Arc 1: The Discovery

Chapter 3

Rachel

My name is Rachel. Yadda yadda yadda can't tell you my last name or where I live. You know the drill. Jake dropped me off back at my home and then him and Marco went off to work on their "English papers" which is obviously boy talk for goof around playing video games and then Monday morning blame it on our super secret war council.

Me? I'd already finished everything that I had to do – juggling three major extra-curriculars and holding down a part-time job really gives you a sense of focus. Plus my mom's always been the no-nonsense type when it comes to that sort of personal discipline. So while everyone else needed some time to reflect on what we'd done, I was ready to get to it.

Don't get me wrong, I knew we didn't have any leads just yet. But that was why we had to go out and find them. There was an alien invasion happening right on our door step, there wasn't time to just hang around and wait!

I grabbed an apple off the kitchen counter, taking a bite while thinking about what we could do. Strategy is really simple when you get down to it. On the one hand, we wanted to make the Yeerk army smaller. Preferably extinct. Nothing I could do about that right now. But on the other side of the equation, we wanted to make our own army bigge-

"Boo, Rachel!"

I jumped, turning around in an instant.

"Ha ha! Gotcha!"

I rolled my eyes and gave Jordan a small poke. My middle sister, she's two years younger than me and at that age where she's simultaneously trying to be my best friend like she's too mature now to hang with Sara, the baby in the family… but also doing her level best to aggravate me as much as she can get away with. Thankfully, I'm the mature one.

"What do you want, pipsqueak," I asked before taking another bite of my apple.

Jordan shrugged. "Mom took Sara to the movies."

"Mmhm," I replied, my response on autopilot as I went right back to thinking about how to take the fight to the Yeerks.

"I'm bored."

"Mmhm."

My sister let out a long sigh as if she was the one with the weight of the world on her shoulders. "Let's go someplace."

And then it hit me, the absolutely perfect plan. It was genius, a way to kill two Yeerks with one stone.

"Huh? Yeah, sounds good," I replied, thinking fast. "I was gonna call Melissa actually, but what if instead we all met up at The Gardens? We haven't been in forever."

Jordan took a minute to weigh that, like she wasn't the one complaining about being bored and not-so-subtly trying to come up with an excuse to hang. "Yeah, that sounds alright," she said at last.

"Great, let me just get my coat and call Mel and we'll head out."

I looked at the wall clock. "That gives us twenty to get to Maple and catch the bus – grab your stuff."

She's a good kid, and even with the look of 'disinterested fourteen year old,' she definitely bounced now that big sis was giving her attention.

I called Melissa, and she was really gung ho about coming out. I was glad – even before this whole alien invasion kicked off Mel and I had been drifting apart. She used to hang out with us all the time – we were in gymnastics together – but she'd been gloomy and kinda distant the last few months.

I'm not saying I was thrilled at the idea of using my friend, but if this was what brought her out of her funk, maybe 'Phase II' as I was already calling it would go even better than expected. Melissa even saved us a bus ride; her dad apparently overheard us talking and offered to pick us up and drive us all to The Gardens himself.

Melissa's dad is the vice-principal at our high school. It was weird in a way, because until two years ago I never really thought about what her dad did, and now I saw him every day and he was suddenly this authority figure. But he's a really nice guy, he was always very encouraging to all the girls at our gymnastics meets and has always been really big on community stuff. Apparently, he was headed to The Gardens anyway – some big community group called The Sharing was looking at doing some big fund raiser to help endangered species or something. The whole ride to The Gardens he went on about it, and Melissa was eating it up, more Daddy's girl than I'd seen her in forever. Maybe it was really hard having your dad suddenly being your principle.

"You kids stay out of trouble," he said in his 'school' voice, but gave us a really exaggerated dad wink.

"Bye Mr. Chapman," Jordan and I called out as he drove off towards the administration building, leaving us at the main gate.

"Bye, dad."

The Gardens is this really cool all-in-one zoo and amusement park. We used to come all the time – Cassie's mom works here so we always got discount tickets and sneak peeks at new exhibits. Then Marco's dad hit a rough patch after his mom died and he didn't have any money to spend on things like goofing around watching animals, so he and Jake stopped coming, even if they never really said anything about it. Cassie started working practically full time at the farm and I guess we all just kinda felt it was 'for kids', but it's really a great place and being here now I realized how much I'd missed it.

