A/N: Some housekeeping...

-I don't own Animorphs, but Shannon and Alex are mine.

-This story WILL be violent, and maybe a little sick and twisted. I'm incapable of writing a non-violent story. It's going to start a little lighter, but it will get worse as it goes, so if you don't like violence, stop now. That's why I rated it T.

-I will try very hard not to make this romance a Mary-Sue. If you see red flags, tell me, I'll fix them.

-I'm going to be honest and admit I don't like writing Ax. If you're an Ax fan, you probably won't like this story, because he takes the backseat in everything I write.

-Does anyone know the last names of the Animorphs? If you don't, I'll make them up, but I need them for the next couple chapters. I know Jake and Rachel Berenson, but I don't know the others. I feel like Cassie's starts with a J... like Jones or Johnson. Little help?

Here's chapter 2:

We went to the woods and tracked down Ax. Apparently he'd been pestering Jake about another mall visit. We'd only taken him a few times, but he loved it, and it had been at least 3 months since he'd last been there. I guess it's kinda like a kid who lives next to Disneyland. Except going to the mall was free, so we should have been taking him all the more often. So, while the request seemed random to me at first, I started to understand why he wanted this trip.

Of course, we first hit the food court.

The three of us were hanging out at a table... Ax and his cinnamon buns, Jake with a smoothie, and me empty-handed. I'd only brought quarters, and I wasn't going to waste those on something as petty as food.

Jake nodded towards one of the counters to our side. "That girl's checking you out," he said.

I turned my head and looked. I'd seen her before. She was definitely not the kind of girl I would ever go for. She wasn't a hideous person, but she was definitely not a babe. Her shiny black hair was cut in a bob, but it was kinda Victoria Beckham, and it looked decent on her. Especially when she smiled, which she did often, but she was almost too obnoxiously perky for me. I had a class with her... was it English? Or Trigonometry? Either way, it was after lunch.

"I know her," I said. "We have... some class together."

"Who's the kid?" Funny, I didn't even notice till he said something.

Sure enough, she was sporting a black stroller in front of her. The person behind the counter handed her change and she stepped to the side for the next person to order. As she did, she looked over at us. I turned my head right away back to the table and nodded at Ax, trying to look like I was acknowledging something he'd said. Trying to look cool. Or at least... not like a stalker.

But Jake waved her over.

"What are you doing?" I demanded in a hushed whisper.

"Being friendly," he replied with a huge smile. "She goes to school with us." He squirmed under my glare, and finally demanded, "What?"

"This is going to be sufficiently awkward, especially with Ax here."

"Just use that great Marco charm I've seen so much over the years."

Sarcasm. Just what I wanted to hear.

She came over to us, her tray resting on the top of the stroller. There was a boy in it, maybe a year old. I wondered if he could talk or not... I didn't know anything about kids. But more importantly, I wondered who he was. Was she babysitting? Was he her cousin? Brother?

"Hey, Marco," she said when she got to our table. Funny, Jake waved her over but I was the first one she noticed. Yeah, he was right, she wanted me.

"Oh, hey, Shannon," I answered a little awkwardly. Maybe it wasn't Ax I had to worry about. I'm normally pretty good with girls – check that, I'm normally incredible with girls – but Shannon was one that I hardly knew, and it was weird for me to see her just come over and generate a conversation. A girl I'm interested in, fine, I can work well under that situation. But Shannon? I wasn't going to get all flirty and charmy with a girl I wasn't interested in.

"What brings you here?" Jake asked her. His own tone was incredibly friendly and easygoing. It was a nice contrast to mine.

"Oh, just, y'know, shopping," she answered. "What about you?"

"The fine dining," he replied with a smirk. Then he held out his hand. "I don't really know you. I'm Jake."

"Shannon," she answered, shaking it. Then she looked to Ax. "Who's this?"

"A friend from out of town," Jake replied. He looked at me for a second, then back to Ax for proper introductions. Yeah, I got the hint. He wanted me to do more talking. "He's, uh... just moved here," I said.

"Oh," she said.

"From Iowa," I blurted out. Jake stared at me. Like, of all the things I could have said, I had to give Ax another detail. We tried to avoid details with Ax whenever we could. It was less for us to remember.

"What's your name?" she asked him. Ax wiped the frosting from his mouth.

"My name is Ax," he replied. She smirked and tilted her head.

"Ax? That's a cool name."

Jake chuckled. "His real name is Phillip, but we just... we call him Ax. It's a long story."

"I see." Shannon bit her lip, and I caught her glance at me out of the corner of her eye. The second she saw me looking back, she turned her attention back to Jake.

"Well, I just... I thought I'd say hi," she said. She turned back to me and gave a nervous chuckle, a silence-filler. "See you in class?"

"Yep," I replied. "I'll be there."

"Cool." She looked back to Ax. "It was nice to meet you... Ax."

"A pleasure to meet you, as well," Ax returned with a nod. I was so proud of how well he was picking up human mannerisms. And how he could even talk without playing with the sounds all the time. He still did sometimes, but he knew when not to.

She started walking away, but Jake called after her, "bye, Shannon."

She turned. "Bye, Jake!" Then she took the stroller, tray on top of it, and walked over to another empty table, where she sat to eat her food.

"She seems nice," he told me.

"Shut up, man."

"I think she likes you."

"Not another word."

"You don't like her?"

I sighed. He didn't understand the hunter instinct. Jake had always had Cassie there. She just fell into his lap, and he never had to play the game. Those of us who did play the game – either because we didn't have Jake's good fortune, or because we were not as responsible as he was and didn't want to settle down with the first thing we saw – knew that my and Shannon's relationship was off to a horrible start, and therefore it wouldn't possibly work out. She was the girl I barely noticed in class. I was the guy she probably hadn't noticed until today. We could live without each other. It was no big deal. And "no big deals" never become dates.

"I don't have anything against her," I replied. "But she's just... it's just..."

"I think she's cute," he stated, taking another sip of his smoothie.

"I think you're a doofus."

"Prince Jake is right," Ax said, in between inhaling cinnamon buns. "She's an attractive human."

"Even Ax likes her," Jake announced proudly. "You should give-"

"Not my type," I insisted. "She's not..."

"A cheerleader?" Jake asked with a smirk. "She's not Erica Jenkins?"

"Exactly. She's not Erica Jenkins."

Jake shook his head. He knew I was afraid of commitment, but of all the girls to pick for me to ask out, why her? "You should really give her-"

"What about daddy?" I asked. When he looked confused, I clarified, "Baby's got a daddy, right?"

"You don't know that was her kid," Jake said.

"I have a feeling," I insisted.

"They're probably broken up if she's checking you out like that," he reasoned.

"I don't care. Once you have a kid with someone, daddy's paying child support, so they're still probably on good terms. So it's not out of the question that he still likes her, and that he'd slit the throat of a nearby short guy expressing interest."

He laughed at that. "Marco, you are paranoid."

"No, I just like to make excuses."

A/N: Just a reminder... if you know their last names, what are they?