Disclaimer: My, these get repetitive after awhile: I-own-Julie-and-nobody-else-I-swear-please-don't-sue!

A/N: Okay, that was kind of a mean cliff-hanger there, but after all, how else am I going to keep my readers' interest up? Many thanks to all my reviewers; you're all being so kind and wonderful and making me so happy!

Aximili Esgarrouth Isthill

(You will leave Melissa alone.)

(Or what, Andalite? You will kill me? You will kill yourself? Neither will guarantee her safety. She will die unless you answer my questions.)

Melissa did not know how high the stakes were. I did not know what to do. My shoulders sagged. Melissa looked from me to Visser Three. I could see the fear in her eyes.

"Look, would somebody please tell me what is going on?" she said, her voice tight.

(Do you not understand, my dear?) Visser Three asked coldly before I could answer. My hands clenched involuntarily at his tone. You will not use that tone to my…my…shormlin! That was my thought. 'Shormlin' is not the same as 'shorm'. The difference between them is the difference between the Human "boyfriend" or "girlfriend" and simple "friend". In a small part of my mind, I could not believe I was admitting it, even to myself.

"No," Melissa blurted, though her voice was shaking. "I don't. So explain."

In an exaggeratedly long-suffering voice, Visser Three answered, (Your…boyfriend…is an Andalite. He is an enemy of my people, the Yeerks.)

(Who are a group of bloodthirsty parasites!) I spat.

Visser Three merely looked at me. (Quiet, child, ) he said.

My muscles tensed with anger, but I restrained myself.

(There is a small group of resistance on your planet,) Visser Three continued to Melissa. (And we wish to wipe them out, so we planted a homing device at our feeding ground. The Andalite bandits eventually took the bait, and we managed to tag one of them. Unfortunately, the beacon was faulty, and we only picked up one transmission from it. It was in your house, my dear. I went to investigate, instilled doubt in your heart about the Andalite, and followed you when you went to talk to him. It was quite simple. Now, girl, follow me.)

I stepped in front of Melissa. (What are you going to do to her?)

(Have you had a change of heart, Andalite?) His four eyes bored into my skull. I did not know what to do.

BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP! BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP!

(What is that?) Visser Three snapped.

One of the Hork-Bajir guards at the door cleared his throat nervously.

(Yes? You have something to say, Daren 425?)

The Hork-Bajir said something in Galen that I didn't understand.

(Oh? It's the alarm from Corridor 801?) Visser Three asked, his voice soft. I stiffened. I could feel the angry menace underlying the Visser's voice.

The Hork-Bajir said something else. In an instant, the Visser's tail was at his throat. (THEN WHY DOESN'T SOMEONE GO AND FIND OUT WHO THE INTRUDER IS!) he shouted. He stormed out of the room, followed by a troop of quivering Hork-Bajir. Melissa turned to me.

"That was really lucky," she gasped.

For answer, I put my arms around her and hugged her.

Marco

I demorphed quickly and was going to remorph as quickly, but Julie stretched her arms.

"Wow," she commented. "There's more room than I thought, if you're demorphed and I'm not touching you."

I opened my mouth to reply and clapped my hand over it. What was I thinking! An Andalite would only be able to use thought-speak. I'd be in real trouble if I said anything out loud.

"Um…are you there?" Julie sounded nervous, and I didn't blame her. I was morphing to gorilla as fast as I could, but I had no thought-speak capabilities yet. I opened my mouth and gave a strangled gurgle, which probably just frightened her more, because she gasped and I felt her moving away.

(It's okay, it's okay,) I blurted as soon as I could.

Her breathing calmed slightly. "What happened?" she hissed tersely.

(I was halfway into morph. Andalites can only thought-speak when a morph is complete, ) I lied.

"Oh." Was that the slightest hint of suspicion in her voice? I hoped not.

(I'm sorry; I should have warned you. Now, since I think we're going to be in here awhile, why don't we get some sleep, or at least a little rest.)

"You rest first; I'll make sure you don't stay in morph for over two hours."

(All right. And thanks-er, thank you.)

I closed my eyes. Now, about this point you're thinking, 'What the heck? Is this guy nuts? He's trapped aboard an alien spacecraft with hordes of angry bad guys searching for him, and he's sleeping!'

Well, yes, I guess it does sound nuts. But morphing takes a lot of energy. And I knew I was going to need to have some energy to a) blow up the blade ship, and b) escape with Ax, Melissa, and Julie. So I slept. I'm not saying it was easy. But I did kind of manage to doze lightly while keeping one eye open and nervously shifting from side to side every so often.

The whole time I was dozing, I heard feet pounding in the corridor, but fortunately for us, Visser Three didn't tell anyone to look in the cupboard, and I guess Controllers aren't exactly big on doing stuff Visser Three doesn't tell them to do.

Finally, Julie shook me and told me that now would be a good time to demorph. I told her that it was her turn to get some sleep. She didn't resist much. I guess she was pretty tired.

I demorphed fairly sluggishly, being still half-asleep. I was going to morph again immediately, but for some reason, I decided not to. I kind of liked the way Julie was leaning against me in her sleep, her head pillowed against my shoulder. Somebody outside the closet--or whatever it was--was sweeping a huge spotlight from one end of the corridor to the other. The light illuminated the closet we were in periodically. I guess it was the brightness or maybe she was just done sleeping, but Julie stirred, blinked, and opened her eyes. She was looking right at me. Human me. I gulped and hoped she'd think it was dream. She smiled at me, and against my better judgment, I smiled back. Then she yawned, turned a little and snuggled into my shoulder.