Disclaimer: I don't own anything Animorphs-y.
Chapter Eleven.
I didn't feel very comfortable for the first couple of nights up there.
Part of it was that I was still sleeping in a cave. I don't know why I was sleeping in a cave. I guess, on some level, part of me wanted to stay separate. To keep all the violence in me away from them. Because, you know, war stains. The marks are invisible most of the time, but they're there. You can't erase them. Once war touches you, it stays.
So I slept in my cave.
But that wasn't the only reason I was uncomfortable. The basic wrongness of what I was doing pressed down on me.
I'd run away from the war. Yet here I was, prepared to fight again, after meeting people who didn't understand war…
I worried about my parents. I love them, you know? They taught me a lot. How to help animals in need. How to love. They brought me up and cared for me, and lately it felt like I was repaying them with lies.
By now, they probably thought I was dead.
I curled up. I felt like crying.
Yes, they would think I was dead. They would hold out hope for a while, but I'd already been missing for at least four days. By now, their hope had to be running out. Before long, they would know that I was never coming back.
And I hated myself for it.
There was nothing to stop me from morphing osprey and flying home right now. And, man, I wanted to do it. In a matter of hours I could be lying in my own home, in my own bed. My parents would be happy. I would be happy.
And the Yeerks might find the Pemalites and attack them. Steal their technology. Bring about the final doom of an ancient race.
No. Not while I lived to prevent it.
My life, my parents…or the world? Which to choose?
I wanted to choose my parents. But, you know, sometimes other things are more important. Sometimes you have to rip your heart out of your chest and throw it away, and try not to cry.
Maybe, someday, I would be able to return. I hoped so.
But, until then, I was stuck to this mountain. And I was going to have to live with it.
----
I lived with it. And, once you got used to being surrounded by weird, bipedal canine aliens, it was actually pretty fun.
I got used to it fast. I've had a lot of experience with weird. I've had a lot of experience with aliens.
Mind you, nothing –except maybe running a dog home and a high-tech facility –prepares you for dealing with Pemalites.
There were about a hundred or so of them that I saw. They'd come out of the ship slowly, which was why I'd seen increasing numbers of them over the first few days. They'd been on the ship for generations, and they were fond of it, but they liked being outside more.
I suppose that after living all your life in close confinement, you're glad to get out and stretch your legs.
They had all kinds of jobs, except that they weren't exactly jobs. Some of them knew a lot about computers, and others were good at biology, and some were better than others at medical problems. But they weren't jobs. It was just…stuff that they did. Things they were good at, and would do for the good of everyone else. It wasn't like work.
Everything was a game, to them. There was a joke in every situation. Always something worth laughing about. There was always something worth learning, and, man, they wanted to learn.
So they learned English. At least, some of them did. Not all of them. Inest learned it, a couple of the children, a few adults. The others seemed to focus on learning about Earth, its animals and plants, its weather. And the rest of them just had fun.
I enjoyed it too. But I had questions of my own.
And, when Inest and I could talk reasonably well to each other, I asked them.
"How come you're here?"
Inest glanced at me. "We landed here. In the ship."
"Yeah, I know. But how…"
"You'd have to ask Ionos about that one. I don't know much about engines."
"That's not what I meant."
"Then what did you mean?"
I thought for a minute. "You're Pemalites."
"Yes. I'm curious –how did you know? I didn't tell you." She suddenly looked hopeful. "Are there…others? Here?"
I bit my lip. "No. I mean, I know some of them came here, but they died. It was thousands of years ago." Oh, great! How am I supposed to explain that one?
"Oh." Inest looked sombre. "But they left something. Something that told you…what we are."
"They did," I confirmed. "And something that told us about…about the Howlers." I watched her face carefully. Saw no reaction. "It told us that they attacked you. That all the Pemalites were dead. So how –?"
Inest stared at a flower. She looked up at me, her dark eyes searching me. It was as though she saw everything I felt. Marco says I know what people feel five minutes before they do. And it's true I'm good at knowing how people think. Inest had the same kind of ability.
"It's hard to kill a spacefaring race," she said finally.
I had to be content with that.
I try now to remember those days. All two and a half weeks of them. Because, though I was more than slightly miserable about my family, and worried about the Yeerks, it was secluded up there. Cut off. And it was a happy place.
It still is.
But that's how I try to remember it. Before everything happened that opened a pathway from my little idyll back into the world.