Separation, part one of a duology
'I am sitting in the morning,
at the diner on the corner.
I am looking out the window
at somebody coming in.'
- D.N.A.
The café was fairly quiet, like it always was Monday evening, when the girl walked in the door. Mary usually wouldn't have noticed a single girl coming in. Girls came and went all the time, and she never gave them a moment's thought. This one, though, for some reason caught her attention, and the thirty-odd-year-old poet studied her.
The girl was African-American, about 5'4" tall, with short hair cut close to her head. She was wearing a pair of faded flare-leg blue-jeans that looked a little too big for her, and a loose blue tee-shirt with a faded logo advertising 'The Gardens' on the front. She looked nervous, and Mary got the feeling she wasn't very trusting. She also got the feeling that this girl was bleeding inside. Mary got these feelings, sometimes. They came out of nowhere, and they were usually right. She continued to watch the girl.
This girl was naggingly familiar, and Mary frowned. She never forgot a face-
It hit her, like a runaway train. She was drawn back four years, to a place she had never wanted to think about again.
The Yeerk Pool. Mary shuddered slightly and the memory. She'd been a Controller, for four years. Four years of being a slave to a slug from space, of not being able to do anything at all. Those four years had ended when a small group of animals had broken into the Pool, and set about trying to save everyone there. Mary had been the only one to actually escape, besides the animals themselves. She'd been carried out of Hell on the back of a horse. The horse had dropped her in a parking lot and trotted away with the elephant, before Mary could even say thank you. The elephant probably thought that Mary would just run off, go home. But Mary had all the curiosity of a cat, and she'd followed the elephant, and had seen the elephant and the horse change, become two girls. The elephant had become a tall, blond, supermodelesque girl. And the horse-
Well, the horse was standing in the doorway, looking around the café.
The girl walked up to the counter. Lisa, the cashier, asked her what she wanted. The girl looked longingly at the prices for the meals, but looked in her purse and sighed.
"A muffin and a small coffee, please," she said, her voice very quiet. Mary shook her head.
"Get her the soup and sandwich, Lisa," Mary ordered. "Put it on my tab." Lisa nodded, and the girl looked startled.
"Oh, no," said the girl, "I couldn't possibly impose. I'll be fine- " Mary cut her off with a snort. She smiled, kindly.
"And how long has it been since you had a proper meal, m'girl?" she asked, with some asperity. The girl flushed a little, embarrassed. Mary smiled again. "Don't worry about it. Come sit down, and eat." Lisa put the tray with the food on the counter, and Mary picked it up with one hand. With the other, she took hold of the girl's shirt and pulled her to the table. "Sit. Eat," she ordered, pushing the girl down into her seat. She sat, and watched the girl nearly inhale the sandwich.
"So," Mary said casually, "what are you doing here? Last I remember, you were down south, rescuing people from Yeerk Pools."
The girl's reaction was instant and impressive. She jerked up, swept the room with her gaze, and then looked at Mary.
"What do you mean?" she demanded, staring at her, fear and surprise warring in her eyes. Mary gave her another smile.
"Relax. I'm not going to hurt you. In fact, I need to say thank you."
"What for?" the girl asked, remaining wary. Mary lifted an eyebrow.
"Do you remember when you attacked the Yeerk Pool?" she asked, and the girl nodded. "You got one human out that night. That was me."
The girl studied her for a moment, and then relaxed with a sigh. "I guess I'll have to trust you. It's not like it matters much, anyway. If you're a Yeerk and you know that much already I'm screwed anyway."
"Good thing for you I'm not," Mary said. The look of sadness on the girl's face had come back, full force. "So," Mary said, "what's your name?"
"Cassie," the girl replied.
"What're you doing out here? I think I mentioned before, your home's a ways away."
"I....I'm not sure what I'm doing," Cassie confessed, looking down at her soup. Mary nodded.
"Maybe a better question would be, why aren't you at home?" she said gently. Cassie swallowed.
"It's kind of a long story," she said, stirring her soup.
"I'm listening."
*****************
'I'm only pretty sure
that I can't take any more . . .
