Visions
By Starseeker
Part 2
Getting closer. I hope you enjoy this part. It's a little longer than the last one. E-mail me with comments or suggestions. I'll try to get the third part started soon.
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"Give me a break, Alyssa. You're getting paranoid," my friend Kat said. "I'm sure that Josh had a perfectly good reason to dump you."
"But he just called me yesterday afternoon," I objected. "Three times. I finally had to convince him to go start his book report. Why would he change his mind about me so suddenly?" It was lunch time. I sat there, fiddling with the school's 'food' and talking.
"I don't know. Maybe you said something accidentally?" I shook my head.
"No, I don't think I said anything to offend him. But maybe I just don't really remember..." I looked at the next table. Josh was sitting there. He avoided my eyes at all costs. What had I done to him?
"Alyssa...come on Alyssa, it was probably something stupid. By next week he'll have forgotten all about it," Sara told me. I smiled weakly.
"I hope you're right." Terry leaned over her tray and looked at me.
"'Lyssa, me and Allie are going to the mall after school. Do you want to come? Maybe get your mind off of Josh?" she offered.
"Sure. I'll just have to go home first and tell my mother," I replied. Terry smiled.
"Don't worry, I'm sure it wasn't you," she told me. "But you're not going to be upset like that all day, are you? I mean, it's one break-up. There will be plenty of others...guys, I mean." I laughed.
"Is that an actual smile for the first time today?" Natasha asked in mock astonishment. "See? You're better already!" I realized that I was killing my macaroni, but by the time I got to eating it, it was already cold. I dropped my fork back onto my plate.
"You gonna eat that? No? Thanks," Kat said, spooning up what was left of my mutilated macaroni.
"I didn't know you like cold macaroni," I said, laughing. Kat shrugged.
"Well I kind of developed a taste for it, since I never get to eat it any other way in school."
"Yeah, you always talk too much and then stuff everything in your mouth before it's time to go," Terry mocked. A normal lunch period. People talking and joking with each other...my kind of good time.
Trei walked by, quiet and secluded as usual. He glared at me as he walked past, going to sit at the only empty table in the lunch room. Wherever it was every day, he would always find it.
"Ugh, that guy just creeps me out," Natasha mumbled. Everyone quickly agreed with her.
"Hey, speaking of being creeped out...have you noticed how mean Rachel's gotten? I mean, she nearly got into another fight yesterday! She's going to get suspended some time if she doesn't lighten up and stop taking things too far," Terry said.
"What bugs me is that she used to be really nice!" Kat piped up. She and Rachel were friends a while ago. I don't know what happened. They were almost inseparable. But friends grow apart, eventually. Now they hardly spoke to one another.
"Let's try to talk about something else. Oh, did you see..." I turned around, feeling eyes on me. As I suspected, Trei was still glaring at me. Or was he? Did I just imagine that he was looking at me? Was he just looking at the wall? He got me so confused. I looked back at my friends.
"Sheesh! I am so glad it's almost time to go home!" Sara exclaimed. Almost everyone agreed. "This day has been too long."
"You just can't wait to see Andrew after school!" Terry pointed out. Sara blushed.
"Well, uh, I...um...oh, hush!" Terry laughed as Sara's face turned redder and redder.
"Oh come on! Most of us already know that you have a crush on him!" Terry pointed out.
"Is there some kind of rule that you can't like your older brother's friend or something?"
"Well, he is majorly cute," Natasha said.
"'Tasha, stay away from him. If you go out with him or anything, Sara's liable to tackle you," I joked.
"Oookay, new subject!" Sara said.
The bell rang. I grabbed my tray back from Kat, who had nearly cleaned off the macaroni and was in the process of grabbing the chicken from it. I stood up, said good-bye to those of my friends who got to stay another ten minutes, and walked away.
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I started to fidget in my seat. The bell was just about to ring, and I would have to practically run to my locker to get my books before someone else blocked me from it. I couldn't miss my bus again today.
Everyone was staring anxiously at the clock. Well, almost everyone. Trei wasn't. He was staring at the floor. He almost looked like he was worried about something.
The bell rang. I almost didn't notice, jumping out of my seat and shoving past everyone to get to my locker. I took out my math book. I hate homework. Stuffing it into my bookbag, I zipped it up and made a mad dash for the buses.
I wondered where I would sit. I usually sat with Josh. But not any more.
