the Yeerks.
I waited and ticked off the minutes. The flea's brain was scarcely a brain at all. It contained almost nothing. The sum total of what the flea "knew" was this: Jump toward warmth and the smell of life.
Since there was no warmth and no smell of life, the flea brain had nothing much to say.
I waited. And hoped. And feared. And listened for the Visser's thought-speech.
There are two kinds of thought-speech: open and closed. Open thought-speak can be "heard" by anyone. Closed thought-speak is like a human whispering to only one person.
The Visser gave his orders in open thought-speak, so that everyone heard. That was how I knew when he'd returned. From a distance I heard, <You and you. And you two. Follow me to the bridge.>
I tried to control the fear that welled up in me at his approach. I hated him. I knew I had to live on that hate and try not to let the fear overpower me. My time would come, I told myself. I would avenge Elfangor. I would save my honor.
<Where is the Veleek? Then open the hatch, you idiot, and let it in! Yes, right here on the bridge. And brighten the Andalite's cage. I want to see these old friends meet.>
I saw light, which was actually just an increase in the number of gray dots. There was a silence from Visser Three for about two seconds. Then an explosion of enraged thoughtspeech. <FOOLS! Where is it? Where is it? I'll kill every one of you if it has escaped!>
Suddenly, a rush of air! I felt it waft across my bristles and antennae. Then, the scent of exhaled breath. A sensation of some warm object. The smells of a living creature!
<NO! Don't open the cage!> Visser Three yelled.
Too late, I thought. JUMP!
Above my back legs was a biological spring. It fired. The energy went to my legs and I went flying.
I've seen humans jump. They cannot jump their own height. Even we Andalites can barely jump our own height. But the flea . . . well, the flea can jump a hundred times his own height. It was as if a human being could simply leap over a sixty-story building. I flew through the air. And as I flew, I somersaulted over so that I was flying legs first.
I hit something and stopped very suddenly.
<Close the cage!> Visser Three screamed.
I felt a swift movement in the air just above me. The thing I was attached to fell. And even as he fell, I could sense that he no longer smelled like life.
Despite the fact we had kind of figured out that the dust creature wasn't actually trying to eat us, I was still slightly worried as it wrapped me up out of the ditch and carried me away.
"Slightly worried," as in crying like a baby.
I could feel that we were rising upward. But I was more concerned with just breathing, which was hard enough. The dust beast swirled around me, choking me, binding me, imprisoning me.
Suddenly, I sensed that we had stopped moving. A few moments later, the dust beast released me.
I don't know what I expected to see, but it sure wasn't this. I was on something that looked like the bridge of the starship Enterprise, only triangular. Instead of Data or Sulu or Worf or Spock, there were a bunch of Taxxons and a circle of Hork-Bajir with their weapons drawn.
I also saw an open, empty box that looked like it could be a cage. And just in front of the box was a dead Hork-Bajir.
Finally - and this was the worst part - instead of either Captain Kirk or Captain Picard, there was Visser Three.
Visser Three, with Hork-Bajir blood on his tail. Visser Three, not looking happy. Not that he has probably ever looked happy, exactly.
Visser Three. The dust monster hovering above us, filling the top of the room like a storm cloud. Taxxons at computer screens. A circle of Hork-Bajir armed with Dracon beams.
And me, a gorilla, in the middle of all this.
It would have been funny. If it had been happening to someone else.
<Morph out of that stupid form,> Visser Three snapped.
I said nothing. We had faced Visser Three before. We never spoke, for fear he would be able to tell that we were human, not Andalite.
<Someone remove that garbage,> Visser Three said, pointing at the dead Hork-Bajir. <And find that Andalite! Bring in bio-scanners. He didn't disappear, he's just morphed something very small.>
Andalite? He had to mean Ax. Which meant Ax was still alive. And he had escaped! Which explained the poor Hork-Bajir. Visser Three is a hard guy to work for.
I felt a surge of hope. Ax was alive!
<Marco?> I jumped. Not far, because gorillas aren't big jumpers. I just sort of jerked in surprise. Every one of the Hork-Bajir tightened his grip on his weapon.
<Marco? Is that you? It's Ax.>
<Ax! It's me. Are you sure Visser Three can't "hear" us?>
<Just keep thought-speaking directly to me,> Ax said.
<Where are you?>
<I morphed a flea.>
<Good. Maybe you can get away then. You're practically invisible. I'm in gorilla morph. I'm kind of noticeable.>
<I have a plan.>
<Oh, good,> I said. <All our plans are working out so well. Where are you?>
<The safest place I could think of,> Ax said. <I'm on Visser Three.>
I stared at Visser Three. Somewhere in his Andalite fur, Ax was hiding. Visser Three glared at me.
<I told you to morph out of that ludicrous shape,> Visser Three said to me. <Don't force me to use painful measures.>
<Did you hear that?> I asked Ax.
<Yes. He was thought-speaking openly. Don't morph. Don't say anything. Just tell me - do you see a computer console nearby? There will probably be a Taxxon working it.>
<I see a bunch of consoles. And a bunch of Taxxons. And Visser Three looking like he's ready to barbecue me.>
<Any console will do. Do you see a small square pad that the Taxxon is touching?>
<Yeah. All of the Taxxons are pressing one hand - if that's a hand - on these little squares.>
<Why do you defy me, Andalite?!> Visser Three demanded. <To what possible purpose?
