Jake and the other Animorphs have ventured into the Proving Grounds to conquer their more difficult to contain morphs. While Jake transforms into a tiger and wrestles against the mighty animal's mind for dominance, the Old Bloods review the data again and hold another conversation, with the main topics being the safety of the other Old Bloods in the face of The Controller's hunt, and the greatest threat to the group's cohesion.
In a Darker Place
Tobias watched as Jake descended into the pit, disappearing from the inner tower's camera feed.
((Jake's taken the dive,)) Tobias reported from his chair in the observation deck that was directly above Marco, who was still trying to get a hold of his fly morph.
((Ah, I figured he'd be last!)) Harry said, disappointed.
((So, you know what that means,)) Ben said, his voice holding a hint of smug triumph.
((Cassie just dipped in,)) Ellen chimed in.
((Hey, I'm not paying you anything yet!)) Harry said from inside the shack where Marco was currently a fly, motioning with his extremely pale arms. ((He wasn't the last in, but if he's not the last to conquer his morph, then that's when you get it. That bet's overwritten, if Jake is not the last to conquer his morph, then I give you double. Which is obviously never going to happen!))
((And no further reiterations of the bet,)) Ben said.
((Now that they're all in there,)) Tobias interrupted the debate. ((I think this is the perfect time to discuss the meaning of the information we've gathered, and what it means for the rest of us.))
The Old Bloods grew silent, any intent on small talk that existed was crowded out by the serious nature of the question.
((The Controllers are way too close to the water filtration plant, and last time I checked, there's a healthy amount of ETCS personnel living here, too,)) Tobias summarized. ((They're not just killing Andalites and Old Bloods, they're trying to take over the ETCS as well.))
Harry cursed through his teeth.
((Anything else is useless,)) Ellen said from the observation chamber, stowed away above the room where the, slowly clenching her pale hand into an even paler fist. ((They've been allowed to cause too much damage for too long, and now that they're being taken over by the one alien faction capable of conquering the planet? It's not a debate anymore, they should be wiped out.))
((I agree,)) Harry said. ((Even without their resources combined, we're way outnumbered.))
Tobias stared at the elderly lady, sitting in a chair of her own, looking into Cassie's progress in her own screen, which showed her transforming into a wolf, the grey and black fur growing down her back like a shaggy rug, her mouth and nose elongating and fusing to form a muzzle. a tail sprouted from her behind and grew to a foot before the advancing carpet of fur reached it and made it into a shaggy feather duster.
((No,)) Tobias sternly said, noting that Jake had begun his own transformation already. He put his hand on the controls.
((Are you blind?)) Harry pointed out. ((ETCS are the deadliest group of humans on the planet, and the most genocidally anti-alien. We can't take them on when they have the full backing of an alien faction!))
((But how do you know that they have taken over a significant portion of ETCS?)) Alice pointed out, Rachel fully turned into a bear.
((You saw Eyelizard's footage,)) Tobias said. ((They said that they were suffering a manpower shortage, or whatever 'man' means to them. They very well might not be able to take it over.))
((Even ignoring that,)) Ben chimed in. ((The tracker data, and site of the ambush indicate they don't operate outside of The State, and ETCS' headquarters is 600 miles from the border to California.))
((How could you be against obliterating those freaks after what they've done to us?)) Harry pointed out.
((Never,)) Ben testily replied in a tone of steely ice. ((Now is not the time. We have bigger problems.))
((Like the fact that the remaining Old Bloods still scattered are in danger,)) Alice said. ((If ETCS is responsible for the anti-morph serum, then they could taint every faucet in the nation.))
Tobias nodded, relieved that Alice had gotten to the main issue he was trying to point out.
((Anti-morph Serum is especially bad for us,)) Tobias clarified. ((Even if this threat isn't that widespread, then I have to go find them and bring them back. They may be safe for now, but I don't know how much longer that can last.))
((How many of them do you think can fight?)) Harry said. ((The defects are not something to laugh at, you and Alice may be cool, but Ellen, Ben, and I? Our bodies are still too weak to actually take a hit. My legs still get rickety if I'm on my feet longer than 15 minutes!))
Ben turned to give Harry a fierce stare, but before anything could come, Tobias' response beat him to the punch.
((That's right,)) Tobias nodded. ((And if the poison hurt Jake and his friends that bad, that quick, then it'd hurt us even worse.))
((But can we even hold them?)) Ellen pointed out. ((The houses in this place are barely livable, and those are just the ones in the best condition.))
((We'll cross that when we come to it,)) Tobias pointed out, turning to Alice. ((And it's not like I haven't lived in worse places than that in the past. And there's more, an anomaly has appeared.))
((Before I left ETCS, I caught wind of an entity, or group of entities, running around slaughtering Andalites and ETCS. Wiping out entire groups dozens strong,)) Alice pointed out.
Tobias saw Alice's report on that, it was one of the first things she privately brought up to him.
((So you're saying some alien's have been taking shots at them?)) Ellen asked. ((What's strange about that?))