"Rides first!" Jordan exclaimed as we entered.

"Do you have your birthday money?" I asked, dreading the answer.

"Forgot it."

I sighed. She probably really did honestly forget – I swear my sister thinks she's an adult but as soon as she's hanging out with me she regresses ten years.

On the other hand, this worked out really well for 'Phase II'.

"Fine," I exclaimed, pretending to be annoyed. Which wasn't that hard, cause I was still giving up more than an hour's pay at the mall so my sister would be away for a bit. I handed her a ten dollar bill. "Two rides. Melissa and I will wait for you. Be back in twenty. Go!"

Jordan looked like she wanted to negotiate, but then thought better and took the money and ran. I rolled my eyes at Melissa – so easy!

"We should do this more often," I said to Melissa as we watched Jordan waiting in line for one of the park's two roller coasters.

"I'd like that," Melissa said with a smile, even though it looked a little forced.

"How's gymnastics?" Between soccer and lacrosse, gymnastics for me had become a filler sport – my balance beam sucks and I'm varsity squad for both the other two, so it was a no-brainer which one I had to drop. But Melissa is really good; there was talk of her joining the Junior Olympics team a few years ago but nothing came of it. Even so…

"It's alright," she said with a shrug. "I dunno…"

I frowned. "Everything ok?"

She shrugged again, eyes firmly fixed on roller coaster. "Yeah, I'm fine. Everyone's just been real busy," she gave a little laugh. "I'm just being a drama queen. It's fine. Really."

I reached over and squeezed her hand. "We should definitely hang out more this summer," I said, a not-quite-promise, not-quite-apology. "Season's over now and I get the best employee discounts at the mall."

For the first time she gave me a real smile.

"Totally."

It almost made me feel bad that I was scouting out our first recruit. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't like I was planning on telling her about the invasion right then and there, and I wasn't going to actually do anything without running it by the others, but Melissa had been my friend as long as any of the rest of us had been. Any other night, it just as easily could have been her running into Elfangor with me and Jake instead of Cassie. It would be just like old times, except instead of taking on the crosstown high school, we'd be kicking alien ass back to whatever planet the Yeerks came from!

Just as soon as we knew she wasn't already taken. I twitched at that. Melissa gave me a look.

"My nose tickles," I explained. She giggled. We chatted for a bit until Jordan came back and we went into the zoo proper.

The second part of Operation: Garden Gambit didn't go quite so well. It wasn't a failure but in my excitement of coming up with the plan, I forgot I had no way to touch any of the animals that had danced in my imagination. Oh sure, I could have gone into the petting zoo, but if I had a limited number of morphs, I wasn't going to waste it on a petting goat or a lamb. No, I wanted the big guns.

But I've always loved shopping, and window shopping definitely counts when you can't get the real thing. At least I could always tell the others I was checking out potential morphs, getting ideas for what I – what we – wanted and how to divvy them out. I was calling shotgun on the Grizzly though. And the Bull Elephant. Oh, maybe the Alligator. I actually laughed out loud in the monkey house – I'd bet my both my favorite handbags that Marco was going to pick Gorilla. Jake was our leader; Lion, maybe? Maybe Cassie should take the Elephant. I didn't really know Tobias or Elfangor well enough to guess what they'd pick. Rhino? Panther? Viper?

"Wow Rachel, you are reeeeeeeally into this," Jordan snickered.

I shrugged, keeping it cool. "I guess I realized I really missed this place." My voice turned syrupy. "It's been so long since I've had a wittle bittie sister to come here with."

"Be nice," Melissa chided, though she was laughing too.

I had another brilliant insight. A little test for Melissa that would be totally normal. "If you could be any animal on the planet, what would you be?" A Yeerk would unquestionably think about Andalites, but it's the sort of question that gets asked a million times every day in a zoo.

"Ocelot!" Jordan said at once. "They were soooooo cute." She paused. "Or maybe a fox? They were really funny."

"What about you, Mel?" I asked, keeping my voice super casual.

