DISCLAIMER: Okay, here's the real reason I was gone for so long: K.A. Applegate heard about the times I joked about owning the Animorphs, and she was not amused so one day as I was diligently typing out a chapter some big guys in black government-type suits and shades barged in to my room and - ::chip in brain starts to sizzle:: - AHHH!!!!! ::twitch, twitch::
NOTE: Okay, I'm saying sorry again this time for TWO reasons. One, the same as before. Sorry for the obscenely long break in the story. Sorrysorrysorrysorrysorry! And two, ::blush::, uh, okay hear me out. In the year and some odd months that I've been missing in action, uh….I seem to have…forgotten specifically what I had planned. I mean, I remember the story okay…just not all the little details. So it's going to get messy while I try to bridge the gaps. By messy, I mean there will be moments of blatantly obvious "hah, way to backtrack/make excuses". I'll do my best to bring some sense back, but the most obvious moments will be isolated to just this chapter. And, well, the one before.
Again, ::blush::
F-RECAP-LE: Jake, Cassie, and Tobias provide the distraction, they meet the resident brainless farts of censored city name where they live, and Cassie displays her extensive knowledge of drug terms :D Onward!
Marco –
"Did they torch the place yet?" I whispered impatiently. Rachel glared and stomped on my foot. I nearly yelped.
"Shh!" she hissed unnecessarily. We had already moved away from the Controller guards, since Jake and the others were taking their sweet little time providing their freaking "distraction". Now Erek had us hidden around the corner, since for some reason Ax wasn't comfortable with us being so close within earshot to the Controllers. Apparently the fact that Rachel and I were shooting death glares and strangling each other in our minds each distressed him a little.
We weren't even sure what we were fighting about. It was like the simple fact that I existed annoyed her out of her psychotic little Xena-mind. Well, if she was going to be that way, I was going to make it likewise.
I could glare down PMSing blondies like no other.
"If you like pina coladas…" one of the controllers began to murmur.
Rachel, Erek, and I nearly snapped our necks as we craned around and stared at the thickly muscled Controller, completely startled out of our death stares. He was humming.
"Getting caught in the rain…" he continued. The other controller looked at him sternly.
"What are you doing?"
"My damn host has this cursed human song stuck in our head. I think he did it on purpose."
"I hate when the little bastards do that."
"Me too."
Silence.
"It's stuck in my host's head now too." The other controller grumbled.
"If you're not into yoga…"
"If you have half a brain…"
Now Ax was staring. We gaped at our two mortal enemies as they started to get into it. I silently applauded the poor guys whose brains these yeerks stole. Apparently getting a song stuck in a yeerk's head was a weakness. Wow, that was right up there with that whole oatmeal thing.
"If you like making love at midnight, in the dunes of the cape. I'm the love that you've looked for. Write to me and escape." They sang, keeping their military-like composure the entire time.
Rachel rubbed the bridge of her nose. "If they don't hurry up with the distraction I think I might just go up there and punch them both out right now."
-(Yeerks.)- Ax seethed.
After a few more verses, we were getting desperate, all death-glares and tense silences forgotten. The Pina Colada Song floated mercilessly through our minds, suppressing all our functional systems. I swore, I was going to explode.
Oh no….no…
Now it was stuck in my head.
"You know, at this point I don't think I would mind if the guy who wrote that song was hit by a large motor vehicle." I muttered.
Erek sort of shuffled his feet. Rachel gaped at him.
"No way." Rachel whispered.
"Um…yeah. I sold it to Rupert Holmes in England nearly two decades ago in my previous life." Erek mumbled embarrassedly.
Four eyes plus Ax's four that had been staring transfixed at the singing Controllers now averted to Erek.
-(But why?)- Ax asked with the total exasperation of a teenage alien in human guise sitting in an evil movie theater listening to guys toting ray guns sing raspy, warbled versions of The Pina Colada Song.
"It was a hobby, okay?" Erek whispered defensively.
"Well, okay, since you're a friend I don't wish harm upon you." I said. "I wish harm upon the guy who invented the Pina Colada."
Erek looked away uncomfortably.
"Good Lord, Erek!?"
"Hey - "
Just then Erek was interrupted by a really, really inappropriate smell wafted around my nostrils.
"Oh…that's putrid…" I whispered, making a face. I looked pointedly at Rachel. Thankfully Erek was between us, probably on purpose, and Rachel wasn't able to dismember me.
"It wasn't me, you idiot." Rachel snarled quietly, holding her nose shut. The both of us looked at Ax, since it wasn't likely the resident android could be having troubles with the bean burrito he had for lunch.