((No,)) Tobias said. ((What makes this unusual is that this anomaly has been given a name to the rest of ETCS: Animorph.))
The entire room went silent, not even their breaths dared to interrupt the silence. It was so quiet that everyone could hear the tiny notification sounds that came from the consoles observing the Animorphs in their battle morphs.
((Well,)) Ben said. ((Whatever this thing is, if it's prompted Amin Torelli himself to bring that up to the rest of the organization, then it must be hurting them bad.))
((Well...what are we going to do about that?)) Harry said.
((It seems to have no interest in us, they're lingering in Oregon,)) Tobias said, sparing a glance to Jake, who has finished morphing, he could see the tiger prowling in the dark, investigating his surroundings. He flipped a few switches before returning his gaze to the rest of the delegation, ((We have nothing on it, we'll cross this bridge, whatever it is, when the time comes to do so.))
Tobias took a deep breath before his face grew hard as stone, his eyes steel.
((As many problems as ETCS causes, their absence would mean instability that can be easily exploited by all of the invaders. Are you suggesting we kill Marco's Dad? Humanity's situation is already unstable enough without wiping their strongest faction off the face of the planet! We already have too many enemies without making them ourselves! We should be actively trying to avoid destroying their trust!))
(('Destroying their trust?')) Harry repeated, scoffing.
((How about reevaluating where we put our trust? Marco's connected to ETCS,)) Harry pointed out, sparing a glance to Alice. ((Actual ETCS, not a plant. How can we guarantee our 'friend' practicing his insectoid impression downstairs won't betray us?))
((Because Marco is not Amin Torelli, nor are any of them,)) Tobias defended vehemently. ((Father decided to trust them, even taking Marco's connections into account. is that not enough for you?))
((Oh, did he? You're not forgetting about the part where he ordered you to hide the truth from them, are you?)) Harry acidly bit back.
Tobias and Harry stared at eachother, but Harry's anger couldn't withstand Tobias' resolve, and he broke eye contact.
((But if They are targetting the ETCS, what are we going to do when they eventually get to Marco's family?)) Ben asked.
((And if we can't keep the power a secret from Marco's Dad, then what's stopping ETCS from disappearing them for it?)) Ellen questioned.
((Our strategy remains unchanged, we're still going by Father's plan,)) Tobias declared, clenching his fist. ((We pacify all of the hostile aliens, and then after a few months to prepare, we obliterate ETCS for their crimes, root out the corruption of humanity's leadership, and we finally kill Amin Torelli for the betrayer he is.))
((But how would your childhood friends just accept human beings as their enemy?)) Ben asked, uncertain, scared. ((Would the bonds we forge in battle be enough for them to...be able to trust us enough to override their reputation?))
((And what's your plan if ETCS starts going for us before we finish the invasions?)) Harry asked.
Tobias flinched and hissed in anger through his clenched teeth.
((We'll cross the bridge when we come to it! Alice!)) Tobias snapped, and the Master of Shadows gave him a green eyed stare. ((Give me the locations of the remaining Old Bloods. And on further consideration, I'm overdue for a visit to our friends in the Grand Canyon.))
Tobias returned to monitering his console, paying close attention to Jake.
Father. What do I do? I'm not ready for this. None of us are...
I fell in the dark pit, the wind whipping my hair as I clung to the pod in fear at the sudden fall. Almost as suddenly as I began my descent, I stopped, my body yanked and jarred at the end of the rope. The pod began to purge my arm from itself with a strange sensation that felt like some cool silly putty was being rolled over my skin.
My eyes widened in fear, and I struggled to keep holding on, it was so dark that I couldn't even see my own skin, my elbow emerged, then my wrist, then I was only in there by my fingers.
"Ahh!" I said as I was dropped, landing on soft earth.
I looked around in the near total darkness, and when I felt the ground with my hands, I found that it was some sort of sand, even though it was too dark to see anything, I could tell from the light above that this wasn't colored like ordinary sand. I looked up from where I sat down as the pod that brought me here began to ascend, moving just as suddenly as it did when it brought me here. There was a ring of light that shone above as the only source of illumination, it was bright, but only in the way that the full moon was, and it illuminated just as much by itself and looked small enough for me to put my finger through it.
When the pod that brought me here returned to its original spot, the ring of light stopped shining, and the hole in the ceiling was so far away that no ambient light was visible. Even if I could see with whatever light made it from the hole to the tower, I heard a groaning sound like a giant stone door to an ancient temple being opened sound off above, and when the thud came I knew that the entrance was closed, I had been sealed inside.
The next thing I knew I remembered what would happen next, as Tobias had relayed it to me on the way to the Proving Grounds.
"After I morph," I whispered. "The chamber will turn into an environment that is uncomfortable for the creature I am turning into, and the machines in here will jostle me awake."
I took a deep breath and readied myself to morph, I leaned forward and put my hands into the sand in the pitch black, I put my bare legs forward until my feet were on the ground instead of my knees. Then I focused.
I waited patiently for the changes to begin happening, but it didn't take me long to realize that I wasn't turning into an elephant.
