Children of the Andalites Chapter 1: The Protector

by Sarah aka DEVI

My friend Lauren and I are HUGE animorph finatics. So why not put us in the story somewhere?-_-'....Hopefully will have more chapters to come... :) I do suck@summaries-_-'....Please R&R

5. Children of the Andalites Chapter 5: The...

The Hunted

My name is Lauren. That's all I'm going to tell you. You can call me Lauren, Leia, total psycho, I don't care. Its what I do now that's important. I'm an Animorph now, dedicated to saving the earth that we live on from the Yeerks. They've really screwed up our lives, so we're going to screw it up back again.

If you first looked at me, you'd see a girl with darkish hair, that was extraordinarily long, younger than my colleauges, and hair in a Princess Leia style. I wish I could tell you all, I really do, but if I did, it might mean the end of human freedom as we know it. What about the Civil War you say? Forget it, this is eternally more worse than that.

I thought I was just an ordinary kid, excluding the fact that I fight aliens and risk my life every other day, until a guy with a camera decided to go take a walk in the woods. I thought that Sara's past was strange, but it doesn't come even close to what I am. I'll tell you about it.

I think for a moment I stopped breathing. We all probably did. Ax is an Andalite, and Elfangor's little brother. He was the only survivor of a whole Andalite dome ship, and now he's trapped on Earth. To explain an Andalite, give a centaur blue and tan fur, a scorpion tail, an extra pair of eyes on the top of stalks on the top of his head, a couple extra fingers, a deer bottom instead of a horse, take away his mouth, and give him slits on his head to breathe through, and presto, you've got an Andalite. To Ax, food and taste are a total diffrent experience. You can sort of say that he goes, shall I say, hog wild over food. It drives him crazy. You've probably seen the movie "Contact", and you've seen how people react when they find out that they're not the only ones in the universe? Well, you can just imagine what that could do, not just with the humans, but with the controllers too.

"Are you sure?" Jake asked, "Do you know who it is?"

Sara's eyes flared slightly. "I couldn't really see very well, but I don't think its a controller. He didn't go screaming 'Andalite!' or nothing like that." Sara looks fairly normal, fairly tall, dirty blonde hair that's contstantly in a braid, the only thing that looks strange about her is her eyes. They are an incredible green, the exact same hue as Ax's eyes. I'm amazed that controllers aren't trying to kill her 24 hours a day. In reality, she's half Andalite. Yep, that means one of her parents was an Andalite and the other was a human. This gives her some special abilities, such as being able to morph very quickly, or speed morphing as we like to call it, being able to morph deceased animals(Yes, that means that she can do a T-rex!), being able to run abnormaly fast, the ability to use thought speak when not in morph, and having the ability to see who is a controller and who isn't. Now that definitely is strange, since there is NO way anyone can actually do that, not even Ax. As for her history, well, just recently it went WAY mixed up. I'll explain later. For now, I'll keep on track.

"When did this happen?" I asked. Poor Ax, he can never resist food.

"About five minutes ago." Sara replied, "I was talking with another member of my figure skating team, and I saw Ax out of the corner of my eye

in some bushes, along with a pretty bird. I was about to call to him in thought-speak to get out of there, when I saw a camera shutter going off over on the end of the field. I'm almost certain that it was a bird watcher getting a picture of the bird that was with Ax. As far as I can tell, he got a GOOD picture."

"Well, its not good for us." Marco said. "We need to find out who that was, and get that roll of film before he develops it."

What about Ax? Tobias queried. How's he doing?

"I haven't checked." Sara admitted, "I was so nervous when I saw that shutter go off. We should go check on him."

"Agreed." Rachel said, "Sara, Lauren, Cassie, and I will go check on Ax.You three stay here and keep an eye on Chapman's movements. And Marco, you're NOT getting that cake!" She snatched the box away from him, and started to walk towards the field, trying not to look too conspiciuous.

"Yes, all mighty Xena!" Marco said, keeping his voice down.

I'm coming with you four. Tobias answered, and started to fly from tree to tree as best he could. I'm not staying here with mister sugar lunatic.

We started to walk as normally as we could towards where Sara said that Ax became a snapshot, with Tobias flying a short distance away.

As we approached the spot, our heart sank to see a huge circle of people clustered around something, shouting and yelling. I could hear only snatches of the conversation, but it was enough to know that we were in trouble. Big trouble.

"Lemme see!"

"I was here first!"

"Oh my God! What is it?"

"It's.... blue! Looks like a blue deer!"

"No, more like one of those mythological thingies- what are they called?"

"I don't care what it is! It's an alien! AAAAH! WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE!"

I ignored the fact that the last shout had been closer to the truth than most of the students there realized, and fought my way to the center of the circle. "'Scuze me, 'scuze me," I muttered, forcing through the mob. Despite my efforts, Sara got there before me and forcibly turned the birdwatcher's hand toward her so she could see. She turned a pale face to me, but she didn't need to explain. I saw very well.

It was a perfectly clear picture of an Andalite- a very surprised Andalite, and a reddish blur that was probably the bird flying away as fast as it could. I didn't blame it. Right now I would have loved to fly away, get away from it all, but I couldn't.

I had my duty.

Rachel and Cassie had managed to get to the circle's center too, and they were staring in amazement, trying to figure out what to do.

"Sara," Cassie whispered urgently. "Are any of them-" She was already scanning the crowd, concentrating hard.

"I can't do them all!" Sara whispered. "They're too many! I don't see anyone!"

"Maybe we can-" Rachel was interrupted as sirens suddenly filled the air. Seconds later, four police cars, lights blaring, screeched into the parking lot. Sixteen or so policemen (and policewomen) piled out and ran toward the crowd. I looked at Sara. She was squinting at the police.

"Yes," she whispered. "All of them, I think." The police began to break up the crowd, screaming at kids to get along home or they'd be thrown into jail. Most left- but not all the way, of course. They retreated, watching. Having no choice, we went with the flow of scared and excited students and waited.

"Come with us," A hard-looking policewoman said, grabbing the luckless birdwatcher/photographer by the arm. "We can't have you disturbing the peace."

"B-but I-"

"You won't be hurt," One of the policemen said coldly. "But we'll have to confiscate the picture."

"Here! Take it!" The student waved the picture. The policewoman grabbed it.

"I think you'd still better come with us," she said, and they moved toward the cars. Many of the students, disappointed, began to leave, chattering excitedly about the alien.

"They'll make him into a Controller!" Rachel hissed. "We have to do something!"

"Tobias!" Cassie said. "Where-"

As if on cue, a flash of brown shot from the sky, materializing as a hawk by the policewoman's shoulder, grabbing the photo and making off with it. But he was flying very low, and seemed to be having trouble.

"What's wrong?" I asked, then realized it. The photograph was thin and slippery, and Tobias was trying not to drop it. He managed to get a hold and began to soar higher, out of reach. But one of the police had taken advantage of the hesitation, and taken out their gun. I realized what was going to happen a split second before it did, and was about to cry out when-

"BANG!" A shot rang out, and Tobias fell, crumpling, the photograph falling from his nerveless talons. Rachel and Sara cried out and started forward. The nearest policeman grabbed the photo and was about to pick up the limp form of Tobias when Cassie screamed out, "NO!"

I stared in shock as she ran forward, pleading to the Maker that she would have sense. I didn't have to worry. Cassie always has sense.

"You've already shot the poor bird! Leave him alone!" The policeman looked at Cassie, then at her 'Save the Crown-of-Thorns Starfish' T-shirt, and snorted.

"Come ON, Marlfox!" The policeman grunted and stood up. We all let out a sigh of relief as they left, though our troubles were nowhere near over.

"How's Tobias?" Rachel whispered to Cassie, who was examining the wound.

"It's not Tobias!" Cassie hissed. "This is an osprey- it's Jake!"

I was shocked. Tobias was bad enough, but Jake? Jake was our leader, what would we do without him?

"We'd better take him somewhere where he won't be seen." Rachel said. Cassie nodded and picked up Jake's peregrine falcon form. We went as quickly as possible to a short distance into the forest. That way, no one would be able to see him. Tobias came over and landed on Sara's shoulder.

I guess now would be a good time for me to explain Sara's history. You see, she is Elfangor's daughter. If you were paying attention a little while ago, then you would know that Elfangor gave us the power to morph. That's not the half of it. She and Tobias are twins. No, not twins that are identical. Just twins. For a good amount of time during the time I have been with the Animorphs, I had thought that Tobias, um, LIKED Sara.

"We've got to get those bullets out." Cassie said urgently.

"Whoa, whoa, one disaster at a time." I said, "We should get him to morph, at least part way before we start to take the bullets out. Then we won't have to deal with loss of blood."

"She's right." Rachel agreed. "Sara, can you get to him? You did with Tobias, remember, at the movie theater?" Don't ask me about the movie theater, since I wasn't there at the time. You'll have to ask Sara.

"I can try." Sara said, and focused on Jake. I'm not quite sure what she was doing, but it looked like she was doing something similar to a Vulcan mind meld, only without having her hands on his face, and that "My mind to your mind." routine. Jake stirred slightly, and his eyes opened. We all breathed a sigh of relief.

Wha--what happened? Jake asked in thought speak. Thought speak is what we use whenever we're in morph, since in most morphs you can't exactly talk with a mouth.

"Let's just say that 'watch the birdie' has a whole new meaning now." Marco said, and then yelled, "NOW MORPH OUT BEFORE YOU GO NAPPIE BYE AGAIN!"

Okay, okay, you don't have to yell. Jake replied, which sounded a little dazed to me. I'm guessing that he was feeling faint from loss of blood.

Don't morph out all the way, since we still need to get the bullets out. Tobias said.

Sounds like the time at the movie theater. Jake said, and began to morph.

Now morphing is a little icky in most cases. Most of the time, you want to scream, barf, and wet your pants all at the same time if you didn't know what was going on. We do, and it still wants us to do all those things at the same time, since morphing is not a pretty sight. Jake first started to loose his feathers. They mushed together and started to turn pink, like some bizarre hot wax. You could also see his morphing suit showing through. Much to our disapproval, you can't morph normal clothing, since it gets shedded, and when you morph out again, well, let's just say that you wouldn't want to be in a crowd when it happens. His eyes wandered to the front of his face again, and the wicked beak split and formed his nose and mouth. The wicked looking talons formed his feet, since shoes are also out on the "morphing protocal" list. Those were about all of his transformations, since he wasn't going to morph all the way, since the bullets hindered him in a way.

"You'd better morph back now." I suggested. "Then we can worry about the bullets." He reversed the morph now, with the bullet wound slightly better now. "Okay, next dilema, how the heck do we get the bullets out?"

"Simple." Cassie and Sara said at the same time. They had both obviously read Watership Down.

"One of us morphs into a seagull, and picks them out." Sara said.

"I'll do it." Cassie voulnteered.

Are you sure you can handle it? Jake asked weakly.

"Are you kidding?" Cassie asked as white feathers came from her skin. She is the only one I know that can actually make morphing look pretty. "If I can change the bandage on an angry wolf, then I can pick out some bullets out of Nake's wegg." That last part was garbled because she started to accquire her beak, and that makes talking very difficult.

It was only a few minutes when Cassie was a full seagull now.

Okay, let's see if I can do this. Cassie said to no one in particular. She cocked her head towards the wound, scoping out the best way to pick out the bullets. Man, these things are in deep. I hope I can pick them out. She went in with her beak and started to pick out the tiny pieces of lead. Jake winced slightly as she picked them out.

"Ah, plenty good!" Marco said. I'm guessing he's also read Watership Down.

There, that should be all of it now. Cassie said, and began to morph out. Jake did as well. Now, since the bullets were out, the skin could morph now. The good thing about morphing is that we use the DNA of an animal to morph, and DNA isn't affected by injuries. That's really saved our skin a few times.

"Oh man, as if getting swatted was bad enough. Now I know how Tom feels." Jake said once he had a mouth capable of talking again. Apparently, Sara and Jake rescued Jake's brother, Tom, from the Yeerk pool, and saved him from being a controller.

Now you're probably wondering what a Yeerk pool is. Well, I'll tell you. The Yeerks have one big weakness--once every three days they have to go this pool, and get out of their host bodies. Then, they begin to soak up Kadrona rays, which are some sort of nutrient to them, don't ask me, since I'm not a zoologist. If they don't do this, then they die. Once Rachel and the others, excluding me and Sara, destroyed a Kadrona machine, and that really screwed up things with the Yeerks.

