Nightmares
I heard the screams and curses of the involuntary controllers as my brother and two others led me to the infestation pier. We reached the pier and I was shoved roughly to my knees.
"Is there anything you want to confess Jake?" Asked the yeerk who was masquerading as my brother. I knew what he was asking me to do and I be damned if I was going to do it. The yeerks would soon find out that we were Animorphs when they took over my brain. I would betray my friends but I wasn't going to do it willingly.
"Damnit Tom. You can't do this to me!" I yelled instead.
"Watch your language Jake. What would Mom and Dad say if they heard you talking like that?" He replied in a mocking voice and suddenly I felt angry. I was angry with myself for being careless and angry with Tom because he was supposed to protect me from danger not put me in it. I knew that I could plead with him all day but it would do no good. There was no reaching him because he had been a controller too long.
"Do it." He ordered and my head was shoved under the sludgy water of the Yeerk pool. I could feel thousands of Yeerks swimming around me and then I felt one touch my ear. I tried to recoil from it but I couldn't because firm hands were holding my head under. I felt intense pain as it flattened its body and crawled inch by inch into my ear. It seemed like it took forever but then it was all the way inside. Almost immediately after that my head was yanked back up. It was as if they knew the exact moment that I had become infested. I could feel the Yeerk connecting itself to my brain and moments later I ceased to exist.
"No!" I screamed and looked around wildly trying to figure out where I was. I finally realized that I was sitting up in my bed with the sheets tangled around me. It was just a dream I told myself trying to calm my racing heart. I had been dreaming about Tom making me a controller again. I guess it was normal when the very enemy you were fighting was living in your house. I knew that I could free Tom by tying him up for three days until the Yeerk died of Kandrona starvation. It would be so easy but I couldn't do it because he would know who I really was then. I had to pretend that everything was normal with myself and with him. I realized long ago that I was going to have to face and probably kill him in battle. I looked at the clock and saw that it was midnight. I sighed heavily knowing that there was no way I would get any more sleep tonight. I got up out of bed and took off my pajamas under which I wore my morphing suit. I concentrated on the image of the falcon and felt the changes begin. When the morph was completed I flew out the window that I had left open earlier and flew blindly to the house of the person that I wanted to see the most.
I approached Cassie's house and saw that she had left her window open like I did. I flew through it and landed on the carpeted floor. I demorphed to human and crossed over to the bed where Cassie was sleeping. She looked so beautiful with the moonlight shining on her and I felt my heart swell with love. I have loved Cassie since I first met her. She is the only person in my life that can make me feel like my totally whacked life is worth living. I watched her sleep for a while and then I laid a hand on her shoulder and gently shook her. She opened her eyes and when she saw it was me she blushed bright red.
"Jake?" She glanced at the clock on her bedside table and then back at me.
"What are you doing here at this time of night?" She whispered
"I had to see you." I whispered back.
"Why? What's wrong?"
"Nothing's wrong Cassie." I lied but Cassie being the type of person she is knew I was lying.
"I know you Jake. You wouldn't have come here at this time of night if everything was alright."
I sighed thinking that Cassie would make a great therapist some day.
"I had the dream again." I told her and she looked at me with understanding in her eyes. This wasn't the first time that I had visited her this late at night. I had blindly come here when I had the dream for the first time. She had comforted me when I fell into her arms scared and angry. She listened as I told her about what it really felt like to be a controller. The feeling of being helpless but also the intense feeling of some other conscious thing sharing your brain. She held me as I raged on about this damn war and what it had done to us and everyone that we knew. She held me as I cried telling her that I knew I was destined to kill Tom. When I went home afterwards I slept without nightmares for the first time in months. Cassie could chase my demons away even if it was for just one night. I was broken out of my thoughts by the sound of her voice.
"It's going to be alright Jake." She said and pulled me down onto the bed beside her.
"I love you Cassie." I said and closed my eyes.
"I love you too Jake." She said and hugged me.
I hugged her back so hard that I probably left bruises but she didn't complain or pull away. We held each until I reluctantly pulled away.
"I have to go Cass. It's getting late."
"Okay Jake but I'm here if you need me."
"I know." I said and then out of impulse kissed her. I meant it to be a brief kiss but when I felt her sweet lips against mine I was lost. We kissed each other until breathless we pulled away.
"Goodnight Cassie." I said and morphed into the falcon and flew out her window. When I got home and fell back asleep it was without nightmares.
The End