Not enough biomass, I concluded. I shouldn't be surprised.
I shifted my focus, and again near obsessively visualized the animal in my mind.
Tiger.
And this time, the changes came with the sound of shifting sand, slow at first, as it is everytime a new creature is morphed for the first time, the first thing to happen were my bones readjusting, the discomfort in my waist from the four legged position disappeared as my pelvis and spine adjusted to a quadropedal form, then my legs rearranged themselves into the shape of a proper big cat before they expanded. My front arms swelled as the muscles in there changed their position, and grew more powerful, more explosive rippling power entered my limbs until my arms were as buff as a body champion builder, but far stronger! No matter how they trained they couldn't even come close to this level of power!
My hands took the longest time to change, and they were the part the changes in I felt the most, certain parts of my hand grew in size, the palms grew, and my fingers grew too, however they only widened, not lengthened. The fingers actually shortened while the palms of my hand were covered with black pads, my fingernails grew into massive claws, but as my fingers shrunk in length they were concealed by my big cat hide.
A tail sprouted from my back and extended out from my body, my hands and feet turned into paws, my nose and mouh extended into a snout with my jaw locking intself into place so that it could only move up and down without breaking, and my body lengthened and increased in size, the very faint sloshing feeling of my internal organs rearranging themselves was as real as the itching sensation that overcame my scalp and paws and spread down to the rest of my skin, including my face, which was a tiger's snout. Shortly after the spread of the tiger's hide overriding my own human skin, I felt my hair recede and change, alongside a multitude of new hairs bursting out from my hide and spreading across my body, following the spread of the tiger's skin like grass growing over a barren hill from a small grove where the seeds were planted.
Once the carpet of orange and black fur reached my waist, the underwear I was wearing vanished, there was no human equipment to hide.
The awkward grinding as my skull changed in shape was as obvious as the strange tingling of my eyes turning into that of a big cat's, I breathed in through my nose and the air was more alive, I could smell more scents in here, that of many many animals that I couldn't identify, that were here in this place a long long time ago.
My internal clock knew that a few minutes had passed until the changes were complete, and the animal overtook me.
The first thing I noticed it was dark, but sandy, there was no cover, nothing to conceal me from my prey, or from any attackers. I could smell that this place was big, and that many animals that I did not recognize the scent of had passed through here, but a long time ago.
Areas with no concealment are not a good place for me, I need to move and find foilage in order to hunt and figure out where here is. Which is a problem, since it is so dark that somehow not even the stars or the Moon are visible, troublesome, if it's too dark for even my eyes to rely on, then I must navigate out of this place using my smell. I smell no tigers here, though, so if I find some shrubbery and the animals I smell return along with the light in this place, this would be a hunting ground I could work with.
All of a sudden the room was brightly illuminated! A light flashed above like a gigantic sun, it was daytime, Noon, but this is too sudden! Too bright!
I growled and froze in surprise, blinking away the bright light, and leaving my eyes in a narrow squint when they adjusted. The black sand was shiny and reflective, it was just more stinging pain for my eyes.
Then I heard a sound like a roar, and the ground near me started rumbling. Earthquake? Sinkhole? I shouldn't stay here!
I turned away and started running in the opposite direction of the rumbling, shifting sand, climbing over the dune with my paws.
An explosion sounded off behind me, and another roaring sound emanated from the placed where the rumbling was. Not a natural disaster, an animal.
Even more reason to not be caught in the open! If it's prey, then I can get the drop on it if it doesn't spot me, if it's a rival, then I should keep my distance regardless. Just as I climbed over the dune, I felt a kick between my legs.
It dare attack my reproductive organs?!
I turned to face my enemy and it was some thing I did not recognize. It was long and an obnoxious shade of red, it wasn't a snake and it certainly wasn't a cat, even though it was way longer than me, if was not much bigger and that made it more vulnerable!
Attack!
When I saw my opponent I rushed back down the dune to punish its attack with my own!
Its limbs were long and spindly, as was its neck and head, I leapt from the uneasy ground to the creature's face. The light glaring from both above and below, when my teeth connected to that thing's throat I began ripping at its soft flesh with my claws and teeth. Its flesh was too soft, my teeth just went right through it, the satisfaction arose in me as my teeth and claws went in deep into its face and throat. But then it began shrieking this horrible deafening wail that just grated me in all the wrong ways. But never mind that, it'll be over soon, and this offensive thing will pay for-
THUD!
I was suddenly sent flying head over heels and landed back in the sand, the creature was shaking, it extended its cut neck and shook its head, getting droplets of sticky blood all over my pelt.
This thing really needs to die.
Day 10, Evening
"Thank you, so much," Jacob said, sitting in the large chair, it was a red bowl shaped thing the seat of which was a beanbag chair, the room was full of windows and even had a skylight, but outside it was dark, the sky was black, and no hope of starlight could get through. The room was illuminated by a couple of lamps, all of which were red. "You have no idea how much I appreciate you doing this for me."
"Oh, anytime. And you'd be surprised at how good I am at estimating how much gratitude someone has," Tom casually accepted Jacob's appreciation while he sat at the table in between them, rifling through a number of sheets of paper.
