CHAPTER TEN: TOBIAS

I opened my eyes. I was staring straight up. I was on my back. Above me, I could see the ocean all around. High overhead, fish swam by, sparkling. Higher still I could see the bright barrier between sea and sky. But it was very far away.

I rolled my head to my side. Rachel was beside me, still unconscious. There was blue grass under my head. I sat up and looked past the slumbering bodies of the others at the field of blue grass all the way to the lake and its impossible green crystal growths. This was the most beautiful place I'd ever seen-no, the most beautiful place I'd never seen. It was like somebody had taken all of my mom's paintings and put them together to build an entire world down here under the ocean. It was incredible, it was impossible, it was...it felt like coming home. Even the air smelled better, more right, than I'd ever smelled before. I wanted to stay here forever.

I looked the other way and saw-

"Oh! Oh, wow!"

{Do not move. I stunned you to see what you are. But if you move, I will destroy you.}

The being who had spoken in my mind stood on four delicate hooves, looking, at first glance, like a pale blue and tan deer or antelope. But I knew exactly what I was looking at. I had recognized the first one of their kind I ever met without even realizing it, without understanding why I felt so connected to an alien stranger.

It was because I had grown-up surrounded by paintings of their people, bright splashes of blue fur and kind green eyes.

This was an Andalite.

An Andalite who was holding a Yeerk Dracon beam pointed right at me.

I barely noticed the weapon. I smiled so wide I felt like my face was going to split in half. "Oh, wow," I said again, "we found you. We really found you."

The others were waking up all around me, but I only had eyes for the Andalite.

"What the… Oh," Marco said. "Please tell me that's a real Andalite and not Visser Three."

Suddenly, without warning, the Andalite's tail arched forward. The blade stopped inches from Marco's face. Reality jolted back in unpleasantly. This wasn't one of my mom's paintings. This was a real person, and we had no idea if they were a friend or a foe.

{Visser Three! Do not speak that name!} the Andalite thought-spoke.

"O-o-o-o-kay," Marco said slowly. "Whatever you want."

"We are friends," Cassie said, holding her hands up less like someone showing that they were unarmed and more like she was trying to calm a skittish horse.

{I don't know you,} the Andalite said, and I itched at the unfair truth of that. They didn't know us, and we didn't know them. But after a childhood surrounded by fragments of Andalites, I felt like I should.

Still, the Andalite withdrew their tail and Marco started breathing again.

"You called me," Cassie said. "We've come to help you."

{Called? You heard my call?} The Andalite fixed all four of their eyes on Cassie. {What are you?}

"Human. A person of Earth," Cassie explained.

"An Animorph," I said.

The Andalite turned one eye-stalk in my direction. {I have seen images of your kind,} they said. {My call was to my cousins. How did you hear it?}

"I don't know," Cassie admitted. "I heard it in my dreams. We all did, sort of. We guessed it was an Andalite. We wanted to help."

{What do you know of Andalites? My people are not known to humans. You do not travel the stars. You know only your own planet. My elder cousins have taught me this.}

"We knew an Andalite," I said. My voice was hoarse. I had to blink against a sudden stinging in my eyes that I didn't think had anything to do with the saltwater that had dried on my skin. "We were there with him in his...in his last moments. Just before he died...before he was murdered."

This Andalite narrowed their main eyes. {Who was this Andalite you say was killed?}

I couldn't say it; my throat had gotten all choked-up. While I was clearing it, Cassie said, "I can't remember all of his name. But part of it was Prince Elfangor."

"Elfangor-Sirinial-Shamtul," I croaked out. "His name was Prince Elfangor-Sirinial-Shamtul."

The Andalite jerked as though struck. Their entire body seemed to quiver. That deadly tail arched high in the air.

{Prince Elfangor? No one could kill Elfangor. He is the greatest warrior ever. No one could kill him!}

"Someone did," Jake said. "We were there."

{Who? Who do you claim killed Elfangor?}

"The one whose name you don't want us to speak," Cassie said softly.

