Just then, through the massive, round porthole on his right, Marco caught a glimpse of a new player in their little game. This new apparition was long, sinuous, and poison-yellow. A waterborne snake that was bigger than any Taxxon hed seen in his life, with a mouth that could swallow a small boat.
The snake was making slow, inexorable progress toward the facility. On either side, like some kind of honor guard, came Hork-Bajir in bizarre red diving-suits. They were propelled by jets that looked like theyd be perfectly at home on a torpedo, and they were traveling just a few feet back from the sinuous, undulating snake.
Marco had a feeling he knew just who was coming to pay them a visit.
Turning, he paused a moment to wait for Shara, then followed his- Visser One out into the hall. She didnt turn, didnt look back, just swaggered on like the Yeerk commander she was. Feeling a tug on his left shoulder, he turned to look back at Shara.
"Dont let yourself get distracted, Marco," she said firmly. "We still have a lot of things to do."
If hed been expecting anything else, it was blown right out of his head by what she actually said. "Youre right," he said, with a sharp nod. "Lets go to work."
Maybe it wasnt so bad to have Shara in on his secret, after all.
Ducking into a side-door, he quickly looked the room over. What he could see of it, anyway; it was pretty much just as dark as the room that they had all "landed" in a few minutes ago. He could see moving lights in the dark behind him, and when he looked back over at Shara, he saw that the lights were her pinkish eyes. Which was weird, even for him.
The Animorphs were pretty much the reigning champs of the weird-o-limpics, but even their eyes didnt glow in the dark.
The sound of something fast-moving in the air, followed by the meaty slap of impacting body parts, alerted him to the fact that something had just happened.
"Ax, hasnt anyone ever told you that its a bad habit to attack your own allies?" Shara demanded, sounding only semi-serious.
(How,) the Andalite sputtered, and as his eyes adjusted to the lack of light in the room, Marco saw the reason. (How did you do that, Shara?)
"I have good reflexes," she said calmly.
Which was, of course, the understatement of all time. Axs tail moved faster than the eye could see up until it hit something, and here Shara was with that same tail clenched in her fist; her hand around the base of the blade so Ax couldnt even cut her.
"Has anyone told you that youre one of the most abnormal things in the history of abnormal things?" he asked, still a bit wobbly from actually having seen the impossible done right in front of him.
"I am not a thing, Marco," she said tolerantly, then turned to look with those glowing, pinkish eyes at him. "And youre a fine one to talk about being abnormal," she said with a wink.
"We were just trying to figure out whether we should go and rescue you two, or go join the fight outside," Tobias said, his now-unfamiliar human voice drawing attention back to the matters at hand.
(We accessed the central computer for this facility,) Ax said calmly, now that Shara had released her hold on his tail; he was still shooting glances at her with his stalk-eyes, though. (However, before we could discover anything, you two came in.)
Ax lead them both over to a glowing, three-dimensional computer display. He thought it was kind of funny, the way this place looked like any normal, boring office that you would find in a building somewhere. Like an insurance agent, or a secretarys; the Yeerks, of course, wouldnt want to bother with Human-level computers.
He heard a roar; either Jake or Slade, but whoever they were, they didnt sound good.
"We need to get out there and help them," Tobias said, gritting his teeth.
"No," he snapped, cutting that line of thought off before it could really begin. "They cant be helped by us rushing out there. Visser Three is coming here with more Hork-Bajir. Hes morphed this giant snake from planet Whatever."
The rest of them even Shara looked at him like he was nuts. He didnt care.
"Look, its him, okay? I saw the thing through the porthole. A huge, yellow sea snake with Hork-Bajir alongside. Who else do you think that would be?"
(He cannot have had time to hear about a battle down here,) Ax pointed out. (This is too quick to be a rescue mission.)
"I dont think it is a rescue mission. I think its a coincidence. I think he was just on his way over here."
"Well, thats just our bad luck," Tobias scoffed.
"Maybe not," he pointed out. "Visser One and Three are rivals; Visser one let us escape to mess with Visser Three. This just might work out for us. But, first things first: Ax? Start questioning that computer."
