Back to Before
Author: K. A. Applegate
Date: 2000-04-15 04:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Extraterrestrial beings; Science fiction; Juvenile Fiction; Fiction
Description: From Wikipedia Megamorphs #4: Back to Before is the fourth and final book in the series, a spinoff of the Animorphs series. With respect to continuity, it takes place between The Other (#40) and The Familiar (#41).
Publisher: Demco Media

Help me."

I tried to get up. There was a body lying
on me. Hork-Bajir. His wrist blade was jammed
against my side.

I tried to lift up with all four legs, lift the dead
thing off me. But I only had three legs. My left
hind leg lay across the bright-lit floor, a curiosity,
a macabre relic. Tiger's paw.

OCRed By Arpit Nathany

I tried to slide. That was better. The floor was
wood, highly polished. Slick with blood, animal,
alien, human. I reached out with my two front
paws, extended the claws, and dug them into the
wood. They didn't catch at first. But then my
right paw chewed wood and I gained traction.

A voice said, "Help. Please help me."

1

I dragged myself slowly, carefully, gingerly out

I felt a wave of relief. The last I'd seen of
from beneath the bladed alien. The pain in the

Cassie she was in trouble.

missing leg was intense. Don't let anyone ever

In the distance, out through the big doors,
tell you animals don't feel pain. I've been a lot of
down the dark hallway, I heard the hoarse vocals
animals. Mostly they feel pain.

of a grizzly bear. Rachel. Not fighting, not any-

<Jake? Jake?>
more, just raging, raging. Roaring with the frus-

It was Cassie. <Yeah. I'm here.>
tration of a mad beast looking for fresh victims

With a lurch I was free of the weight press-
and finding none.

ing me down. I rose, shaky on three legs. Looked

Marco was already demorphed. A kid. My age,
around through the tiger's eyes.

but he looked so young to me. My best friend.

It was a fabric-cutting room. A design house.

He'd demorphed to human because the alterna-

You know, dresses no one actually wears. The
tive was bleeding to death from the gash across
kind of stuff you see on Style With Elsa Klensch
his gorilla throat.

as you're flipping channels.

Demorph to human. All better. No pain.

Fashion? Strange front organization for the

"I'm cold. I'm cold, help me," the voice

Yeerks. Why?

called.

There were hugely wide, long tables covered

<Make sure he can't see you,> I warned Marco.

in cloth. One tilted up weirdly, one leg had been

Rachel came lumbering back into the room,
broken off entirely. Kind of like me. There were
eight hundred pounds of shaggy brown fur and
big rolls of patterned fabrics on that end that
railroad spike claws and a vaguely quizzical grin
weighed the table down and made it balance,
that hid sharp canines. <Where's Tobias?>
like a seesaw, not up, not down.

I didn't answer. I didn't know the answer.

Overhead there were banks of brilliant fluo-

Rachel began shoving and lifting Hork-Bajir
rescent lights. Splashes of stylish neon on the
bodies. She found Tobias, a crumpled hawk. He
bare brick walls. Bodies everywhere. Blood.

was breathing.

Slashes of it.

<Tobias, morph!>

<Cassie?>

I heard the clop, clop of delicate hooves. Ax

I saw the wolf limp out from behind an over-
was behind me. As alien as any of the dead lying
turned cart. She was alive.

around us. A dainty centaur. The body of a blue

2

3
deer or antelope, with an upper body not so dif-
maybe twenty years old. A human with an alien
ferent from humans. A head that was very differ-
slug in his head.

ent, mouth less, with two extra eyes perched atop

"Help me," he said to the tiger's face looming
movable stalks. His long, dangerous tail was wet
above him. "I'm cold. Help me."

with gore.

He was cut. Badly. It was a Hork-Bajir slash.

We'd been in many fights. This one was bad.

Friendly fire, that's what it's called when one of

This one would invade my sleep and wake me
your own troops accidentally injures you. Kills
sweating and crying.

you. Hork-Bajir in the middle of violence slashed

<Tobias! Listen to me! Go to human!>
one of their comrades.

"Someone . . . so cold . . . help . . ."

<Leave him, Yeerk,> I said. <Let him alone,

Cassie trotted over to Rachel. She demorphed
at last. Get out of his head. Let him do this last
swiftly.

thing as a free human being.>

So good to see her. Healthy. Whole. Beautiful

His face was pale. White. Waxy, like a white
in my eyes.

candle. Someone had smashed his head, man-

"He's okay," Cassie assured Rachel. "I think
gled his ears. I recognized the marks of a tiger's
he's just stunned."

claw. His brown eyes stared up at me.

As if to prove her right Tobias ruffled a wing

"I can't get out," the Yeerk inside his head
and said, <Hey! What? Oh. Oh. I'm alive.>
said to me. "The ears are blocked. Can't get out.

