Bryan sent me to get Tala and the others. Erek and no more than four Chee were standing guard outside the meeting room. Toby arrived as well, carrying a holographic emitter disguised as one of those huge radio flashlights. It made her invisible to those around her. Erek not only sound proofed the room, but put up a hologram of an empty room and a force field.
"Tala!" I shouted, sprinting towards the table. "Hey Tala!"
"Hmm?" Tala asked. He was sipping soda. Robert was sedately drinking coffee, but I saw Tala's hand inching up his thigh.
"Bryan twisted his leg. He wants to talk to you, do you think you could find Spencer and Ian. And Robert, Johnny said to come get you and Enrique. He's found Oliver, and you will never believe his story, but Oliver had a pretty tough night and he'd like to go home."
Robert sighed reluctantly. "Oh well, there's the week to come." He stood up and stretched.
Tala followed. He turned his head, made a gesture, a sign across the room. "Great, Ian and Spencer should be here…"
"Find Bryan yet?" Asked a voice at my elbow.
I jumped. "Hi Ian. I found him."
"Silly goose twisted his ankle." Tala rolled his eyes.
"Tyson!" Enrique called. He slipped under Spencer's massive elbow and almost tumbled head first to the ground trying to slow down. "You found Oliver?"
"Yeah, we did." I sighed. "You would not believe his story, or you might. I wouldn't know."
They followed me upstairs. I was not bothered on the way. I saw no sign of the Chee, not the slightest ripple as we passed them and entered the first layer of the hologram.
Tala paused, peering somewhere to my right. "Something wrong Tala?" I asked.
"I thought I saw something, must by my cyber eyes getting the better of me."
I gulped, if Tala could see through holograms…. I opened the door.
Nothing was there.
"Erek?" I called.
"Come, IN!" Rachel's hand shot out and yanked me back in.
"AH!" I cried, almost jumping out of my skin.
There was a shimmering in the air around me. "What the hell?" Enrique demanded. I thought that Robert would say something like… 'How uncouth!'
He didn't. The only thing out of Robert's mouth was, "Woah!"
"Cool!" Ian exclaimed.
"Intriguing." Spencer commented, looking around him.
"I KNEW IT!" Tala exclaimed. "A hologram!"
"And forcefield/soundproofing too." Erek said smugly. "It took five of us to set it up."
Sure enough, two chee were directly inside the door. One of them calmly shut the door.
The next things that they saw were Ax, Ezimili, and Toby. "Who or what on or off the earth are they?"
//I am an andilite.// Ax answered. //My name is Aximili Esgarrouth Isthil.//
//You know me Robert.// Ezimili smirked. //My name is Ezimili Ani Maradak, Daughter of Noorlin Sirinial Coraff and Forlay Esgarrouth Maheen; Sister of WarPrince Elfangor Sirinial Shamtoul, to use his full title.// And with that she began to morph.
Robert dropped his coffee. A small noise came out of his throat. "You're a princess?" He asked.
"Actually, War Prince is a military rank among my people, a high honor."
"We're waiting for Team Psykick, the Saint Shields, the Tigers, and the All Starz." Johnny checked his watch. "They're going to come after us. We need to get out of here ASAP, tick tock!"
"Who?" Tala asked.
"The yeerks, I'll explain once we're all back at my house." Max said calmly. "But they're not nice. They went after Oliver, and Bryan twisted his ankle trying to get away. Tyson, Kai, Cassie, Rachel, Hillary, and Ezimili went down to get them, to get me too. We're lucky that they're not exactly…"
"Totally solidarit?" Oliver asked. "Is that even a word?"
"I got the idea though." Ian growled.
"How do we get out?" Robert asked.
Johnny wordlessly tossed him the keys.
That was when Judy and the All Starz came through the door, followed by the Tigers. "MAX!!" Judy cried.
"SUPER MOM!" Enrique joked.
"You have no idea." Judy murmured as she and Max ran to each other. "Max, MaxMax! I'm so sorry that I ignored you! I'm sorry I said those things! Can you forgive me?"
"Momma! I'll give you a second chance if I can have one too!" Max wailed. "I'm so sorry! I felt horrible having to hide from you! I really did!"
