THE RESISTANCE III
"We are agreed?" Jake asked.
"Sure. We don't do anything till you guys checked the situation
out." Mitch replied, "That's easy, I'm not against doing nothing. I
prefer a quiet day."
Julian rolled his eyes skywards, "Uhuh, guess who isn't going to be
thrilled."
Max sighed. "I'll talk to her."
"Man, she's out of control." Cole muttered, "When are we going to
do something about it?"
"You're saying that because Angela creeps you out." Julian said
grinning. "Awww. Isn't that sweet. Cole, don't worry I'll protect you
against Angela's death claws."
"Over my dead body." He snapped, "She doesn't scare me."
Julian looked at Marco and then said, "Don't they always say that."
He laughed, "So, Rachel, what do you think about this Angela, it sounds
like your loft is being taken over."
"Shut up Marco. I'll show you who'd be taking over who."
"Hey, you kid's aren't serious are you? I was just joking."
Julian looked surprised.
"Kids? Kids?" Marco yelped, "Now we're kids?"
"Marco chill. We're not kids." Rachel batted her eyelids, "You
are."
"Hah, hah and Hah!" Marco shook his head, "Now this is serious.
Since when were we kids?"
"So where do you guys live?" Cassie asked, "I mean. From what you
told us you're pretty much alone."
I communicated using sign language, Marco looked a bit surprised.
"What, what's wrong."
More sign language.
"She's saying that we live in the forest." Julian translated.
"Yeah but why is she-"
"She's deaf." I think that through the half hour we've been
through they hadn't noticed this detail.
"But then how does she…uh. Can she understand us?" I could see the
awkwardness. As an unofficial rule, a long time ago I've told the others that
I didn't want them telling anyone that I was deaf. I could manage to trick a
lot of people, I've also told them not to say that I can speak. Which they
were not going to do, this was something I introduced.
I rarely talked anyway. And besides, I'm almost always with Julian and
Genie, they know hand language, actually all of us do, but they were the only
two who used it extensively with me.
Why the fuss? Well, no one knows for sure why I do that, why I just
don't throw the whole truth out. The answer to this question is simple;
impulse. Something that I've adopted, I've been at a lot of orphanages and
shelters I've met a lot of people and I had adopted this instinct to throw my
weaknesses at people and then to my desire I'd slowly add my strengths.
I don't think that a person with full hearing understands what it means
to talk when being deaf. I am used to it. Of course, my voice is never clear, I
am told that it waves and flatters at times, and that the syllables of my words
are jumbled together, so I need to really concentrate and think about the
process of speaking.
And being a girl that frequently daydreams I am not a huge fan of
concentration.
Sign language is so much easier.
Genie once explained to me that there are some people who find it
disturbing, sign language, and the deaf. I didn't understand. She said it made
normal people feel awkward.
This is exactly what I was seeing. I saw and understood the pity that
translated from face to face. From Jake, Marco, Cassie, Rachel and Tobias. I saw
their awkwardness. I ignored it, I'm used to that too.
In any case I decided against showing any complications then was
necessary and spoke out, "Yes, I can understand you."
The Andalite, Ax, just looked confused. He was in his human morph, and so
was Tobias. They told us Tobias's story. I thought that it was sad.
For some strange reason I didn't find bravery in Tobnsi-language:
EN-US">Julianias, not the way it
was in Rachel, Jake and Ax.
He reminded me of me. I don't know why. Not to say that either of us
are cowards.
Ax looked at me and talked. I read his lips and understood what he was
saying. "I do not understand, what does the deafness have anything to do with
Melody's ability to learn speech? Laar-nuh."
Cassie had an answer for that, "Well Ax, it got to do with the fact
that human babies need to hear speech to learn how to copy and mimic the
words."
The fact. I hate that word. The fact that human babies need to
hear speech to mimic. The fact that I'm an orphan. The fact that I'm deaf.
All facts.
And facts are things no one, least of all me, could change. Facts are
facts. Face the facts.
Nothing I could change. But looking around me, I could see more facts.
Some which were more important than my being deaf.
The young boy who was transformed to become a leader.
The sweet, gentle girl who wants to help, sentimentality, some people
tend to lose that through war, this girl knows her bearings.
