AN: I was going to wait to upload this, but lucky you, here it is. Thank you to those who reviewed and favored, you know who you are xD. Remember, thought-speak is being shown as: ((thought))

Chapter 4
Aximili-Esgarrouth-Isthill

Teaching Marco was not as bad as I thought it would. At first he didn't understand, but once I showed him only a couple of times that by the time my stomach started protesting in hunger he leaned back, closing his books.

"Thanks Ax-man." He sighed, linking his fingers together and placing them behind his head, closing his eyes, "Somehow it seems so much simpler. Still hate it, but at least if this comes up on my exam I know that's one question I can answer."

"Well, if you need help studying I could help you."

Marco opened his eyes and looked at me, "Thank man, I appreciate that. Math and Science are the two I'm doing the worse in."

I smiled, "Well, I just so happen to have an excellent understanding of both."

Marco tossed his head back and laughed, "Very, very true." He sighed, "I'm almost tempted to order pizza again."

I looked up at him and he nodded, "Yea, that sounds good to you as well. Alright." He groaned and got up to his feet. He stretched his arms around his head, stretching out his muscles. I had to turn away, and pretended to watch the television as he moved off into the kitchen.

"Stupid." I muttered to myself, "Aximili you are being ridiculous."

Suddenly feeling restless I grabbed Marco's textbooks and notes from class and placed everything, neatly back inside his bag and took it back up to his room. The Andalite me wanted to run, to feel the wind, hear the birds, the leaves rustling...

As a human the claustrophobia wasn't so bad, but it was still there, and being surrounded by walls was a little suffocating to me, but the human instincts were comforted by this fact: more barriers meant less chance of attack to the human mind. It is very confusing, the two conflicting emotions, but Marco was kind enough to have me here, even though it was a little risky, so I pushed the feelings down like usual and headed back downstairs. At the very least I should have those figured out by the time I got back out to the forest.

"Alright, I even ordered you Cinnamon rolls. Let me grab one first this time alright." Marco said, coming back from the kitchen. He looked around the living room, frowned slightly when he didn't see his books.

"I put them upstairs." I said simply, sitting back down on the couch, folding my legs up under me.

"Oh well, thanks. But you don't need to clean up after me Ax-man." He placed another Coke down in front of me.

"I know." I said simply, opening the drink and taking a sip, "To be honest, Marco, being inside is a little uncomfortable for me."

"Oh, well, guess that would make sense." he said, wincing slightly, "I'm sorry Ax-man."

I shook my head, "No no, I am grateful to you Marco, honestly. I am not complaining at all, but children are taught techniques from their parents on how to deal with the feeling of claustrophobia, and many Andalites have different ways of dealing with it. Members of the fleet are taught calming techniques. My Mother always had some sort of craft to work on, my Father would do some of his work, while pacing up and down the scoop. Every time we were stuck inside due to a storm or something, I always ended up reorganizing everything. It angered my parents greatly."

Marco laughed, "Oh great, you have OCD, just great. What was Elfangor's technique?"

I laughed, "He used to tap his blade against his hoof. My father hated that more than my organizing. There were times when Elfangor would annoy our Father so bad, he kicked Elfangor outside into the storm because he couldn't take it."

Marco burst into laughter, clutching his sides, "Oh! That's great! You're telling me, your great, heroic brother got kicked out of his own house for pissing off his dad? That's awesome!"

I laughed too, "Yes, it was quite odd to hear all the amazing adventures my brother got into, but when he came home my parents were definitely in charge and they saw him as nothing more than their child."

Marco continued to laugh, "Man, that would suck. Everyone you work with think you are the biggest hero in the entire universe, and yet, Mom and Dad still ground you when your home on leave. Poor Elfangor."

I was still sitting on the floor I realized. Not entirely uncomfortable. I leaned my head back though, looking up at the ceiling, letting the couch cradle my head. Marco was sitting on the couch beside me, his eyes were on the television, and I took the time to watch him out of my peripheral.

"Hungry Ax-man?"

I nodded, just as my stomach rumbled.

"Should be here soon." he chuckled, reaching over and placing his hand on my head. He let it linger for a second, but the bell to the door rang, and I quickly brushed off the disappointment aside and watched him.

I didn't watch him get the pizza last time. On Earth, humans have different ways of obtaining food and water, or one of the various water substitutes, like Coke for example.

They could go to a store and buy their own food, which has been grown for them, or raised, then slaughtered (I try very hard to ignore that aspect of humans), and packaged up, and all you need to do is pay the store currency for the food, take it home, and prepare it however humans do. So far, I haven't seen any humans actually grow their own food, Prince Jake told me once that Cassie's farm used to be used for this. Now it's a make-shift hospital for wild-life.

Then there's the food court, where humans order from a list of prepared food, exchange currency. No need for the trip to the store and picking what they want. For example, Cinnamon buns, and pizza. Cassie told me once that living off of 'fast food' is very unhealthy.

But I haven't seen this way of obtaining food. I assumed Marco called the store and told them what he wanted. Now, there was a human male, around Marco's age, holding the box of pizza, and bag of cinnamon buns in his hands. Marco said a couple of things to him, the male answered him back, Marco handed the male some currency, the male gave Marco the food and left.

Marco shut the door with his foot and walked back over, putting the box on the table in front of us, and sat down on the floor.

