Chapter 23
"Why do I look worried?" Jake asked. "WHY do I look worried? You've only been unconscious for over an hour, and had your chest sliced open, and we all thought you were going die!" He was breathing heavily.
"Sorry. Man, you're not kidding about my chest being sliced open; this thing hurts like heck!" Tom replied. His face was white. He laughed weakly. "Don't worry, Midget. I'll be fine." He tried sitting up again.
"Tom, no," I told him. "You need to lie still, otherwise you might reopen the wound. Don't try to move, you need to stay here for at least another two weeks."
"Two weeks?" Tom and Jake asked, alarmed, together.
"Maybe more. It depends on how Tom feels."
"That's not fun… I want to stand up and move!" Tom exclaimed. He got very excited, and started to sit up again, but Jeanne held him down. After a moment, he sat quietly again, exhausted by his efforts.
"You should rest now, we don't want to tire you out too much," I said to him.
"Alright," he responded, "But can you first tell me who that is and what she is doing here?"
"This," Marco said proudly, "Is Sandra. She was kidnapped by the Skrit Na and brought here. She's going to hang out with us until we get back."
"Okay… I'll ask when I'm not quite so tired. Good night."
He started to close his eyes, but Jeanne leaned over and whispered something in his ear, which made him smile. A few minutes later, he was asleep.
"I think he's going to be okay, if he rests," I said. Jake's slow, rare smile illuminated the room. I grinned back at him.
Now that we're all settled and know that Tom is okay, at least for now, do you guys think Yahal could tell us about what happened when Elfangor and Mom met? Tobias asked.
"Yeah," Rachel agreed, "I think that that would be interesting to hear."
I nodded my agreement.
About twenty-seven years ago, soon after my father Alloran-Semitur-Corass was dishonored for releasing the quantum virus on the Hork-Bajir home world, he was on the Dome Ship StarSword with the two arisths Arbron and Elfangor. I believe you know them. Near the seventh planet of your system, a Skrit Na ship was found, which they boarded. There was another Skrit Na ship, but it escaped to Zero Space. On board the first one, they found two humans, named Loren and Chapman. Loren had grabbed the beam weapon the captain of the ship had had, and Chapman was knocked out. He soon revived, and after Arbron downloaded the files on the Skrit Na ship computer, Elfangor, Arbron, and the two humans came onto our Dome Ship. Soon afterwards, the captain gave the assignment to my father and the two arisths to return the humans to earth using the original Jahar. It was a trip of many million miles, and it took a few days. Arbron kept looking through the files of the Skrit Na ship, and two days into the trip, Arbron finally broke the code on one of the files, and discovered that the other ship had the time matrix, the greatest weapon ever created, on board. The time matrix was thought to be a myth, just as its creator, the Ellimist, was, but there were pictures of it right in front of us. The time matrix is a time ma-
"We know what the time matrix is," Marco told him. "We've seen it before."
You have? asked Yahal, surprised.
I bit my lip. The time we found the time matrix was one of the times I was most ashamed of. "Yes," I answered. "Visser Four found the time matrix hidden on earth, and used it to go back in time and change many of the historical events in the history of humans in order to make us easier to conquer. The result was terrible… I owned a slave. Rachel was not even with us, it was her friend Melissa instead. Jake was like some sort of junior Nazi. Marco's mom was still with us, and he hated it. Tobias was still basically the same. Ax was oppressed, because no one would listen to him because he was an alien. Our technology was fifty years behind where it should have been, and the Yeerks were within months of taking over. Ellimist made it possible for us, the real us that we are now, to follow him in his time jumps. We followed him into the battle of Agincourt, Washington crossing the Delaware, Einstein coming to Princeton, the battle of Trafalgar, and D-Day. We eventually took the time matrix, and went back to the place where the host of Visser Four's parents met. We made it so that they never did meet, therefore he was never born, and that timeline never happened." A tear fell from my eye.
Yeah, Tobias said. There was a silence. Anyway, what were you saying about the computer files and the time matrix?
Yahal continued on, and in about two hours, told us the entire story of what had happened to Loren, Chapman, Elfangor, Arbron, Alloran, and Esplin 9466.
They did love each other, didn't they? asked Tobias when Yahal had finished.