<More or less,> Rachel growled. <That was a

I'm trapped."

crazy thing to do, you idiot! You dive-bomb a

<We have to get out of here,> Ax said. <They

Hork-Bajir?>
may send reinforcements.>

<You know?> he said. <Thinking back now, it

"I'm cold," the human-Controller said.

was crazy.>

"Just. . . just get me a blanket or.. ."

<ldiot,> Rachel said. But she managed to put

<Prince Jake,> Ax prodded.

an awful lot of affection into that one insult. To-

"I'm scared. Does that. . . does that make
bias had saved her life, nearly ending his own.

you happy, Andalite?" the dying man said.

I limped over to the one injured human in the

To the Yeerks we were Andalites. The morph-
room. A human-Controller. An enemy. A man,
ing technology is Andalite science, far beyond

4

5

anything a human was yet capable of. So to them
we were Andalites, a misunderstanding we delib-
erately fostered.

Ax was the only true Andalite in our group.

<No. It doesn't make me happy,> I said.

"The pain . . . can't you help me? Cold. Help
me."

<Come on, Jake.> It was Marco. He'd re-
morphed. To osprey this time. We needed to es-
cape. The air was our surest way out. Grow wings
and fly. Fly and put it all behind us. Pretty soon
we'd be joking. Laughing. Trying anything that
would make us forget what we'd seen.

What we'd done.

"Help . . ."

My name is Jake.

<Let's go,> I said.

I live in a normal American city, in a normal

I demorphed. Out of sight of the doomed Con-

American state.

troller. Then I grew falcon's wings and flew out

I love my mom and my dad. I even love my big
through a window Rachel opened with her fist.

brother, Tom. I like basketball and hate math and
get a little down when it rains for more than one
day. I think those little Audi TT's are cool but if I
had the money, and was old enough, I'd probably
drive a Jeep.

I live on burgers and fries and have never vol-
untarily consumed a brussels sprout.

My room is a mess. My homework is late. My
class notes are so disorganized they cannot be
read by anyone except Marco, who has been living

6

7
off my notes for five years or more, and some-

I'm the leader of the Animorphs. I don't know
times has to interpret them for me.

how that happened. It was some doom pro-

I cried the day Michael Jordan retired. And I
nounced by Marco. Why me? Because, Marco
can still tell you what time it was, what day,
said. Because it has to be.

week, month, hour, minute, and second, what I

We were five kids taking a shortcut home from
was wearing and what I was eating when Mark
the mall at night. There was a ship. There was an

McGwire banged his record homer.

alien. There was the destructive worm of knowl-

I'm a kid. A kid with a dog and parents and
edge: You are not alone. You are not safe. Nothing
teachers and friends. Just a kid.

is what it seems. No one is who they seem to be.

I have these nightmares. Sometimes I'm a

The knowledge of betrayal and terror. The
termite, trapped inside a piece of wood, can't get
awareness of evil.

out and the clock is ticking, ticktock, ticktock,

And then, the power.

can't escape, wooden walls and blackness all

The power made us responsible, see. Without
around me, pressing me tight.

the power the knowledge would have just been a

Sometimes I'm falling. Flying and my wings
worm of fear eating up our insides.

just aren't there and I'm a mile up in the sky,

Bad enough. But it was the power that turned
falling, and thinking, / can't fly! I can't fly!

fear into obligation, that laid the weight on our

Sometimes still, even now, I see the dark red
unready shoulders.

eye of Crayak and feel his malice reaching for me

We could become any animal we'touched, the
all across the millions of light-years.

Andalite told us.

But the worst dream is just me and Cassie.

Power enough to win? No. Power enough to

And we're standing in the forest somewhere.

fight? Ah, yes. Just enough, little Jake, here is

She's outlined in light. You know, like there's a
just enough power to imprison you in a cage of
bright light hidden behind her. And it's almost
duty, to make you fight.

like she's shining. And there's this cave. And I'm

"Help me. I'm cold."

telling her to go in, and she's looking at me with

Another battle. Another horror.

trust in her eyes, looking at me and loving me

Couldn't anything make it end? Was there no
and believing in me and trusting me and I'm
way out? Was I trapped, fighting, fighting till one
telling her to go into the cave.

by one my friends died or went nuts?

8

9

I lay on my bed. Stared up at the ceiling.

closer. Closer till his face was only inches from

"Help me. Please. I'm cold."

my own.

Into the cave, Cassie.

"There is a way out," the Drode whispered.

All for what? For nothing. To delay the Yeerks,

"Say the word and it never was, Jake. Say the
but never to win. And someday, to lose.

word, Jake, and you never walked through the

Was there no way out?

construction site. Say the word and you know

"There's always a way out, Jake the Mighty,"

nothing. No weight on your shoulders. Say the
a voice said. "My lord Crayak holds out his om-
word."

nipotent hand to you, Jake the Yeerk Killer. Jake

"Go away," I said through gritted teeth.

the El I i mist's tool."