Sooner or later you have to emerge.>
<Those are interfaces,> Ax said. <like your human keyboards. When you touch it, you can transmit commands directly to the computer. It's similar to thought-speech, however the basic scientific principle is actually->
<Ax? I don't need a science lecture. Visser Three is looking at me like I'm his beef jerky, so if you have a plan, just do it!>
<Okay. Everything will go a bit crazy in a few minutes. Just go for the console. Press your hand on it and think "open hatch." Just think "open hatch. ">
<What are you going to do?>
Ax laughed. He seldom laughs. It surprised me.
<Heh-heh-heh. That Veleek goes after morph energy. So I'm going to give it some morph energy to go after.>
Visser Three was still staring at me. I could practically see the wheels turning in his evil brain. <Why? Why are you afraid to demorph? Why won't you speak? The other Andalite spoke. Why don't you?>
Then . . .
Over all our heads, the dust monster began to rotate. Faster. Faster.
"Visser gullhadrash is muragg Veleekl" a Hork-Bajir said in their weird mix of English and their own native tongue.
But Visser Three had already noticed. It would have been impossible not to. The Veleek was going totally tornado! A tornado with sharp teeth and slashing blades. Anything that wasn't bolted down was flying around the bridge.
Suddenly ropes of dust shot down from the twirling cloud. Ropes that wrapped Visser Three up like a package!
I caught a glimpse of something on Visser Three's back. It was a bug, growing slowly larger, already an inch long.
Ax!
The Hork-Bajir all leapt forward, trying instinctively to rescue the Visser from the dust creature.
Big mistake. The first Hork-Bajir tried to slash at the whirling dust cloud with his bladed arm. In a split second, he no longer had that arm.
"Aaaarrrggg!" The Hork-Bajir screamed.
This was my chance. I barreled toward the closest computer console. A Hork-Bajir, half-fixated on the dust monster and half on me, got in the way. I hit him full force with my head down like a charging bull.
The Hork-Bajir staggered back and splayed across a Taxxon. The Taxxon's weak legs collapsed. I didn't wait for them to get up. I punched a second Taxxon with my big gorilla fist. He scuttled back.
I was in the clear!
<Water!> Visser Three cried from within the swirling dust cloud. <Water!>
He was thirsty? At a time like this he was thirsty?
I pressed my hand on the computer console. Open hatch, I thought. Open hatch. Right now.
To my utter amazement, it worked.
I could barely see through the tattered edges of the dust monster's storm, but the ceiling of the bridge seemed to split down the middle. It began to open. I could see stars outside.
This was Ax's plan? To open the bridge up to the vacuum of space? We would all be sucked out instantly and die. I considered reversing the command. I wasn't ready to die.
But then I noticed something: We were not getting sucked out into space.
And then I noticed something else: a cloud. Above us. We were in the atmosphere!
<Fools!> Visser Three screamed. <They're trying to escape! Get him. Get him! Get that monkey!>
Monkey? Monkey? I'd show them monkey!
I turned. Six Hork-Bajir warriors advanced on me, their bladed wrists and elbows flashing.
<Ax? Um.. I have the hatch open. And whatever you're planning on us doing next, now would be a very good time. Right now.>
Yeah, that was a fun chapter.
Incidentally, do we ever find our why Visser One's hork-bajir spoke English perfectly? (Is it attributable in some way to V3 being a terrible boss? Of course it is.)
Of course Marco and Ax go well together, they're the two best characters in the series and they form a perfect straight man/funny man duo.
I morphed out slowly. I had no intention of going all the way. My plan depended on my remaining a flea.
As I began to morph, I could feel the air swirling wildly around me. It was working! My morphing had drawn the Veleek. It sensed the morphing energy and it was now doing what Visser Three had programmed it to do. It was capturing the morph.
Of course, in capturing me, it also captured the Visser.
I heard Visser Three yell for water. Why? What was the purpose of that?
Then, I heard Marco say, <Ax? Urn ... I have the hatch open. And whatever you're planning on us doing next, now would be a very good time. Right now.>
I reversed morph. Back to total flea morph. The hairs on Visser Three's back, which had shrunk to the size of tall trees, now rose up again around me, taller than the tallest building. I felt my flea armor-plate clank back into place. I was once again not much bigger than a comma on this page.[quote]
That's a meta comment!
[quote]It was time to move. I released the massive spring power in my hind legs and fired myself away from the Visser's body. I hit a wall of wind.
I was caught in a swirling mass of dust. The particles were roughly my own size. They shot past me at incredible speed.
SLAM!
A particle hit me! It stuck to me. It was impaled on my own flea "combs," the spikes that protected the joints in my armor. It was stuck to me.
And only then, locked together with it, was I able to see it through my weak flea eyes. It was alive! It was a creature my own size, but with a hundred minuscule wings that beat the air. It had antennae, but different than any seen on Earth. These antennae were covered in tiny, upturned bowls. Like the dishes of primitive human radio telescopes. Those were the structures it used to sense energy sources.
There were no eyes. And no mouth. But two long filaments, like strands of wire, swept back from the front of the creature. These must be how it fed: by channeling the energy down the wires.
The Veleek was not one creature. It was billions! It was a swarm of billions of these tiny creatures. They had evolved into a swarm that could come together and become a destructive entity of gnashing teeth and slicing blades. But in reality they were separate insectlike creatures that fed on energy.
I motored my tiny front legs and shoved the Veleek away. Its wings beat, and in a flash it was gone.