I wonder, what are we fighting for?'
- Third Eye Blind
Two years. That's what Ax told us, when we asked him how long it was going to be, before the Andalites came. He said two years. I was fourteen, then.
Now, I'm eighteen.
The Andalites are a little late.
Do I sound bitter? Well, I am, a little. I wasn't, and still am not, cut out for fighting. I hate it, every time I have to morph, to fight, every time I kill . . . I hate it.
Who am I? Like I know. I know who I was. I was Cassie. You know me. Every school, every town has a Cassie. The Nice Girl, the Enviro-nut, the one who takes care of animals, and goes to rallies to stop child labour. That was me, and oh God, how I want to be her again.
But I can't be. You can't go back, become who you were, undo the past. Well, that's not entirely true. You can change the past. It's not a good idea, though. You could screw some stuff up real bad, and never understand what happened. Anyway.
I'm wandering a bit. I haven't really talked to anyone for a while. Sorry.
I guess I'm here because I'm running away. Not from the Yeerks. No, I'm not running away from them, or from fighting. I did that once, and it didn't last very long.
I'm running from something worse.
I'll start at the beginning.
It was on a mission a bit over two months ago that I got the first inkling that something was wrong. We were attacking a small military base that the Yeerks had totally infested. It was a strategic point, I forget what was so important about it now.
We burst in through the gates, thinking we were catching them by surprise-
And found them waiting for us.
Ten ranks of humans, backed by twelve of Hork-Bajir. We slammed to a halt.
Retreat! Jake yelled in thoughtspeech. We all spun round and dove into a door on our right. We slammed the door shut, and Marco threw the desks in the room in front of it.
That will not hold them for long, Ax, our resident Andalite warned. Dracon beams will cut through that door in very short order.
They knew we were coming, fearless leader, Marco said, looking at Jake. Jake, in his tiger morph, nodded.
It was a trap, he said, in that tone that told me he was blaming himself for the fact that the Yeerks anticipated us. We need to get out of here.
Fight our way through. Rachel, naturally. My best friend didn't like sneaking around. She hides all her fears behind a mask of insane bravery, the same way Marco hides his behind sarcasm and jokes. Bust down this door and slam through them when they're not expecting it.
Rachel! I protested, a little horrified, the human soldiers out there won't stand a chance!
We don't have a choice, Jake said, giving me a sad look. I think they've figured out that we won't attack humans the same way we would Hork-Bajir. There aren't any windows in this room, and the only way out is through the Yeerk forces. We do it.
I didn't argue anymore, but I felt kind of unsettled. Two weeks ago, Jake would have found another way, any other way. For some reason, today he didn't even really try.
We got out, hurt, but that doesn't really matter when all you've gotta do to heal is demorph. And I didn't say anything to Jake about my uneasiness. I left it alone.
Stupid me.
Everything seemed fine, after that. Jake was a little more reckless, a little more violent. But I overlooked that. And for some reason, more and more human-Controllers seemed to die on our missions. But I kept my mouth shut. I didn't want to add to Jake's burdens.
I love him. Never doubt that, never question it. And I think he had it harder than any of the rest of us. I mean, every time we went on a mission, it was the decisions he made that decided how to get us out of there, safe and whole, and it was his decisions that could get one or more of us killed. And every time something went wrong, he felt like it was his fault. Even if there was nothing he could have done differently.
I never thought it would be him, though. I thought maybe Rachel, possibly Marco, maybe even me, or Tobias. Not Jake. Jake was too together a person for that.
Shows how much I know.
He didn't suddenly snap. I would have noticed that, tried to do something. He sort of slid. Every time we went on a mission, every time a human died, he showed less and less remorse, like he was building a wall to keep the guilt out.
We had to defend the Hork-Bajir's valley, once. The Yeerks hadn't exactly figured out where it was, but they were getting too close. We knew that this would just be a short, pitched battle. No purpose but to lead the Yeerks away from the free Hork-Bajir. Our two forces met in the woods, and there was no quarter given. We fought and fought. I tried to avoid killing as much as I could, using my wolf morph and going for incapacitating injuries instead. I took one Hork-Bajir down, biting through his major leg muscle, and I looked up to see where Jake was.
