The Invasion Again
Smitten x Kitten

Ch 9

(She's back! After forever.. anyway. I edited the other chapters in an attempt to make them slightly better. Trying to remember where I was going with this story. But it all works! Anyway, I'm back, and doin' it. Yay for that!)

We waited until after the bell rang for second period to start before doing it. Forcing Jake to curl up on the toilet seat was fun, seeing as he was kind of a big guy who lacked any kind of balance. I could poke him and watch him teeter around on the seat, all the while muttering curses under his breath as he tried valiantly not to fall onto the nasty bathroom floor or into the stained toilet bowl. The fun part was he couldn't say anything without giving it away to the flighty airheads that - gasp - there was a male in the girls' bathroom! Hey, he deserved it after that whole spider thing! I glanced back at him as I gave him a nudge and his eyes narrowed with annoyance. He started to mouth something that looked like Stop it!, but I didn't really care and pretended not to notice. Stifling a giggle, I averted my eyes and waited it out, occasionally giving him a push and watching him grab the toilet for dear life.

Of course, it was all a cover up for my screaming nerves, but no one but me had to know that. I just had to shove the gnawing fear into the back of my head and ignore its malicious chewing in my gut. Ugh. Even as I silently taunted Jake with my playful jabs, I was quaking inwardly. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I hoped that Jake would topple off the seat and get us sent to the principal's office so we didn't have to do this stupid thing. Was I crazy or something? Just the two of us, going down there alone? Yeah. I was officially ready to check myself into a mental institution.

Miraculously, the passing period came and went without us getting caught, so we were good to go. As the last girl left the bathroom, I took a deep breath to steady myself. This was stupid... but, on the bright side, the others wouldn't be in danger. Just me and Jake. We could just go down, take a quick look, then run back out.

"Alright, I think the bathroom is clear so we can-" I froze mid-sentence and struggled to avoid screaming. The idiot didn't bother to tell me he was morphing! And jeez, it was disgusting. His skin was lifting off his face like giant boils, enormous blisters that were partially transparent. It looked like if I barely touched one, it'd burst and spew yellow, slimy pus all over my hand. The blisters were taking on a sickening green color and beginning to harden and move down his neck. I managed to glare at him while choking down my vomit. Couldn't he have morphed scales after he was small? Ugh. I'd definitely seen enough.

Morphing is seriously gross. I grabbed for the latch and stumbled into the sink. Ow. I glanced up and realized I could still see him morphing in the mirror! Maybe I should be nicer to Jake next time, I thought with disgust. Fine, no more toilet-tight-rope-walking for him!

"I hate you, Jake. I really, really hate you." I murmured as I chanced a glance at the lizard boy. He was blessfully smaller, but still gross. Shoving the stall door shut, I waited for him to finish his morph. I was seriously shaken. That was one of the grossest things I'd ever seen. I was lucky that I didn't wet myself or something! Jerk. Were we really going to do this? I mean, we'd already agreed it'd be a good idea to scope out what we were getting ourselves into, but even so… The one part of me was glad he was coming. The other part was screaming that I was putting Jake in danger by having him there. I didn't really care if I, personally, got myself killed, but Jake? Ugh. I shoved the treacherous thought back into the tiny recessives of my brain, where it was supposed to have been all along.

I was still visibly shaking when he decided to grace me with his lizard presence. I had a serious case of the jitters. C'mon, a girl can't be expected to deal with more than one creepy thing a day, right? I wasn't so sure if I still had the nerve to go down to the pit of screams or hell or whatever was down there. But Jake had already morphed a lizard and it'd be stupid to stop now... at least, that's what I told myself.

(Alright, let's go. Just follow me.) Jake said, sounding not at all pleased about heading back to the janitor's closet of doom. I nodded and I guess Jake saw it. Either that or he wanted to get it over with before he backed out of it, the same as me. The lizard-boy took off under the door, and I followed. How bizarre was this? I was ditching class and following a talking lizard, who'd been my friend Jake moments before, down the hall and into the janiter's closet where there was a threatening door leaking screams and sounding like it was the portal to hell. Couldn't get any weirder, could it?

Anyway, I followed Mr. Bond to the janiter's closet.

(Just wait here. I'm going to go and demorph, then unlock the door for you.) Jake said as he scurried under it. I was just glad I didn't have to witness his morph this time. Ighhh, that was so gross! I glanced up and down the hallway, nervous that a hall monitor would find me and march me off to class. Man, this would have been so much simpler at my old school. We didn't have the idiot hall monitors to worry about.

A few minutes of nervous pacing later, Jake finally opened the door. My teeth were completely on edge because I could hear a pair of teachers talking just around the corner. I slammed past him and knocked loose a few brooms. Muttering a curse, I tried frantically to keep them from hitting the door Jake had just shut. No, I had no anxiety issues whatsoever, of course not!

"Sari? Are you okay?" Jake whispered with concern.