-(What are you suggesting!?)- Ax cried, offended.
"I think I'm about to pass out." I squeezed my nostrils shut and my eyes began to water.
"Those guys are huge. It had to be one of those Controllers." Rachel gasped.
"Or both of them."
"Shh." Erek shushed us. But lucky him, he could turn off his mechanical smell receptors or whatever the hell he was doing to not pass out on the spot. It wasn't the first time I wished I was an android.
-(You guys? Our distraction is done.)- Jake announced.
"What did they do, collectively fart in the ventilation system!?" I whispered.
-(Prince Jake, I thought you were merely going to start a fire.)- Ax said.
-(Uh…we did…)-
Sure enough, I heard loud stomping noises coming from further down the opposite hall.
-(Well, in addition to the alarming fire, there is a rather pungent odor passing through the hallway. I believe the smell is strong enough to knock out a human child.)-
"Or a human teenager." Rachel wheezed.
There was one of our trademark Animorph awkward silences before Jake responded. -(Ah, well…you see, there may have been stink bombs involved.)-
"Stink bombs?" Rachel, Erek, and I repeated.
-(Stink bombs?)- Ax wondered. I shook my head.
"Later, Ax. Ask them what the hell they were doing with stink bombs."
-(Marco wishes to inquire what you were doing with - )-
-(Long story.)-
"What id dat?!" One of the controllers groaned. We looked around at the Controllers, both of whom had clamped their fingers over their noses.
"I hab do idee-uh." The other said.
"Is id metade?" Controller One asked.
"Whad?"
"Metade! Da gas!"
"Oh. I'b dot berry fabiliar wid da properdies ob Earth Gases." Controller Two admitted shamefully.
Fools, the smell isn't methane. Ax scoffed. It's obviously a mix of nitrog -
"'Ey, is dat smoke?" Controller One looked over in our direction. I had to remind myself that he couldn't see us, but sure enough we smelled smoke. The fire that the others must have started
"Id is smoke. Sub foo' must hab burned subting." Controller Two said dismissively.
"You idiot!" Controller One cried. "Metade is combustible!"
Their eyes widened.
"You stay here." Controller One ordered. "I'll go check whad's goin on." He left his post, fingering his dracon beam as if for reassurance.
"This is it." Rachel whispered.
"What are you going to do? There's still one controller at the door." Erek whispered back.
"Ax is gonna knock him out and we morph him." I reminded him. Rachel may be abnormally strong for a girl, but Ax's human morph was closer to Jake's build. He had the upper body strength that was, admittedly, stronger than mine.
Though I could still kick his ass, if he ever asked for it.
"Did we discuss this at the meeting?!" Erek hissed. He sounded shocked.
-(Yes, I believe Rachel suggested it.)- Ax said.
"She was serious?!" Erek was getting dangerously loud now. They might have heard him.
"Of course she was, it was Rachel!" I said, ignoring her scowl. "What's the problem Erek? It's not like we're making you doing the knocking out here."
"You don't understand!" Erek shuddered. "I can't help someone knock somebody out....but…"
The Controller turned the corner and gaped at us.
"Um, please tell me he's not staring at us." Rachel murmured.
"Who - ?!"
Ax's fist was too fast, reacting out of pure human adrenaline and shooting out to land a painful uppercut on the guy's chin. He hit the floor like a sack of potatoes, thankfully out of sight, and his hidden dracon beam slid across the floor.
-(Ow.)- Ax winced, cradling his hand. –(But that was rather impressive, human strength.)-
"He saw us!" I fisted my hair in frustration. "He freaking saw us human!"
"Why'd you take the forcefield down?!" Rachel whispered angrily. Erek, who was back in his human disguise, also looked angry.
"I can't inflict violence or aid in violence!" Erek said. "But, since you two weren't the ones doing it, I was able to hide you."
"We told you we were – " Rachel's voice was rising. I clamped a hand on her mouth.
"I thought you were joking! You people are always joking." Erek hissed. "It seemed far too crude to be serious!"
Rachel tried to bite my hand.
"You have to understand." Erek was almost pleading now. "I can't…
"Okay, Erek. We understand." I looked at Rachel and Ax. They both still looked outraged. But apparently, it was my turn to play the Cassie.
He looked as though he didn't believe us, but put the hologram back around us all, anyway. "I can only keep this up as long as there is no violence…but at this point we're looking at some simple 'fool the other controller into letting us in the room' action, right?"
I nodded. "Yeah."
