6.

I was glad David had gotten the idea, because when we outlined the plan for the others it was pathetically simple. The bungalows housed the world leaders. If we couldn't stop the Yeerks by subtle means, then just tear the place apart. Things would probably be cancelled after that, if not for any other reason than for rebuilding.

Rachel's eyes lit up at the idea and she hugged me. Marco groaned and Jake was slowly nodding. It worked pretty well and he figured the sooner, the better.

You almost had to feel sorry for the Secret Service and all the other security guys on the beach, huddling in the rain beneath their ponchos while they gazed through night-vision goggles. One minute it's nothing but waves and lightning. The next minute it looks like a small pod of whales has decided to get up out of the ocean and go hang out on the beach.

Their training must have prepared them for almost anything. But not, definitely not for the possibility that four rhinos and four African elephants would come trumpeting and snorting out of a one-hundred-year-storm surf.

David and I were laughing as we destroyed the bungalows.

~So this is what being an Animorph is?~ He asked, making me giggle as the rain poured down and we moved around the complete and utter chaos.

Spotlights were shining down from the top of the hotel, sweeping madly here and there. There was the poplpoplpop! of gunfire. There were men in dark suits racing back and forth, guns drawn. There were guys in tuxedos and women in formal gowns running and tripping and yelling. I heard helicopters chopping the air overhead.

And through it all galumphed elephants and rhinoceroses, banging into anything we could bang into.

The thunder was rattling windows. The rain was turning everything to mud. And every few seconds, the lightning would flash and I'd see the entire madhouse scene frozen by the strobe light.

It would have been funny. If people weren't shooting at us.

We ran for the water's edge, bullets whizzing after us, and plowed into the surf. I began demorphing instantly, even as I continued to motor out against the waves.

I was giddy. I was going to survive! I was laughing, laughing at the sheer, insane rush of it all. No weariness now, just mad, frantic glee at having escaped alive.

~How will they ever, ever explain that?~ Tobias wondered.

~l don't know,~ Rachel said, obviously just as giddy as me, ~but that's one summit meeting no one will forget.~

We just laughed. Survival was an awesome, amazing feeling. We made it back home, and I noticed that my house was empty.

Yeerks made lousy parents, I decided. I collapsed into bed and slept hard until a voice said, "Melissa!"

"Huh? Whazzit?" I moaned.

"Oh my God, I don't believe this. Were you up late?" My father demanded.

Oh. Right.

"Couldn't sleep..." I wasn't lying, not really.

"I don't believe how irresponsible you are!" He ranted. "Get up this instant!"

As my father... well, the Yeerk in him... lectured me, I got ready for the day and, yawning, collapsed into the car and slept on the ride to school.

In the middle of Chemistry, I was dozing off, not even finishing my test. Oh man, this wasn't good. No wonder Rachel's grades had dropped a little.

The test paper seemed to waver in front of me. Intermolecular force... I knew this... but I was so tired.

~The answer's D.~

I almost jumped at David's voice. I glanced out the window and could barely make out the golden eagle in the tree. ~Took a look at the teacher's paper. Figured I could help you a little since I got to sleep in.~

I smiled, unable to help it, and finished the test rather easily. I didn't like the idea of cheating, but I was just so tired... when I finished the test, I slept for the rest of the period after turning it in.

The next few days were quiet ones. I would visit David and we'd talk. He said Ax and Tobias spent time with him and at least he got to sleep in. I'd bring him food sometimes, stuff I usually cooked.

My parents had never encouraged the cooking. I had always been confused. I thought it was okay, but it was as if they'd find any excuse to not be near me.

David had quickly said that I was great at cooking and practically inhaled his first dish, making me giggle.

I had learned after the first time Ax had come with us to always cook a ton extra because he could eat when he was in human form. Tobias sometimes would eat with us. David mumbled that he was having trouble hunting because another hawk was coming onto his territory but that was all he knew.

But there were no missions, things were almost... normal. Except they weren't, it felt so weird, being so jumpy and paranoid.

It was weird, but the fact that my parents didn't really pay attention to me turned out to be in my favor. They did everything to ignore me. When I asked if I could drop gymnastics, my father didn't protest or ask why. When I suggested going on my own to and from school so that I 'could be ready for college,' they didn't care.

Before I would have cried. But now I was just relieved. Ax and Tobias had always been staking out known Controllers. Now with David, they could plot and sometimes even act, attacking smaller sites.

Things were fine until my father approached Rachel and me in the library after school one day to ask me a question.

"Melissa, have you seen Tobias?"

Oh crap.