A/N: First of all, thank you to all of you who read my first fic 'Shorm'.
You all seemed very enthusiastic about this idea in particular, so I
decided I'd start to read it.
The way I got this story idea is very interesting. I was playing a game with my younger sister, TD, and I really wanted Tobias to be a little kid in this game and be taken care of by her favorite character, Ax. I tweaked it a little here, messed with some of the idea here, and the fic was born ^_^.
This story will be written in Megamorphs style, including the opening explanation. Just pretend you are reading one of the Megamorphs that happens to fit between #23-24. Think of it as Megamorphs 2.5 ^_^.
Please note that Tobias will only get one chapter, the first chapter, and why will become more apparent later on.
\\Thought speech//
Disclaimer: K.A. Applegate and Scholastic, not by the lowly authoress, own Animorphs.
Genre: Um.I'll get back to you on that ^_^;
Rating: PG to PG-13
Summery: Tobias, Ax, and the other Animorphs are in for an interesting mission. They were informed by the Chee that the Yeerks are up too something again, this time developing a ray to make their human controllers immortal by stopping the aging process. But when Tobias is hit with it, they're in for a big problem in a small package! *Between books #23-24. Featuring Chibi Toby! *
Authoress: Innocent Blood (tobias_ax_shorm@yahoo.com)
Title: The Innocent
Chapter 1
TOBIAS
My name is Tobias.
Tobias no-last-name. Tobias no-home. Tobias I-can't-tell-you-anything. Tobias the-freak-of-nature.
Even if it were safe to tell you my last name, my address, and all that other information, I'm not sure I could. I don't think I remember it anymore. You tend to forget things you never use. After all, who needs a last name when you live in a tree and eat mice?
Heh. I'll bet you have a bad image of a wild boy kneeling down in the forest with a mouse-tail hanging from his mouth. Well, don't be too grossed out. I'm a hawk, not a human. I was human for the first part of my life though. At least, part human. I also happen to be, by some odd twist of fate or the Ellimist, part Andalite.
You probably think I'm crazy, and I might agree with you. Sometimes I'm not sure anymore whether I'm sane, or whether I've created this whole war in my head. What war you ask? The intergalactic war against the Yeerks of course!
What's a Yeerk? It's an ugly grey slug, maybe, *maybe*, two inches long. Not very threatening is it? Until you consider the fact that these tiny slugs have the ability to crawl into the ear canal, by-pass the inner ear, and wrap itself around your brain, then take complete control. I really mean complete control.
Oh, you'll still be in your head, but as a prisoner. The Yeerk will have complete access to your body, your memories, to your family. The Yeerk, not you, will be living your life. Sucks, doesn't it?
The worst part is, we don't know whose a controller, or infested with a Yeerk, and whose not. The Yeerks are very good at what they do, I'll give them that much.
So, who's fighting this silent invasion? The government? The great world leaders? No. Try a bird-boy, one very lost teenage alien, and four teenage kids. And you thought humans were going to kill each other with nuclear weapons, didn't you?
We do have one weapon the Yeerks don't, our only weapon. The power to morph, to become any animal we can touch in our natural forms by absorbing their DNA. The Andalite war prince Elfangor gave this power to us. My father, though I didn't know it at the time. I would like to think that he did, but really, how could he? As far as he knew, probably, I was just another human kid that happened to be in the right place at the right time. Or the wrong place and the wrong time, if you are Marco.
Morphing isn't without limits though. You have to be able to touch the animal in your natural form, a real problem if you are Ax or me. Secondly, you can only stay in morph for two hours, or get stuck there permanently. End of story. That's what happened to me, I got stuck as a hawk on our first mission, until the "all powerful" Ellimist gave me my power back.
Now that you have some background, let me bring you up to speed. Earth's only hope, the Animorphs as we call ourselves, were having a meeting. Erek the Chee, one of our indestructible pacifist android allies, had given us a disturbing new piece of information. It turns out that humans age a bit faster than other alien species. So we get weaker and die faster. The Yeerks didn't like that. Now they were trying to find an anti-aging ray to keep their Controllers young and healthy. All of this Jake, the unofficial leader of our band of misfits, had just finished explaining to us.
"Let me get this straight. The Yeerks invent a fountain of youth to keep their warriors young and strong, instead of selling the rights to make enough money for a new fleet of space ships?" That was Marco. The voice of reason, but only when he had to be. Now wasn't when he had to be.