"Alyssa! Over here!" I looked at Terry and smiled. She made room in her seat by moving her bookbag and I sat down.
"Hi. Thanks," I said.
"No problem. You okay?" I looked at her questioningly. "I mean, the whole Josh thing..."
"Yeah, I'm fine. I'll live. So I'll call you when I get home so we can get to the mall? I'm sure my mom can drive us." Terry nodded.
"Great! Allie and I will get over to your house and your mom will take us from there!" Terry smiled. "I've been saving some money so I can get that new CD I wanted."
"Cool."
"Do you know if the CD store still has stuff on sale?" I shrugged.
"We'll just have to find out."
I got off at my bus stop. It was only a block or so away from my house. I walked the rest of the way every day. Unless it was raining, then my mom would pick me up from school.
I heard a noise from behind me. The soft, almost indistinguishable sound of leaves barely being rustled on the ground. I stopped. The noise stopped. I started walking again, so did it. Panic arose in my stomach as the rustling got louder, and I felt a hand on my shoulder. I nearly screamed as I turned around.
"Don't say anything," a male voice hissed. I turned around completely, and found myself staring at Trei.
"What-"
"Sssh!" he whispered.
"Why?" I whispered back. He pointed to a parked black car with tinted windows.
"See them?" I nodded. "They're after me." I looked from Trei to the car and back to Trei.
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"Run," he said simply. He grabbed my arm and dragged me along as I heard car doors open and slam shut.
"There he is!" someone yelled from behind us.
"Get him!" another voice cried.
"The girl, too!" My heart almost stopped beating. Trei gripped my arm tighter and we ran, through trees and around bushes, crashing through peoples' yards and almost getting hit by a few oncoming cars as we ran through the street.
"Are you trying to get us killed?!" I shrieked. "Who are they?!"
"They're Yeerks. Aliens. They want to invade Earth," he explained.
"Are you kidding me?!" I demanded. He shook his head.
"It's for real. They crawl into the mind and control people. There's no way to tell who's one of them. They look like...slugs," he continued breathlessly.
"You're telling me that they're evil slugs from space?! Are you nuts? Do you think I'm stupid?" I snapped.
"It's true, every word of it!" Trei insisted, stopping to throw his bookbag down, taking a small gun out of the front pocket. I gasped and said a few words that need not be repeated as Trei handed the weapon to me and took out an identical one. I looked from him to the gun, astonished that I was actually holding it. Trei turned and started shooting at the men behind us.
They opened fire. I panicked.
"What do I do? What do I do?!" I shrieked.
"Kill them!"
"I'm not a freaking assassin! I don't kill people!" I snapped. Trei sighed and continued shooting. I shut my eyes tight and the shooting ceased quickly. I took my hands away from my eyes, thinking that my heart would explode from beating too fast. This whole day was insane!
"You could try and be a little more helpful next time."
"Well, I'm sorry that I'm new to this whole killing evil space slugs thing," I said dryly.
"We got lucky, they had guns and not..." Trei stopped and took a deep breath.
"They have worse stuff?" I asked. He nodded.
"Dracon weapons."
"What weapons?"
"Dracon. It's...like a laser, I guess."
"Terrific! They're trying to invade Earth with the upper hand and they have better technology than us! Anything else? Are they immortal, too?"
"Thank you so much for your sarcasm, Alyssa."
"Is there any advantage that we have over these...these...um..."
"Yeerks. Yes. There are rumors...that a group of rebel Andalites-"
"Anda-whats?!"
"Andalites. Different aliens. They're on our side."
"Ah. I see. Is Earth the major alien hub or what?"
"Well, there's a group of 'Andalite bandits' that have been raiding Yeerk events -Sharing meetings, feeding cycles, Yeerk projects- all over this area. I came here to check it out."
"So...is that the reason you came to this school?"
"Actually, it isn't."
"So what did you come here for?" I asked. Trei looked at me with the same glare that he gave me every day.
"I came to find you."
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"What do you mean, came to find me? Why me? Of all the people in the whole world, why me?" I asked. Trei hesitated before answering.
"The Yeerks have a secret project. Completely under wraps. I don't even think that Visser One-"
"Who's a Visser One? Better yet, what's a Visser One?" I cut in.
"A Visser is a high-ranking Yeerk. There's Vissers one through thirty-two, I think. Something around that. And then there are sub-Vissers. It's just a ranking system. They're not any more dangerous, but they do get extra protection. Whole armies maybe, depending on rank." I nodded slowly, halfway understanding what he was saying.
