I don't own anything. I hope you like the story. I also hope it isn't overly stupid. Oh, and the Animorphs are from the books, not the TV series (personally, though, I think KA Applegate could have ended the series a bit better, and this is if it had). ~Grimwood. grimwood83@yahoo.com
By the way, * = telepathy/thoughtspeech
"The Vacation Saga: Part 1; Gargmorph"
Rachel, Jake, Cassie, Tobias, Marco, and Ax had decided to take a vacation to Manhatten. "I mean, why not?" Marco had asked.
"I see no reason," Cassie had agreed. It still took them a few days to convince Jake because, although the yeerks had been defeated, he still didn't agree fully that a "vacation" was a good idea.
Tobias had suggested that they all morph to their various bird forms and fly to Manhatten. *We can take a rest every two hours for demorphing and snagging something to eat,* he thought-spoke.
That ended up being exactly how they got to Manhatten. Though Rachel had asked her mother to arrange for a motel and spending money. All things considered, that wasn't very difficult. It took the Animorphs six hours by their "flight plan" to reach the Motel 6 where Rach's mom had reserved them rooms.
Rachel wanted to go shopping, of course. She rounded up some of the money that her mother had given them for spending. "Hey, anyone wanna go shopping?" she asked the others.
*Do you think they have Cinna-buns here?* Ax wanted to know.
"Why wouldn't they? I would rather go sight-seeing, though," commented Cassie.
"Well, I'll go with Cass. Ax, looks like you and Tobias are goin' with Rach. Marco, who do you wanna go with?" Jake asked.
"Decisions, decisions. I think I'll go with you and Cass, Jake," Marco decided.
"Okay. Guys, We'll meet back here by midnight. For a better view, considering it's all ready night fall, d'ya guys wanna go in owl?" Jake inquired of Cassie and Marco, already beginning to shift to his own owl morph.
"Sure, why not?" said the others, who followed suite into owl.
"Ax, Tobias? You might wanna get human before we go," Rachel suggested to them. Ax's tail was the first to dissappear as he shifted to human, where as Tobias lost his beak first.
*No matter how often I see any of us change, I will never get used to watching it,* Cassie said matter-of-factly.
*Ditto,* Marco agreed.
The "humans" and "owls" then split up for sight-seeing and shopping.
While the "owls" were flying along, they got a fantastic view of the Eyrie Building. *Did I see that statue move?* Cassie asked the others.
*I think you did! And that other one's moving, too!* Marco stated excitedly.
*Haven't you guys watched the news?* Jake asked. *Those must be the Manhatten Gargoyles. I hear some people are scared silly of them.*
*Well, they weren't taken by the yeerks, so they must be good guys. Personally, I think it might be something similar to the meeting of a Hork-Bajir for the first time. They look fierce, but deep down they're really quite sweet,* Cassie said.
*Say, I've got an idea! Let's go see if we can meet 'em!* Marco thought to the others.
*Not a bad idea, Marco. Rachel? Tobias? Ax? Can you guys hear us? If so, please head to the Eyrie building. We'll be waiting right outside,* Jake thought-spoke, hoping to reach the others.
*Rodger that, Jake. We hear you and we're on our way,* Tobias reported. *We're going to arrive as a pair of owls and a hawk.*
*Good,* Jake thought back. *We'll be ready and waiting.* Jake, Cassie, and Marco then went ahead and landed in front of the Eyrie Building. They demorphed and waited. Within minutes, sure enough, two owls and a red-tail hawk swooped down and demorphed into Rachel and Ax. The red-tail morphed into a human, while Ax chose to remain in Andalite form.
"Okay, guys. Let's go," Jake said simply.
*Prince Jake? Are you certain this is a good idea?* Ax, of course.
"Sure. We'll just go up and ring the bell," Marco replied before Jake could even think of a response. Before Marco could figure out where the door-bell was, Owen Burnett walked out.
"Greetings. Mr. Xanatos will be pleased to be informed that one of the famed Andalites has shown up for a surprise visit," the stiff secretary stated.
"Hey, how'd you know we were here?" Marco practically demanded.
"Is that relevant? I thought you were at the Eyrie for a more specific reason," Owen replied.
"Ignore Marco. I'm Jake, and these are my friends: Rachel, Marco, Cassie, Tobias, and Ax. We're the orginal six Animorphs," Jake said, pointing to each of his friends in turn.