\\ Actually, even with your money, you would not have the technology to even build a decent bug fighter. //
"Our money, Ax. You live here now, and it's your money too. Get over it." I would have smiled if I'd had a mouth to do it with. Ax was my best friend in the whole world, and also happened to be my uncle in an odd sort of way. Like I said, I'm one screwed up bundle of genetics.
"So what do you want us to do with this, Jake? They don't even know if the ray works yet!" Rachel fumed from her place on top of a pile of hay. Even in Cassie's dusty barn, she still somehow looked perfect and completely in place.
"They're testing it in the forest, about five miles from Tobias's meadow. All I'm suggesting is that we check it out. For the moment, it isn't a threat. But, we need to know the instant it is."
"So, you want Ax and Tobias to look?" Cassie guessed from where she'd been tending an injured blue jay. I'd tried to explain to her it wasn't worth it, one blue jay wouldn't be missed by anything, but somehow she didn't understand. Jake nodded to her before looking at the two of us.
"Just lie low. Do NOT draw attention to yourselves. Just watch for about an hour, see how far a long they are, and then get out. Whatever you do, do not engage in battle. We don't want the Yeerks to catch onto us yet."
Yeah, okay, easier said then done. \\ Okay, Jake. We'll be good, promise. // Ax smiled up at me with his main eyes, his stalk eyes darting this way and that. No matter how much time I spent with him, that would still creep me out. Two hours later, Ax and I are hanging out in the sky over a meadow that was *way* to crowded to not be where the Yeerks with their nice new toy.
\\ There are only human controllers here. // Ax observed. I had noticed this too.
\\ It's probably too risky for them to bring out anything else. They haven't even bothered to put a hologram around this. Must not be very high up on the Visser's priority list. Still, messing with aging has to be dangerous. I want a closer look. //
\\Prince Jake said to remain inconspicuous. //
\\Yeah, well Jake isn't here. Besides, I will be inconspicuous. See how they're all human? Well, I can pull that trick too. //
\\ Do you wish me to accompany you for back up? // I thought about this for a minute. Even as soon as it was after the incident with DeGroot and Aria/Visser 3 no one down there had any reason to suspect me of being anything more than a Controller just like them. Still, the thought of having Ax in the trees in case something did go horribly wrong was very comforting.
\\ Okay, demorph and remain hidden while I check things out. If something goes wrong, get out. // We both knew the last part would be completely ignored. Ax and I had been close before I found out Elfangor was my father, about three months ago, but now he was downright possessive. It was endearing, actually. I landed in some bushes about ten minutes from the Yeerk's meadow, demorphed, and then walked in as casually as I could.
'Okay, Tobias, act casual. Act like you belong, and no one will even notice that you shouldn't be here. No one will talk to you.'
"Hey, you!"
'Or not.' I turned, trying to look as annoyed as I could. "Yeah, what?"
"You shouldn't be here!" The controller said angrily. He looked about 25, with thin brown hair. Not at all threatening. Still, I didn't want to mess with him if I could avoid it. Time to activate plan "free pass".
"The Visser sent me," I sneered. I saw the little flicker of fear across his face. Bingo. Then, to my surprise, his expression changed to delight.
"Ah, yes, we have been expecting you. Please step this way." Expecting me? That was never good. But, I couldn't back out now, or it'd be obvious that I wasn't supposed to be there at all. Gulping as quietly as I could, I stepped over the grass. The guy led me to a blank patch in the middle of the meadow, where there wasn't even any grass.
"Stand there." I did, blinking, and trying to look unconcerned, but I noticed that all activity in the meadow was now focused on me. Not a good sign.
"Our last test subject vanished. We believe he shrunk down in age to non- existence. But we are confident we have fixed the problem." Test subject? Shit! I tried to escape, but it was to late. A ray of purple light fired at me from somewhere across the meadow, and it hit me directly in the chest. I gasped as a tingling sensation spread over my body, and then everything began to grow as I felt myself shrink. Couldn't focus, couldn't yell for Ax. I felt my thoughts slipping away, and then.
END A/N: All right, I know this chapter is WAY rushed, but I just had to get it written to give you a bit of background information. It's choppy too, but oh well *sigh*. The rest of them will follow a more logical thought pattern, I promise. This one was just a necessary evil.
