I'm working on My chaps for my Teen Titan Fan fics, but I was just TOO tempted, so I wrote a One-shot on my favorite insane villain; Taylor! At the moment, It's a one shot, but if I get enough support, I'll turn it into a proper story :D It begins just as Taylor is blown away by the gas at the end of book #43. I know there have been a few stories like this but hopefully, mine has a twist you won't expect. ;D
Thanks To SEGsquirrel who Beta read this piece for me ^^ Cookies for her! :D
Disclaimer: *reads of some paper* I don't own the Animorphs. *throws paper away* But I do own the red motorcycle! :D
My name is Taylor.
Taylor the Yeerk. Taylor the human. Taylor the torturer.
I've destroyed a soul, and I'm damn proud. You never feel as alive as when you're causing someone to squirm in pain, to spill his soul and scream all of his weaknesses out like the fool he is.
I smirked, my artificial hand hovering over the gas pipe as I watched him struggle with indecision, eyes locked on me; though he was in Taxxon morph, I could see his tortured soul, his weak heart and broken self. I had helped break him. Me. Us. Because of it, I knew him better than anyone and he knew it; I had the power to destroy him.
I had tortured him to within an inch of his life and then he had escaped, leaving me to the mercy of Visser three...But now I had my revenge! I would kill them and the pathetic Yeerk peace movement in one beautiful sweep. But in my mind, all I saw was HIM dying. His scream as fell into the explosion.
Him.
The Andalite.
The one who escaped and claimed that I was weak. Hah! I...I wasn't weak! I was stronger than that fool; I had broken him! He shook with terror at the sight of me! He didn't know me. I controlled him and I was about to take my revenge out on him!
The human Taylor resurfaced and glared through my eyes, powerless; she had softened recently, weakened. She didn't think that lying and taking so much life was right. The edges of her hatred had smoothed and tamed. I've had no choice but to cut her off completely from control.
Please... Don't. Don't do this, she pleaded.
I will destroy him... them... for what they did to us. It's all their fault! Everything! I almost screamed in the insane thrill of the moment; I knew she knew all this. She was just too weak to admit it.
But-
You enjoyed it, I interrupted, sneering as I used my trump card. When we tortured him! When we watched his soul spill out and saw him battle with his foul existence. You were laughing with me. You knew he deserved it. Andalite scum messing with our invasion! Acting as though it knows us! It deserved the torture.
She fell silent. I knew that back when we were closest, when our minds were tangled in every thought, she hated them as much as I did. She supported us Yeerks because we gave her what no-one else would give us; beauty, acceptance, power. She enjoyed his pain back then, and I wasn't going to let her sudden weakness let her forget it.
Get her! one of the other Andalites cried; I focused in the dark slime-covered tunnel and saw the rest of the pathetic Bandits lopping towards us, my personal paralysing gas slugging their movements. I relished the sight. Tobias, get her!
My smile broadened.
Tobias.
Strange name for an Andalite. Maybe it was short for something. I could see him practically shaking now, unsure, doubting himself.
I turned and raised my arm, preparing to burst the pipe and blow these fools to kingdom come.
NO! Someone yelled.
Die, Tobias, I thought, smashing a hole clean through the pipe.
Instantly, reality changed.
Gas filled the air, choking and billowing, ramming into us with as much force as a bull. I was instantly knocked off my feet, thrown through the air with such power, it almost ripped me apart. My hair and clothes flew around me, slapping me like whips.
And I was laughing.
Because it was so funny. It was so amazing. I was going to kill them all, get my revenge, and get my life and reputation back. But all I could do was laugh as I listened to their screams echo around my head. I managed to force my eyes open enough to see Tobias as I flew past him. His Taxxon face was crunched with horror as he realised he was going to die.
So funny.
Taylor was screaming hysterically in our head; she was going to die too. I don't care. She isn't anything to me! She was a host and that's it! She doesn't... she doesn't mean anything. I am a Yeerk. I probed her mind and felt, under the horror, under the panic, under the terror; the tiniest bits of satisfaction at seeing Tobias meet his fate.
The tiniest bit.
I drew it out.
We were thrown through the tunnel, slamming into the sides, rocks cutting our skin and foul Taxxon-slime burning us. Hysterical half-scream half-laughs were coming from us, crackling into our ears before the sound got stolen away by the rushing gas. Together we screamed, and together we laughed.
I was slammed into a ledge, caught for a few seconds, something stabbing into my leg and tons of gas pounded me against the rock.