"All right. Follow me," was all Xanatos's right hand man would say. The Animorphs followed him into the Eyrie. As they walked down the corridor, Owen observed that their feet weren't making the usual "squeak" of shoes. "Where are you shoes?" he asked.
"Uh, we haven't learned how to morph those yet," Marco informed Owen.
"Is that so?" Owen wondered aloud. He picked up his walkie-talkie and contacted Fox. "Mrs. Xanatos? Could you bring Alex down to the third floor, fifth sector?"
The Animorphs heard Fox's reply of, "No problem."
Soon, Fox arrived with young Alex. Owen put his glasses into his shirt pocket and spun into Puck. "And how's Alex this evening? Wanna learn a quick spell?" the mischievous Puck asked the baby quarter-fay.
Alex responded with a happy burbling, so Puck began the lesson. "These guys need some foot wear. I doubt Lord Oberon would object to me 'n' Alex giving them some," he said just as mischievously as ever.
Through teaching Alex, each Animorph gained a pair of shoes as well as a tenth-century outfit. "Cool! Can I keep this?" Rachel asked after she recieved her gown and slippers.
"I don't see why not," said Puck.
Suddenly, the trio and Angela walked into the corridor. "How lovely! I didn't know we were having a costume party," Angela stated.
"We are?" inquired Jake who hadn't actually acknowledged what he and the others were wearing. He looked down and saw that he, Marco, Tobias, and Ax were all wearing tenth century tunics, leggings and shoes (in Ax's case, it was just the Tunic) while Rachel and Cassie had gowns from the same era. "Huh. What d'ya know? I thought we were just gonna get shoes," he said after his looking at their costumes.
"Do I really have to wear this? It's awful fancy," Cassie expressed her distate for wearing fancy things.
"Aw, come on, Cass! You look great," said an enthusiastic Rachel.
"She's got a point," said Brooklyn. "By the way, I'm Brooklyn. That's Broadway, Angela, and Lexington," and he pointed to each Gargoyle in turn.
As a bounding dog-like Gargoyle came in, Lexington told them, "And that's Bronx. Where are Hudson and Goliath?"
"I believe Hudson is watching T.V. Goliath went to visit Elisa," Fox explained.
"Okay. Now all we need is Xanatos," Puck said. With a snap of Puck's fingers, Xanatos appeared.
"Hello, everyone. How come no one told me we have guests?" he asked with a minor frown.
"Sorry, boss. I should have let you know. Well, they're here, and now they're more properly dressed. I think we should all go into another room. This hall is getting crowded," Puck commented. Then he had Alex teleport everyone to the courtyard.
*What d'ya s'pose his instincts would be like?* Tobias privately thought-spoke to Jake, who gave a very subtle shrug of his shoulders in reply.
"Man, you guys have all the fun! Look at this place. I wish I could live somewhere like this," Marco half-whined.
"Why's that? Don't you get to choose where you live now?" Xanatos inquired.
"Sort of. It gets tricky, though, because I'm legally dead. Same for my parents."
"Hmm. Now I'm certain I can remedy that. After all, I'm quite good at such things. Just ask Dr. Sevarius. I believe I've helped him with similar problems before," Xanatos offered.
"That'd be cool," Marco said. In an undertone to the other Animorphs, he inquired, "Uh, who's Doctor Sevarius?" The others gave him expressions that meant they didn't know the doctor either.
"So, can you really change into other animals?" Brooklyn asked.
"Sure, but it'll ruin the outfits," Jake stated matter-of-factly.
"I'm NOT gonna ruin my new dress before I've had it a week!" Rachel said fiercely.
"No one said you had to. Oh, and there are a few things you should know. One, we can only change into creatures that we've borrowed DNA from. Two, we usually wear spandex underneath so that we don't morph into or out of human form in an embarrassing way. Last, but not least, not all of us will be morphing, but demorphing. Um, Puck? Could you please put us back in spandex so we can show what we can do?" Jake explained to Brooklyn and requested of Puck.
"No problem, but I will leave them where you can find them for later," Puck said. With a "poof," the Animorphs were back in their shoe-less, spandex outfits.
"Thanks," Tobias said politely.
Tobias demorphed to a red-tail hawk. Rachel morphed to grizzly bear, Jake went to his tiger, Cassie to wolf, and Marco to Gorilla. Ax again chose not to morph after seeing that the others were going into battle mode.
*Enter the battle morphs!* Marco openly thought-spoke.
*My true form is best suited for battling, therefore I have not morphed into something else,* Ax stated somewhat apologetically.
"Battle morphs?" Lexington queried.
