Chapter Nine

Jake and the others were waiting for us outside. Apparently, they had triggered the fire alarm by throwing a rock through a window on the far side of the building.

We went a little ways away from the building so we could talk in private. We also made sure we couldn't be seen, so Cassie could morph back to human.

"So what'd you find out?" Rachel asked.

"Nothing," Ax said. "I cannnnot use such primi-primitive machines. You humans still use keyboards, for goodness' sake!"

"You didn't find anything?" Tobias asked.

"We got interrupted," I explained.

"But you were there for five minutes!" Cassie said. "You had plenty of time!"

"What were you doing in there—sleeping?" Rachel asked.

"We were engage. Gaged. Guh. Engaged in a fascination discussion about Brit—" Ax began.

"We weren't doing anything!" I interrupted. "On a positive note, I stole some papers! Check them out!"

I handed the papers to Jake. They turned out to be a bunch of copies of the agenda for the meeting we interrupted. It was actually a pre-meeting, if you can believe that. As if meetings aren't boring enough, they have to have meetings before the meetings in order to double the boredom.

Although, in this case, bureaucracy saved the day. The pre-meeting was for activities board committee monthly blah blah planning event thingy.

"Good work, Marco," Jake said. "It looks like the Sharing is having a meeting next week to discuss the events and activities they'll be doing for the next few months. The date agency is on the list of topics to discuss."

"So all we have to do is spy on their meeting," I said, trying to sound like I had known what I was doing all along. "That's where we'll get the information needed to stop the dating project, as well as several others."

"Slight problem," Jake said. "Visser Three. It says he'll be at the meeting."

Aw, man. Can't we have one mission that doesn't involve that jerk?

"Um...we'll worry about that later?" I suggested.

"Meeting tomorrow at Cassie's after school," Jake decided. "See you all then. Good work, everyone."

Personally, I thought Jake was taking things a bit quicker than normal. After all, he hadn't even asked anyone for their opinion on the situation. But it turned out there was a reason Jake was rushing things. Just like Cassie, he wanted to talk to me. I must have been wearing my "I like to talk about my feelings" shirt that day.

"Marco, what's up with you and Melissa Chapman?" he asked as we walked home together.

"What do you mean?"

"Rachel's about ready to rip your head off, bro," he said. "It was all she talked about when we were making that distraction for you guys."

"Rachel's just paranoid," I said. "Nothing's going on between me and Melissa. I just flirted with her a bit this morning, that's all."

"She made it sound like you two were practically having sex in the school hallways," Jake said.

"I wish," I said. "That would have been hot."

"Well, in any case, I know I said this before, but just stay away from her, okay? Spending time with Chapmans is begging for trouble."

"Yes, Dad," I said. "I won't date anyone until I'm thirty."

If I last that long. I can't tell you how many times I'd thought that I wouldn't last another week as an Animorph.

All the more reason to start dating someone now.