"So, what is this job you're offering, about?"
Tom stopped messing with the stuff in front of him and sighed. He slowly, deliberately, raised his head from looking at the table and stared at Jacob directly.
"Well, it's a bit complicated. First up, I'm going to tell you some things, things that you won't want to hear, things you might even get angry about."
Jacob's eyes narrowed in skepticism as he swallowed, his Adam's apple moving.
"Before I begin, I need you to make me a promise," Tom said, scratching the back of his head. "Promise you won't get too mad, or...physical."
"What? No!" Jacob said, shaking his head. "Of course not! Why would I hit you? You've been so nice to me, you even advocated for me to become a Sharing Member a month early after what happened to my meat shop."
"A frickin' travesty, that," Tom spat as he got up and walked around the large table to where Tom was sitting. "But thank you."
Tom kneeled down in front of Jacob and cleared his throat.
"Tell me, are you aware of how much of...society is permeated with lies?"
"Lies?" Jacob echoed, not catching his hint.
"What kind are you aware of?" Tom asked. "What misinformations did the trusted sources publish? What deceptions did the public at large swallow?"
Jacob's face scrunched up in thought, "There's the deliberate misreporting of the Israel-Palestine issue, and anything the authoritarians across the seas say to justify holding onto power, but other than that nothing comes to mind."
"What about the lies in America?" Tom asked, removing something from his left pocket, unfolding the white squares as he spoke, his jean covered knees on the carpet. "A lie accepted is far more dangerous than a lie rejected. And the most dangerous liars are the ones who are able to fabricate a lie so lifelike that separating it from reality would be impossible, especially legally."
"Now what do you think of these?" Tom put the picture forward.
"Huh...?!" Jacob saw the contents of the photo and shouted in outrage. "What the Hell?! Where did you get that?!"
Jacob got up from the bean bag chair and grabbed Tom by the collar, lifting him up off the ground. The photos, including the one at front, the one of Tom making love with Jacob's Mother forgotten in favor of seizing the perpetrator.
"Exactly my point!" Tom said, raising his hands in between himself and the much buffer teenager, his voice and tone innoffensive. "Take a good look at the photos."
Jacob's eyes widened when he understood Tom's point. He gently set Tom back on the ground, looked to his right and picked the fallen photos back up, looking at them with the pure white light illuminating his chair. He filtered through them, wincing at their disgustingf contents.
"Try to look for seams, discrepencies," Tom said. "Evidence of alteration. Look as hard as you possibly can!"
Jacob prerused the photos, their offensive contents were shocking, and even contradictory to history. The man in that infamous photo of the soldier shooting the crying man was now reversed, the soldier was now being shot and executed instead, his would-be victim laughing. John F. Kennedy shooting his would-be shooter from his open roofed car, his wife cheering him on.
"That's right, you don't see any, do you?" Tom interrupted Jacob's examination. "But I promise you, every single one of these photos are pure fabrication! It's the real fake..."
"A fake so real," Jacob finished, falling back down onto his seat. "That you can't separate it from reality."
Jacob's eyes darkened and he looked to Tom.
"Destroy them," he demanded.
"As you wish," Tom snatched the photos in an instant, took out his Zippo lighter and set the pictures to fire.
"What are you doing, you'll start a fire!"
"The carpet's fire retardant," Tom dismissed as the photos went up in flames, and he dropped them, afterwards they immedaitely fizzled out. "See?"
"But how is this possible?" Jacob whispered, shaken. "How did you make those? And why are you telling me this?"
"Haven't you already guessed?" Tom said, walking over beside Jacob, and pulling another chair of the exact same as the one he was sitting on, and positioned it so that the dip in the bowl that allowed people to sit on it was facing Jacob. Tom rested on the chair, facing Jacob. "I'm blowing the whistle on conspiracies!"
"Conspiracy theories?" Jacob dismissed, snorting. "If you're going to lie to me and dupe me into believing a conspiracy theory-"
"Then why would I go into detail on how flawlessly constructed said lies can be?" Tom interrupted. "How byzantine the methods in which those with ulterior motives are willing and able to hide the truth can be? Are you really ready to dismiss that the photos you just saw were deep fake, or that the tax hike that shut down your meat shop wasn't because your 'leaders' wanted a pay raise?"
Jacob's breath hitched in his throat, his mind and body had ground to a halt.
"Okay, I get the memo," Jacob said after a good minute. "What is it you want to tell me?"
Tom smiled and got up from his chair, reaching into his other pocket.
"Okay, the juicy bit. I, Tom, am currently hosting in my head, a symbiote lifeform."
"...A symbiote lifeform?" Jacob repeated. "What does that mean?"
"It means that we are in an arrangement that benefits the both of us," Tom explaiend. "He sees what I sees, hears, tastes, and feels what I feel as well, and in return we can collaborate, coordinate our separate brainpower and thought processes to do incredible things!"
"Really?" Jacob said, laughing. "Prove it."