"Well, now what?" I asked.

"The obvious of course." Rachel replied, "We need to find Ax, tell him what's happened, then find a way to get the picture back. That picture could really cause problems."

I'll go look for Ax. Tobias voulnteered, and flew off.

"Hey! Wait up!" Sara called, and dashed into the forest, leaving the rest of us to wait for them to find Ax.

It didn't take long. Ax had probably been watching the whole thing in horror, unable to do anything for fear of being discovered...again. But he apparently had come to his senses at last, and had finally got into his human morph. Seeing that morph always gives me a strange feeling of deja vu. It's like looking at the rest of the Animorphs, all in one. Probably because it is. Ax sort of mushed their DNA together to make a human morph that wouldn't be recognized as someone else. It came out as either a sort of homely girl, or a strangely pretty boy. Pretty disconcerting.

"I am sorry. Sah ree. Reereeree. I have violated our security. Tee tee. Ree. Teeree." As you can probably tell, Ax likes to play with sounds. It comes from not usually having a mouth, I guess. You can't 'hear' yourself when you're using thought-speak, as Andalites do.

"Ax," Jake groaned, "Don't do that. Please."

"What? Whuh-tuh. Whuh whuh whuh. Tuh Tuh-"

"You know very well what!"

"Yes, Prince Jake. Yes-suh. Uh." Ax seems to think Jake is his prince, and absolutely refuses to stop calling him so. Jake keeps trying, though.

"Don't call me Prince Jake," he said automatically and wearily, rubbing the spot where he had been shot as if it still hurt. "You're forgiven for getting your picture taken- it's not your fault. Why did you come here, anyway?" Ax looked miserable.

"I was hungry. I like food. Ood. Ooohd. Especially grease. And salt. Sal- tuh. And chocolate! Chocolate is my- what's the word? Obsession. Ession. Session."

"We noticed." Marco muttered. Ax looked, if possible, even more miserable. I felt sorry for him.

"Rachel," I whispered. "Maybe just one-" She had already put her hand into the bag.

"Here, Ax," she said. "Just one. Will you stop playing with sound if I give it to you?"

"Do not- notnotnot- bribe me! Eeeeee!" Ax let out a squeal as he bit into the chocolate morsel. "More! Moremoremore!"

"No," Rachel said firmly, closing the box of goodies. "We've got more important things to do."

I was wondering when you'd finally say that, Tobias said impatiently. Can we go? They might have destroyed the picture by now.

"Yes," Rachel agreed quickly. "Let's go!" Ignoring Marco's snort, she hurried toward the forest. We followed.

"Good old forest," Cassie murmured. "Very useful to morph in." I had to agree as I shedded my extra clothes and stashed them by a huge oak tree. What if we lived in someplace like, say, New York City? Where would we morph? In back alleys?

I lost my train of thought as I launched into my broad-winged hawk morph. You have to concentrate when you're morphing, or at least I did. Someone who was good at it, like Cassie, might not have to pay attention at all.

I shrank first, which was unusual. Usually I would shrink somewhere in the middle. So I was a three-feet tall human with pattened skin before anything else began to change.

"I'm an elf!" I shrieked in a tinny voice, right before my arms shot out into a mess of wet feather-like extensions.

You're always an elf, Tobias muttered. He seemed to be in a bad mood, probably because Jake had gotten hurt when he should have been there.

"Hey!" I cried out, the last words I could speak before my mouth disappeared into a hard scissor-like beak, ready to tear live mice apart.

Hey! Marco said at the same time. Marco is almost as conscious about his height as I am about mine, and I'm even shorter than him!

Don't make fun of elves, Sara said solemnly. Elves are very cool. Ever seen Dark Crystal?

What are these 'elves'? Ax said, confused.

Make-believe creatures, Jake explained, testing his wings. I was still working on my feet. They look like tiny humans and have, um pointy hats, I think?

That's gnomes, I said coldly. Elves have pointy ears and are green.

No, they're not! Cassie said. And they don't have pointy ears. It's the hats that are pointy!

You're all idiots! Marco proclaimed, swooping in a circle. Elves aren't green. They have pointy ears, and pointy hats, and pointy shoes, and they help Santa! Duuuuuuuh. Unexpectedly, Sara burst into laughter. You have no idea how weird it is to see, um, hear, um, whatever! Let's say HEAR a bird laugh. Anyway, it's weird. Phew!

Here we are, the talking birds out saving the world, arguing over what elves look like! Are we weird or is it just me?

Just you, Marco supplied.

I am VERY confused. Ax mentioned.

AAAAAAAAH! I screamed. This is too intese for me. Let's get out of here! I need to fly!

Finally, eight birds of varied type, size and speed shot out of the woods toward the police station.

We flew to the police station, which wasn't all that very far. I flew with Tobias, who you can already guess what his form was, and Sara, who also had a red-tailed hawk morph. The only thing was, hers was a female. That kinda was something that made Tobias nervous, as you can very well imagine. We flew somewhat apart, so no wandering eyes would wonder why the heck two ospreys, two red-tailed hawks, a peregrine falcon, a bald eagle, a broad shouldered hawk, and a northern harrier were flying together.

Now I can tell you, there is nothing better than flying up high. You think you've had exitment? Rode a bucking horse? Nah, a roller coaster? Close, but nothing will compare to flying hundreds of feet up in the air on a thermal and then diving at top speed towards the ground, then pulling up again. Its like being strapped to a rocket pretty much. Its totally exhilarating.

Ask me again why the heck Ax was out in the open? Marco asked. His morph was an osprey. He and Cassie had accquired the same bird.

Marco, will you chill? Rachel replied. She was the bald eagle. It wasn't his fault. It just happened that he was standing next to a rare bird, and he got in the way when someone decided to take a picture. Just calm down.

Oh, yes almighty Xena. Marco chided.

AND STOP CALLING ME THAT! She yelled. I actually think though that she secretly likes being called that. We hoped that no one down below heard her yell. It seems that we all have nicknames that Marco gave us. Mine is Leia, because I have my hair in Princess Leia style occasionally. You know, the one in the first Star Wars movie that looked like she had two cinnamon buns strapped to her head? We all occasionally call Ax Ax-man. That's kinda a cute name. Sara has two nicknames. She also has a third one, but we rarely use it. They are Spock, because she's half Andalite and half human, like Spock from Star Trek, only he's half Vulcan and half human. Marco calls her that. The other one is Sar, just a simple one syllable name to use whenever we're in a tight situation, and we can't waste time in calling people by their whole name.

It took us only a few minutes before we reached the police station. It looked any ordinary police station, if you've ever been in one. We landed behind it, in a small alley kind of niche, and morphed out. Sara finished first and kept look out for anyone in case someone came.

"How are we going to get in there?" I asked. "We can't just waltz in."

"Fly perhaps?" Cassie suggested. "No one will notice some flies."

"No one except about fifteen bazillion controllers." Marco replied.

"Too late." Jake said, "Flies it is." He turned to Sara. "Anyone coming?" He asked.

"Nope, all clear." Sara reported. "Go ahead."

We all concentrated on our fly morphs. It was the first one I ever got, since the day that I found Sara in the locker half morphed into a bird. Morphing into a fly is something that made you want to crawl into a hole and die. When you see the two fly eyes pop out of a person's head like a pair of balloons, your stomach really wants to protest. I kept my eyes closed as long as possible.

It was when my wings actually began to appear that the fly consiousness actually appeared. It was very powered up, and it was majorly hungry. What I wanted to do at that moment was sink my straw like mouth into a fry that someone had dropped a couple of days ago. It was perfect! All mushy and everything!

NO! I told myself. STOP IT! You're loosing control! I beat down the fairly powerful fly mind and regained control. After a few minutes, we all lifted off and headed as best we could towards the police station window. Tobias was going to stay outside and keep guard.

Once I had the fly mind under control, I was out of control! I felt like I had drunk 20 cups of black coffee, and then had a whole chocolate cake. I was powered! ZOOM! I was careening towards a wall. ZOOM! I nearly collided with another fly, who I think was Cassie. ZOOM! I'm barely scraping the ground. I zoomed through the small crack in the window in the police station, with the others following me.

Whew! Sara said with exhiliration. I'll never forget how much fun that is.

Still, let's get this over with. Jake replied. That newspaper is eyeing me, and the two-hour clock is running. Tick tock.

We soared through a few rooms with police officers doing work, going past some spiky haired guy that had just been brought in. A hand reached up and tried to swat me, but I was too fast for him. It whizzed harmlessly by.

Where do you think it might be? Cassie asked.

Who knows? Rachel replied. I think we should look for our bozo that took the picture from that kid in the first place. Sara, can you look for any Controllers?

I certainly can try. Sara replied, Its just that its a little hard to scan when you're in mid air. There were a few minutes of silence before she said, There! The one with the funny looking hair. Follow him. We zoomed around and started to follow the man that Sara had indicated.

After a few minutes, the person went to a file room, and took out a file. We were in really good luck because he he opened it up, and there was the picture. Through my compound eyes I could clearly see Ax in that picture.

Another man came in, and I could hear their conversation.

"So when will the Visser be here?" The first man whispered. I knew who exactly he was talking about. Visser Three, our worst enemy. He was the only Yeerk to take over an Andalite body. Very recently, we came very close to freeing Alloran, who was the Andalite he had taken over. Afterwards, I think that he was brainwashed, and our vital information lost. It was devastating to all of us, but I think it impacted Sara the most. She freaked out and nearly committed morphicide. Along with the word 'Animorph', that's another word that Marco came up with. It referrs to anyone who will purposelly stay in a morph for more than two hours.

"Probably within the next two hours or so," another replied. "Is the evidence ready?"

"I've got it right here." The first one replied. He paused for a moment, and said, "It looks like someone is causing a ruckus out there. We'd better go and help or someone will suspect something." They left, and the first man left the picture out on top of the filing cabnet. We all gasped.

What a stupid controller! Marco exclaimed.

Can I guess that we are going to get the picture now? Ax asked.

No, we just wanted to go follow some controllers. Marco replied sarcastically. Of course we are!

We flew up to the top of the cabinet, and sat down on the picture. It felt like we were standing on some strange field of colors, or something. We all got on strategic places on the picture so we could hold it accordingly.

I grasped it, and tried to take off, but it was like trying to pick up an elephant, and a couple of boulders. The picture wouldn't budge!

Oof! I heard Sara cry. This isn't getting us anywhere. She declared. We all agreed. I have an idea.

Uh oh. I said. Whenever Sara had an idea, that generally meant trouble. Not bad trouble, just dangerous trouble.

What? Rachel asked with interest.

Come on. Sara said. We need to go to my house.

We stood in Sara's backyard. It wasn't very big, because she only lived with her "uncle". Actually, her uncle was an Andalite who was a friend of Elfangor's. He asked him to watch over Sara, and so he morphed into a human and commited morphicide. Now we all call him "Gran", since his Andalite name is really unprounouncible. Ax was in his human morph at the moment, since we didn't want any univited guests. He was going to return to Andalite once we were ready. Tobias was up in the trees.

Sara stood next to a structure, fairly big. She opened the door, and reached in. She pulled out an animal, with big ears, wide eyes, and huge hind feet. You guessed it. She was holding a rabbit. Cassie, Rachel, and I all squealed with delight and commenced to petting the rabbit. The rabbit was obviously enjoying all this attention.

"What are we going to do with a rabbit?" Jake asked.

"Oh, now what do you think?" Rachel asked.

"Eat it?" Marco asked with a smirk.

Sara glared at him with her fiery green eyes. "Don't you dare even suggest that, or I'll morph into a Yeerk again and crawl into your head. We can use Hyzenthlay here, along with a couple of others to sneak into the police station."

"But we'd be spotted immediately." I replied. Rabbits weren't exactly unnoticeable in a police station, and a rabbit there would immediately signal that it was us.

"Not Hyzenthlay." Sara replied. "She has black fur, so she would be hard to spot in dark places, and rabbits are natural tricksters. Besides, she can also crawl. I have a couple other dark bunnies that we could use as well. I've already accquired her, now its your turn."

"I'm not going to accquire some stupid Easter bunny!" Marco yelled.

"They're not bunnies! They're rabbits!" I replied.

"Same thing!" Marco replied.

"No it's not!" I replied.