Gambatte Kudasai,
IB
The way I got this story idea is very interesting. I was playing a game with my younger sister, TD, and I really wanted Tobias to be a little kid in this game and be taken care of by her favorite character, Ax. I tweaked it a little here, messed with some of the idea here, and the fic was born ^_^.
This story will be written in Megamorphs style, including the opening explanation. Just pretend you are reading one of the Megamorphs that happens to fit between #23-24. Think of it as Megamorphs 2.5 ^_^.
Please note that Tobias will only get one chapter, the first chapter, and why will become more apparent later on.
\\Thought speech//
Disclaimer: K.A. Applegate and Scholastic, not by the lowly authoress, own Animorphs.
Genre: Um.I'll get back to you on that ^_^;
Rating: PG to PG-13
Summery: Tobias, Ax, and the other Animorphs are in for an interesting mission. They were informed by the Chee that the Yeerks are up too something again, this time developing a ray to make their human controllers immortal by stopping the aging process. But when Tobias is hit with it, they're in for a big problem in a small package! *Between books #23-24. Featuring Chibi Toby! *
Authoress: Innocent Blood (tobias_ax_shorm@yahoo.com)
Title: The Innocent
Chapter 1
TOBIAS
My name is Tobias.
Tobias no-last-name. Tobias no-home. Tobias I-can't-tell-you-anything. Tobias the-freak-of-nature.
Even if it were safe to tell you my last name, my address, and all that other information, I'm not sure I could. I don't think I remember it anymore. You tend to forget things you never use. After all, who needs a last name when you live in a tree and eat mice?
Heh. I'll bet you have a bad image of a wild boy kneeling down in the forest with a mouse-tail hanging from his mouth. Well, don't be too grossed out. I'm a hawk, not a human. I was human for the first part of my life though. At least, part human. I also happen to be, by some odd twist of fate or the Ellimist, part Andalite.
You probably think I'm crazy, and I might agree with you. Sometimes I'm not sure anymore whether I'm sane, or whether I've created this whole war in my head. What war you ask? The intergalactic war against the Yeerks of course!
What's a Yeerk? It's an ugly grey slug, maybe, *maybe*, two inches long. Not very threatening is it? Until you consider the fact that these tiny slugs have the ability to crawl into the ear canal, by-pass the inner ear, and wrap itself around your brain, then take complete control. I really mean complete control.
Oh, you'll still be in your head, but as a prisoner. The Yeerk will have complete access to your body, your memories, to your family. The Yeerk, not you, will be living your life. Sucks, doesn't it?
The worst part is, we don't know whose a controller, or infested with a Yeerk, and whose not. The Yeerks are very good at what they do, I'll give them that much.
So, who's fighting this silent invasion? The government? The great world leaders? No. Try a bird-boy, one very lost teenage alien, and four teenage kids. And you thought humans were going to kill each other with nuclear weapons, didn't you?
We do have one weapon the Yeerks don't, our only weapon. The power to morph, to become any animal we can touch in our natural forms by absorbing their DNA. The Andalite war prince Elfangor gave this power to us. My father, though I didn't know it at the time. I would like to think that he did, but really, how could he? As far as he knew, probably, I was just another human kid that happened to be in the right place at the right time. Or the wrong place and the wrong time, if you are Marco.
Morphing isn't without limits though. You have to be able to touch the animal in your natural form, a real problem if you are Ax or me. Secondly, you can only stay in morph for two hours, or get stuck there permanently. End of story. That's what happened to me, I got stuck as a hawk on our first mission, until the "all powerful" Ellimist gave me my power back.
Now that you have some background, let me bring you up to speed. Earth's only hope, the Animorphs as we call ourselves, were having a meeting. Erek the Chee, one of our indestructible pacifist android allies, had given us a disturbing new piece of information. It turns out that humans age a bit faster than other alien species. So we get weaker and die faster. The Yeerks didn't like that. Now they were trying to find an anti-aging ray to keep their Controllers young and healthy. All of this Jake, the unofficial leader of our band of misfits, had just finished explaining to us.
"Let me get this straight. The Yeerks invent a fountain of youth to keep their warriors young and strong, instead of selling the rights to make enough money for a new fleet of space ships?" That was Marco. The voice of reason, but only when he had to be. Now wasn't when he had to be.