Tom smiled and reached into his pockets, which Jacob noted looked wierdly full. Tom took out a thumb ring with a long spike on it, his zippo lighter, a typing pad, a vanilla wafer cookie, and a bunch of small colorful balls.
Jacob's eyebrow raised in curiosity, intrigued.
Tom put on the thumb ring and transferred the wafer to the same hand, resting close to the wrist along with his lighter and the balls. He began typing on the little pad and using the thumb ring with a giant spike on it to carve into the vanilla wafer, as Tom threw his zippo into the air, Jacob flinched, but the lighter came back down into Tom's hand, he threw it up again but this time all of the colorful balls as well. The zippo lighter and the juggling balls all landed on Tom's hand ina way that his thumb was untouched, able to keep on carving into that wafer cookie while he juggled with a single hand...with half a hand! And typing at the same time with the other hands.
Jacob was mesmerized, unable to believe what he was seeing, his jaw began to drop. The display went on for about a minute until Tom stopped carving on the cookie with his thumb, stopped typing with the other hand, and caught all of the objects he was juggling flawlessly. Tom turned around, took off the ring with a spike on it, retracted the spike back into the ring, dropped the balls onto the chair, put the ring back in his pocket, turned around and gave Jacob the cookie and the type pad.
'Welcome to The Sharing,' the vanilla wafer read.
'Anymore questions you want to ask?' was what the type pad says.
Jacob's widened and he stared at Tom accusingly.
"Alien! You let them inside your head?"
"Yes, but they're not hostile or even unfreindly, they have no ill will towards humanity and thrive off of cooperation with the ones whose heads they inhabit."
"Prove it," Jacob demanded. "Prove to me that they're not yet another invader wanting to trample over us."
"Alright. It's time for my friend to take over," Tom said, before leaning down, closing his eyes before he snapped back up. All traces of the somewhat careless but serious person is gone, this was an entirely different personality speaking to Jacob.
"My name is Temrash, the galaxy is in a bit of a turbulent state," Tom, or his 'symbiote,' explained, picking the juggling balls and his zippo up and putting them back into his pocket. "The main perpetrators of this instability are a race of meddling supremacists called The Andalites. Because we cannot see, taste, touch, or experience the universe outside of a body belonging to another person, or in a robotic body made specifically for us, we are in their words, 'blind helpless bottom feeding freaks,' and therefore, are unworthy of having a civilization. This is the basis for the war between our species, the Andalites intend to remove all of our civilization, sending us back to the Stone Age, but they don't care that we would go extinct as a result of this."
Jacob was taken aback, this was definitely not Tom, the tone, the way he carries himself, even the amount of words he uses marked the speaker as a clearly different person.
"So why are you here?"
"The Andalites know that our greatest strength is our ability to cooperate with other sentient species. Another reason they wish to crush us is that, as you just saw, when working together with a host, we can perform physical feats that no member of that species could do by themselves...and I don't think I need to tell you anything as to how this would translate into combat performance."
"You're supersoldiers," Jacob said. "But how much would that actually matter in terms of space combat? Where lazers and ship to ship is the go-to weapon of choice?"
"Apparently to the Andalites, enough to feel the need to fight a war with us to stop us from being able to do so," Temrash explained further. "The Andalites are physically one of the most powerful species in the galaxy, deadly warriors whose speed, reflexes, and striking power makes them universally feared. Such a combination of physical and mental traits ensure that Andalite Warriors were untouchable...until we showed up, and they realized just how close to closing the gap one of us working together with a sapient host came. And naturally, we're here because humanity is one of the best suited species for one of us to be allied with, and the Andalites know it as well. And as such we sent a military force here to prevent the Andalites from ever bringing mankind to harm."
Jacob nodded slowly as his words ended.
"Makes sense," He said. "That makes sense, except, you seem to be doing a good job at protecting us from Andalites, but when it comes to everything else you're utter garbage. How many times were we teetering on the edge of collapse?"
"The Andalites are very very hard to deal with," Temrash explained. "We had to dedicate all of our resources on the planet to keeping them at bay, and for such a uniqeuly heavily populated world, with such a biodiversity that's rare in the galaxy, the Andalites of this planet have a huge advantage. Visser 3 was sent here to take charge of the defense. None of us can fight better than him, and he fights the Andalites better than anyone else in the galaxy, he understands them inside and out due to inhabiting the body of one and subduing him."
"So you can forcefully take control over someone," Jacob accused, but deep down he began to find it not hard to believe that Temrash's people really were that nice. "What's stopping you from doing that to us? What do you call yourselves? And what's a Visser anyway?"
"Ah, you ask the good questions," Temrash nodded. "We have all sorts of laws against involuntary co-habitation, to which enemy combatants are an acception. Vissers are guardian generals, they first emerged to defend us as champion warriors, but as we advanced, the organizations of power evolved, and now the Vissers are our foremost military leadership. If you ever see Visser 3 and notice anything unstable about him? It's because subduing people via infestation takes a toll. As for the name of our species, we never had one, we didn't see the need in the ancient times as most of our communication was done when we were not in our host bodies, and since then we let our reputation give our name for us...in hindsight, though, this wasn't the best idea."