"How long till your cousin Rachel loses her

I sat up. I knew the voice.

grip? You know the darkness is growing inside

The Drode stood by my desk. It wasn't large.

her. How long till Tobias dies, a bird, a birdl How

It perched forward like one of those small di-
can he ever be happy? How long till Marco is
nosaurs. It had mean, smart eyes in a humanoid
forced to destroy his own Controller mother? Will
head. It was wrinkled, dark green or purple
he survive that, do you think? How long, Jake, till
maybe. So dark it was almost black. The mocking
you kill Tom? Then what dreams will come, Jake
mouth was lined with green.

the Yeerk Killer?"

The Drode was Crayak's creature, his emis-

"Get out of here. Crawl back under your
sary, his tool. Crayak was . . . Crayak was evil. A
rock."

power so vast, so complete that only the Ellimist

"It will happen, Jake. You know that. The
could keep him in check. A balance of terror: evil
cave. The day will come. You know what the cave
and good checking each other, limiting each
is, Jake. You know what it means, that dark cave.

other, making deals that affected the survival of

You know that death is within. When she dies,
entire solar systems.

when Cassie dies, it will be at your word, Jake."

"Go away," I said to the Drode.

I covered my face with my hands.

"But you called me."

"My master Crayak offers you an escape. In

"Go back to Crayak. Leave me alone."

his compassion Great Crayak has struck a deal

The Drode smiled. He got up and moved
with that meddling nitwit Ellimist. Crayak would

10

11

free you, Jake. Crayak would free you all. All will
be as it would have been if you had simply taken
a different path home."

I saw that moment again. At the mall. Decid-
ing whether to take the safe, well-lit, sensible
way home. Or the route that would take us
through the construction site, and to a meeting
that would change everything.

Undo it. Undo it all. No more war. No more
pain and fear and guilt?

"Just one word, Jake," the Drode whispered.

"No . . . no, two, I think. One must not sacrifice D A Y O N E
good manners. Two words and it never was. Two
words and you know nothing, have no power, no
responsibility."

We hooked up at the mall. I was there with

"What words?"

Rachel.

"One is Crayak. The other is please."

Rachel is my best friend. No one knows why,

I wanted to say no.

least of all either of us. We could not possibly be

I wanted to say no . . .

more different.

I wanted . . .

Here are Rachel's priorities in order of impor-
tance: shopping and gymnastics.

Me, I'm into animals.

Rachel is every cover girl from every Made-
moiselle or Seventeen you've ever seen. Tall, thin, blond hair and flawless complexion, and approximately four hundred shiny white teeth. To
make matters worse, she can't just be written off
as another fashion bimbo.

She's not mean. She's not a snob. She is not

12

13
a member of any clique. She is her own, one-girl
see the excitement in hunting: the combination
clique. That's the power she has: to be everyone's
of knowledge and instinct and the thrill of stalk-
vision of physical and intellectual perfection and
ing and closing in for the kill.

not to care.

The girl makes the pursuit of a forty-percent-

Sometimes I wonder where she gets it from.

off sweater in just the right size and just the right

Not the hair, or the clothing, or even her eerie
color seem like a safari to track down a man-
ability to never be messy, dirty, or wet. I wonder
eating lion.

where she gets the indifference. I wonder how

"Twenty-five percent off at Express, that's fine,"

she can have every boy in school throwing him-
she said. "But, same basic sweater, better mix of
self in her path, and be indifferent.

fabrics, forty percent off at Structure? Plus, the

Not that she's humble. No. You wouldn't call
point is, this sweater goes with the jeans on sale at
her humble. She knows she's special. But she's

The Gap or the jeans on sale at the department
impatient with the whole idea of being popular or
store, and the Express sweater only goes with The
whatever.

Gap jeans."

I get the feeling with Rachel that she's wait-

"I know I'm going to be sorry I asked this," I
ing. Impatient. Looking for something more. Mov-
said, "but how can one sweater that is almost
ing through life in search of a very different
identical to another sweater not go with a pair of
destiny.

basically identical jeans?"

Her sports are gymnastics and shopping. She

Rachel gave me the look. The look of in-
knows she'll never be a great gymnast; she's al-
credulity and confusion.

ready about twice as tall as the average gymnast.

"Cassie, you know I love you, but did you just

That part of her interests me but not as much as
get in from Uzbekistan?" she asked.

her shopping.

"Yes. Yes, Rachel, I just flew in from Uzbek-

See, it's not about the stuff with her. It's hunt-
istan."

ing.

