A/N: Thanks to Hanni B, who emailed me with a suggestion! I use it in this chapter! And I would just like to say to Shawna: ORLANDO AND MARCO ARE MINE! I'M GOING OUT WITH MARCO, THEREFORE HE IS MINE! You can have Fred, though. If you marry him, and I marry George, we'll be twins-in-law! LOL!
Chapter 8
I was worried. We had miraculously come this far without losing anybody. We had come close to doing so, but Tom had beat death. Even with the One, the destroyed Blade ship, and the Garatron trying so hard to destroy us, we were all still safe. We had a few scrapes and bruises, but they could be overlooked. I truly did not want to lose anybody after we had come this far.
But each living thing needs three very basic things to survive: food, water, and shelter. Okay, so ever since humans met aliens, we've learned that not all things need water, such as the Veleek that lives on good old Saturn from our own solar system. But you still get my drift. However, Guide was not getting his food, Kandrona. He was starving to death. And to our knowledge, the closest Kandrona particle emitter was on the Yeerk homeworld, light years away.
By now, the rest of the people in our group had stopped and were goggling at the sight of Guide writhing on the ground in agony.
"He said that the Isk can't live without the Yoort, right?" Rachel asked.
I nodded. "He said that it was a truly symbiotic relationship, and that each was vital to the other."
Yes, Ax said haughtily, in that one way, they are different from the Yeerks. They are symbiotes. But it appears that it can also be a great weakness.
Jake nodded slowly, his eyes locked on Guide. "Captain Miaker, when you transported the Yeerk ancestors to Kelbrid space, how did you feed them?"
We had a Kandrona on the ship, with a pool to go with it, but the Garatron took the Kandrona when they attacked us and set all of our pets free.
When he mentioned the word "pets," I looked over at Ax. His tail started twitching, his main eyes narrowed, and he looked as though it was taking every ounce of his strength to keep himself from killing the Murkra.
"Ax," Jake said, noticing the same thing I had, "cool it."
Ax lowered his tail. About one millimeter. Jake glared at him and he lowered it a bit more.
"So there is nothing you can do for him," Jake said, listlessly.
I'm sorry. Nothing.
Jake closed his eyes and shook his head. I could imagine the stress he was under. Not only were we light years away from home, about to face an evil, seemingly all-powerful being, but Jake had always told me how important it was that a leader show no weaknesses. He thought that he needed to appear especially strong right now because of his panic attack from a few moments earlier. But it was going to be hard for him to do that if we all knew without a doubt that Guide would die.
"Guide, how much longer do you absolutely have to have Kandrona?" Jake asked.
One hour, two hours maybe, Guide managed to gasp.
"What can we do?" Santorelli questioned.
Guide did not answer him, but Captain Miaker supplied an answer. He cannot survive unless he gets Kandrona in the next hour to two hours, however long he has left. We cannot do anything.
"I say that I know what we do: we kick the One's all-powerful butt and force him to create a Kandrona for us." Rachel, of course.
I do not think that he can do that, Ax said, but it may be possible, and it is our only possible chance.
Jake looked at Guide, who was still lying on the ground in pain, grimly, and said, "Okay. We go quicker, and hope to get there and destroy him in time to save Guide. The fastest way to do this is to have all morph-capable people morph something that can go through these trees quickly, one of us carrying Guide. Toby, too, of course. Everybody else will just have to stay here. I'm sorry, but we're faster without you, and besides, no offense, but Sandra, General Doubleday, and Menderash, your human bodies are useless in a fight. Cassie, Marco, Tobias, Ax, Rachel? Morph Hork-Bajir. I'm sure that the Hork-Bajir your morphs are based on would not care. Tom, do you have a Hork-Bajir morph?"
Tom shook his head, and said, "No, sorry."
"Alright then, you will need to acquire something, along with Yahal, Santorelli, and Jeanne." Jake turned to Indi, and I supposed that he was going to ask if it would be alright to use his DNA, but then I spotted something in the trees above us.
"What's that?" I asked, but I recognized it almost as the words came out of my mouth. It was a chadoo. It was brightly colored, and had feathers. It was jumping through the trees, opening flaps on its sides to glide, almost like a flying squirrel.
"Chadoo," Indi said bluntly. As he said that, he walked over to a nearby tree and scraped away some of its bark, allowing some sap to trickle out of the wound. He put some on his claw, and held it up in the general direction of the chadoo. Surprisingly, the small animal came down quickly and started licking the sap off of Indi's hand. "This is chadoo," he said again.
Jake said, "Everybody who needs a morph that can take you through the trees, come here. Acquire the chadoo."
Santorelli, Tom, Jeanne, and Yahal came over and one by one, the DNA of the chadoo became a part of them.
"Toby, could you please tell Indi what will happen? You have seen us morph before."
"Indi, in a few minutes, they–" she pointed at the Animorphs, Jeanne, Santorelli, and Tom, "–will change bodies. They will still be themselves, but they will look like chadoo or Hork-Bajir."
I started morphing, and the first sensation I had was of growing up. I am actually quite short, only an inch or two over five feet, and I was about to become a Hork-Bajir that was seven feet tall, more or less. I reached the full height when I was still fully human.
