Chapter Six – Sean

The first time around an animal's instincts can overwhelm you. Dogs for example are very playful and they enjoy running around, smelling things, and chasing randomly moving objects. The instinct to bark at other dogs or to sniff complete strangers can be overwhelming. The second time around the instincts are easier to control as you know what to expect.

But this time around it was hard to ignore the frog's panic as the ambulance shook and hit speed bumps. It didn't like the movement, or the fact that it was so dry in this small space. The sensation of Bryce's android body was unusual, and disturbing. The frog preferred soft or moist ground, with plenty of fresh air surrounding it and the cool breeze off of a shaded pond. But I was able to keep the instincts from forcing me to move. The hologram was the only thing keeping us from sight.

Bryce was strapped to a gurney and an emergency medical technician slipped a breathing mask over his mouth. The driver relayed information over the hospital over the radio and asked for instructions about where to take the ambulance as they exited the parking lot.

"White male, possibly twelve or thirteen years old. Apparently a friend helped him into the bathroom and then the kid just collapsed. The police are looking for the other child now."

I tried to remember if I had seen cameras. It was a small museum dealing with local history, not the Smithsonian. The man who had knocked on the door wasn't even a guard as such, but a random volunteer worker. Still, at least two people saw Bryce getting sick and I wasn't exactly incognito, so at least two people could give a reasonable description of me to the police.

Stuff just keeps piling on, you know, I said to Bryce.

Still no response. Not that I wanted him to say anything while we were on our way to the hospital. The Chee can understand thought-speak but they can't use it themselves. But a simple flicker of a finger would have made me happy.

I knew this had to be devastating to him. In the month since I had met them, I never saw a Chee even step on a bug. Bryce was always meticulously careful to avoid even the tiniest ants that happened to be in his path. And he did it with such practice and precision that one time I actually tripped on my own shoelaces watching him avoid them.

When the dogs needed tic or flea removals, the Chee used hypersonic waves to make the arachnids uncomfortable. Then they were rounded up in some kind of force field and taken out of the underground park.

Being with them was like being with an army of android Buddhists.

Granted, I was no big fan of the Yeerks right now. But a Yeerk was still a living creature, capable of feeling pain and fear. From what I understood, Bryce must have been reading its feelings right up to the end.

It wasn't your fault. I said a few times. We'll figure this out.

As the ambulance took a steep road to the hospital, a shadow loomed over me. My hind lings fired and I leapt into the air in time to avoid being squashed by the EMT's arm. I landed near Bryce's feet.

"What the heck?"

"What's wrong?" The driver asked.

"There's a frog on the bed."

The driver snorted.

"I don't suppose the kid was getting high on it."

"Do kids even know about that one yet?" The EMT asked, returning the chuckle.

I thought it was a little insensitive. But as I wasn't in much of a position to say anything, I just stayed where I was and kept quiet. I couldn't see the EMT's face very well. With my size and from where I was sitting, it would be like just waking up beneath the nose of an airbus and trying to make out the lettering on the nose. But I could see his arm clearly as he tried to keep the gurney from shaking too much on the way up.

Guys, I don't know if you're listening to all of this, I said, as the ambulance reached the top. But we're on our way into the hospital. Bryce is doing a great job pretending to breathe into that thing, but if I remember any of my stays in hospitals correctly, they're probably going to take some blood. You guys don't happen to have a fake reservoir of blood in there for occasions like this do you?

I had no way of knowing if the others could hear me through Bryce or not. I was careful to make sure only he could hear my thought-speak, and I knew the CheeNet could was able to listen in on it, but I just didn't know if it made any difference. And until now I had never seen a Chee go catatonic on me.

Bryce listen, I said. If you can snap out of this, I swear I will never use a dog morph to do anything more rash than pooping on someone's lawn. I swear it.

Nothing.

The ambulance finally stopped. As a wave of light flooded the back, I had to fight not to jump out the back.

"What's with the frog?" Someone asked.

"I think it just got caught on the kid's clothes or something. Here, can you take care of it."

There was movement and then a sudden pressure around my body. A smell that reminded me of bacon grease and hand lotion filled my nostrils and drove the frog to panic. I struggled to get free of the hand, but the person was determined to keep a grip on me.

I didn't know how far from the Emergency Room they were taking me. But when they finally set me down, I felt a comfortable breeze and a smell that made the frog happy.

Water! I immediately dived in.

"Well, there you go," someone said.

There was tall grass surrounding this area of the pond and a few colorful flowers. I did a few laps around to calm the frog down. The water felt great on skin and unlike the lake, this was the clear, clean water that the frog's mind preferred. No fish and plenty of dragon flies buzzing overhead.

I crawled onto a rock and looked around. The distance between the rock and the grass looked like jumping across the floor of a small classroom. I leapt again, clearing the distance and landing on the ground gracefully.

Ninja frog, I said. Turtles beware.

The grass here was shorter and the sun beat down on me. The frog wanted to go back into the water, but I needed to get back to the hospital. The person who grabbed me couldn't have walked very far, but nine times out of ten, there was a huge parking lot here. I had no idea how exposed I was, so morphing out was risky and I wasn't in the mood to play a real life game of Frogger.

Decisions, decisions.

Oh yeah, I also had to get in there to see how much damage Bryce's apparently comatose state was going to cause. Was it an act, or was he seriously beginning to shut down? Did the Pemalites even have a plan in mind in case one of their androids actually killed something? And how did Bryce kill the Yeerk anyhow? According to Erek and the others, he was doing everything right.

I hopped a few more feet. The distance I could jump in this morph distracted me from the less pleasant aspects of this day. When I felt a reasonable amount of privacy I began to morph out.

Halfway there, my eyesight came back and I could see that I was standing beside a man-made pond on next to a paved path. There was nice looking bench with a marker on it stating that this path was donated by some person who was a patient at this hospital years ago. The parking lot stretched beyond that and I could see the back of the hospital along with several smaller buildings that were a part of the campus but not attached, probably offices.

There were no open windows that I could see. And none of my dog morphs were going to get me into the building. If anything a stray dog on the property would cause more problems and frog was the smallest morph I had. Man, I needed to start working on that list.

A quick breeze made me aware of just how exposed I was. My boxers were all that remained of yet another outfit of clothes I had lost so I crouched low and tried to hide behind a small clump of bushes on the other side of the pond.(The Chee were definitely paying me back for the clothes this time.)

On the other hand, I thought. If I get caught out here like this, I will definitely be closer to Bryce than I am now.

I sighed. The only thing to do now was morph seagull and see if I could find a way in.