Chapter 6
We paired up. Rachel was with Cassie, I was with Jake, Tobias was with Ax. Then, we flipped coins to decide who would morph.
"Heads!" I called. Jake flipped the coin. I didn't see Lincoln. Jake was happy. "Two out of three?" I begged.
"Sorry buddy," Jake responded, "You get to be a slug."
"Hey, Marco," Rachel said, "Won't be too bad. Not a big change for you."
"Very funny," I muttered. "You get off easy. Cassie already has a Yeerk, so you're home free. Cassie, could you please find some embarrassing memories or something?" I growled. "Where is that slug?"
"Over here," Erek said, "In this bucket of water."
Tobias and I had 'lost'. Although, who knows? Is it better to be a Yeerk or a Controller? He perched on the edge of the bucket, and I stuck my hand into the warm water. The slug was down pretty deep. I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, grabbed, then acquired the Yeerk. I lifted it out of the water so that Tobias could touch it.
"All right, what now?" I asked.
"It's about 2:15." Erek said. "We don't want you guys to morph yet, in case anything happens down there. We want to give you as much spare time as possible. I have to go get 'my father'. He agreed to help. You guys wait here for us. We'll be back soon." He started to walk away, then turned. "You might want to try morphing the Yeerk so you can get used to it." He said. Then he left.
"Just so you guys know, I most assuredly do not want to morph a Yeerk to practice," I said, "But I will."
Ditto. Tobias said.
"I've already done it," Cassie said, "But it's been a while, so I'll do it again." To Tobias and I she said, "Do you want to know what to expect?"
"No," I responded, "No I definitely do not want to know."
I began the morph. The first thing that happened was that my skin turned gray and was covered with this disgusting slime. Not like slug slime, where only the underside is covered, but all over slime. It covered my eyes, and I was glad. I didn't want to see what happened. I didn't want to see my friends' faces as they watched. Next, I felt all my bones dissolve, and I sunk to the ground. My normal human insides also dissolved and I was kind of filled with slime. There were a few startling seconds when my lungs and heart disappeared, and I was sure I would die. My arms were sucked in and my legs twisted together. Finally I shrank, and the morph was complete.
AAAAAHHHHH!!! I screamed , AAAAHHH! Oh, Aah! My skin is drying up! This is not good! Help! Someone!
We were all undergoing the same problem, but only Cassie knew what to do. It also didn't help that I couldn't here or see anything because I had no ears and eyes.
Jake! Cassie screamed, Rachel! Ax! Someone! Put us in the bucket of water!
I felt myself being lifted, then set down again, and my skin stopped burning. Okay, that was so not fun! I said. Then, Jake? I guess I'm ready when you are… Uh, Cassie? Tobias? We should decide who goes first. I mean, we can't exactly tell people apart… We decided Cassie would go first, then me, then Tobias. I felt vibrations as something large went into the water. It was removed, then something else was put in.
Marco? Cassie said, That thing in the water is Jake's head. Swim towards it, then let the Yeerk take over.
Okay. I responded. Here goes.
Stretch-scrunch. Stretch-scrunch. I swam until I felt something that could have been an ear. I felt around until I found an opening and crawled in. I secreted numbing slime to the ear canal. Stretch-scrunch. Stretch-scrunch. I crawled to the brain. It was tingly with electricity. I stretched and squished my body into the nooks and crannies of Jake's brain. I lifted my host's head out of the water and looked around the barn through his eyes. I heard a noise.
Marco? It's Jake.
Irrelevant. Block out the host. Search his memories and find the way to act like him. Try moving the legs. Walking. The arms. Talking.
Marco it's Cassie. Listen to me. I know Yeerk instincts are subtle, but they're strong at first. Control your morph, not your host.
What? Huh? Oh, yeah. I'm okay now. I said. I relaxed my hold on the host body and let Jake take over again. I felt bad for Jake. This must be hard for him. He'd already been a controller once. Without thinking, I lifted Jake's hand to his eyes and focused on the watch. 2:30.
"We've been in morph about 10 minutes," I said using Jake's voice. "Erek and Mr. King should be back soon."
Marco! Jake said, Relax! Let me do the controlling. It's my body.
Oh, right. Sorry dude, I said. Have at it.
Right then, Erek walked in the door.
Erek? I said, Where's Mr. King?
Erek shimmered, then two 'people' stood where.
"Hi guys!" Erek said, "Did I fool you?"
"Sure did," Rachel/Cassie said.
"Where is everyone?" Erek asked.
Well, I said, I'm in Jake, Cassie's in Rachel, and Tobias is in Ax. Speaking of which, we should probably demorph now.
I walked Jake over to the bucket, turned his head sideways, and slithered out. I demorphed. Tobias/Ax and Rachel/Cassie did the same.
"Eyes!" I said, "Legs! Arms! Ears!"
I was happily ranting about how glad I was to be human again, when Erek said, "Sorry to burst your bubble, Marco, but it's 2:45. You all need to morph back so we can leave."
"I knew it!" I said. "It always works that way."
I morphed back to slimeball and crawled into Jake's ear.
What now? I asked. I mean, we don't exactly know the nearest Yeerk pool entrance.
"That's easy," Erek said, "New community center's locker rooms. Jake, Tobias, Marco, Ax, I can show you guys. Rachel, Cassie, just watch some true controllers. They'll know the way."
Ax morphed to human and we left. We all knew where the community center was, so we spread out, trying to seem inconspicuous. I tried to slow Jake's walking a little without him noticing, but he did.
Marco, quit!
What? Come on, I'm just trying to delay my death by a few minutes at best.
This was your idea.
Did I ever say it was a good one? I just said it was practical. I checked the watch. Five of 3:00. Good.
We were nearing the community center. I said to Jake/myself, "This is it." And we walked in.
Chapter 7
I followed everyone else down the stairs to the boys' locker room. (Jake had let me take over for a while. Yeerk instincts are pretty subtle, but very strong, like Cassie said. It was hard not to take over.) I walked into a door in the back corner of the locker room and through the Gleet Biofilter. No problem.
I said to Jake, Now, I won't say we're invincible, because that would be like writing my death sentence. But I will say we made it through the first obstacle. Now all we have to do is get out of the regeneration line, get me out of here, prepare for battle morphs, find out where the sensor thing is being built, destroy it, and save the world!
Marco, Jake said, You know why I like you so much?
My good looks? My humor? My charm?
Your optimism. Lets get going.
Finally, our chance came. We broke from the line and wandered back behind one of the storage sheds where we couldn't be seen. I turned my, I mean Jake's head, and slithered out. I began to demorph. The first thing that happened this time was my eyes. I did not like having to watch me emerge from a Yeerk. The expression on Jake's face definitely did not help. So far, everything went as planned and no firepower was needed. Rachel was bummed. This was too easy and we all knew it.
