Mission Accomplished
Disclaimer: I do not own Animorphs.
"Let's take a vote," Rachel said.
"I vote we live long enough to get driver's licenses," Marco said.
-Animorphs #1.
Marco burst into Cassie's barn one day triumphantly holding a little card in his hand. "This is the greatest day of my life."
Rachel tossed her hair behind her shoulders. "What, did you finally convince some poor unsuspecting airhead of going out with you? Cassie, you should do something."
"Me?" Cassie asked, looking surprised to be dragged into this. "Why is this in any way my responsibility?"
The three of us had been working on homework and, shockingly, that kind of thing bored Tobias and Ax easily so they weren't there. Ax might not have been so bored if we let him tell us everything he knew about the subjects he'd read about (too damn much), ask us every little detail that we usually didn't know about the things he hadn't, and 'correct' our right answers because human science got them wrong. Needless to say, it was probably for the best he wasn't there.
"Airheads are people, too, and people are animals which means that it's your job to protect them," Rachel explained.
Cassie just shook her head. "You know what, Rachel? How about I delegate?"
"Good idea," Rachel replied. "Jake, you're up."
"Right, first order of business is coming up with a name," I said dryly. "I was thinking People for the Ethical Treatment of Airheads but PETA's taking. You'll have to get back to me."
"You people are useless," Rachel said disgustedly.
Marco looked up from stroking his card long enough to say, "I don't have a date, Rachel. Yet. Although with this, it's really only a matter of time."
"Jake," Rachel said sweetly, "brainstorm faster."
"I'm working on it," I assured her lazily.
Marco was looking expectantly at me.
"Why is this the greatest day of your life, Marco?" I asked obligingly.
Marco beamed. "So glad that you asked, Jake. As it happens, as of…" he trailed off, glancing at his watch. "Thirty-seven minutes ago I am the proud owner of one California-issued drivers license!"
Rachel started. "Oh dear God…"
"The roads aren't safe anymore," I agreed.
"My dad saw a car commercial that reminded him of what Marco did to his truck and I swear that he was tearing up," Cassie added.
Marco glared at us. "You guys are the worst friends ever."
"I think we could be a lot worse," Rachel argued.
"How?" Marco challenged.
"Well, we could be the kind of friends that talk you into joining the Sharing," Rachel pointed out.
"Yeah, but-" Marco cut himself off and sighed. "You're right. But you're still terrible friends. How about a little congratulations here?"
"Congratulations," I said belatedly.
"Pretend you mean it," Marco instructed.
"Congratulations, Marco. This is a really big thing," Cassie said, managing to sound almost sincere.
"Oh, come on, what's the deal?" Marco complained. "When you three got your licenses everyone was thrilled for you! I know that I was thrilled for you even as I secretly resented you for getting it before I did."
"Well yeah, but…" I hesitated. "Rachel? You want to take this one?"
"Gladly," Rachel said, nodding. "Marco, you're a terrible driver and we feel less safe living in a world where you have a license. It's also costing us a great deal of faith in humanity to think that someone actually passed you."
"We live in a world with Yeerks," Marco said flatly.
"So don't you agree that we really don't need to have any more worries?" Rachel asked logically.
"Me being able to drive is not a worry!" Marco protested.
I held my hand up and placed my thumb and forefinger very close together. "It's a little bit of a worry."
"You also didn't manage to get your license until three months after I got it and my birthday and Jake's come after yours," Cassie pointed out.
"I was busy!" Marco insisted.
"We're all busy," I reminded him. "We're usually all busy at the same time, too. And yet somehow, we all found the time."
"Okay, so I could do better with time management," Marco said shrugging. "That still doesn't mean that I'm a bad driver."
"No, but what you did to my dad's car might," Cassie told him.
Marco made a face. "Oh, come on, Cassie! We were getting chased by a giant tornado monster from hell!"
Cassie titled her head. "I thought that was Saturn."
"Oh, what's the difference?" Marco asked flippantly.
"I'm not even going to touch that one," Rachel said, holding her hands up as if to shield her from the offending question.
"Well how about this one?" Marco demanded. "If you guys thinks I'm such a horrible driver then why do you always have me drive during the missions? Especially after you guys all got licenses?"
We all looked at each other blankly. It was a damn good question. The truth was that at first Marco and I were the only ones who had so much as played a driving game and Marco was better than I was. Not that that really translated well into actual driving, as it turned out. Over the years, we just sort of got used to him being the driver even if he wasn't very good at it.
"Your gorilla morph has a far better chance of actually driving something than any of our morphs," I came up with finally. "And we have to drive in morph or we might get recognized or at least ruin the illusion that we're Andalites."
Rachel and Cassie nodded enthusiastically now that we had an excuse to cling to.
Marco looked unimpressed. "Yeah, you guys can go acquire a gorilla morph anytime you want to. It's not like there's some sort of limit on how many morphs you can have."
"That we know of," Cassie pointed out.
"True," Marco conceded. "And knowing our luck we'll find out at the worst possible moment. But you'd think Ax would have mentioned it."
"Since nobody on the Andalite home world apparently ever morphs," I said, thinking of all those Andalites above Leera who had needlessly died because not a one of them had a sufficiently small morph, "how would they really know?"
"Still, you'd think Visser Three would know," Rachel remarked. "We've never seen him morph the same thing twice."
"Why would he feel the need to share that information, even if he did find a limit?" Marco asked.