Suddenly ... a huge, silvery globule the size of a human house came shooting past. It hit several of the dust creatures and knocked them away. Then more. More!
A spinning globule hit me. It wrapped itself around me. I was trapped. Trapped, falling, falling!
A strange substance pressed all around me, enclosing me, smothering me.
Water. The Yeerks had turned on a water hose! That's what Visser Three had been calling for. Water!
The drop of water that enclosed me splatted against the floor. I could not get away. It clung to me. It was like glue to my flea body.
Then ... I was out! I was on dry ground. But water droplets loaded with powerless dust monsters were showering all around me like a meteor storm.
<Marco! Stamp your feet! I need to find you!>
<I'm a little busy,> Marco cried. <I got Hork-Bajir here looking for trouble! And someone turned on the sprinklers.>
<Stamp your feet!>
I felt a new vibration rumble through the floor. I knew where it was coming from. I leaped. I tumbled through the air. I landed in a forest of gigantic hairs, each as thick as the biggest tree.
<Where are you?> Marco yelled.
<On you!> I said. <We have to get out of here!>
<How?>
<Jump through the open hatch!>
<I'm a gorilla not a ... wait! I have an idea!>
I felt a shuddering vibration like an earthquake that rolled through Marco's gorilla body. Then, movement. Then, wind whipping past at incredible speed
<Where are we now?> I asked.
<The good news is, we're out of the ship. I used a couple Hork-Bajirs as a ladder and climbed over them! That's the good news.>
<You seem to be implying that there might be some bad news, too,> I said.
<Oh yeah,> Marco said. <The bad news is we're about two miles up in the air and we are plummeting to Earth.
The truck hit my back right leg. It must have shattered the bone, because the pain was incredible.
The impact knocked me several feet. I fell and my head slammed the concrete.
Maybe that's what did it. I lay there on my side, breathing with difficulty. My eyes were closed.
FLASH! A construction site, late at night. The light in the sky was gone. Now it was in front of me, resting on the ground. A spaceship! It had landed. There was a voice in my head. It came from nowhere. No, it came from him? The alien! I could see him, lying there injured. The Yeerks. The Yeerks, he said. They have come to destroy you.
FLASH! A barn full of animals in cages. Birds. Foxes. Squirrels. Raccoons. Bats. And Cassie was there.
Yes, Cassie. My friend.
And the others. I could see them now. They had been with me at the construction site. And ever since that night we had been joined together.
Animorphs. That was the word. It was Marco's word.
FLASH! I was flying. I was flying on wings that seemed to stretch forever. Soaring high on the thermals. An eagle, that's what I was - a bald eagle.
Then . . . yes! They had swarmed me. A bunch of smaller blackbirds. They had swarmed me, and I had hit the tree and then . . .
<Rachel! It took Marco!>
I opened my elephant eyes. A squirrel stood nervous and jumpy, tail twitching, mouth working almost as if it were talking.
<Cassie,> I said.
<It took Marco,> Cassie said again. <It took Marco and I didn't do anything.>
<Marco. I remember Marco
<You do? Is your memory coming back?>
<Yeah. Mostly. It still feels shaky.>
Over our heads swooped two Bug fighters.
Bug fighters. The words were right there in my brain! I knew what they were. Bug fighters. Crew: one Hork-Bajir, one Taxxon. I could form mental pictures of the Hork-Bajir. The Taxxon was still hazy.
But both were Yeerks. That was the important thing. Each had a Yeerk in its head.
<I can't stand up,> I told Cassie. <The elephant's leg is broken. I'm morphing back to human>
<Me, too. It's gone for now. The Veleek is gone,> Cassie said. <Rachel, I should have morphed while the dust beast was here. I could have drawn it away from Marco. I was scared.>
<Of course you were scared. So was I> I said. I could feel myself shrinking. My legs, as big as telephone poles, were becoming normal human legs. The tusks sucked back into my mouth and split to form front teeth. The trunk grew weak, lost its muscles, and shriveled back to form my nose and mouth.
"Why didn't the dust beast attack us?" I wondered, as soon as my mouth could form speech.
"It's off, carrying Marco away. Maybe killing him," Cassie wailed. "I should have -"
"Look, Cassie," I said sharply. "That's what happened, all right? It's in the past. We have the present to worry about." I pointed to the two Bug fighters that had looped around overhead and were coming back toward us at a much slower speed.
"Cassie, I don't remember," I said. "Can we morph again so quickly?"
"Yes. Yes, we can. It's exhausting though. But we don't have a choice. We can't let them catch us in human morph. It would blow our cover forever!"
"Cassie, we need morphs that can move fast and I don't remember everything we have available," I said urgently.
Cassie concentrated. "It's night. The woods. Let's go airborne. We've both acquired owl morphs. We used them to guard Jake when he was taken by the Yeerk. Great horned owls."
I squeezed my eyes shut. An owl? I had morphed an owl? Yes. Yes, I remembered. I could feel it.
The Bug fighters took up positions, hovering in the air just a hundred yards to either side of us. In the distance I heard sirens screaming in the night - police cars growing closer.
Probably Controllers, not real policemen.
I focused all my thoughts on making the change. I squeezed my eyes shut and concentrated.
When I opened my eyes again, it was broad daylight.
No. Not daylight. I was seeing the world through the eyes of the owl. It might as well have been noon. I could see everything! I could see every detail of the Bug fighters. I could see deep into the black woods. I could see the flashing blue lights of the police cars as if they were right in my face.