Erek/Tom was going to the re-infestation pier… He successfully got Tom's Yeerk… Then I realized my deadly mistake and mentally kicked myself all the way to Australia. Mr. King/Erek had the real Tom contained in his hologram. Sooner or later, he would have to be 're-infested.' There was no way Tom could be holographically covered with Mr. King across the room. Now I realized an even more serious problem. Once Tom was re-infested, the Yeerks would know about the Chee. Chee are strong, but a dracon beam could still probably take them out. We couldn't let that happen. We needed the Chee. The Chee provided us with information. They were powerful allies. Without them, we wouldn't have survived this long.
I motioned to Jake. "I need to talk," I whispered, "We can't let them hear. Morph cockroach, or something that wouldn't seem unusual here. It's the best way."
Jake saw how frantic and pale I was and nodded. I morphed and he morphed. As soon as he was through, I explained to him what I just explained to you. I could sense his growing terror. I was sure he had already sensed mine. We've got to find the others. I concluded. I'm going to call them. Rachel?! Cassie?! Tobias?! Ax?! If any of you can hear me, this is Marco. We've got a problem. Morph something small and inconspicuous. We need to thought speak.
A few minutes later, they all responded. Jake explained our predicament.
Well, duh. Rachel said. We go over there, bust open the cage, grab Tom and Mr. King, then run!
Oh, yeah, good idea Rachel! I said, Let's go show the Yeerks where we are so they don't even have to try and find us before they kill us! I was mad. I've found that people do have a tendency to be mad when they make mistakes that will probably cost them their lives.
Maybe morph Hork-Bajir and pretend to be the guards preparing to take him over for re-infestation but instead… No, that wouldn't work… I tried to think, but I was brain-locked. Rachel was the one who usually came up with on the spot plans, but right then, she wasn't.
One thing I do know, I said, Is that we have to free Tom. It's really our only option if we still want to be able to have the Chee help us. Now we have to figure out how to do that and still get him, us and Mr. King out of here alive.
And how exactly do you suggest that we do that? Rachel demanded.
Watch me, Rachel. You'll like my idea. Mr. King! I called out, When they come to re-infest you, have Tom walk behind you. Explain just enough to keep him quiet. We'll try to charge in and nab you both, then go up the stairs. It might work, but it's dangerous. We have no choice.
He couldn't respond. I could only hope he could hear me and would do it.
All right guys. Jake said, If we're going to do this, we need to do it now. Everyone, morph something with firepower and hope they haven't already taken Mr. King!
We morphed out then morphed again. Jake morphed tiger, I morphed gorilla and we looked toward the cages. Mr. King was still there, but right then, a human-controller and two Hork-Bajir were walking towards his cage. The human began to unlock the cage.
Get ready… Jake warned. ….NOW!
We charged toward the cages. The Hork-Bajir were startled. Everyone was. They had no reason to expect us. A wolf leapt at the throat of a Hork-Bajir. And Andalite tail flew and the remaining Hork was now headless. His tail flew again, and the controller slumped to the ground, unconscious.
Poor guy. He was out cold before he had time to lock the cage again. A stream of freed human controllers poured out. They weren't afraid of us. Every Yeerk on Earth knows of the Andalite Bandits and the hosts find out about them through their Yeerks. Some of the humans even tried to break into the storage sheds and grab the dracon beams.
I grabbed Mr. King, Tom, and one of the humans in a big old gorilla hug.
Suddenly, a wave of controllers armed with dracon beams appeared. Taxxons charged in. The freed humans were being recaptured by Hork-Bajir and stuffed into the cage again.
The tide was turning and we were losing. Cassie was near a shed and was limping behind it, blood streaming from a gash in her side. Rachel was surrounded by Hork-Bajir, standing on her hind legs and flailing her grizzly bear arms in an effort to ward them off. Ax's tail was flying wildly as he moved toward Rachel, trying to help her. Tobias was swooping down on Hork-Bajir, raking at their eyes, hoping to slow or stop them. I didn't even see Jake.
Then, he appeared. I didn't even see him at first but I could sense him. We heard him laugh, a deep, evil laugh.
Ha-Ha-ha! Welcome back, my Andalite friends! Things have been so quiet here without you. You know, I was just thinking the other day how nice it would be to have you come visit. His voice turned low and menacing. I wanted to show you my new morph.
He began to morph a hideous creature. It stood probably ten feet tall on six, long, tree trunk legs. It's skin was a bright red-orange and was thick and pebbly like a crocodile. It had no torso, but atop the legs was a thick, triangular box with hollow, spear shaped tubes covering its sides. At the front of the body were the eyes. They appeared to be covered with thick glass domes, like the cameras at a grocery store, only it wasn't dark, but a misty blue.
Suddenly, one of the hollow spears shot out at Ax. He dodged, and the spear missed hitting him by a hair.
Oh, too bad I missed. You would have enjoyed watching how fast this poison works. I doubt that you Andalite fools would even have enough time to demorph before you were killed. It certainly killed enough Hork-Bajir when they tried to capture it so that I could acquire it! I'll be sure not to disappoint you next time.
Chapter 8
Now, Visser 1 was joined by two more aliens who snuck up behind him. They were similar in shape to Hork-Bajir without blades. Their feet were webbed and there were tentacles coming out of their 'hands' not fingers. Their coal-black skin was stretched tighter than a drum. They looked like almost harmless stick figures. There were two, forward-raking black horns with very sharp looking points on their foreheads. They stood as tall as the Visser, if not slightly taller. They were armed with shredders.
Abruptly, one of the aliens' mouth opened revealing a glowing royal-blue mouth. A stream of acid shot at the Visser. He screamed in agony. He behind him and prepared to shoot a spear at them. They had seemingly disappeared. Then, from the ceiling, two more streams of acid pierced his thick hide. These creatures had suction cups on their webbed feet and tentacles.
The creatures shot at some nearby Hork-Bajir with their shredders and sent acid streams flying. We didn't know who or what they were, but they didn't seem to be threatening us.
Aximili! one of them called, Jake, Rachel, Cassie, Marco, Tobias! We have come to assist you!
Laria? Yarin? Jake asked.
Yes, we are here, Yarin said, It appeared as though you had need of our assistance.
But how did you- Wait, never mind. Tell me later. We're a bit busy right now, Jake said. There was a loud roar as Jake attacked an oncoming Hork-Bajir.
Jake, buddy, I said, We've got to get out of here while we still can! I don't know how long I'll be able to hold onto Mr. King and Tom and still be alive.
Right, Jake replied. We'll run for the stairs as soon as we can. Marco, go to the stairs and send Mr. King and Tom up. If we're lucky, everyone will be too busy to notice…
Oh no…. I realized, Oh man. The Gleet Biofilter will still zap them and us on the way out!