Why hadn't it exploded yet? Were they dead? Was he dead?!
I couldn't breathe, couldn't hear, and couldn't see; the gas was everywhere! It leaked into my head; it attacked my artificial skull that protected my brain. That protected me. Why hadn't it exploded yet? Unreal pain shot through my body, yet it all seemed to concentrate in my skull; it was suffocating! I was burning! No, No! It shouldn't be like this, I shouldn't be feeling this pain, and it should have exploded by now and killed them all! Why was I feeling pain? What was happening?! Was Tobias dead?!
I wanted him to be. More than anything, I wanted him to scream in pain and die. How dare he make us feel this pain! It was all his fault! All... his fault... it had to be all his fault...
Taylor screamed in my head, yet I could tell... she agreed...
Something burst! It hissed! My skull, my head! Gas, heat, pain; it was too much, too much! I could feel the gas start to die down slightly, very, very slightly, yet the pain still continued. The hiss as something melted, reacted, died...
The pain!
I wished it onto him as darkness began to eat away at our sight...
A rock, flying because of the force of the gas, hit my head roughly and everything died.
oOoOoOoOoOo
We woke up at the same time, the human and I, groggy and slow, pain still numbing our senses; Strange, we hadn't woke at the same time since before his torture...back when we were basically the same being. My eyes opened slowly and I stared stupidly forward, not really taking in the settling dust or fallen rocks.
I was suddenly aware of the pain I was in; my head burned, my body cried and something was sending sharp stabs of pain from my heel. The pain frayed my nerves, a clear shock through the fog. My sight traveled down to my body and I almost recoiled at the sight; slime and dirt covered me, and I was almost blanketed with huge cuts and bruises. My left heel was bloody and mangled; a certain Taxxon's handy work.
I remembered him, Tobias, and a strange sound ripped from my throat. He was dead... He had to be dead! I hardly realized that I was shaking. He must die! He couldn't live because... He couldn't! No! He should die for the pain we were feeling right now! Where was the explosion? Where was the gas? No! What was happening? Why wasn't my plan working, why wasn't the Visser returning to me the power we deserve?! Why?
It was... it was his fault... he had done something. It was him! How dare he live...But... maybe he wasn't alive! The gas might still have killed him! Yes, yes! I had to check. Make sure.
Taylor growled out loud, no energy to speak but still- wait. What?
She controlled my mouth! I shook my head and tried to push the fool back again but... something was wrong. I crawled to my knees and Taylor heaved herself up; we both grit our teeth as we tried to hold back the wave of pain coming from our leg. What was happening? I could sense Taylor's confusion as strong as my own and together, we stumbled forward, slipping in the thin layer of slime not thrown by the gas.
"What's happening?" Taylor demanded.
"Shut up!" I hissed back.
We were both controlling our mouth! She wasn't under my control; suddenly, we were equal. No! I was a Yeerk, higher than everything! I tried to feel my own slug-like body, coiled around her brain, but it felt amazingly hard... as though I wasn't really there anymore...
She realized it first.
"Get out!" she screamed; panic suddenly filling us with horrified adrenaline. "Get out! Get out!"
I tried, I tried to escape from the coils of her brain, but I wasn't there. I was her. She was me. What had happened to us?!
"I can't get out! You scum, you scum!" we screamed together as realization hit us like a ton of bricks. "You've destroyed me! Get out of my head! What's happened? I can't! We will be killed! Get out, get out!"
No-one else would understand the horrified ramblings of two mortals, trapped in one body; we were both screaming, almost falling into insanity. Later, I would guess that the gas and heat had reacted with our artificial skull and had fused our bodies together; but right now, all I could feel was sick. The Visser would say I was now a threat; too much of a risk. Taylor might spill the truth of the invasion; I was worse than an escaped host. This time... he would kill me for sure. He wouldn't hesitate. He wouldn't even think about it. I was a freak, a danger to Yeerks and humans alike.
"It's his fault." We spoke almost mechanically, totally in sync. "His fault."
We stood up and began searching; looking for anything to tell us of Tobias's death. Anything to prove that the Andalites were dead and that we had done it. Just before the gap that lead the Yeerk pool, the tunnel had collapsed, as I knew it would before one of our people could re-fill the tunnel. We pressed our ear against the hard rock, straining for any sound that would slip out the truth of their deaths. The side of our face stung horribly but we ignored it.
Nothing.
