Tobias

My name is Tobias. And I was feeling pretty thirsty this afternoon.

There was a time once where if I wanted a drink, all I'd have to do is walk up to a faucet, stick a glass or my head under the spigot, and turn the knob. Or just press the button on a water fountain.

Not anymore. You see, I don't exactly have hands in this body.

Now I manipulate and grab things with two sets of curved, dagger-sharp talons and a hooked beak.

I'm currently inhabiting the body of a red-tailed hawk, you see. Permanently.

Thanks to a bit of time-tweaking by this more or less godlike dude known as the Ellimist, I can take a break from this surreal state of affairs to become my former self or another animal, but never for more than two hours.

I've accepted that I am what I am. Plus, spending the majority of your day literally living as a wild animal leaves little time for self-pity. But back to the afternoon's events.

It hadn't rained for at least over a week, and the meadow where I generally hunted had grown dry and crisp in the warm wind.

That translated into less prey, and less water.

I normally drank from a big creek that ran through my territory. It had nice gravel banks to stand on, was in a fairly open area of the forest, and was nice and clear. Now it had turned into a series of shallow, muddy, stagnant pools.

The hawk in me didn't really care. It would've drunk from a mud puddle if it had to.

But my human brain did.

Leaping from the branch I'd been panting on, I flapped hard to gain altitude, the ground falling further away with every beat of my wings.

Flapping along like a duck for any real length of time is always hard work for me, but it especially sucks when it's hot out. Feathers are pretty useful for helping me take to the sky and keep warm, but oh man, on a hot day it's like being forced to do the hundred yard dash in a full-length fur coat.

Thankfully, it wasn't long before I found a nice thermal, and rode the shaft of heated air way up above the trees.

Turning, I sailed west, leaving my territory and soaring over the national forest behind the town. There was a river that flowed through these hundreds of square miles of woodland, and that's where I was headed.

When I saw the glint of water through the trees, I angled my wings and gently glided down in a series of slow circles. Even from so high up, I could see an exposed sandbar in the river. A perfect place to land.

And a safe one. It was almost hard to remember now that once there had actually been a time when I could not only drink from a tap, but do so without having to worry about being bushwhacked by a coyote or a raccoon or a bobcat.

Even here, there was always the slight chance that a snapping turtle could grab me by the face and haul me into the water.

I put on the air brakes, touched down on the coarse oblong of sand, walked to the water that flowed around it, and lowered my head to fill my beak, tilting it back to let the water trickle down my throat.

After drinking enough to refresh myself, I pushed off into the air again to head back to what I guess you could call my "home."

It was just a couple minutes later when I spotted the short girl, dressed in green and tan, her hair worn in a huge bun at the back of her head. She was barefoot for some reason, yet it didn't seem to bother her as she picked her way through the forest.

If I'd still had facial muscles, I would've expressed my puzzlement in a frown as I glided closer to get a better look. What was she doing here all by herself in the middle of the woods, far from any roads or trails?

She was wearing a loose green shirt with elbow-length sleeves underneath a tan-yellow tunic, secured with a dirty yellow sash.

Okay. That was just a bit unusual. Tunics of any kind were not the sort of thing you see preteen girls in turn-of-the-millennium America wearing, unless it was Halloween or for a play.

Her hair was secured by a green, peaked headband with a dangling yellow tassel on each end, and she wore a pair of very loose, almost skirt-like, knee length pants.

Around her wrists and ankles were studded leather bands, from which green fabric covered the tops of her hands and feet. This chick or the culture she belonged to sure had a thing for the color green.

Something was definitely odd about her presence here, to say the least.

Sad as it is, suspicion and paranoia have become a way of life for us Animorphs. This could be some Yeerk trick.

Yet, I couldn't imagine even the most ignorant Yeerk dressing their human host in a getup like this, or forcing her to wander around by herself in the middle of nowhere, putting her in a situation where she could potentially die-and the Yeerk with her.

Mostly I was both intrigued and concerned about if she was all right.

I circled lower, silently watching her walk and jump over logs.

Her motions were confident, natural and unhurried. She didn't look upset or wounded or like she was messed up in the head. Nor did I see any sign that she was carrying weapons, which was encouraging.

She did seem a little perplexed at times, stopping every so often to get her bearings before shrugging and uncertainly moving on.

A squirrel leapt between two trees just in front of her, landing on the other branch with a hissing crash of leaves, and she idly lifted her head to see it better-or so I thought.

Even from three hundred feet above the trees, I could see her face as easily as if I'd been having a talk with her, and nearly gasped in shock when I looked at her eyes.

They were almond shaped and green in color. But there was a misty veil across them, and her stare was blank, unfocused. She was totally blind.

It was a reckless move to say the least, but my gut reaction was to turn on the thought-speak.

(Hey, blind girl. Need help down there?)

I saw her stop with a jolt and stagger, head darting around, shocked and amazed at the sound of my silent voice in her brain.

She spat out something in Chinese. Great, she didn't speak English.

Still, I could tell from her tone that she'd made a demand, most likely the equivalent of "Who's there?" or "What's going on?"

(I'm Tobias,) I replied. (Do you need help or want me to help you find your way out of here?)

Her tone of voice was more confused, inquiring, as she spoke in Chinese again.

This time though, I caught two recognizable words. One, not surprisingly, was my name being repeated.

The other was "Ellimist."

I can't exactly say it was that big of a shock.

Suddenly the blind girl spoke again, with more of an effort than before.

This time, her words were in English.

Please leave reviews, k?