*Yeah, battle morphs. You know, the morphs we use primarily for fighting?* Rach explained.
"Oh, okay," said Lexington.
Then they demorphed again. "Well, what you like to see us morph now?" Jake asked.
"Morph me," Brooklyn told Jake.
"You really want me to? I'd need some of your DNA. Place your hand on mine. Try to relax, 'cuz it won't hurt. You'll feel a little drowsy, though," Jake said.
"Okay," Brooklyn replied and complied. He staggered slightly as the after effects of the borrowing of DNA took place.
"Now, since I've obviously never morphed a gargoyle before, I'm not sure what'll happen. Stand back, everyone," Jake instructed.
Jake then began to morph into Brooklyn. He sprouted a tail first. Then, his nose and mouth elongated into Brooklyn's beak. Wings sprouted from his back and his toes melted into a set of three talons with a heel spur. Next, the horns sprouted. His hair became longer and his arms and legs shifted into the same shape and porportion as Brooklyn's. Jake's hair color remained the same, but instead of turning red, he gained his tiger stripes!
"Whoa, Jake! You don't look exactly like Brooklyn. How'd you do that?" Marco asked.
"Do what?" said Jake with a voice somewhere between his own and Brooklyn's.
"You gave yourself tiger stripes and kept your hair color," Cassie provided.
"I wanna look in a mirror," Jake stated.
"No problem!" Puck said mischievously. With that, he summoned Titania. "Say, Titania, could we borrow your mirror so Jake can look at himself?"
"I guess so," Queen Titania said, bewildered. "Who's Jake?"
"The funny-looking Brooklyn," Puck supplied, again mischeviously.
"Hey!" Jake and Brooklyn said in unison, which sounded very peculiar and caused them both to jump.
"I. . . see," Titania replied. With a clap of her hands, her mirror appeared in front of Jake.
"Weird. What went wrong with the morph? It felt normal. Well, as normal as morphing can be," Jake ammended.
"Nothing went wrong," Lexington said. Then he explained about the Gargoyle clones Dr. Sevarius had created. He told Jake about how even then the clones weren't exact duplicates. "It's because our DNA is designed so that no two Gargoyles are EVER exactly alike."
"Oh. Okay. If that's the way of things," Jake stated.
"So, what's it like?" Cassie asked.
"Well, the instincts are very different. It's not quite like the overwhelming sense of power you get from most predators. It's certainly not like the sensation of morphing an herbivore. The instinct tells me that there's five hours left until dawn. They also say that there isn't any danger present. The instincts also describe how to move the wings into a cape and how to glide. That should be fun! How about some lessons, Brooklyn?"
"What about the others? Won't you guys feel left behind?"
*Nope,* said Tobias.
"Not I." Marco.
"I could go owl and keep up with you," stated Cassie.
"I don't have a problem staying behind." Rachel.
*Why should I feel left behind?* Ax.
"Okay. That settles things, I think," said Brooklyn, wondering if it really did.
Jake demorphed and then remorphed, keeping his previous pattern, to maximize his time in morph. Cassie morphed owl as Jake was remorphing.
*Ready,* said Cassie.
"Ditto," Jake agreed.
"Then let's go," Brooklyn suggested. They headed for the elevator when Titania zapped them to the roof.
"You'll do better if you start from up here," she told them.
*Thank you,* Cassie said.
Cassie began flying. Brooklyn leaped off the roof. Jake followed.
"Wow! Letting the instincts take over for this is kinda fun!" Jake added a whoop to his comment, making Brooklyn laugh.
"You think that's fun? Let's play 'follow the leader,' and I'll be the leader," Brooklyn proposed.
Brooklyn led Jake through series of loops, curves, and other acrobatics. They were having so much fun, that they nearly collided into Goliath and Elisa!
"What?!" Goliath roared as he saw the pair of gargoyles. "Brooklyn, what is going on?"
"Oh, hi, Goliath. This is Jake, and that owl is Cassie. They're Animorphs. Jake, Cass, meet Goliath and Elisa Maza."
"Hi," said Jake, swooping carefully so as not to knock all of them senseless.
*Hello,* Cassie thought-spoke.
"Um, hi there," Elisa gulped. "Am I really talking to an owl?"
"Sorta," Jake and Brooklyn said in unison, breaking into nearly-identical grins.
"Brooklyn, show us to a good roof top. We'll demorph and remorph there. And try to hurry. Our two hours are almost up," Jake instructed.
"This way!" Goliath said, taking them down to a nearby roof.