The Andalite held their head high, but their tail sagged and dragged down to the grass. They lowered their weapon. {He was my brother. Did...did he die well? In battle?}

I realized I was crying, and I turned my head away and hid my face in my hands. Jake answered for the rest of us. "He died protecting us, and defying the Yeerks to the end. At the very last moment he struck with every weapon he had."

The Andalite closed their main eyes for a brief moment. {My brother was a great warrior. His cousins loved him. His enemies feared him. No more can be said of any Andalite warrior.}

"He was kind," I said, my voice muffled by my palms. Someone - I think it was Rachel - put a hand on my shoulder. I resisted the urge to shrug it off, letting myself accept the offered comfort instead. "He was kind, too."

If my words were a surprise to the Andalite, they were nothing compared to what Jake said next. "I've lost a brother, too. He's one of them. A Controller."

I made myself look up through the curtain formed by my hair and fingers. I saw the Andalite open their eyes wide, too. {And you, human. Do you serve the Yeerks or fight them?}

"I fight them," Jake said. "We fight them."

{With what weapons? Do you have powerful weapons?}

"We have your brother's weapon," I said. "The power to morph."

{Elfangor gave you that? It is never done!} The Andalite seemed disturbed. {The situation would have to be very bad for him to give you morphing capability.}

"The situation is worse than you think," Marco said. "The Yeerks seem to know you're here. Some piece of Andalite wreckage washed up on shore. Their search party was only a few miles away when we headed down here."

"Visser - the one whose name we aren't supposed to say," I corrected myself. "He heard your call, too."

That rocked the Andalite. Their main eyes went wide with - well, it's hard to gauge alien emotions, but it looked like horror. {No,} they whispered. Their stalk eyes swung around, staring at us one by one in turn.

I nodded.

The Andalite pawed uncertainly at the ground. {What is your plan?}

"To get you out of here and hide you," Cassie said.

{You came only to rescue me? This is true?}

"Yes."

"Your brother saved us," I said. I made myself straighten and meet the Andalite's eyes straight on. Well, the two eyes that were pointed in my direction, anyway. "We would never let one of his people die if we could help it."

The Andalite smiled with their eyes, just as Prince Elfangor had done. {You will be tired after this last morph. You will need to rest.}

Cassie was already nodding, but I shook my head. "There's no time," I said. "The Yeerks aren't far away. And my - my mom is up on the surface, waiting for us. We need to get back to her boat before they reach her."

The Andalite's brow wrinkled in a frown. {Your mother? You have brought a female into battle?}

Rachel's hand dropped off my shoulder real fast.

"Excuse me?" she said.

Jake looked bemused. "We brought a few 'females' into battle," he said, jerking his thumb at Rachel and then nodding at Cassie standing beside him. "This is Rachel and this is Cassie."

The Andalite looked even more startled. {I see. I was...I did not realize that humans were a species of sexual homogeneity in battle.}

Marco snorted. "Buddy, trust me, you're way better off fighting a dude than most chicks I know."

Rachel was looking at the Andalite like she was ready to demonstrate why that was true right here and now. "I guess we can assume you're a guy, then," she said icily.

{Of course,} the Andalite said. He sounded vaguely insulted. {I am Aximili-Esgarrouth-Isthill.}

"Are you a prince like Elfangor?" Cassie asked. Her question had the air of someone trying desperately to change a subject.

{No.} The Andalite's shoulders hunched in and they - he - dug at the grass with his fore-hoof. {I...I am only an aristh. A cadet. That is why I am...why I was here, in the dome. I was too young for battle, by the laws of our people. The dome was separated from the main ship during the battle. It maneuvers better without it,} he explained, but it wasn't the tactical aspects of ship-to-ship combat that had us staring at him.

"You're a kid? I mean, like a young person?" Marco asked.

{Yes.}

Cassie's face was a study in distress. "Are you the only one left?" she asked. "The only Andalite here?"