The sad hawk boy. I couldn't make out much about either of Marco or
Rachel. I could see that Marco likes a good laugh; I could see that there's
more to him than just that. And I could see more something aggressive in the
blonde, something that reminded me of Julian, or Angela, but Angela is
different. She's insane. Wako.
I don't mean to be mean. No, that's a fact.
I told you I liked that word.
We headed away from civilization and into the forest, to Base, it's an
abandoned house, I have no idea why it was built there or who thought of
building a house in an isolated place like this, but I do know that Angela is
the one that found it.
I swear that the place is enchanted, every time I try to go there I lose
track of where I'm going. Like all of a sudden I feel that it isn't a good
idea to go that way, even though I know that the house was there.
Commotion, the others were messing around.
What was it?
Out of the bushes something scrambled, with his jaws yapping and his
brown black coat damp, Duke bolted towards us.
He stopped a few feet away and started to bark madly, and then he ran to
Julian and started to jump at him, trying to grab his attention.
"Whoa!" I finally managed to catch someone talking, Julian,
"What's wrong boy?"
Duke stopped barking and stood with his head cocked to a side, he looked
at all of us, his tail wagged slowly.
Julian went up to Duke. "What's up boy?"
He barked. I never heard a dog bark but I know that it is a loud sound. I
knew this by once going up to Dukle and place my hand at his vocals, the
vibrations told me that. Tell you the truth; I think that neither dog nor human
vibrations 'sound' nice. Not that I've 'heard' anyway. He again tried
to lick Julian's face by jumping up at him.
Julian laughed and pushed Duke down.
I saw Julian gasp.
"What?" Cole asked, he looked annoyed. "Cut the suspense. I can't
stand it."
Julian stared at us bewildered; he held his palms out for us to see.
Blood.
Duke's coat was stained with blood.
"Angela." Max whispered breathlessly. He looked stunned;
"She's alone at Base."
Julian cursed. He headed out in a run following Duke. We followed his
lead. The Animorphs came too. They looked just as puzzled as we were.
Duke led us to wards a patch of green forest near the lake, he took us to
a path I remembered only too well.
"Where are we going?" Rachel wondered.
"Alexis. His grave." I said tightly.
Maybe Angela was there. But that didn't explain the blood. Duke stopped
suddenly when he reached the tree he started to sniff around. The tree was an
old huge oaken tree. Yeah, long time since I came back here to take a look at
it.
"Who?" Marco panted.
"He's not there…" Max trailed off. He looked startled. He jerked
forward and walked round the thick tree to where the grave was, the alarm on the
other's faces told me that he must have said something.
"What is it?" Genie asked she looked afraid, her face pale.
Max said nothing, just pointed.
"Sick." Cole hissed.
"Oh my…" Genie whispered, "Hey…"
The grave. It was…it was dug out. I frowned; I still didn't see the
huge alarm.
Okay…if the grave was dug out then there must be a body…the
body…Alexis?
No body. Huh?
On the bark of the tree I saw a picture. It took me a few moments to see
what it resembled.
It was a picture of an Andalite, a human body lay near it. A headless
body. The face sort of hung in space, but the face itself, the features where
deformed. It was defiantly a human face, but half of it appeared to be bone, and
the other half skin…rotting skin I think. It was painted-if you want to say
painted- in blood, human blood no doubt.
"What the…what does it mean?" Jake stuttered.
The others like Jake and my friends were shocked. So was I.
Max looked at the ground. His face was changing color rapidly, like he
was going to be sick. "That's what the Visser did to Alexis's body…after
killing him he…he cut his head off…then, then he…he threw his body in
acid…umm, Angela,"-I could tell that he was talking in a low faint voice,
from the expression on his face-"It was to get Angela to break down and
reveal…reveal a secret she knew."
"That's the Visser we all know and lov-" Rachel's elbow found
it's way to Marco's ribs. He stooped talking abruptly.
"What secret?" Cassie asked gently.
"We…we don't know." Max looked like he was going to cry. The
others were having a hard time controlling themselves too. Genie was already
crying. It was unexpected. We've buried Alexis and the memory of his death
right here, a few years ago.
"Angela." Julian yelled suddenly, "Where is she?"