Ax, would shredder fire disable the Biofilter? Jake demanded.
It should be able to, yes. Ax said.
Laria! Yarin! One of you get to the top of the stairs and fire at the Gleet Biofilter! Jake yelled.
They didn't respond, but I saw one of the aliens bolt for the stairs.
TSEEEEWWWW! TSEEEEWWWW! KABOOOOOMMM!!!!
There were two blasts followed by a loud boom as the Biofilter and part of the entrance exploded. Rocks and debris tumbled down the staircase. I wondered if the alien would be all right.
I climbed up the hill of debris, still holding Tom and Mr. King. I set them down almost at the top of the stairs and they went out. I assumed Mr. King would go someplace quiet and safe and project another hologram that would make it look like they weren't there.
I charged back down the hill, scraping and cutting my feet and knuckles. Jake had called the order to back off and retreat. Ax was on his way toward the hill. Visser 1 had disappeared. Rachel was limping hurriedly and painfully toward me. It looked like her hip had been partially smashed. Jake was missing most of his tail and had a gash on his back and was struggling away from the scene.
One alien was already at the top of the staircase, pushing aside the rubble that had collapsed onto him/her. The other was crawling along the side of the domed ceiling.
I couldn't see Cassie… Wait. There she was. A wolf had collapsed near the base of a storage shed and was lying there unconscious. Hork-Bajir were dragging it toward one of the cages. I knuckle-ran over to the scene and gave them each a massive gorilla punch. They went down and stayed there. I lifted the wolf as gently as I could, and raced for the hill. I could only hope she wasn't dead. There were no extremely severe injuries as far as I could tell…
Chapter 9
I actually made it up the hill alive. Of course, I did have a couple dracon beam wounds on my back and hind legs, and I was barely able to move, the pain was so severe, but I was alive.
I looked around, but there was no sign of my friends. I searched every room, calling their names. Finally, I heard thought speak. It was kind of faint, but I could hear it.
Marco! It said, This is Jake. Where are you?
I'm over by the entrance to the swimming pool, I called, Where are you?!
Over at the other end of the building. Some conference room. There's a hallway that runs all the way around the perimeter of the pool. Keep following it. You'll find us eventually..
I kept walking poking my head in at every doorway, hoping I wouldn't collapse before I reached them. Finally, someone announced, in thought speak of course, that they saw me. I dragged myself into the room, set Cassie down, and began to demorph. Mr. King covered me with the hologram. At least Cassie was still breathing.
Jake, I said as I morphed. We've got to get her to demorph. I don't know how much time she has left. I think they- Here I had to stop speaking as I crossed the theoretical line that separates thought speak from normal speech.
"Ax," Jake demanded, "How much time does she have?"
I am not exactly sure.. Ax said. At best it would be about seven minutes. She had to remorph shortly into the battle due to a wound. I was not even sure if Marco would be able to demorph. He had less than thirty seconds to spare.
I nearly collapsed. I had made it out of morph by only thirty seconds?
"Jake, I think they might have stunned her. It doesn't look like there are any really serious wounds," I said, "She's probably been out for a good ten, fifteen minutes. Now we just have to figure out how to get her to wake up.
We didn't have to wait long, however, until the wolf stirred. Both the wolf and Cassie moaned, Oooohhh, oh, ow. Ow. Ow. She didn't need anyone to tell her to demorph.
After the initial, "Yay! Cassie's alive and not stuck as a wolf!," the small smooch between Jake and Cassie that they pretended no one saw, etc. Jake said, "Well, so far so good. We're all alive and well. We are out of the sludge pit. We did a good amount of damage. Now we need to talk with Erek and see if he has the information we need. Oh, and one more thing. Laria, Yarin, thanks. We probably would not be alive right now if you hadn't shown up when you did."
"But what I want to know," I said, "Is where you got that morph. Cassie said you didn't have any powerful morphs."
Cassie looked embarrassed. "Um, well, I didn't exactly ask. I guess I just kind of assumed they didn't. When Ax arrived, he didn't have any morphs except for a Kafit bird," she pointed out.
"Yeah, well, you could have at least asked them," I said, "But, I guess it turned out for the best."
Laria answered my initial question, We acquired this morph on one of our moons, Sankor. When we prepared to come here, we stopped there to acquire this morph and one other. We thought they might be useful. . It is called a Zakriem. Sankor turns very slowly, leaving one side dark for months at a time. This is where the Zakriem live. When the planet has turned so that they are in brightness once more, the Zakriem merely migrate to the darkness again. They really are fascinating creatures to study.
"Right," I said. "Fascinating."
"Anyway," Jake said, "We agreed to meet Erek at the barn as soon as we could, so I guess we should head over there if you're ready."
I noticed Tom, sitting quietly in the corner. I knew how he must feel. I'd watched my dad get told. He was shocked to say the least. Tom seemed pretty cool, though. I guess it was because he already knew about the Yeerks and the 'Andalite Bandits.' I imagine what was most shocking was to find out that his little brother was the one doing the damage and leading the fight against the Yeerks.
"What about me?" Tom asked. "Will you let me help in some way? Any way, anything to help in this fight. We've got to win. We have no choice."
It interested me how Tom automatically figured himself into the equation. It was 'we' no questions asked. Our team had grown by three in only a day. Jake said, "Tom, if you want to help, you can. You certainly have enough reasons. We'll discuss it at Cassie's barn. Mr. King? You take Tom covered by a hologram out a back entrance or something so that the Yeerks won't see. We'll morph fly and follow you. Once we're out, take Tom to the barn. We'll fly ahead and meet you there."
"I can do that," Mr. King said.
It was now about 3:30 AM. I couldn't help but wonder if Jake would let us stop at Starbucks on the way over to the barn…
Mr. King decided to project a Hork-Bajir. If anything happened, he could pretend to be a controller searching for the Andalite bandits. Once, another Hork-Bajir came by, but it saw nothing unusual about more than one Hork-Bajir searching the place for us.
Once we were outside, we flew behind a dumpster, demorphed, and remorphed as owls. Mr. King projected a dump truck around Tom and himself.
We flew in silence, trying to gather our thoughts together and recuperate from the battle. We were all exhausted. My thoughts were jumbled. Two Andalites, Tom free, morph, demorph, remorph, do it again, try to get out alive… It had been a long night.
Chapter 10
I'd love to say I solved all our problems on the trip to the barn, but, truthfully, I wasn't much help. None of us really were. We just flew and tried to stay awake.
What are we going to do about Tom? Rachel asked, unnecessarily. We all knew what we were thinking about.
I don't really know… Jake said slowly.