"Yes it is!" Marco then said. We did this back and forth for a moment until Rachel and Cassie accquired the rabbit. Rachel broke us up, and now it was my turn.

As I placed my hand on the quivering rabbit's thick dark fur, I noticed the boys were acquiring a different rabbit. Probably didn't like being a girl, no matter what species, I thought, bemused. Then my attention was diverted back into acquiring the rabbit. You have to concentrate a little bit, though the morphing technology took care of the actual acquiring. I felt Hyzenthlay go still and calm as the acquiring trance kicked in, then I 'knew' that the DNA was part of me. I shook myself out of my own trance as Hyzenthlay recovered from her own. As I stood up I heard a shout from the other side of the room and a strange, high-pitched scream which I realized came from the rabbit. Sara hurried over and cooed over the dark-furred rabbit.

"Shh, shh, Thlayli. It's all right... He's not a real hawk..."

Hey! Tobias said, angrily.

"I didn't mean it like that," Sara said, trying to control the still- squealing rabbit. "I just meant you weren't going to eat him."

I don't know, Tobias teased. He looks awful good...maybe with barbecue sauce... Marco pretended to throw up in the corner. This did not improve the rabbit Thlayli's emotions, especially when Rachel began to shout at Marco to shut up, and he started to yell that Xena was torturing him.

"Shut UP! All of you!" We stared. It was Cassie!

"Woah," Marco whispered. "Cassie tells us to shut up?"

"I suggest you listen to her," Ax said nervously. "This small creature appears to be on the verge of exploding." Obediently, we all shut our mouths or thoughts, for Tobias, and simmered down for a moment. The rabbit, too, finally calmed down and began to try to wiggle out of Sara's grip. Sighing with relief, Sara placed the rabbit down again.

"Okay, Tob, you come at Thlayli here from behind and try to touch him gently. Hopefully he'll go into the trance fast."

"Hopefully he'll go into the trance at all," Jake muttered, still looking in surprise at Cassie for her outburst. Luckily, the rabbit went zombie- like almost the moment Tobias touched him, and the rest of the acquiring went without problems. Sara picked up the rabbits, who were showing their skill at hiding in the shadows, and put them back in the hutch.

"There you go, Hyzenthlay," she murmured. "Whoops! Don't step on Thethuthinnang!" I shook my head in amazement.

"Where the heck do you get these names, Sar?" She looked at me like I had just hatched from a piece of cheese-covered broccoli.

"Watership Down, of course! Where else?"

"Where else, indeed," I sighed.

She looked at me suspiciously. "You mean to say you still haven't read it?" I looked down at the floor sheepishly.

"Well, I, um, sort of, well," Rachel snorted impatiently.

"Look, you guys, are we going to stand around here talking about your summer reading list forever, or are we going to get going?"

"Get going," Sara said firmly. "Let's-"

"Hey!" Rachel interrupted. "That's my line. Let's go!" Marco muttered something noncommittal and sprouted a tail.

We have a weird life.

"Well Lauren, how was your day?" My mom asked as I came in the house. We had all morphed into our birds, and went home, deciding that we would begin the raid tomorrow, since it would be Saturday. I had lied and said that some of my friends and I went to the mall after school just to hang out, so that would explain how come I was late.

"Great!" I said. I hated lying to my mom, but it was necessary, because, Heaven forbid, she might be a controller, it would mean the end of all of us. "The picnic was a blast!"

"That's good." My mom said, "I was wondering if you would like the food there."

"Well, as long as there are grapes there, then I'm satisfyed." I replied. My grape fanatics were well known throughout the family. "And of course, there were."

"Do you have any homework?" My mom asked. Typical mom questions.

"Of course not!" I replied, as if she had been asking me if the sky was blue. "The picnic was today!" My mom smiled.

"Well, if that's the case, then why don't you go outside? Its a beautiful day, and it certainly shouldn't be spent cooped up in here." My mom replied. I said yes. What's a little while longer in the sun? I went upstairs and got out the picture I was drawing, along with my colored pencils and my drawing utensils. I was drawing a sunset scene, with a pair of horses running across the scene. So far, I had drawn the horses, and gotten the basic sun drawn. Something was missing, but I couldn't quite place it. Something..something..I didn't know, but maybe it would come to me once I started to draw again.

I went outside to the back porch and set up my stuff. It was plesantly warm, and there was a slight breeze. I sat down and began to draw. I added on some grass in the front, and gave the sun a few more rays. Sun? Why was I drawn to that?

FLASH! I saw myself, watching a battle, against a setting sun.

I shook my head. What was that? I thought for a moment, I had seen Ax and Visser Three. I shook the thought away from my head, and concentrated on the picture. Was I going insane? Maybe this Animorph stuff was getting to me.

The next day, I lied to Mom again, and said that we were going to the Gardens that day. It made sense, because I enjoy going there. The Gardens is a zoo/amusement park, which is kinda interesting. Both parts are fun though.

Instead of going there and having fun, I was going to put my life on the line once again that week. That became anything but fun. We all met at Jake's house, since his parents were out for the day, and Tom didn't mind at all. He had been a controller, but Jake and Sara had rescued him. Now he was doing everything he could to help. If he had the choice, he would probably use the morphing power we had given him to help, but Jake had persuaded him to stay away from the battle. He had already done enough. We met there and morphed into our bird of prey morphs. We then flew out and went towards the police station once again.

The flight went without incident. We all stayed a fair distance apart so no one would suspect anything. You have to admit, a group of totally diffrent birds flying together is enough to make anyone stare, and that's the last thing we need. During our time in morph, we have to stay completely in our morph, behavior wise. If a controller were to suspect us of unnatural behavior, he or she would pull out a Dracon gun and fry us in

an instant. Then all hope would be lost.

So I'm going to be turning into Bugs Bunny, is that right? Marco asked.

Marco, will you COOL IT! Sara yelled. She obviously hated anyone making fun of her rabbits.

Both of you, enough! I yelled. I was kind of preoccupied about what had

happened the previous day. Maybe Sara might know something. For quite a time, she had been having visions of an Ellimist, and her father. Once even, she and Tobias had the same vision. One of the visions she had, we

kind of all saw, because she began to play a beautiful piece of music on apiano at Cassie's house, and she didn't know how to playto well. I caught a thermal, which is a pillar of warm air, and rose up to Sara's altitude.

Sara, I whispered, how long it took you to realize what was going on when you were having visions?

Um, about a couple of days. Sara whispered back. Why?

Because either I'm going insane, I replied, Or I saw Ax and Visser Three against a setting sun. I'm not quite sure what they were doing yet though.

I see. Sara said, understanding what I was going through now. Just let the visions come, don't fight them. Eventually you'll find out what's going on. We're coming to the police station.

Indeed, my keen eyes clearly read the sign of the police station on the side of the building. We landed in the same spot again, and once again Sara was the first one to morph out again. She kept watch while the rest of us climbed out of the morphs we were in.

How are we going to get in? Ax asked, shifting from one hoof to the other.

I scoped the place out yesterday after everyone had left. Tobias said. There is a hole large enough for a rabbit to fit through over there.

Sara turned around and put her hands on her hips, cocking her head to one side and giving a lopsided smirk. "Now I wonder how you knew that." She said. Man, those two know exactly what the other's thinking. I guess that's the good thing about twins.

"Let's get this over with, shall we?" Jake said. "I kinda want to get this over with."

"Well, do we have a voulnteer?" Rachel asked. What we did with a new morph was have one person morph first, so the others would know what to expect, and so they could pull the voulnteer out of it if the animal's mind took over.

"I'll do it." Sara said, raising her hand as if she was in school. "I've had this rabbit morph for a long time, but never got a chance to try it out." She stood still and closed her eyes. I kept a watch for anyone that might be unlucky enough to wander around the corner.

Sara's morph was a little more speedier than the rest of us. I was kinda jealous about that, because then she gets it over with earlier. But then again, I am not far behind her, kinda odd if you ask me. The first change was her size. Within a few seconds she had shrunk about a foot and a half. Dark fur, almost black, started to appear all over her body. Her spine arched some, and a dark tail grew out of her spine. Her face protuded some, and her eyes wandered to the sides of her head. Her nose grew smaller and began to sniff the air like crazy.

"Whoa, Sara the hyper nose." Marco said. Sara didn't answer, because I think she was bearing down for the rabbit mind. Her ears went to the top of her head and grew like some bizarre weed. They became extraordinarily huge and papery thin. Her knees bent and became muscular, while her actual feet practically exploded. She started to fall forward as the rabbit legs took over.

"Catch her, catch her!" Rachel said, and bent over to keep Sara from

alling right in the dirt. After Sara grew claws, she became a full rabbit. She got up upright, and sniffed the air. Sara took one look at Tobias and ran off screaming.

"Sara! Wait!" I yelled, diving for the little rabbit. She certainly knew how to make lightning fast turns.

Sara! The rabbit mind has control of you! Ax said, Bring it under control. After a moment, she stopped hyperventilating, and came over to us.

Sorry about that. Sara apoligized. I never realized how frightened rabbits can get when a predator is around.

Cassie picked her up, so no stray dogs could get at her easily.

"Well, let's get started." Rachel said. "I want to start being a rabbit." Cassie set Sara on some boxes, and she laid down while we morphed.

I had just locked onto the rabbit DNA when I had a sudden idea. "Tobias!" I called up. "Morph to yourself- you know, uh, human. Then when we've all controlled our minds you can morph into the rabbit."

All right, he said, and quickly began to form into the blond-haired dishrag sort of guy I barely remembered used to exist. I began to morph again, thinking the rabbit wouldn't be as scared of a half-human, half-hawk as it would be of a complete hawk.

Unlike Sara's morphing, I got my ears first. Still human-like, they wandered around my head until they were happy where they were, nearer to the top, then elongated and became very thin. My skin turned darker and darker until it was nearly black, then suddenly sprouted like mushrooms after a rain into thick, healthy rabbit fur. Quite abruptly, my legs changed shape and I fell forward. Luckily I had been shrinking the whole time, so I didn't have hard to fall. My toenails sprouted into strange claws.

Funny, I thought. I never knew rabbits had claws. My nose shrank and whiskers sprouted like some sort of weird mustache. I felt my organs squishing around inside of me, changing and moving. My eyes had been changing this whole time, and now I lapsed suddenly into rabbit vision. I could still see colors, but not the same as us humans do. I felt a small sort of bobtail sprout out, and then after a few more minor changes, my morph was complete.

I sat, huddled on the ground, waiting for the rabbit brain to resurface. I saw that most of the others were also morphing. I could see Tobias standing sort of awkwardly over to my right. I was wondering what he was thinking and if we really looked too disgusting when the rabbit brain surfaced suddenly.

Fear! Strangers! Run! This rabbit really wanted to run, and I let it. I ran right into the half-morphed form of someone, I couldn't tell who.

Ow! The voice was familiar... how could it be familiar? Hey, little rabbit, whoever you are, don't run all over me! You just scratched my foot! I, the rabbit, didn't like that. I tried to run the other way, but ran into someone else. I began to squeal in despair.

Lauren, shut UP! Someone will hear you! Get control of yourself, little elf! Lauren...I knew that name. At the mention of 'elf', my memories, and control, flooded back.

Wha- what- wow. I lost it, didn't I?

Yes, Sara said without malice, hopping her way over. We're going to have to work at helping everyone get their control back. Rabbits have pretty strong instincts!

No kidding, I muttered. It was after about a minute more that everyone had completely morphed. While we waited for Tobias to finish morphing, we had to help the others get back to the world of the humans instead of the rabbits. It took a moment for me to calm down a frantic Rachel.

Rachel! I said, It's me! Lauren! Snap out of it!

After a moment, she went, Oh, sorry about that, I must have gone beserk.

I think we all did. I replied. We heard a rabbit scream. I think Sara needs some help.

After Tobias had morphed and gotten under control, we had to get going because Sara had been in morph for about ten minutes now. Ax made some remark about the strength of rabbit instincts. We blindly tried to get to the police station, because rabbits have their eyes on the sides of their head, not in the front like humans, to basically you were looking from two points of view. One side saw the alleyway that we were in, the other saw a group of rabbits--the others.

Being a rabbit was fun, but what really was interesting was that it was like I had been deaf and scent-impaired all these years. It was incredible! I could smell the strong scent of asphalt and stone, and I could hear the rustling of paper in a passing by car that was behind the fence.