"So, um...what were you saying?"
"Well, the Yeerks have a secret project going on. It's been there for a long time, actually. It's a military training facility. Under heavy, heavy protection as of late."
"Why is this place so important?" I inquired.
"They train most of the Yeerk armies there, from a very young age."
"And? What does this have to do with me?"
"I was a soldier there. Since I was three. They were extremely brutal. About three years ago, maybe four, someone raided the base. They kidnapped a few of the soldiers. I was one of them. They explained to me that the Yeerks were evil, that we had all been convinced that we were the enemy. They also told us that they were a special organization designed to defeat the Yeerks. But they needed soldiers. We were to be those soldiers.
"The Yeerk facility couldn't risk us getting away alive. They followed us out of their base and attacked the truck that we had been dragged into. They blew it up. I think I was the only one to make it out."
"That's awful! But I still don't know why I'm such a big deal in this!"
"The children chosen for this training were all selected from birth. I'm not sure how we were chosen, but we were. After they took me, my parents died. I kept saying that I wanted to go home, but they told me that the enemy had killed my family."
"I'm so sorry, Trei..." I trailed off. "Please, continue."
"They had raided the military facility some time earlier, about six or seven years earlier, and rescued some of the younger kids. The facility trained both male and female children." He paused. "Alyssa, you were one of those soldiers selected to be trained by the Yeerks. You came to the facility at two and a half. I was about five at the time."
"But if you're older than I am, how are you in my classes at school?"
"I changed my records. As I was saying, you were being trained. But the other organization that took me, called Stryfer, kidnapped you in their first raid, seven years before I was taken if I remember correctly. You are fourteen, right?" I nodded. "Okay."
"What happened after that?" I asked eagerly.
"I guess they felt pity for you young children. You were no older than four at the time. They sent you home."
"I still have one question, Trei. Why did you find me? How did you know what to look for?"
"Well, it was kind of a vision. I have these...these flashes. Of people, and places. About a month ago, I saw a word and a number: Selle 825. I looked it up in Stryfer's database, but I didn't find anything. Then I decided to hack into the Yeerk facility database and I found it. There was a Yeerk, Selle 825, assigned to one with the code name 'Lisse.' I didn't know what it meant at first."
"I didn't really understand it until I had another vision. It was your face, Alyssa. And your school's name. So I enrolled in the school to find you. When I first saw you, though, I didn't know if I had made a mistake or not. I severely hoped not. I didn't need to waste any more time."
"So you've been spying on me since you came? You really were watching me all those times?"
"Yes," he told me. "I know I was right about you now, too."
"How?" I asked skeptically. There was no way he could tell something like that about a person. Was there?
"Everything about you. You remind me of your older brother."
"I have an older brother?" Trei nodded.
"He's a few years older than me. By now, he's probably infested though. Already part of the military." Trei paused and took a piece of paper out of his pocket. He handed it to me. "That's a picture of him," he said as I unfolded the paper to see a close-up of a very handsome man, sandy-colored hair like mine. But with brown eyes instead of green. My hands began to tremble as I studied the picture. He looked like me...
"But..." I began.
"It's hard to believe for you, I guess. But Alyssa, I swear to God that it's all true." I nodded.
"Not sure whether I believe you or not, Trei, but this photo is some damn convincing proof to me," I whispered.
"Alyssa, I have to tell you..." I looked at him as he trailed off.
"What?"
"You can't go back. They know you, they've seen your face. You can't ever go home." I stood in shocked silence. The picture fell from my stiff fingers to the ground. Trei picked it up and put it away in his pocket.
"W- what do you mean?"
"You can never go back to your family, your friends, your school...never again. If you do, it could be trouble for you and them."
"I wouldn't want them to get hurt, but...never? I can't even watch them worry about me?" God, I sounded conceited now. "I mean, um..."
"I know what you're saying. But the answer is no. It's just too dangerous. I'm sorry." I began to stutter, trying to find words. Anything. I couldn't say anything. Never was such a long time...and my mother...she had already lost my dad, and my little brother. Now me.
And my friends...what would people say, that I ran away? I shook my head, realizing that I was thinking too far ahead. "Just try to deal with what's going on," I reminded myself. I looked back at Trei and had in mind only one question.
"So what do we do now?"