"I really liked the otters," she said after a moment. A perfectly human response. No conflict at all. "Or a panda? The tigers were adorable."

"What about you?" Jordan asked.

"A b-" I stopped. If I said bear and then a bear showed up on the news attacking aliens, would this conversation ever somehow be linked to me?

"A buh?" Jordan asked, raising an eyebrow. No idea where she got that from. "Did we pass one of those?"

I scoffed. "There's no such thing as a 'buh'. I was gonna say Buffalo. I'd have every lacrosse scholarship in the country with that sort of ramming power."

"How would you hold your crosse?" Jordan asked, and Melissa looked curious as well.

I shrugged. "Tie it to my horns, obviously."

"Okaaaaay," Jordan replied as if she were the one with the weird younger sister.

It was a great afternoon. I ended up buying one of those programs they sell that goes through all the animals in the zoo – there were just too many to remember and it would be good to have a list. Plus I'd have something to really show the others, even if Cassie probably already owned one. It was like a Macy's catalogue but for alien guerillas.

Melissa's dad texted her when he was finished, and we made our way back out. By the time we got back to my house, my mom and little sister were already home. Melissa and her dad came in for a little bit, my mom and her dad making the kind of grown-up small talk that grown-ups do. Melissa looked anxious. Then just before they left, she called out, "Hey Rach, do you wanna come round and have dinner? I feel really bad about having to bum that last ticket off of you."

I could feel my brow furrow. Melissa hadn't borrowed anything. Her eyes were intense.

"I'd love to," I replied, keeping the question out of my voice. "If it's alright with your dad, of course." I gave Mr. Chapman a smile.

He grinned. "That's fine with me, unless you all have plans?" He looked at my mother. She shook her head. "That settles in then, dinner at the Chapmans. I'll bring you back home by eight. School night."

Trust a vice-principal to be a stickler for that sort of thing.

"I wouldn't want to put you out. Jake's on the same street – I'll give him a call and he can bring me back, no problem."

Chapman just shrugged and moved to the car, he wasn't going to argue logistics with me if my mom wasn't upset about it, and she wasn't. She knows I'm a trustworthy daughter. Good grades, scholarship track, no crazy parties. I had a lot of free reign. And with the Yeerk invasion underway, it was time to cash in.

Dinner at the Chapmans was great. Mr. and Mrs. Chapman were thrilled to see me, and asked all about our time at The Gardens. Melissa had had a gymnastics meet last week and came in second overall and first on the uneven bars, so there was a little bragging and Melissa turned bright pink. I asked Mr. Chapman about The Sharing since I know my cousin Tom is really involved in it, and he went on about how great it was bringing the community together and how he'd had a really productive talk with The Gardens and they were tentatively going to have a big fundraiser as soon as the summer started.

"You should come," he said after finishing up dessert. "And bring your cousin too. It's such a shame you kids don't have more time together." He chuckled, "I guess that's partly my fault, huh?"

Melissa asked if I could stay and watch a movie, but Mr. Chapman said he had to put his foot down. If I was going to Jake's he couldn't make me be home by eight if I really didn't want to, but rules were rules and he wasn't going to 'aid-and-abet'.

I lied, told him I'd already texted Jake and he was expected me anyway. But I promised Melissa we would do this again real soon. I even proposed a beach trip for next weekend. She gave me a small smile. "I'd like that."

I'm leaving out one tiny detail. At some point during dinner when he came to patter around and explore what all the fuss was about, I kinda maybe sorta acquired Melissa's pet cat, a black and white tomcat named – I'm not kidding – Fluffer McKitty. To be fair, Melissa was nine at the time, and the two of us had spend an afternoon coming up with names together. To be honest with you, Fluffer lucked out over some of the alternatives.

So far, Operation: Melissa Morpher hadn't given me any red flags. But would a Yeerk reveal itself in front of an animal in a way it wouldn't in front of a human? Only one way to find out.

I walked most of the block back to Jake's house, then dashed around the back of a house with one of those big wooden decks that jut out the side. All the lights were out. Hidden in the shadows and behind two empty trashcans, I did my first morph.