"Shape. Color. Cut. Waistline." She shook her

I could never be friends with someone who
head in mock pity. "How do you expect to get
went out and hunted animals. Sorry, but people
through life without an appreciation of what goes
who want to shoot deer are not going to be my
with what?"

friends. But when I'm with Rachel at the mall I

"I expect life will just be one long struggle."

14

15

Rachel laughed. No one was more amused by

Believe me, he doesn't know you're black. That's
her obsession with shopping than she was.

how little he would care. Jake is the one guy out

Like I said, Rachel was waiting for something
of a thousand who really does care about who you
else. She didn't know what. I sure didn't.

are, not what you look like."

"Don't look," I hissed. "It's Jake."

"So, how do I look?" I asked anxiously.

"I can't look at my cousin?"

"Like you should be singing eee-yi-eee-yi-oh.

"You can look, just don't look, that's all I'm

You're wearing Wal-Mart overalls with bird poop
saying."

on the cuffs. You have no makeup on and there's

"You mean, don't look at him in a way that will
dirt under your fingernails . . . that is just dirt,
somehow convey to him that you are hot for him?

isn't it?"

That you want his lips pressed against yours? That

I looked down at my fingernails and tried to
you want his big, strong arms wrapped all around
remember. "Probably dirt. Possibly manure."

you?"

"Yeah, well, you compensate for your Old

"Yeah, Rachel, that's what I meant. That is

MacDonald clothing sense by being pretty, very
exactly what I meant."

smart, very cool, and the most completely real

Jake is cute. Not cute in a little itsy-bitsy
person I've ever met."

he's-so-cute kind of way. He's a big guy. Not

"Thanks. Thanks for the last half, anyway."

hulking big, just like he's two years older than he

Jake was with his best friend, Marco. Marco
really is. He's also smart and funny and modest.

and Jake were not as mismatched as Rachel and

I think he likes me. We sit together on the bus

I, at least from what I knew. I don't know Marco
sometimes. Sometimes we seem to accidentally
much at all, just to say " h i " to.

end up near each other at assemblies, or in

He's small, especially alongside Jake. He has
class.

fairly long, dark hair and an olive complexion and

He's never asked me out. I've never asked
a permanently amused expression.

him out. Needless to say Rachel finds all this

Marco is a comedian. Not a class clown, not a
touching, funny, and completely idiotic.

guy who wants to make the teacher mad. He just

I asked her once, "Do you think he's okay with
seems to think the world is funny. I guess a psy-
me being African-American and all?"

chologist would call it a defense mechanism. His

She said, "Cassie, I've known Jake all my life.

mom died a couple years ago. Anyway, maybe

16

17
that's it. Or maybe he's just funny. Anyway, if

Jake started to form a word, but Rachel had

Jake likes him he must be okay.

him now.

Yeah, I don't sound too much like someone

"You think we're helpless just because —"

with a crush.

I cut her off. "I'd appreciate it if they did walk

There was a third guy with them. This kid
with us. I know you're not afraid of anything,
named Tobias. He's kind of an unknown to me.

Rachel, but I guess I am."

He seems like he's kind of latched onto Jake.

Rachel shot me a harsh look. I was spoiling

Jake is too nice to ever tell him to go away, and I
her fun.

could see he was trying to include Tobias in the

To get home from the mall we could either go
conversation and all. But Tobias was still stand-
a long way around, which is the safe way, or we
ing a little apart. Looking a little uncomfortable,
could cut through this abandoned construction
trailing a little behind.

site and hope there weren't any ax murderers

The three of them were coming out of the
hanging around there.

video game place. Marco looked like he was teas-

We took the long way.

ing Jake.

Ten minutes of mostly silent walking later, To-

Jake spotted us. For a moment he had a deer-
bias said, "Hey, what's that?"

in-the-headlights look. Then he put on his non-

I turned and looked in the direction Tobias
chalance.

was pointing. A streak of light, off to our right.

"Hey, Rachel. Hi, Cassie."

"Meteorite?" Jake suggested.

Rachel whispered, "Can I look at him now?"

"Great," Marco muttered. "A meteorite falls

"You guys going home?" Jake asked. "You
out of the sky and totally misses the school. That
shouldn't go through the construction site by
is so not fair."

yourselves. I mean, being girls and all."

We kept walking.

This was a mistake. Jake knew it as soon as

But I had the strangest feeling. Like . . . like
the words were out of his mouth, I could see it.

going into a room you know, where you're fa-

But it was too late.

miliar with every stick of furniture, and it's

"Are you going to come and protect us, you
your room, and it's just like it always has been,
big, strong m-a-a-a-n?"

only somehow, in some way that only appears

18

19

as a tingling on the back of your neck, it's dif-
ferent.

I shook it off. I had other things to focus on.

Like whether Jake was ever going to even hold
my hand.

D A Y S E V E N

I woke up.

Great. Another day.