Duke's ears prickled up suddenly, like he was hearing something
distant. The Andalite and Tobias had demorphed.
Some one is screaming. Tobias sounded alarmed.
We ran to Base at top speed, Tobias flew ahead and Duke sped away. Julian
was first to reach his destination. I followed with Max just behind me.
Julian burst through the front door. "Angela!"
I doubt that there was an answer because I saw no reaction in Julian's
face, or Max's.
We walked through to the living room and found nothing.
"Basement. The door is open." Cole said, he looked slightly angry. I
understood why, down at the basement is Cole's private world, he spends more
time in there than any other place, his lab if you want to call it that, is down
in there, he also got a surveillance set so he could see what's happening all
over the house including outside and neighboring sites.
Yeah, even our bedrooms, Genie, Angela and I objected. Cole insisted that
it was for 'security reasons' I didn't believe him.
So it meant that all of us are going down to take a look, Cole didn't
like any of us walking around in their, last time I went he kept screaming
"Don't touch anything!" at me till I left.
Of course I took advantage of my being deaf.
The notion of having an Andalite and five kids going down along with us
will drive Cole crazy. I know that about him.
Ugh, he's so secretive. You'd think it would kill the guy if we took
a look around his secret lair.
Cole pushed open the heavy metal door, it was open which is very strange,
Cole never leaves that door open and it is protected by some secret code, there
was no forced entry and his code would actually take the Yeerks time to crack.
U-huh, Cole learnt a lot of his skills by being a host to a Yeerk
scientist. But that was ages ago, and Cole was able to build up from the
knowledge that he had leant.
Marco whistled as he saw the vast area of monitors that displayed
surveillance, there even was a sort of upgraded sensor that would alert if there
was a ship flying by.
This place shows a sophistication in technology more than what I have
seen in hands of humans. The Andalite marveled.
Thought speak, the closest thing I'd ever come across hearing
something, but thought speak is like a voice in your head, and deaf or not this
I've heard a voice in my head.
Mine.
You're asking how I know what my voice sounds like? Well, I'm known
to throw a few white lies here and there. I wasn't born deaf, but it is a
very, very long time since I heard anything, and the voice in my head wasn't
one of a seventeen year old, it was one of a five year old.
Thought speech isn't something new to me, Visser three's
thought-speak was the first thing I heard for over roughly eleven years.
The first time I heard it I almost though I've died and went to hell.
Visser three's thought speak didn't sound like an angel's, I can tell you
that much.
"No, that's true. But I've learnt all that from the Yeerks." Cole
answered smoothly.
"Yeah? What did you do? Threaten them?" Rachel asked.
"No." Cole said tightly as he scanned the lab, "I was a host for
over five years."
The Andalite jerked slightly. Marco whistled, "Six years?"
"And three days." Cole grinned.
Julian rolled his eyes, "Gimmie a break."
"Cole." Mitch said suddenly, "Didn't you say you there was a trap
door somewhere."
Cole looked like he was going to knock out all the teeth in Mitch's
skull. But then he said neutrally, "I may have said that."
"You may have said that?" Max snorted. "We have a situation
here, let's not forget that."
They all froze suddenly.
"It's from the attic!" Genie yelled. For my benefit she added,
"Angela's screaming."
For what felt like the hundredth time that day we charged in search for
Angela. We reached the attic in five minutes. We arrived to find the trap door
open, the ladder dangling.
Max, Julian, Cole and I climbed up the ladder, Mitch and Genie stayed
behind with the Animorphs.
We found Angela, she was tied to a metal chair with chains. Her face was
bloodied, I saw that most of the blood came from her mouth.
That' when I noticed the knife protruding from her abdomen. I stepped
forward to help her but a warning glance from Max stopped me.
He had spotted something I hadn't. A shadow, it was a solid, black
shadow of a human. I couldn't make out the features.
But I didn't care much for the figure; all I could see was that Angela
was in critical condition. I saw that she had also been stabbed a couple of
times, mostly high up on her shoulder and her shoulder blade.
Max said quietly, "Yeah we need help here."
Someone most have called up at him. Otherwise he wouldn't have
answered. A second later a tiger and a Gorilla bounded in.
What the…?
Oh my god.