{Yes. I am alone. When the Blade ship appeared unexpectedly, they caught us off guard. I saw the main section of the ship burn. Dracon beams damaged the orbital stabilization of this dome. It fell. It splashed into the ocean and sank to the bottom. I have been here for these many weeks, hoping that my cousins would come for me. Hoping that some survived. Finally I risked sending out a mirrorwave call. It works by…} He stopped, and looked embarrassed. {I am not supposed to explain Andalite technology. My brother will… He would have been angry with me.}

"Just you survived," Cassie said sadly.

{Just me,} he said. {No prince. No warriors.}

"And no women," Rachel muttered. "Because 'females' aren't supposed to fight."

{Forgive me,} the Andalite said, turning to face Rachel with three of his eyes. {I meant no offense. I know that there are many species where males and females alike go into battle, and several where the females fight and the males do not. Many species do not have any distinct sexes at all, and some have several. I should not have made the assumption that humans are like Andalites in this regard.} He bowed with his stalk eyes. {Forgive my foolishness and inexperience.}

"Well...okay," Rachel said. I could tell that she was trying to maintain an attitude of offended dignity, but she was clearly charmed by the formality of his apology. "I guess since you just didn't know any better."

Cassie rolled her eyes at her best friend, then looked back at the Andalite. "We're inexperienced, too," she said. "And young. Too young to fight, according to the laws of our people."

{But still you fight!}

"We feel like we don't have a choice. Look, we - what did you say your name was again?"

{Aximili-Esgarrouth-Isthill.}

Cassie shook her head.

"Ax," Marco said definitively. "Pleased to meet you."

"Ax, we need to get out of here," Cassie continued. "Will you come with us to the surface?"

{Who is your prince?} Aximili asked.

One by one we looked at Jake.

"Oh, give me a break," Jake said. "I am not anyone's prince."

But the Andalite had stepped forward. He bowed his head even lower than he had to Rachel and lowered his tail. {I will fight for you, Prince Jake, until I can return to my cousins.}

"Um." Jake looked embarrassed. "Thanks."

"Hey," Marco said, maybe taking pity on his best friend by changing the subject. "I have a stupid question. How do we get him out of here?" He jerked his thumb towards Ax…towards Aximili.

Jake's embarrassment shifted to blank confusion. "Um, Ax, I don't suppose you can swim? Swim really well, I mean. We're a long, long way from land."

{I would not swim in this body. I would morph a sea creature.}

"You've already acquired something?" I asked.

{Yes,} said the Andalite. {A large creature swam close one day. I stunned him and acquired him. I thought he would be useful if I was to escape."

"What kind-?" Cassie started to ask, but Jake was already nodding in relief (possibly as much at the fact that the Andalite was no longer calling him "prince" as at the realization that Ax did have a way to reach the surface without drowning).

"Excellent," he said. "Then let's take Tobias's advice and get out of here. We can rest on the boat ride back to shore."

I don't think any of us were in a hurry to get back into our dolphin morphs right now, as tired as we were - but they all crammed themselves into the small hatch enclosure alongside Aximili without delay.

I was the one who hesitated, despite my urgent need to get to the surface and make sure mom was okay. I couldn't help turning back to look at the beautiful dome environment and drink the sight in one last time. Sure, I supposed I could have come back later - but it wasn't exactly an easy place to get to. Would I even be able to find it again if I tried, without Cassie's whale-imbued knowledge as a guide?

I wished there was a way to get mom down here. She would have loved it.

"Tobias, come on!" Rachel called.

I wrenched my eyes away and hustled to join the others.

"Sorry," I said, as Aximili pressed the panel to close the hatch behind me. Water rushed into the chamber, swirling up around our legs, and I pushed the captivating images of the Andalite foliage aside to concentrate on the dolphin instead. As we all grew, the tight confines of the small chamber became increasingly narrow around our heavy gray bodies.