The couch I was sleeping on was saggy in the
middle and smelled of cigarette smoke. But my
uncle had gotten drunk and passed out on the
floor in my room. So I took the couch.

It was okay, at least that way I could watch TV
till I fell asleep.

I was wearing a T-shirt and shorts. I needed to
find something to wear. My uncle doesn't do
laundry, I do. So I knew exactly what I had avail-
able. A nice collection of stuff that could make
me look like a complete dork or a complete
lowlife, my choice.

My uncle also doesn't buy a lot of stuff for

20

21
me. I'm what you'd have to call "low priority" in
and headed for the bus stop. That part was okay.

his life. Half the stuff I had was stuff he'd thrown

No major hassles at the bus stop, usually. It's not
away. Or else stuff I'd picked up from my aunt's
till I'm on the bus that it started. This kid named
attic whenever I was shuttled off to be with her

Andy and his creep sidekick who for some reason
for a few months.

was called Tap-Tap, enjoyed kidney punching

The food was better at my aunt's. She didn't
me. They'd wait till we were getting off the bus,
pass out in my room. She had her own brand of
find some way to get up behind me, and when I
fun. She'd work me like her own personal slave.

was all crammed in, they'd nail me once or twice

That's how I knew what was in the attic: I
in the back.

cleaned it out. And she'd keep me out of school

I am what they call a bully magnet. I don't
to run errands for her or just to "be there" in case know why. I just am.

she needed me.

Used to be these two other guys who had the

At least my uncle let me go to school. He'd
job of torturing me. Their thing was swirlies. You
have let me go to Australia and not cared. Not a
know, they'd grab me by the ankles and knees
nice feeling knowing that if you were ever kid-
and dip my head in the toilet while they flushed.

napped or whatever, there was no one around to

Used to. This guy named Jake came into the
bother and call the cops.

boys' room while they were doing it. He told them

But, hey, that's life. It's worse for lots of kids.

to step off. That was it, but he had a way of say-

Marco's mom died. His dad is a wreck. Marco
ing it, I guess.

does everything.

Those two haven't bugged me since.

My mom probably died, too. And my dad. I

I don't think Jake has a big reputation as a
don't know. Everyone just says my mom ran off.

tough guy or anything. He's kind of quiet, actu-

Everyone says my dad ran off before I was born.

ally. Almost shy. But there's something about

Or sometimes they make up stories, like they
him that makes you take him seriously.

both died in an accident. Sometimes I make up

I hung around with him for a while. Totally
stories. The truth, if there ever was any truth, was
lame on my part. Jake has a best friend who
lost a long time ago.

doesn't like me, I don't think. After a while it was

Doesn't matter.

kind of obvious that I wasn't going to be part of

I put on the least pathetic clothes I could find
that circle of friends.

22

23

That was okay. I was still grateful. I guess

Andy laughed. "But you're so nice and easy,"

Jake is who I'd like to be if I could be someone
he said. "No one else is as big a wuss as you."

else. But there was a long list of people I'd rather

Tap-Tap joined in the laughter. "You're the
be than me.

man, Toby."

I managed to avoid Andy and Tap-Tap on the

Tap-Tap shoved me suddenly forward. Off
bus. Which just meant they'd lie in wait for me
balance I slammed into Andy.

some other time. Probably it would have just

"Hey! He attacked me, Tap-Tap!"

been better to take my beating and move on,

"Sure did. Toby, man, what's up? Are you get-
without all the suspense of wondering when they
ting all violent and stuff?"

were going to get me.

"He pushed me," Andy said in mock in-

Yeah, right, Tobias. That's a good way to live.

credulity.

I had to wait all day. Sixth period. I headed for

Wham!

the boys' room. The boys' room is always danger-

The punch caught me low in my gut.

ous for me, but I couldn't hold out all day.

Wham! Wham!

I went in, hoping against hope that a monitor

I was down, twisting my legs around, pretzel-
would be in there. But it was me, and two guys I
ing to keep from peeing.

didn't know, and Andy and Tap-Tap.

Thunk!

"Toby, Toby, Toby," Andy called out. "Hey,

A kick that caught me in the ribs. I rolled
man, I missed you on the bus this morning. I
over, rolled onto crushed paper towels, head
thought we were friends."

against one of the stall uprights.

I felt the surge of fear. The ice in my stomach.

Thunk!

The urgent desire to wet myself. Tap-Tap moved

A second kick. The pain was shocking. I was
fast to get behind me, block my escape.

scared. They'd really hurt me, this time. Oh,

Tap-Tap grabbed me by my shoulders from

God, they'd really hurt me, who was going to take
behind. Should I beg? Would begging do any
me to the hospital?

good?

