It took a year to fully restock the ship. Over that time I had seen Cassie…I had helped her with the Hork-Bajir and we once again became friends. She had broken up with Ronnie, realized how important Jake was to her. After he came to her asking for Tobias, she tried to get to the ship as fast as she could. She got there as they were taking off…she thought that she would never see Jake again…
She was coming with us this time, so were a few other people that seemed useful. The mission was still kept top secret though, they once again left without giving notice to anyone but still having people taking care of things for us, as though they were there "just incase" we left.
"Why do I feel like I'm on Star trek?" I asked as we once again boarded The Rachel. I had become more distant as time went on, trying not to get to attached, thinking that it could be over any day…
Tobias had been watching me; he didn't trust me and I understood why. He had seen me at the memorial, staring at my own grave. I had also gone to see my mother, I didn't tell her who I was, and I simply said that I was a friend that was here to see if they needed help. My mother had welcomed me in, after the war was over they moved back to our original house, and my mom now stayed in closer contact with Jake's parents, said that they got along better than they used to. Jordan had skipped two grades and was now a freshman in college, study tactical warfare and nuclear fission. Sarah was eleven-years-old now, she hardly remembered me. My mother said that at my memorial, Sarah hadn't said a word, she had just stood there until she raised her little hand pointed towards saying "Bird," when Tobias grabbed my ashes and flew away. My father had been killed in the war; his yeerk had betrayed Visser One so he was executed shortly before we arrived at the pool ship.
So anyway, I was walking on The Rachel with my bags packed and Cassie behind me complaining. "How could you pack so much stuff…I swear did you buy that all last night?" I tried to keep myself secret but when you love the mall, you love the mall!
Behind Cassie was Jake; two days before we left they had gotten married. I thought it was the most romantic thing I ever saw them do…I sat there in the chapel and cried, how long had I hoped that Tobias and I would get married, that we would survive the battle, the war? But no, I had died; I had died and left him there all alone, with no one to love him…
"Okay, everyone knows where their quarters are?" He asked as we all got onto The Rachel. Jake had become a little more upbeat and not as depressed since we got back, since he got Cassie back, and Cassie seemed to feel the same way although she had left behind someone that had truly loved her. Ronnie had been heartbroken but he stayed on the Hork-bajir project and tried to remain friends…
"Yes fearless leader sir!" Marco shouted while recognizing Jake with his hand on his forehead then pointing it out. "Jeanne your with me." He laughed as she hit him in the groin.
"I don't vink so!" she said as she walked over to me smiling. We had become good friends, she had reminded me of myself in a way, before the war that is. She was full of dreams and dirt never did cling to her.
I tried so hard to block out the memories of my life before death whenever I was around them, the Animorphs but that seemed impossible. Things that I knew happened and things I wanted people to remember haunted my dreams.
I was trapped! Trapped as a rat for the rest of my life, no I couldn't let this happen. I screamed and bellowed in thought speak as he walked around my cage, as the doomed Animorph had walked around my cage taunting me. "You will die David! I will kill you myself." I screamed in my sleep, then I was suddenly in the alley with a rat in front of me, I didn't know what to do, I still didn't. "I won't take your life." I said quietly as I stared at him. He told me that he figured I wouldn't and started to once again taunt me, bring up memories from within memories that I had so desperately tried to conceal. "I had no choice!! I have to protect them Jake told me to do it, he told me to! I was the only one that could do it! I was there, I was the one that –…"
"Faith!" Jeanne struggled to get me up as I screamed in my sleep. Suddenly I was awake and I saw her looking at me.
"What did I say?" I asked her quietly as she let go and sat down on her bed, which was place a few feet away from mine.
"Many things, mostly gibberish but…" She hesitated as she looked down at her hands then at me. "You screamed on and on in rage about someone named David, Crayak's offer…and the Ellimist. How do you know these things?" We sat in silence for minutes; I sat there with my chin resting on my knees and my arms wrapped around my legs.
"Never tell anyone of what I say in my sleep. Never say a word to anyone." I looked at her. "If you do I will kill you, I will give you a death worse than my own." With that she shut up and went back to sleep. I trusted her with my life, but I wanted to get the point across, no one should know about my dreams.
