Chapter 26

Tobias

The upcoming battle had fully preoccupied Jake. With him was Toby, who'd reentered Taruff space a couple of days earlier. Her message made the preparations redouble in their haste. Engineers raced to get Taruff fighters spaceworthy. Kertians sharpened their blades and kept themselves limber. Toby was instructing thousands of kertians per day in war strategy.

The kertians, while competent with their blades, were not suited to the kind of full-scale war that was upcoming. They were used to their honorable, one-on-one challenges. Toby tried to break them of the habit, teaching them close quarter combat skills. Toby, who was a seer of her people, was akin to a master chess player. She didn't think in the present – she tried to impress upon the Taruffs the need to think nine or ten moves in advance. Analyze placements of enemies and their predicted positions on a timeline, plan your moves quickly, and execute them, she preached. Most of the Taruffs seemed to be eager and hopeful students.

Jake was busy talking strategy with the many commanders, generals, and princes of the brand-new Xylen Armed Forces. His experience with the Yeerks served him well, and he soon gained a reputation among the Taruff nobility as a 'vicious warrior, capable of eliminating the enemy on many levels.' After seeing Cassie one last time, his single goal seemed to be the destruction of the Trunsk forces, which the Taruffs found to be a commendable quality.

With Jake and Toby tied up here, Ax on his mission to recruit outside help, and Rachel, Marco, and Lok on the Trunsk home world, I really had no one left to talk to and nothing to do. I wasn't the military mastermind that Jake was, and I certainly wasn't the combat genius that Toby was turning out to be. I was befriended by Lok's sister Hali, who happened to be a kindred spirit in that we both fervently wished the members of Marco's expedition to return safely.

Hali was not a warrior. Lok, who was an established kertian and fighter pilot, would not allow her to put herself at risk. Instead, he excelled and brought their family enough honor for the both of them. Hali became not exactly a pacifist, but a scholar. She asked questions that no one else thought to ask, and was very intelligent in her own way. She taught me much of the Taruff planet and culture that the warriors I'd been exposed to hadn't considered important.

For example, I'd assumed that Xylen was a sort of twilight/desert planet, which Hali cured me of quickly. "Where do you live on Earth?" she'd asked.

(I live in a meadow in the forest,) I'd informed her.

She'd tilted her head to the side and said, "Ah, so Earth must be a forest planet, no?" She wasn't mean about it, but the comment made me feel dumb enough to consider my words before I said whatever came to mind. The Taruffs were neither savages nor stupid – assumptions were just impending mistakes that could be avoided.

"You're correct in assuming that we Taruffs mainly live in the night-sand regions," she said of the dark purple and black deserts that stretched as far as the eye could see. "The loose sand is how our legs evolved to be able to give powerful kicks and leaps. Luckily, we evolved into the most powerful predators in the night-sand."

I thought that over. (But you're not the most dangerous beings on the planet?)

She grunted. "By the skies, no. That title belongs to the Mazerroo. They live in the swamp regions south of here, and they're the sole reason my people cannot live there."

(What makes them so dangerous?) I asked.

"They are almost fifty feet tall," she said simply. "They have a hide like steel, and none of our weapons penetrate it. They walk like us, but their arms are for nothing other than killing." She hooked her fingers like a large claw to demonstrate. "Natural blades tip their arms. They can spit large amounts of a debilitating poison, and their powerful tails are like bladed whips. Their only saving grace is that they are very, very rare."

(Sounds deadly,) I said. Hali made a comment about avoiding them at all costs and went back to making the intricate, metal jewelry that the Taruffs were so fond of. As she worked, a plan hatched in my mind about how I could be useful. As a hawk, I was pretty much useless to the upcoming battle. In Hork-Bajir morph, I would be no more deadly than one of the millions of Taruffs already committed to combat. As a Mazerroo, however…

That was how Hali and I ended up in the Maneri Swamp searching for a Mazerroo. That Hali was even with me spoke highly of her bravery – she had an almost supernatural fear of the creatures even though she'd never seen one. I wondered if the stories were exaggerated, and that soon shifted to wondering if the Mazerroos even existed. Hali acted as bait, floating through the swamp in an anti-gravity recreational vehicle painted, hopefully, in a color scheme the Mazerroo would not see as edible. She amplified her voice and gave the hooting call of a lost Taruff.

(I think I see one,) I called down to Hali. In the greenish water, I could see something about the size and shape of a large alligator heading towards the noise Hali was making. She instantly jetted away in her air car until I could no longer reach her through thought speak.

The Mazerroo was big, though not near as big as Hali had described. Certainly it didn't have the features she'd suggested. It looked like a big alligator without a tail. It's eyes, once I spotted them through the murk, were huge. I wondered how it was swimming with no legs or visible tail when it raised its head out of the swamp.

