They were making their way to Tobias and Ax's table, with Marco feeling as if he could take on anyone in the world. But when his eyes caught on a particular person in the crowd, a fair distance behind Tobias but in the same general space, Marco didn't feel quite so pumped-up anymore. In fact, he felt a little sick.
It was Erek. Erek the Chee. One of the Animorphs' greatest and strangest allies in the battle against the Yeerks. Not a hard-core warrior like Slade, hell Erek couldn't even fight for himself if it came down to it. About the only thing he was useful for was information-gathering. But then again, he was incredibly useful when it came to that one thing.
And so, Marco figured that he could put up with Erek for the useful information that he and the other Chee could gather on the Yeerks. But the inevitable downside of being a spy was the fact that you often ended up being the bearer of bad news. Marco had even come to expect mostly bad news from the Chee.
Looking at the expression on Erek's face, Marco didn't know exactly what to expect from him, but he had a feeling that his opinion about Erek wasn't going to have to be revised anytime soon. Marco and Jake separated from the other Animorphs so as not to draw attention to their group, and Marco saw Erek nod slightly. The two of them walked over to meet with Erek while still trying not to be too obvious about it.
"Hi, Marco," Erek greeted. "Hello, Jake."
"Hi Erek. How's it going?" Jake asked warily, as both Animorphs nodded respectfully to the Chee.
They had both been present for the battle at the Matcom corporation; the one and only time that Erek had been freed to be the unstoppable warrior that he was capable of being when not constrained by his own pacifist programming. They could still remember the stink of the blood that had been coating the walls, floor and ceiling once Erek had been done.
Come to think of it, Tobias had said that Slade had done a fair amount of damage – and taken it as well – when he had been under that mind control. Marco sometimes wondered just who would win if the two of them were ever forced to fight. Of course Erek would need to have his pacifist programming disabled again, otherwise Slade would probably pound and/or shred him into scrap metal.
"Fine. And we've heard, through our sources, that you have been doing good work against our… mutual acquaintances," Erek lowered his voice to the point where a normal person would have a fairly hard time overhearing. "I think we should have some privacy for this."
The air around the three of them shimmered, and when Marco and Jake were finally able to see him clearly again, Erek had reverted to his normal form. Something that that looked like an odd, metallic greyhound that was able to walk on its hind legs.
"What did you do?" Marco asked.
"I extended my hologram to cover the three of us and some of the surrounding area," Erek said. "Anyone who walks by now will see a group of security guards standing around talking. No one will bother or overhear us."
Marco thought that what Erek had done, while being an extremely cool trick on the android's part, did not bode well for what he was going to say to them. It had to be something very important for Erek to resort to these kinds of drastic measures. And in this line of work, important was usually synonymous with bad.
"The work you did rescuing the two free Hork-Bajir was a very commendable thing," Erek said. "Those two may be the foundation of something very good in the future. You six may have begun the salvation of an entire race."
"Well, we do like to keep busy," Marco said offhandedly. "And it's either try to save entire races or sit at home and play Nintendo."
Erek laughed, an odd sight considering his current canine form, then he became serious again. "Marco, I need to speak with you privately."