We squeezed through the hole that Tobias had mentioned, since it was our only way in. I felt trapped in the hole, but the rabbit's mind felt more comfortable, because the hole and tunnel was very similar to a burrow underground, and the rabbit liked that.

Marco started to hum the Mission: Impossible song, where it came from, I don't know.

What's with you and the Mission: Impossible song? Sara asked.

Well, this mission IS impossible, right? Marco asked. At first, you would think that he was a pessimist who never wanted to get into this, but in reality, I think he has the most reason to fight out of all out of us. You see, his mother is one of them, and one of the most powerful ones on top of that. His mother is Visser One, the most powerful Visser, more powerful than Visser Three.

Marco, just get going. Jake said. We need to find this picture before Visser Three can take it.

We got into the police station, and started to sneak under desks and the like, keeping to the wall, and praying that no one kicked us. I wasn't sure what it was, but this felt very familiar, like deja vu. You know, the

feeling that you've been somewhere before. Somewhat like the horse picture the other day. We should try to find the filing room. Ax suggested.

Wasn't that this way? Cassie asked.

Let's try it. I said. We sneaked under some more people, and reached the filing room. It was full of regular files, but we knew exactly what we were looking for.

We should hurry. Tobias said, People will be coming in and out of this place.

Didn't the controller leave the picture on top of the cabnet? Cassie asked.

I think so. Sara said, This'll be tough. I'm just about as tall as that cabinet.

Now we all know that this will take a while, you jolly green Vulcan giant. Marco said to Sara.

Oh, shut yer yapping you elf. Sara replied. We've got to find a way up there.

My sensitive ears picked up the sound of feet walking closer. Someone's coming! I shrieked.

The human came in with a lot of noise, which seemed to my rabbit ears nonsense but which my human ears recognized as 'Baby Love' by the Supremes. I wondered briefly why a Controller would be singing, and so badly too, but before I could react he stepped into the room and my questions were answered.

It was the custodian.

He was dunking his mop in something that smelled horribly and launching into the third chorus when he noticed us. "What? Huhhh, what the hell are rabbits doing in a police station?" He lapsed into some muttering and lumbered over toward us.

Not a Controller, Jake muttered, But dangerous anyway. Let's hop it! We scattered as the janitor's hand crashed down into the space we had just vacated. Swearing, he overbalanced and fell into the cabinet. It shook horribly as his substantial weight knocked into it, and the picture was knocked off the edge and fluttered to the floor.

The picture! Rachel hissed. We immediately began inching our way out of the tangle of furniture we had hidden ourselves behind- as the custodian struggled up.

"Hey Jimmy!" he hollered to someone. "We got some sorta infestation in 'ere! Rabbits! Six...uh...seven of them!"

Eight, thank you, I retorted silently. The 'Jimmy' rushed in, and I knew at once we were in trouble. He had on a policeman's uniform, and they'd taken over all the policemen... The moment he spotted us, his eyes widened.

"Andalite!" he growled, grabbing the gun from the holster at his hip. I had an awful feeling that it wasn't a normal human revolver, but the deadly and very precice Dracon gun of the Yeerks.

Holy shit, I whispered. What do we do now?

I told you this was an impossible mission, Marco groaned.

Hey, on Mission: Impossible they always win, don't they? Rachel said optimistically. He's not going to kill us- you know what Visser Three would do to him if he did. And we have something to bargain with!

The picture! Cassie hissed. But do they care? Why are they keeping it, anyway? If people knew about it, the alien story would be all around town!" All this time, we were slowly inching toward the picture, trying not to catch the eye of the Controller.

I suspect they are hoping to figure out where my feeding grounds are, Ax said. As they think we are all Andalites, we'd need a very large area to feed in. At that moment, I decided I was close enough to the picture to make a jump for it. I waited for a moment.

The Controller turned his head. "Smith! Roberts! The Andalites are in here!" I took advantage of the distraction and leapt onto the picture, covering it with my dark little rabbits' body. Everyone scampered over after me as I pulled the picture up and into my mouth. Just then, five more Controllers leapt in the other door, Dracon guns lifted. We were surrounded!

Sara, Rachel said grimly. You said this little rabbits are fast, right?

Yes! Ever tried to catch a rabbit?

Let's hope these Controllers don't try, Rachel said.

Uh oh, Rachel, I don't like the sound of what you're planning- Tobias began.

Let's go! Rachel shouted. Scatter! Run! Tell these stupid little brains there's a hawk nearby! GO! NOW!

They're not- Sara began, but then we bolted and any more was lost. The poor janitor huddled on the floor, screaming, as the Dracon beams laced out, screaming through the air and burning holes in the floor.

And that's the stun setting! I thought, letting my hind legs go like a wound spring. Utter confusion reigned.

I dashed like there was no tomorrow, which there might not be for me if I didn't put my little rabbit butt in gear. I dashed about, crashing into a number of things because I wasn't paying attention. I bit down into the bad tasted of the picture in order to hold it better. Thank goodness they hadn't made any enlargements.

Which way? Ax asked.

Back track, back track, back track! Jake ordered. We followed the scent that we had made on our way in. Remember, every living thing has a specific scent, and right now I was following my own scent, and Thlayli's. I had to dodge quite a bit because I was a prime target for Yeerks, since I had the picture.

Come on! Sara yelled, This way! Move move move move move! Need I say that she was anxious.

We dashed under tables, hearing the confused yells of non-controllers, who had no clue what was going on. I dodged a broom as it tried to fall on top of me. The picture was now locked in my jaws, not like a death grip, just that I wasn't about ready to let go.

I heard a rabbit scream, and I saw one of the guys get picked up by a police officer, in an uncomfortable position. When I say that, it was just that it wasn't the way that Sara gently picks up her rabbits. It was a tough pick up. He swung around helplessly, trying to find a way to get at the police officer that was holding him.

"Now Andalite, you will call off your friends and give us the picture back. Now!" The controller said.

"Andalite? Picture?" I heard a voice say. "What do you mean by that? Have you gone off the deep end?" I was guessing that it was a non-controller.

Let go of me! It was Tobias. He didn't say it to the controller, but he would have if it was possible. This meant trouble. You see, as long as I have been in the Animorphs, and with Sara, she always had the tendancy to be very protective of Tobias, even before they found out that they were twins. I even watched one time as she let go of her human self and totally beat up a couple of bullies who were picking on them.

Don't you dare do anything to hurt him. I heard Sara hiss. Like I said, don't intimidate her with hurting Tobias. She dashed up at top speed, and bit that guy in the ankle--very hard. I saw her draw blood, maybe down to the bone. Probably not, but if she could, Sara would.

"AAAAAAIIIIGGGGGHHHHH!" I heard the man say. He dropped Tobias, and kicked his foot. That sent Sara flying. She landed on her back on the ground. Sara flipped over and dashed back to us.

Sara, are you all right? Rachel asked.

Yeah, I'm fine. Sara replied.

Apparently, these rabbits can be dangerous when given the chance. Ax

observed. We dashed out of that room, and finally made our way outside.

We dashed about, trying to find our way back to the alley that we had come

to in.

I actually thought we were going to make it, when I heard a BLAM! BLAM!

We were being fired on!

After all we've done! I groaned. I definitely do not want to be killed by a bullet!

Better than being a Controller, Ax said. I concentrated on running, then decided to let the rabbit brain take over a bit. It would know how to escape better than I would. I let Hyzenthlay's frightened consciousness come about halfway forward. She did NOT like being shot at. I shot off like one of the bullets that was following me, finding my way through tiny openings, concentrating only on running.

Why are they shooting at us? Cassie was wailing. They just want to kill us, after all that's happened? I didn't answer, because I had found what looked like a way out. I got down on my stomach and crawled through a break in a brick wall, then popped out.

I'm free! I shouted, forgetting myself. I had popped out onto a busy street, and the 'sound' of my cry was heard by everyone there. A group of students carrying a sort of banner turned and looked in shock at what was going on.

"They're shooting at those poor little rabbits!" one of them said.

"We've got to stop them!" Another growled. Just then I was able to read the banner. S.A.H.N. STUDENTS AGAINST HURTING NATURE. EARTH DAY IS TODAY AND EVERY DAY!

This could be good, I thought, scuttling off to hide behind some sort of post. I listened carefully with my oversize ears.

"Stop it!" one of the students was shouting. "They haven't done anything to you!"

"If you don't cease and desist this moment," another was saying. "we'll report it. This should make a good story; policemen shooting rabbits!" Suddenly my head swam. Policemen...shooting rabbits.... I was falling. Another vision!

I saw rabbits running, faster, faster. A woman was running after them, and for a moment I thought I saw myself. She had the same long dark hair, blowing out behind her like a flag. But she was much older than I was, old enough to be my mother. My mother... something jolted inside me as I thought that, and I began to return to the normal world. Just as I was leaving, I saw the woman turn. She was holding a baby, with hair as dark as her own. The baby looked directly at me, and I stared, not knowing what to think, into eyes the exact color of my own.

"LAUREN!" I sat up abruptly, or tried to, then realized I was a rabbit. I spit out the picture I was still holding in my mouth.

Huh? What?

"Lauren! Oh, thank god you're awake. Morph! Now!" I looked up, confused. Marco was standing over me, shouting in my face.

Ow. Okay, okay! Geez, you don't have to yell. I have really good hearing, you know. Marco was losing whatever patience he had left.

"If you don't morph back you'll keep that hearing for the rest of your life!" he shouted. "Ax, tell her!"

Lauren, Ax said urgently. You have ten minutes left. That woke me up.

Holy hell! I yelped, and immediately began to morph back to my human form.

Once I had gotten my mouth, I asked, "Where are we?"

"Back at the dumpster." Jake replied. "You totally went out on us, just fainted. Those high school students 'rescued' us, and we were let go over here, since they thought that we had a home here."

"Like I told Cassie," Marco said, "guess what she will be doing once she's in high school."

"Oh, hush about that." Cassie replied. "Are you all right now?"

"Yeah, I'm fine." I replied. "I guess the stress is getting to me." I didn't want to tell them anything about what happened, because I didn't think that it was real, maybe some Ellimist trick.

Something's fluey here, I thought. It was getting strange. That baby looked

remarkably like me. Did that mean something? I went back to the present, and concentrated on the dilema at hand.

"So do you think the yeerks learned anything?" Sara asked. We all looked at the picture now, and got a good look at it. Like I had said before, it looked like a very suprised Ax, and a red blur.

It looked like they probably figured out that Ax hangs out around there. Tobias replied, But it isn't anywhere around Cassie's house, and it's a good distance away from my meadow.

"Still, they've got a good estimate of where you live Ax." Sara pointed out.

"Maybe we should find out what they really know." Rachel said. "I suggest that we infiltrate the yeerk pool, or get a hold of a controller, and find out."

"Why did I get the feeling that you were going to say that Xena?" Marco said.

"Will you hush about that?" Rachel snapped. We could all tell that she was not in the best of moods.

Ax glanced up. It appears that it is becoming darker. I would suggest that we should leave and discuss this after you come out of school tomorrow. I looked up and noticed that he was right.

"Okay." I said, "We'll discuss this tomorrow." We all morphed into our various birds of prey and took to the air. I flew for a while before I decided to talk to Sara about the "dream" I had.

Sara, I whispered. when you were having your visions, what were they like before you actually went into them?

Why do you want to know? Sara asked.

Just curious I guess. I lied. I was lying to my friends now! What next? Would I lie to myself now?

Well, first I would feel very exausted and tired, like I was about to collapse right where I was. Sara explained. Then I would fall into that REM sleep, and then the vision would begin.

Hmm, I said, Well, okay. Neat. Thanks Sara.

No problem. Sara said, sounding very suspicious. I bet that if she could, then she would raise her eyebrow, like she would do occasionly. She banked off as she came to her house, and I continued on my way home.

That night, I had another vision.

It was a given, I suppose. I was thinking it from the moment I got home to just before I fell asleep. Why had I gotten a feeling that that baby, the one the woman had been holding, was me? Suddenly it hit me. Of course! My mother had told me... I had been adopted. She and my father had adopted me when I was two. She had made a point of making sure I knew, and understood. I had just realized this and was trying to figure out how I could remember my life at such a small age, and was wondering what had happened to my parents, when I fell asleep and dreamed...

I saw myself, a child of one or two, painting a picture of- Oh, god! How could it be possible? I was painting a picture of an Andalite. No, two andalites. Standing side-by-side. My dream mother came over, smiling, and admired 'my' picture.