That's right, its head. The large creature I'd thought so similar to a big gator was only its head. As I watched, stunned, it reared to its full height and I instantly flapped for altitude. It was tall enough nip me out of the air at the level I'd been at. It stood like a bipedal dragon, slime and water rushing off of its armored body. As it looked around for the Taruff it had heard, it snapped its long, thin tail behind it in frustration. The razor-sharp tail sliced through a very big tree and toppled it. The Mazerroo didn't even notice as it raised its head to the air and barked like a massive dinosaur.

(Oh, man,) I cried and I started in a dive, aiming for the creature's spiny back. I didn't think my talons would stick into its flesh, but if I aimed right I could perch on one of the smaller spikes protruding from its shoulder blades. It never even saw me approach – I was like a mosquito flying at a human. I flared and perched on the spike, praying that it wouldn't notice me and cut me in half with his tail. It didn't.

I focused on acquiring him, and he closed his eyes and rumbled softly, a small earthquake beneath my talons. After I was finished, I took off again, flapping furiously for distance. I needn't have tired myself out – he never even knew I'd been there. With one last sniff and a disappointed bark, in sank back down into the murk to wait for its next victim. I flew out of the swamp until the soil started changing from mud to sand, and spotted Hali quickly. (Hey!) I cried. (It's safe, I'm done.) I dropped into the back seat of the air car so I wouldn't have to tire myself out flying all the way back.

Hali wasn't in a great mood. "I cannot believe I didn't stay to see the creature," she grumbled. "I'd have been the only Taruff in the tribe to see a Mazerroo besides the Princess."

(I'm glad you weren't there. He was really looking forward to a Taruff Lunchable,) I said, not bothering to explain the joke to her. (Besides, you'll see one soon enough.)

Her eyes glowed with understanding. "You're able to become a Mazerroo," she said excitedly. "You will be more effective than a hundred kertian."

(Slow down,) I told her. (I might as well try it now, outside the village. The Mazerroo's mind will be with mine, so be ready to take off. I'm not sure if I'll be able to control it right away on the first time.) Hali nodded her understanding even though she clearly didn't understand. I flapped about fifty yards away from her and said, (Here I go.)

I focused on the details of the dragon I'd been perched on not even an hour earlier and instantly began to grow. I grew and grew, far bigger than any morph I'd ever done before. But that wasn't the most interesting change. Some Earth animals have thick skin, but none, not even the rhino, had the armor plating that was developing all over my body. It was something like bone, only many times thicker and harder. Shredders on full power would have to be sustained for quite a while in a single location to penetrate. It was overlapped and jointed so I had a full range of movement. As my head grew fifty times the size of my hawk body, I felt the pillow-sized poison glands fill my cheeks. The butcher knives that filled my mouth were able to be flattened against my jaws, allowing accurate spitting of the vemon.

The tail that sprouted behind me was probably my favorite part. It was just as moveable as my arms or legs, but unencumbered by unnecessary bones. It was pure muscle with thin armor plating almost like scales, and the natural razor sharpness of it pleased me. It would be fun to swing that tail, bisecting those dumb blue creatures that sometimes encroached in my swamp into bite-sized pieces…

(Nope!) I told myself, quickly asserting my mind over the Mazerroo's. It wasn't the cold, calculating, powerful mind I was used to in a predator. It was so supremely dangerous that it didn't have to be. It knew it would eat. Hunting was a game it played to pass the time. Picking the combinations of it's natural weapons to hunt with was its lot in life. It knew, if food got scarce enough, that it could always travel to the desert and snack on the Taruffs. I shuddered in fear for the Taruffs that the Mazerroo should ever run low on prey in the swamps.

(I've got control,) I told Hali, looking for her in the desert. She hadn't run, but the painted patterns on the air car were very effective in making it uninteresting to me. I resisted the urge to use my tail to slap her out of the car and play with her, tossing her in the air and enjoying her screams. That disgustingly playful mind of the Mazerroo kept acting the devil on my shoulder, trying to convince me to give in and have fun.

She tentatively walked up to me and called something out. (What?) I asked. She cupped her hands and yelled, but I still couldn't make it out. It was like someone trying to yell at somebody on the top of a six-story building. I lowered a hooked claw to the ground, and she scampered up onto it. I raised her to my face, and I could see that she was terrified.

"I said that this is quite the form to be able to take!" she yelled, and I nodded my massive head. "Any creature with half of a brain would think before engaging you!"

(That's the idea,) I said as I set her down. (I'm going to morph back now – the Mazerroo keeps trying to make me eat you,) I told her with a mental shrug. Even from this height I saw her shudder and bound back to the relative safety of the air car. I began shrinking and couldn't wait to tell Jake how I was going to contribute to the coming fight.