Cassie and Jake demorphed. They told Goliath and Elisa what they had been up to. "So, that is what happened. For a moment, I thought Sevarius was behind this."
"Nope. Though I suppose you could blame the Andalites," stated Cassie. Then she remorphed to owl and headed back for the Eyrie Building.
"Well, I guess I'd better remorph, too," Jake told the others. "Otherwise, it'll be a lot more difficult to get back." With that, he remorphed.
"Your friends are right. That's just too weird to watch," Brooklyn admitted.
"What friends? Are they capable of changing into variances on you as well?" Goliath asked, startled.
"No, Goliath. Although I really doubt you'll have any problems getting along with them. They're really cool," Brooklyn said by way of brief explanation.
They began gliding back to the Eyrie Building. Suddenly, down on the streets below, a human was being attacked by a gang! Before Jake realized what he was doing, he swooped down to help the human.
"Back off," he snarled. The gangster whirled around to see Jake standing there with his eyes white with Gargoyle rage. The gangster dropped his crowbar and backed up.
"N-n-nice Gargoyle. I-I wasn't causin' trouble. I-I-I was just leaving." The gangster turned and ran. His gang, who'd had run-ins with the Gargoyles before, followed suite.
Goliath and Brooklyn swooped down. After setting Elisa on the ground, Goliath walked over to Jake. "Why did you suddenly swoop down like that?"
"She needed help," Jake said, pointing a striped talon at a lady Goliath had overlooked. "I had no idea how strong a Gargoyle's protective instincts are. I didn't even realize that it had been instinct kicking in when I swooped down. I think I better demorph and remorph if I'm to make it back to the Eyrie without becoming a nothlit."
"A what?" asked Goliath.
"A nothlit. Someone trapped in a permanent morph. Tobias had that happen. He got lucky, and this dude called an Ellimist gave him back the ability to morph," Jake explained. Then he demorphed and remorphed.
"So, if we can only glide, how do we go about getting enough air under our wings from here?" he asked.
"We climb," Goliath said, pointing to a brick wall.
"Okay. If you say so," Jake muttered skeptically.
"Don't worry, Jake. Gargoyles are also designed to have their claws dig right into stone. Show 'im, guys," Elisa informed Jake. Then she swung her arms around Goliath's neck.
"Wait a minute," the rescued lady said. "How come. . . ?"
"In short, I'm an Animorph," Jake told the lady before they lost more time. He watched Brooklyn and Goliath climb up the brick wall and gave a low, long whistle. Then he began climbing the wall. Keeping his eyes on Goliath and Brooklyn, Jake saw them take off shortly after reaching the roof. "Oooh, boy. I hope I can do this without messing up," he muttered to himself. Then he just let the Gargoyle instinct kick back in and take him the rest of the way up the wall. He also let the instinct give the initial take off.
"I'm so not doing this on a regular basis," he told Brooklyn as he caught up with the two Gargoyles and Elisa.
"You don't have to. Besides, you could have selected to morph a bird to get you back to the Eyrie," Brooklyn stated.
"I didn't think about it. Ah, well. I'm not about to switch morphs now."
The rest of the glide was uneventful. When they got back to the Eyrie Building, Cassie pounced on Jake. "What took you so long? I was about to go back into owl and go look for you!" she scolded.
Brooklyn, Goliath, Elisa, and Jake all exchanged glances. Then they broke out laughing. "What's so funny?" Marco asked. "I thought I was the comic relief." That only made the four of them laugh harder.
Finally, Jake caught his breath and explained what had happened.
"You mean to tell us that the whole reason you were slow is because your morph's protective instinct kicked in?" Xanatos asked.
"Exactly," said Jake. Then everyone present burst out laughing. Jake demorphed after he calmed back down.
"Do you guys have any special plans for while you're visiting Manhattan?" Angela inquired. "If not, we could introduce you to the Mutates. We could all have a lot of fun."
"Well, guys, what d'ya say?" Jake asked his friends.
"I'm for it!" Marco instantly responded.
"Sounds good to me," Rachel replied.
*I would enjoy meeting others you consider friends. Then, can we go find a place that sells Cinna-buns?* Ax, of course.
*I wouldn't mind too much. My only problem is that I'm s'posed to be a creature of the day,* Tobias said sullenly.
"Alex and I can fix that without damaging your morphing abilities," Puck reasured Tobias.
"I think it'll be great fun," Cassie commented.