<Ready?> Cassie asked.
<Yeah. I think so.>
<Follow me,> Cassie said. She flapped her wings. I flapped mine. We flew, just a foot off the ground.
Suddenly, a large creature dropped from the hovering Bug fighter. It dropped more than fifty feet, hit the ground, rolled, and was up! My owl vision saw him as if he were bathed in a spotlight.
<Hork-Bajir!> I yelled. <Straight ahead.>
A second later, another Hork-Bajir dropped from above. With amazing speed, they were up and running for us. Their arm blades glinted in the moonlight.
We were flying straight at them. Too low! Too low, and not enough time to get off the ground! If we turned, we would lose altitude. They would get us before we could get clear.
<Straight at them,> I said.
<My girl, Rachel,> Cassie said grimly. Then, <Go for the eyes!>
I flapped my wings with desperate energy. I raked my talons forward. The Hork-Bajir came straight at us. We went straight for them. I knew right then that my fate was not in my own hands anymore. If their orders were to kill us, we would die. I could measure the distance, I knew my own speed, and I could see the superhuman speed of the Hork-Bajir, with their flashing, bladed arms.
RRRROOOOAAAWWWRRR!
Something big flew through the air. I saw a flash of orange and black. My Hork-Bajir went down hard with a huge tiger on his back, slamming him down into the dirt. The Hork-Bajir in front of Cassie turned to see, for just a split second.
Cassie blew past him.
The tiger leaped back off the downed Hork-Bajir.
I sailed above them all, flapping for dear life.
<Let's get outta here!> Jake said.
<Definitely,> I agreed.
<What about Marco?> Jake asked. <Have you seen Marco?>
<Aaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!>
I don't think in the entire history of planet Earth that any gorilla has ever plummeted through the night from a height of two miles. So it was a first for "both" of us.
I was spinning wildly, down, down, down through the cold night air. Far below me ... way too far below me ... I saw streetlights. And car lights. And neon store lights. And right beside me, almost all around me, clouds.
I was a four-hundred-pound gorilla who had just decided to go skydiving without a parachute.
<Aaaaaaaahhhhhh!>
<Marco, why are you screaming? It hurts my head.>
<We're gonna die, you alien lunatic!>
<No, we won't die. Don't be foolish,> Ax said.
<Maybe you won't. You're a flea! You'll bounce. I'll hit the ground like rock!>
<Marco, morph into a bird.>
<Oh. Duh,> I said, feeling a little foolish. <Is there time?>
<I don't know. Maybe we should hurry,> Ax said in his annoyingly calm Andalite way.
Now, the problem we had was a simple one: You can't morph from one animal into another.
You have to return to your natural form first. So I had to become human. Then I could morph into a bird.
A minute later we were no longer a gorilla and a flea falling. Now we were) a human and an Andalite falling.
And now the ground was no longer way too far below us. Now it was way too close!
"Aaaaaaahhhhh!" I yelled.
<Aaaaaahhhhhh!> Ax screamed in thought-speak.
I felt relieved that at least he was screaming now, too. But mostly I was busy noticing that I could make out individual houses, ringed by faint light. I could see individual car headlights and taillights. And I could see the mall parking lot, which was almost empty except for a crew painting new stripes on the blacktop.
"Aaaaaaahhhhhh!"
I focused as hard as I could. I had long ago morphed an osprey. That's a type of hawk. It's mostly dark gray-brown, with a sort of mottled white underside and a dark beak. It's a cool bird. But you know what? Right at that moment, I didn't care what kind of bird I became, as long as it had wings.
"Grow, wings, GROW!" I yelled, and the wind screaming past my face blew the words right out of my mouth.
Feathers began to form on my skin. I felt myself shrink. I felt my bones grow light, hollow.
I could hear a grinding sound as the bones of my skull scrunched down to hold a much smaller brain.
Too slow. Way too slow.
I could see people now. The guys working in the mall parking lot. I could see people! And I was still falling.
No way I could morph in time!
No time! The ground!
It was going to hit me! It was jumping up to hit me! I could see one of the work crew look up at me.
I could see his eyes!
I spread my arms wide.
No! Not arms. WINGS! WIIINNNGGS!
SWOOOOOOSH! The wind snapped my wings back, straining every muscle, and I blew at ninety miles an hour, just inches off the freshly painted blacktop.
<Yah-HAH!> I yelled. I glanced left. Ax was right beside me, in his own harrier morph.
<That was exciting,> Ax said.
<Yes, it was. Let's never, ever do that again.>
<Ever,> Ax agreed.
We spent a bad night, Cassie and Rachel and I. Cassie and I went to our homes. Rachel spent the night at Cassie's house, because otherwise she'd have had to explain to her mom why she wasn't at gymnastics camp.
Rachel was still shaky, but her memory was almost all the way back to normal. I figured the best thing for her would be to spend some time with Cassie.
As for me, I dragged myself home at almost midnight. There was no question: I was grounded. I didn't even argue. No TV. No Sega. Inside the house by five o'clock. Wash all dishes. Take out all trash. For two weeks. And oh, by the way, clean out the garage.
I didn't say anything but "Yes, sir," and, "Yes, ma'am," and, "I'm really sorry I worried you."
Then I went up to my room and tried not to imagine what Visser Three was doing to Ax and Marco.
I've never felt so tired and so bad. I fell asleep in my clothes, facedown on my unmade bed.
