Hidden in Plain Sight

by natural-blue-26

"In many ways, Rachel before the war is both the most obvious of the future Animorphs the Yeerks would want in, and campaigning for, the Sharing- but she was also the least likely to join."

Take if off- Animorphs/any/the morphing suit was strangling under his/her clothes for daythirtynine on the livejournal community comment_fic.

'Hidden in Plain Sight'

In many ways, Rachel before the war is both the most obvious of the future Animorphs the Yeerks would want in, and campaigning for, the Sharing- but she was also the least likely to join. Publically, she has been the over-achieving, best dressed, "most likely to succeed" member of their graduating class since grade school. Now, with her GPA not quite as stellar as it used to be and an "icy bitch" veneer slicked over her persona to keep other, non-Animorph classmates at bay, she still does not give off the mild vulnerability that is like blood in the water for the Sharing representatives that circle like sharks in the water in the of commons, gym and hallways of the school.

Underneath the outer perfection she is being weighed, measured and calculated by, though, her morphing outfit creeps across her skin sometimes- or does it make her skin crawl? Between fashion forward public clothing and the tight spandex of her other identity, another kind of war is waging.

Of all the Animorphs, no one would think it's odd that Rachel Berenson has a gymnastics leotard on under her clothing. (And it's doubtful that Tom or anyone else in the Sharing would think a teenager in spandex is anything more than a fashion faux pas at the very worst; certainly Jake and Marco have both gotten snide comments in the gym locker room about their bike shorts and extra tight shirts.)

Sometimes Rachel will go through multiple class periods pretending to be normal- smile at Melissa in geometry, compliment another girl's hair cut in chemistry, acknowledge a cute boy flirting with her in Lit with a gracious smile and a flirtatious hair flip behind her shoulder. But then Chapman will walk past a classroom window, or Tom will nod at her in the lunch line. Today the shoulder of her tank top slipped sideways under the strap of her back pack and her thoughtless fingers touched spandex when she reaches to readjust- and then Rachel forcibly remembers what she is pretending (for just a few hours) to forget.

The fabric that fits so smoothly other times will shock her, in a way, then- a scarlet A for Andalite, Animorph, annihilation, abnormal…But only to her.

Because who else would think twice about a gymnast in her practice uniform?