Marco did the same thing, and started laughing. "Wow, Rachel, would you look at this? I'm taller than you, and by almost a foot, too!"
She smirked. "Yes, but I could still whup you anyday," she said as blades grew out of the knees, elbows, and wrists of her still mostly-human body. She flashed a toothy grin at him, and her face exploded outwards into a Hork-Bajir beak.
I felt an itching sensation on my forehead, and placed my hand on it, only to feel horns sprout out of it. Vicious blades also grew from my arms and legs. There was a squirming sensation as my backbone elongated and a thick tail grew from it. I was still myself, except for the blades, the tail, and my tall stature.
"That looks awesome!" Tom exclaimed. "How do you do it?"
"I don't know… I just do," I answered him.
Cassie is a natural estreen, she has a talent for morphing, Ax stated. She is actually better than many of the estreens on the Andalite homeworld.
I felt myself blush from the praise, and to cover it up, I let my smooth skin become rough and dry, like leather. It changed color from brown to dark green. I felt muscles ripple up under my skin, and my lips became hard like fingernail. They bulged outward, and I heard a grinding noise as my skull reformed to hold the swiftly growing jaw.
I know that you must be thinking that it was extremely painful, right? But the Andalites, when they created the technology, worked some sort of pain-killer into it. That was a good thing, because if there hadn't been, I probably would have died from the pain alone. I could sort of tell that it should hurt, but it didn't. The best way to describe it, I think, would be like having your mouth injected full of Novacaine at the dentist's office. You know that the drilling should hurt, and you can feel it from very far away, it seems, but it does not hurt.
A few seconds later, the morph completed, and I felt the Hork-Bajir mind bubble up beneath my own. It was strange, many of the Hork-Bajir instincts were not unlike some of my own human ones. I had noticed the same thing about five years before when I had been to this planet, with the Ixcila of Aldrea-Iskillion-Falan, the daughter of Seerow who fought the Yeerks here, eventually becoming a nothlit so that she and Dak Hamee, a Hork-Bajir seer and Toby's great-grandfather could live together, inside my head. Aldrea had guessed that we had tree-dwelling ancestors, and that it was those primordial instincts reasserting themselves. I agreed with her.
Beyond that, the Hork-Bajir instincts were quite mild. Although the Hork-Bajir look fierce, they are actually only peaceful herbivores, who use their blades to strip bark from trees. Unfortunately for them, the Yeerks saw them as weapons, and used them as their shock troops when they fought for domination of the galaxy.
I looked around with my eyes, to see everybody else only about half morphed. I have always seemed to be a bit faster at morphing, as well. As I watched, Jake's human eyes turned red, and horns shot out of his forehead. His toes melted together and reformed into three toes, and a third came out of his heel. Marco's tan skin turned the same dark green mine was, and his ears became long and pointed. Rachel's long blonde hair schlooped back into her head. Ax's tail became shorter and thicker, and his tail blade split into four spikes that came up like a Stegosaurus' tail spikes. Tobias' hawk eyes, for he had had to demorph to hawk before being able to morph Hork-Bajir, changed to red from gold, and a few remaining feathers melted into his skin. Two stubby legs burst out of Tom's chest, and they quickly became covered with blue feathers. Stretchy flaps of skin grew out along Jeanne's sides, which she could stretch out and use to glide. As for Yahal, a horizontal gash opened across his face, and small red teeth sprouted out of it.
Sandra had her eyes glued to us, her eyes wide in horror, her mouth hanging open. General Doubleday had his eyes averted, hoping not to see what he knew would be a gruesome sight. Menderash stood watching, looking a little put out, probably because he was thinking that he would be morphing chadoo right now if he weren't trapped in human morph. Toby continued talking to Indi, and Guide lay on the ground trembling.
The others completed their morphs, and Marco, seeing Sandra's expression, said, Not exactly like they make it look in the movie, huh?
She shook her head, no.
Yeah, they make it look all nice, and pretty, and gradual in those. But it's actually not like that at all. He grinned in anticipation, but it was the slightly scary Hork-Bajir smile. Except for me. I can make anything look good.
Sandra rolled her eyes, but smiled anyway.
Prince Jake, we will not have very much time. We should leave now, Ax declared.
Toby carefully picked up Guide, and started climbing up the nearest tree. We wanted to get up as high as possible.
See ya, Menderash, General. Goodbye, Sandra, Marco said. He lightly placed one claw on her shoulder, and she put her hand on it. It only lasted a minute, but it made me smile.
Later, people, if we survive, Rachel said grimly. I shot her a nasty look, and she shrugged.
We will be back, okay? Just go back to where you saw Burg, Luk, Fed, Lorn, and Ink last, and you should be able to get back to the Hork-Bajir camp from there. Wish us luck, Jake said.
"Good luck!" Sandra and the General cried.
"Andalites do not believe in luck," Menderash said, "but we do believe in hope. I hope that you will succeed."
With that last note, the rest of us climbed into the trees, and followed Indi on his way. And the higher we got, the more I got the feeling that I had seen these exact trees before.