We'd just had a long ordeal with David, the only other person besides Ax, to be added to our original group. He had not been interested in helping us, and tried to kill all of us. Making Tom an Animorph was the most obvious choice, but after what we'd been through, we weren't exactly excited about the thought.
Oh man! I yelled, We did it again! Every single plan just gets-
Jake cut me off. Marco. he said in a very leader-like tone, What. Is. It??
Apparently, Cassie realized it too.
Oh, great. The Yeerks don't know Tom is free, but they'll definitely suspect when Tom's Yeerk doesn't come for a feeding. They'll grab him again, and we're doomed. She said it so matter-of-factly that it only made things worse. The only thing I can see us doing is pretending to kill Tom, and have him live with the Hork-Bajir like Marco's Mom and Dad.
I can't see any other option either, Jake said slowly, But I'd sure love to discover some other, less painful plan… I mean, I wouldn't exactly want to put my parents through that. Besides, how exactly would we pull it off?
I was pretty sure that at this point, Cassie was privately talking to Jake, trying to cheer him up and comfort him. Cassie's like that.
I waited a little while, then decided to break up the mushy moment. Okay people! Back to business! I have a few ideas.
Go ahead, Jake said.
I said, Okay. Tom's "death" has to be silent, with no body, like my mom. Tom doesn't go boating, so that's out. He could theoretically get lost in the woods on a hike or campfire, but eventually, they'd have to find something. A fire of some sort would work. But how? We wouldn't want to do arson and burn your house down or something. What about his car?
Jake replied, Okay. I had you for a while there, but as far as his car is concerned, what in the world are you talking about!?
We crash his car late at night, then burn it! If it's done in a remote enough area, no one would see. Then, the car would be like, totally burned and they'd think that he'd burned up!
That might work, Cassie said cautiously.
No, no, it really would! I said, Tom's 'Yeerk' needs to regenerate on what, Wednesday? So we could just make it seem like his Yeerk put off regeneration for some reason or other till the last minute. At like, one in the morning, Tom could leave the house and drive the back route to a Yeerk pool entrance. In the woods on a remote street he could have a crash for some reason. They'd probably assume he swerved to miss a deer. The car could slam some trees on the edge of the woods. After Tom was out and safe, we'd put a match on some newspaper left on the seat and light it. Eventually, the rest of the car would burn, too.
Well, Jake said carefully, Tom will definitely not be happy about burning his car.
Does this mean we're going for it?
Yeah. I guess it does.
When should we do it?
I think we'll talk with Tom and Erek, then decide. Besides, we're just about to the barn, Jake said.
We landed in the barn and demorphed. Erek was waiting for us, but Tom and Mr. King hadn't arrived yet.
Everyone said hello, then we waited for Tom and Mr. King. It took them a good half hour or more to get here, but I didn't mind. Neither did anyone else. Some of us dozed off. Since all these changes began in the Yeerk conquest, we've hardly gotten any sleep. Generally, three to four hours on a good night. Needless to say, grades are down, parents displeased, and exhaustion is the norm. Even though I can't go to school, Dad has me copy and do most of Jake's homework then check my answers against his. Ugh.
I awoke sputtering and coughing as Rachel dumped a bucket of brutally cold water on me. After she did so, she smiled sweetly.
"Good morning, sleepy-head!" she said mockingly.
"Whatever happened to sugar and spice?" I muttered angrily.
"Children?" Jake said, "Please sit down and listen to the teacher. We don't approve of fighting in school."
I sneered at Rachel, then moved to a dry seat.
"All right," Jake said. "First thing on the agenda…Tom." He turned toward him. "The Yeerks still think you're a controller. That's good. It gives us three days to work something out." He hesitated, then continued, "Well, we had thought out a plan, but…"
"Jake," Tom said, "You can tell me. At this point, of probably seen and experienced even more terrifying things than you. Not much scares me anymore."
"But, Tom, I uh…" Jake was not being helpful.
"I'll explain," I said. Jake looked relieved. "You see Tom, if you're 'Yeerk' doesn't come to feed on Wednesday, the Yeerks will just come nab you and Yeerk you again. They'll know about us and then the whole world, not to mention us will be-"
"Yeah, I'd figured as much," Tom interrupted me. "So what are you going to do?"
"Well if you'd let me finish, I'd have told you. You remember what supposedly happened to my mom, but didn't?"
"Are you saying you're going to kill me?"
"Not in reality, but yeah. Really, you'll come live with me and my Hork-Bajir friends. A little on the slow side, not the best chefs, but hey, Ax has cable! As I was saying…
"We decided the best method would be a car accident. Of course, you won't be in the car at the time, we'll just slam it into a tree."
"But there would still have to be a body, wouldn't there?" Tom asked.
"Not if it's burnt up."
"You're gonna burn my car?!" Tom demanded, outraged.
"You got a better idea?" I responded. "It's either that, get yourself killed, or get Yeerked again and get us killed."
"All right, all right. But what about Mom and Dad?"
"We can't tell them," Jake said sadly, "What if they were taken by the Yeerks?"
Tom nodded, "Well, when are we going to do this?"
"I was thinking Tuesday night would be best. The Yeerks would think you were on your way to the Yeerk pool but had a car crash. I guess Mom and Dad would probably find out about it Wednesday."
"Until then?" Tom asked.
"Well," Jake replied, "The Yeerks have no reason to be suspicious, so I guess you just go home. As long as there were no special plans or anything that your Yeerk had made."
"No special plans," Tom answered. "And I guess if something came up, I could just go as myself. I know how the Yeerk behaved, so that won't really be a big deal." He paused, then said, "It's just going to be so hard not to tell Mom and Dad."
"I know," Jake said. "I know."
"Moving on…" I said, "Erek. Did you find out anything useful?"
"Well, several things actually. Most are things we already knew… But I found out where the ray is. You will be surprised."
"Where is it?!" We all asked at once. (Of course, some of that was in thoughtspeak, but hey.)
Erek replied calmly, "The school's attic. Apparently, they have a whole lab up there. Doing lots of tests and stuff. Trying to fix old inventions that didn't work, make new things, well, you understand. Now for the bad news. They are going to test it sooner than we'd thought. Tomorrow morning."
I could have fallen asleep right then. Now we were talking about another all night thing. I wasn't looking forward to it.
After we had gotten over the initial shock, Jake said, "Okay. That means they're going to test it Monday morning." He looked at his watch. "It's about 4:30, Sunday morning now. I suppose we should probably go home for now and catch up on that much needed rest, do chores or whatever to keep the parents happy, try to get a little more sleep and meet back here around, say, eleven tonight? We can go to the school from there."
None of us were going to argue with a plan that involved sleep.
We agreed. I morphed to osprey and flew back to the Hork-Bajir colony.