Thus they had Xanatos, Xanatos's family, the clan, and Elisa help them have fun for their vacation. However, the adventures they had during their vacations are all seperate stories, which are recorded elsewhere.
Temporarily The End
By the way, * = telepathy/thoughtspeech
"The Vacation Saga: Part 1; Gargmorph"
Rachel, Jake, Cassie, Tobias, Marco, and Ax had decided to take a vacation to Manhatten. "I mean, why not?" Marco had asked.
"I see no reason," Cassie had agreed. It still took them a few days to convince Jake because, although the yeerks had been defeated, he still didn't agree fully that a "vacation" was a good idea.
Tobias had suggested that they all morph to their various bird forms and fly to Manhatten. *We can take a rest every two hours for demorphing and snagging something to eat,* he thought-spoke.
That ended up being exactly how they got to Manhatten. Though Rachel had asked her mother to arrange for a motel and spending money. All things considered, that wasn't very difficult. It took the Animorphs six hours by their "flight plan" to reach the Motel 6 where Rach's mom had reserved them rooms.
Rachel wanted to go shopping, of course. She rounded up some of the money that her mother had given them for spending. "Hey, anyone wanna go shopping?" she asked the others.
*Do you think they have Cinna-buns here?* Ax wanted to know.
"Why wouldn't they? I would rather go sight-seeing, though," commented Cassie.
"Well, I'll go with Cass. Ax, looks like you and Tobias are goin' with Rach. Marco, who do you wanna go with?" Jake asked.
"Decisions, decisions. I think I'll go with you and Cass, Jake," Marco decided.
"Okay. Guys, We'll meet back here by midnight. For a better view, considering it's all ready night fall, d'ya guys wanna go in owl?" Jake inquired of Cassie and Marco, already beginning to shift to his own owl morph.
"Sure, why not?" said the others, who followed suite into owl.
"Ax, Tobias? You might wanna get human before we go," Rachel suggested to them. Ax's tail was the first to dissappear as he shifted to human, where as Tobias lost his beak first.
*No matter how often I see any of us change, I will never get used to watching it,* Cassie said matter-of-factly.
*Ditto,* Marco agreed.
The "humans" and "owls" then split up for sight-seeing and shopping.
While the "owls" were flying along, they got a fantastic view of the Eyrie Building. *Did I see that statue move?* Cassie asked the others.
*I think you did! And that other one's moving, too!* Marco stated excitedly.
*Haven't you guys watched the news?* Jake asked. *Those must be the Manhatten Gargoyles. I hear some people are scared silly of them.*
*Well, they weren't taken by the yeerks, so they must be good guys. Personally, I think it might be something similar to the meeting of a Hork-Bajir for the first time. They look fierce, but deep down they're really quite sweet,* Cassie said.
*Say, I've got an idea! Let's go see if we can meet 'em!* Marco thought to the others.
*Not a bad idea, Marco. Rachel? Tobias? Ax? Can you guys hear us? If so, please head to the Eyrie building. We'll be waiting right outside,* Jake thought-spoke, hoping to reach the others.
*Rodger that, Jake. We hear you and we're on our way,* Tobias reported. *We're going to arrive as a pair of owls and a hawk.*
*Good,* Jake thought back. *We'll be ready and waiting.* Jake, Cassie, and Marco then went ahead and landed in front of the Eyrie Building. They demorphed and waited. Within minutes, sure enough, two owls and a red-tail hawk swooped down and demorphed into Rachel and Ax. The red-tail morphed into a human, while Ax chose to remain in Andalite form.
"Okay, guys. Let's go," Jake said simply.
*Prince Jake? Are you certain this is a good idea?* Ax, of course.
"Sure. We'll just go up and ring the bell," Marco replied before Jake could even think of a response. Before Marco could figure out where the door-bell was, Owen Burnett walked out.
"Greetings. Mr. Xanatos will be pleased to be informed that one of the famed Andalites has shown up for a surprise visit," the stiff secretary stated.
"Hey, how'd you know we were here?" Marco practically demanded.
"Is that relevant? I thought you were at the Eyrie for a more specific reason," Owen replied.
"Ignore Marco. I'm Jake, and these are my friends: Rachel, Marco, Cassie, Tobias, and Ax. We're the orginal six Animorphs," Jake said, pointing to each of his friends in turn.
"All right. Follow me," was all Xanatos's right hand man would say. The Animorphs followed him into the Eyrie. As they walked down the corridor, Owen observed that their feet weren't making the usual "squeak" of shoes. "Where are you shoes?" he asked.