\\ Actually, even with your money, you would not have the technology to even build a decent bug fighter. //
"Our money, Ax. You live here now, and it's your money too. Get over it." I would have smiled if I'd had a mouth to do it with. Ax was my best friend in the whole world, and also happened to be my uncle in an odd sort of way. Like I said, I'm one screwed up bundle of genetics.
"So what do you want us to do with this, Jake? They don't even know if the ray works yet!" Rachel fumed from her place on top of a pile of hay. Even in Cassie's dusty barn, she still somehow looked perfect and completely in place.
"They're testing it in the forest, about five miles from Tobias's meadow. All I'm suggesting is that we check it out. For the moment, it isn't a threat. But, we need to know the instant it is."
"So, you want Ax and Tobias to look?" Cassie guessed from where she'd been tending an injured blue jay. I'd tried to explain to her it wasn't worth it, one blue jay wouldn't be missed by anything, but somehow she didn't understand. Jake nodded to her before looking at the two of us.
"Just lie low. Do NOT draw attention to yourselves. Just watch for about an hour, see how far a long they are, and then get out. Whatever you do, do not engage in battle. We don't want the Yeerks to catch onto us yet."
Yeah, okay, easier said then done. \\ Okay, Jake. We'll be good, promise. // Ax smiled up at me with his main eyes, his stalk eyes darting this way and that. No matter how much time I spent with him, that would still creep me out. Two hours later, Ax and I are hanging out in the sky over a meadow that was *way* to crowded to not be where the Yeerks with their nice new toy.
\\ There are only human controllers here. // Ax observed. I had noticed this too.
\\ It's probably too risky for them to bring out anything else. They haven't even bothered to put a hologram around this. Must not be very high up on the Visser's priority list. Still, messing with aging has to be dangerous. I want a closer look. //
\\Prince Jake said to remain inconspicuous. //
\\Yeah, well Jake isn't here. Besides, I will be inconspicuous. See how they're all human? Well, I can pull that trick too. //
\\ Do you wish me to accompany you for back up? // I thought about this for a minute. Even as soon as it was after the incident with DeGroot and Aria/Visser 3 no one down there had any reason to suspect me of being anything more than a Controller just like them. Still, the thought of having Ax in the trees in case something did go horribly wrong was very comforting.
\\ Okay, demorph and remain hidden while I check things out. If something goes wrong, get out. // We both knew the last part would be completely ignored. Ax and I had been close before I found out Elfangor was my father, about three months ago, but now he was downright possessive. It was endearing, actually. I landed in some bushes about ten minutes from the Yeerk's meadow, demorphed, and then walked in as casually as I could.
'Okay, Tobias, act casual. Act like you belong, and no one will even notice that you shouldn't be here. No one will talk to you.'
"Hey, you!"
'Or not.' I turned, trying to look as annoyed as I could. "Yeah, what?"
"You shouldn't be here!" The controller said angrily. He looked about 25, with thin brown hair. Not at all threatening. Still, I didn't want to mess with him if I could avoid it. Time to activate plan "free pass".
"The Visser sent me," I sneered. I saw the little flicker of fear across his face. Bingo. Then, to my surprise, his expression changed to delight.
"Ah, yes, we have been expecting you. Please step this way." Expecting me? That was never good. But, I couldn't back out now, or it'd be obvious that I wasn't supposed to be there at all. Gulping as quietly as I could, I stepped over the grass. The guy led me to a blank patch in the middle of the meadow, where there wasn't even any grass.
"Stand there." I did, blinking, and trying to look unconcerned, but I noticed that all activity in the meadow was now focused on me. Not a good sign.
"Our last test subject vanished. We believe he shrunk down in age to non- existence. But we are confident we have fixed the problem." Test subject? Shit! I tried to escape, but it was to late. A ray of purple light fired at me from somewhere across the meadow, and it hit me directly in the chest. I gasped as a tingling sensation spread over my body, and then everything began to grow as I felt myself shrink. Couldn't focus, couldn't yell for Ax. I felt my thoughts slipping away, and then.
END A/N: All right, I know this chapter is WAY rushed, but I just had to get it written to give you a bit of background information. It's choppy too, but oh well *sigh*. The rest of them will follow a more logical thought pattern, I promise. This one was just a necessary evil.
Gambatte Kudasai,
IB