We paired up. Rachel was with Cassie, I was with Jake, Tobias was with Ax. Then, we flipped coins to decide who would morph.
"Heads!" I called. Jake flipped the coin. I didn't see Lincoln. Jake was happy. "Two out of three?" I begged.
"Sorry buddy," Jake responded, "You get to be a slug."
"Hey, Marco," Rachel said, "Won't be too bad. Not a big change for you."
"Very funny," I muttered. "You get off easy. Cassie already has a Yeerk, so you're home free. Cassie, could you please find some embarrassing memories or something?" I growled. "Where is that slug?"
"Over here," Erek said, "In this bucket of water."
Tobias and I had 'lost'. Although, who knows? Is it better to be a Yeerk or a Controller? He perched on the edge of the bucket, and I stuck my hand into the warm water. The slug was down pretty deep. I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, grabbed, then acquired the Yeerk. I lifted it out of the water so that Tobias could touch it.
"All right, what now?" I asked.
"It's about 2:15." Erek said. "We don't want you guys to morph yet, in case anything happens down there. We want to give you as much spare time as possible. I have to go get 'my father'. He agreed to help. You guys wait here for us. We'll be back soon." He started to walk away, then turned. "You might want to try morphing the Yeerk so you can get used to it." He said. Then he left.
"Just so you guys know, I most assuredly do not want to morph a Yeerk to practice," I said, "But I will."
Ditto. Tobias said.
"I've already done it," Cassie said, "But it's been a while, so I'll do it again." To Tobias and I she said, "Do you want to know what to expect?"
"No," I responded, "No I definitely do not want to know."
I began the morph. The first thing that happened was that my skin turned gray and was covered with this disgusting slime. Not like slug slime, where only the underside is covered, but all over slime. It covered my eyes, and I was glad. I didn't want to see what happened. I didn't want to see my friends' faces as they watched. Next, I felt all my bones dissolve, and I sunk to the ground. My normal human insides also dissolved and I was kind of filled with slime. There were a few startling seconds when my lungs and heart disappeared, and I was sure I would die. My arms were sucked in and my legs twisted together. Finally I shrank, and the morph was complete.
AAAAAHHHHH!!! I screamed , AAAAHHH! Oh, Aah! My skin is drying up! This is not good! Help! Someone!
We were all undergoing the same problem, but only Cassie knew what to do. It also didn't help that I couldn't here or see anything because I had no ears and eyes.
Jake! Cassie screamed, Rachel! Ax! Someone! Put us in the bucket of water!
I felt myself being lifted, then set down again, and my skin stopped burning. Okay, that was so not fun! I said. Then, Jake? I guess I'm ready when you are… Uh, Cassie? Tobias? We should decide who goes first. I mean, we can't exactly tell people apart… We decided Cassie would go first, then me, then Tobias. I felt vibrations as something large went into the water. It was removed, then something else was put in.
Marco? Cassie said, That thing in the water is Jake's head. Swim towards it, then let the Yeerk take over.
Okay. I responded. Here goes.
Stretch-scrunch. Stretch-scrunch. I swam until I felt something that could have been an ear. I felt around until I found an opening and crawled in. I secreted numbing slime to the ear canal. Stretch-scrunch. Stretch-scrunch. I crawled to the brain. It was tingly with electricity. I stretched and squished my body into the nooks and crannies of Jake's brain. I lifted my host's head out of the water and looked around the barn through his eyes. I heard a noise.
Marco? It's Jake.
Irrelevant. Block out the host. Search his memories and find the way to act like him. Try moving the legs. Walking. The arms. Talking.
Marco it's Cassie. Listen to me. I know Yeerk instincts are subtle, but they're strong at first. Control your morph, not your host.
What? Huh? Oh, yeah. I'm okay now. I said. I relaxed my hold on the host body and let Jake take over again. I felt bad for Jake. This must be hard for him. He'd already been a controller once. Without thinking, I lifted Jake's hand to his eyes and focused on the watch. 2:30.
"We've been in morph about 10 minutes," I said using Jake's voice. "Erek and Mr. King should be back soon."
Marco! Jake said, Relax! Let me do the controlling. It's my body.
Oh, right. Sorry dude, I said. Have at it.
Right then, Erek walked in the door.
Erek? I said, Where's Mr. King?
Erek shimmered, then two 'people' stood where.
"Hi guys!" Erek said, "Did I fool you?"
"Sure did," Rachel/Cassie said.
"Where is everyone?" Erek asked.
Well, I said, I'm in Jake, Cassie's in Rachel, and Tobias is in Ax. Speaking of which, we should probably demorph now.
I walked Jake over to the bucket, turned his head sideways, and slithered out. I demorphed. Tobias/Ax and Rachel/Cassie did the same.
"Eyes!" I said, "Legs! Arms! Ears!"
I was happily ranting about how glad I was to be human again, when Erek said, "Sorry to burst your bubble, Marco, but it's 2:45. You all need to morph back so we can leave."
"I knew it!" I said. "It always works that way."
I morphed back to slimeball and crawled into Jake's ear.
What now? I asked. I mean, we don't exactly know the nearest Yeerk pool entrance.
"That's easy," Erek said, "New community center's locker rooms. Jake, Tobias, Marco, Ax, I can show you guys. Rachel, Cassie, just watch some true controllers. They'll know the way."
Ax morphed to human and we left. We all knew where the community center was, so we spread out, trying to seem inconspicuous. I tried to slow Jake's walking a little without him noticing, but he did.
Marco, quit!
What? Come on, I'm just trying to delay my death by a few minutes at best.
This was your idea.
Did I ever say it was a good one? I just said it was practical. I checked the watch. Five of 3:00. Good.
We were nearing the community center. I said to Jake/myself, "This is it." And we walked in.
Chapter 7
I followed everyone else down the stairs to the boys' locker room. (Jake had let me take over for a while. Yeerk instincts are pretty subtle, but very strong, like Cassie said. It was hard not to take over.) I walked into a door in the back corner of the locker room and through the Gleet Biofilter. No problem.
I said to Jake, Now, I won't say we're invincible, because that would be like writing my death sentence. But I will say we made it through the first obstacle. Now all we have to do is get out of the regeneration line, get me out of here, prepare for battle morphs, find out where the sensor thing is being built, destroy it, and save the world!
Marco, Jake said, You know why I like you so much?
My good looks? My humor? My charm?
Your optimism. Lets get going.
Finally, our chance came. We broke from the line and wandered back behind one of the storage sheds where we couldn't be seen. I turned my, I mean Jake's head, and slithered out. I began to demorph. The first thing that happened this time was my eyes. I did not like having to watch me emerge from a Yeerk. The expression on Jake's face definitely did not help. So far, everything went as planned and no firepower was needed. Rachel was bummed. This was too easy and we all knew it.
