Chapter 21 (Rachel)
That was a good question. What to do now? We'd gone and busted Joseph out and we didn't know what we were going to do with him. I mean, every Controller in the United States of America was going to be looking for him.
Joseph started fidgeting. "I'm becoming a problem right?"
I shrugged. "Yeah, just slightly."
"Well I can take care of myself. I can find my own way home from here."
"No you can't." Jake's words came off slightly sharper than I imagine he meant them to. "You can't go home."
"Why not?"
"Maybe it escaped your notice," observed Marco, "but the Yeerks are not very forgiving right?"
Joseph watched Marco warily. "Right."
"But maybe, if they know which school you attend, they might know where you live. And if you go back there any time soon they might kidnap you again."
"And you think my parents are about to let that happen?"
"Joseph, don't you get it? Your parents could be one of them. Either, or both, of your parents could be a Controller. Especially if they're your parents." Joseph looked at me in pure shock. That thought had obviously skipped his notice.
"That's a lie."
I shook my head. "It's not. Look, you can go home right now, okay? Nobody's stopping you. But, like Marco said, Visser Three knows who you are. He knows where you are. And I'm guessing that he wants you dead. Especially if you managed to escape from right under his nose. He won't let you off lightly. He may even know what you are."
"What do you mean? I'm just a kid, I'm nothing special."
I felt so guilty. I really did. What had happened to Joseph was mostly our fault. Us Animorphs. If we weren't around Visser Three might not have been so eager to kill him. Joseph glared at me. "What am I, if you're so sure?"
"Joseph," said Jake, "have you ever heard of an Ellimist?"
"No," muttered Joseph irritably. "And I really don't care."
What do you know about your dad? Tobias's question had evidently taken Joseph off guard, but he managed to play along with, what he thought was, a game.
"Tall guy, about forty. Sandy hair, looks a bit like me…"
"That's not who he means." Lee looked at the floor before bringing her gaze back to Joseph's.
"Who else can he be talking about? I only have one dad. Right?"
If the situation hadn't been so tense, I would have laughed. He was ready to question everything.
"Well, no." Lee rubbed the back of her neck before continuing. "We think you're half Ellimist."
"I hope he is," muttered Marco not-quite-under-his-breath. "We didn't just bust him out of a Yeerk pool so he could come out to play."
"Shut up, Marco," snapped Lee shortly. "Now is really not the time."
"Can I ask a question? What the heck is an Ellimist? I've seen a lot of strange things in the past few days, but I don't think I've seen one of those."
"So you believe us?" Cassie asked the question gently, the only way the girl knows how.
Joseph paused for a moment. "I think so. But could you just answer the question? What's an Ellimist? And how do you guys figure that one is my dad? For that matter, how do you figure I have two dads? I mean, that's supposed to be impossible."
"Well…" Man, this was going to be tough to explain. "You don't exactly have to fathers. Not how you mean it anyway. Your mother and father had a child, hunky dory, but the Ellimist got a look at their hand." I paused, trying to think of something that would make him stop thinking I was a lunatic. Oddly enough, it was Lee that came up with the near-perfect explanation.
"You remember in the bible? How Jesus claimed to be the son of God?"
Who is Jesus? Muttered Ax to himself. Everyone ignored him, except Joseph who seemed to back off just a little.
Lee continued, "Well, excuse my thinking so, but I can't really imagine Mary and God having passionate sex. I mean, that doesn't present me with a pretty picture. You know?" She glanced around at us all, trying to keep a straight face as she watched us all double up laughing. "What? All I said was…" At that point she broke into the giggles as well. It was contagious. Even Ax was laughing. Smiling. With his eyes. Sort of. You get the general idea anyway.
It was after we'd more or less managed to quieten down that Ax said, Why do humans find sexual intercourse amusing? And that just started us up all over again.
Eventually we managed to calm down. Eventually. Marco kept saying, "Oh God!" And starting us up all over again.
That had been what we needed. Joseph wasn't quite so scared of us anymore. He'd even grown a little more comfortable with Ax and didn't pull away every time Ax spoke. "My God!" cried Marco making everyone break out in hysterics of laughter. I suppose it was good for us.
Finally the snorts of laughter subsided and we sat or stood where we were for a while, trying to get our breath back. Then Jake said, "Back to business guys." We all groaned and complained. But Jake was in sensible guy mode and wasn't about to be swayed. Marco bellowed out his favourite phrase again, provoking Jake into giving the evil eye. Then, after making Marco cower quite convincingly into the corner, Jake turned back to the rest of us. "I have a plan," he declared.