He was about twenty yards from me, and he, too, had just taken down a Hork-Bajir. Then I saw a human-Controller pull himself up from the ground. The Controller was obviously wounded.
But he was alert enough to fire a gun.
JAKE! I screamed, throwing myself into the air. Jake ducked just as the Controller fired. The bullet grazed Jake's flank, sticking in his shoulder. Jake roared in pain, and then launched himself at the Controller. He landed on the man, and before I could say anything he tore the Controller's throat out. Jake! I said again, this time in horror. He shook his head, groggily.
Oh God, he said, sounding a little sick, the pain . . . I lost control for a moment.
Lost control of the morph, I decided he meant. Let me see your shoulder, I ordered, coming to stand beside him. I nuzzled his side.
Awwww, how sweet, Marco took the time to say, before plunging back into the battle. I ignored him.
You'll be all right, I said. The bullet did some damage that would be a problem if you were actually a tiger, but you'll be able to fight.
Jake nodded, and gave me a grateful look. Thanks for warning me.
Like I could have done anything else, I replied. I tried to sound lighthearted, but it stilled bothered me, what had just happened. I pushed it away, though. I had an explanation. The pain Jake had been in had made him lose control of his morph. And when a tiger is hurt, he attacks the thing that hurt him. It was clear-cut, and simple.
But it didn't stay that way.
Yesterday, Erek, our Chee spy, had discovered something. If you overloaded the computer systems in the Yeerk pool, it would explode. It was fairly easy, too. Ax could do it. There was only one problem:
The Yeerk Pool was built underneath public places. The Mall, the school, the Micky Dee's. We couldn't do this. It would kill people, innocent people. We could justify blowing up the Yeerk Pool itself. The only innocents there were unwilling hosts, and for them death was better than infestation. And the willing hosts were the enemy.
But the mall, school and McDonald's would be full of people who had nothing to do with this war. No idea it was even being fought. We couldn't do this.
"We can't," I said, looking around. Rachel looked doubtful. Marco looked speculative, but I expected that. Marco can be completely ruthless, and he could turn off his emotions. Right now, he was looking at this from a purely strategic and tactical point of view. Ax looked thoughtful, and I couldn't read Tobias. But then, Tobias is trapped in the body of a hawk, and hawks don't show emotion. What bothered me was that I couldn't read Jake, and I could always tell what he was feeling. But that day, his face was absolutely closed.
"It would set the Yeerks back . . . years," Marco said, raising one eyebrow. But, like I said, I expected him to say something like that. He was making sure we understood the tactics of the situation. We're sort of opposites, him and me. He sees 'the straight line' as he calls it, he sees the situation without all the complications of morals and emotions. I, on the other hand, see all the morals and emotions right away. To make a good decision, Jake needs both of us.
"It doesn't matter," Rachel said, giving Marco a glare. "To many innocent people would get in the way."
So far, one for, and two against. We looked at Tobias.
As much as I hate it, I don't think we can afford not to, he said, reluctantly. The Andalites haven't come yet, and we have no idea how their end of this war is going. The Yeerks here are getting reinforcements every week. We need to do something major. He avoided looking at Rachel's angry glare as he said this. I had a feeling he and Rachel were going to have a fight before tonight was over.
So, two for, and two against. We looked at Ax.
I will do as Prince Jake commands, he said. It was his way of saying that he didn't think he had a right to voice his opinion. After all, it wouldn't be his species we'd be killing.
That left it all to Jake.
"Don't call me Prince," he said, an automatic reaction. He was staring at the ground, biting his lip. For a moment, I couldn't believe that he was even considering it. He looked up at me. I couldn't read the look.
"We cannot do this," I repeated, using the full word for emphasis. He continued to give me that unreadable look, and I felt an uneasy feeling in the pit of my stomach. Then he gave a wry little half-smile.