We were beaten. That's what I fell asleep thinking. We were done. The dust monster would be back. We had survived - most of us - but we would never be able to morph safely. We Animorphs were finished. The battle was done. Nothing now stood between the Yeerks and complete control of Earth.
And you know what? That thought just made me feel relieved. I was too tired to fight... too tired.
The next thing I knew . . .
"Booga booga booga boooga!"
"Whaaaa?!"
I sat up, spun around, twisting myself up in my sheets, then promptly fell out of my bed.
Marco laughed so hard he started crying.
"How did you get here?" I demanded. Then, "You're alive?"
"No, I am the ghost of Marco. Fear me!"
"What time is it?"
"Like ten in the morning," Marco said. He went to the window and opened the blinds.
I recoiled from the bright sunlight. "Cassie said the Veleek carried you away."
"Yes, it did. And now we're going steady. Look, get with it. Wake up, fearless leader. We're all alive, and waiting for you to come and lead the counterattack."
"Counterattack?" I glanced at the door.
"Don't worry," Marco said. "Tom's out. I checked."
"I can't go anywhere," I said. "I'm so busted for coming in late."
"Um . . . yeah. I talked to your dad on my way up. He mentioned that little fact. He said if you clean the garage you can go out for a while. It seemed very important to him. Like maybe if you cleaned the garage he would be the happiest guy in the world."
"Sure. Why not? My mom has been after him for a month to clean the garage. So now he gets to dump it off on me. Why wouldn't he be happy? You going to help me?"
"Me? Help clean the garage? As if."
I smiled. "I'm glad you're not dead, Marco."
"Me, too."
"Get everyone together. Give me three hours to deal with the garage. We'll meet at the edge of the woods. No one morphs. Got that? No one morphs."
<I can't believe you guys were doing all this while I was sleeping!> Tobias raged. <Playing tag with some dust monster from Saturn? Rachel having amnesia till Marco plowed into her with a truck? Escaping from Visser Three's Blade ship? And I'm sleeping the entire time? No way! I missed all the fun.>
"You're the only one who can't morph," Jake said matter-of-factly. "So the Veleek isn't interested. Lucky you."
"It's the morphing that this Veleek goes after," Marco said, grinning his taunting grin. "It - or they, I should say - eat energy. It's not interested in your deep-fried hawk legs."
<Come stand over here, Marco,> Tobias said. <Stand under my branch.>
Everyone laughed. Except me. I hadn't slept much. It wasn't the dream this time. It was the memory. The dream had become real. And what sleep I had was broken by images of myself, scared and shivering while the Veleek hovered above us and finally dove on Marco.
I didn't like that memory. I don't mind being scared. We're all scared. But I didn't like knowing that I had kept myself safe at Marco's expense. There was only one word for a person who would do that: coward.
I didn't like that word. It twisted inside me.
"Okay, here's what we know," Jake said. "One: The Veleek is sort of an insect swarm. The individual particles spread out till they sense a type of energy they can eat, then they call the swarm together. The swarm forms into this beast that chews through anything. Two: Visser Three has altered this creature to serve his own purpose."
<Yes,> Ax said. <It is fairly simple, really. The Yeerks reprogrammed the beast to hunt for morph energy, but to eat a different kind of energy: the power of their spacecraft engines.>
Rachel nodded. "Like a trained hunting dog. A hunting dog chases the fox or whatever, but only because its master will give it food of a different kind. The Veleek chased morph energy, brought the morph to its master, then was rewarded with energy from the ships."
"Exactly," Jake said. "The Veleek is Visser Three's dog. And unfortunately, it is awesome. Maybe unbeatable."
"No," I said quietly. "Not unbeatable. It couldn't lift Rachel when she was in elephant mode. She was too heavy. It has limits. Also, on board the Blade ship the Yeerks used water to control the Veleek."
Everyone was looking at me now.
Jake said, "So, what do we do with this information?"
"I ... I have a plan," I said. I took a deep breath. "But I have one condition: I have to be the one who does it."
I told them my plan.
"Cassie, this is beyond dangerous," Jake said when I was done. "Why should you do it?"
"Because." I looked at Marco and met his gaze. "I let the Veleek take Marco. I could have morphed. I could have drawn it to me. I let it take Marco."
Marco smiled wryly. "Cassie, it's no big deal. Here I am, fine and healthy. And as cute as ever."
"That's not the point," I said. "I was a coward."
Rachel rolled her eyes. "Good grief! Cassie, you have been in every fight we've been in. You are the farthest thing in the world from being a coward!"
"Easy for you to say, Xena.- Warrior Princess."
"What?"
"Don't you remember? That's what Marco calls you."
Rachel made a face. "I guess there are still one or two holes in my memory." She looked suspiciously at Marco. "Do I like it when you call me that? Or do I kick your butt?"
"Nice try, Rachel. But you can't distract me. I'm doing this," I said flatly. "It's my plan. I'm doing it."
"Cassie," Jake said, pleading with his eyes.
I took his hand in mine and gave it a squeeze. "You know it's a good plan, Jake. And you know I'm the person to do it. It's a new morph, with no chance to try it out first. And I'm the best morpher."
No one said anything. I could see worry in Jake's eyes. Rachel put her hand on my shoulder.
"All right," Jake said heavily. "Let's go to the beach."
I caught a beautiful thermal rising up from the cliffs along the ocean. Just perfect! I spread my wings and felt the warm updraft grab me. It was like being fired out of a slingshot. I rose and rose and circled high above the ocean. I needed all the altitude I could get.