"It sounds like it," commented Sandra.
I was deep in thought. The Ellimist had drastically changed the timeline and the lives of so many people. Most personally, he had made Tobias grow up without a father. I was angry that he could do what he did to so many people. He had made Elfangor and Loren lose each other as well. If he was so powerful, and capable of bringing people back from the dead as he did with Vice-Principal Chapman, then why did he not save Rachel? I knew he could have; it would not have been too hard for him. But we were just puppets, and him the puppet master, having us act out the scenes needed so he could win his millennia-long game with Crayak. I felt a warm tear come to my eye for the pain we all went through because of her death, and Ellimist's refusal to relieve it.
Time stopped.
There he was, in his guise of a saintly old man. "I could not save her, it was against the rules. You would have felt it if I had anyway, and known that that was not the way the timeline should be. You are an anomaly, Cassie. While all other people can only see what is in their own timeline, a few like you can see small glimpses of others. They only remember dreamlike memories of them, but it is more than anybody else." The Ellimist's voice was large, and it sounded like it was coming from everywhere and nowhere at the same time.
I was quiet for a moment. "You've explained this to me before. I don't know when, or how, but you did."
"Yes," he replied. "I have. In another timeline. You see, you remember."
"You still could have saved her. I wouldn't have minded, had it saved the life of my best friend."
"I came to her, you know. Right before she died, in the other timeline, 'before' you saved her. I could not save her, but I could give her the respect she deserved. I told her who I am. What I am. It was only fair. She knew that I could not save her. And I told her what she wanted; she wanted to know whether she had made a difference or not, and I told her the truth, which was yes. She died, but understood why. She was immensely upset at dying when she was so young, with her entire life ahead of her, and her love of war gone, but she knew she had to, to save her life as she knew it. To save the boy she loved. It was noble of her, and I showed her respect for that. I did not save her, but I caused her to understand."
"Should she have died?" I asked. "Was it right of me to bring her and Tom back?"
"I cannot see the future," Ellimist replied. "Therefore I do not know what consequences it will have. I do know, however, that it was what was needed for your friends, and they are important. They are key players in the fate of this universe, and they needed to live, which they would not have if you had not destroyed the Blade ship, and they needed to come back to reality, and they needed Rachel to do so. The six of your fates are entwined for all time; five of you are not whole without the sixth. What you did may not have been good, but it was needed."
At the last few words, people started moving again, and Ellimist disappeared. I sat there, lost in thought.
"Cassie?" Toby's voice brought me back to reality.
"Oh. Yes?" I asked, feeling stupid.
"We just asked what size of a ship you thought we should get, so that ten humans, one Hork-Bajir, two Andalites, and one hawk could live there for a few months comfortably. We also need to know how much food we should get."
I answered her, and Guide brought Toby, General Doubleday, Menderash, Yahal, and Santorelli to find our supplies. Meanwhile, Jake, Tobias, Rachel, Ax, Marco, and I stayed back to discuss what to do to get back home without being shot out of the sky by the Garatron. Sandra, Jeanne, and Tom also stayed back so that Tom could rest, Jeanne could take care of him, and I guess Sandra stayed because she knew the most about the six of us through interviews, news stories, etc. and therefore felt the most comfortable around us.
"Alright, O Fearless Leader, what do we do?" asked Marco with a smirk.
Jake put his head in his hands and rubbed his temples. "The Garatron and the One have probably followed us here, right? So we need to take off without their knowledge, before they can find us. They'll figure it out that we're gone soon enough, but maybe we can get away with enough distance to stay safe. If not, we can hide on various planets like we are now. There will be some other safe planets on the way back to earth, right?" Jake asked Ax.
Yes, we will pass the Andalite homeworld, the Leeran homeworld, and the Hork-Bajir homeworld, as well as a few other ones. Another possibility is to hide in Z-space.
Jake nodded his understanding. "Well, people, it's been a long day, and the sun is setting here. I vote we hit the sacks until morning, and then we can think on this some more. We leave for earth as soon as Tom is well enough. Menderash, Santorelli, and the others should be getting here soon. I'll take the first watch."