Ax was changing, too. That sight was every bit as fascinating as the dome, and watching him change didn't make it any easier for me to concentrate on my own moph. It's weird enough when an Animorph morphs; seeing an Andalite do it, with their four legs and long tail and stalk eyes, was a thousand times more bizarre.

Mom was sort of right, though. There was something almost beautiful about the transition, too.

Almost .

Aximili's limbs withered away the same as ours did, just moreso; his tail didn't, but instead spit into a different kind of tail, with a long, raked, vertical blade and a shorter lower blade. I grinned and might have tried making some kind of joke about Andalites and tail blades - even though I didn't think I was very good at making jokes generally, especially not compared to Marco - but I no longer had a mouth, and dolphin beaks aren't great at forming human words.

I'd slipped under the water and started growing fins before my distraction lifted enough for me to realize the source of the blades: Shark!

Ax had morphed a shark.

{Oh, good choice, Ax,} Marco said. {You morphed a shark?}

{Is it wrong?} Aximili wondered.

{Your species and ours are mortal enemies,} Cassie explained for the benefit of the confused extraterrestrial.

{Oh. I have a lot to learn about Earth.}

{Don't worry about it,} I said. {We'll help you.}

{Yeah,} Jake agreed, {but later. For now, just try to resist any urges to bite one of us, and let's get out of here before the Yeerks come knocking.}

He bopped the panel to open the exterior door and we swam out from the cramped confines in a rush.

Cassie took the lead, soaring up through the water, angling straight for the distant surface. It was a shorter trip up than it had been down, since we weren't aiming for any particular location but rather just chasing the sight of the sun. We could find mom and the boat - if she hadn't been ushered away by the Yeerks already - once we got our heads above water again.

Aximili followed without issue, and I wondered if dealing with uncooperative animal instincts was something that was easier for Andalites than it was for us mere humans. Maybe without the smell of blood to chase, sharks were just naturally chill.

I was decidedly not chill. Down in the dome, everything had seemed to be far away somehow - as though it was impossible for terrible things to happen when you were standing somewhere so peaceful. I knew that was total crap, of course, but that didn't change the way the place felt.

{Why do your spaceships have domes like that?} I asked the Andalite. {I mean, it's beautiful. Absolutely beautiful. But what's its purpose?}

{Purpose?} Aximili sounded surprised. {Why, it is where we live.}

{What, just out in the open? Out on the grass?} Marco asked.

{Where else would we live? We must have space to run.}

{So, wait, is the environment inside the dome actually what it's like to be on your planet? To be on the Andalite homeworld?}

{Of course,} said Aximili. {We take our home with us into space. It angers the Yeerks,} he added grimly.

{Why do they care what you take into space?} Marco asked.

{It is a part of everything they hate and would destroy if they could,} Aximili explained as he swam. {The Yeerks would take our world and make it as barren as their own. As they will to your planet unless they are stopped.}

Cassie actually stopped swimming to spin around and stare at Ax. {What...what are you saying?} she gasped. {What do you mean about making the planet barren?}

Suddenly several things clicked into place in my head, things that the first Andalite - Elfangor - had shown me in that information dump the night he'd died; things that I'd wondered about the Yeerk Pool and its lack of decoration or adornment.

{Oh no,} I groaned to myself.

{It is the usual Yeerk pattern,} Aximili explained calmly. {Once a planet is under their control, they alter it to suit their own desires. They will leave enough plant and animals species to keep the host bodies fed - humans in the case of Earth - and the rest they eliminate.}

Cassie didn't get it, or maybe she just didn't want to. She pressed the Andalite to explain, but I barely listened. My head was full of terrible images of woodlands laid to waste, of mountains stripped bare, of the lush life of the ocean floor shriveled and desiccated when their waters drained.

{They eliminate them,} Aximili finally told Cassie. {They will make Earth as much like the Yeerk homeworld as possible.}

She tried to protest, to pretend that Ax was making it up, but I knew. I knew he was telling the truth about the Yeerks. I knew he was telling the truth about what they were, what they did.

