I don't own Jake, Cassie, Marco, Rachel, Tobias, Ax, or any other Animorph there may be that I don't know about. I don't own Criminal Minds either. :P (Really, I don't.)
Chapter 8
The Meeting
I was lying on something relatively damp and soft, like a pillow, but it was wet and it smelled fresh, unlike a pillow from a stuffy house covered in frills and all that other stuff to make it pretty. My body was resting on something hard and all of my joints ached from the lumpy surface. I rolled over and groaned in my uncomfortable position. My shoulder ached when I turned onto it and I groaned again. My head hurt as well, but thanks to the soft material under it, I was relatively comfortable, aside from the throbbing in my temples.
I tried to stand up, tried to gather my surroundings, my bearings. Where was I? Had Hack taken me there? What was I doing there? One of the many problems with being blind is that you don't know if anyone is around or where you are unless something moved.
I was about call out "hello" just in case someone was there, but decided against it. If someone was there, I didn't know whether they were on my side or not, whether they wanted to kill me or not. I stood up and took a step forward, but wasn't expecting to smack right into a wall at the first step. I fell back again, bouncing off the wall and grumbling angrily to myself. Another downside to being blind: not being able to seewalls right in front of you.
"Stupid wall, I hate this place. What kind of room is this?" I grumbled angrily to myself getting up again. Then I remembered the texture of the wall I had banged into -- it wasn't regular. It was rough and felt like it dug into my skin just as quickly as I had bumped into it.
I got up and felt the wall which I had slammed into, and soon found out that it wasn't a wall at all: it was a tree in a forest, the one outide the city. Instantly my guard went up and I tried to concentrate to see if I could hear anything or anyone breathing around me. I could hear something up in a tree beside me like a rustling and went over to it. Had I been kidnapped and sent into the forest to be hunted by freaks with arrows who just liked to see people suffer? Yes, I saw that episode of Criminal Minds. I love crazy madmen -- just not when they're chasing me.
"Hello?" I called, despite my fear of being hunted. I heard something up in the trees and realized it was only a bird singing, then flying away at the sound of my voice. "Hello?" I called again. There was no answer. Annoyed now, unable to know where I was, unable to find out except by the trees, I took a step forward -- and imagined myself sinking into quicksand, until I realized that the forest in my city's backyard didn't have quicksand. In fact, it was rare that forests would even have quicksand.
I took another step, feeling my way around the trees with my hands, always prepared for the worst, hoping for the best. I held up my guard, careful for anything that might be dangerous to my well-being. I had no idea where I was going or how I would get there without tripping or breaking my leg or something. I could easily step into a gopher hole and fall and twist my ankle, most likely breaking it. The worst part was that I didn't know if it was night, morning or noon. I hated that. It smelled of dew and the air was heavy around me -- afternoon? I guessed.
I heard something move to my right and froze. I felt around with my hand and touched it. It was soft, fuzzy even, and slim. I had seen something like it before, when I wasn't blind. Hack had been showing off for me when we were friends and he had shown me -- with his shirt off -- that he could flex his chest muscles without his hands. He was on the football team, so he was a total jock and pretty muscular. It was a bare chest -- a guy's chest -- with fur, but it was short and rough. I knew what it was as soon as I touched it.
I jumped back, fury and terror striking me suddenly, like a spear entering my soul. I bumped into a tree and held onto it behind me with my hands so that I couldn't fall down or lose my spot.
"Andalite," I snapped, fury in my voice, then I reconsidered my tone. There was a noise whizzing toward me, but my reactions were slow since I hadn't had a chance to completely wake up yet, and I didn't move until the fierce tail was right at my throat.
