The Infested
An Animorphs Fan Fic
Author's Note: I do not own the characters in this story, just the situations involved. All characters are the property of K.A. Applegate.
My name is Rachel. I can't tell you my last name. I probably shouldn't have told you my first name. See, right now the Earth is being invaded. Now, I know what you're thinking. If the Earth were being invaded, it would be on t.v. It's not that kind of war. There's a race of slug-like aliens called Yeerks. They invade your mind. And then they take control. They could be anyone. Your teacher at school. The policeman on the corner. Your parents could be the enemy and you'd never know it. That is the reason for all the secrecy.
It doesn't help matters that right now, I am on the run from four of my friends. We were all that stood against them. I'll never forget that night. We were ordinary teenagers, probably like you. Everything changed when we went through the construction site. It was there that we recieved the only weapon we have to fight the yeerks. It was there we recieved the power to morph.
Animorphs, we called ourselves. Jake, my cousin and our fearless leader. Marco, his best friend. Cassie, my best friend. Tobias, a kid we barely knew. Soon after, we rescued another alien, an Andalite named Ax. The Andalites fight the Yeerks. They possess the morphing power. It was Ax's brother, Elfangor who gave us our power. Ax rounded our group to six. We'd been through so much. Who knew it would all come crashing down.
It had been a mission of necessity. We had recieved word that Visser Three, leader of the Yeerk invasion had a dangerous new plan. Our only allies, the Chee had informed us that the yeerks were planning on infesting the school board. The details were sketchy, but we knew we couldn't let the Yeerks take that kind of control. Erek King, a Chee, had told us that Visser Three's plan was to make joining The Sharing required.
The Sharing is a front for the Yeerks. On the outside, it looks like a co-ed scout organization. It's actually one of their main methods of recruiting hosts. Jake's brother, Tom is a member. He is also a high ranking human controller. A controller is someone who has a Yeerk in their head. They like to recruit people voluntarily, but they have no problem either way.
Anyway, we had no idea how the Yeerks planned on taking over the school board, so it was decided that we had to infiltrate Hell, itself. We had to infiltrate the Yeerk pool. See, in their natural state, Yeerks are slugs. Every three days, they have to leave their hosts to soak up Kandrona rays, or they die. They do this by swimming in pools that replicate their home planet's sun. They had also upgraded security. We had caused the Yeerks serious damage since we'd recieved our powers. Most of the time, though, we were just lucky to escape with our lives.
Unfortunately, this time the Yeerks were ready for us. We found and entrance that wasn't guarded by a Gleet Bio-filter. We figured we'd morph insects to do some recon. And towards that end, the mission began without a hitch. As soon as we entered, we realized that there was sufficient cover where we were to demorph. Tobias was even able to fly through unnoticed. Or so we thought.
As soon as he flew by, he was spotted by Visser Three himself. [Andalite!] he roared in thought-speak. Instantly, Tobias was a target for dracon beams. [Guys! Help] he said in our heads. "Okay, battle morphs," Jake ordered. As he began to morph to tiger, a stray dracon beam destroyed our cover. I barely made it to fly. The rest of my friends weren't so lucky. They had been exposed to the Yeerks as humans. [Well, well, what have we here?] Visser Three's cruel voice rang through our heads. I could only watch as my friends were surrounded by Hork-Bajir.
[AHHH!] A thought speak voice sounded in my head. But not just anyone. Tobias! I silently cursed. Visser Three laughed. [That should be the end of your hawk friend] he sneered. Jake sent a knowing look to Ax. [Prince Jake says run, Rachel!] So they knew I hadn't been seen. [Not a chance!] I shot back. [I sense a promotion coming.] Visser Three gloated. I could do nothing as my friends were led to the Yeerk pool.