I tried to go back to sleep but was restless so I eventually got up and walked over to the "kitchen." The andalites had done a wonderful job in modernizing the living space for us; it was now like a house on wheels, or a house in space to be exact. I went to the fridge and grabbed the ice cream and a spoon then sat down at the table.
"What are you doing out here so late?" I turned around and in an instant had my spoon a centimeter away from its head when I realized it was Tobias in human form. "A little jumpy, aren't we?" he asked with a sardonic smile.
"What are you doing…who are you?" I quickly asked as I realized "I" had never seen Tobias in human morph. He had grown…he was 25 now, his birthday would be next week, did he remember it?
"No, I think the question is who are you and what are you doing here?" He asked coldly, I now knew that he was gone, almost nothing could bring him back completely…
"My name is Faith I am the third officer under the command of Captain Jake Berenson and if you move so much a hair I will kill you."
"I'm tobias." He said slowly as I put the spoon down and returned to my ice cream.
"I've never seen your human form before…" I said quietly as he sat across form me.
"I haven't morphed human for five years tomorrow…" he said with a frown on his face, I had forgotten that it was the anniversary of my death… no wonder they were all quiet lately.
"You like Ben and Jerry?" I asked as I got him a bowl of rocky road ice cream and a spoon.
"No." He said with a blank expression on his face as he began to walk back to his quarters. I wanted to stop him, to tell him who I really was, how much I still loved him but I just stood there and watched him walk away.
We were on The Rachel for months before we found the blade ship again. It had been wondering around Kelbrid space, still deserted and yet possessed by The One.
"So we meet again Jake the yeerk killer." It sneered as it melded into the form of Ax. "Oh and I see that you have brought the tree hugger with you also? Your married now, you always said you would get married."
"That is not of your concern." Jake replied coldly…Cassie was three months pregnant. "We wish to make an agreement of peace, and we want Andalite War Prince Aximilli-Esgarouth-Isthill back with us."
"Under one condition." It said as it once again melded its form…it became me! The way I used to look, the way I was. "Bring me Faith." She laughed as I stepped into view. Jake was dumbfounded that he had wanted me.
Tobias stepped into view, he morphed human more often now, and I guess he wanted to feel that he had some humanity left in him. The One looked at him evilly and once again shivered. "Still alive I see? Oh Tobias." She said with a grin. "Are you having fun playing detective, your very close to the answer isn't he Faith?" She asked as I stood next to him and beamed at her. "You look tired, having trouble sleeping?" It was true, the past few weeks the nightmares had become so intense that I stopped sleeping all together. My dreams would now repeat every night, my last moments before the change, before everything had happened. I would watch myself make a deal with the Crayak and then something more powerful than even he saving me, saving a part of me, my soul. But the pain of it was unbearable, and I figured that she felt it too.
"I believe you have been having trouble yourself." I said slyly, she looked at me with rage in her eyes.
"Yet you still have a secret, I work for the Crayak, I know who I am and so do they but do they know you Faith? Why did you pick that name, I would have just stuck with the original." She smiled. "After all Rachel sounds so much prettier than faith." My heart stopped and I felt as though both of my universes had collided. I looked around but they stayed there looking at her, watching her talk when she looked at me again. "Don't worry, that's our secret for now, they didn't hear." They did hear that as Jake started to give out orders of attack.
"No!" I said as I ran up to Jake. "Give me command of the ship, I know what she'll do, our best chance is to do the opposite."
"I also know who SHE is god dammit she's my cousin Faith, or at least a part of her and she's still alive, I am one of the only people here that does still know her, that's all I've been thinking about the past five years, how I messed up and how I killed my brother and my cousin." I let him rest then he looked at me and I smiled.
"You don't have to worry anymore Jake, please trust me." He looked at me as thought he had déjà vu, then he nodded with a familiar smile.
"I knew I knew you from somewhere…" He whispered, then to the crew. "Faith is in charge listen to her, she knows what she's talking about." I ran over to the pilot controls where Mendorash was sitting. "You see that planet on the monitor?" I asked him as I pointed to it.
"Yes." He replied, even though he had permanently morphed human he was still an Andalite.
"Good, take us there. Land the ship in the southern hemisphere latitude 46 and longitude 87." He obeyed and we proceeded to the planet…
