Sub-Visser Eighty-Three (Orkath)

I could feel the fugue. Not the true death throes of starvation, not yet, but I could feel that it was coming for me. Twice over the past day, Chris had regained consciousness. The second time I noticed that we were no longer at the hospital facility, but in one of the oatmeal storage areas on the perimeter of the Yeerk Pool complex. I assumed that they had made the move to avoid detection by Craig and the other Animorphs at the hospital. It was horribly ironic that I was going to die less than fifty meters from the life-giving nutrients that I needed, killed by an ally that had no idea I was his ally. Perhaps it was the most fitting punishment for all of the cruel, sadistic things I had done to Chris when I was first inside him. I didn't deserve his forgiveness.

And yet I did have his forgiveness, and his friendship. In his unconsciousness, he was having a blissfully absurd dream about me, in a human body, frolicking with him through green clouds over a river of marshmallow cream sauce. Not Eric, not Ewell or Craig or Jake… me. Perhaps it was his brain's way of expressing concern for me in it's stupor. Perhaps it was his brain's way of saying goodbye to me.

I waited out the day, and half the next one, listening to his thoughts and dreams. Making sure that he would be okay, that Eric's slugs to his head weren't causing any permanent damage. But as I felt the first pains of the fugue, I realized that I had to leave. I had no delusions of escape – I couldn't see out Chris' eyes, and I had every reason to think they'd be watching for me, ready to squish me the moment I fell out of his ear. But the fugue is said to be horrifying – the least I could do was spare him that torment. Maybe myself, as well. Resigning myself to my fate, I started to disconnect myself slowly from the neurons in Chris' brain.

«Goodbye,)() I murmured, his essence floating away from me as I hurtled out into the world.

Christopher Windward

I felt a slithering along my outer ear as I came around. Despite my awareness of the situation, I couldn't keep a groan from escaping me as I lifted my head and peered at over a ton of maple and ginger oatmeal in neat, tidy barrels. It drew the attention of Martin, the guard of the day, who picked up a Dracon beam weapon and aimed it at me.

"Wait," I tried to insist, but my voice came out all slurred and groggy.

"No worries, Sub-Visser," Martin insisted, leveling the beam on me. "It's getting near that time. You should stay awake for this part. I hear that Chris will be gifted with all of your memories towards the end, and that could be useful."

I waited a moment for Orkath to reply before I realized. "He's gone." I started to feel my blood boiling. "You killed him, he's gone! He was good, he'd changed, and now he's GONE!"

Martin shook his head. Or more than likely, the Yeerk did. I assumed that they were sharing control the way Orkath and I always did. "Don't be stupid, there's no way you went through the fugue without tossing and turning in the host. Just accept your death with dignity."

"I've got no Yeerk, you idiot!" I insisted to Martin. "Get out of Martin and search around in my brain if you don't believe me."

It was only then that Martin started to look uncertain. "But if he's not in you…" He crouched down underneath me, fingers running across a damp spot on the floor. The spot where Orkath must've fallen. "It's fresh," he announced, running his finger along. "But it doesn't feel fugued."

"He morphed," I speculated, struggling against the ropes binding me. "He morphed something small and he's trying to make his way back to the pool."

Martin gave me a concerned look. "I've got to tell Eric," he began, storming for the door. After five paces he stopped and turned around. "Good?"

"YES," I repeated, making my struggling motions more obvious. He took the hint and ran around behind me, untying my bonds. "He's been good for awhile now."

"Imagine that," Martin mused. "Two days babysitting and all that planning, and all we ever really had to do was walk up and ask."

"Not knowing who's on what side has it's disadvantages," I agreed, rubbing my arms now that they were free. "We've got to help him. Only insect he's got is a mosquito, and there's no way it can find it's way to the pool on it's own."

"It's okay," Martin said, placing a hand on my shoulder. "Morphing should buy him some time. I don't think he'll feel the hunger anymore until he demorphs."

"/If/ he demorphs," I insisted. "He thinks he's surrounded by enemies, remember?"