We began to walk through the tunnels, the same ones again and again, searching for what must have added up to hours. When our legs buckled with pain and tiredness, we crawled, our hands and knees growing red and raw.
Nothing.
Nothing, nothing, nothing!
I would have screamed again but Taylor made me hold on; she wanted him dead for this horror but she tried to remain one step further away from insanity. We couldn't talk in our heads anymore but I really didn't care; I needed to shout, to listen to my anger!
"Why isn't he dead?" I shouted, grabbing the rock.
"He will be," she promised, using the rock to shakily get us to our feet.
"I will find him and kill him with our own two hands! Then the other bandits!"
"The Visser still won't accept us! You know-!"
"I don't care, I don't care! I need to... need to kill something."
"There are worse things than death."
We smirked.
Suddenly, we jumped three feet into the air as a male voice rang out, shockingly close.
"Woah! What the hell happened here?"
We slipped and fell backwards onto the rock, the last of the slime stinging as it slapped our skin; a loose rock stabbed into our bloody heel and we cried out in pain as electricity jolted up our leg like lightening.
"Hey, I think I heard someone, down here!"
"Ugh, God, this place is disgusting. You sure you heard someone?"
I saw a faint light as someone entered the tunnel and stumbled closer the corner that separated us; I hadn't realized we were so close to the entrance. We would have glared at the fools, but the pain was building now and we were too busy fighting away tears and unconsciousness.
"Oh my God! Chad, get over here!" Someone with a flashlight was now kneeling next to us, voice cracking with shock as he took in our bloodied body; I couldn't focus enough to really take in what he looked like, but I could tell he was big; his broad shoulders shadowed me. "Are you okay?"
"Do I look okay, you idiot?" I snapped; he seemed completely unfazed by my response, fussing around me like an irksome fly.
He said something but it was hard to concentrate; blood was everywhere and the pain was starting to eat away at me. Taylor wanted to go with the man, feeling comforted by his presence but I made my anger known, glaring cross-eyed as my sight failed. I didn't need any help! I need to kill Tobias if it was the last thing I did! We couldn't go with them; he might lead us to Visser three! No!
I hardly realized that I wasn't really making sense anymore, thoughts bubbling over each other in a plea to be heard... to be screamed...
"Hey, she's waking up!"
"Thank god... Poor kid."
I blinked blearily in the faint light. What had happened? Where were we?
"You okay, love?" The big man's voice floated towards us again; annoying, foolish, reassuring. We must have lost consciousness for a second because we were suddenly outside, wrapped in something warm. "We lost you for a second there."
"The ambulance will here in about five minutes." Another voice. This was thick with worry, uncertainty. "What do you think happened to her?" I hated the way he spoke, as though we weren't there.
Suddenly, we realized that the big man was carrying us, cradling our body in his arms as he tried to whisper how 'it will all be alright'. I recoiled angrily but Taylor kept one hand clutching his shirt, desperate for his kindness. We noticed the second man, thin with a pig-like snout, hovering near a red motorcycle as though he wanted no more than to jump on and ride away as far as he could.
"Moron..." I muttered, before Taylor could stop me, turning away from the pig-nosed guy and wincing slightly in pain.
The big guy chuckled, his chest shaking softly. "You got that right, kid." He laughed.
"Shut up, George." The pig-nosed guy growled, knotting his brows; we noticed that he was avoiding looking at us; standing well back as though we had a disease. "Just look at her!"
Taylor mentally recoiled as though she had been stabbed through the heart. I understood... She had heard that too many times before, seen people stare in horror at her or just avoid looking all together. She had had that for the most horrible mouths of her life, when everyone either looked at her in pity or disgust, whispering even when they knew she could hear every word.
"My God, that's Taylor?! What happened to her?"
"Freak! So much for the prom queen!"
"Just look at her!"
"What do you mean?" we whispered, looking up demandingly at George who was glaring lethal daggers at his 'friend'. "What do you-" Our voice cracked. I could feel Taylor getting more and more distressed, maddeningly so. "What does he mean?!"
George opened his mouth wrestling with words that just wouldn't come. After a second, he set us down on some crisp grass, looking into our eyes; for the first time, we could see him properly. He was actually quite young, though his bright golden eyes were creased with worry and pity. The pity that shone through his eyes struck deeper than the pain that still throbbed faintly.
"He just... he just means how pretty you are. Right, Chad?"
"That's right..." we muttered to ourselves, suddenly not aware of anything around us. "I'm... pretty. I'm beautiful, they said they I would be!" Taylor suddenly became racked with fear, shivers spreading along our body. "They promised!"