The rest of us voiced our agreement. We all became busy trying to find the softest piece of ground to sleep on and curling up to sleep. I was tired, but after a few moments of lying there with my eyes closed, I realized that sleep was just not going to come to me tonight. I opened my eyes and sat up. I stifled a giggle as I saw Marco leaning in close to the sleeping form of Sandra and staring at her. He obviously liked her. I scooted over to Jake, who was looking out at the quieter city than before, although it was still very busy.
"Hey," I said with a shy grin.
He jumped, and turned around. One of his slow, wonderful smiles crept across his face. "You scared me," he said with a laugh. It was the first real laugh I had heard from him ever since that final battle.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to," I laughed.
"It's okay, I guess I'm just a little high-strung right now…" His voice trailed off.
"A penny for your thoughts," I said to him.
He sighed, and he sounded tired. "I just don't know how we are going to get home," he said to me. "The One is bad news. He seems to know everything, and he's so powerful…"
"You faced Crayak and stood up to him before," I encouraged him. "And how is one evil all-powerful being really different from another?"
He looked into my eyes. "Thank you, Cassie," he said. "I really could not have made it this far without you." He paused for a moment, and then leaned in and kissed me gently. It only lasted a moment, but I felt my cheeks turn hot, butterflies rise in my stomach, and an overwhelming feeling of happiness inside. "Our first kiss was here," he said softly.
"Yes," I said, "It was." I looked at him, trying to see where this was leading.
"Years ago, I bought something because it reminded me of you. It wasn't much, but I kept it with me everywhere I went as some sort of good-luck charm. However, now, I would like you to have it." He kneeled down on one knee, reached into the pocket of his jeans, and pulled out a small, metallic looking thing. When I looked closer, I saw that it was a cheap pewter ring with a little engraved horse on it. He held it up to me. "Cassie," he said, "Will you marry me?"
My jaw dropped. I loved Jake, but I really had not been expecting this. "I-"
"I know it's not much of a ring," he interrupted me, "But it really is the only thing I have to give as one right now. I'm sorry."
"No, no, it's not that, but- Jake, you're sure you're better? You're going to be okay?" I blurted out.
He grinned again. "Cassie, I have never felt better in my entire life. The two people I thought were dead are not, my brother is going to be alright, as long as he gets enough rest, and I think we may actually make it home, if the Garatron do not kill us first. Not to mention the fact that I just asked to woman of my dreams to marry me."
The woman of his dreams. Was I dreaming? I pinched myself, believing this too good to be true. I guess I pinched a bit too hard, because it hurt quite badly and the place on my arm turned angry and red. "It's not a dream," I whispered. "It really isn't a dream."
Jake looked at me, his eyes hopeful. "No," he replied. "It's not a dream."
I looked down at him, and smiled. "Yes," I finally answered. "Yes, I will. I love you, Jake Berenson."
His face lighted up like a firecracker on the Fourth of July. "I love you too, Cassie." He slipped the tiny ring with the horse engraved into it onto my ring finger.
I kissed him, this time.
A/N: I have decided to make this a trilogy, like books 20, 21, and 22 were, because my story is just sooo long, and I am trying to stay true to KAA's form of writing, and she tended not to have more than 25 chapters in a book (I'm not doing very well at staying in her form, but believe me, I AM trying!!!) Anyway, all of you need to R/R, and tell me your favorite parts and why, because that would just make me sooooo happy ^_^ . In addition, I NEED A BETA READER!!!!! If you are interested, please email me at MyLittlePony204@hotmail.com. I would most appreciate it. Anyway, there will probably be one more chapter to this book, and then I will start on the sequel, yclept (lol, that means called for all you people that don't know… We learned it in our vocabulary books, a couple of days ago, and our teacher tells us to use them in normal, every-day things to get them to be a firm part of our vocabulary, so I'm going to use it just to sound like I'm smart and to confuse you!) #56: The Carried. Also, just like KAA *smiles maniacally, because she's copying her role model to the smallest detail *, I will add a chapter from the next book to the end of this series, just to give you guys an idea about what it's going to be about!!! Methinks you guys will like it *smiles mysteriously, because I know something you don't! *. Yeah. Now, fill in that magic box at the bottom of this page, even if it is just to make my computer burn in flames when I read what you wrote. J/C and R/T forever!!!!!
