Disclaimer: I don't own anything.

A/N: To my most persistent reviewer, SouthernBelle, who deserves an answer: Yes, this story will primarily focus on Cassie –she's at ground zero, as it were. However, there will be chapters focusing on the other Animorphs.

Chapter five.

Jake.

My name is Jake.

And I was getting worried.

I hadn't felt too bothered when Cassie didn't show up to school that morning. After the argument of the night before, I hadn't felt much like attending either. And the others looked similarly grumpy.

By lunchtime, though, I was starting to feel odd. Like something wasn't quite right. It wasn't like Cassie to miss school. And about half an hour before the end of the day…

"She's missing?" I yelled. The people around us glanced over and I lowered my voice. "What do you mean, missing?"

Marco looked uncomfortable. Also slightly ticked off. "I mean missing, all right, Jake? Her parents phoned the school around lunch, asking if she was here. Apparently she walked off into the woods and they were getting worried."

"Walked off when?"

"I don't know, man. Before school, after breakfast? It's not like the grapevine cares."

I breathed out slowly. "So they've been asking around for her…"

"Yeah."

"Say it."

Marco feigned innocence. "Say what?"

"Marco, man!"

"Fine." He dropped all pretense of joking. "Jake, this is not going to end well. Remember what happened last time."

Oh, yes. I remembered all right. I ran a hand through my hair. "She'd really better not get into any more deals with Controllers."

"Or get nearly stuck as an insect."

I closed my eyes and told myself it was nothing.

Wrong again, Jake.

----

Rachel. Five minutes before school. Day after Cassie mysteriously went AWOL.

"She still hasn't been found."

"Oh, man. Tobias?"

(I haven't seen anything, Jake.) He looked about as disturbed as a red-tailed hawk can get.

"Where'd you look?"

(Everywhere. The woods around her home. Most of the town. The woods a few miles out from her home. Nothing. Unless she's in morph, she's nowhere near.)

"Just wonderful." I kicked a can. Just a disguise. By now I was really getting worried.

I don't think I paid attention to a single word in class that day.

We met up after school at the barn. Morphed birds of prey. Searched.

Found nothing.

Marco went wolf. He found a scent trail, faint from rain. Followed it. An hour later, he'd run several miles and we still hadn't found her.

(She went some distance,) Tobias commented.

(Yeah. On foot,) Marco said. (Can't you lot scout ahead? This trail's more or less a straight line.)

I rose higher in the air, scanning the woods. I flew along the vector Cassie had taken so far. I flew a long way ahead. And then, with my keen falcon's sight, I saw something.

It was the remains of a fire.

That didn't tell us anything, of course. It could have been days old, hidden in the rock like it was. Anyone could have lit it. But it was the only lead we had.

Except not quite. Because in that little hollow, next to the blackened wood, we found some other stuff.

Blood, red and sticky, was smeared on the rock. And some clear yellow gunk. It smelled like Cassie, according to Marco, and he told us she did not smell well.

Ax was able to tell us what was wrong.

Septicemia. Then, seeing Marco's blank face, he added, blood poisoning. Cassie has injured herself badly.

"How bad is septicemia?" I asked impatiently.

Ax hesitated. I could see he didn't want to tell us.

"Ax!" Rachel exploded. "Just tell us –"

The infection is potentially fatal.

My heart just about froze solid.

"Fatal?" I said quietly.

Under normal circumstances, with access to standard human medical treatments, the infection would be manageable. Serious. But curable. But Cassie is, to the best of our knowledge, far away from human civilization.

Potentially fatal.

I turned away, feeling sick.

Cassie was lost, wounded, and infected with something that would probably kill her.

"How long?" I asked. I had to know. Had to know how long we had to find her before…

I am not entirely sure of the progression of human illnesses. However –based on what I know -

"Just tell me."

Two or three days, Prince Jake. Probably less.

Silence.

"But…she can morph," Rachel said. "Won't that…"

"Yeah," Marco said. "Sure, she can, Rachel. But she won't. You know Cassie."

"I know she's not an idiot," Rachel said angrily. "She'll morph to save her life."

No, she won't, Tobias said.

"Yes, she –"

She won't morph, Rachel, Tobias said, because she won't know she's sick. We had no idea what that stuff was. Cassie knows symptoms. She'll know she's ill. But she won't know what's wrong with her. And so she'll stay human. Until she's too weak to morph. And then…

She would die.