Erek/Tom was going to the re-infestation pier… He successfully got Tom's Yeerk… Then I realized my deadly mistake and mentally kicked myself all the way to Australia. Mr. King/Erek had the real Tom contained in his hologram. Sooner or later, he would have to be 're-infested.' There was no way Tom could be holographically covered with Mr. King across the room. Now I realized an even more serious problem. Once Tom was re-infested, the Yeerks would know about the Chee. Chee are strong, but a dracon beam could still probably take them out. We couldn't let that happen. We needed the Chee. The Chee provided us with information. They were powerful allies. Without them, we wouldn't have survived this long.
I motioned to Jake. "I need to talk," I whispered, "We can't let them hear. Morph cockroach, or something that wouldn't seem unusual here. It's the best way."
Jake saw how frantic and pale I was and nodded. I morphed and he morphed. As soon as he was through, I explained to him what I just explained to you. I could sense his growing terror. I was sure he had already sensed mine. We've got to find the others. I concluded. I'm going to call them. Rachel?! Cassie?! Tobias?! Ax?! If any of you can hear me, this is Marco. We've got a problem. Morph something small and inconspicuous. We need to thought speak.
A few minutes later, they all responded. Jake explained our predicament.
Well, duh. Rachel said. We go over there, bust open the cage, grab Tom and Mr. King, then run!
Oh, yeah, good idea Rachel! I said, Let's go show the Yeerks where we are so they don't even have to try and find us before they kill us! I was mad. I've found that people do have a tendency to be mad when they make mistakes that will probably cost them their lives.
Maybe morph Hork-Bajir and pretend to be the guards preparing to take him over for re-infestation but instead… No, that wouldn't work… I tried to think, but I was brain-locked. Rachel was the one who usually came up with on the spot plans, but right then, she wasn't.
One thing I do know, I said, Is that we have to free Tom. It's really our only option if we still want to be able to have the Chee help us. Now we have to figure out how to do that and still get him, us and Mr. King out of here alive.
And how exactly do you suggest that we do that? Rachel demanded.
Watch me, Rachel. You'll like my idea. Mr. King! I called out, When they come to re-infest you, have Tom walk behind you. Explain just enough to keep him quiet. We'll try to charge in and nab you both, then go up the stairs. It might work, but it's dangerous. We have no choice.
He couldn't respond. I could only hope he could hear me and would do it.
All right guys. Jake said, If we're going to do this, we need to do it now. Everyone, morph something with firepower and hope they haven't already taken Mr. King!
We morphed out then morphed again. Jake morphed tiger, I morphed gorilla and we looked toward the cages. Mr. King was still there, but right then, a human-controller and two Hork-Bajir were walking towards his cage. The human began to unlock the cage.
Get ready… Jake warned. ….NOW!
We charged toward the cages. The Hork-Bajir were startled. Everyone was. They had no reason to expect us. A wolf leapt at the throat of a Hork-Bajir. And Andalite tail flew and the remaining Hork was now headless. His tail flew again, and the controller slumped to the ground, unconscious.
Poor guy. He was out cold before he had time to lock the cage again. A stream of freed human controllers poured out. They weren't afraid of us. Every Yeerk on Earth knows of the Andalite Bandits and the hosts find out about them through their Yeerks. Some of the humans even tried to break into the storage sheds and grab the dracon beams.
I grabbed Mr. King, Tom, and one of the humans in a big old gorilla hug.
Suddenly, a wave of controllers armed with dracon beams appeared. Taxxons charged in. The freed humans were being recaptured by Hork-Bajir and stuffed into the cage again.
The tide was turning and we were losing. Cassie was near a shed and was limping behind it, blood streaming from a gash in her side. Rachel was surrounded by Hork-Bajir, standing on her hind legs and flailing her grizzly bear arms in an effort to ward them off. Ax's tail was flying wildly as he moved toward Rachel, trying to help her. Tobias was swooping down on Hork-Bajir, raking at their eyes, hoping to slow or stop them. I didn't even see Jake.
Then, he appeared. I didn't even see him at first but I could sense him. We heard him laugh, a deep, evil laugh.
Ha-Ha-ha! Welcome back, my Andalite friends! Things have been so quiet here without you. You know, I was just thinking the other day how nice it would be to have you come visit. His voice turned low and menacing. I wanted to show you my new morph.
He began to morph a hideous creature. It stood probably ten feet tall on six, long, tree trunk legs. It's skin was a bright red-orange and was thick and pebbly like a crocodile. It had no torso, but atop the legs was a thick, triangular box with hollow, spear shaped tubes covering its sides. At the front of the body were the eyes. They appeared to be covered with thick glass domes, like the cameras at a grocery store, only it wasn't dark, but a misty blue.
Suddenly, one of the hollow spears shot out at Ax. He dodged, and the spear missed hitting him by a hair.
Oh, too bad I missed. You would have enjoyed watching how fast this poison works. I doubt that you Andalite fools would even have enough time to demorph before you were killed. It certainly killed enough Hork-Bajir when they tried to capture it so that I could acquire it! I'll be sure not to disappoint you next time.
Chapter 8
Now, Visser 1 was joined by two more aliens who snuck up behind him. They were similar in shape to Hork-Bajir without blades. Their feet were webbed and there were tentacles coming out of their 'hands' not fingers. Their coal-black skin was stretched tighter than a drum. They looked like almost harmless stick figures. There were two, forward-raking black horns with very sharp looking points on their foreheads. They stood as tall as the Visser, if not slightly taller. They were armed with shredders.
Abruptly, one of the aliens' mouth opened revealing a glowing royal-blue mouth. A stream of acid shot at the Visser. He screamed in agony. He behind him and prepared to shoot a spear at them. They had seemingly disappeared. Then, from the ceiling, two more streams of acid pierced his thick hide. These creatures had suction cups on their webbed feet and tentacles.
The creatures shot at some nearby Hork-Bajir with their shredders and sent acid streams flying. We didn't know who or what they were, but they didn't seem to be threatening us.
Aximili! one of them called, Jake, Rachel, Cassie, Marco, Tobias! We have come to assist you!
Laria? Yarin? Jake asked.
Yes, we are here, Yarin said, It appeared as though you had need of our assistance.
But how did you- Wait, never mind. Tell me later. We're a bit busy right now, Jake said. There was a loud roar as Jake attacked an oncoming Hork-Bajir.
Jake, buddy, I said, We've got to get out of here while we still can! I don't know how long I'll be able to hold onto Mr. King and Tom and still be alive.
Right, Jake replied. We'll run for the stairs as soon as we can. Marco, go to the stairs and send Mr. King and Tom up. If we're lucky, everyone will be too busy to notice…
Oh no…. I realized, Oh man. The Gleet Biofilter will still zap them and us on the way out!