In my mind I was ridiculously pissed off at our resident bajillion year old android. I knew his capabilities if his stupid programming was rewritten. He took out an entire army Controllers and saved our asses once, barehanded. But no, his eternal memory couldn't handle all the violent memories, so he had to remain how he had been. A pacifist spy.
The irony of it all was way too much for me to deal with right now. I released Rachel's mouth and she shoved me hard into the wall.
"Don't touch me." She threatened through clenched teeth.
"I can't believe you tried to bite me!"
-(Prince Jake, we have a controller unconscious.)- Ax informed the others. -(Everything may still go according to plan.)-
-(Well you all better hurry the hell up.)- Jake warned. –(The fire's going strong.)-
-(Yes, Prince Jake.)-
-(Don't call me Prince.)-
Ax looked at Rachel and me, her still having pinned me to the wall with her freakishly pointy elbows. –(Who will morph this human?)-
"I'll do it." Rachel volunteered, letting me off the wall.
I shrugged. "Whatever."
Ax nodded and Erek wasn't looking at us.
Rachel leaned towards the big unconscious Controller and a minute later, the changes began. The first was her torso, which doubled in size and made her arms and legs look amusingly tiny.
"Spongebob Squarepants." I snickered at the squareness of her body. Then her biceps bubbled over with muscle and I promptly shut up.
Soon, pretty blond Rachel was a big ugly man. Thankfully, Rachel managed to not morph her leotard and reveal way too much big ugly man. Unfortunately, the guy's bulk ripped the legs of Rachel's leotard all the way up near the crotch area. There were just no words.
"Rachel, your, uh, your package is hanging out a little."
Okay, so there were words. Rachel winced and turned around, taking care not to look as she tucker herself – himself – into a more acceptable appearance. Then she looked at her massive arms appreciatively.
"Cool." She commented.
"Great, you can ask him out later." I said dryly. "Just take his clothes and go, already!"
Rachel made a face. "I do not want to see this guy naked." She removed the guy's shirt, her eyes squinched shut, and put it on. The same with his shoes.
"What about the pants?"
"If you think I am taking off his pants you are sadly mistaken, Marco."
-(I will take them off.)- Ax volunteered. Then he looked at the Controller. –(Ah, but I do not know how.)-
All eyes turned to me.
"Are you kidding me?!" I pointed at Erek. "He knows how!"
Erek shook his android head. "Um, hey, this is your mission. I'm just the hired help."
I grumbled, looking down at the Controller's vastly unattractive pants. "Oh, all right." I shut my eyes tight like Rachel had and unbuttoned his jeans. Rachel whistled.
"Shut up." I got the pants off and threw them at her, taking care to shield my precious eyes from what lay beneath the Controller's pants.
"That is just ew." Rachel said. She looked at the Controller in his underwear. "Just, ew."
-(I agree.)- Ax said.
-(Um, you guys? Hurry up.)- Jake said urgently.
Rachel slipped the pants on, muttering something about catching crabs or scabies, and peeked around the corner. "Here goes nothing."
"Do we follow her?" I wondered.
-(I don't see why not.)- Ax said. –(We should be closer in case something happens we can get into the room quickly.)-
Erek nodded and we quietly followed Rachel.
"What's going on?" The Controller demanded.
"There's been a fire." Rachel answered. "But its not methane." The Controller's eyes widened.
"Andalites."
"Um, no. Just another stupid teenage prank."
As if on cue, two familiar, chunky guys screeched down the hall, chuckling loudly.
"Come on, Chase, move!"
"Dude, did you see that naked guy?!"
"AHAHAHA!"
They barreled into the storage room and presumably sprinted out the way we had come in. Ax, Erek, and I exchanged confused looks.
"What the hell?" I mouthed. Uh, thank you, God?
"…See?" Rachel said sheepishly.
"Damn kids." The Controller grumbled. "I'll go get them."
"No, wait." Rachel stopped him. "I have orders to go in there." She pointed at the door behind them. The Controller looked at her blankly.
"Why?"
"I, um…fire extinguisher." Rachel answered lamely. "In there."
I stared. Ax stared. Erek stared. Clearly we should have rehearsed this before jumping on in.
"Damn it, I told them we needed those. 'This is only a cover' they said. 'The construction and safety officials are one of us, we don't need to hassle with any mindless human garbage' they said. Well look at them now, needing the stupid fire extinguisher." The Controller totally bought it and brought his hand to the panel, still grumbling about the incompetence of his superiors.