{Don't you know?} Aximili asked Cassie and the others. {Don't you know whom you're fighting?}

I'm not sure what Cassie answered, what anyone else answered. It didn't matter. I knew.

I knew exactly what we were fighting.

{How...how long until your people return to Earth?} Marco asked eventually, his thought-speak voice small.

Aximili didn't answer right away, which was what caught my attention. After several long seconds of silent swimming, he finally said, {One of your years. Maybe two.}

{Two years!} Jake sounded stricken. I thought about Tom, and couldn't blame him. Were we really going to let Jake's brother remain enslaved to the Yeerk in his head for two years? I didn't know what we could possibly do to save him, but maybe now that we had an Andalite with us, even a young Andalite, maybe things would be different…

{Five kids against an enemy that has destroyed half the galaxy?} Jake was saying bleakly. {Five of us?}

{Six, my Prince,} said Ax.

I felt something like warmth swell up inside my dolphin chest, something that pushed away the cold tightness of the water around me.

Marco, of course, didn't feel any such thing. Or wouldn't have admitted it if he had.

{Six. Well then,} he sneered with grim sarcasm, {with six it shouldn't be any problem.}

{Six is better than five,} I pointed-out.

{Hey at least somebody here passed his math test,} Marco retorted.

{How did the Yeerks get this far?} Rachel demanded, ignoring the side-banter. {How did this happen? If you Andalites are so tough, why didn't you stop them a long time ago? How did a bunch of slugs who live in dirty ponds manage to become so powerful?}

Aximili hesitated again. {I am forbidden to tell certain things,} he said.

I winced inwardly. I knew that wasn't going to go over well.

It didn't.

{You're telling us all of planet Earth may be scheduled for destruction and we are the only thing standing in the way, and you are going to keep secrets?} Rachel said furiously. {I don't think so.}

Fortunately for Aximili, just then we reached the surface.

{Okay, where's the boat?} Marco asked. He sounded slightly panicky, but no one said anything about it. I was feeling a little panicky myself. Where was mom?

There was nothing but open water around us. I thrashed my tail, turning in a desperate circle. Where was the boat? Where was mom?

{We'll find it,} Jake said calmly. {Relax. We can't be that far.}

{Maybe she forgot she was supposed to be waiting for us,} Marco griped sourly. {Just puttered on home, la-la, no big deal... Hey, gosh, I wonder where my son is? Sure hope I didn't leave him in the middle of the ocean with no ride home...}

I bristled with fury and rounded on Marco, ready to tell him off, but before I could Cassie lurched between us with a splash.

{There!} she called. {I see the boat! We just came up a little farther away than - uh-oh.}

It wasn't the distance that sent the sudden spike of worry through Cassie's thought-speak voice. It was the sight of the other boat. Longer and taller than the speedboat mom had borrowed for us, with an enclosed cabin, a confusing blister of sensors and antennas on top, and a wide orange stripe of inflatable padding around its sides.

The Coast Guard.

{Oh no,} Marco echoed.

{Mom!} I shouted.

{Stay cool, Tobias,} Jake barked. {She's not hurt - look.}

I did, although it was hard to see through my fear. But Jake was right: mom was okay. There were two people in Coast Guard blue under bright orange life jackets at the side of their boat, talking down to her. One of them was crouched low, looking at her through the thin lifelines that I couldn't really see from this distance but was extrapolating from the way his arms seemed to be dangling off invisible strings. The other was standing beside his co-worker, gesticulating firmly.

Mom's answering gestures were broad and outraged.

{She's arguing with them,} I said.

{No duh,} Marco retorted. {I knew this was going to go bad. I knew it.}

{Marco, shut-up. Tobias, don't freak out. She's okay.}

{I have to get over there,} I said, more to the universe than to Jake. {I have to help her.}

{No,} said Jake.

{Jake's right,} Cassie said gently. {A dolphin barreling over there all of a sudden is going to draw attention. And if those are Controllers…}

{And we know those are Controllers,} Rachel said grimly.

{I do not understand what is happening,} Aximili confessed.