I lay there groaning, back wet from splashed

"Why don't you guys find someone else to
toilet water puddles. I lay there groaning and
pick on," I said. Yeah, that'll work. Whining.

didn't even realize my tormentors were gone till I

Whining will work.

saw the faces of the other two guys, the two guys

24

25

who'd witnessed the whole scene, looking down
at me.

"You okay down there?"

I couldn't talk. The pain. The rage. The hu-
miliation choking me.

"Your life doesn't have to be like this," one of
them said. "You don't have to be a victim all the
time. There's a way out, man."

The other one drew a small card from his
back pocket and handed it down to me. "You
don't have to be all alone, man. You don't have to
be anyone's punching bag."

They walked away. After a while I managed to
stand up.

I threw up in the toilet.

I jerked awake.

I rinsed my face in the sink. I was late for

Eyes wide open.

class. Great. That meant a trip to Vice Principal

My covers were a mess. My sheet was twisted

Chapman.

around my legs. My pillow was damp with sweat,

I cried. I was there alone, what did it matter?

but the room was cold.

I cried.

It had happened again. The call. Like a voice,

After a while I splashed more water on my
but not a voice. Speaking without words. Images.

face. And then, I looked at the card.

Pictures, fuzzy, distorted, meaningless.

It read THE SHARING.

A wide, grassy field. A glass dome. Trees with
pink and blue leaves. And water. Everywhere, wa-
ter.

It gave me the creeps.

"You have a serious case of the willies," I
whispered to myself.

I got up, went to the bathroom, drank some

26

27
water, and spent five minutes rearranging my

"Not that we're saying we expect you to be wild
sheets and blankets.

or anything, let me make that perfectly clear.

But I couldn't go back to bed. I was wide-

We're not saying it's okay."

awake now. Adrenaline awake.

"Okay, Dad. I'll stop my wild and crazy ways."

I could work on some homework. Work on that

They laughed. I laughed. We all knew I was
paper.

not exactly the definition of a wild and crazy girl.

No.

I told the story to Rachel. She said, "Wow, it

I pulled a pair of overalls on over my sleep
must be cool to have your parents actually trust
shirt. Stuck my bare feet into a pair of muddy,
you. Man, that would be great if my mom trusted
unlaced boots. Then I took the boots back off.

me like that."

Boots were not going to make it easy to sneak

"Because then you could get away with any-
past my parents' bedroom.

thing?"

I tiptoed down dark stairs to the living room.

"Exactly."

The blue display on the VCR was blinking 00:00

I smiled as I was remembering that. I opened
again and again. There was a glass on the coffee
the freezer. Hello Ben. Hello Jerry.

table. My dad's. I picked it up and carried it to

No. What if Jake wasn't asking me out be-
the kitchen and deposited it in the sink.

cause of my thighs?

"That's right, Mom and Dad, I couldn't sleep

I staggered, gripped the refrigerator door. It
so I decided to get up at three A.M. and clean
had hit in a wave. The voice. The soundless,
house." Yeah, that would work. That wouldn't
wordless voice. Calling from the water.

seem too insane.

Oh, man, I really was going nuts.

Was that it? Was I going crazy?

And it wasn't just the voice. There was this

They say schizophrenia usually appears first
sense o f . . . of what? Strangeness? Of things be-
during the teen years. I told my mom that once.

ing wrong in some way I couldn't figure out?

She said, "Honey, how can anyone tell the differ-

Not funny. Not really. What if I was actually
ence between a crazy teenager and a regular
mentally ill?

teenager?"

The animals. That was it, I'd go check on the

My dad had laughed, then caught himself.

barn.

28

29

I went out into the night, out through the
things, imagining things, remembering things
kitchen door rather than the front door because
that had never happened. The familiarity of the
my parents were less likely to hear me.

barn soothed me. But within that very familiarity

Our barn is the Wildlife Rehabilitation Clinic.

lay a new, unsettling sensation. I saw Jake, pac-

Both my folks are vets. My mom works with large
ing. I saw Rachel, restless. Marco lolling on a
animals at The Gardens. My dad handles the
bale of hay. And up there, up in the rafters, a
clinic, with some help from me.

bird.

I guess to a lot of people the barn at night

A hawk.

would have seemed eerie. Not to me. There were

I could almost see him. Almost.

rows of cages, most full. We had muskrats and

Madness. I was losing my mind.

raccoons and geese and bats and foxes and deer

I was losing my mind.

and a forlorn eagle. All were injured or sick.

Many wore bandages. Some were in one form of
restraint or another, to keep them from chewing
or pecking their own wounds.

They smelled, I guess. Anyway, that's what

Marco said when he came —

No, no, he'd never been to the barn. Why
would he have ever been to the barn?

"Forget it, Cassie. It's late. It's dark. You're
just confused."

My hands shook a little as I tunneled a hand-
ful of grain into the goose's cage. She didn't
need it, really. I just wanted to do something.

Something normal.