"That's very nice, honey. Who is it?"

"Printh 'Fangor and daddy," I replied, hissing my s's because of the absence of my two front teeth. "Mama, tell me thtory of 'Fangor an' morph 'gain." My mother smiled, sat down in a soft chair, and took me on her lap. She gently wove my downy black hair through her fingers as she spoke.

"A thousand years ago, there was a plague which threatened the whole of our Milky Way galaxy, if not further out. It consisted of a parasitic slug race which took over others' minds, working ruthlessly on a conquest to take control of the entire galaxy. They were the-"

"Yeerks!" I squealed in delight. As I watched my dream self giggle over the word, I wondered if there would ever be a time when I would do the same.

"Yes, darling," My mother continued. "The Yeerks. And we, on Earth, were the next step in their ladder of destruction. The Yeerks landed and began taking over our world, destroying an Andalite dome ship in the process. But one Andalite, Prince Elfangor, landed on Earth on a mission of his own, right at the dawn of the invasion. He landed on a construction site. On this construction site there also were some children- five human teenagers. They came to the site in pure luck. Elfangor was dying, and while they stood by him he gave them a power which would save Earth from destruction; the power to morph."

My dream self looked bored. "I know dat, Mommy. Tell 'bout Animorphs!"

"I was getting to that. The five teenagers hid while Prince Elfangor...died. Then they left, and began the long fight for freedom. They were later joined by an Andalite named Aximili, a human girl named Sara who was Elfangor's daughter, and another girl with a half alien background named-"

"Lauren!" I crowed joyfully. My mother smiled.

"Yes. Your namesake. This group worked for many, many years, trying to bring freedom to our planet. Things got very bad for a while, but with the aid of a new weapon and many new allies, the Yeerks finally were forced to surrender and the human-Andalite alliance was formed."

"An' dey all lived happily ever after, Mommy?"

"Yes, Lauren. They all lived happily ever after."

I sat up in bed, gasping with shock. I realized I was also laughing. I quickly stopped. It was only a dream! Only a dream! It didn't mean we won... I slowly lay back. But I had been having visions, too. Could it be true? Could such a future really be possible? Eight of us against a horrible empire... and if my dreams were true, who was I? WHO WAS I? Daddy?......I fell asleep again, silent tears pouring down my face.

I had no other dreams or visions that night. In the morning, my eyes baggy, I went up to my mother.

"Mom, I was adopted, right?"

"Yes. I've told you!" She looked a bit uncomfortable, as she always does when I mention being adopted. I think she wishes she was my true mother.

"I know. But I want some details."

"All right." Sighing, she turned from the computer where she was typing up something or other and crossed her arms across her chest. "What do you want to know?"

"Why did you name me Lauren? How was I found? How old was I?"

"Hey! Slow down!" My mother smiled. "Well, let's see. You were found just standing in a field, crying your poor little eyes out. You were nicely dressed, if a bit strangely, and looked like you had been well taken care of. But your parents were never found. You were put into an orphanage, but you only stayed there a month. Your father and I-" She blushed slightly. "had always wanted a child, but had never been able to have one. You were like a sign from heaven."

I hurriedly wiped away a tear and swallowed. "But my name, how did you get my name?"

"Oh, that. It was on the outfit you were wearing. It said 'Cristalinamin- Lauravesto-Corrass.' And right underneath that it said 'Lauren.' I have to admit, it was a very interresting name." What was it about that name that rung a bell? I shrugged it off.

"Oh, well, I've got to go, Mum," I said, extracting my shoes from the pile of junk that could be mistaken for a closet and putting them on. She groaned.

"Again? Where are you these says, Lala? You're never around." I felt a pang of guilt at both the pet name and the reminder of my far-too-often absences.

"I'm sorry," I said lamely. "I-I promise to stay home as much as possible as soon as I can. "Really!" My mother sighed.

"If you say so, Lala. Very well, see you!"

"Bye!" I called out, dashing out the door.

I decided that it would be a good idea for me not to tell anyone. Hopefully, I wouldn't get any...any premonitions during the day, like Sara did. That way, I could keep this to myself. What was so familiar about my name? It seemed to remind me of something, but I could't remember what it was.

I jogged down the street towards Sara's house. Apparently Ax had forgotten that today was a teacher workday, so we had no school. That was just fine for me though. My grades had been suffering ever since I had joined in on the fight against the Yeerks. Everyone had to work extra hard to keep the grades they had at the moment, and that was no picnic. Since Sara's house was the closest, we had decided to meet there, and we wouldn't have to worry about anyone spying on us. In fact, I think that Sara's house is the safest place to meet, since we don't have to worry about anyone easesdropping on us.

I came up to Sara's house, and rang the doorbell. After a few moments, the door opened, to reveal Sara. She had in her hands some paintbrushes and a washcloth.

"Hi Sara." I said. "Project?" I gestured towards the paintbrushes.

"Oh, yeah." Sara said. "I have to do a model of the Tower of London. No stroll through the park I can tell you."

"Hmm," I said, and stepped inside. "I'm glad I'm not in your social studies class, and I don't have to do that."

Sara's Andalite green eyes narrowed at me, and she smiled. "You will Lauren. You're the first one here. The others should be here at any time now. Gran's at work, so we've got the house to ourselves." Her uncle works as a programmer for the Gardens, working to help create a more effective schedule that people can access better and get on time more often. As an Andalite, he had been one of those computer guys, so this was right up his alley.

We walked into the small living room, where there were Quaker Oats cans half covered in grey paint, and some cereal boxes waiting to be covered. She moved those to the kitchen, with me helping some. Just as Sara was washing the paint off of the brushes, the doorbell rang again. This time, it was a strangely handsome boy, who we both recognized as Ax in morph, and Jake and Marco.

"Hi you two." Jake said. "Tobias said he'll be coming in any minute, so you should open a window."

"Already did that." Sara said, jesturing towards the windows, which had been opened wide. "I needed some extra air to help dry the paint on my project."

"That social studies one?" Jake asked. Marco made a gagging sound and collapsed onto the couch.

"Yep." Sara replied.

"Is Marco okay? Kay?" Ax asked, glancing at Marco, who was still there, making a "dead" face.

"He's fine." Jake said. "Just suffering from England project anxiety."

"Is it deadly? Ly? Leeeeeeeee?" Ax asked. I rolled my eyes at how he was responding.

"No, just stressful." Sara said, then walked over to Marco. "You'd better get off the couch like that before I dump all this grey paint down your shirt!"

This looks interesting. Tobias said, flying through the window and landing on Sara's shoulder. Marco, I think she means it.

"Oh no great Spock, I didn't mean to antagonize your great Vulcan wisdom." Marco said, sitting up. Sara's eyes seemed to flare slightly. I don't think she ever liked that name very much.

After about five more minutes, Cassie and Rachel came. We all sat in the living room, anxious somewhat. The air had that feeling that it always did just before we went on a mission. Like you had a gut feeling that something was not right.

"All right everyone." Jake said. "We'll use the normal approach, commando run, all right? No stopping to stir things up." He glared at Sara a bit. During one of the times into the Yeerk pool where it was supposed to be a in and out situation, Sara had gotten a bad case of sympathy, and really rocked the place up.

"Tobias, have you found another entrance?" Rachel asked.

I think so. Tobias replied. It seems to be a janitor's closet at one of the business buildings, I can't remember it's name. I can show you where it is.

"Well then, let's go!" Rachel said. We all rolled our eyes at her normal saying, and began to morph into our birds of prey.

As it was a long way to the center of town where the major businesses were, even as the crow (hawk?) flies, I dropped back to talk to Ax. It gave me a vague sense of deja vu, as I remembered Sara doing the same thing when she was having visions. But Ax was the only one who might know about the name.

Ax? I asked privately. He caught on and answered only to me.

What is it, Lauren? Are you feeling anxiety about the upcoming mission?

No. It's just that- well, this is silly.

As I read in the book of quotes Cassie gave me, there are no silly questions.

Well...okay. You see, it's my last name. Corrass.

But that's not your last name! Is it?

No. It was changed. But that used to be my last name, and for some reason it rings a bell. Do you have any idea- Ax? Ax! He had fallen back.

Sorry. It just came to me. Corrass is part of Alloran's name: Alloran- Semitur-Corrass. Just a coincidence, of course. But what an odd one! My blood ran cold.

Alloran, I whispered. Who is he? Though I had a feeling I already knew.

Alloran is the Andalite body of Visser Three.

Oh, God! This time it was I who fell back. Ax banked and came to me.

Lauren! Are you all right? What is wrong? I regained control quickly, nothing that the others ahead were looking at us suspiciously, and with worry.

Um... nothing. Really. It's okay. Thanks, Ax. I want to be alone now. He flew away obediently. But despite my outward appearance of calm, as it is difficult for a hawk not to look calm and fierce, my insides were jolting like butterflies...or maybe more like marbles. Visser Three... He had an Andalite body, and could morph...I was apparently from the future, a future in which the Yeerks surrendered...

Before my thoughts could reach the peak I was desperately avoiding, we arrived at a tall building with shiny blue-tinted windows.

Here we are! Tobias called out. I forced down my thoughts to a small, dark corner of my brain, and concentrated on the task ahead.

I never did like office buildings. Cassie said. There's something about them. It just freaks me out.

Well, that was vauge, if I ever heard one. Jake replied. We sat on the top of the building, which was about ten or so stories up. Even though I was a hawk at the moment, my stomach twisted slightly. You never know what can happen at ten stories in the air.

We'd better morph out, and pray that there's no airplanes flying overhead. Rachel said. Indeed, if there were any low flying planes, then we were in trouble, especially if there were any controllers on board, which undoubtedly there would be.

We went into the shadows, so we would be shielded somewhat. I felt the stomach wrenching sensation as my organs twisted around to accomadate my human body. It certainly would hurt, if it wasn't for the Andalite technology, which numbed the pain to only some queasy sensations, and the occasional crunch as bones realligned themselves. My black leotard started to show through. Sara had already finshed and was now standing in her sky blue practice leotard. She takes figure skating you see. Rachel also has an athletic hobby, only hers is gymnastics.

"Really, we need some sort of uniform." Marco said. "We look like some escapees from a bad comic book."

Sara rolled her eyes. "Can it, will you Marco?" She asked. "That's always your topic of discussion whenever we morph out somewhere. Can't you think of anything else?"

Marco thought a minute, scratched his head, and said, "No."

"Oh seriously." I said, once I had a mouth.

"Okay everyone." Jake said. "We're going to roach, and sneaking in. Tobias, you're leading."

I decided that now was the time for me to speak what was spinning in my mind ever since we decided on going to the yeerk pool to do this. "Everyone, why the yeerk pool? We know what's down there, how hard it is to get in, and how hard it is to forget what is going on down there. Isn't there an easier way?"

Lauren, I've never seen you this emotional. Sara whispered to me in thought-speak. What's going on? I just stared at her for a moment, and basically told her to be quiet with my eyes.

"I'm sorry Lauren." Rachel said sympathetically. "I'm sure that we all don't want to go into the yeerk pool. We've seen what goes on down there, and frankly, I've had quite a few nightmares about that. If there was an easier way, I would most certainly take it, but I don't see any other way. Chapman is constantly on guard, and it's very hard to keep a controller captive, as we found out when Jake was infested."

We all went silent for a moment, trying to take all this in. It was Ax that broke the silence. Perhaps this will be diffrent. We will stay out of everything as much as possible. That didn't help much, but it did snap us out of our somber trance, and into morphing. Cockroaches aren't exactly my first choice for a morph, but it was the only one we could all agree on, and cockroaches can take minimal damage.

We scuttled through the minor cracks in the building. I never wanted to go into a building again, because we had just gone through a very large crack in the concrete. It gave me a sickening feeling.

Are you sure we're going the right way? Sara asked Tobias.

I'm absolutely positive. Tobias replied. I checked this out when I was riding a thermal. It is definitely this way.

If you say so. Sara replied. I didn't get much into the conversation, because my mind kept wandering back to my dream, and what Ax was talking about. Me? Related to the body of Visser Three? It was sickening to even think about it.

We plopped into a small office room, with a very large closet from what I could tell. A person walked in behind us, and we scuttled to the sides of the room. Luckily, he didn't notice us. He walked into the closet and shut the door.

Do you think that this guy is a controller? Cassie asked.