Cassie shrugged. "To let us know that our wonderful Andalite technology has its limits?"
"And besides, Marco, even without a morphing limit we still can't possibly go and acquire a gorilla," Rachel claimed.
Marco raised an eyebrow and crossed his arms. "Because…?"
"That would require us to actually prepare for things ahead of time," Rachel responded, sounding perfectly serious. "And after all this time I think it's clear that we don't believe in that."
"Hey!" I objected.
"Oh, it's not your fault," Rachel assured me. "None of us do. That's why we've been stranded in the arctic with no cold-weather morph, stranded in the ocean with no salt-water morph, went to the Yeerk Pool and Cassie only had a horse and Tobias a cat and a hawk, stranded at the-"
"Okay, okay, I get it," I hastily cut her off. "Do you guys think we should, you know, acquire morphs in advance so these kinds of things don't keep happening to us?"
Marco shrugged. "It's kind of a pain to hit the Gardens and, knowing our luck, these kinds of things would still happen to us."
"But they might happen less often," I pointed out.
"I wouldn't count on it," Marco disagreed.
"In my defense," Cassie spoke up, "if I hadn't been kidnapped and dragged to the Yeerk Pool that one time I would have acquired a wolf or something."
"Sure you would have," Marco said, clearly not believing her.
"I would have! A horse was really not the best choice there. I was kind of useless for anything but trampling people and riding," Cassie replied.
"Hey, I just remembered something!" Rachel said, snapping her fingers. "Isn't this your third time taking the driving exam?"
Marco shot me a dirty look. "Traitor," he muttered.
I stared back unrepentantly. "What? It was hilarious."
"I have to agree with Jake here," Cassie told him.
"Those two times weren't my fault!" Marco exclaimed.
"I would really like to see how you figure that one," Rachel said, amused.
"The first time my permit expired before I finished the fifty hours and so I couldn't practice anymore. I'm lucky that that time all I failed because of was my inability to back up around a corner," Marco announced.
"And that's not your fault because…?" I prompted.
Marco made a face. "Well, okay, maybe the fact I let my permit expire was sort of my fault. But I've been busy!"
"If you didn't renew your permit and hadn't gotten your fifty hours, how could you get your license?" Cassie inquired.
"My dad doesn't read my driving log when he signs off on it," Marco explained.
"Marco," Cassie said disapprovingly.
"What?" he asked innocently. "I passed!"
"Eventually," Rachel muttered.
"Why is backing up around a corner even on the damn test?" Marco demanded. "When has anybody in the history of ever needed to back up around a corner?"
"Um…U-Turns, maybe?" I guessed. "I know that I haven't."
"Me either," Rachel admitted.
"Not me," Cassie said.
"Thank you," Marco said, sounding satisfied.
"But what about your other failure?" Rachel asked, smirking.
Marco closed his eyes. "That driving instructor was such a bitch!"
"What happened?" Cassie asked curiously.
"Okay, so there I was practically hyperventilating trying to do everything perfectly," Marco revealed. "I had practiced backing up around a corner until I could – and did – do it with my eyes closed."
"That's safe," I deadpanned.
"Not during the test," Marco clarified as if that made it any better. "And then when it was over she turned to me and said that I would have passed with flying colors except that when I was leaving the DMV, my very first stoplight caused me to fail. Not even thirty seconds into the test she failed me and then still made me take the damn thing. I hate her."
"Why did you fail?" I prompted him.
Marco muttered something unintelligible.
"We don't speak gibberish, Marco," Rachel said helpfully.
Marco rolled his eyes. "I said 'I turned right on red when another car was barely visible in the distance.'"
"That doesn't seem like a good reason to fail someone," Cassie said, frowning.
"That's what I said. Apparently I was being unsafe. My third time, I sat there at the stoplight even though no one was coming for what must have been five minutes just to make sure not to give the guy an excuse to fail me," Marco said grimly. "Besides, it really didn't matter if I'd passed that time or not because no one was able to get a license by the time I got back from my second attempt because one of the other people taking the test had driven their car into one of those poles with the electricity. Whateverthose are called."
"See?" Cassie said encouragingly. "It could have been much worse."
"Well, I'm not sure about much," I replied. "You're right, though, that it definitely could have been worse."
"Mitigating circumstances or not, the fact you failed three times is still significant," Rachel declared.
Marco appeared not to hear her. "And thus, this is the greatest day of my life. I really never thought that this moment would come, you know?"
"Neither did we," I assured him. "Or at least, we hoped that it wouldn't."
"Do you guys remember back before we even agreed to do any of this?" Marco asked suddenly.
None of us had to ask what 'this' was.
"We were voting on if we should join the Animorphs or not – but that was before I came up with the name – and my vote was to live long enough to get our drivers' licenses. And folks, that day is today," Marco said proudly.
"Huh," I said. I couldn't really remember that but evidently it had really been a priority for Marco. Not enough of a priority to just do the fifty hours but a priority nevertheless. "Good for us."
"Can you believe we've been at this for three years?" Cassie said thoughtfully. "It doesn't feel like it's been that long."
"It feels like it's been forever," Rachel said, offering a differing opinion.
"Now I can die fulfilled," Marco said dramatically, kissing his license. He glanced suspiciously at me. "Not that that gives you license to get me killed!"
"What?" I demanded. "Seriously, you guys have no faith in me."
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