"You did what you had to Maxie! You did!" Judy sobbed into her son's hair. "And it all turned out okay! Really!"
"Um… this is like the ending to a movie that I missed." Michael said, blinking.
"You knew about all of this?" Emily asked.
"I was planning for it." Max said darkly. "But I thought they'd target Tyson, not me, or Kai, I mean, they're both way better bladers."
"Are you sure about that?" Asked Toby. "I do not understand many human things, and almost as little about Beyblading, but I know the yeerkish mentality. They targeted you Max, because the yeerks believe in the strength of the small. You may be the weakest, but I think that what mattered to them was that your heart be strong, not your physical strength. Perhaps your friend Didlit told you?"
"Um…" Max blushed, "Something like that."
"Ah, human modesty. Believe in yourself Max." Toby smiled, leaning back against the wall. "It may be what saves you in the end."
"Can somebody tell us exactly what is going on?" Eddy insisted. "Coach?"
"It's a long story boys, I still don't understand all of it." Judy said with a smile. "When we've gotten everybody out in one piece I'll tell you."
"Johnny and Robert are working on that." Enrique said calmly.
That was when Ozuma and the Saint Shields, followed by Kane and the Psykicks entered the room, lead by Zeo and Wyatt. "Wow! Sweet set up!" Zeo exclaimed. "Hey! You guys are the same species as that creature Visser 3!"
//Not the same. Visser 3 is a controller. What you saw was his host body.// Ax said, miffed.
"Andilite host?" Judy's face twisted in rage. "AN ANDILITE HOST? I'LL KILL THE GENIUS WHO THOUGHT THAT UP!" The Animorphs, Ax, and Ezimili winced. "Who… who… who else have they taken?"
"Taxxons, some leerans, but they survived, a species called the Garatron, and they're working on the Anati." Ezimili recapped. "There are also…" She hesitated.
"Also?" Judy's face was red with rage.
"Also??" Then her face turned white. "Who…"
"There are signs that they may have made it to the Andilite Home World." Ezimili said, beginning to demorph. "My parents decided that Earth, with the Animorphs, was safer than the homeworld."
Judy's face paled. She fell back into one of the chairs, head in her hands. When she removed them, I saw tears running down her cheeks. "How could I have been so dumb? Thinking that it wouldn't happen, and it did."
//It's okay…// Ezimili said gently, putting a hand on her shoulder. //It has to be.//
"No… never… it won't be okay until the yeerk empire is… is ripped to shreds… every last one… slashed… stomped… starved… it doesn't matter, as long as they die…" Tears streamed from her eyes.
"Judy, you can't break down on us now!" Jake said frantically. "We need to get everybody out… can you morph?"
"Yes… but nothing appropriate for guard duty." Judy said softly. "Wait… one… maybe two but it would cause a huge stir."
"Then wait until we make it to the bus, then morph and be ready to fight." Jake told her.
"How do you… how do you know about morphing?" She asked, voice a hoarse whisper.
Jake smiled wanely. "How do you think five children and an andilite could hold out for three years? Well… almost three."
Judy jumped, looking up at him. "And you… you lead them?"
Jake nodded. "We call ourselves the Animorphs. We used the BBA as a cover for this mission. We'll be able to use the contacts too. I'm sorry that we caused so much trouble for you."
"No…" She shook her head. "I needed to be woken up, because I couldn't forget about it, not this late in the game."
"It's ready." Johnny said, rushing in. "Robert says hurry!"
"Right, I'm going to divide you up into five groups, each one with a chee to cover them. Erek, take group one. Toby, go with group two. Judy, go with group three. Tobias with group four. Ezimili with group five." He started counting us off into five groups, like choosing teams for dodge ball or something. I was in group three with Max and Rachel. Jake sent us out one by one in odd intervals. We crept down the hall, keeping our voices down.
Judy's fists were clenched into a white-knuckle grip. "Tyson, do you know the name of Visser 3's host body?" She whispered finally as we crossed the parking lot.
"I think it was… Alloran Semitur Corass."
