I had failed.
A numbing, tingling pain permeated the entirety of my upper body. The fact that some of my upper limbs had been amputated was of little concern to me. What concerned me most, as I returned to consciousness, was that my plan had failed. Elfangor had not killed me. He had wounded me greatly, yes, but I had not been killed. If only Elfangor hadn't missed with the shredder. Or perhaps he hadn't missed, and deliberately spared my life. I felt a sudden stab of hatred for Elfangor. Who was he to keep me alive when I yearned for the release of death?
Trying to distract myself, I looked up at the sky. How long had I been out? Enough time for the sun to set, at least; unfamiliar stars shone in the sky and three small moons cast eerie shadows above the desert landscape.
What remained of the ship crackled and smouldered. It was very clear that it would never fly again. The one Skrit that had been present aboard the ship had survived the crash; it now scurried around in a frenzy of agitation, trying futilely to clean up the blackened floor, chattering something unintelligible.
Something softly nuzzled up against me, and I pushed it away with what remained of my lower legs. In my semiconscious stupor, I tried to figure out how to best end my life. I was no longer an Andalite and thus I would feel no shame from killing myself. I considered slicing myself open on a sharp rock or a jagged piece of metal; my ravenous Taxxon instincts would do the rest. But even I did not want to end my life so shamefully and painfully. Perhaps I could electrocute myself on the shipwreck's wiring, or possibly throw myself of a cliff. If only I could stop being prodded, I could think…
The realization that something large and alive was pushing up against me snapped me out of whatever previous trauma-induced delirium I had been in. Fearing the worst, I twisted my Taxxon head, and had my fears confirmed.
Three Taxxons looked inquisitively at me, prodding me with their heads. Under the circumstances I was in, I did not think it unwise to panic. I kicked with what remained of my legs, shrieked and snapped with my mouth, hoping to frighten them into leaving me alone.
The largest one, and the one that I took to be the leader of the trio, was missing one of his eyes. Had he lost it in battle, or had one of his so-called comrades ripped it out of its socket in some cannibalistic feeding frenzy? It was a thought that I did not particularly want to ponder. I hissed and spat with my mouth with the ferocity of a wounded kaftid bird.
Then, with the sudden calm clarity that comes from facing an imminent death, I realized that this might be the way for me to end what remained of my miserable existence. Immediately, I ceased my struggles and slumped onto the ground. I waited for the sensation of Taxxon teeth and tongues ripping into my body, and anxiously awaited the release of death.
But death did not come. Instead, to my horror, I watched as two of the Taxxons scuttled over to where Elfangor lay. One of them extended an enormous tongue in a grotesque mockery of curiosity, prodding Elfangor's body. But Elfangor did not deserve a death at the hands of a hungry Taxxon. Even in my semi-conscious, self-pitying state, I realized that I could not let Elfangor die due to my negligence. Even if it meant that I would die in the process.
With one quick motion, I rolled up onto my Taxxon feet, shrieked with all my might, and slammed into the Taxxon nearest to me. Fortunately, my impact was blunted enough as to not draw blood; I did not want to think of what would happen if the trio of Taxxons descended into one of their infamous feeding frenzies.
‹Wait! Stop!› I shouted instinctively in thought-speak, trying to place myself between the slavering beasts and the body of my friend. I felt his breathing, though shallow and shaky, and tried my best to repress my own shrieking desire to feed on his unconscious body.
The three Taxxons looked at me like I was a dancing hoober.
"Speak?" said one of them in the sibilant Taxxon tongue. "Speak in head?" He stared at me with all the confusion he could display on his emotionless face before turning back to Elfangor's body. I had never heard a Taxxon speak before; of course, I knew that their shrieking and hissing had to mean something, but this was the first time that I, or at least the Taxxon part of me, could decipher those hideous noises into something approximating speech.
"Not Taxxon. Why not eat?" said another one, nudging Elfangor's lower body with his head. If I didn't act fast, I realized, Elfangor would die- and I might have a part in his murder. My mind raced desperately. What could they eat? How could I distract them?
The Skrit cocoons! Of course!
‹Follow me.› I said, hoping that the novelty of a thought-speak using Taxxon would momentarily overpower the urge to feed on the warm, juicy flesh of an easy kill…
… I had to get a grip. Elfangor was my friend, even now. Even though he had refused to end my life.
Entering the ship was far easier than the last time. For one thing, the airlock had been ripped off its hinges by the impact.
As I searched for the Skit and the two cocoons, I looked around at the other things that the Na had obtained -stolen? - from the human planet. Strange garments, peculiar bound sheets of paper, and, most interestingly, a huge yellow contraption whose purpose I could only guess at.
None of these peculiar alien items, though, were of any interest to the Taxxons who followed me.
"Food?" asked the Taxxon with the missing eye, for that was the only real feature that set him apart from the other two. "Head-speaker find us food?"
