Disclaimer: I only own Casey and his family. All other characters are properties of K. A. Applegate and/or the other authors who are with me in this roleplay/collabfic.
A/N #1: {{}} = Thought-speech.
*~*~*| Chapter 4 - The Offer |*~*~*
*KRRRERRANGGG!*
*EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE…*
My attention was immediately diverted again. Another spaceship, this one with glowing red engines and which resembled a cockroach, had just been sent careering into an idle construction crane. The crane's towering steel frame groaned threateningly – then snapped! Its upper half tilted and quickly gathered speed, before crashing into the concrete with a loud, echoing clang. A cloud of dust billowed into the air, further restricting our already-low visibility. At the same time, the damaged alien ship blew up from the impact, sending a wave of heat towards us!
This is crazy! What am I doing? Why am I still here?!
I had seen far more unbelievably insane nonsense in the last 20 minutes alone than I had in the 19 years of my life thus far. I'd seen a blue scorpion-centaur. I'd seen two alien spaceships – one recently blown out of the sky, and the centaur's own just calmly parked in the middle of a traceur's wet dream. I'd seen laser weapons that clearly belonged in the science fiction section of any exhibition.
I was clearly in way, way over my head. We all were! And the guy I was speaking to appeared to have gone temporarily deaf, thanks to the sound of the blast earlier, because he didn't look like he even heard me.
The numerous warnings I'd received about the construction site – ones that I'd conveniently discarded in my eagerness to get home – had all made their way helter-skelter into my frantic thoughts –
"Don't you ever step foot into the construction site! Only hooligans go there."
"You'll probably get kidnapped by some strange gang and then sold as a slave to some third-world country."
"I'm not bailing you out if you get mistaken for some kind of criminal and get arrested."
"If you don't sit down and behave right now, I'm taking you to the construction site and leaving you there!"
Well, guess they were all correct about how dangerous the site was, because now I was stuck up shit creek desperately trying to find a paddle, as my Australian friend would say.
At this moment, yet another voice suddenly made itself heard in the darkness. (How many people WERE there in this "abandoned" construction site anyway?!) "Hey, what are you waiting for? We need to get out of here. They'll kill us if we stick around." I spun around looking for the source of the voice, and instantly had to tilt my head to make eye contact with a tall, burly man - at least a head taller and twice as wide as I was; perhaps two or three years older. He was panting slightly – was this the third guy who was with Erik and Anna earlier? Maybe he ran away and came back when he realized his friends were missing.
Then my eyes slid sideways to the blue-furred, blood-splattered, battle scarred alien that had somehow managed to sneak up behind him, and I involuntarily gasped, taking a step back. The others followed my line of sight and had similar reactions – someone even let out a strangled yelp.
He had destroyed the ship and probably killed several aliens. Was he now coming for us too?!
No, I realized. He told us to leave before firing on the rest. He could have killed us when he had the chance, and he didn't. Even now, he's not threatening us… at least, I don't think he is.
But what does he want with us? Does he want us to help him hide, or something? Are we supposed to spirit him away somewhere?
{{I told you to leave for your safety, not out of hate.}}
There was his voice in my head again – a voice that had no direction, but which seemed to appear like a thought in my mind. He felt… solemn. Sad, almost. It felt like his "voice" was carrying the weight of whatever world he came from behind it.
{{I am sorry. I–…}}
My confusion only grew. Sorry for what? For having to land on our planet? For having to defend himself from whoever or whatever was shooting at him?
{{Your friend is right. If you do not leave, you will be killed. Or worse. My enemy… our enemy… will not hesitate to end you even if they are, in some ways, human. They will not stop until you all are silenced for what you've seen tonight.}}
The words were thought with an air of absolute finality, as if he knew exactly what he was talking about. As if he had seen it all before. As if we were just the latest bunch of random passers-by who just happened to be caught up in this weird battle of his.
I found myself believing him.
As if to frame the ominous words the alien had just thought, a momentary, eerie hush fell over the area. I tried to rub some heat into my cold, wet arms, shivering slightly as I did so. Over the silence, I could hear the gradual crescendo of police sirens.
{{I want to help you escape this. Please… please accept my help.}}
"Um. I have three questions." My voice filled the deathly silence which had enveloped us. I whispered as quickly and as quietly as I could, not wanting to draw any attention from whoever else might still be in the immediate vicinity that would want us eliminated. "First – what are you? Second, what on Earth is going on? And third, how are we supposed to get out?"
Yeah, I know. Maybe it wasn't the best time to ask the first two. But I really wanted to know what the hell was going on, damnit!
"…you want to help us? How?" asked Anna, voice quivering.
{{We haven't much time, but I will explain all that I can. I am an Andalite. My name is Prince Elfangor-Sirinal-Shamtul. I am a warrior and a pilot. I fight the Yeerk Empire, whom my people have fought for a very long time now. The Yeerks are on this planet - Earth - and they plan to slowly, quietly undermine and enslave your species, as they have done many times before. The humans I have just fought were already under total Yeerk control. If any of you are seen well enough to be identified, the Yeerks will stop at nothing to capture and enslave you, too, even if they have to capture or kill everyone you know to do it. Of course, that assumes you can escape this place at all. Simply put, you have seen too much, and that makes you dangerous to the Yeerks.}}
{{It is against the laws of my people to give advanced technologies to lesser developed species,}} he paused, scanning everyone with his stalk eyes. {{Certain Andalite technologies would make an individual very hard to spot. It would make them very dangerous, too, if they knew how to use it. No, it would be impossible for an Andalite to give away our technology.}}
{{Of course, if such technologies were stolen… well...}} he trailed off.
Unfortunately, his explanation, illuminative as it was, threw up way more questions than it provided answers. But I guess this wouldn't have been the right time to satisfy my curiosity – even though I really just wanted to shake him down and demand he actually EXPLAIN something. Like, how did this war start? What is a Yeerk? What do they look like? Why was humanity targeted? How do they capture and enslave? I couldn't imagine anyone in this day and age still being a slave – not in the USA, and not on a large scale, anyway. Surely someone would've noticed?
Instead, I was faced with the prospect of becoming a criminal in an alien society I'd never even heard of just 20 minutes ago.
Well, I guess stealing technology from a far more advanced alien race definitely sounded like a great way to kick off humanity's interplanetary relations.
Joy.
If we ever run into these blue furry horsemen again, we will have a LOT of explaining to do. Assuming they don't kill us first.
The sirens had gotten a LOT louder over the last few minutes.
But then again, if he's right and we don't get out of here, we'll probably not survive to meet them anyway.
So instead of the deluge of questions I was prepared to unleash, I went with just one.
"How will this technology help us escape?"
*~*~*| 4 |*~*~*
A/N #2: Elfangor is written by /u/Tman008. Alazar (the tall, burly man) is written by /u/DeadBravo.