Ok, I had been hoping for a grizzly bear, but it was still pretty wild for my first time. My hands melted into paws first, and there was this really strange crunching noise as my tail bone grew, and grew, and grew. My spine did things that would have brought a chiropractor to tears. I started to shrink, realizing too late that my brand new cardigan was now lying on some grubby patch of cement. At least it was out of the way so it probably would still be here when mission accomplished, but ugggh.

Before I could finish contemplating what morphing was going to do to my wardrobe, I was a cat.

I was amazing. I mean I guess I always knew that but it was like my eyes were suddenly open to the coolness that was me. I took a step forward. Whoa.

Forget being some stupid buffalo with a crosse strapped to its horn. I would win every gold medal in gymnastic Olympics for the next decade. Jump three times my own height? No problem. Just because I hadn't done it yet didn't wipe out the assurance that I could. Balance beam? Psh, cut it in half and I'd still cross it with all the difficulty that you lumbering buffoons manage a crosswalk.

I was the queen of awesome. I was the-

There was a mouse. Somewhere, somewhere, some- there!

I pounced. A little voice in the back of my head said no! I missed. Thanks, voice, your fault, definitely not mine.

The voice was me.

Me. Rachel. A human turned into a cat, not an actual cat. A cat on a mission.

I could still admit it was all very, very cool. The mouse scurried under a hole at the edge of the concrete. I turned up my nose and started padding back towards the Chapmans. As long as the mouse knew I let it get away, it was fine.

A part of me knew that the rest of the… we really needed a name – the rest of the group was going to be annoyed that I did my first mission solo. And yeah, it really wasn't a big deal, it didn't need more people. And in my defense, I had it all planned out and was ready to bail if it wasn't gonna work out. But like I said, I'd known Melissa for years. I'd known Fluffy literally all his life. I knew he spent his evenings prowling outside, before coming back inside a few hours after dark to settle down.

Tonight was no exception.

So I prowled a little bit anyway to make sure, but as soon as I knew it was safe – and it was – I jumped through Melissa's open window. She was playing some music. All very human things to do.

And she was crying. Like really, really crying. Big sobs shaking her body as she bit her lip to keep them in. Clutching her knees. Holy crap, I was expecting her to just be hanging around and a little part of me was prepared for some one-hundred-eighty-degree-character-twist-she's-really-an-evil-alien-mastermind but…

Does it make sense if I tell you this was kinda worse?

"Meow." I jumped off the window sill and onto her desk, then down again in two seamless jumps. Whoa.

She sniffled. "Hi Fluffy." She gave me a watery smile. "You're home early."

I looked up at her, not really sure what to do. She let out a wail of agony.

I jumped onto her bed. In a second, she had her knees down and pulled me into her lap. "Meow!"

"Oh what have I done," she whispered to me. "What have I done? Why are they doing this to me?"

I caught myself from accidentally thought-speaking to her, but God it was hard.

She cried, petting me with increasingly wet hands every time she wiped her eyes.

"Why did everything change?"

It occurred to me that other than Melissa's strangled sobs and her music, the house was completely silent. Nothing was happening anywhere else in the house. For that matter, why was Melissa bawling her eyes out and her mom and dad weren't here? I'd only been gone fifteen minutes at the most. Where was the happy, laughing family I had literally just walked out the door of?

Something was very, very wrong. And obviously, I jumped to the first conclusion. I hoped it wasn't true.

On the other hand, given that the Chapmans were ignoring their grieving daughter, maybe I wished I was right. Maybe I wished it wasn't the Chapmans doing this at all, but some evil space slugs.

I knew I had a mission, but to be honest I think I'd already solved it. Melissa wasn't a Controller. If anything, I actually got us a step further, and possibly had found us our first Yeerk lead.

I wish I hadn't.

I stayed with Melissa for an hour. But my morph had a time limit, my mom would call Mr. Chapman-the-maybe-Controller who would call Jake if I didn't show up soon, and there was always the chance the real Fluffer McKitty might either bound through the window or else start clawing at the door.

Hiding while aliens blew up a ship was easier than leaving my friend to her tears. But I did it.

I vowed that next time, we'd come bringing vengeance.

Jake drove me home. Or rather, Jake drove me home while chewing me out about morphing by myself and going on a mission without telling anyone. I let him for a bit, my heart wasn't really in arguing.