He walked in too briskly. Sara replied. I couldn't get a good hold, but I think it was a controller. Why don't we wait a few minutes. So we sat there, doing nothing for about two minutes. It was a painful two minutes, because anyone could come in and squash us.

Well? Jake asked expectantly.

Either that guy just can't put his coat on the hangar, Marco said, then added with a strained voice, or that's the yeerk pool.

We all grimly started towards the door, not sure what to expect, when someone came storming in the room behind us. We scattered, Sara, Tobias, Jake, and I against one wall, Ax, Marco, Rachel, and Cassie against the other.

"What do you mean that they escaped?" The man asked, obviously fumed to the breaking point. Another man came in, who I immediately recognized as Chapman, our assistant principal, and one of the higher ranking controllers.

"I'm sorry Visser, but there were some students who were not controllers, and we couldn't stop them." Chapman stuttered.

Visser? Tobias asked.

Visser Three! I hissed.

Again? Marco groaned. He's like a bad dream! Why can't he pick on some other group of world-savers?

Hate to mention it, Marco Polo, I growled. But we're the only ones.

Don't remind me! he said. And don't call me Marco Polo!

Marco Polo, Marco Polo, Marco Polo, Marco-

Shut up! Rachel hissed unexpectedly. I can't hear! Obediently, we shut up and listened, which, believe me, was not easy with roach hearing.

"Students!" Visser Three was growling. "What did they do, throw pencils at you? Give you paper cuts? You can't let yourself be bossed by a bunch of minor...humans!" He let out the latter word like it was some disgusting morsel of food that he despised. I stared up at the normal-looking human mask, and the thoughts I had been trying to control came flooding back. Was I really related to Visser Three? Could it be possible? Or was it just a coincidence my last name was Corrass... How many Corrasses do you think there are in the phone book? I asked myself. Not many!

With quite a lot of effort, I wrenched my mind back to the present and concentrated on the words the two Controllers were speaking, not who was saying them. Chapman was trying to explain.

"I couldn't help it, Visser... there were people watching..."

"People!" The Andalite-Controller snorted. "Soon there will be no more 'people', except the ones acting as robots for our kind!" He glanced over at Chapman, who looked like a slapped puppy. "Ah, well. It is not of great consequence. Our new plan will destroy the resistance once and for all. Pity there will be no Andalite bodies to infest... but that will change as we destroy the Andalite homeworld itself. Haha, think of all the little Andalite children writhing in pain...mothers screaming out..."

Ax, no! Jake had to forcefully hold Ax back from leaping at the Visser. You can't exactly do anything in this morph. What do you expect to do, poop on their shoes? Seeing the logic of the statement, Ax calmed down a bit. But it was easy to see he was still fuming. Chapman himself was looking a little nervous.

"Ah, what plan? I was not told-"

"Ah!" The Visser crowed. "You will know, everyone will know, tonight. We are holding a meeting in the sub-annex of the pool feeding room. You were notified, correct?"

"I was," Chapman said. "But could you not tell me about the plan now? What does it involve? Have you found another morphing detector? Is-"

"I will say nothing," Visser Three said firmly. "Other than this: we shall soon have a very fiery victory. VERY fiery, indeed! Hahahahaha!" Chapman looked at his master, perplexed, as he opened the secret door to the Yeerk pool and they stepped into a dropshaft.

What- what are they going to do? Cassie whispered, almost afraid of the answer.

Fire, I said firmly, feeling a sudden lump in my throat. They're going to burn the forest. We were all shocked that Visser Three would go that far. He had left the room, leaving us on the floor. I was suprised that he never noticed us.

What? Cassie said. She sounded like she was about ready to scream. Burn a forest? Are they crazy?

Cassie, calm down! Sara reassured. We'll think of something.

Yeah, right. Cassie replied. Like what? Morph into elephants and trample the place? Turn into something slimy and put out the fire with our wonderous mucus? Face it! There's no way to win this one. There is no way anyone can put out a forest fire once it's gotten started unless we can mobilize the entire fire department! And most of them are probably controllers!

Cassie? Rachel asked. We were all shocked at Cassie's pessimistic outburst. What's gotten into you? You're starting to sound like Marco.

You don't get it, do you Rachel? Cassie replied. We're going to loose! Finito! DONE! We will just dissapear, and the yeerks will take over.

Don't talk like that! I yelled. We are going to win this, no matter what!

Um, that doesn't sound right. Sara said. Lauren, you sound like you know everything that's going to happen.

Did I say that? NO, I didn't say that. I replied. Where had that come from? Wasn't that from my dream, with the little girl? I had to cover it up, so then I whispered to Sara, I'm just trying to make Cassie feel better. If you're going to have an idea, now's the time for it.

I'm thinking! I'm thinking! Sara replied. Apparently, she too was amazed at the fact that Visser Three would burn a forest. Then again, he IS a demented, crazed, evil psychopath.

Um, I hate to say this, but we have used up about an hour of the safe time. Ax said. Apparently, Andalites have this internal clock that allows them to keep track of the time they've been in morph. We should leave.

Cassie was still fuming, but with a little persuasion we finally got her out of the building. We took the same path we took last time. I could almost swear that the little cracks that we traveled up had become bigger. We returned to the roof, where it had gotten somewhat cloudy.

"I hate to say this, but we will have to return tonight." Jake said. "We need to find out when they are going to start burning. If anyone has any ideas on how to stop the fire, tell the others. We'll meet back here at 7:00 tonight. Is that all right for everyone?"

"No." Marco said immediately. "Why can't Ax and Tobias just find another feeding ground?"

Three reasons: One, I happen to like it at my meadow. Two, we can't relocate the two Hork-Bajir that we are protecting in the forest. Three, if you don't decide to go along with it, you'll have to wear a hat every time you go outside. Tobias said. Despite our agitated state. Everyone howled at the sight of Marco being "bombarded" by Tobias.

Throughly embarassed by this, Marco said, "Okay! Okay! I'm going!"

"Well, you know my answer." Rachel said.

"Even though we're going to blow it, I'll join you." Cassie said fearfully.

I have to take revenge on Visser Three, so I am with you as well. Ax added.

You can count me in. Tobias declared.

"I have to stand by Tobias, and because of my nick name 'Gabrielle', so I'm in too." Sara said. When she mentioned "Gabrielle", she glared at Marco, who gave her a chipmunk face.

"Someone has to keep you all out of trouble, so include me." I said.

"I'm in too." Jake said.

"Well, that settles it then." Rachel said. "Back here at 7:00. For now, let's go home."

"No argument here." Cassie said.

We all morphed into our birds of prey and headed to our homes.

That night, I couldn't sleep. My mind was whirling with the possibilities... a forest burning... creatures dying...all because of us. No! I shouted at myself. Not because of us! Because of the Yeerks! Because of you! my inner voice wheedled. They wouldn't be burning down the forest if they didn't think you were in it... They wouldn't be burning down the forest if they weren't Yeerks! I yelled, but my resolve was slowly dwindling. If it was our fault, then it was also our responsibility...to save the forest...

Suddenly I fell into the merciful land of sleep.

I saw myself again, this time perhaps a bit older. I was running in the fields, laughing at the sun. I already had a veritable mane of black hair, and it flew out behind me like a flag. Giggling, my dream self threw herself down on the grass and lay flat, staring up at the endless blue sky. As she/I did, I saw a strange light in the sky, a flash of unearthly light. What is it? I wondered, looking away from my dream self and staring at the light. Some kind of spaceship?

WHOOSH!

Suddenly the meadow disappeared, and I was somewhere else. Only this time I was not watching myself, but some strange... disturbance. I seemed to be in space, but everything was white. Z-space? I wondered, remembering what Ax had told us. What's going on?

All around me were flashes of light of many different colors. When two colors met, they would become a sort of whirlwind, then either they would both disappear, or one would emerge, victorious. Victorious? Where had I gotten that from?

"What is this? What's happening?" I whispered. Suddenly a strange voice answered my question in hissing and resounding tones.

"Ellimist....war!"

WHOOSH!

And I was back in the meadow. My dream self was watching the lights in the sky in wonder and growing fear, for the lights were becoming brighter and more turbulent. Suddenly my dream self seemed to sense danger from the lights, for she/I began to run, screaming, toward the house.

"Mommy! Mommy! Lights-" Suddenly she/I was silent. Surprised, I looked again. She/I was not only silent, but GONE! I gasped in shock, then snapped my fingers. That was it! I was beginning to piece this jumble together! I had come from the future, and-

WHOOSH!

"Irritating whooshes," I muttered, looking around. I was back in the house where I had seen myself draw prince Elfangor. Only this time my younger dream self was not there. My mother was. She was crying while being held in the arms of a man who I assumed was my father.

"No," she rasped, pulling away. "She can't just be gone! We've got to find her!"

"How?" My father asked, spreading his arms. "We don't even know what happened!"

"It's obvious," my mother said, pacing around the room. "That xenophobic extremist group, the yin-yang triangle one-"

"Yiyatra?" Her husband said softly.

"Yes, Yiyatra. They never liked the Andalite/human alliance, not even when with the Andalites' technology, we gained space travel. They decided since the Yeerks were evil, all aliens must be evil. They didn't like the look of the Hork-Bajir, either. So they began killing them off, one by one."

"But they've been irradicated!" My father shouted. "They're dead!" My mother placed a hand on his shoulder to calm him down.

"They're not all gone, Jenrik. And they're probably after us."

"What? Because of that my grandfather was Visser Three's host! I had nothing to do with that! I wasn't even alive! Surely they can't hold a grudge against that!"

"Apparently," my mother said sadly, "They can." My father fell silent, staring out the window at the meadow where I had disappeared.

"What can we do?" he rasped.

"If you can't stop the fire from burning, you've got to stop it before it starts," my mother quoted. "We can't quite stop it before it starts for Lauren, but we can do so for other innocents killed by the Yiyatra." My father looked at her and nodded, and they stepped out of the door, hand in hand, and began walking toward the distant city.

I was staring after them when I heard my name being called. "Lauren! Lauren!"

"Lauren! Lauren!" I sat bolt upright in bed and found myself looking at the worried face of my adopted mother. "You were tossing and turning, shouting something about fire. And something weird that started with Y... bad dream?" she asked.

"Yeah," I gasped, hiding my tears in my sheets. "Yeah." Understanding my need to be alone, she left, leaving me to piece together my past.

I trudged slowly to Cassie's house at about 6:30, instead of leaving at about 6:45 like I had originally planeed to leave. Cassie's house was where we generally met when we were going to go to a sucicide mission. I had left early, because I didn't feel like flying to Cassie's house like I usually did. I had to fly quickly though, because Jake would probably go crazy if he found out that we used our morphs occasionally for personal reasons.

Why couldn't the dreams just leave me alone? They kept coming back and haunting me. It was no longer a dream, it was a nightmare! Visser Three? My great grandfather? NO! I told myself. Prince Alloran, not Visser Three. And that supposed Ellimist war, what was I to think of that? I had never met an Ellimist personally, but I had heard of them from the others. They are sorta like "Q" from Star Trek, if you've ever seen that show. Something strange was going on. I was going to find out, even if it killed me.

Okay Lauren, back to the present. I told myself. Enough of this speculation.

I wrestled down the turbulent emotions, and started thinking how were we

going to stop this mass slaughter of earth life. It was mad!

I started to walk a little faster, trying to vent some of my anger towards the Yeerks. They were causing everything! Every single bit of it! I started to wonder, what would everything be like if the yeerks had never decided that Earth would be a good place to host an invasion. We'd probably all be perfect strangers, and everyone, what would their lives be like? Jake would probably be having a grand old time with his brother, like he used to. Rachel, her life wouldn't have changed much neither, the same with Cassie. Marco would still have his mother. Ax would probably become a great warrior in a couple of years, or however long it takes for Ax's rank to move up. Tobias and Sara, they would have never been born! Elfangor would probably never travel to Earth, and marry Loren, and have kids, Ellimist or no Ellimist! Me? What would my life be like? I used to speculate that until there was nothing to speculate about, but now what? I DIDN'T KNOW! I screamed at myself. What? What? What?

I stopped yelling at myself, because I had come to Cassie's house now. It had never occured to me that I had been traveling for a good time now, because Cassie lives on a farm, and that's a good deal out of town.

