Chapter Two

My mind instantly started to race. How could the Yeerks even exist? It was all just a book series, or so I had thought. I couldn't put my thoughts in order, I glanced over at Tyler and the others and they just looked petrified. I wondered if our group of five was infested, I didn't see any looks of contempt, I just saw five terrified teenage kids looking for a way home after a lousy football game.

The hologram of Aklia continued to speak in her smooth voice of a warrior, The Yeerks know that they have succeeded in shooting my fighter down, and they will come to destroy the remains of my ship. A new Visser has been assigned to this plant, Visser Seven. He is beginning again with a silent invasion, the less people who know, the more chances he has of success.

Once again I looked around me, and once again I saw faces that shown with pure terror. None of them knew what was going except for myself. I was the only one who read Animorphs; I was the only one who knew. All the news broadcasts had been drastically changed before airing on the ten o'clock news, if they aired at all.

The hologram continued on, The Yeerks are parasitic alien slugs who crawl into the ear of a body they call a "host." They take over the mind of that "host" and take complete control over the body. The "host" is completely helpless to do anything against them.

In the distance I heard the faint buzz. A sound I had never heard before, but I could guess that bug fighters were on their way to the crash site. They would be here any moment and if we didn't clear away from the area, would be taken. I jumped around the hologram, knowing that my friends all needed to hear the message completely. The ramp into the Andalite fighter was open to its entirety so I easily ran inside.

"Laura! What are you doing?" Michael called after me, "Get back here! You don't know what you're doing!"

I didn't listen to his orders. I knew exactly what I was doing, and I knew exactly what we were up against. The inside of the ship hit me with a wave of familiarity. Jake had described it perfectly with a few minor changes due to technology advancement. I searched quickly while the buzz of Yeerk fighters grew nearer to us. Looking past the control panel for a moment, I saw the fallen Andalite warrior. She was covered partially in blood from two major cuts across her back and arm.

I forced myself to look away from Aklia and my eye caught a faint blue glow hidden under some rubble of a panel. Kneeling by it, I threw parts of it aside and found what I had begun my search for in the first place: The Blue Box. The blue box held the morphing technology inside it and without it we couldn't fight the Yeerks.

"Laura!" Michael called again, "Get out here now! Someone else is coming and we need to move. This thing said they will blow up the ship and if we don't get out now, we'll be killed in the explosion."

I hate to admit it, but Michael was right. The Yeerks would fire their Dracons and complete destroy Aklia's ship and everything within blasting range. I ran down the ramp, Aklia's holographic-self continued talking but I picked up the disk in my free hand as I ran and it cut off. I stuck the disk in my pocket and cut my flashlight off, the blue box tucked carefully under my shirt to hide the glow.

"Hey," I yelled as the others ran slightly ahead of me, "cut your flashlights off or the Yeerks are going to find us."

That got everyone's attention and four beams off light cut off around me and ahead of me. The buzzing of the Bug Fighters continued to become louder along with the backwash from them. The wind picked up so much that I had to stop running because I couldn't open my eyes enough to see. Turning away from the wind and looking up, I spotted an extremely large aircraft I knew to be a bug fighter.

TTTSSSEEEWW!

Dust flew up as the Dracon fire hit the ship. At first I didn't think the ship had been effected by the huge blast. It was almost as if time had stopped for a moment and then a rumble started up in the ship, which slowly became louder.

Ka-BOOOOOM!

The ship exploded outward sending small fragments of metal flying throughout the air. I closed my eyes and waited for the air around me to calm down before I looked again. For the most part, the Yeerks blew the ship into non-existence and the fighters landed all around the mess. I stumbled trying to start running again as the Bug Fighters' doors opened and the Hork-Bajir and Taxxons stepped out to surround the destruction they caused. I looked around me and saw no sign of the others and I hopped they had made it out because I wasn't sure if I was going to.