"Let's head for home, people," he said, and I gave an internal sigh of relief. But the uneasy feeling didn't go away. In fact, it got stronger. We all went home. We hadn't met in my barn. It was too full at the moment, so we were at Ax's scoop, out in the woods behind my house.
I went home, did my homework and went to sleep. But I didn't sleep well.
I was haunted by nightmares. Or, rather, one nightmare. No matter how many times I woke up from it, and then went back to sleep, it still haunted me.
I couldn't remember details. All I remember is fire, a raging fire, and me searching through it for something, someone-
At midnight, I decided to call Jake. I always felt better after talking to him.
The phone rang. On the third ring, Tom picked up. Tom was, and is, a Controller, so I had to watch what I said.
"Hello?" he said. I swallowed.
"Hi. It's Cassie, is Jake there?"
"Nah. He's at Marco's," Tom said. My mouth went dry.
"Oh. Well, I'll try Marco's then. Bye!" I hung up, and tried to convince myself that it wasn't what I thought. Jake had just decided to go to Marco's for the night. I rapidly dialled Marco's number. His dad answered the phone. "Hello?"
"Uh, hi. It's Cassie. I was just wondering if Marco was there?"
"Nope. He's over at Jake's for the night." My heart stopped, and started to scream.
"Um, thanks," I managed to say, then hung up. I sat still for a moment, then pulled on my clothes and ran downstairs and out the door. I started my car, the one my parents had given me for my 17th birthday and started driving toward the Mall as fast as I could.
I don't know what I thought I was doing. Maybe I thought I could stop him-
I was halfway there when the explosion rocked the sky.
Throwing the car into a spin, I managed to stop before the piece of debris hit me. I pulled myself out of the car, and looked up.
Up above the flames wheeled five birds of prey.
I threw myself back into the car and headed back home as fast as I could. I didn't go back into the house, though. Instead, I went to the barn.
I was there when he came in. He was probably hoping to crash there until morning, so his parents wouldn't know he wasn't at Marco's. I don't know where Marco was.
He walked in, looking around. He spotted me, and froze.
"How could you?" I asked, almost in tears. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out. "How could you, Jake? How could you kill that many people?"
"I didn't have a choice, Cassie. We have to win- "
"It's not about winning!" I almost yelled, my voice cracking. "You killed them! Innocent people, Jake! They- "
"How do you know they're innocents?!" Jake, demanded, getting angry. "Half of those people could have been Controllers! For all we know, they were!"
"It doesn't matter! We have to- "
"We have to kill them all!" He yelled, so loudly I stepped back. He paced around the barn. "We have to kill the Yeerks, Cassie, or else they'll kill us! Earth will not be safe until all the Yeerks are dead, and if we have to sacrifice a few humans to save the human race, then so be it!" I kept backing up, 'til I ran into one of the tables. "Cassie, we can't let ourselves get weak, and not hurt the Yeerks just because a few humans die. We have to press on, we have to defeat them, make sure that all the Yeerks on Earth are dead!" He kept ranting, as my heart tore itself apart. Right in front of me, the person I loved had turned into this . . . monster, this being obsessed with this war, and I hadn't seen it, hadn't done anything. I backed around the table, and put my weight on it, needing its support.
"We have to fight, Cassie, and we can't let our morals get in the way. This is war!" Jake continued. A dazed calm surrounded me, as I went into emotional shock. Jake started again, "We have to- "
"Goodbye, Jake," I heard myself say, in a voice so quiet it could have been a whisper. But Jake heard it, and understood it, even before I myself was sure what I meant. He turned to me, shocked written on his face, and he took a step toward me. I turned and ran.
Behind me, I heard the crash of the table falling, and Jake cursing and calling to me. In a blur, I ran back to my car, and threw myself in and closed the door. Jake burst out of the barn just as I started the engine.
"Cassie! No!" he yelled, but I was past hearing. All I could see or feel was the betrayal and the hurt, all I wanted to do was escape. I floored the gas pedal just as he reached the car, and, sobbing, I drove away. Away, running from Jake, from war, from hurt, from everything. Running . . . from broken love.
***************
'God, I feel like hell tonight.
Tears of rage I cannot hide.'