The panel bleeped softly and opened, revealing about a billion little buttons. They all looked the same to me, but the Controller pushed seven specific ones in some order. The two doors slid into the wall, leading into the same brightly lit room. Suddenly the Controller turned to Rachel, suspicion in his stolen eyes.
"Wait, we have a fire extinguisher in there?"
"Um, ye – "
"HEY!"
We all swiveled around to find the other Controller standing at the end of the hall in only his underwear, sporting a nasty bruise on his forehead.
"Uh oh." I said. The dude had recovered way too fast. Must've been all the meat in his head.
"Umm…" Rachel looked lost and cornered, so she did what Rachel does best.
Her fist connected with the Controllers chin and he fell. I looked back at the naked Controller, definitely not noting his happy face boxers, and saw him raise his Dracon beam.
Well, bloody hell.
TSEEW!
Rachel fell to the ground next to the Controller she had knocked out.
"Oh shi – "
Ax looked down on the floor at the fallen Controller and Rachel. He looked at Erek. He didn't have to say anything.
"In the room, Marco." Erek said.
"Wh – "
I didn't get a chance to ask. Instead, Ax shoved me into the room, underneath some big metal table.
Erek's hologram vanished, revealing Ax.
"What the – "
The controller stared, temporarily frozen at the weirdness of having a kid appear out of thin air for the second time. Ax took the moment to quickly grab a Dracon beam from the unconscious controller and shoot it. Apparently the Dracon beams were all set to stun, because I could still see Rachel's breathing, as well as the two unconscious controllers.
I understood. Erek knew the only way out of this was with violence, so he wanted me to get out of sight. Seeing me as human spelled death to us Animorphs, since I could be identified. Ax's human morph, however, didn't have much of a life so it would be less of a blow to see him than me.
When happy-face-boxers was down, I scrambled out of my hiding place to Rachel's side. There was a nasty burn on her chest, but it didn't look life threatening. I shook her hard.
"Rachel, wake up."
Erek looked her over for a moment. "She's okay."
Ax bounded into the room and I heard him fiddling around in there with some things. I wasn't listening, though. My aim at the moment was to get Rachel to demorph.
"Wake up the hell up, come on, man!"
-(Prince Jake the BioFilter has been disabled successfully)- Ax announced. –(But Rachel has sustained some injury, though she is in morph.)-
-(WHAT?!)- Tobias's voice, not Jake's.
-(We're coming in…)- Jake answered briskly.
Suddenly…
BREET! BREET! BREET!
Ax jumped. Whatever he had done in there must have set off some kind of alarm. Figures the yeerks don't have a fire alarm, but they have a "Holy crap, the Andalites are here" alarm.
-(…In battle mode.)- Jake amended.
"Crap." I tried to drag Rachel's humongous body into the room.
"Marco…" Erek looked helpless. He knew that this mission was quickly going all to hell, and he couldn't do much if there was going to be fighting.
"Go." I answered gruffly, trying not to let my bitterness show. He got to leave. It was like, a Get out of jail free card, his limitations.
He left, dejectedly.
When I had finally gotten Rachel's bulk into the room, Ax was an Andalite. He was staring at something, completely disregarding the alarm and the fact that a bunch of armed controllers were about to make their way here in a few seconds. I quickly started to go gorilla.
"What are you looking at?!" I demanded, before my mouth went gorilla and thus useless.
"Are these primitive security cameras?" Ax pointed. Sure enough, an entire section of TV screens faced us.
"Damn it. We need to erase the videos of us!"
I barely had the sentence out of my mouth before Ax's tail whipped into an expensive pile of machinery. He reached a blue Andalite hand into the rip and pulled out several things I didn't recognize. He sliced them.
"Done."
"Wow."
Then, GRAWWWWRR!!! A tiger's roar reverberated down the hallway.
I looked out of the room with my gorilla head and saw Jake in tiger morph tackle a human controller. Behind him, out of the storage room entrance burst a wolf and a Hork-Bajir. The cavalry.
But it was only a matter of time before the yeerks brought out the big guns, i.e. the Hork-bajir. We had disabled their filter, after all.
-(You guys, get in here!)- I yelled. They looked at me and barreled towards my door.
TSEEWW!
They may have been weak human controllers, but they were armed to the teeth. Cassie limped after Jake and Tobias.
-(Cassie!)- Jake turned back and took Cassie' by the nape of her neck like a mother cat carrying a baby.
TSEWWW! TSEWW!
They must have realized there mistake. Keeping a BioFilter up made them unable to guard whatever it was they were guarding with anything but human controllers. Granted, they had dracon beams, but it wasn't enough.