Eric Campbell

I stood side-by-side with Visser One and watched as three hundred of my fellow humans – men, women and children – were unloaded from one of the trains and escorted to the infestation pier. Every bone in my body was shaking and there was nothing Ewell could do to calm it down. Fortunately, the Visser was used to such reactions in his presence, and didn't think anything of it. Just another scared underling. Certainly not a potential assassin.

«Are you sure about this?)() I insisted, tension radiating my thought-speak voice.

«You heard Mister Tidwell,)() Ewell reminded me. «Now that we're all morph-capable, we can be more ambitious with our plans. Imagine if we succeed, Eric. We can halt this invasion in it's tracks right now.)()

Against our collective will, Ewell and I found ourselves gazing upward at the hunter robots patrolling the pool from above. The plan was a simple one – we were to acquire the Andalite host body that the Visser was occupying and then run like hell. Our running was the signal to the Yeerk in the control tower, who would then order the hunter robots to attack Visser One. The trick would then be to get our people in place to carry away the Visser's body before the loyalist Yeerks could see that he was dead. Then we would morph to Andalite and take over the invasion effort entirely – which, of course, meant that we would order it slowed down and discreetly conspire with the human governments. Maybe even reach some kind of a settlement.

I reached out to touch the Visser's flank, but he chose just that moment to trot thirty meters to our left, approaching one of his Lieutenants. «Report,)() he ordered curtly.

The soldier stood at attention. "Four thousand, three hundred and eighteen new human hosts have been acquired within the last twelve hours, Visser. We have another two thousand unhosted humans locked up in the cages. We just received three thousand more Yeerks from the pool ship, but it's going to take time to get them all into host bodies. We're going to start overcrowding the containment facilities."

The Visser shook his head, all four eyes focused on the reporter. «Order the Taxxons to extend the pool's perimeter by ten feet in each direction. Tell them to eat any host bodies in the cages that need to be moved.)()

Slowly, we stalked towards the Visser, glancing around at all the cages that were along the pool's perimeter. Over five hundred humans and Hork-Bajir, sentenced to death just to make room for more Yeerks.

«We're not all like this, I swear,)() Ewell said guiltily in my head.

«I know,)() I responded grimly. «But I'm going to make him pay.)()

One stalk eye swiveled towards us as my hand came down hard on the Visser's rump. I closed my eyes and started concentrating on the Andalite form, but the Visser didn't fall into the acquiring trance fast enough. He swung his tail blade down and sliced my hand off clean at the wrist.

"AHHHHHHHH!" I screamed, the blood gushing from the stump as I started to back away. The Visser turned his body to face me.

«Going somewhere, Animorph?)() he taunted. He raised his tail blade again, but before he could bring it down on my head, it was singed by a hunter robot's laser weapon. I didn't need another opportunity – I turned and started flat-out running.

Three more laser blasts sounded behind me. «Oh, it's traitors, then, is it?)() he complained. «Computer, Elfangor!)()

At the shout of the long-dead Andalite's name, every hunter robot in the Pool area self-destructed.

Sub-Visser Eighty-Three (Orkath)

I made it into the pool. I was amazed that I'd even had time to morph mosquito. My little Yeerk antennae heard something that sounded kind of like a groan, and I thought for sure that was the foot coming for me. I guess it was Chris, waking up. The guard probably was too focused on him to notice me on the floor.

Once I was in the mosquito morph, it was much easier than my earlier shared experience with Chris. Turns out mosquitoes fly with little miniaturized air currents, such as the kind a human makes when they move. And since the Yeerk pool was the center of attention down here, most of the minitaturized air currents were moving towards it. I demorphed to Yeerk and opened up my pores, the sweet nutrients passing all over me. For a long time, I floated there and just fed. Eventually, something akin to a commotion started going on above me, but I couldn't focus on it. I was as a human stranded on an island for days who finally discovers a buffet. I could think of nothing but how sweet the rays of the Kandrona tasted upon my body.