It was Marco and Jake. They sounded sick.
Sudden movement! I jerked.
It was the figure, the human stepped forward, that's when I saw the
features, that's when I realized what Jake and Marco's alarm had been about.
I screamed. It was Alexis, he took another heavy step forward and grinned
sickly. "Hello all."
No one said anything. I cannot describe his voice for you, but what I saw
was his looks, and his eyes.
His face was pale, white as a paper, his lips were blood red, his white
hair was stained in a mixture of dirt, blood, and leaves. His once bright blue
eyes were dead black, a strained look across them, I could see an evil gleam in
his unblinking glare.
I shivered as I noted his overall appearance; scars and wounds marked his
body, he wore what he had worn before he had died, only his clothes were torn
and ripped.
He stepped behind Angela and placed a hand on her shoulder, he griped
firmly. Angela stifled a moan.
"I was having some quality time with Angela…Care to join us?" He
moved his lips the way a drunken man did, from time to time his eyelids would
fall heavily.
Still no one said anything, we were all too busy being shocked. I could
see Alexis's grip tighten around Angela's shoulders, her face twisted in
agony, her breathing got short.
"What are you doing here?" Max said not too nicely. Judging by the
fury in his face.
"What am I doing here?" Alexis questioned looking surprised, "I
don't know you tell me? You know why I'm here. Don't you..?" He
inquired.
No answer. Max had fallen silent. I saw his face change color once more.
"You want me to go away don't you don't you?" He hissed, the
drunken quality of his earlier talk was abandoned; his eyes screamed with rage,
"You want me to crawl back to that god forsaken hole in the ground don't
you?"
I felt my mouth go dry. True that was what I had been thinking, he looked
at us all while he spoke.
Then he cocked his head at Angela, "You understand don't you?"
I watched her as her eyes began to race, Alexis leaned over and reached
for the knife. Angela closed her eyes and tensed up. He grasped the end of the
knife and yanked it out. Angela screamed again.
All the time we did nothing just stared. We were too shocked to do
anything, and the arrival of a dead Alexis was, well, stunning.
Alexis shook his head slightly, smiled at Angela, pointed at her and
said, "Be there."
Then he jumped out of the window.
Max ran to the window and peered out. "He's gone."
I walked to Angela and cut her bounds loose, she stood up, barely being
able to stand upright. Max paced. Looked at Angela, opened his mouth to say
something, stopped and said something else then fell silent.
"What happened?" Cole asked Angela.
"Not now." I replied for her. Cole fumed angrily.
"Mitch! Julian!" I yelled, "I need some help here."
As Julian and Mitch helped Angela to her room Max stared at her like he
was in a trance. I didn't know what the others were saying downstairs, which
was okay, I didn't want to know.
"Julian would know what to do." Max said numbly. After Jake and Marco
had demorphed and stepped out.
"I'm sure the others will help Angela." I said.
Again, Max tried to say something but fell in mid sentence.
"What is it?" I asked kindly.
His face twisted into a disturbing mix of utter despair and sadness.
"You know, Melody, I try my best."
"You do."
"I always try to do what's right. Get you back in one piece more or
less, but you know what? I'm tired of Angela."
"I'm sure this will be sorted out."
"She's always keeping secrets. You know? Last time she almost killed
us, and there is this thing between Angela and Visser Three, I feel it."
"You could be right."
"I always tell her, help me become a good leader, and all she says is
alright. Then she'd send us to disaster by keeping things away from us,
that's what she's good for, keeping secrets away and acting like a total-"
"Maybe she has a reason" I suggested cutting Max's line of foul
words.
He stared at me; the way he did it was like he just noticed I was
standing there.
"Melody?"
"Uhuh."
"How do you do it?"
"Do what?"
"Cope with having a weakness."
"What?"
"You know, people look at you differently because of that, you know,
the normal kids, the stupid ones."
"Well, I wouldn't care-"
"How come you can not keep secrets? Unlike Angela, I'd have thought
something like that would come from you, but you know, I mean, or maybe
Cole…"
I stared at him, why was he talking like that?