"Uh, we haven't learned how to morph those yet," Marco informed Owen.
"Is that so?" Owen wondered aloud. He picked up his walkie-talkie and contacted Fox. "Mrs. Xanatos? Could you bring Alex down to the third floor, fifth sector?"
The Animorphs heard Fox's reply of, "No problem."
Soon, Fox arrived with young Alex. Owen put his glasses into his shirt pocket and spun into Puck. "And how's Alex this evening? Wanna learn a quick spell?" the mischievous Puck asked the baby quarter-fay.
Alex responded with a happy burbling, so Puck began the lesson. "These guys need some foot wear. I doubt Lord Oberon would object to me 'n' Alex giving them some," he said just as mischievously as ever.
Through teaching Alex, each Animorph gained a pair of shoes as well as a tenth-century outfit. "Cool! Can I keep this?" Rachel asked after she recieved her gown and slippers.
"I don't see why not," said Puck.
Suddenly, the trio and Angela walked into the corridor. "How lovely! I didn't know we were having a costume party," Angela stated.
"We are?" inquired Jake who hadn't actually acknowledged what he and the others were wearing. He looked down and saw that he, Marco, Tobias, and Ax were all wearing tenth century tunics, leggings and shoes (in Ax's case, it was just the Tunic) while Rachel and Cassie had gowns from the same era. "Huh. What d'ya know? I thought we were just gonna get shoes," he said after his looking at their costumes.
"Do I really have to wear this? It's awful fancy," Cassie expressed her distate for wearing fancy things.
"Aw, come on, Cass! You look great," said an enthusiastic Rachel.
"She's got a point," said Brooklyn. "By the way, I'm Brooklyn. That's Broadway, Angela, and Lexington," and he pointed to each Gargoyle in turn.
As a bounding dog-like Gargoyle came in, Lexington told them, "And that's Bronx. Where are Hudson and Goliath?"
"I believe Hudson is watching T.V. Goliath went to visit Elisa," Fox explained.
"Okay. Now all we need is Xanatos," Puck said. With a snap of Puck's fingers, Xanatos appeared.
"Hello, everyone. How come no one told me we have guests?" he asked with a minor frown.
"Sorry, boss. I should have let you know. Well, they're here, and now they're more properly dressed. I think we should all go into another room. This hall is getting crowded," Puck commented. Then he had Alex teleport everyone to the courtyard.
*What d'ya s'pose his instincts would be like?* Tobias privately thought-spoke to Jake, who gave a very subtle shrug of his shoulders in reply.
"Man, you guys have all the fun! Look at this place. I wish I could live somewhere like this," Marco half-whined.
"Why's that? Don't you get to choose where you live now?" Xanatos inquired.
"Sort of. It gets tricky, though, because I'm legally dead. Same for my parents."
"Hmm. Now I'm certain I can remedy that. After all, I'm quite good at such things. Just ask Dr. Sevarius. I believe I've helped him with similar problems before," Xanatos offered.
"That'd be cool," Marco said. In an undertone to the other Animorphs, he inquired, "Uh, who's Doctor Sevarius?" The others gave him expressions that meant they didn't know the doctor either.
"So, can you really change into other animals?" Brooklyn asked.
"Sure, but it'll ruin the outfits," Jake stated matter-of-factly.
"I'm NOT gonna ruin my new dress before I've had it a week!" Rachel said fiercely.
"No one said you had to. Oh, and there are a few things you should know. One, we can only change into creatures that we've borrowed DNA from. Two, we usually wear spandex underneath so that we don't morph into or out of human form in an embarrassing way. Last, but not least, not all of us will be morphing, but demorphing. Um, Puck? Could you please put us back in spandex so we can show what we can do?" Jake explained to Brooklyn and requested of Puck.
"No problem, but I will leave them where you can find them for later," Puck said. With a "poof," the Animorphs were back in their shoe-less, spandex outfits.
"Thanks," Tobias said politely.
Tobias demorphed to a red-tail hawk. Rachel morphed to grizzly bear, Jake went to his tiger, Cassie to wolf, and Marco to Gorilla. Ax again chose not to morph after seeing that the others were going into battle mode.
*Enter the battle morphs!* Marco openly thought-spoke.
*My true form is best suited for battling, therefore I have not morphed into something else,* Ax stated somewhat apologetically.
"Battle morphs?" Lexington queried.
*Yeah, battle morphs. You know, the morphs we use primarily for fighting?* Rach explained.
"Oh, okay," said Lexington.