"Of course..." George was frowning slightly now, wondering about our comment.
Terrified, I shoved him away so Taylor could scramble to our feet and stagger the few steps over to the red motorcycle, clawing our way to the side mirror, hands shaking. I think someone tried to say something to stop us, but I couldn't hear anything; Taylor's fear grossly outnumbered my own and seemed to fog my brain as we looked into the mirror.
We screamed, horrified, knuckles going white on the mirror and tears falling like rain water.
A raw burn spread from our right ear and covered just almost half of our face, pulling one eye to the side. The rest of our face was covered in scabs and cuts, general grime coating us and making our face look almost unrecognizable. A deep scar ran over our temple where the rock had hit, dry blood spilling over. We slowly raised a hand and touched the burn tenderly; it stung and would have sent tears to our eyes if we weren't sobbing already.
We...I...she...looked hideous. A monster. Inside and out.
I heard a strange gasping, ripping sound and it took a few seconds for me to realize they were coming from us; Taylor had grown hysterical at the sight, insane sobbing tearing through our chest and sending our whole body shaking on edge.
She had gave up her mind to get her beauty back; now she had lost both, an outsider in every world she had ever known. I let her collapse into George's arms, clawing our face and sobs and screams dieing in her throat.
"It's HIS fault..." No, that wasn't me.. That was Taylor. Human Taylor.
She hissed it out, ignoring George's confused face and glaring at the ground, digging our fingernails into his chest. He tried to softly pry our hands away but we hardly noticed, both thinking the same thought: revenge. It was his fault. All of it.
Our life was as good as gone because of him.
Tobias.
And he would pay.
All pain was suddenly forgotten and lost in the crashing stream of my mind.
A memory suddenly filled my mind, sharp and clear as a knife.
I stared triumphantly at him, broken and bloody, barely standing in the glass cube. But when he spoke, his voice was harsh.
So you hurt others because of your own suffering? he asked, acting as though he knew me. He knew nothing!
But even so... I remained silent, staring blankly at him.
Who are you?
I just stared back. Who was I? Taylor the human questioned herself as well and we both found that we simply didn't know the answer anymore.
Who are you? he repeated, voice drilling into me.
"I'm a sub-Visser in the Yeerk empire," I said, suddenly hollow.
No. You're a weak, misguided human girl. And you are also insane.
The words struck home. We sort of hung our head, wondering whether it was true. After a few seconds, we lifted our head and pressed both palms against the glass, staring at him with wide eyes.
And I smiled.
"Then join me in my madness, Andalite," I rasped, before pushing the control and sending him to hell.
The words swam around my head, teasing us, provoking. We hung our head so our hair covered our face and hid us from view. Everything we had treasured was gone...everything...and in our mind, it all streamed from Tobias.
We started planning revenge from that instant; we would kill him, but that wouldn't be enough. Not any more.
So you hurt others because of your own suffering?
He would die! We had suffered too much to let him live...I'd give him that. We was right about one thing; I simply loved revenge and power too much. He would regret the day he's crossed me! I will kill him as painful as possible, play with his mind, destroy him like he had done to me!
We floated into insanity, no longer with a conscience of any sort, planning the day when Tobias lay motionless at our feet like the Andalite scum he was.
Join me in my madness...
George moved my hair away clumsily, bringing me out of my revengeful stupor. "The ambulance will be here soon," he said, lost for any words of comfort. "It...looks worse than it is...look just..."
I silenced him by looking up into his face, my eyes misted over with thoughts of torture. I lifted my artificial arm and wiped some grime from my face, a smirk suddenly on the edges of my features; a stray beam of light reflected off my hand, sending it shining. George noticed it for the first time and frowned, confused; my expression got him spooked and he glanced over his shoulder at his friend who was moving his bike away and clearly not listening in the slightest.
He tried to change the subject, and smiled shakily. "So... what's your name then?"
Join me in my madness...
"My name," I purred, "is Taylor."
O.O So, What D'ya think? It's my first time writing in this genre so I'm really nervous, I'd really appreciate some feedback on how I did and if I got Taylor right. ALSO, my beautiful readers! :D Do you think it should be a proper story? If I do, I'll be working hard on each chapter so it won't be updated really fast but fast enough. :P Also.. they will defo be Tobias/Rachel-ness and Erek in possible future chapters :D
Please Review! ROCK ON! XD