Max paced angrily, he was keeping something back, and the story had
something to do with Max, I think, more than it had to do with Angela. Something
between Max and Alexis, I noted a strange thing between them, it wasn't words,
no it was…it was eye contacts, every time Alexis looked at Max, Max's eyes
would fall to the ground. I stared at him.
"Is there something important you want to tell me?"
"Uhh, I." He shook his head and fumed.
"What did Alexis mean?" I said suddenly.
"What?" Max froze, he looked like someone had just convicted him of
something.
"I said what did Alexis mean?" I repeated sharply.
"Huh?" I saw something in Max's eyes, something weird. It was
guilt.
"What did Alexis mean when he said 'you know why I'm here. Don't
you?'"
"He didn't mean anything." He muttered, looking away from me.
"Max!" I said as he walked away. He didn't turn back just hopped
downstairs, out of the attic.
Max had always been a rotten lair, I always knew when he was lying,
he'd squint his eyes and look far away when speaking, or he'd look away from
my eyes.
Max was hiding something important, something that bothered him,
something he didn't want to speak about.
But what could it possibly be?
They talked to Angela, she told them that she'd been visiting
Alexis's grave –another secrete she'd been hiding, not that Max could
penalized her for doing so, she's free to do that I supposed.
She told us the way Alexis dragged her here and…well, we saw what he
did.
The had to go back home, and we were alone again, before I went to sleep
a I noticed that the porch light was open, I went out to close it and saw Max
sitting on the steps alone.
"Hey." I said gently, "Aren't you suppose to go to sleep?"
I sat down beside him and saw that he had been crying. Max doesn't cry
often, actually, he never does. So I got worried in a rush.
"What's wrong?"
"I don't know." He said miserably.
I reached out and held his hand in mine, " You could tell me what's
wrong."
"Nothing's wrong with me." He said stubbornly.
I didn't say anything to that, what was I suppose to say? You look
miserable. Instead I said, "If you can't talk to me or anyone else then you
can go ahead and wallow in misery alone." I started to get up.
Max reached up and grabbed my arm, "Please stay."
I stared at him.
"Please."
I sat down. Waited. I knew that whatever he had to say would have
something to do with his family, maybe, I was the only one who knew why Max had
left.
He couldn't say why to the rest, I guess he couldn't face it, what
had happened to his family.
Max used to have this perfect family, which is good, but Max said he had
lied to us. It wasn't 'perfect', his father, who Max used to constantly
admired him, turned out to be involved in a murder, yes, it's a long story,
part of it was that his father lied to get away from being convicted guilty for
murder degree one.
Instead a man, who was a lone parent for a six year old girl got the
conviction, he happen to be the man who tried to save Max's father's victim.
An act of complete cowardice on behalf of Max's father and…Max had been
deeply troubled by his father's secret. So he ran away.
"I swore I'd never be like him." He muttered to me. "But it turns
out that what they say is true."
"What is?"
"Like father like son."
"You're not like your father, you're brave and hey, you are saving
the human race right?"
"Melody? I'm telling you something that I don't want the others to
know…" He closed his eyes and then said through gritting teeth, "Actually,
it's up to you if you want to tell them or not."
"Tell them what?"
"Remember the fight I had with Alexis?"
"Uh, which fight?" I asked uncertainly.
"Before he died."
"Oh that." I frowned, "The one where you two were fighting over
leadership?"
He slammed his fist at the wooden porch swearing.
"What?"
"He had everything." He hissed suddenly, "Everything I'd have
wanted, only I would get it if he…"
"If he would what?"
"He got the looks, friends, Angela and now this. The leader thing."
"Alexis used to be leader, sure, but I never thought it bothered you, I
mean you were best friends! Come on! And you know Angela liked Alexis more than
yo…"
I fell silent, stared at him, he was jealous?
"That day, when we went to the Yeerk pool to get Angela. She was all
screaming you know, and I thought-"
"You thought what?"
"It doesn't matter what I thought." He snapped suddenly, "It's what I did."
I stared at him, I didn't like where this was heading.
"We all know that Alexis gave himself over to Visser Three, and as he
was doing so was shot."
"Yeah, but-"
"I shot him, not the Hok-Bajir."
My mouth dropped open.
"I killed Alexis, not the Yeerks, and I did it because I hated him for
who he was, what he got. I shot my best friend because of jealously."