"And you want me to host one of you?"
"No, no we don't," Temrash explained. "We don't have many of our kind on this planet that are available right now."
"Than what do you want me to do?" Jacob questioned, leaning down and holding his head. "This is all so much!"
"The Andalites have the ability to morph," Temrash explained. "They can become any creature they can touch, and they use this to infiltrate human society, spy on, and even kidnap people. Unfortunately, they have exploited your government."
"Oh no."
"It is corrupted, which means that the Andalites have forged a dark alliance with your leadership. Working together, they summoned the alien invasions you're suffering from, and though ETCS was founded in order to fight it, in truth, it's the Andalite's military wing on Earth, comprised entirely of traitors to humanity who ensure the Andalite's interests are served, right now they fight to preserve and expand the power of whatever corrupt politician class is ruling America right now...at least until the government's interests conflict with those of their alien masters."
Jacob shook his head, looking up at the dark ceiling. He stood up, trying to take in the information.
"The Andalites can shapeshift, other than infiltration, they use this power to survive a multitude of injuries. We have devised a way of detecting them when they morph humans, and our strike teams have found massive success. The bad news however, is that when in morph, they're basically immortal, they can control their morphed bodies, even when dead, and they've returned from the grave a number of times to keep attacking. So we devised another solution to keep them out of the fight, and that's where you come in."
"What am I to do?"
Temrash, in Tom's body, got up from the chair and began walking to a door on the far end of the room, Jacob began following him.
"We're currently understaffed, in order to implement this solution, I suggested utilizing local volunteers to ensure that this suppression of the Andalite incursions is less prone to hiccups. I'm currently in talks with my superiors about the amount of pay you will recieve."
"Pay?" He said. "Oh thank God, I'm still getting paid for this. As long as this Visser 3 of yours makes sure that the money is decent, we should be good."
"Visser 3?" Temrash said, his face a little confused as he and his guest moved around in the dark building. "This isn't his domain, this matter is delegated to one of his Undervissers."
"Undervissers?" Jacob asked as they reached the edge of the room.
"The ones responsible for the behind the scenes stuff," Tom explained, opening the door to the next hallway. "If Vissers are the generals, then Undervissers are the logistical masters who take care of the finer moving parts of the machine of civilization, ensuring that it keeps operating smoothly. He'll hook you up with everything you need, and if you're lucky, you'll get enough money to...well, I don't know how much the maximum is, but you're going to get paid. Paid enough that your entire family might never have to work again!"
Jacob nodded, a smile on his face.
"Now come, Jacob, there will be plenty of time for you to think on this as we gather the other volunteers. This is a big operation," Tom said as they both walked through the door, the tall wooden panel slowly closing shut.
"How familiar are you with scalpels?"
I was smacked aside as I lunged at the offending creature again, landing in the sand as it shrieked its infuriating wail.
Why won't you die! You...you...you-
Suddenly, just like that I snapped back, the horrible wailing of the machine stopped, its skin was in tatters and its green sticky blood was everywhere. All of a sudden the droplets, including the stuff that was on me, moved off of my body. The grains of black sand perforated my orange hide, which were no longer reflective and looked just like regular sand, the glaring lights died down to a level that was comfortable for my eyes, which was pretty dark, but not the all consuming shroud it was when I entered here.
Yes. I did it, I realized, feeling the rippling power of my muscles, but also the big cat's exhaustion. I control The Tiger now!
Almost smiling at my triumph, I reared up on my hind legs, looking up at the dark cieling as I began to demorph.
((Congratulations, Jake,)) Tobias said as the artificial creature regenerated, the blood trickling up its skin from its feet to reenter its body, once all of the viscera was inside the wounds sealed shut. The pale greenish white dinosaur looking thing then dug down and buried itself in the sand. ((It looks like you're the first to take control!))
The bones in my legs and back adjusted into that of a creature that stood upright, my upper body shortened while the muscles in my arms shrank. My chest and neck changed so that breathing was not difficult, and as the place where my spine connected to my head changed, I found myself looking from the ceiling to the black dunes. The creature was gone. My THe fingers of my hand lengthened as they shrunk to their normal human size, the claws being forced out of their retractible sheaths before they widened and ounded out into my fingernails. I traded the pads on my paws for human dexterity, my shoulder shrunk and the movement of my jaw all of a sudden became a lot freer. The sight in my eyes went dark as the fur on my body began to recede, and my underwear reappeared with my human skin.
My muzzle shrunk into a face, my teeth lost their sharp points, and my tail shrunk into my back until it became nothing.
When I returned to my human body I collapsed on the ground.
"Ah...ha...aah," I panted, squeezing the black sand between my fingers, letting it cake on the sweat accumulating on my legs, feeling it as it seeped underneath my finger and toenails.
"I did it," I whispered before smiling and breaking out into weak laughter, fully cementing what I had just done.
"I did it. The first real step to learning this power," I said, smiling as I got up despite my exhaustion. "Hang on, Tom, I'm coming to save you, and next, the world!"
