Chapter 27

Whilst all of this was going on, the Visser was acting like a bit of a spectator, letting his troops do most of the work for him, letting them tire us out before he came in with the big guns, so to speak. Perhaps he was more of a coward than I first thought. After all, he was the only one in the room with a giant alien spider morph, and he was the only Controller not fighting. However, he certainly wasn't going to take a back seat for long. The Visser suddenly appeared to get bored of sitting around, and scuttled towards the resistance, his stinging tail jabbing and thrusting repeatedly at them.

--All my little Bandits!-- he crooned. --Together at last! Together, in our great Pool Complex!-- He laughed manically and darted towards the other morphers. Sticky black oil spurted from the tip of the tail, drops of which splattered the wolf and the ground around it.

--Arrgh!-- the wolf - a girl - cried. Her wolf body let out a howl as it desperately tried to lick off the burning liquid.

--Cassie!-- roared the bear - another female. She loped over to the wolf, an enormous lumbering beast, and dragged her friend out of the pool of burning oil.

The Visser stabbed again and again at the resistance, each time emitting more eruptions of the foul liquid. And each time, the animal morphers dodged and dived out of the way, sometimes coming back into attack again. The young Andalite was swinging his tail blade skilfully at the Buthida's outer skin, hacking though the layers of dark exoskeleton. The Visser yelled out in pain and outrage as the Andalite caused a wound deep enough to release a pus-like substance, which smelt a little like sulphur.

"Tseer!" The hawk, flying a few meters below me, suddenly let out an ear-piercing screech and shot into a dive towards the Visser, talons outstretched.

Copying the actions of the hawk, I dived down, raking my talons at the Buthida's eyeballs.

The battle raged on below me. Slashing, biting, growling, swiping - whilst our troops were holding back ther Controllers, I could see we were weakening. Many of the American morphers were badly injured. Sam was limping, dragging one hoof behind her and slashing weakly with her tail blade.

--Jake!-- cried the gorilla, bleeding severely from a large gash across his stomach. --I don't know how much longer we can carry on for! I'm thinking we should haul-butt soon!--

--I agree, Prince Jake,-- said the Andalite, calmly swinging his the side of his tail blade at an approaching human Controller. The Controller went down, unconscious. --Perhaps we should do what we came here to do, and leave as quickly as is possible.--

--You're right,-- replied the first guy - Jake - who I assumed was the tiger. --Marco? Try and get those celebs out of those cages. Just grab whoever is nearest and get them outta here. You know the rest!--

--On it!-- Marco, the gorilla, replied, knuckle walking his way over to the cage holding the celebrities.

Jake, still fighting two Hork-Bajir, turned his attention to Sam. --Not to be rude or anything, since I don't even know your name, but you have to do exactly what I tell you now, ok?--

Sam agreed, albeit somewhat taken-aback. --What do you need us to do?--

--Get one of your guys to morph the most powerful animal you have, and start helping my gorilla buddy Marco bash down some cages over there!--

--Philip!-- shouted Sam. --Musk ox, now!--

--Already on my way,-- he called, throwing his Dracon to Ferdie and galloping around the back of the cages out of sight. Less than two minutes later, he emerged, a snorting, grunting bull, possessing powerful thick horns and over two hundred pounds of furred covered bulk. He cantered towards the cages, ramming into the metal bars again and again. The bars of the cage collapsed, and the celebrities poured out of their prisons, crying and yelling, terrified and confused. The human hosts in the cages next to them began to scream and shout, kicking and banging at their own cage, in a desperate attempt to join them to freedom.

--Thanks for that!-- called Marco to Philip, before turning to the celebrities. He picked up one of the more attractive women, a tall, slim blonde, and flung her over his shoulder.

--Right - you twelve, I assume you all want to get out of this alive and free - if that's the case, follow me!-- He began lomping towards one of the exits, the celebrities almost tripping over themselves in a rush to escape. None of them seemed particularly bothered that they had just been spoken to by a gorilla.

--What are you idiots doing?-- bellowed the Visser, as he watched a dozen of his prospective hosts being led to freedom. --Intervene!--

Hork Bajir ran to prevent their escape. They blocked the exit or tried to grab the celebrities and take them back to a cage. But Marco managed to fight his way though, swinging his enormous fists and knocking the great lizards out of the way, never taking his eyes off the exit.

--I might need a little help, Jake,-- called Marco, heading towards one of the stairwells. --Gonna be more Controllers out there!--

--Cassie - you get with him,-- Jake ordered. Obviously this Jake guy was the leader, taking on a similar role to Sam. The injured wolf trotted after the gorilla, and the two of them disappeared up the staircase, followed by maybe five or six of the celebrities. The remaining celebrities were escorted by Hork-Bajir back to the cages. They screamed and shouted, aware they had lost their chance of freedom.

Philip galloped over to Jake's group, providing back-up for the last few moments. The remaining four of them appeared to be in much worse shape than the four of us, but the battle appeared to be coming to an end. The Visser was beginning to demorph, finding little success in his new morph. There were still dozens of unharmed Hork-Bajir Controllers around, but maybe of these were keeping far back against the walls, firing their Dracons unskilfully into the action.

--Fools!-- bellowed the Visser at his Hork-Bajir army. --If you carry on firing like that, you'll destroy all the hosts! Get into the battle and fight like the soldiers you are!--

--That's our cue to bail,-- called Jake. --There's nothing more we can do. You four - I suggest you join us if you want to get out of here alive!--

--Absolutely,-- Sam replied. --Philip, Maggie, Ferdie, let's get going!--

I swooped down towards the ground, following the hawk and he soared towards one of the entrances.

--Jake - this exit leads out into the mall!-- shouted the bear suddenly. --Too many innocent people around! Plus there's a Biofilter!--

Jake said a rather rude word. --We'll have to go Marco's way,-- he replied.

--But that leads out onto the street,-- said the hawk, another guy. --And if the Yeerks have seen two of us leave by that exit, chances are they'll have the place overloaded with Hork-Bajir.--

--No choices about that,-- Jake replied. --We'll just have to fight it out.--

Just then, Sam cantered briskly towards Jake.

--There's another exit,-- she said. --One we know about. The Yeerks don't know we came down by it. There's no filter thingy either. --

The tiger looked as if he could have kissed Sam. --Where?-- he demanded.

--Back by the cages where the celebrities were being held,-- she replied. --Forth door of the right of the big cage. It leads out into a corridor, and there's a elevator which I think will reach the top story of some hotel. We could get out onto the roof, morph birds, get away from here!--

--Right, that's it then,-- Jake called. --Rachel, Ax, Tobias - forth door to the right of the big celebrity cage - get going now!--

He turned back to Sam. --Can you get your guy to knock down the door?-- he asked, respectful of that fact that we were our own team so had our own leader and ways of doing things.

--Can do,-- Sam replied. --Philip? Can you remove the problem of the door?--

Philip lowered his enormous ox head and thundered towards the door. It came straight off its' hinges, and Philip galloped out into the corridor.

--Let's go, people!-- Jake barked. A tiger, a bear and three Andalites pounded after Philip into the corridor. The hawk and I dived down towards the ground and into the corridor. Since I had such a broad wingspan, I had to fly through the doorway sideways - a movement the hawk seemed to appreciate.

--You're not a bad flyer,-- he said, as the eight of us crammed ourselves into the lift.

--I could say the same thing about you,-- I replied. --I'm Maggie, by the way.--

--Tobias,-- replied the hawk. --And thanks, but I've had way to much practise in this body.--