Judy looked like she was ready to faint. "Alloran…" She murmured softly. "Ironic that… So much that I've missed… hiding too long… stupid, stupid, stupid…"
Tobias was standing on the edge of the passenger window. //Hey, they're coming Robert, group three, and Judy's with them.//
The door opened soundlessly. "Soundproofing and holograms are online." Erek reported. "It's alright to speak now."
Judy nodded, before sitting down, but she didn't speak. I looked at her carefully. She was trembling. That's when it hit me. Judy, Max's mighty super mom, was afraid.
"An andilite controller." She murmured at last, shaking her head. "Poor Alloran."
We all made it safely into the bus. Robert started up the engine. We began to roll away from the convention center.
"You're an android." Tala stated, looking at Erek.
"That I am, the most powerful computer currently on planet Earth, you're looking at him." Erek said smugly. "But I'm impressed that you were able to see through our holograms. My creators, the Pemalites, took their technology directly from the Elemist's fleet, known as the Multitude. The Elemist later ascended to Space Time."
"Ascended?" Asked Oliver, "What does that mean?"
"It's a long and painful process, and it would result in the person who ascended losing everything that made them them. The person in question slowly moves from themselves, to a Cyborg, to an android. As they get stronger and evolve, their awareness expands and they are able to warp space/time. The final leap for the Elemist came when Crayak threw him into a black hole and destroyed the Multitude. Somehow the Elemist survived to learn how to warp time and space." Erek explained. "The Elemist continued to thwart the Crayak from where he sat in space time. Crayak grew so frustrated that he followed the Elemist into the same black hole, and they're still in there today. I have been gathering data for awhile now, and I believe that the Elemist and Crayak have decided on Earth as their last stand. That is why there is so much going on at once. First the continued strife within the BBA, then the Yeerks, and all of these problems that the Animorphs have been having with time space interference."
"Wait a minute." Enrique demanded. "Woah! Woah! Woah! You're saying that we're involved in this?"
"Oh yes Enrique of the Majestics. All of you are in way over your heads." Erek said with a sigh. He shook his canine head ruefully. "I do regret telling you all this, but back on the Pemalite homeworld, we too had Bit Beasts. We called them the Remnants. They claimed to be the last of a species that had been drawn into a black hole when their star had gone nova. They are the only species ever to have ascended as a whole. How else would they be able to warp space time? How else…" He turned to Tala. "Could Wolborg have sent my sensors skyrocketing off the charts?"
"Machines…" Tala murmured. "They… we… what exactly am I anyway? The point is that everything exists in layers. Humans as a species tend to only see the outside of things. I don't like to be pessimistic, but I completely agree with the Philosopher Thomas Hobbes. Ever since I was two my life has been lived in his 'State of Nature.' Lately… I've kind of been seeing beyond the layers you know? I've been seeing and hearing beyond what humans normally would see and hear."
"You saw through a hologram designed by easily the oldest being in the galaxy." Erek said with a smile. "I think your vision will do you credit in the battle to come."
"Wait a minute." I said suddenly. "Jake, the Demolition Boys are Cyborgs. Will they be able to morph with their cyber enhancements?"
"I… I didn't think of that…" Jake said slowly.
"They will." Judy said with a smile. "Their cyber components are made of the same alloy that forms the specialized cells necessary for morphing. You could say that Boris and Voltaire broke the patent on that count."
I sighed in relief. Good thing I'd thought of that. I didn't want to think about what would have happened. I shivered.
Judy sighed. "So you boys want to tell me exactly what happened?"
I pulled open the cooler. "Guess."
Comprehension dawned on Judy's face. "YEERKS!" She hissed.
"They targeted the BBA. Visser 3 had figured out that if he took one team from each of the major Beyblading centers that he could set up a sort of web around the world. He didn't count on what we call the Peacenik faction of his forces. It was made up of yeerks who believed that there was a better way than infestation, they just hadn't found it yet. The leader of the peace faction gave us a warning about what was going to happen. He fixed it so that all the yeerks assigned to the attack tonight were members of his group. They're going to stage the disappearance of the nine members assigned and blame it on the 'andilite bandits' that's us by the way. In exchange the members that we captured are allowed to choose one morph and go nothlit in it." Cassie explained. "The whole nothlit thing is an option that we give captured yeerks. Either be trapped and avoid contact until the end of the war, or starve."