Then they demorphed again. "Well, what you like to see us morph now?" Jake asked.
"Morph me," Brooklyn told Jake.
"You really want me to? I'd need some of your DNA. Place your hand on mine. Try to relax, 'cuz it won't hurt. You'll feel a little drowsy, though," Jake said.
"Okay," Brooklyn replied and complied. He staggered slightly as the after effects of the borrowing of DNA took place.
"Now, since I've obviously never morphed a gargoyle before, I'm not sure what'll happen. Stand back, everyone," Jake instructed.
Jake then began to morph into Brooklyn. He sprouted a tail first. Then, his nose and mouth elongated into Brooklyn's beak. Wings sprouted from his back and his toes melted into a set of three talons with a heel spur. Next, the horns sprouted. His hair became longer and his arms and legs shifted into the same shape and porportion as Brooklyn's. Jake's hair color remained the same, but instead of turning red, he gained his tiger stripes!
"Whoa, Jake! You don't look exactly like Brooklyn. How'd you do that?" Marco asked.
"Do what?" said Jake with a voice somewhere between his own and Brooklyn's.
"You gave yourself tiger stripes and kept your hair color," Cassie provided.
"I wanna look in a mirror," Jake stated.
"No problem!" Puck said mischievously. With that, he summoned Titania. "Say, Titania, could we borrow your mirror so Jake can look at himself?"
"I guess so," Queen Titania said, bewildered. "Who's Jake?"
"The funny-looking Brooklyn," Puck supplied, again mischeviously.
"Hey!" Jake and Brooklyn said in unison, which sounded very peculiar and caused them both to jump.
"I. . . see," Titania replied. With a clap of her hands, her mirror appeared in front of Jake.
"Weird. What went wrong with the morph? It felt normal. Well, as normal as morphing can be," Jake ammended.
"Nothing went wrong," Lexington said. Then he explained about the Gargoyle clones Dr. Sevarius had created. He told Jake about how even then the clones weren't exact duplicates. "It's because our DNA is designed so that no two Gargoyles are EVER exactly alike."
"Oh. Okay. If that's the way of things," Jake stated.
"So, what's it like?" Cassie asked.
"Well, the instincts are very different. It's not quite like the overwhelming sense of power you get from most predators. It's certainly not like the sensation of morphing an herbivore. The instinct tells me that there's five hours left until dawn. They also say that there isn't any danger present. The instincts also describe how to move the wings into a cape and how to glide. That should be fun! How about some lessons, Brooklyn?"
"What about the others? Won't you guys feel left behind?"
*Nope,* said Tobias.
"Not I." Marco.
"I could go owl and keep up with you," stated Cassie.
"I don't have a problem staying behind." Rachel.
*Why should I feel left behind?* Ax.
"Okay. That settles things, I think," said Brooklyn, wondering if it really did.
Jake demorphed and then remorphed, keeping his previous pattern, to maximize his time in morph. Cassie morphed owl as Jake was remorphing.
*Ready,* said Cassie.
"Ditto," Jake agreed.
"Then let's go," Brooklyn suggested. They headed for the elevator when Titania zapped them to the roof.
"You'll do better if you start from up here," she told them.
*Thank you,* Cassie said.
Cassie began flying. Brooklyn leaped off the roof. Jake followed.
"Wow! Letting the instincts take over for this is kinda fun!" Jake added a whoop to his comment, making Brooklyn laugh.
"You think that's fun? Let's play 'follow the leader,' and I'll be the leader," Brooklyn proposed.
Brooklyn led Jake through series of loops, curves, and other acrobatics. They were having so much fun, that they nearly collided into Goliath and Elisa!
"What?!" Goliath roared as he saw the pair of gargoyles. "Brooklyn, what is going on?"
"Oh, hi, Goliath. This is Jake, and that owl is Cassie. They're Animorphs. Jake, Cass, meet Goliath and Elisa Maza."
"Hi," said Jake, swooping carefully so as not to knock all of them senseless.
*Hello,* Cassie thought-spoke.
"Um, hi there," Elisa gulped. "Am I really talking to an owl?"
"Sorta," Jake and Brooklyn said in unison, breaking into nearly-identical grins.
"Brooklyn, show us to a good roof top. We'll demorph and remorph there. And try to hurry. Our two hours are almost up," Jake instructed.
"This way!" Goliath said, taking them down to a nearby roof.
Cassie and Jake demorphed. They told Goliath and Elisa what they had been up to. "So, that is what happened. For a moment, I thought Sevarius was behind this."