I could not believe that Cassie felt like the weak link in our group. I mean, I was the one who had slept through half of what happened! It was embarrassing. It was frustrating.
The only good thing was that at least I had a role to play in Cassie's plan.
Normally a red-tailed hawk is not a water bird. We don't fly that well over water, because over water you don't get thermals. But I was way, way up, and with a little luck I could stay aloft long enough to find what I was looking for.
I headed out to sea. And as soon as I was well out over the gray-blue water, I felt the air grow slack. I worked the headwind to compensate, though, and I was able to hang on to most of my altitude.
All the while, I scanned the ocean beneath me. I have amazing vision, but it isn't adapted for seeing through water, like a bald eagle's or an osprey's is. Still, if what I was searching for was down there, I'd see it well enough.
I was getting tired by the time I spotted the spout. It was actually back, closer to shore than I was flying. That was lucky.
I turned south a bit, and veered at an angle that brought me nearer to shore, though still more than two miles out from the beach.
And then, it was just below me. I could see it plowing majestically through the waves. It rose and blew out its lungs, then dove again. It reappeared a hundred yards farther south.
Always south.
I wheeled to my left and headed back toward shore. I was tired, and glad to see land. But I wouldn't get much of a chance to rest. The real test was still ahead.
With my hawk's eyes I swept the beach below.
It was not crowded, but still, it took a few minutes to find them.
I spilled air and dropped down to meet my friends.
<I have one for you, Cassie,> I said. <I found a whale.>
This just makes me wonder why they didn't acquire Jesus whale at the time.
<Come stand over here, Marco,> Tobias said. <Stand under my branch.>
They did wonder if there was a limit to the number of animals to acquire at some point, but they probably should have asked Ax about it after he joined.
The lines that stick with you... it's been close to twenty years since I've read this. I didn't remember a single thing about it. I did remember Marco driving after the fact. But the sentence before this, "stand under my branch" just popped right back into my head.
They did wonder if there was a limit to the number of animals to acquire at some point, but they probably should have asked Ax about it after he joined.
The lines that stick with you... it's been close to twenty years since I've read this. I didn't remember a single thing about it. I did remember Marco driving after the fact. But the sentence before this, "stand under my branch" just popped right back into my head.
I'm just saying there are people who should be lying out on the beach, and there are people who shouldn't be," Marco said. "Do you see fat hairy old guys in Speedos on Baywatch? No. No. On Baywatch they have a law against it. David Hasselhoff kicks anybody off the beach who isn't good-looking. We need the Hasselhoff law here. That's all I'm saying."
"So you wouldn't mind never going to the beach, Marco?" Rachel said wanly, not really interested in playing put-down games with Marco.
We walked along the beach, pretending everything was normal. Pretending we weren't worried. Pretending everything was fine.
Rachel was still quiet. I think the experience of losing her memory had shaken her up.
Rachel is someone who is always in control. She's very brave at dealing with threats. But this was something new to her: a threat that had come from inside.
Marco was trying too hard to tell jokes and make everyone relax. He felt somehow he was responsible for my feeling bad. He wanted to tell me that he didn't blame me. But he'd already told me, and I'd said thanks and still I felt bad. Marco didn't know how to deal with that. So he tried to make everyone laugh.
Jake was just one big tension machine. He hides it well, but I know him. I know when he's upset. It's something you see in the way he presses his lips together a little too hard. And a certain hooded look in his eyes.
And then . . . Tobias was back.
<I have one for you, Cassie,> he said. <I found a whale.>
I waved at him. Tobias told us where the whale was.
Jake stopped walking. "You don't have to do this, Cassie. The force of the impact... if you hit too fast. . . besides, maybe the Veleek isn't even around anymore . . ."
I couldn't look him in the eye. He was offering me an easy way out. I didn't want to be tempted.
"I'm going in," I said as calmly as I could.
"I could do this, Cassie," Rachel said.
"Do three morphs, six changes, including one that's totally new, all that quickly?" I asked her. "You all say I'm the fastest morpher. The one who gets control over a new morph easiest. I'm the person for this job."
To my surprise, Jake nodded. "Cassie's right. It's her job." He took my hand. "But we'll be there for you."
The four of us walked into the surf. Ax had to sit this one out. He would have had to morph back to his original form, and that probably wouldn't have gone over too well at the beach.
We had chosen a spot far from the lifeguards. We didn't want someone deciding we needed to be rescued.
I splashed into the cold surf. Water bubbled around my ankles, then my legs, my waist. I plunged forward and swam away from shore. The others were right beside me. Tobia had flown to the top of the cliff to rest up for a few seconds.
I swam out to sea, and as I swam, I focused on the first morph. Some morphs are terrifying. Some are disgusting. Some overwhelm you with their animal instincts of fear and hunger.
Other morphs make you feel invincible with their power.
And some morphs ... not many, but a few, are simply wonderful.
As I swam, I felt my face bulge out and out and out. I felt my legs begin to fuse together. I felt my skin become thick and rubbery. I could even feel when my lungs shut down for a moment, and a second later were sucking air from a hole behind my head.
From far off, I heard Tobias's thought-speak, faint but understandable.
<It's coming! The Veleekl It's coming!>
I was a creature with feet but no legs, hands that were flat and gray, and no arms. I had human eyes that still stung from the salt water, but a blowhole in the back of my neck. I was half-human, half-bottlenose dolphin.