{The blonde lady on the little boat, that's Tobias's mom,} Cassie explained to him quietly. {The boat's supposed to be our ride out of here. But the other boat, that's the Coast Guard. They're like...water police and EMS all rolled into one.}

{Authority figures,} Aximili said.

{Yes,} said Cassie. {And...we're pretty sure they're all Yeerks. Or at least that the Yeerks are in charge.}

{They'll all be Controllers,} Marco said grimly. {If you're looking for a crashed spaceship, you aren't going to risk bringing ordinary humans along who you'll need to explain or cover-up things from later. If any of those dudes weren't infested before today, they are now.}

Everyone fell silent at that. Even me. I hadn't been talking since I'd sent a private thought-speak plea to Rachel. I knew Cassie was right, but I couldn't leave mom alone.

I had to know what was happening. I had to know that she was okay.

Fortunately, Rachel understood. That was why she'd agreed to help me, why she hadn't mentioned anything to the others when I started demorphing beside her.

Now she let herself sink low in the water so I could clamber up onto her back in my shivering, underdressed human body. That was when Jake finally noticed what was happening.

{Tobias, what are you doing?} he demanded.

I was already remorphing. Not into a dolphin again, but a seagull.

Maybe I couldn't do anything to help. But I could at least be there.

{Chill, Jake,} Rachel said. {No one's going to notice a seagull out here.} She sounded as cool and casual as though she were sitting at a table in the mall, telling her friends not to freak-out because the cute guy from Sbarro's had come to collect their trays. With the small, distant part of my mind that wasn't consumed by fear for my mom or focus on my morphing, I envied her that chill. Elephant was a great morph for Rachel. When she didn't want to be moved, nothing moved her. Not even a teenager turning into a seagull on her back while her cousin scolded her.

{Do you see any other gulls around?} Jake demanded.

Rachel was a dolphin right now so she couldn't shrug. That was lucky for me, because that would have knocked me off her back and in the steadily shrinking part-boy, part-bird body I was currently wearing, I probably would have drowned fast. But we could all hear the audible shrug in her thought-speak voice as she answered, {So what? It's the sea. Seagulls fit in. That's why we picked them to fly out here in the first place.}

{Seagulls are one of the few birds that can actually drink salt water,} Cassie offered. {They regularly travel more than a hundred miles from shore. In fact, they often roost on the water at night to avoid predators. If it wasn't for all the trash people drop on land, they'd probably-}

{Not now, Cassie,} Jake said tersely.

Cassie fell into a hurt silence.

{Tobias, morph back to dolphin right now,} Jake ordered.

I was far enough into the morph to thought-speak now. I said, {No.}

{What are you even going to do as a bird?} Marco pointed-out. {Poop on them?}

If I have to, I thought. I didn't say anything. There wasn't much they could do to stop me, short of trying to jump over Rachel's back and knock me off. And my wings were coming in now. They were too late.

{He just wants to see what's happening,} Rachel said belligerently.

{It's probably not a bad idea,} Cassie pointed-out. {That is our ride back to shore, after all. If we can't get back onboard, we...we'll have to figure something else out.}

That shut them all up.

{Fine,} Jake grated-out. {But reconnaissance only. No heroics.}

{He's a bird,} Marco reiterated. {Heroics are already kind of off the table for him.}

{I'll be back,} I said, and flapped my wings.

{Hey,} I heard Marco asking the others as I flew away, {anybody see what happened to that helicopter?}

By the time I got close enough to hear voices, the argument was over. I watched the two Coast Guard officers step away from the side as mom turned back to the wheel and started her engine. Seagull eyes don't have anywhere near the vision of the birds of prey we'd morphed before, but they were still good enough for me to see the tension in her shoulders. I could tell that she was fighting the urge to turn around and look for us.

Don't look, I thought to myself. Don't look, don't look, they'll wonder why. Don't look.