"How are you feeling? Huh? Yeah, I know,
that wing still hurts, doesn't it?"

I went down the row of cages. Tried not to
think. Tried not to believe that I was hearing

30

31

Bajir with my blade, and watched it topple onto
the ground.

I was panting. Gasping for air. It was my ninth
attack. I was tired.

Or maybe it was all in my head. Maybe it was
the billions of pounds of pressure, the water that
pressed down from all directions.

There was very little hope left within me now.

Too much time had passed. If anyone had sur-
vived, if my brother Elfangor had survived, he
would have found me.

D A Y T E N

The dome was still intact. It rested on the
floor of one of Earth's oceans. It was at a slight
angle. I noticed the incline whenever I raced
across the vast, open field of grass.

J. raced at full speed, all out, hooves flying,

I was not sure how far down I was, how deep.

tail tucked down, upper body bowed, stalk eyes

All the instrumentation, the main computers and
straight back to watch the ground that receded
so on had been in the main section of the ship,
from me.

spread out along the long corridors, the seem-

I raced straight for the target, a bundle of
ingly endless stalk that connected the dome to
sticks tied together to form an extremely crude
the distant engines.

Hi
representation of a Hork-Bajir-Controller.

Likewise all small craft. The fighters, the

I ran. Waited. Reveal nothing. No subtle "tells,"

transports, the scout ships. Anything that would
do not give anything away, he is ready to react to
fly. All left behind when the dome separated and
the slightest clue. Would I go left or right? Stop
fell, atmosphere-shrieking and burning, down
and strike or shoot past and tail whip him?

Earth's gravity well.

Fwapp!

Life support was intact. The low-power force

I shot past, caught the "head" of the Hork-
field that kept the transparent dome from being

32

33
crushed by the ocean's pressure, all that was in-

Unacceptable.

tact. The energy plant would last for a hundred

I was alone. Without a prince or a partner. A
years. The grass would grow, the trees would
single Andalite aristh alone in the submerged
bloom. The pond had spilled out during a tempo-
dome of a once-great ship. How many light-years
rary loss of artificial gravity, but it had mostly re-
from home? What did it matter? I had no ship.

filled.

I had called out in bursts of thought-speak. I

I could live out my life down here. Live out my
had used all my energy, all my strength, to fire
life in this habitat meant to duplicate life at
bursts of thought-speak, seeking Elfangor.

home.

There had been no answer.

Except that I could not do that.

No answer for so long.

Elfangor was probably dead. All the brave

I let my momentum carry me past the decap-
warriors with him. We had come out of Zero-
itated stick figure, on through the pink-leafed
space, expecting at most to encounter a few
trees. To the dome wall.

scattered Yeerk ships. But they had been wait-

It rose up at an angle. I pressed my hand
ing. A full Pool ship with its legion of Bug fight-
against the plex. Outside, out in the alien ocean,
ers. And more dangerous still, the sleek black
creatures swam by. The variety was startling. I

Blade ship of Visser Three.

had seen perhaps fifty different species in all,

Our warriors had slaughtered the Yeerks. But
large and small, some apparently harmless and
we had lost some fighters. And then, the Blade
some seemingly dangerous.

ship had appeared.

Earth.

Maybe Elfangor had survived, somehow. But

Elfangor had said little about the place. It
if he had, where was he? A fighter's sensors
was not a major planet. There had been some
would have located me without great difficulty.

speculation that its dominant race was on the

And, unfortunately, the same would be true if
verge of achieving spaceflight, but aside from a
the Yeerks were still present in orbit. Sooner or
few hundred primitive orbital satellites there had
later they would find me. Some Taxxon watching
been no evidence.

a sensor display would catch the blip of trapped

One thing was sure, the Yeerks in orbit had
air beneath the waves.

not been bothered by Earth-based craft.

34

35

A long, gray-blue creature swam close by. It
admit that. The morphing power is only good for
scraped the dome, just a short distance from my
two hours at a time. More than that and you are
splayed fingers. It had fins at its sides, a triangu-
trapped. How far was the shore? How hostile
lar fin that rose from its back, a raked, aerody-
were the inhabitants? Could I hope to survive?

namic tail, and eyes that were small, black, and

The Earthers might be savages. There might be
empty. It also had something called a mouth.

diseases. Predators.

Many species on the home planet did as well.

And there was the very real possibility that

But this mouth seemed designed as a weapon.

the Yeerks were already there in force.

There were several rows of jagged triangular

You have to decide, I told myself again. But
teeth.

not yet.

The fish swam away into the murk. Even when

I headed back toward the target. I stopped

Earth's sun was high in the sky the light down
still and stared. The head was back in place.

here was dim, rippling, green-blue. During plan-

Hadn't I . . .

etary night the dome was so dark that I could

I had. I had seen the head fall. Impossible.

stand and watch the faint phosphorescence of

Decide soon, I told myself. The isolation is
passing creatures, like slow comets crossing my
having psychological effects.

personal sky.

