Ulysses Carter staggered on through the forest. The voice that had guided him in rescuing three of his five children from the Radam had fallen silent now. But given how weak it had been once it had halfway deactivated the three Teknopods, Ulysses wasn't really surprised.

He still carried the body of Devon Connor, one of the others who had been rejected by the Radam's Teknoprocess. Most of the fluid that had coated his body had evaporated by now, but nothing had happened to Devon short of getting a bit heavier. Suspecting that if he took one more step he would collapse in the dirt, Ulysses stopped. Leaning against a tree for support, he checked Devon's body.

He'd wiped off the blood that had dripped from Devon's eyes and mouth, but hadn't bothered with the Teknopod fluid. He now realized that he probably should have at least tried to wipe some of it off.

Amazing, it must possess some kind of enzyme that speeds up decomposition. Ulysses thought, his passion for biochemistry taking hold despite the desperate situation he was in. He was thankful that all of the fluid on his body was gone by now.

Must be because I'm still alive. Ulysses mused. The fluid must have had some heat-reactive properties, so much that even the relatively mild heat produced by the human body was capable of destroying it. I wonder what a fire would do to those plants?

It would probably destroy all of the Teknoplants, but with the unfortunate side effect of killing anyone inside them.

***

The Animorphs were all gathered together now, all eyes were on Cassie as she explained what she had found. And what she had felt.

"Does anyone find this kinda familiar?" Marco asked, thinking of the when they had rescued Ax from the bottom of the ocean.

"Yeah, but this time only Cassie felt it. Unless…" Rachel trailed off, turning to look at Tobias, perched on one of the rafters, keeping lookout for anyone who might be heading for the barn.

No, he said, turning his fierce hawk eyes to the group. I didn't feel anything.

"Well, we know from Tobias' surveillance that Ness Carter picked up the blue box just before he and his family disappeared in the forest. Maybe it's calling out to us somehow," Marco suggested sarcastically.

That is not possible, Ax said, missing the true intent of Marco's statement. The Escafil device is an inanimate object.

Marco rolled his eyes, wondering if he should tell Ax that he had been being sarcastic.

"Could there be another Andalite on Earth?" Cassie wondered aloud.

Before any of them could answer, they all felt it. It was like a bolt of electricity straight through their minds. Jake, Rachel, Cassie and Marco all shot to their feet. Tobias and Ax, who had already been standing, both drew closer to their friends.

"We don't have much time," Rachel said.

"Wolf morphs, everyone," Jake advised, feeling the same sense of urgency that the rest of the Animorphs had.

The other Animorphs nodded, quickly shedding their outer clothing and beginning their own morphs. Rachel had started morphing before Jake had finished speaking, and she was halfway finished when the others were only starting. Cassie, with her ability to subconsciously control her morphs, soon caught up with her best friend.

Six gray wolves soon stood amid several scattered heaps of clothes. Jake berated himself for not having the Animorphs gather their outer clothing before they had started morphing. It was too late to do anything about that, however, and so Jake and the others simply grabbed their clothes in their teeth and stuffed them into the nearest convenient hiding place.