I walked over to the barn, and went in. Cassie was there, cleaning a cage. Her dad runs the Wildlife Rehabilitation Center, which speaks for itself. It's stationed in their barn, and is filled with screeching, growling, and any other animal noise you can think of, animals. Some had bandages, or stitches, or something similar.

"Hi Lauren." Cassie said. "You're here early."

"I had nothing better to do." I replied. "Have you gotten any ideas?" She knew I was referring to the fire. She sadly shook her head. I was almost positive that she tried her hardest to think of something, but nothing ever came.

For a while, I helped her clean some of the cages, until the others came. Eventually, Marco was sitting on the hay, with a piece in his mouth looking rediciulously like those cartoon farmers. Rachel was staring at Marco with disgust, and trying to tell him that hay tastes like chalk. Jake and I were helping Cassie with the cages. Sara was sitting quietly, with Tobias on her shoulder as usual. I'm sure that her shoulders have gotten very tough now, with Tobias's talons. Ax was in his human morph, making weird noises as usual.

"Okay everyone." Jake said. "We need a plan of action. It's obvious that we are going to have to go in there, and find out where and when they are going to start this. Did anyone have any ideas last night after we left."

"No," Marco said, "But I did have a dream about being attacked by forks that looked like Xena." We all stared at him, bug-eyed. He smiled.

"Now seriously," Rachel said, then added as she looked at Marco with the piece of straw in his mouth, "Although serious doesn't quite get comprehended by Farmer Brown over there, we need to figure out, how are we going to put out the fire?"

"If you can't stop the fire from burning, you've got to stop it before it starts." I said. Wasn't that in my dream? Did that mean something?

"What?" Marco opened his mouth and the piece of straw fell out. "Good lord. Lauren's becoming a philosopher!"

"I'm not," I protested. "It came to me in a... a dream."

What came to you? Tobias asked, looking as confused as a hawk can. I don't get it.

"Listen," I said, the beginnings of an idea beginning to form in my mind. "There's no way we can stop a forest fire, right?"

"Riiiiight," Jake agreed.

"So, if we can't stop it after it's started, we've got to stop it before it starts!" I waited while this sank in.

"All right," Rachel said. "I get that. That's great. But the problem is- how?"

"I can't think of anything," I said hopelessly. We all turned to look at Sara. She was frowning and chewing the end of her braid.

"I say," she let out finally, "we get going. We haven't got long, anyway. We can decide on the way."

"Fabulous idea," Rachel said, grinning. "I couldn't have said it better myself. Let's go!"

"What a surprise," Marco groaned, chewing a fresh strand of straw. "Rachel is ready to go. I never thought I'd see this day!"

"I do not understand. Stand," Ax said, confused. "Why are you surprised? Rachel always- ah. This must be the strange human 'sarcasm'."

"No, he's perfectly serious," Cassie shot at Ax before turning to Marco. "You know, I think you're sitting on the hay where we were stitching together a horse's stomach that other day."

We erupted into laughter as Marco leapt up, spitting as hard as he could, while brushing off his clothes.

"Come on," I said, trying very hard not to laugh, "Let's get out of here!"

I had nearly forgotten my strange dreams as I began to morph into my broad- shouldered hawk.

About fifteen minutes later, we were flying over downtown toward the forest, spread out as usual so as not to look suspiscious. I was just catching a nice thermal when I noticed something below. It was the green- and-white sign of the S.A.H.N., the Students Against Hurting Nature. There were about twenty of them this time. They were tramping down the street, waving their sign and singing "We've got the Whole World In Our Hands" racously while picking up trash and putting it in huge black bags.

I stared at them unthinkingly, listening to the sound of the song. Suddenly it was if a light bulb had gone off inside my head.

Hey! I yelped. You guys! Luckily they were still in thought-speak range. I just had the most fabulous idea!

Only two minutes later, I was swooping down to land on top of the bright sign. Carefully keeping my voice toned down so only the group heard, I spoke. The forest...on fire. One of the girls, a redhead who was singing a rather nice harmony to "We've Got the Whole World in Our Hands", stopped singing.

"Forest? Fire? Who said that?"

"Forest fire?" Another student, a boy with a ponytail, spoke up. "What forest fire?"

"Forest fire!" Yet another student, this one with a shaved head, yelled out indignantly. "Who's setting fire to the forest? What are you talking about?"

"There's no forest fire," The redhead said. "I just heard someone say it."

The forest is going to be set on fire.. I hissed, clutching the sign with my talons. Stop them!

"We've got to stop them!" The ponytailed student shouted, apparently thinking one of the students had spoken. "To the forest!"

"To the forest!" The students shouted as one, changing direction. Giggling inwardly, I leapt out into the air and fought my way upward where everyone was waiting.

It worked! I said gleefully.

Okay, now what? Marco asked. How will they know where to go?

What do you mean? Rachel asked. They know to go to the forest.

True, but do they know exactly where? Marco replied. I mean, the forest is a big place, and by the time they had gotten there, it would have probably been too late for them to stop the controllers.

Sara? I asked. The red-tailed hawk that was Sara was already focusing on the students underneath us, scanning them, trying to find any yeerks in their heads.

They're all clear. Sara said. Go ahead Lauren, if I know what you are doing.

I swooped down, to land on the same sign I was on before. Focusing my thought-speak to only the students, I said, You'll never get there alone. Follow the birds of prey! I leapt into the air, trying to be as attraction- getting as I possibly could.

"Who said that?" One of them asked.

"It wasn't me." Another answered.

"Well then, who was it?"

"It's the birds! Look there! Follow them!"

"Have you ever seen so many diffrent species flock together like that?"

"Maybe it's a B.A.H.N., Birds Against Hurting Nature! Ha ha ha."

The students altered their course slightly to be following us. Even I wasn't sure that we were going the right way. Even so, we would be able to spot them a lot quicker than they ever could.

I feel like I'm in "Frankenstein". Jake commented.

Why is that? Cassie asked.

Well, we're leading a mob. Jake replied.

Yes, but it's for a good thing. Besides, this time we're not going to burn everything down. Cassie pointed out.

We're coming to the forest. Rachel pointed out. Keep your eyes peeled.

We looked around with our binocular-like eyesight, trying to find some evidence of the Controllers. I was about to suggest that we should leave, when a moving van caught my eye. From a crack in the metal, I could see that there were some guys inside, with torches. I also saw some Hork-Bajir warriors. There was also a big car, that had been beaten up. It was probably with them to cover up the real reason why they had torched the forest.

Do you see that truck over there? I asked.

Are you kidding? Sara replied. How could you not miss it? They're all controllers too. I can see them even from here.

Follow us! I said, This way! The students turned with us like a flock of birds. I heard some of the conversation going on below me.

"I can see their truck!"

"Why would they want to do this? What did the forest ever do to them?"

"Let's get them!" The students converged on the spot where the trucks were, and blocked their path. The driver got out and stood in front of them.

"Just what do you think you are doing, out here at this time?" He asked.

"Preventing you from destroying something that has done nothing to you!" The leader of the group said. "Return to where ever you came from, and we'll be on our way."

"I'm afraid not my friend." The driver said. "You will have to leave before I call the police." From over by the truck, a scream eminated.

"Oh my God, what is that?" Someone said. We landed in some bushes, a short distance away that were not visible by anyone. We morphed out, and watched carefully from our hiding place.

"It looks like a snake, a kitchen knife drawer, and a tyrannosaurus rex!" Another person said. The controller driver was looking very uncomfortable. He started to move his hand towards the pocket of his jacket.

He's going to pull a dracon gun on them! Tobias said.

We've got to do something. Ax added.

"Everyone! Start to morph!" Jake ordered.

We quickly landed in some handy bushes and began quickly to morph out to human, then into our most dangerous morphs.

Oh great, Marco muttered. He had already morphed human and was beginning his gorilla morph. So we go out and expose ourselves to who knows how many people, and fight a truckload of Hork-Bajir at the same time? Sounds great.

What I don't get is why the Yeerks were so careless, Sara said. Sara was already halfway into her velociraptor morph, eyes golden like a cat's and dangerous claws beginnning to form. Forget us, why are they exposing themselves?

It was probably an accident, I suggested.

Yeah, well, what are we waiting for? Let's go! Sara, grunting velociraptor grunts, leapt off toward the truck. We heard screams.

That's my line, Rachel muttered. Irritated at being only barely out of my human morph and worried about how tired I was getting with all this rapid morphing, I concentrated on my morph. Jaguar. Total steel. I turned away from the grotesque sight of everyone else morphing and worked on speed. My skin grew a lovely orange and black-spotted pattern, like a skinsuit, then popped out suddenly in fur. My legs shriveled, changed, and grew again. I fell forward, groaning in pain as I hit a rock. My eyes changed and I was blind for a moment before I could see in the jaguar's eyes. So different from human. My claws formed and with a strange noise a fur-covered tail zoomed its way out of my rear end. I wiggled it, grimacing with my new fangs.

Ready! I growled. I'm outta here! Turning around, I noted that everyone else but Marco was also gone. Marco's gorilla face was squishing around, nearly complete. Okay, so I'm a slow morpher, I muttered. Bye, Marco Polo! Ignoring his protests, I leapt out through the bushes to see a scene of mass confusion.

The poor students were running around screaming or standing stock still, frozen in fright. I noted one who was perfectly calm, frowning and rubbing his chin as if assessing the situation. "Funny," I heard him say. "I could have sworn the dinosaurs died out millions of years ago." I heard other shouts.

"Oh, God! What is that? It's a... knife monster! And... a dinosaur? A tiger? A leopard?"

Jaguar! I growled, leaping into the confused Hork-Bajir. I noted Jake decapitating one unlucky creature, and Rachel pushing aside a screaming student while she slashed at another Hork-Bajir who was roaring in pain and anger. I saw Sara scaring the heck out of everybody, and Marco throwing a Hork-Bajir into a tree. Hey, we're good! I thought, grinning a jaguar grin as I leapt an amazing height onto one of the few parts of a Hork-Bajir that was bladeless.

Suddenly over the screams and roars, I heard a desperate cry. "Retreat! Retreat!" It was the human Controller. The Hork-Bajir were only too glad to comply, getting out of there as fast as they could and loading themselves into the truck.

Thow back the torches! I heard Ax scream from somewhere. I didn't even know what morph he was in. Probably himself. Hardly a minute later, the truck disappeared in a cloud of dust, ten extinguished torches lying in its wake.

Phew! I let out a sigh of relief, then winced as I looked at all the students, who were standing there staring at us like we were aliens from outer space who had just turned into a bunch of- wait a second. Okay, they were standing there staring at us like we were butterflies singing the national anthem of Peru. Jake, you want to handle this?

It was your idea, Lauren. You clear it up.

Okay... Listen, you guys. This was just a dream. You never saw it. Got it? They all nodded obediently. Nodding obediently sort of comes automatically, especially if you're nodding at a big talking jaguar. Good. Now, you just run along. Go walk down the street and sing "We've Got the Whole World In Our Hands" to a lot of people. You sing nicely. Go on!"

Most of them left, but a couple hung back, looking at us suspiciously. The one who had been the calmest during the attack walked up to me.

"Who are you, anyway? Some kind of superheroes?" I stared at him, noting that he was wearing an X-files T-shirt. Figured.

Yeah. I answered. It was close enough. You just helped us save the world.

"I bet," he snorted. "Who are you, really?"

Who am I? I replied. To tell you the truth, kid, I really don't know. He didn't look at all satisfied with this answer, and it was a long and anxious minute while he stood staring at us. Then he suddenly whirled around, linked arms with one of the students who was standing nearby staring with her mouth open like a fish, and stalked off singing "We've Got the Whole World In Our Hands" in a horrible voice.

Phew, I said, turning around. That was close.

Way too close, Cassie agreed. Let's go home.

Unable to argue with that logic, we hurried over to the bushes again (for some reason we felt safer there). A few minutes later, a small flock of exotic birds lifte up into the sky, then shot off in different directions. The different directions of home.

We flew silently for a while, just being quiet. I was still pondering the Visser Three thing. No silly! Alloran! Not Visser Three! Visser Three is a Yeerk. It is Alloran that is your ancestor, okay? Now get a grip!

I glanced over at Sara, who was flying absent-mindedly.

What's wrong? I asked.

Something just doesn't work out. She replied. The yeerks fell back way too easily. If I know the yeerks, they would have sent someone to start the fire while the others distracted us. The forest should be blazing right now, but it isn't. There is something fishy about the whole thing.