"Here give me the remote- Why are you looking at me like that?"

I shook my head, handing him the remote and opening the pizza box, "Humans are weird." and took a bite out of the delicious food.

Marco stared, but must have decided he didn't want to hear it, because he turned and reached for a pizza slice with one hand, and searched through the channels with the other. Eventually he stopped on a movie. I have already seen it, but that was alright, the only thing good on the television on Monday's was These Messages or the '7 o'clock Monday Movie'.

The movie was called 'The Blaire Witch Project'. I think it was supposed to be scary, but really it was quite silly. I tried to get Tobias to watch it with me but he flew away, muttering about: 'he slept in a forest', something about not sleeping for days.

We settled into silence, eating the pizza and watching the humans wander through the woods, not realizing that they were getting lost yet.

Forty minutes into the movie I went upstairs to demorph and re-morphed back into human as quickly as possible, but I was tired now, morphing takes a lot of energy, and morphing this much every two hours was exhausting on my, already overtired, body and mind. Therefore, I did not morph as fast I truly wanted. Nor could I force down the sudden wave of claustrophobia as my Andalite instincts kicked in. For a moment, I felt myself panic, I wanted to rear back, kick the barrier, run.

Morph, morph. I muttered over and over, and slowly I felt the changes come over me. When finally, the morphing stopped I realized that at some point I had started holding my breath. I released it, gasping for air. My legs were shaky, but I did not want to fall and alarm Marco. Reaching out and placed my hands on the counter in front of me.

There was a mirror, and I looked up into it. Getting the first good look at my human morph. Rachel told me once that I was attractive. Right now, I did not think so. My face was pale, when usually it had the slightly same color to it as Marco's. My eyes were red, blood shot.

Was it because I was so tired? Yes, the claustrophobia is always there, but I have not had such a reaction since I was a small child.

Why was it bothering me now? I wasn't trapped, I was safe, here. Right now, where I really wanted to be, was where it was dangerous. So logically, I should not be having any kind of reaction.

But logic wasn't working right now. My mind wouldn't stop whispering that I was trapped, there was no wind, hurry run run runrunrun...

"Ah!" I yelled out, clutching my hands to my head, stumbling back against the wall. I think something fell to the floor. I am not sure. All I remember is hearing 'Run run run..' over and over again, getting more and more urgent as I stood there with my head in my hands.

Somewhere in the distance, I felt a shift in the air. Suddenly, something warm and strong wrapped around my hands and pulled them away. At some point I had moved them over my ears, hoping, hoping that would stop it.

Suddenly, the warm disappeared, and I clasped my hands over ears again as -run run run runrunrunrunrunrunrunrunrun...

The warmth was back, trying to move my hands again, no no! Don't want hear, stop!

But the warmth was stronger, and then.. it was just my hands that was warm. My whole body.. warm. I'm cold. Cold, yes. No.. don't want to hear...

Oh, what was that?

No, please no no no...

"Ax?"

Ax...?

"Ax, come on man."

I was Ax right? No, no I was-

"Aximili!

Yes... Yes that was me... Aximili-

"Aximili-Esgarrouth-Isthill!"

I snapped my eyes open, yes, Aximili. Marco. Marco was holding me, he had something pressed against my nose.

Aximili, me. Andalite, currently in human morph.

"I am alright." I said, wincing as my throat protested.

"Alright, just don't- don't talk, just- just sit here a second." Marco, moved over, placing me up against the wall, before standing up to the counter. He twisted a tap, dumped a couple of toothbrushes out of a cup and filled it with water.

He crouched down next to me, putting the cup to my lips, "Here, take a couple small sips." I tried raising my hand to take it from him, that was when I realized how hard I was shaking. Realizing all I would accomplish was getting myself covered in water, I let him tip some of the liquid into my mouth. The water had an odd taste, but slowly I swallowed, wincing at the pain, but each sip went down a little better then the last, until finally, I could probably talk now, though it occurred to me later that I could have just used thought-speak, seeing as how I was in morph.

"I am sorry Marco." I whispered, all that I could manage.

"Jeez Ax, what was that?" He asked, almost whispering now himself. He sat back down, facing me. He picked up a cloth from beside me I hadn't noticed, gently he tilted my head up slightly and began wiping around my mouth and nose.
"I don't know." I said whispered tiredly, "I think I panicked-"

"No, Ax, that was more than a little panic attack." He snapped. I think he was worried about me, and I realized why, as I turned to look, realizing that the cloth was covered in red.

Many Earth animals have red blood, humans have red blood as well. I was human right now.

I raised my shaking hand, and raised it to my nose, pulled it back-

The whole tip of my finger was covered in cooling blood.

"What-" I whispered, my tired brain trying to thing of some explanation, but I couldn't, not now.

"Ax-man, I know your tired, but I really need to get you cleaned up." Marco, I slowly turned my eyes to him, "Your covered in blood man, even if you morph that wont clean it off."

"Oh, no. No it wont." I said, nodding, agreeing with him.

"What the fuck.." Marco muttered, his hand coming up to my forehead, "Dammnit Ax! Your burning!"

"Yes I do not think I feel well."

"Ax? Aximili stay with me!"

((I'm right here Marco...))

AN: -waves goodbye- Review please and you might get to see what happens next xD