2.
The next day was another boring normal school day. You know the routine: get up way too early, shower, dress, get a ride to school, and go into homeroom.
I was in there early, reading, when David came in. He looked... troubled, irritated and confused until he saw me. "Hey Melissa," he greeted, sitting next to me. The classroom was empty, and I had my hood on and up. Whoever thinks leaving windows open in this place really needs a head exam or something because it's cold! I wasn't the only one up early, it seemed. There was a bird outside, relaxing in the tree, a hawk of some kind.
I turned my attention away from the hawk and back to David.
"Morning," I said, giving him a smile. "How are you?"
He looked as if he wanted to say 'fine,' but he said, shaking his head, "Something really weird happened to me yesterday. Very weird."
I was worried, "Is everything okay?"
"Remember that blue box I showed you yesterday?"
"The pretty blue one, the one with the odd cipher thing?" I asked, remembering it. It had been interesting.
David nodded and leaned towards me, "Last night someone tried to steal it. And you'll never guess how they did it. Trained birds."
"Birds?" I stared at him, confused. "How?"
"Two birds flew in my bedroom window and tried to get away with the box. Fortunately Megadeth went after one." He smiled "I just wish my snake had been out of his box. Even though his venom's taken out, I bet it would have scared those birds."
"But they're birds," I said, shaking my head. "How do you know they were trained? Maybe it attracted them for some reason?"
David shook his head, "I know for sure they weren't ordinary birds. One of them opened a sliding glass door. It was an eagle, I think."
"An eagle?" I had seen one around my house sometimes, a beautiful bald eagle. Some days I wished I could fly away with it. "Why would anyone want to steal that blue box? And why use birds? I mean, if you have that much money, just hiring someone to take it makes more sense."
He nodded his head. "That's what I was thinking, but I don't know why they didn't do it."
"Still," I mused. "Burglar birds..."
David sighed. "It sounds insane, I know."
"So insane that I know you're telling me the truth," I said quietly, making him look steadily at me once more. "But if one's an eagle... I don't get it. It makes no sense. If you have that kind of money..." I drummed my fingers, thinking. "Maybe... they used birds, maybe that thing is part of an experiment? You did find it, right? What if those birds were trained to take it?"
He followed my train of thought instantly, "Someone knows what the box is and wants it back. So it does have some kind of value." He grinned, "Glad you agree. After that, I thought it'd be smart to get it out so that my folks don't freak out. So I'm going to try and sell it."
"Where at?" I asked, thinking. "I don't think a place that has enough finances to train birds like that will go anywhere we do. And the only places I can think of that might sell that are maybe art places..."
David chuckled, "Oh that's so low tech. I posted a 'for sale' notice on a couple Web pages last night after all this went down. I described it. And I described those symbols, the ones that look like foreign writing? This morning before school I checked, and there was already an answer. Some guy says he wants to see it. He says he'll pay good money. Says he'll go anywhere, anytime."
I thought for a few seconds before shaking my head, "Good money and he doesn't know anything about you? Doesn't know if you're lying online or something. Going anywhere at any time?" I made a face, "Sounds too good to be true, you know?"
He hesitated for a second before slowly nodding, "I didn't think of that. I was going to ask you to come as my backup in case he tries to rip me off."
"You didn't give this guy your address, did you?"
David smirked. "I'm not a moron. The guy could just rip me off while I'm stuck here at school." He shook his head and gave me a sly leer. "I set it up on a timer so the e-mail with my address won't go out till right before I get home."
"It's on automatic?" I said, giving him a look. "After what we just said?" I shook my head, "And yes, you did give him your address." I bet my disapproval was obvious on my face.
He nodded, sighing. "I was thinking I could send the e-mail, the guy comes over, and I give you ten percent for helping me out."
"Ten? When I pointed out the flaws in your cunning plan?" I mused for a few seconds, "A quarter of it."
David made a face but sighed, "Fine, but we have to cut last period."
I shook my head, "My father."
Another face, a pouting one.
I smiled, "How about instead of a quarter I take fifteen percent and you stick the whole day out."
"And the guy?"
"Send another e-mail from our computer lab at the end of the day saying you'll be later than you thought. I'll tell my dad I'm going out with a friend after school and I'll see him home." I thought about it, "Actually, that might be better, tell the guy to meet you another day at somewhere like the mall. You know, so that there's more people around in case it's some crazy person."
"All right," David said, sighing. He looked irritated, but I had a feeling it was because he hadn't thought of that.
"Hey, calm down, you're under a lot of stress," I said, making him look up.
"That obvious?"
"You just moved here, so not only are you still adjusting but then you get terrorized by some weird birds and everything plus you have a shot at actually getting some decent cash? Nobody would think straight with all of that."
The day basically went normally, my father just nodded, waving me off when I said I was going to hang out with a friend. I met up with David who sent another email saying what I said, and told me where he lived. But since we had missed the school bus, he had no clue how to get there.
Fortunately, I did. It would be easier for me to show him a few of the sights around so he could pick a meeting spot.
