THURSDAY

Given the events of the day before, Jake made the decision that they would not go to The Sharing meeting that night. Lindsay was sitting in Rachel and Cassie's apartment with them. Cassie was being nice enough, making small talk with her. Rachel however, mostly just sat and glared.

"What morphs have you acquired?" Cassie asked Lindsay.

"Oh geez, ummm... A tiger, sparrow, border collie, termite- terrible idea by the way, polar bear, llama- don't ask, a spider, and a cobra. Lindsay answered, ticking them off on her fingers.

Rachel snorted. "That's it?"

Lindsay narrowed her eyes at her. "It's pretty hard to waltz into a zoo and tell the keepers that you just need to touch the animals real quick... we went at night when we could, but security made it difficult."

"Well, my Mom works at the zoo here, so we made a copy of her keys a while back so we could get in and get what we needed after hours, so next time we go you can get a few more." Cassie said, trying to diffuse the situation quickly. Ax, Jake, Tobias and Marco walked in as Lindsay stood up and walked towards the door.

"What's up?" Jake asked, looking at Rachel's angry face.

"Just getting to know each other." Cassie answered her face pleading with him to shut up.

"You can't leave!" Rachel yelled angrily at Lindsay.

Lindsay whipped around. "Then come with me."

"I'll come!" Marco said, oblivious to the two girls confrontation. Lindsay rolled her eyes at Rachel, but smiled slightly at Marco, opening the door and ushering him out.

"What the hell is that? Marco is supposed to be on my side!" Rachel said, her cheeks turning pink as she fumed.

"Baby, we're all on the same side..." Tobias said, putting a hand on Rachel's shoulder.

"I don't trust her!" Rachel insisted.

"Why? Do you think she's been infected?" Jake asked, concerned about his cousin's outburst.

"No! Because she should have gone down with her team! She shouldn't be here if they aren't! What kind of shitty leader lets all of them die, but gets out herself?"

"A good leader makes the hard choices. I can tell from the pain in her eyes that she wishes she had stayed, but instead she helped the wounded escape, and evaded the possibility of being captured. She will blame herself every day and will beat herself up more than you ever could." Ax said quietly. Rachel looked at him and her expression softened.

"Rachel, would you want me to stay? If it was our team, would you want me to be captured? We said we'd rather die than be infected." Jake said.

"I still don't like her." Rachel grumbled.

"You don't have to like her, but she's part of our team now, and you have to get along with her, you have to work with her." Jake said firmly, letting her know it was an order.

FRIDAY

Lindsay sat in class, knowing Ax was buzzing around somewhere, in his fly morph. He would occasionally make a comment to her in thought-speak, but mostly he was quiet. The professor finally released them, and Lindsay gathered her things.

"Hey."

Lindsay looked up into the blue eyes of one of her classmates. He was tall, tan, and very cute.

"Hi..." She said warily.

"You're new here right? I didn't think they took people mid semester."

"Oh yeah, lots of hoops to jump through, but it's possible." She said with a small smile.

"Well, I'm Reid." He held his hand out to her.

She grabbed his hand and shook it. "Lindsay."

"Well Lindsay, would you like to go out sometime? Dinner or something? Hell I'd even take a yes for lunch." He said with a flirtatious grin.

The memories of her ex, of the night in The Sharing flashed through her mind. "Um..."

"It's just one date..." He said gently, still holding onto her hand.

"Alright, one date. Here's my number." She said finally, writing it on a sheet of paper.

Prince Marco will be displeased She heard an amused voice in her head as a fly buzzed by her ear. She brushed it away gently.

"I've got to get going, see you around." She said, turning and hurrying away. She smiled slightly, and went to a small secluded area where Ax could morph back to his Andalite form, then into his human form.

"That class was very interesting, inter- esting, interesting. I never knew the study of ancient bones could entail so much." Ax said to her.

"You learn something new every day Ax." She said as they walked to the quad.

"And what of this boy that you are going on a date with?" Ax inquired.

"What of him?" She asked.

"Is he safe?"

"I have no idea. It's not like I'm planning on telling him 'oh by the way I have the ability to morph into animals and these slimy brain snatchers would love nothing more than to capture me'."

"Yes, I believe that would be unwise." Ax said thoughtfully.

"Ax, haven't the others taught you about sarcasm?"

"Oh yes Prince Tobias said that anything Prince Marco says is not to be taken seriously, as it is more than likely sarcasm."

"That's probably a good rule of thumb..." Lindsay mumbled. They got to the quad where they saw the others waiting for them.

"Did you have fun Ax?" Cassie asked.

"Oh yes, and I believe that Reid did as well." Lindsay smacked Ax as he said that.

"Who's Reid?" Jake asked in confusion.

"The student, stoo-dent, that asked Lindsay for a date."

"Already going on dates? Do you think that's wise?" Rachel asked.

"I think that my life is my business and as long as he doesn't try to take me to a slimy hot tub I'll be alright." Lindsay shot back at her. The two girls glared at each other.

Tobias cleared his throat, "speaking of hot tubs, let's go to Cassie's and talk."

Once they were in the barn they all looked to Tobias, who looked at Jake.

"Tobias and I have found out that Student Clinic on campus just got a hefty donation from The Sharing." Jake began. "We also discovered that they will have a delivery tomorrow evening to include "Hazardous Material" and a small hot tub."

The group groaned, no good come from this. "Well ladies and gentlemen, who's up for some Yeerk killin'?" Marco joked behind dark eyes.

"We should go to The Gardens tonight, acquire some morphs." Cassie said, looking at Lindsay, who nodded in agreement.

"Let's talk strategy, we need small and fast, and a couple bigger and stronger for fire power." Rachel said, getting into her zone. "I'm thinking mice to get in, then some big cats and maybe raccoons or monkeys for anything requiring opposable thumbs, unless we're cool with destroying the place then I could always just go grizzly..."

"NO RACHEL!" Jake, Tobias, Marco and Cassie said.

Rachel grinned at them. "Fine, so cats and raccoons? Kind of boring, but whatever..."

"Boring is good, boring is safe." Jake reminded her. "Lindsay, do you have anything we can use?"

"I've got a tiger..."

"When we go to the Gardens, pick up a panther or something smaller than a Tiger, just in case, but we'll probably just use it. Marco has the chimp morph and I have raccoon if we need it, but I think we should be good with Marco taking care of anything. So who's going to go to the pet store and get us some mice?" Jake asked.

"I'll go." Lindsay volunteered. Tobias said he would go with her, which made Rachel also volunteer.

"Rachel, why don't you come with us and scope out possible entry points and weak links. You, Cassie, Marco, and I can make appointments for different areas of the clinic so we can have a good map of the whole place." Jake said to her. She scowled, but agreed. The group separated, getting ready to prepare for the next night.

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