I thought about trying to thought-speak to her, but I wasn't sure how close I had to be for her to hear me. I was also afraid that if I did, she'd jump or startle and give herself away somehow. Instead I mentally crossed the fingers I didn't have and hoped as hard as I could.

The boat started to pull away. Mom only looked back once, and that was to make a rude gesture at the Coast Guard boat.

I breathed a sigh of relief and started to bank away, to let the air currents carry me back to the others. I knew I was going to feel a little stupid going back to them after such an anticlimax, but I didn't regret what I'd done even though it had made Jake mad. She was my mom. I had to know.

Before I fully realized what I was doing, I dropped onto the roof of the Coast Guard boat. I perched alongside the overlarge antenna and ducked my head down, trying to look like an ordinary bird that was taking advantage of an unexpected perch to grab a rest.

I wasn't resting, though. I was listening. Because someone else had just walked out to join the two Coast Guard Controllers, someone who had stayed inside the little cabin out of sight while they shooed my mom away.

Chapman.

He was dressed like they were in a Coast Guard uniform, but mom would have recognized him immediately if he'd let her see him. Now that she was gone, he could come out on deck again without blowing his cover.

Or he could have, if not for me.

"This is a mistake, Iniss 226," said the taller of the Coast Guard Controllers, a pretty Hispanic woman with a bouncy ponytail. The harsh voice coming out of her mouth was at odds with the perky expression on her face. "The woman got too close. She should be Infested."

I felt my feathers ruffle in a way that had nothing to do with the breeze. My little seagull heart pounded and I fought the urge to leap into flight and - what? Attack? Marco was right, I was useless right now.

{Rachel!} I called. {Rachel, can you hear me?}

She didn't answer. I stretched my neck up so I could look over the side of the roof and stare down at Chapman's bald head. I felt cold all over.

"No," Chapman said. His voice fit his position as an assistant principal very well, although it was strange to see him in short sleeves and a life jacket instead of his usual grim suit. "Loren Mullins is not a candidate for Infestation."

I almost fell off my perch. What?

"She doesn't seem very useful, I admit," said the other Coast Guard Controller, a burly white man whose tan was handling the sun a lot better than Chapman's pink scalp. "But for security alone…"

"No," Chapman said again. "She's much more useful to us this way."

"Useful?" the woman barked. She turned to stare out at the wake left by mom's departing boat. "That?"

I couldn't see Chapman's face, but I could hear the smile in his voice as he said, "That woman is one of the best cover operations we have, and we don't even have to waste resources on managing her. She'll do what we want without having a Yeerk in her head, or with any instructions from us at all."

"I don't understand," the man said. He sounded even more confused than his partner.

"Everyone around here is so used to Loren Mullins spouting nonsense stories about aliens," Chapman explained happily, "that every single word she says is automatically presumed false. Anything she notices, everyone else will dismiss just because she mentioned it." He chuckled. It wasn't a pleasant sound. "If we ever do have an actual leak, we'll probably be able to plug it just by telling her about it, then sitting back and letting her tell everyone else. And-" Chapman's voice dropped into a low purr "-even better, if anyone ever does get wind of what's going on, and tracks down Ms. Mullins because her story sounds like the truth, we'll be able to shut them up before they can do any actual damage." He shrugged, and his tone returned to his normal cool affability as he said, "That's providing, of course, that merely meeting her doesn't convince them that whatever they heard or saw is all a load of bull. There's nothing like seeing who else believes the conspiracy to make a person reevaluate their crazy theories, isn't there?"

The other Yeerks laughed with him.

I'd heard enough. I took off, pumping my wings back towards the others.

Inside, my mind was reeling. It was upsetting to hear people say stuff like that about my mom, of course, but I was also used to it. What was making my head spin was the conclusion that Chapman had drawn from my mom's weird behavior: that she wasn't just harmless, she was more useful to them the way she was.

My mom was safe. No matter what she saw, what she did, what she said, the Yeerks weren't going to Infest her. They didn't think they needed to. More than that, they thought it was better if they didn't.

My mom was safe.