Chapter 14

Prince Jake had described his vision changing, so that he could see all sides of everything at once. Inside, outside, front, left, right, back, top, bottom.

But this was so much more.

An almost crack-like thing opened up in my vision. A window into another world.

I could turn my human head, and the crack would turn, too. Always staying in the center of my perspective.

And inside the crack?

Whiteness.

I knew what it was.

Visser Three recognized it, too.

{Zero-space?} he asked, as baffled as I was.

Prince Jake's vision change had occurred as the Yeerk died.

But this time, nobody was dying.

Right?

I peered into Zero-space.

Andalite scientists always told me there was nothing in Zero-space.

Just empty whiteness, stretching on infinitely far in every direction.

But this section of Zero-space wasn't empty.

It was a graveyard.

There were perhaps 30 Andalite corpses floating around, most in various forms of decay. Several were just bones.

One or two Andalites were still seemingly alive, writhing in pain.

They were slowly disintegrating, turning into bones.

They screamed incomprehensible animal sounds, their last shred of sanity long gone.

Then a new body floated by. A Yeerk.

What was going on?

I looked closely at a nearby Andalite.

Slowly, incredibly slowly, little black particles broke off his body and floated away, like grains of sand being blown by the wind.

I was watching his body disappear, bit by bit, atom by atom.

And then, I became aware of another different corpse.

It was a human.

And it was a human I recognized.

He looked at me with empty eye sockets, his eyes long since eroded.

His legs and arms were nearly gone, just off-white skeletal structures poking out of stumps.

I could see through his torso in several places, past his swiss cheese spine and out the other side.

His blond hair was nearly gone, just a few strands here and there.

He looked at me, with eye sockets that couldn't possibly see, and then, he spoke.

"Help me, Ax," David pleaded. "The pain never stops."

I crawled out of Visser Three's head. As soon as I could, I demorphed.

I was trembling when I finally returned to my Andalite form.

Marco was holding Visser Three. The abomination looked up at me with his bloody Nothlit face.

A face I had caused to be bloody.

I wondered if he was still staring partially into Zero-space.

How was I able to hear David's voice? I asked myself. There's no air in Zero-space, so sound shouldn't be able to travel.

{So…do we kill him or what?} Marco asked.

I shook off the creepy vision. Focus on the important thing.

{We have to,} said Rachel. {It's not even a question. The Visser dies.}

{Agreed,} said Marco.

I was about to agree with Rachel and Marco, but then Cassie spoke up.

{If we kill an unarmed prisoner, how are we better than the Yeerks?}

Good question.

{Let Ax make the call,} suggested Rachel. {He has the burden of revenge, after all.}

Yes. I did.

Visser Three had killed my brother, in a very similar situation.

It's totally different though, I thought to myself. My brother wasn't a mass murderer. My brother wasn't a war criminal. My brother wasn't an abomination.

My brother's blood dripping down my face.

Stop it!

I shook my head violently.

{Ax? Is that a no?} Marco asked.

{I'm thinking,} I said. {How is…}

Suddenly, Hannah swooped down, in her Cooper's hawk morph.

{A Yeerk search party is on it's way!} she warned. {They will be here in five minutes. They have sniffing dogs!}

{Ax!} Marco hissed. {Make the call, man! We all have to have wings before the Yeerks show up!}

I did have the burden of revenge. The laws of my people demanded it.

But the law also forbid giving humans morphing technology. My brother had broken that law, and the Animorphs had saved my life many times over.

I was alive because Elfangor broke the law.

Visser Three was a monster.

A serial killer.

An evil, evil person.

And he deserved to die.

But could I make that decision?

How would killing Visser Three now be any different than what Visser Three did to Elfangor?

Killing a defenseless prisoner.

But Visser Three was evil!

Visser Three had done so many horrible things, my time in his head I had barely scratched the surface of his crimes.

Elfangor would kill him. If Visser Three had eaten me alive, Elfangor wouldn't hesitate to avenge me.

But…

Elfangor wouldn't kill defenseless prisoners.

I had seen it in Visser Three's memories.

Elfangor had refused to slaughter defenseless Yeerks.

But that was 10,000, and this was one.

