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Chapter 3

The next day my alarm didn't ring so I was awakened by the sound of my dad shouting my name from downstairs. When that failed to make me get up, he came up and requested very politely that if I could please hurry up because I was going to make him late for work. My mom had already left and she couldn't drop me off at school. After some grumbling on my part and some mild threats on his, I reluctantly went over to the restroom and proceeded to do my daily routines and get ready for school.

The lack of sleep and stress made me look like a zombie who had been submerged in flour. When my dad commented on my unholy appearance, I almost threw my plate of pancakes to his face in a totally uncharacteristically aggressive manner. I get cranky when I'm running on less than two hours of sleep.

After the morning's adventures, my dad drove me to school and I might have dozed with my face pressed against the car window. It was actually a very old, very cool yellow mustang that my parents said had sentimental value whenever I asked. They never did say why.

Had I been more alert, I might have noticed the black car that followed us wherever we went.

During lunch, I sat alone like usual in the back of the cafeteria and tried to finish a history paper that was a week late, and my teacher had said that if I didn't turn it in that day, I would fail the semester.

Even before the Animorphs, I had always been kind of a loner with the exception of my former best friend Erek King. Shortly after we first received the morphing power, I found out he was a Controller. A voluntary Controller. Yes, those actual exist. There are some sadistic people out there that would betray the human race for their own benefit.

I had known Erek all my life because our father's were friends. And he had ruined our relationship because of his betrayal, though he didn't actually know the cause.

As it turned out, he hadn't actually sold out our race, and we didn't even belong to the same one. Erek turned out to be part of an ancient race called the Chee that used holograms to put up a façade of being human. Under that big smile and brown eyes hid a dog-like android that was almost as old as humanity.

He wasn't actually a Controller and was just pretending to be one for the sake of recon. Chee are actually very good spies and provide us with inside info on the Yeerks when we really don't need any more bad news.

Anyways, as I was about to reach the 1,000 word mark on my essay, someone slid their tray on my table and sat down on the chair in front of me. I didn't look up and hoped the person would get a clue and leave.

"You look like crap." I looked up at the familiar face and smiled.

"Thanks Marco, right back at you."

In front of me sat a short, Hispanic boy with dark hair dark eyes. His skin was usually tan though currently his face was pale, and he had dark bags under his eyes from lack of sleep. Marco, who is also an Animorph, reached for my plate and took my blue applesauce. At least, I think it was applesauce. I still hadn't figured out why it was blue. I wrinkled my nose in disgust.

"You actually like that stuff?" He shrugged.

"I overslept and missed breakfast. I'm starving." I watched him eat for a few seconds before returning to my paper and was slightly surprised that he didn't fall over and die.

"What are you doing, anyway?" he asked.

"I am explaining in full detail why the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was so horrible and why it should never be repeated."

"Jake wants to know if you want to hang out at the usual place today after school." So that was why he was here.

Jake is the leader of the Animophs. The "usual place" was at Cassie's barn, and by "hang out", he meant plan another suicidal attack on the Yeerks.

"I can't," I replied and was actually relieved for being grounded. I had a good excuse to skip the missions. At least for a while.

"Why not?"

"I'm grounded for the next two and a half months, and no, I can't ditch out of it and go anyways because my parents are paranoid and my dad will be picking me up from school and taking me to his work."

"I'm guessing they found out about your little escapades and weren't too happy." I sent a mild glare in his direction.

"We'll fill you out on the details later." He left and I was left to wonder how on Earth I was going to finish a two-thousand word paper in the next 20 minutes.

After school, my dad picked me up just like he said he would and I was feeling better because there had been a substitute in history so I hadn't had to turn in the paper and had the weekend to finish it.

The feeling was ruined, though, when I noticed something particularly strange.

There was a taxi behind us, and it seemed to be following us. I kept staring at it through the mirror. A guy in his late thirties was the driver, and he had no passenger. After three turns he was still on us. I really got worried. I silently debated whether or not I should inform my dad, but I finally gave in after telling myself I was being paranoid and that there was no way it could be the Yeerks.

"Dad?"

"What is it?" His eyes were fixed on the road and made another turn. The taxi was still on us.

"The taxi behind us. It's following us." He took a look through the mirror.

"Don't be silly, Tobias. He's not following us." However, he still gave a wrong turn and this time the taxi stayed behind and didn't come after us. I let out a sigh of relief. "See? It's nothing. But now I'm probably going to be late because of this slight detour."

He turned the car around and headed back. One slight problem: the taxi seemed to be waiting for us. As soon as we got back on the road, it continued its pursue.

"Dad?" I felt him tense up next to me.

He hit the petal and we sped up down the road and made a few random turns. Through it all, my heart was racing, and I felt my mind yell at me to morph like it does whenever I'm in trouble. Eventually, the taxi stopped, but my dad kept on going and stopped in front of the mall.

"Dad, why are we here?" He got off the car and slammed the door after ordering me to get off. "Dad?"

He grabbed me from the wrist and practically dragged me inside the building and into a random store. Or at least, it seemed pretty random to anybody else but me.

"Dad! Dad, what are you doing!?" I practically yelled and received a couple of weird stares from other customers. My heart was beating so fast I thought it would explode. "No!"

"Tobias, stop struggling! You're drawing attention to yourself!" But that was the least of my problems because the store he had dragged me to wasn't exactly safe.

He had dragged me into the Gap, a known entrance to the Yeerk Pool.