‹Food,› I agreed, feeling a sudden surge of horrible hunger as I said the word. ‹I will find you food.›
And there they were. The Skrit cocoons. They had been dislodged from the wall in the crash, but they were intact. The thick regurgitated silk mesh would not hinder a Taxxon mouth in search of food.
The one non-cocooned Skrit lunged in front of me, still shrieking and chattering in its indecipherable tongue. It stood no hope of stopping us, of course.
"Food!" cried one of the Taxxons as he saw my catch.
The Skrit screeched and writhed as I seized it in my mouth. ‹Food.› I agreed grimly. The Skrit wriggled desperately, trying to escape, but we pinned it to the floor with our needle limbs. With characteristic Taxxon brutality, the Skrit was devoured in only a few short seconds. Thick blue liquid that I could only guess was blood splattered across the bulkheads and ringed our mouths. The cocooned Skrit put up even less of a fight. We ripped the cocoons apart and greedily devoured the half-formed Na inside.
I had killed three beings in order to spare Elfangor's life. I was not even sure why I had done it. To take my mind of my burgeoning guilt, I looked at the Taxxons. Compared to the enormous, bloated specimens that waddled around the Yeerk spaceport, these three Taxxons were different. They were slenderer and sleeker. And, although I know that the hunger raged within them with as much passion as it did in me, that they did not seem as likely to perpetrate the random, senseless cannibalism that the Taxxon-Controllers and their collaborators had become infamous for.
‹You… you're not working with the Yeerks, are you?› I erred on the side of caution; who knew how many Taxxons were Controllers or collaborators? If today was anything to go by, being caught in a Yeerk sting operation would be just my luck.
"Yeerk?" said one of them, one with a series of long scars down his rubbery back. There was a moment of deliberation.
"Yeerks bad," he finally said. There was a pause while the Taxxon tried to puzzle out what to make of me. "But you hurt Yeerk mountain. No Taxxon hurt Yeerk mountain before. Talk like Hive, too. Work with Hive?"
It took me a moment to realize that the "Yeerk mountain" that he referred to was more likely than not the Skrit Na ship. But I was unsure as to what a Hive was. We had seen the hives- more like crude mounds of dirt than any Andalite structure- that the Taxxon-Controllers made their home in, of course, but the way that this Taxxon spoke about this Hive was almost… reverential.
‹What is Hive?› I asked, fearing the worst. Years of Andalite military training had taught me to expect the worst from the Taxxons. Perhaps this was all a trap in order to secure one more meal for the evening.
"Hive is mother and father. Hive is home. You hurt. Rest in Hive."
I suddenly remembered that Elfangor had wounded me significantly. The throbbing pain of my many amputated limbs suddenly resurged. The Taxxons stared at me with an inscrutable look in their eyes.
Perhaps the Taxxons were telling the truth about the Hive, and perhaps not. Either way, what did I really have to lose? To spend the rest of my life among Taxxons… a self-inflicted death would still be preferable. If nothing else, I would lead these three Taxxons away from Elfangor.
‹Show me where the Hive is.› I finally said.
The Taxxon homeworld is… well, "monotonous" is probably the best way to put it. Almost every part of it was some variety of canyon or crag or desert valley, and, under the moonslight, with the wind whistling through the desert, I did not feel reassured at all. I imagined horrible monsters lurking around every corner. I tried to remember everything I had learned about the Taxxons and their planet, which was pitifully small. Andalite exobiologists had never mapped out this planet. Who knew what horrific beasts might make a meal of an unsuspecting Taxxon? I missed my tail. An Andalite without a tail is like a kaftid bird without wings.
And then I saw the mountain.
It was not like mountain I had ever seen. The Andalite homeworld only has a few mountains around the equatorial deserts; they are more like enormous hills than anything on the Taxxon homeworld. This mountain was enormous. It was bigger than any building at the Yeerk spaceport. It resembled a fortress hewn out of the rock itself; a veritable redoubt that could deter anything. From this distance, the mountain seemed to move slightly, shimmering like a mirage. As I got closer, I realized why.
Taxxons! Hundreds and hundreds of Taxxons slithered across the mountain. Some carried slabs of meat into the mountain, others emerged to vomit up an unappealing green substance that coated the outer walls of the mountains. Dozens of holes had been carved all across the mountains; the Taxxons wriggled in and out of these holes like some grotesque larvae dining upon an enormous red slab of meat. Under the circumstances, it was not the most pleasant of analogies, and made me wonder what my fate would be. Although I still wanted to die, I did not want to die at the tongues of a thousand hungry Taxxons.
But as I followed them into the enormous red mountain, I became aware of another sensation. It was not something that my Andalite mind fully comprehended, but the Taxxon part of me- and the horrible hunger along with it- relaxed slightly. How can I put it into word? The sensation I felt was… nurturing. Parental. Almost loving. For a few brief moments, I really did believe that my parents were waiting for me in that mountain.
I suppressed another shudder of revulstion and followed the Taxxons.