The room was crowded now, jam packed with all us Animorphs.
-(Glad you could make it, would you like some tea?!)- I cried shrilly.
-(Shut the door!)- Jake bellowed. –(Shut the door, shut the door, shut the door!)-
Ax didn't respond.
-(AX!)-
-(I've got this)- I looked at the panel on the inside of the door. It didn't look quite as complicated as the one on the outside. In fact, I had definitely seen this kind of lock before.
BAM!
I shoved my gorilla fist into it, twisted and ripped some random wires, and the doors squealed as the slid together.
-(How awesome am I?)-
-(Where's Rachel?!)- Tobias demanded.
-(That would be tall, dark, and ugly over there.)- I pointed at Rachel's unconscious form.
-(Oh, that man is unattractive.)- Cassie couldn't help but comment.
-(Get her to wake up. We're besieged here.)- Jake said impatiently.
-(Besieged? How long have you waited to say that?)- I smirked as a bunch of angry fists banged against the door.
Jake ignored me. –(Ax? Ax, what are you looking at?)-
He didn't answer. His back was to us, staring at some obscure thing in the far corner of the room.
Jake went over by Ax and stopped in his tracks.
-(Um, Jake?)-
Now Jake was silent.
-(Jake? Jake, dude, what are you doing?)-
Cassie looked up from nudging Rachel. –(What's wrong?)- she limped over to Jake's side and stopped as well.
-(Cassie?)- I poked her. –(For real, guys, what are you looking at?) I gently shoved Ax out of the way to see.
And then I was frozen. I couldn't move, couldn't talk, hell I wasn't even sure if I was breathing.
But my eyes were sure as hell working.
Before us, sitting on top of a counter as if it were no more important than a paperweight, was a black crystal no bigger than a Rubix cube. It was the deepest black color, yet it managed to shine as bright as any diamond. Actual black light radiated from it. Not blacklight, like those cheesy hippie decorations, actual black rays shot from its crystal surface. How was this possible? How was it real?
How did it just paralyze us all?
-(You guys?)- Tobias left Rachel's side for a moment. –(What's wrong with you people?)-
He walked over behind us and then I felt a sudden jolt, as if someone had picked me up a couple inches and dropped me again. Then I started to black out and as I fell to the floor, feeling a strange absence of pain as my head hit hard, I saw Tobias still standing.
Alone.
THE HAPPY KORNER!
LJstagflower4e – I'm not ridiculously outlandish? Excuse me, but I am seriously AFFRONTED by that comment! I BANISH THEE ::banishes ye into a land where Jake and Cassie are mortal enemies::
DawnOfEast – Hi!! Thanks for the non-rustage reassurance. Still I think it will be a while before I get back into the full swing of things…
Korean Pearl – Hola! Yeah, I read all the reviews I hadn't read before, thanks! But yeah, I guess I would've given up on me after so long ::blush:: sorry. As for "How did you get to be so funny", well I just don't know. I'm sure it has nothing to do with the fact that I live on top of a former nuclear waste dump though…Thanks for the brackets advice, by the way ::grabs a dead fish and hides it under ffnet's pillow::
Juxapose – Thanks for the welcome! As for whether or not Marco and Rachel will get together, ah, well, I can honestly say………"Nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah!" :P
SEB – I remember a StinkE Burrito! Is that YOU!? HULLLO! Well you're not the only one to have given up on me, heh. Really sorry about that, by the way ::blush:: You know the more people who say that, the more I feel like I have to prove myself or whatever. Uh-oh. ::spazz::
freak show – I didn't DIE ::pinches self and checks pulse:: yeah, I'm still very much alive! (Evil never dies, muahahahaharr!)
SurrealSerpent1 – Hola! Yeah, I'm back and can I just point out the way you said "Cassie's hot blunts" in your review brought to mind an image that I REALLY did not intend when I wrote it. Heee!
SilentBob546 – Thanks!
East Coast Ryder – You write too? Awesome, I shall go forth and take a look!
Rebell – Hope you enjoy reading through the rest of it!
Dot the Distracted – See "rebell" above.
SouthrnBelle – I will try very hard not to do it again ::blush::
D.H. L'Orange – You remembered it? Wow, awesome dude cause I didn't even remember! Thanks for sticking around ::high five::
Natalie - Hi! Yeah I'm back! And read the disclaimer to what why I was gone for so long! Heh ::smirk::
PhebgaMFM - Cassie is full of surprises, isn't she? Saucy wench ::snicker::. And I'll try not to have another hiatus.