Ax, would shredder fire disable the Biofilter? Jake demanded.
It should be able to, yes. Ax said.
Laria! Yarin! One of you get to the top of the stairs and fire at the Gleet Biofilter! Jake yelled.
They didn't respond, but I saw one of the aliens bolt for the stairs.
TSEEEEWWWW! TSEEEEWWWW! KABOOOOOMMM!!!!
There were two blasts followed by a loud boom as the Biofilter and part of the entrance exploded. Rocks and debris tumbled down the staircase. I wondered if the alien would be all right.
I climbed up the hill of debris, still holding Tom and Mr. King. I set them down almost at the top of the stairs and they went out. I assumed Mr. King would go someplace quiet and safe and project another hologram that would make it look like they weren't there.
I charged back down the hill, scraping and cutting my feet and knuckles. Jake had called the order to back off and retreat. Ax was on his way toward the hill. Visser 1 had disappeared. Rachel was limping hurriedly and painfully toward me. It looked like her hip had been partially smashed. Jake was missing most of his tail and had a gash on his back and was struggling away from the scene.
One alien was already at the top of the staircase, pushing aside the rubble that had collapsed onto him/her. The other was crawling along the side of the domed ceiling.
I couldn't see Cassie… Wait. There she was. A wolf had collapsed near the base of a storage shed and was lying there unconscious. Hork-Bajir were dragging it toward one of the cages. I knuckle-ran over to the scene and gave them each a massive gorilla punch. They went down and stayed there. I lifted the wolf as gently as I could, and raced for the hill. I could only hope she wasn't dead. There were no extremely severe injuries as far as I could tell…
Chapter 9
I actually made it up the hill alive. Of course, I did have a couple dracon beam wounds on my back and hind legs, and I was barely able to move, the pain was so severe, but I was alive.
I looked around, but there was no sign of my friends. I searched every room, calling their names. Finally, I heard thought speak. It was kind of faint, but I could hear it.
Marco! It said, This is Jake. Where are you?
I'm over by the entrance to the swimming pool, I called, Where are you?!
Over at the other end of the building. Some conference room. There's a hallway that runs all the way around the perimeter of the pool. Keep following it. You'll find us eventually..
I kept walking poking my head in at every doorway, hoping I wouldn't collapse before I reached them. Finally, someone announced, in thought speak of course, that they saw me. I dragged myself into the room, set Cassie down, and began to demorph. Mr. King covered me with the hologram. At least Cassie was still breathing.
Jake, I said as I morphed. We've got to get her to demorph. I don't know how much time she has left. I think they- Here I had to stop speaking as I crossed the theoretical line that separates thought speak from normal speech.
"Ax," Jake demanded, "How much time does she have?"
I am not exactly sure.. Ax said. At best it would be about seven minutes. She had to remorph shortly into the battle due to a wound. I was not even sure if Marco would be able to demorph. He had less than thirty seconds to spare.
I nearly collapsed. I had made it out of morph by only thirty seconds?
"Jake, I think they might have stunned her. It doesn't look like there are any really serious wounds," I said, "She's probably been out for a good ten, fifteen minutes. Now we just have to figure out how to get her to wake up.
We didn't have to wait long, however, until the wolf stirred. Both the wolf and Cassie moaned, Oooohhh, oh, ow. Ow. Ow. She didn't need anyone to tell her to demorph.
After the initial, "Yay! Cassie's alive and not stuck as a wolf!," the small smooch between Jake and Cassie that they pretended no one saw, etc. Jake said, "Well, so far so good. We're all alive and well. We are out of the sludge pit. We did a good amount of damage. Now we need to talk with Erek and see if he has the information we need. Oh, and one more thing. Laria, Yarin, thanks. We probably would not be alive right now if you hadn't shown up when you did."
"But what I want to know," I said, "Is where you got that morph. Cassie said you didn't have any powerful morphs."
Cassie looked embarrassed. "Um, well, I didn't exactly ask. I guess I just kind of assumed they didn't. When Ax arrived, he didn't have any morphs except for a Kafit bird," she pointed out.
"Yeah, well, you could have at least asked them," I said, "But, I guess it turned out for the best."
Laria answered my initial question, We acquired this morph on one of our moons, Sankor. When we prepared to come here, we stopped there to acquire this morph and one other. We thought they might be useful. . It is called a Zakriem. Sankor turns very slowly, leaving one side dark for months at a time. This is where the Zakriem live. When the planet has turned so that they are in brightness once more, the Zakriem merely migrate to the darkness again. They really are fascinating creatures to study.
"Right," I said. "Fascinating."
"Anyway," Jake said, "We agreed to meet Erek at the barn as soon as we could, so I guess we should head over there if you're ready."
I noticed Tom, sitting quietly in the corner. I knew how he must feel. I'd watched my dad get told. He was shocked to say the least. Tom seemed pretty cool, though. I guess it was because he already knew about the Yeerks and the 'Andalite Bandits.' I imagine what was most shocking was to find out that his little brother was the one doing the damage and leading the fight against the Yeerks.
"What about me?" Tom asked. "Will you let me help in some way? Any way, anything to help in this fight. We've got to win. We have no choice."
It interested me how Tom automatically figured himself into the equation. It was 'we' no questions asked. Our team had grown by three in only a day. Jake said, "Tom, if you want to help, you can. You certainly have enough reasons. We'll discuss it at Cassie's barn. Mr. King? You take Tom covered by a hologram out a back entrance or something so that the Yeerks won't see. We'll morph fly and follow you. Once we're out, take Tom to the barn. We'll fly ahead and meet you there."
"I can do that," Mr. King said.
It was now about 3:30 AM. I couldn't help but wonder if Jake would let us stop at Starbucks on the way over to the barn…
Mr. King decided to project a Hork-Bajir. If anything happened, he could pretend to be a controller searching for the Andalite bandits. Once, another Hork-Bajir came by, but it saw nothing unusual about more than one Hork-Bajir searching the place for us.
Once we were outside, we flew behind a dumpster, demorphed, and remorphed as owls. Mr. King projected a dump truck around Tom and himself.
We flew in silence, trying to gather our thoughts together and recuperate from the battle. We were all exhausted. My thoughts were jumbled. Two Andalites, Tom free, morph, demorph, remorph, do it again, try to get out alive… It had been a long night.
Chapter 10
I'd love to say I solved all our problems on the trip to the barn, but, truthfully, I wasn't much help. None of us really were. We just flew and tried to stay awake.
What are we going to do about Tom? Rachel asked, unnecessarily. We all knew what we were thinking about.
I don't really know… Jake said slowly.