((Tobias,)) I sent out. ((I'm ready to go back up.))
I waited, looking at the surroundings, not nearly so dark as they were when I entered, I heard a clicking/hissing sound, I turned to see the pod that carried me into this pit descend into the dunes, shimmering like a falling star. Did I really get that far?
Dragging my exhausted legs toward the pod was a chore, but my high spirits made ignoring how spent I was very easy. Morphing larger animals must be very taxing.
I climbed over the last hill of cool black sand when the pod reached the ground, I saw the pawprints my tiger morph had made, surprisingly that thing Tobias had controlled was careful in not disturbing the sand. When I reached the ooblong white device I hugged it and mentally gave it a command, again its smooth alabaster white surface rippled as my arms sunk into it, this time shoulder deep. A blue light flashed, the rippling stopped and the pod resolidified with my arms still inside of it.
Just as suddenly as it dropped me in here, it picked me up, jarring my insides, I looked up at the light that I was rising into.
I am dead and being taken to heaven, the thought suddenly burst into my head, prompting me tos tart chuckling at the thought. The single light then split into a ring of individual lights, and then the ring widened until I could see the sky above the hole. The pod stopped just as suddenly as it started, again I was dangling over the pit, I looked down to see that the ambient light inside was fading as the door to the pit closed, sealing that place away in the darkness yet again. Once solid ground was underneath my feet my arms began to melt from the pod, I pulled, speeding the process, soon enough I landed on the cool stone with my bare feet. I looked up at the dusty spiraling corridor that brought me here and started jogging up it, I ascended at a steady pace, circling the loop until I reached the top of the tower and looked out across the space where the other towers were, the entire place was wide as an NFL football field!
When I looked at the tops of the towers I noticed Rachel's and Cassie's clothes discarded, Rachel's were folded neatly while Cassie's were I think wrapped up in her own overalls.
They probably wouldn't appreciate me being here to see them return here naked.
Oh, nuts, there's Cassie, she poked up above the tower while I was looking at her clothes. She noticed me pretty quickly and ran back down, poking her head out just high enough to see me.
I looked away from my girlfriend peeking out from tower and back to the wall until I noticed the place where I had come from, once I did I began walking back down the stairs to the floor.
Man this is a lot of walking.
After jumping off the last stair I walked on the cold floor to the door where Marco was training to control his fly morph.
((Hey, Tobias? You got a chair in there?)) I asked. ((I'm pretty tuckered out.))
((Yo, Jake-man!)) Marco said.
((Marco! Glad to know you got a handle on the fly!))
((Me too, but Tobias wanted me to tell you that The Old Bloods are currently talking about something, it's pretty big,)) Marco said.
Pretty big? I wondered.
((What could it possibly be?))
((Dunno,)) Marco said as I reached the door to the smaller room, it began giving way. ((But Tobias wanted to wait to share the results of the debate when everyone was outsi-))
"Aaaaaaaaahh!" I screamed when I saw it.
((Who asked you?!)) Harry loudly admonished in my head.
I walked in the room just in time to see the most ugly thing I have ever seen, Marco was at the moment the perfect person to cast as the monster in The Fly! He was part boy, part insect, complete with shrinking gossamer wings, bulging red eyes, and most of his lower body was an exoskeleton. I turned away at the sight immediately.
((Is something wrong?!) Cassie asked, scared and concerned.
((Everything is just fine,)) I said. ((I just got surprised is all!))
((Oh, should've asked you to wait at the door...)) Marco ruefully commented.
((Couldn't you have told me you had just conquered your fly morph?))
((It happened really quickly, I've been morphing it and demorphing over and over again just so that wouldn't happen!)) Marco defended himself.
After that incident Ben chimed in that they needed to tell us something important, and to wait until Rachel was with us in order to be briefed on it. Cassie returned quickly, fully dressed, and after Marco and I got our our clothes back on, we dragged a bunch of chairs in a semi circle. Once Rachel returned I stood up and approached her.
"Welcome back, Rach," I said, holding my hand out.
She accepted my fist bump.
"Last, but not least," she remarked as I heard a faint hissing sound and then that classic tomb-like noise of stone dragging on stone.
I looked to where the noise was coming from to see Tobias, Ben, Alice, Ellen, and Harry standing on a large circular platform that was descending to the floor. Harry and Ben in particular looked displeased.
Marco started clapping suddenly.
"Bravo, bravo!" Marco said.
"...W-what for?" Harry asked.
"With the right posing," Marco said as the platform landed on the floor, prompting the others to walk off. "You could look like some serious superheroes!"
They immediately walked over to the chairs and sat down.
"Alice," Tobias said, sitting down while holding his face in his hand. "I think you should break it to them."
She nodded before turning her green eyes to us.
"While you were training down there, we had another discussion on what the water poisoning," Alice said. "We discussed the effects that this stuff would have on the other Old Bloods, and we've decided that we need to retrieve the rest of them before they get afflicted with this venom."
"What?" Cassie asked. "What do you mean?"
