Author's Note: It feels so good to be doing this again. Thanks muchly to Lenalaye, my trusted beta, and to anyone and everyone reading this. It feels soooo good to be writing Animorphs again, I cannot tell you. I know that this is going to be difficult to write later on but I really do enjoy writing this. I'd like to dedicate this story to my writing teacher, Kelly, who is currently instructing me in a several-week course on how to be a better writer. I definitely understand the characters more. If this is any better than I am normally (and I really hope it is), you know who to direct your silent thanks to.
Chapter One
"Please, Ms. Brooks, please!" Mr. Williams whined. The faux fresh-air smell of the entirely gray-colored office was really beginning to get to me. Seated in an uncomfortable, stiff black leather chair, I was quickly growing tired of his overly persistent efforts to strike a publishing deal with me, the unwilling Cassie Brooks. Who would have thought the tree-hugger wouldn't be kind enough to share with the world? But a tree-hugger isn't an author, and I really didn't have time.
"I told you, Mr. Williams, no." I said as forcefully as possible.
He still wouldn't give up. "I'll-I'll up the contract! Forty million, at the least! Fifty percent royalty!"
"I told you, Mr. Williams, I'm not interested in money."
"Sixty percent royalty!" I was desperately annoyed with his nasal efforts. I knew he wouldn't let me go unless I rudely stormed out, and I didn't want to be rude. I did, however, want to leave as quickly as possible. The unfriendly fluorescent lights glared down upon our negotiations. As my mind reviewed my discomfort, it also raced ahead on a different path.
"Wait." I said suddenly, and his eyes shifted nervously. "How about we donate some of the money to charity?" If it would do something good, I would do it.
"What charity?" The businessman's eyes turned shrewd.
"The Hork-Bajir."
"Fine. Twenty percent to them, forty percent royalty for you."
"Sixty/ten."
"Fifty/ten."
"Sixty/five."
"Fifty-five/ten."
"Deal." I shook hands with him. Marco would say I really am a tree hugger at heart- Marco. No, Cassie, don't cry, not here. But I wouldn't cry. It had been a long time.
"I'll have the papers drawn up by tomorrow, Ms. Brooks, I assure you. In the meantime, could you, perhaps, think about your rough draft? Whether you want an editor and/or co-author? Just things like that," Mr. Williams persisted.
I sighed heavily, relieved and exhausted. "Fine. Can you fax those papers to my office at Yellowstone, please? I've really got to go. I'm catching a flight out there in less than three hours." He nodded.
Driving home to get my suitcases, I had a sudden idea. I pulled into the driveway and parked my forest green SUV, then immediately ran upstairs to the attic, where I pulled out a neatly labeled box reading "War Journals." I stuck them into my not-quite-full carry-on bag, deciding that I could look through them. I loaded my suitcases into the car and left for the airport.
Ten minutes into my six-hour plane flight found me breezing through my entries from the end of the second year of the war. A word, neatly printed like all the others and surrounded by tearstains as well, caught my eye: Nartec. A single image passed through my mind, vague and half-formed, from the night before. Backtracking to the beginning of the week of the immensely lengthy journal entry; after all, I had to know what was going on before that. I began to read:
Dear Journal,
Today was one of the scariest experiences in the war yet. Mutant humans, living underwater, the lost city of Atlantis. It may sound crazy, but everything else so far has been! What happened was, today I woke up around three. Toby was throwing stones at my window! The Visser has been experimenting on Hork-Bajir to make them be able to fight underwater. The worst part is, he isn't even doing it right; he just grafted the gills on. Valves malfunctioned and the Hork-Bajir were discarded like so much living garbage. The Visser was going to go on an underwater mission. It was so awful. Toby came to me with one of them, Hahn Tunad. Hahn gave Toby information, which I guess is good. But he died- he died! –Here, tear marks blurred the page, and fresh ones joined them as Cassie shed a tear in remembrance, both of Hahn and of her own emotions, of what she knew would come next,- He was dying, and I couldn't do anything. Add him to the many. That's a very Marco or Rachel reaction to this, I know. So anyway, Jake and I held each other. It was so nice. It would have been really nice if it was just some regular day, at four and five in the afternoon instead of four and five in the morning, if a Hork-Bajr hadn't just died, if we could do it more often- but still, it was nice.-Cassie shed a tear here, too.- The rest of the day was a pretty average day in terms of school. I sat next to Jake at lunch. We all sat together, actually- we all magnetized to Jake and he couldn't very well turn us away, even though lunch ended up starting with the usual "bad for security" lecture. He kept bumping my knee and stuff. Rachel made faces.
For today,
Cassie
Cassie smiled weakly, and this smile included her eyes. Another life lost, another step forged. That was the life of her, an Animorph, back then. She closed her eyes.
The crying and the reading had taken more of a toll on her than she realized. She still had five hours left to read, plus the return flight. So she hadn't read about Nartec yet- she was starting to remember, although she wasn't sure remembrance was what she wanted. She drifted off to sleep and had the dream from a few nights ago again.
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So, that's the first chapter. Hopefully I've built *some* suspense along the way. Do tell me your thoughts using that nifty little review box at the bottom, provided that it's actually working. I hold no grudges against FFN and I'm actually glad it's down; I can write without pressure to post. I like this late-at-night writing thing; expect chapter two by Monday of next week, alrighty?