We'd just had a long ordeal with David, the only other person besides Ax, to be added to our original group. He had not been interested in helping us, and tried to kill all of us. Making Tom an Animorph was the most obvious choice, but after what we'd been through, we weren't exactly excited about the thought.
Oh man! I yelled, We did it again! Every single plan just gets-
Jake cut me off. Marco. he said in a very leader-like tone, What. Is. It??
Apparently, Cassie realized it too.
Oh, great. The Yeerks don't know Tom is free, but they'll definitely suspect when Tom's Yeerk doesn't come for a feeding. They'll grab him again, and we're doomed. She said it so matter-of-factly that it only made things worse. The only thing I can see us doing is pretending to kill Tom, and have him live with the Hork-Bajir like Marco's Mom and Dad.
I can't see any other option either, Jake said slowly, But I'd sure love to discover some other, less painful plan… I mean, I wouldn't exactly want to put my parents through that. Besides, how exactly would we pull it off?
I was pretty sure that at this point, Cassie was privately talking to Jake, trying to cheer him up and comfort him. Cassie's like that.
I waited a little while, then decided to break up the mushy moment. Okay people! Back to business! I have a few ideas.
Go ahead, Jake said.
I said, Okay. Tom's "death" has to be silent, with no body, like my mom. Tom doesn't go boating, so that's out. He could theoretically get lost in the woods on a hike or campfire, but eventually, they'd have to find something. A fire of some sort would work. But how? We wouldn't want to do arson and burn your house down or something. What about his car?
Jake replied, Okay. I had you for a while there, but as far as his car is concerned, what in the world are you talking about!?
We crash his car late at night, then burn it! If it's done in a remote enough area, no one would see. Then, the car would be like, totally burned and they'd think that he'd burned up!
That might work, Cassie said cautiously.
No, no, it really would! I said, Tom's 'Yeerk' needs to regenerate on what, Wednesday? So we could just make it seem like his Yeerk put off regeneration for some reason or other till the last minute. At like, one in the morning, Tom could leave the house and drive the back route to a Yeerk pool entrance. In the woods on a remote street he could have a crash for some reason. They'd probably assume he swerved to miss a deer. The car could slam some trees on the edge of the woods. After Tom was out and safe, we'd put a match on some newspaper left on the seat and light it. Eventually, the rest of the car would burn, too.
Well, Jake said carefully, Tom will definitely not be happy about burning his car.
Does this mean we're going for it?
Yeah. I guess it does.
When should we do it?
I think we'll talk with Tom and Erek, then decide. Besides, we're just about to the barn, Jake said.
We landed in the barn and demorphed. Erek was waiting for us, but Tom and Mr. King hadn't arrived yet.
Everyone said hello, then we waited for Tom and Mr. King. It took them a good half hour or more to get here, but I didn't mind. Neither did anyone else. Some of us dozed off. Since all these changes began in the Yeerk conquest, we've hardly gotten any sleep. Generally, three to four hours on a good night. Needless to say, grades are down, parents displeased, and exhaustion is the norm. Even though I can't go to school, Dad has me copy and do most of Jake's homework then check my answers against his. Ugh.
I awoke sputtering and coughing as Rachel dumped a bucket of brutally cold water on me. After she did so, she smiled sweetly.
"Good morning, sleepy-head!" she said mockingly.
"Whatever happened to sugar and spice?" I muttered angrily.
"Children?" Jake said, "Please sit down and listen to the teacher. We don't approve of fighting in school."
I sneered at Rachel, then moved to a dry seat.
"All right," Jake said. "First thing on the agenda…Tom." He turned toward him. "The Yeerks still think you're a controller. That's good. It gives us three days to work something out." He hesitated, then continued, "Well, we had thought out a plan, but…"
"Jake," Tom said, "You can tell me. At this point, of probably seen and experienced even more terrifying things than you. Not much scares me anymore."
"But, Tom, I uh…" Jake was not being helpful.
"I'll explain," I said. Jake looked relieved. "You see Tom, if you're 'Yeerk' doesn't come to feed on Wednesday, the Yeerks will just come nab you and Yeerk you again. They'll know about us and then the whole world, not to mention us will be-"
"Yeah, I'd figured as much," Tom interrupted me. "So what are you going to do?"
"Well if you'd let me finish, I'd have told you. You remember what supposedly happened to my mom, but didn't?"
"Are you saying you're going to kill me?"
"Not in reality, but yeah. Really, you'll come live with me and my Hork-Bajir friends. A little on the slow side, not the best chefs, but hey, Ax has cable! As I was saying…
"We decided the best method would be a car accident. Of course, you won't be in the car at the time, we'll just slam it into a tree."
"But there would still have to be a body, wouldn't there?" Tom asked.
"Not if it's burnt up."
"You're gonna burn my car?!" Tom demanded, outraged.
"You got a better idea?" I responded. "It's either that, get yourself killed, or get Yeerked again and get us killed."
"All right, all right. But what about Mom and Dad?"
"We can't tell them," Jake said sadly, "What if they were taken by the Yeerks?"
Tom nodded, "Well, when are we going to do this?"
"I was thinking Tuesday night would be best. The Yeerks would think you were on your way to the Yeerk pool but had a car crash. I guess Mom and Dad would probably find out about it Wednesday."
"Until then?" Tom asked.
"Well," Jake replied, "The Yeerks have no reason to be suspicious, so I guess you just go home. As long as there were no special plans or anything that your Yeerk had made."
"No special plans," Tom answered. "And I guess if something came up, I could just go as myself. I know how the Yeerk behaved, so that won't really be a big deal." He paused, then said, "It's just going to be so hard not to tell Mom and Dad."
"I know," Jake said. "I know."
"Moving on…" I said, "Erek. Did you find out anything useful?"
"Well, several things actually. Most are things we already knew… But I found out where the ray is. You will be surprised."
"Where is it?!" We all asked at once. (Of course, some of that was in thoughtspeak, but hey.)
Erek replied calmly, "The school's attic. Apparently, they have a whole lab up there. Doing lots of tests and stuff. Trying to fix old inventions that didn't work, make new things, well, you understand. Now for the bad news. They are going to test it sooner than we'd thought. Tomorrow morning."
I could have fallen asleep right then. Now we were talking about another all night thing. I wasn't looking forward to it.
After we had gotten over the initial shock, Jake said, "Okay. That means they're going to test it Monday morning." He looked at his watch. "It's about 4:30, Sunday morning now. I suppose we should probably go home for now and catch up on that much needed rest, do chores or whatever to keep the parents happy, try to get a little more sleep and meet back here around, say, eleven tonight? We can go to the school from there."
None of us were going to argue with a plan that involved sleep.
We agreed. I morphed to osprey and flew back to the Hork-Bajir colony.