But this one had probably done more evil things than those 10,000 Yeerks combined.

Prince Jake should make this decision.

But Prince Jake wasn't here.

Elfangor wouldn't kill unarmed prisoners.

It was Elfangor's first battle! He was young, foolish, a hopeful, inexperienced delusional dreamer.

And now he was dead.

I heard Elfangor's final cry echo in my head again.

Visser Three deserved to die.

But that still didn't make it right.

Right?

{Sorry Ax, but we're out of time,} said Marco.

With a crack, Marco snapped the Visser's human neck.

Visser Three's lifeless body fell limp.

Visser Three was dead.

{MARCO!} exclaimed Cassie.

{We don't have time to debate,} said Marco, already starting to demorph.

{He's right,} said Rachel. {We can discuss ethics when our lives aren't at risk.}

Cassie seemed like she wanted to argue, but she knew we were out of time. She started to demorph too.

A couple minutes later, five birds of prey flew up into the sky.

{Ax,} Cassie said privately to me. {Are you alright? You really scared me when you started smashing your head into that rock. I thought you'd totally lost it.}

{No,} I admitted. {I'm not alright. I saw…horrible things in Visser Three's memory. Horrible things. I really don't want to talk about it.}

The next day, we were in the food court in the mall.

All eight of us.

I learned that Tobias, Jordan, and Prince Jake had gotten into a large battle. A battle that had very nearly gone wrong. Prince Jake had needed to land, and quickly demorphed and remorphed tiger to save the others.

Marco and Tobias returned from the counter with two large trays of food.

Marco set a huge container of nachos down in front of me.

"Just remember to save a few for us, all right?" he teased.

"Thank you," I said.

I picked up a nacho and placed it into my mouth. A little bit of cheese got on my chin. I wiped it off with my hand.

I looked at my hand.

It was the black of Andalite blood.

No it wasn't! I blinked my eyes a few times and looked again. It was yellow, like always.

As I chewed the nacho, I once again tasted my brother's flesh.

Heard his dying scream.

I pushed the nachos away.

"On second thought….I'm not hungry," I muttered.

Seven pairs of eyes looked at me.

"Ax, not hungry?" Rachel demanded.

"Who are you and what have you done with the real Ax?" asked Tobias.

There was an awkward silence.

Prince Jake got it.

"Ax, let me talk to you privately for a minute," Prince Jake said.

I nodded.

Prince Jake led me away from the others, to a different table out of earshot from anyone else.

Prince Jake and I sat down across from each other.

I stared at the floor, not wanting to meet his eyes.

"Ax…." Prince Jake began. "I'm not going to pretend to know what you went through. I'm not going to pretend to understand. But know this: I'm sorry."

I looked up for the first time.

Prince Jake seemed ragged, like his eyes were aimed at me but focused on something far away.

His face trembled very slightly.

"I'm sorry you had to do that. And I'm sorry I pretty much forced you to morph a Yeerk and infest Visser Three. I…" his voice trailed off.

I saw an emotion I'd never seen before in Prince Jake.

Guilt. Shame. Regret, maybe?

For a terrifying second, I thought Prince Jake might cry.

"It's okay," I reassured him. "We've all seen terrifying things. It will pass."

"Ax, why did you repeatedly slam your head into a rock?" Prince Jake asked bluntly.

A stab of shame. Someone else must have told him. Cassie, probably. Or maybe Marco.

"When I was inside Visser Three's head I watched…" my voice broke for a second, but I took a deep breath and composed myself. "I watched Visser Three kill Elfangor."

A stunned silence.

"Shit, I didn't think about that. I should have predicted it, I should have known better." Prince Jake stammered.

"Don't be ashamed," I said. "I knew what I was getting into."

"It's all my fault," Prince Jake lamented. "My fault. Marco tries to kill his mother. Rachel becomes an adrenaline junkie. Tobias gets tortured. Cassie is forced to kill. And now you have to get….essentially psychologically tortured. It's all my fault. I'm sorry, Ax."

Prince Jake buried his head in his hands.

"It's not your fault, my prince," I insisted. "Yeerks started this war. Not humans. Not Andalites. Yeerks. They carry the blame. Not you."