Funny, I don't smell fish. Marco remarked.

Sara is right. Tobias backed up. There were just too many glitches in their plan. They have a secret agenda, I just know it.

A strong wind banked us off course slightly, nothing to really worry about. My hawk nose wasn't ever great for sniffing stuff out, but now the air had a distinctly fishy smell.

Now I smell fish. Rachel said. Her bald eagle morph was designed to eat fish, so she could definitely detect the presence of the fishy odor.

Ah, now how does that saying on the series, Star Truck go? A sinister voice said, I can see you Quirk, can you see me? My heart must have leaped out of my body and gone squeaking down in the forest below, but not before I thought, It's Star Trek and Kirk, you idiot.

Visser Three! Ax hissed. We all knew who it was.

Fly everyone! Jake ordered. Split up! I went with Sara, Tobias, and Marco, while Ax, Jake, Cassie, and Rachel banked off in the other direction.

Ah, so you believe that separating will make the hunt harder for me eh? Visser Three sneered. No matter, it is only a matter of time before I find all you Andalite bandits, and put an end to your puny little existence. Visser Three believes that we are a group of Andalite warriors that escaped the destruction of Ax's dome ship, and are now trying to end the invasion. I said nothing, because if Visser Three found out that we were just a bunch of kids, then it would only be a short while before he killed us all. I wanted to scream at him so badly, everything, that I hated who he was, and I also wanted to yell to Alloran, I'm not sure what, but something.

We've got to find out what he is. Tobias said.

I heard Ax mention that it was an invisible sort of animal, that was able to go invisible and reappear at will. If that's the case, then we're all screwed.

Maybe not. Sara said. If she was a human at the moment, her eyes would be glinting like crazy. There was one thing that we can tell where he is.

What? Tobias asked.

The fishy odor! I said, catching on to what she was saying. As long as we can smell that, then we know where the Visser is.

We need to find a place to land, and get some sort of plan, and fast. I said.

Right. Sara replied. Start looking! We scanned for a place to safely land and hide, while the whole time keeping our noses alert for the fishy smell of Visser Three.

Suddenly the air filled with a smell not unlike a bait shop. Scatter! Cassie screamed, but it was unnecessary. We were already heading for the nearest star- as far away from the fish smell as we could.

Hahahaha! Visser Three laughed hysterically. You can run, but you can't walk!

Hide, you doofus, Jake hissed, not actually to the Visser of course.

You will surrender! The Andalite-Controller shouted. You will bend to the will of the Yeerks!

I'll never join the dark side! Marco screamed, diving between two trees. I concentrated on flying and smelling at the same time. The fish smell hightened and I, in desperate fear, dove down to the forest as well, bending and twisting through tiny holes. This was getting spooky. I was just waiting for Visser Three to say, "Lauren..... I am your father....." Well, at least he wasn't as closely related as all that.

Ax! I gasped out, my muscles tiring quickly. How big is this morph of his? Luckily Ax was still in thought-speak range.

If it is a Jukunian pea-hawk, as I believe, then he is about the size of a compact car.

Great! Jake groaned from somewhere. He can swallow us all at once!

Make for the trees! I screamed. Dive through small holes! Get him caught!

Good idea, Rachel agreed. Let's-

Done, Sara said, and I caught a glimpse of a red-tailed hawk shooting down my way. Sara? Or Tobias? I pushed my speculations aside and concentrated on flying. But my hawk's poor muscles, not used to flying so fast so long without thermals to boost, were getting very tired. To my dismay, I began to falter and hit a branch. I cried out silently in pain as my wing crumpled and I began to fall.

Ha! An injured one! Watch out, little birdie, here....I....come! Suddenly the fishy smell grew so bad it was nearly intolerable. Terrible pain shot through my legs and I watched in horror as they began to disappear. He's...absorbing me! I thought. Had the Yeerks decided not to worry about getting our bodies and just kill us? Had they landed on the Andalite homeworld, then... Stop with this speculation! I shouted at myself. You are NOT going to die.

As I fell and my feet disappeared bit by bit, the pain increasing every moment, a red-and-brown blur flashed by, slamming into the empty air behind me.

Ouch! the Visser screamed. Why, you- To my horror, I saw the air shimmer a bit, and then the red-tailed hawk that was tearing at the air jolt and go limp

Sara! I screamed.

No... the hawk whispered. Tobias... Then suddenly the hawk's wings began to disappear, and Tobias screamed. AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH! AAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!

There are different types of thought-speak. You can talk privately to one person or group, or you can broadcast your voice to anyone near. Tobias was screaming, and anyone near could hear. It was a scream full of pain-

Tobias! I sobbed, trying to get up there to do something. But the Visser's tentacle or whatever it was was still on me, and I couldn't move. HELP! I screamed. SOMEONE HEEEELP!

As if on cue, an osprey shot out of the trees and landed on a branch, staring at the spectacle in shock. Oh, God! the bird whispered. Oh, God! Lauren, what can I do?

Marco... I gasped. My legs were gone and my hindquarters were beginning to disappear. I was about to pass out in pain. Nothing. Marco, go... Save yourself and the others. Save the world... Suddenly my lower organs disappeared, and the pain was unbearable. I screamed. AAAAAAAAHHHHH! Marco leapt up from the branch, about to dive at the empty bit of air where Visser Three was.

No! I shouted with my last bit of energy, and he, surprised, went back.

But Lauren, you're going to die! Tobias is going to die! I just can't stand, uh, fly here doing nothing!

No. I agreed. Fly away. Fly away home... I winced as another wave of pain shot over me. Marco...Polo.

And then I lost consciousness and knew no more.

It seemed like an eternity before I opened my eyes, in great pain. I heard screaming. Who was screaming? I couldn't remember. Something about morphing?

"MORPH OUT LAUREN! NOW! NOW NOW NOW NOW NOW!" I heard someone say. I started to slip back down again, but then I looked at what was left of me. My bird legs were gone, and my bird hips. There was extreme bleeding.

Just that was enough to shoot me out of it. I concentrated like crazy, and crawled out of my bird morph. I was so glad that morphing only relates to DNA, or I would be dead.

As my eyesight came back into focus, I saw everyone bending over me, except Sara. She was over to the side, breathing hardly, tears streaming down her face, and her skin smoothing out from scales. Behind her was a huge trail of debris from the forest. After I had morphed out considerably I figured out that she had done a t-rex morph.

Over to the side, I also saw Tobias morphing to his human morph. He had sustained just as much damage as I did.

"What happened?" I asked.

"Well, while you decided to conk out on us," Rachel explained, "Sara here was watching what was going on, and went to her Andalite side again. She did a t-rex morph just as your hips were disappearing, and took a big chomp out of Visser Three."

"But she couldn't see them!" I replied.

"Didn't you ever watch any of those palentology shows?" Cassie asked. "Even if you stood perfectly still, a t-rex could find you because tyrannosaurs have an excellent sense of smell, and can detect animals's scents, even alien scents. That fishy smell of Visser Three was what got him."

By this time, I was totally morphed out, and Tobias was all right now. Sara came over to evaluate her twin's condition, and to see how I was doing.

"Man Sara, those anger outbursts will get you nowhere one day." I said. "But thanks for getting rid of him." I realized what I was saying. Did Sara just kill my ancestor? I must have turned very pale then, because everyone stared at me. "Did you kill Visser Three?" I asked.

"No, I would have liked to though." Sara replied. I sort of took that as offense, but didn't say anything, because she didn't know.

"Well, I guess you didn't, because I'm still here." I replied. Time stuff gave me a headache, but I was able to figure that out.

"What?" Everyone asked at once.

"I mean--well, um," I stuttered.

"Okay, out with it Lauren." Tobias said. He was still in his human morph.

I bit my lip, trying to figure out the best way to tell them. This was going to be tough, especially because I'm not very good at explaining things. I knew now how Sara felt when she had to tell us about her visions.

I took a deep breath, and said, "As far as I can tell, I'm from the future. I'm not sure when, or how I got here, but when I was three or so, I was sent back in time to now due to an Ellimist war. That I can handle, but the thing I can't handle is that I'm a direct descendant of Visser Three!"

They all stared a moment, until Ax broke the silence, and said, "You mean War Prince Alloran."

"Same thing." I replied. "But it's true!"

"Oh dear," Sara said, staggering a bit, "If I had killed Visser Three, you would disappear because I would have ruined the entire space time continium!"

"Come again?" Tobias asked. Sara then let out a whole string of explaining about how the timeline would unravel, and stuff like that. The only one who seemed to understand even a little bit of it was Ax.

"Wait, I get it now." Jake said. "In other words, Visser Three would be dead, so he would never have kids, who would never have kids, and so on, so Lauren would never exist, and we would have never remembered her!"

"Speaking of which, what happened to the ol' Visser anyway?" Rachel asked.

"Well, when I took a chomp out of him, he became visible again, and I had a bad taste in my mouth." Sara explained. "He hightailed it back to where ever he came from. He's probably whacking the head of some unlucky controller as we speak, in a fit of rage."

"Now we know where Lauren's intimidating personality comes from." Marco

said to me. I glared at him good naturely.

"Marco Polo," I snarled back. It really was a stupid nickname, but it was all I could think of.

"Princess Leia!" he howled. Rachel buried her head in her hands and began to moan.

"Woah, Lauren, what's wrong?" Cassie asked, looking at me, worried. Jake glanced up.

"You've gone pale! Holy cow! What is it?" I glanced up at the worried faces, gulped, then forced a smile.

"Oh, it's nothing. Just a funny coincidence, that's all."

"What what what what what what?" Marco said annoyingly, chewing on a leaf to take place of the hay. I laughed nervously, embarrased.

"Really, it's nothing. Just when you called me Leia, well, it scared me."

"I get it," Sara said. "Like Visser Three's related to you, the worst enemy, and-"

"The Yeerks are the Dark side!" Jake spurted, and fell over in laughter. "You'll bend to my will, Andalites. I'll never join you, Visser Three! Lauren, I am your great-ahahhahaha!" We all dissolved into laughter. Ax stood staring.

I do not understand this," he menitoned. "I suppose I should be laughing. Hah. Aha. Haha. Ha. Ha. Ha-

"Stop it!" Cassie said, waving at Ax. "You're scaring me. Well, I suppose we should explain it to him."

I'll do it, Tobias said eagerly. While he and Ax went into the details of the famous Star Wars trilogy, I explained more details of my visions.

"So you were named after yourself in the past in the future?" Jake said, then frowned. "Did that make any sense?"

"No." Rachel said.

"No, I get it," I said, going into the millionth explanation. "My mother named me after the famous Lauren, saver of the world-heh heh- and then I went back in time and my name was on my shirt, so-"

"So you were named the same name- AGH! I hate time travel!" Cassie moaned, holding her head. "Can we-"

"Wait a second!" Marco held up a hand. "You're saying we WON in the future?"

"Yeeeah...so?"

"So that means we're going to win!" Marco said, looking amazed. "Man, that almost makes me want to go on another suicide mission!"

"That'd be a first," Rachel said dryly.

"I said almost," Marco reminded her. "But isn't that cool! We really do save the world! And become rich and famous, da da da..."

"Hey!" I silenced all their excited jabberings with a raise of my hand. "It's only one possible timeline, you guys. There's no complete assurance it will actually happen!"

"Still," Cassie said. "Now we know it's possible." We kept an almost reverent silence for a moment, though it's hard to be reverent with the sound of a hawk imitating Darth Vader in the background.

"Well," Rachel said brightly, getting up. "I guess we'd better do all we can to make that future possible."

"You sound like my math teacher," I complained, glancing at my watch. "Well, I'd better be off. See you!" They all murmured their goodbyes, still shaken by the recent battle. I heard Marco shoot of a 'Leia' after me as I hurried off. "Lauren! does this mean we can call you spock now?"

"Well...I suppose you could. But since you do have a gorilla morph....I guess that mean I can call you a hairy mexican."

His mouth just dropped, and I was on my way home.

As I walked along the sidewalk toward my house, I stopped a moment to look at the stars. Where would I be if it weren't for that Ellimist war? I wondered. Up there? I stared at the stars wishfully for another moment, then sighed and began walking again. Whatever future I would have had, it couldn't be as important as the one I had now. Whistling "We've got the Whole World in Our Hands", I opened the door and stepped in.

"I'm home!" I called. "Boy, did I have a day."