- Sheryl Crow
Cassie's tears slid into the forgotten soup bowl. "That was last night. I don't really remember a lot of the trip. I just sort of drove, trying to forget. I was in this haze. Jake- " Her voice broke, and she swallowed. "I had to stop for gas sometime this morning, and that took most of the cash in my wallet."
"Do you have anywhere to stay?" Mary asked, concerned. Cassie shook her head.
"I wasn't thinking when I left. I guess I'll sleep in my car- "
"Like hell you will!" Mary said, indignantly. Her mind raced. "Look, are you any good with animals?" Cassie nodded, wiping the tears out of her eyes. "Okay, then, my friend runs the veterinary clinic on the corner, and her assistant is going out of town for a week, so she needs some help there. That'll make you enough for meals and stuff, and you can use my spare bedroom, at least until you figure out what you're gonna do."
"I don't want to impose- " Cassie said, weakly. Mary snorted.
"You aren't. Now, have you phoned your parents yet?"
Cassie shook her head. "They must be frantic by now. I better go do that- " and she would have gotten up and gone to the phone right then, but Mary grabbed her sleeve.
"Wait a minute. You've got to figure out what you're gonna tell them, first," she said, pulling Cassie back down into her seat. "I mean, you have to have a reason for leaving town so abruptly, and for not calling them. You can't exactly tell them that you ran off 'cause your boyfriend went berserk because of the pressures of leading a group of kids who are Earth's last hope against the invading aliens, can you?"
"No," said Cassie, rubbing her temples. Mary frowned, deep in thought.
"Do you have any relatives or friends who would call on you in an emergency?" she asked. Cassie frowned for a moment.
"No relatives," she said, "at least, not any that wouldn't contact my parents, too. I can't think of any friends, either."
Mary sighed. "Well, scratch that idea," she began but then Cassie held out her hand.
"Wait, wait a minute. Last year, I was doing volunteer work at the hospital, and there was this one girl I worked with, who was Down-Syndrome and had seizures, and I could always manage to calm her down. Her parents started relying on me, until they moved away."
"Do your parents know where they moved?" Mary asked, intently. Cassie shook her head.
"I don't even know," she said. Mary nodded.
"This is perfect. Now, this is what happened, so pay attention," she said, leaning back in her chair. "Yesterday, you got up real early and went to school. When you were at school, the parents of this kid phoned you, frantic because nothing could calm him- "
"Her," Cassie corrected.
"- her down. They're desperate. You remember this kid, so you promise to head out right away. Do you have an answering machine?"
"Yeah, but it only works half the time."
"Okay, so you tried to leave a message but the machine went all screwy and you didn't notice. It took you all day to get here, and then you were up half the night with this kid. That sound good?"
Cassie nodded. "It's the kind of thing I would do," she said, sounding exhausted.
"Alright then," Mary said briskly, standing up, "we'll head to my place and call your parents. Then you can have a shower and go to sleep. Get it, got it, good." Then she led Cassie out of the café.
The story worked. Cassie's parents had been worried sick, and were so glad for a reasonable explanation that they didn't question it. Cassie told them she'd be staying for a week, just to make sure the child got settled. They said that was fine.
The explosion at the mall was on the news, of course. The police didn't even have suspects. The Yeerks had heavily infiltrated the FBI and the police, so there was no mention of an underground complex. Cassie stonily watched the newscast, then turned the TV off.
For the next week, Cassie helped out at Mary's friend's. She found that working with the animals helped to take her mind off the things she didn't want to talk about.
Friday, she got back to Mary's house the same time Mary did.
"Check the answering machine," Mary said, dumping her purse by the door. Cassie nodded and walked over to the counter.
The first two messages were harmless. One was a friend of Mary's inviting her over for supper, and the other was her optometrist confirming her appointment.
But the third one made Cassie's heart stop.
"Hi, Cassie, it's Rachel. Look, I haven't phoned you before, because I wasn't sure if you want to talk to me, or any of us, after what happened. But Cassie, this is bad. It's really bad.
"Jake's been kidnapped."
To be continued. . . .