"Nope. Though I suppose you could blame the Andalites," stated Cassie. Then she remorphed to owl and headed back for the Eyrie Building.
"Well, I guess I'd better remorph, too," Jake told the others. "Otherwise, it'll be a lot more difficult to get back." With that, he remorphed.
"Your friends are right. That's just too weird to watch," Brooklyn admitted.
"What friends? Are they capable of changing into variances on you as well?" Goliath asked, startled.
"No, Goliath. Although I really doubt you'll have any problems getting along with them. They're really cool," Brooklyn said by way of brief explanation.
They began gliding back to the Eyrie Building. Suddenly, down on the streets below, a human was being attacked by a gang! Before Jake realized what he was doing, he swooped down to help the human.
"Back off," he snarled. The gangster whirled around to see Jake standing there with his eyes white with Gargoyle rage. The gangster dropped his crowbar and backed up.
"N-n-nice Gargoyle. I-I wasn't causin' trouble. I-I-I was just leaving." The gangster turned and ran. His gang, who'd had run-ins with the Gargoyles before, followed suite.
Goliath and Brooklyn swooped down. After setting Elisa on the ground, Goliath walked over to Jake. "Why did you suddenly swoop down like that?"
"She needed help," Jake said, pointing a striped talon at a lady Goliath had overlooked. "I had no idea how strong a Gargoyle's protective instincts are. I didn't even realize that it had been instinct kicking in when I swooped down. I think I better demorph and remorph if I'm to make it back to the Eyrie without becoming a nothlit."
"A what?" asked Goliath.
"A nothlit. Someone trapped in a permanent morph. Tobias had that happen. He got lucky, and this dude called an Ellimist gave him back the ability to morph," Jake explained. Then he demorphed and remorphed.
"So, if we can only glide, how do we go about getting enough air under our wings from here?" he asked.
"We climb," Goliath said, pointing to a brick wall.
"Okay. If you say so," Jake muttered skeptically.
"Don't worry, Jake. Gargoyles are also designed to have their claws dig right into stone. Show 'im, guys," Elisa informed Jake. Then she swung her arms around Goliath's neck.
"Wait a minute," the rescued lady said. "How come. . . ?"
"In short, I'm an Animorph," Jake told the lady before they lost more time. He watched Brooklyn and Goliath climb up the brick wall and gave a low, long whistle. Then he began climbing the wall. Keeping his eyes on Goliath and Brooklyn, Jake saw them take off shortly after reaching the roof. "Oooh, boy. I hope I can do this without messing up," he muttered to himself. Then he just let the Gargoyle instinct kick back in and take him the rest of the way up the wall. He also let the instinct give the initial take off.
"I'm so not doing this on a regular basis," he told Brooklyn as he caught up with the two Gargoyles and Elisa.
"You don't have to. Besides, you could have selected to morph a bird to get you back to the Eyrie," Brooklyn stated.
"I didn't think about it. Ah, well. I'm not about to switch morphs now."
The rest of the glide was uneventful. When they got back to the Eyrie Building, Cassie pounced on Jake. "What took you so long? I was about to go back into owl and go look for you!" she scolded.
Brooklyn, Goliath, Elisa, and Jake all exchanged glances. Then they broke out laughing. "What's so funny?" Marco asked. "I thought I was the comic relief." That only made the four of them laugh harder.
Finally, Jake caught his breath and explained what had happened.
"You mean to tell us that the whole reason you were slow is because your morph's protective instinct kicked in?" Xanatos asked.
"Exactly," said Jake. Then everyone present burst out laughing. Jake demorphed after he calmed back down.
"Do you guys have any special plans for while you're visiting Manhattan?" Angela inquired. "If not, we could introduce you to the Mutates. We could all have a lot of fun."
"Well, guys, what d'ya say?" Jake asked his friends.
"I'm for it!" Marco instantly responded.
"Sounds good to me," Rachel replied.
*I would enjoy meeting others you consider friends. Then, can we go find a place that sells Cinna-buns?* Ax, of course.
*I wouldn't mind too much. My only problem is that I'm s'posed to be a creature of the day,* Tobias said sullenly.
"Alex and I can fix that without damaging your morphing abilities," Puck reasured Tobias.
"I think it'll be great fun," Cassie commented.
Thus they had Xanatos, Xanatos's family, the clan, and Elisa help them have fun for their vacation. However, the adventures they had during their vacations are all seperate stories, which are recorded elsewhere.
Temporarily The End