"Morph? Nothlit?" Steve blinked, rolling the unfamiliar words over his tongue.
//The shape shifting ability that I have already demonstrated is a piece of biotechnology that we andilites use to acquire the DNA of any given animal or being and transform into that being for two of your hours at a time. However, after the two hours, the morpher in question is trapped, unable to return to their original form.// Ezimili explained. //Until recently, it was only we andilites who could use this power. However, my elder brother, a brave and powerful andilite War Prince named Elfangor Sirinial Shamtoul gave a group of five humans the power to morph.// She nodded towards the Animorphs.
//Then, recently, the Blade Breakers walked in on a meeting.// Ax explained. //We gave them the option of joining us. On a training mission, we discovered a place we call The Grotto. In it we found the remnants of an andilite fighter craft, as well as preserved andilite technology. We also found the name of the Andilite in question, Judin Olarn Sorath. Judin was a famous veteran from the battle to save the Hork Bajir world. She earned the nickname Berserker Judin. We also found leads pointing to the BBA. We infiltrated the BBA to search for Judin, but every lead came up blank. Then, the Peace Faction's leader, Illim, gave us a tip off that the yeerks would attempt to infest prominent members of the BBA. Since then we have been tracking the teams, one by one, to make sure that they are not controllers.//
"And we decided to reverse the damage that the yeerks would do the BBA and turn it into damage done to them." Rachel explained, "Kai called it 'Total Disruption.' The yeerks want to expand, they'll find other ways, but we can use this chance to expand ourselves."
Up front I heard an affirmative noise from Robert. "You want to teach us how to use this morphing technology."
"That's right. Look, we haven't even told you Blade Breakers yet…" Jake said hesitantly. "We didn't want to accidentally jinx ourselves by telling you until your training period was over… We used the blue box once, on a kid named David. We tried to get him to join the team. David turned on us. With a swiss army knife of four morphs David almost killed us. Since then we've thought about what happened. As we watched the Blade Breakers train and grow as a team, we realized what we'd done wrong."
"One," Marco ticked off the points on his fingers. "David had nothing to lose if he sold us out. Two, David was less experienced with the dynamics of the team. He was an outsider, or felt like it at least. He felt alienated. Three, we didn't know much about David's personality. We weren't sure where he'd fit in and he turned out to be a kind of afterthought."
Cassie put in, tactfully. "So we decided that you would all have an advantage over David. A.) Beyblade teams would be more dedicated to the cause, especially the top teams. You all knew that on Earth there is a balance and you would understand that the yeerks posed a threat to the balance. B.) Unlike David they had everything to lose if they lost a battle. C.) Their dynamics as a team had already been established. They knew each other well and they knew how to deal with problems within their team. D.) They already had a leader who was experienced with leading, a leader who wouldn't make the same mistake that Jake did and alienate his team mates."
//So we kept an eye on all of you, one by one, first to make sure that you were yeerk free, and second to gauge your personalities.// Tobias explained. //But we also had the experiences of the Blade Breakers to draw on. They told us that if allowed latitude in your separate teams you'd probably be unstoppable.//
//And so we began preparations for a mission to the toughest target in the yeerk's occupied areas, the yeerk pool.// Ax finished. //At the same time we knew that there was so much that could go wrong. We needed a way to get into the yeerk pool without being seen. Erek and I set up hiding stations using Chee holographic technology where we could demorph and remorph without being seen. Half of us would go, the rest of us would hang back and run interference where necessary. If needed we could have been down to the yeerk pool in twenty minutes.//
"And now you have to make the same choice that we did." Kai said calmly. "You can morph and fight, or stand by and watch Earth be destroyed."
"Now is that really any choice at all?" Mariah asked. "I mean, come on, of course we'll do it."
"Yeah." Kevin said with a soft smile. "We saved the world before right? What are the odds we can do it again?"
"And while we were the ones you were saving the world from," Tala said with that small, serene smile of his, "You can be sure that we will atone for what we have done in the past."
Silence hung in the air for a moment. "Think on it you guys." Jake said with a small, crooked smile. "This isn't a decision made lightly."
"And so begins the road to enlightenment." Ozuma said with his usual cold smirk.