There had to be something wrong with being so calm while Jake and the other Animorphs were out there in the halls fighting for their lives. Still, hed gotten a good, long look at the pure, uncaring ruthlessness of the Yeerks. Hed seen in Visser Ones eyes; heard it in the pitiless voice that had spoken of his being potentially enslaved by the Yeerks.
There were clearly times when you needed to be as ruthless as the enemy you were fighting; to kill before you could be killed.
(Its as we surmised,) Ax said, staring at the screen with his main eyes as his stalk eyes scanned the room, occasionally settling on Shara. (The Yeerks are invading the Leeran homeworld. It is not going well for them. Most of the Leerans are resisting. Since the Leerans are psychic, its impossible for the Yeerks to deceive them. So the Yeerks have decided to forget about stealth and go for a straight invasion by force.)
"But its a watery world, so they cant rely on Hork-Bajir," he said, folding his arms.
"So the hammerheads are being reengineered to allow the Yeerks to make Controllers out of them," Shara said, stepping forward to peer more closely at the display. "The sharks are meant to be shock-troops in the war for Leera."
"Thats great," Tobias snapped, already starting to demorph. "Now can we get out there and help Rachel and the others?"
"Ax, can you find a way to remove these things in our heads?" he asked, ignoring the demorphing Tobias and the impassive Shara.
Ax paused for a moment, probably communicating with the computer. (There is a liquidation program in place, but it is heavily encrypted. The only other way that the implants can be liquidated is in the event that this facility is completely destroyed.)
"What? You cant eliminate these implants without blowing the whole place up?" Tobias demanded.
(Yes. It is there so that there would be nothing left behind if something goes wrong. However, we simply have no way of destroying this facility.)
"Yeah, I dont think even Shara could do something like that," he said thoughtfully. "No offense," he said, turning a sidelong glance on the girl in question.
"None taken," she said, sounding like she was preoccupied by something else.
"Ax?" he asked, opting to leave Shara to think about whatever it was that she was thinking about in peace. "How do the Yeerks keep the water out of this place? I mean, how do they keep it from flooding? If it was just air-pressure, our ears would be seriously imploding here."
(Force fields, I presume,) the Andalite said calmly. (Modulated to hold the water back, while allowing animal lifeforms to enter and leave.)
"Theyd also have to have some way of getting the ships and that submarine through the forcefield without disrupting it," Shara mused.
(That would be simple enough, even for Yeerk technology.)
"Can you reach the controls?" he asked the Andalite, not wanting the conversation to go off on some kind of irrelevant tangent if he could stop it.
(Done,) Ax said, once hed finished fiddling with the computer.
"Can you turn off the force fields?" he asked. "Without letting the Yeerks know that its happening?"
(I am an Andalite,) Ax said, with a derisive laugh. (No simple, derivative, unimaginative Yeerk computer poses any difficulties to me. Not unless its been specifically shielded.)
Not exactly what I wanted to hear. Then again, the chances that this particular computer was specifically shielded against tampering were next to nil. Still, there was always that small chance of failure that you had to look square in the eye if you wanted to get anything done right.
(What are you doing?) Tobias demanded, fully demorphed and perched on Sharas right shoulder at this point. (You let that water come gushing in and well all be killed.)
"Destroy the facility and it just might trigger the liquidation program for these head implants the Yeerks slapped into us," he countered. "Ax, can you build in a five-minute time delay?"
(Five minutes?) he asked, pausing for a moment to give the computer some more orders. (Done. In five minutes, millions of your gallons of water will come flooding into this facility.)
(Wed better all have gills before then,) Tobias said, turning his fierce hawks stare on the three of them.
"Yeah," he said, trying to sound harsh, tough, and unemotional; he didnt much feel it, but it would help if the others saw him that way. "And everyone who cant grow gills; I guess theyll wish they could."
"Lets get going, then," Shara said, already beginning to morph.
"Were outta here," he agreed, turning away from the computer.