"Just peachy," I replied in a pissed 'what-are-you-an-idiot?' tone. I felt as though if I waited any longer, I'd just say forget it and leave. That couldn't happen. "So where's this door?"

Jake studied the wall for a minute with a contemplative look on his face. He reached for the sink, twisted the faucet to the left, then a hook to the right. The wall swung inwards.

"Oh, how terrifying," I said sarcastically, trying to hide the growing fear that was telling me to run in a yammering, screaming mess out of the cramped closet. But that's because I was about to face the worst fear of all: the unknown. "I'm so frightened! A hidden door in the janitor's closet wall. This isn't TOO weird-"

"Shhh! Listen." Jake said. I took his advice, shut up, and listened. The sounds drifting up from the pool were not so very comforting. There were definitely screams. Horrified, terrified screams. People crying out in despair, sobbing. I could hear a child calling for his or her mommy. Maniacal laughter assaulted me ears and I glanced at Jake. Our eyes met; we were both scared shitless.

"No way in hell I'm chickening out," I said like it was just some sort of stupid dare. Just a stupid dare, nothing more. False bravado. Right. "Come on, let's go see what we're up against, Mr. Bond!" Skipping down the stairs with a mock-jovial expression playing across my face, I prayed that he'd follow. I knew that I didn't want to go in there alone, that was for damned sure. After a few moments I heard his footsteps starting down after me, and I let out a sigh of relief. Of course, the sensation was short lived as a piercing female scream assaulted my ears. Despite my concern that I'd get Jake killed, I didn't want to go down there alone. We started walking down the steps, side by side. They were really steep, and uber long. The walls were dirt at first, but soon we were seeing layers of rock, granite, sandstone, all that jazz.

"How much further do you think?" I asked nervously.

"How should I know?" Jake snapped back. "Like I've been down here before!" Guess I wasn't the only one who was edgy. The rock walls suddenly widened revealing a huge, and I mean GINORMOUS, cavern. I've never seen anything so huge. Hell, it was bigger than the super Walmart my dad had found and was so happy about. They probably could have built about eight of them and still have room for a couple of super bowl games. That's including the screaming fans, too. It was absolutely nuts! Except these screams weren't of the happy fans of the Super Bowl. They were of terror and desperation.

I surveyed the room and didn't see any devices of torture. No Iron Maidens or Judas' Cradles or head vices. I let out a breath I didn't even realize I was holding and sent silent thanks to the Elf-God. At least the Yeerks realized that total and complete slavery was cruel enough. Either that or... an unwelcome thought tickled my brain. Either that, or they don't want to damage their... hosts.

While the devices of torture were mercifully absent, there were cages... lots of cages with people jammed into them, and a few stronger ones where Hork-Bajir paced and howled. So that's where the inhuman screams were coming from, and also from the people being forced down the docks in the middle of the sludgy lake... The Yeerk Pool. Just as Tobias had said. I watched, horrified, as a Hork-Bajir dragged a child who couldn't have been any older than four down one of the narrow pier. He forced her blonde ringlets under that nasty sludge with his clawed hand. She tried to beat against him; she was struggling so valiantly! And then slowly, she stopped struggling. Her limbs slackened and the alien beside her helped her to her feet. Then the little girl laughed. She laughed!

I felt sick. This place was so massive, crawling with vermin and aliens of types I couldn't even begin to guess at… How could we possibly destroy something like this? We were only six kids! Six kids against a city teeming with aliens?? Not even if hell froze over could we win.

"We are so screwed." I whispered. Jake simply stared with the same look of horror that must have been written on my face. It was hard to take in.

"It's just like Tobias said," Jake commented.

"And that doesn't make you suspicious... why?" I asked skeptically. I didn't trust Tobias. "I saw visions, the alien gave them to me!" I mimicked in a high squeaky voice. "In my humble opinion, that's a damned weak excuse."

"I don't..." Jake looked around again. I could almost hear the gears grinding in his brain. "I guess you could be right. It'd be a lot easier to get us here, wouldn't it?" He admitted grudgingly. I felt first triumphant, and then a little sick. What if I was wrong about Tobias? There were just too many suspicious things he'd said, but even so...

Well, hey. I'd already managed to piss off both Rachel and Marco, why not add a third to the list? Besides, he'll understand. Right? It's for the safety of the group... At least, that's what I told myself. I wasn't so sure he'd be understanding. I knew that I wouldn't be.

Hesitantly, I took the last few remaining steps to the earth floor below. Jake grabbed for my arm, but I shrugged out of it and glared at him. I just wanted a closer look, that's all. Besides, I didn't see anyone near here...

"Sari!" Jake hissed at me. "We've seen enough, let's go!"

((A.N.--and this is where my writer's block took over! If anyone has any ideas as to where I should take this, please let me know. Because I'm really quite stuck for where I am right now. Dang it!))