I rolled onto my side to look upward. And there it was.- Visser Three's hunting dog. The Veleek. The dust monster. A tornado of energy-hungry particles that swirled like a small tornado.
I dove beneath the waves. And when I surfaced, it was still there. But it had not come closer.
<It doesn't like the water,> Marco said.
<I guess not,> I agreed.
<You were right, Cassie,> Rachel said.
<Let's hope so.>
I felt the last of the changes as I became a true dolphin. The joy! I had forgotten how happy the dolphin was. It seemed strange, given what we were up against.
But still, with all our worry, the dolphin joy was hard to contain.
<Let's go find this whale!> Rachel said.
We took off at full dolphin speed. I fired a series of clicks from the organ in my head. The clicks resounded through the water, and came back to me in echoes. The echoes painted a picture of what was in the water around me.
<I have him on echolocation,> I told the others.
<Yeah,> Jake agreed. <A little left. Not far now.>
Soon I could hear the whale crashing through the water. We raced up alongside him, faster than he was, but insignificant beside his huge bulk.
It was like running next to a truck or a train. His flank was a gray wall, scarred and dotted with crusts of barnacles.
Little ones, the whale said in a voice that was not a voice, in words that were not really words at all. Strange cloud above.
He kept moving, not really caring whether we were there or not. The Veleek kept pace above us, not able to attack, but not drawn off, either.
<Okay, guys. It's time,> I said. <Get ready.>
I began to demorph. Easier said than done. I was moving at whale speed, much faster than I could swim as a human.
Great one, do not dive, I asked the whale. Whether he heard me or understood me, let alone agreed, I could not say. It's hard to describe the way a whale communicates. The dolphins can hear their thought-speech, but it isn't words, really. More like strange, beautiful pictures that simply appear in your mind.
Jake and Rachel each sidled up next to me. They pressed their snouts against me, and pushed me through the water. I demorphed, and slowly my dolphin tail split to become legs. My flippers sliced into fingers.
I was fully human again and gasping for breath, with my face just out of the water. Just two feet off the water, the Veleek hovered - hungry, waiting for a chance.
I pressed my human hands against the side of the whale. I focused my mind on the process of "acquiring." It felt. . . wrong, somehow. As if I should have asked the whale's permission. But the slow, vague communication of whales does not allow for explanations.
I needed his DNA.
He slowed and almost stopped. It was the acquiring trance. All animals become calm while they are being acquired. But it was hard to think of the whale as being just an animal. I had dealt with whales before. They are not intelligent in the same way humans are, but they have minds, and, I believe, souls.
When I was done acquiring the great one's DNA, I took my hands from him.
"I'm done!" I said, getting a mouthful of salt water.
My friends slowed down and the whale pulled away.
Now I was one of the most awkward things in the world: a human being in the ocean. I didn't fear drowning, because my friends were all around me in dolphin morph. But with the Veleek hanging above us, like a low ceiling of gnashing teeth, it was creepy.
"Is Tobias ready?" I asked.
<He's up above the Veleek,> Jake said. <How are you holding up?>
"So far - glublub - pah! Pah!" I spit salt water out of my mouth. "So far so good. I'm ready."
It was not my favorite kind of flying. Hawks are not like geese. We can't just power-fly, hour after hour. Personally, I don't know how geese do it.
A hawk likes a bit of a headwind to get lift for the takeoff. I had that, at least. But most of the time we hunt from trees, swooping down on unwary mice or rabbits. We don't go for serious altitude unless we can get some free lift from a thermal.
Otherwise it's hard work, flapping and flapping for altitude.
But I couldn't complain. Cassie had a worse job.
She rode my back in cockroach morph. She'd had to finish the morph while literally underwater to keep away from the Veleek. She had morphed from human to dolphin to human to cockroach already. And more was coming.
<Hanging in there?> I asked her.
<Yeah. I'm fine. Is the Veleek following us?>
<No, the others are keeping it distracted down below. They're doing partial morphs, keeping it down near the surface of the water.>
<Good. How are you doing?>
<No problem,> I said. It was a lie. I was straining for every foot of altitude I could get, and
I was wearing out. I had to get as high up as possible. Cassie would need every foot I could give her.
We were making progress. At about a hundred feet, I caught a nice gust of wind that I rodeup to a thousand feet or so. But then it was dead air for a while. Totally dead air, and I was struggling.
<Tobias?>
<Yeah, Cassie.>
<Think this will work?>
<If I get you enough altitude, it will work.>
<Are you ever afraid?> she asked me.
<Who, me? I'm afraid of everything. I know I'm a predator and all, but do you know how many predators I have after me? Every golden eagle, every falcon. You know how fast they are? It's like getting hit by a bullet. They make me look like the Goodyear blimp. Then there are the raccoons and foxes and snakes and even the occasional nervy house cat. And that's just the natural environment. Add to that the Yeerks, and the fact that I wake up
sometimes and don't remember exactly what I am, boy or bird . . . yeah, Cassie, I'm afraid a lot of the time.>
<How do you handle it?>
<Who says I handle it? There's only one way to deal with fear: Be afraid. Be afraid, and then go ahead and do what you have to do, anyway.>
<Yeah. I guess that's true. Listen, Tobias, if I don't make it. . .>
<Oh, shut up. You're going to make it.>
<If I don't ... if I don't, you know, then tell Jake that someday he has to tell my parents, okay? Someday, if it's ever safe. Tell them what happened to me. Promise?>
<Sure, Cassie. I promise>
<Just don't tell my dad what happened to his truck,> she added, forcing a brave laugh. <He thinks it was stolen. We'd better leave it at that.>
<Cassie? This is it, kid. I can't go any higher.>
<Okay, Tobias. Thanks for the ride.>
I felt her scuttle down along my wing. And a second later I saw her falling, spinning. A girl who had become a cockroach, now falling from a mile up, trying to draw a monster to attack her.