I heard the other six Animorphs burst into laughter. I glanced over and saw them smiling, joking, having a good old time.

"Look at everyone else," I pointed. "There are hard times. But there are also good times. That is why we fight the Yeerks. To protect what we have."

Prince Jake seemed to accept that. "Ax, you almost lost it. Like full on psycho, lock-me-in-a-rubber-room, insane."

I tried to smile.

For him.

"'Almost' is the same as 'didn't', Prince Jake," I said.

Prince Jake returned my smile.

"What can I do to help you, Ax?" he asked.

I paused to consider.

"I would like to speak to my family," I said at last.

Prince Jake nodded. "Of course."

Then his eyes darted over my shoulder.

"Erek," he said simply.

I followed his gaze.

Erek was walking up to the rest of the group.

Erek looked like any other kid. But that appearance was a hologram. Underneath the hologram, was an android thousands of years old.

"Let's go see what he wants," Prince Jake said.

And Prince Jake and I got up and rejoined the others.

"Congratulations on your victory over Visser Three," said Erek.

Erek had cast his hologram around our table, so to everyone else we would appear to be talking about unrelated topics.

"We have received intelligence that the new Visser, Visser Two, is arriving tonight. He will introduce himself at the Yeerk pool. All controllers are welcome to attend," Erek continued.

"Do you know anything about Visser Two?" Tobias asked.

Erek frowned. "Nothing," he admitted. "But I can get you into the pool, so long as your goal is purely for intelligence."

"It won't violate your pacifist programming?" Hannah asked.

"Nope," Erek responded. "As long as the mission is only gathering information. Information gathering itself is not considered violence. However, I want to be crystal clear, my programming would not allow you to attack. For example, hiding inside my hologram, and then jumping out for a surprise attack, would violate my programming."

"Got it," said Prince Jake.

"I can cast a hologram around you," Erek continued. "You'll be able to hear every word Visser Two says. Ax and Tobias, you'll have to morph human to avoid setting off the Gleet Biofilter at the entrance."

"Seems easy enough," said Marco. "What time?"

"8:00 p.m. But, remember: the convoy to the Hork-Bajir homeworld is also leaving tonight. Have you made all the necessary preparations?" Erek asked.

"No," Prince Jake admitted. "We still have to talk to the free Hork-Bajir."

Erek raised an eyebrow. "I thought you already did that?"

Prince Jake opened his mouth for a second, then closed it without saying anything.

"We were going to, but something came up," said Jordan quickly. "We can take care of it, then meet up with you. Where would you like to meet?"

"How about at 7:30 p.m. at the bus stop across from McDonalds?" Erek suggested.

"Works for us, see you there," Marco said with a smile.

Erek returned the smile. "See you later," he said, and then left.

Once he had left, everyone turned to Prince Jake.

"All you alright, Jake?" Cassie asked.

"I'm fine," he said quickly. "I just have a lot of stuff on my mind."

"So we head to the free Hork-Bajir valley now?" Hannah asked.

"No," Prince Jake answered. "Tobias, Rachel, and Cassie, go update the free Hork-Bajir. Jordan and Hannah will go too, so they can get Hork-Bajir morphs. Marco, Ax, and I will go to the observatory. We'll meet up at the bus stop at 7:30 like Erek said."

"The observatory?" Tobias asked. "Why?"

"Ax wants to talk to his family," Prince Jake said simply. "Marco and I will be back up just in case."

"And that's all you're doing?" Rachel demanded. "You're not going to mention the convoy?"

"Correct," said Prince Jake.

There was a sort of awkward silence.

"I think what Rachel and Tobias are implying," Cassie began. "Is that it seems strange you're sending all the people who voted against telling the Andalites to the Hork-Bajir valley. And you're sending all the people who voted for telling the Andalites to the observatory."

"If you don't trust me…" Prince Jake began.

"We all trust you," Cassie interrupted.

"Well, regardless," Prince Jake continued. "Any of you are welcome to come with Ax, Marco, and I. Jordan and Hannah, that includes you guys too. We can find another time for you to acquire a Hork-Bajir morph."

Nobody said anything.

"All right, let's get going."

Fifteen minutes later, we were in the air.