"I get it, Jake. Jeez. I'm sorry," I said at long last, voice maybe a little snippy. I looked out the window, thinking about Melissa.

I think something in my tone caught up with him. He stopped talking, looked over at me.

"We all need to be careful," he said after a moment. I shrugged. "This afternoon, I almost morphed Homer in my bedroom. While Homer was right there with me. Marco and I went to the beach instead."

I turned to look at my cousin. "I guess all of us have morphed now."

Jake sighed. "Yeah, guess it's official, huh?"

"Yeah."

The drive to my house isn't more than ten minutes, and we'd spent half of that with Jake telling me I'd been an idiot. He pulled into the gas station near my house and got out, coming back a minute later with a root beer and a Diet Coke.

"Sorry for screaming," he said, handing me the Coke then closing his door. We sat there for a few minutes in the parking lot.

"Sorry for not letting you know what I was doing," I said after taking a sip.

"So… what do you think of my plan, to recruit more people?"

Jake took a second to answer, I could tell he was thinking it over and wasn't sure what to say. He's really easy to read sometimes. "It's not bad… we could probably use more support. But not getting caught is way more important, and it's not like the morphing power is ours to give." He paused. "We probably should see if this is even a war we can fight before we recruit more soldiers."

"I don't think we have a choice if we can fight it or not. We have to, no matter what."

Jake took another drink. "Yeah. You're right." He stretched his hands on the steering wheel, fingers squeezing the rim. "I'm not saying you're wrong. In the long run, we do have to recruit. But we have to be really, really careful. We can't afford to screw up. And if you think Melissa's family are controll-"

"She's not though!"

"No… but how long until she is?"

I had no response. Part of what was pushing me was that exact fear. If Mr. and Mrs. Chapman were Controllers, then a crying Melissa was a definite loose end.

"We need to talk to Elfangor," Jake said at last. "We need some idea of how Yeerks operate, what their strategies are. Something else to think about," Jake finished, sounding very tired.

Jake stopped then, staring at his can. "C'mon, what is it?" I asked, giving him a push.

"You know Elfangor expects us to… kill people."

I didn't know what to say about that. I'd caught that back when Elfangor expressed anger at not killing any Yeerks when his ship blew up, but we'd all be kinda dancing around it.

"I talked to Marco already. I have no idea how to bring it up to Cassie."

"Yeah, I can't imagine that going down well," I said, trying to make a joke but it came out sounding really morbid.

Jake gave a nervous chuckle anyway. "He's an alien. For him, they're just… I dunno, meat shields for Yeerks? They're expedient. But they're people. Good people."

"People we know." I finished, thinking of the Chapmans. Jake nodded.

"I don't know," I thought aloud. "But I know that if we don't do anything, we're all going to end up slaves in our own heads."

"Can we trust him though? I mean even if we do – if we do this. And what it means, then will he at least try to limit casualties. Or just…" Jake looked sick.

I took another drink, more to have a reason not to speak. It tasted vile in my mouth.

"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it, cuz," I finally replied. "For now, we don't even know any Controllers… well, not that we're one hundred percent sure of. Maybe we'll figure out a way to tell someone about this without risking ourselves. You never know."

"Yeah. That's true." He didn't sound like he really believed me. That was fine, I wasn't sure I believed it either.

"How was being a dog?" I asked, changing the subject completely. Jake looked relieved.

A small smile flickered on Jake's face. "Really fun. You always figure dogs are having a great time but… you have no idea. It's like everyday is a beach party. And the smells! I mean there's pop-tarts and hotdogs and salt and all, but it's so much more than that." His smiled faded a bit. "There were these three guys playing frisbee on the beach looking like they were having a great time – Marco said they looked fine. But they smelt angry. I didn't even know anger had a smell."

Jake looked at the radio clock and shook his head, turning on the ignition. "Guess we better get to your place. How was being a cat?"

"Like being the queen of the universe, only a little more powerful. When we acquire battle morphs, you should seriously consider one of the big cats; you'll never want to go dog, ever again."

"Don't knock it till you've tried it."

"Whatever you say, Dogboy."