Until I heard the Visser shout out, ()(Oh, it's traitors, then, is it,)() because then I knew that it was someone I cared about that was in trouble. I swam over to the edge of the pool and started growing, assuming Chris' form. But I was barely a foot long when the entire world exploded around me, hurtling me into the air.

Christopher Windward

I stepped out of the oatmeal shelter, eyes scanning all over the dismal pool, ignoring the wails of the condemned. I looked for anything trouble-like, because I figured if there was anything going on, Orkath would probably be a part of it. I spotted Visser One talking to one of his lieutenants. I crouched by one of the cages to get a better look, and wound up taking a heel to the face. I flew away from the cage, landing on my rump.

"Die, Yeerk," the woman who'd kicked me snarled, spitting at me. I recalled her from a mission briefing I'd attended shortly before I was given the morphing power. She was Jeanne Berenson, mother of Animorph leader Jake Berenson.

I wanted to take a moment to tell her I was free, that my Yeerk and so many others were helping her son in this war. Instead I got up and rubbed my face. "I don't have time for you," I grunted, stepping towards the Visser.

That was when I saw Eric reaching out for him, and I saw his tail slice Eric's hand off. "Noo!" I yelled – a sound fortunately drowned out by all the other moans and screams around me. I started running in that direction, but Martin tackled me just as the hunter robots started to go berserk on the Visser.

"It's all part of a plan," he whispered in my ear.

"It's suicide!" I yelled back, but my eyes stayed focused on my brave would-be boyfriend as he ran to find a place to hide. Already his beautiful blonde hair was starting to show streaks of red. The Visser yelled something into the air and the hunter robots all self-destructed.

"Damn," Martin cursed. "He must have had the system rigged." He snickered. "Give it up for the Visser. More paranoid than I thought."

"I've got to get to him," I insisted.

"You'll just get yourself caught, too," Martin hissed. "Focus on finding Orkath."

I elbowed Martin, and he tumbled backward. "Not Eric, the Visser. I've got to distract him, buy Eric some getaway ti.." I paused in mid-sentence, shocked. Amidst the humans in the cages cheering Eric on, I'd recognized a familiar voice. I turned my head and looked. It was my brother, Chance. He was in one of the cages near the infestation pier.

I ran quickly towards the cage, determined to open it. I didn't care who saw me or what they'd realize when they did – I /wasn't/ letting my big brother get taken by the Yeerks.

Eric Campbell

I had one chance – morphing. I started concentrating as much as I could on Chris' form, idly musing that it was a good thing I had spent so many times studying said form in the locker room at school. I had treated each longing glare as if it were a matter of life and death, and now that urgency was vindicated.

I could feel the stump of my left hand jutting outward, forming a new stump, new fingers. I wasn't clear enough on the morphing to know whether or not my injury would return when I demorphed, but for the moment, at least, the bleeding was stopping and I was getting two hands again. Not even a four-eyed Andalite could focus on all the different hunter robots without taking his eyes off of me, and I took the opportunity to melt into the crowd. My Civil Air Patrol uniform made it easier, at least, as there were plenty of troops of all branches down in the cavern. With a flash of insight, I reasoned my only real chance of escape – I bolted for a cage and dug out the key as quickly as I could. If I could just lock myself inside before the Visser caught my eye!

«Quick, the brass one, hurry!)() Ewell cried, not daring to try to help physically.

Unfortunately, the Visser caught sight of me just as I was closing the cage door. What he was seeing was Chris, of course, or Sub-Visser Eighty-Three. But he knew the real Sub-Visser wouldn't be locking himself in a cage.

I expected him to rush me, to bark out orders. But his stalk eyes swiveled towards each side. I followed the gaze of his left stalk-eye and I saw the ice-cream vendor in Chris morph, running down one of the train station platforms.

Then I followed the gaze of his right stalk-eye and I saw another Chris, presumably the real Chris, running towards one of the cages on the far bank of the pool.

Each Chris noticed the Visser's gaze and paused a moment, locked in some bizarre three-on-one stare.

And then, before anyone could say or do anything, a train launched off the track and flew into the Yeerk pool, smashing hundreds of slugs into the cavern walls.