I led the way to a bus stop and when we reached the stop closest to his house, we walked, my hood up once more. It was cold out, at least to me, but I felt a little warmer with my hood up.
"What the..." I said, staring.
David stared too.
There was something weird going on. A house was completely trashed, ruined, and there were... things...
David shouted a curse and began to run.
"What are you doing?" I yelped, grabbing his arm.
"That's my house!"
My eyes widened and we both ignored our common sense instincts, running towards the commotion.
RRRRROOOOOOOOOWWWWWRRRR!
"Is that a lion roaring?" David exclaimed, confused.
"How would I know? I came with you, remember?" I demanded, running.
The next thing we knew, we reached the now hollow shell of a house. Carnage and havoc with creatures and animals was going on and I could hear what sounded like a gun. Before I could voice my confusion once more, I heard David.
"Oh my God," David said, his voice shaking. I turned to see what he was looking at and almost fainted. We were looking into what had once been the second floor of his house.
There was some kind of odd creature. It was as purple as Barney the Dinosaur but it was not cute. And it didn't look to me like an animal that would sing "I love you, you love me." This purple monster did not have a happy family.
It had massive shoulders. Massive enough to make the grizzly bear's shoulders look puny. It stood on two widely separated feet, each with four thick toes as big around as my thighs. Its face ... if you could call it a face . . . was in the center of its upper body, so it couldn't turn and look behind itself, only straight forward. Two big eyes blinked from where a guy's chest would be.
Definitely weird.
As I watched in horror, the mouth grew, splitting open, a red-rimmed gash across the creature's belly. Serrated teeth and a tongue that lolled out almost like a snake tongue and from the shoulders grew four arms, two on each side. The arms started off smooth and muscular at the shoulder. But they became increasingly wrinkly as they went down toward the place where the hands should be. And instead of hands there were bony, deep, deep red points.
They looked like... I don't know, like really sharp traffic cones. You know those things they put up on the highway to divert traffic? That's what they looked like: sharp cones on the end of the four arms.
"What the... what is that?" I asked, not realizing I had taken David's hand. I was petrified.
He clutched my hand like a lifeline.
Good to know I wasn't the only one that was scared.
It's called a Dule Fansa, a rather fanciful name, don't you think? Would you like to see what it can do?
David and I shared looks of horror. Had that thing heard me all the way out here? Except we hadn't heard anything but we had...
"What was that?" David asked, looking around frantically. "I... I definitely..."
"I heard something," I agreed, looking around too. "But... but it wasn't a sound..."
That thing, that Dule Fansa, aimed one traffic cone hand and... destroyed the last wall to a room on that former second floor.
Now, let's make this simple. l want the blue box. I will have the blue box. Or all of you will die.
"Why are they even here?" David said, freaking out. "What is going on here?"
I'm not a patient Yeerk. I'll have the blue box. And I'll destroy you all. But if I get the blue box now, I may decide to destroy you some other time.
"What the hell?" I demanded. "First it's a Dule Fansa, now it's a Yeerk?"
"What is a Yeerk?" David asked.
"No idea," I answered.
He jumped and looked around, confused. "Did... did you hear that?"
"Hear what?"
"That thing knew my name! It sounded a little different but it was just like that thing!"
Brave Andalites, he mocked. You'll let me kill these humans rather than give up the box?
"But I just heard that one!" I said, confused.
"I did too, but it wasn't that... that voice, it said it was on my side-"
"Gashwa! Human children!" A weird Tyrannosaurus Rex thing roared, pointing at David and me.
A man appeared from the second floor. "David!"
"DAD!" David shouted. I had never known anyone's voice to sound that way.
Two of the T-Rex things had David's father by the arms. He was yelling. He was crying his son's name, over and over. "David! David! David!"
The next thing I heard was a roar. I saw a wall of brown bum rushing me and everything went black. How long I was out for, I can't really tell you, but when I groaned, there was a hand to help me.
"It's okay, Melissa," a familiar voice said.
Rachel?
"Yeah, it's me," she said, surprising me. I slowly opened my eyes to see her.
"Rach..." I trailed off, seeing her before my brain caught up with me. I turned, vaguely seeing other people, but David was lying next to me. He moaned and moved his head. His eyes fluttered open.
"Who are you?" he asked, blinking up at Jake, then looking around like I did. He turned back suddenly, until he saw me. "Are you-"
"I'm okay," I said, realizing I was shaking. I looked around now. I recognized mostly everyone there. "Um... what... what happened? Did all of you guys see that?"
David looked around too and back at me. "You know them?"
"I think..." I thought for a few moments, "That's Rachel, Cassie, you met Marco, that's Jake and..." I looked at the oddly pretty boy with them. He was vaguely familiar, but I didn't want to presume anything. "I think that's Jake's cousin..."
"You guys saw what happened, didn't you?" David demanded.
They shared looks and looked back at us.
"I think we need to move somewhere a bit more private for all of this," Jake said with a sigh.
David and I shared looks.
"The stuff we're going to tell you is going to totally change your world," Jake said, looking at both of us.