A girl who thought she was a coward. It's amazing how people can just not know themselves at all.
With my hawk eyes I saw her grow and grow, as human DNA reasserted itself.
And I saw the Veleek turn its many mouths toward the sky.
I fell. Almost blind, with roach's eyes, I fell.
I focused my mind on one thing: morphing. No time to wonder where the ocean surface was. No time to worry about the Veleek. Morph. Morph. Morph.
Hands. Legs. Arms. Eyes.
Eyes!
I could see! Below me, as far as I could see in every direction, water. Tiny white-peaked waves. Ripples that caught the sunlight. It was beautiful. Blue sky above. Blue water below. Water that would be as hard as concrete if I hit it too fast.
I could see Tobias circling above. And in the water below, the tiny pale-gray cylinders of Jake and Rachel and Marco.
And then, coming up to meet me like a tornado: the Veleek. It had sensed the morphing energy from my transformation back to human.
Was I fully human? Yes. I must be, because the exhaustion that hit me in a wave made my eyes flutter and my limbs go weak.
Too many morphs. Too quickly. And now . . .
Morph! Morph! Morph! I ordered myself. Focus! Concentrate! Believe!
But the changes were slow. So slow.
I focused my mind. But I was so tired. And it was so easy to just fall and fall and fall.
Morph, Cassie! Do it!
I felt changes. I felt myself growing . . .
And then, it was on me! The Veleek fired ropes of dust at me. They wrapped around me like the tentacles of an octopus. Wrapping around my hands that had become flippers.
Around my legs that were melting together.
I
gnore it! Morph! It's the only hope.
I
felt the Veleek taking my weight. My momentum was slowing, but we were still dropping, me and the Veleek together.
Through the dust storm I caught a glimpse of the ocean below me. The cigar shapes of my friends were too large. Too close!
Morph, Cassie. One more time. Morph.
But I didn't have the strength. I was beaten. And then ... at that moment, I felt the edge of the whale's brain brushing against mine. Its instincts, its DNA memories.
Help me, I pleaded.
In a dream of falling and falling, I reached out to a dark, vast being that I could not define. I reached out for the whale's strength.
Morph! Finish the morph!
Finish it, and then you can rest.
At first I couldn't see her. But then, the cockroach grew and became larger. I could see her as a dot, way, way up in the sky.
<Here she comes,> I said.
The Veleek shuddered, sensing this new prey.
<Should we try to keep the Veleek interested any longer?> I asked.
<No,> Jake said. <It's up to Cassie now.>
Someday Jake will be a general or a president. He has that ability to make hard decisions, even about people he cares for.
She fell and grew, and became human again.
<She's too close! Not enough time!> I yelled.
<The Veleek. It will slow her down!> Marco said.
None of us had ever done so many morphs in such a short time. It was mind-boggling. It was impossible.
And yet, as the Veleek wrapped itself around her, she was already sprouting the flukes of a humpback whale.
Now all we could see was the Veleek. The dust storm wrapped around Cassie. It slowed. It slowed. And then . . .
<Am I crazy, or is it falling faster?> Marco asked.
<Yes, and YES!> I cried.
<She did it!>
Like a rock, the Veleek fell. Faster. Faster. It could not support the growing weight. It had not been able to lift an elephant, and what it was holding now was so much bigger.
It was wrapped around a full-grown humpback whale.
And it was falling toward the ocean.
At the last second, the Veleek tried to break free. But it had wrapped itself too tightly around the prey that was no longer prey.
I dove beneath the surface, just in time to witness . . .
Spuh-LOOOOOOSSSSHHH!
The tornado hit the water. All the billions of particles slammed into the ocean waves. In a split second, it was gone. Washed away.
And exploding away from the doomed Veleek, emerging from the wasted tornado, was a huge, sleek creature that depth-charged fifty feet straight down.
<Cassie! Cassie! Cassie! Are you all right?>
There was no answer. The whale fell through the water.
<Cassie! Answer me!>
And then there came a kick from that massive whale tail.
<Hah HAH!> Cassie yelled. <Take that, you big bag of wind!>
Cassie power-kicked her way to the surface and shot clear out of the water.
<Hey, Visser Three!> Cassie crowed. <I washed your dog for you!>
She fell back with a mighty splash. And we raced to join her.
<Good job, Cassie!> Jake said. <Scratch one Veleek.>
<I can't believe it,> Marco said. <We actually won one. We won. We flat out kicked butt.>
<Cassie, you must be exhausted,> Tobias said, swooping low and slow above us.
<Not anymore,> Cassie said. <I feel great. I thought we were beat. And guess what? We aren't. Not yet. Not by a long shot.>
Then, to my total amazement, she began to sing the deep, strange, haunting song of the humpback. The sound waves thrilled me, I don't quite know why.
<What are you singing?> Jake asked her. <What are the words?>
<It isn't words, exactly,> Cassie said. <But if it were, it would be just one word: hope.>