"It means you need to leave again," I said, shaking my head. "But you literally just got here!"
"Something's not adding up," Rachel said. "I thought you were the only Old Bloods running around?"
"There are others," Harry said.
"You said that the Anti-morph serum only affects morphers, right?" Marco asked. "Do they have the morphing technology? Because they should be safe otherwise!"
"That one's a bit more complicated..." Ben said.
"Because we're the descendants of morphed Andalites," Alice continued. "We have some of the traits of their morphing tech passed down to us, and this leaves us to an extent vulnerable to the Anti-morph serum, it can also exacerbate the symptoms of Hemovorvoros. And if even if this poison isn't being dumped into the drinking water outside of California-"
"...You need to retrieve them before that happens," I finished.
"Well, what happened to not expanding the team before we learn how to function as a team?" Marco questioned, agitated. "You're flip-flopping more than a breakdancer at a rave!"
"They won't be a part of the combat operations," Ellen explained. "Not until you figure yourselves out."
"Either way, it doesn't change the fact that they're in trouble," Tobias said. "I have all of their current locations, and am working on drawing travel routes to bringing them back. Whether or not I can do it safely on the other hand...I'm not sure."
"Why not?" Rachel asked, motioning towards the other Old Bloods. "You got Alice, Ben, Harry, and Ellen back just fine."
Tobias and Alice looked at eachother, Tobias' lips pressed tight.
"The situation has changed," Tobias confessed.
"The ETCS is on the hunt," Alice confessed. "They're looking for a creature, or group of creatures, they call Animorph."
We all remained silent, the glowing pulsing lights of the room highlighting their grave expressions.
"Oh," Marco said, snapping his fingers. "I knew I heard that word from somewhere before! My Dad told me about that!"
Oh yeah, I realized. He did...and I just gave that name to our team.
All of a sudden we were in total darkness.
"Oh, not again," Ellen said.
"What?" Rachel asked as Ben started to groan, his groan slowly becoming a scream of rage. "What's going on?"
((The Generator's out!)) Harry said over the sound of shifting sand, him morphing I presume. ((We're going to have to fix it! Hold on for a second.))
[3 Weeks and 4 days before Jake, Rachel, and Cassie recieved the morphing power]
Smoke and ash domianted the night sky, blotting out the Moon and stars. The fires had put themselves out long ago, and hooved feet tread across the blackened ground, the sound of crunching class emanated with every step. He surveyed the surroundings with his four eyes as he walked, great concern dominated his features and stances. The broken propeller blades of wrecked choppers rose from the ground like twisted bushes, military jeeps were dismantled all across the field, even the ETCS tanks that had been deployed to the forest had been decimated, one of them had even been flipped upside down.
But the Andalite was not alone, behind him one of those accompanying him walked up from behind and gave a report.
((Biometric scans?)) He asked in a cold, even voice.
"We have found evidence of only a single perpetrator," The Grasper repsonded, bowing his head low.
((How many times did you check?)) He demanded.
"We have looked over the entire area four times, no piece of wreckage was unscoured anywhere."
((So,)) Visser 3 said in response to the report, looking away from the long orange alien with its spindly limbs. ((It appears the rumours are true. An Animorph capable of destroying entire armies.))
((Alone,)) Visser 3 squinted as he continued to scan his surroundings.
"What will we do?" The Grasper asked.
((I cannot allow this thing to destroy what we've built, especially so soon after our victory over the blue furred tyrants!)) Visser 3 declared. ((Cease all spreading of the infiltration and focus on amplifying our security.))
Afteer Visser 3 spoke to his subordinates, he and the rest of the aliens departedpast the smoke, ash, and flames. Hiding in the wreckage of a chopper that had already been searched, but reinhabited, Warlike and Lotr waited as two inconspicuous insects.
((What are those?)) He asked.
((The Parasite,)) Lotr explained. ((The bodies you see them inhabit are not being operated under their own brain power, they've come to conquer the planet to inflict the same fate to the humans.))
((...Enslavers,)) Warlike whispered. ((Don't mind if I strip the flesh from their spines!))
((We cannot destroy them at this moment,)) Lotr explained. ((You just heard him, he's going to move to fortifty his position, he won't be spending time looking outside of their footholds. This gives us a headstart.))
((A headstart on what?)) Warlike demanded.
((To acquiring exactly the kind of edge we need,)) Lotr explained. ((Come, Warlike. Let us take this opportunity.))
And it is done, the last chapter of the year, the longest one I've uploaded yet, and the first one to be published on a set date. As stated in the chapter I uploaded on the 1st of December, 2021, I shall henceforth update this story twice every month, on the 1st, and then on the 17th, this, combined with the fact that I'm determined to make sure every chapter is 5000 words or more, is designed to illicit much satisfaction from you, the readers. And I've noticed that my viewcounts come in more reliably when I do this. I hope you all enjoyed the story so far, the coming future will not be an easy one to suffer, but I have faith we can endure it. Stay safe, but do not let fear affect your decision making, Merry Christmas, and may you enjoy The New Year