Aximili, you have to decide, I told myself.

I could stay in the dome and wait, a week, a
month, a year till the Earthers or the Yeerks spot-
ted me.

Or I could venture out of the dome. I had the
morphing power. If I could acquire one of these
passing creatures I could leave, reach some
shore, demorph, and look to make a life among
the aliens.

<You have to decide. Stay or go. Wait or
leave.>

I did not want to be afraid. But I was, I had to

37

36

thing. You know, that Tobias kid is such a loser
we better put someone with him.

But everyone gets a guide at their second
meeting. A guide is a full member of The Shar-
ing. I'm still not sure what that means, a "full
member." Bill is a little vague about it.

What he's not vague about is pool. They have
two tables in the back of the meeting hall. He
has his favorite.

I gripped the cue. Aimed. Tried to see the an-
gles. Tried to see the impacts: cue tip on cue ball,
cue ball on seven ball, seven ball on bumper.

D A V T W E N T Y - O N E

"Okay, now relax into it," Bill said. "You want to aim like your life depended on it, then relax

Line up on the cue ball, then draw the line
like it doesn't really matter, and let your shoulder
back through your cue, and forward through the
and arm and hand and eye all work together."

ball you're trying to hit, then on to the pocket,

I tried to relax.

right?"

Thock!

He said "right?" a lot.

The cue ball rolled, hit the seven ball that hit

"It's all about angles. Pool is geometry. A se-
the bumper and then curved away from the
ries of collisions, all at precise angles."

pocket.

His name was Bill. He was a high-school guy,

"Sorry," I said.

older than me, obviously. He was my "guide."

"What do you mean, sorry? You were off by

That's what they call it. When you attend your
two percent, maybe. You're getting better. You
second meeting of The Sharing they assign you a
have an eye for this. You can think in three di-
guide. Someone to answer your questions, some-
mensions. That's good. You wait, when you be-
one to hang with you, talk to you.

come a full member you'll be thinking in four

At first I thought it was some kind of pity
dimensions. Five. N-dimensional space."

38

39

I had no idea what he was talking about, but

I snapped the shot. Cue hit cue ball, hit ball,

I felt my face redden. Pleasure. His compliment
hit bumper. My ball rolled into the pocket.

may have been sincere or not. I wasn't sure, but

"Ah!" I yelled, way too excited.

I'd take it for what it was worth. There hadn't

Bill clapped his hand on my back and gave
been all that many compliments in my life.

my shoulder a squeeze. "Cool! Good job, Tobias.

"Take the next shot," he said. "I want to see

That was not an easy shot."

how you handle it."

We played pool some more till at last some

The assumption that I would someday be-
other guys came up and jokingly demanded the
come a full member of The Sharing, that was
table.

strange. I'd only attended two meetings. The first

"No problem," Bill said. "My boy Tobias here
time I just kind of wandered around lost, feeling
is getting too good for me already."

like a dork. I filled out some form with my name

It wasn't true. But I was better.

and address and social security number and all.

"I never played pool before," I said.

The form asked me some personal questions,

"Well, each of us has talents and abilities
too. Nothing too personal, but enough to make
hidden within us," Bill said. "Who knows what
me uneasy.

you can do, Tobias? Have you ever had a chance

But at the same time, even while I was feel-
to find out? That's what The Sharing is all about,
ing lost, no one made me feel bad. They were
man. The whole point is we all help each other to
kind of welcoming, like me showing up was a
become the best people we can become."

cool thing. They didn't press me, didn't try to sell

I wanted to ask, "Why?" Why would any bunch
me anything, just kind of let me hang out, watch
of people want to get together to help me play
some kids playing video games, watch other
pool, or whatever? I mean, what did they get out of
older guys playing basketball out back of the
it?

building on a half-court.

But that was just me being cynical. That was

When the first meeting was over this guy, this
me thinking the whole world was like my uncle.

college guy or whatever, came up and shook my

It was possible that some people were just nice,
hand and asked me personally to come back.

right?

I was back. And now I had Bill teaching me to

There was a chime. A ringing bell, not too
shoot pool.

loud, but insistent.

40

41

Bill groaned. "Time for the 'sit down,'" he
ing with it. Now I have my own plan for the fu-
said.

ture, you know? Get past all the stuff, get on with

"What's a sit down?"

my own life, right?"

"That's just what I call it. Every couple of

"Right."

meetings or so they have us all get together, talk

We sat down on folding chairs. There must
to us about stuff."

have been about forty or fifty people there. Kids,

"Like what?"

older people, white and black and Asian. People

"You know, like the purpose of The Sharing,
in expensive clothes and people more like me.

and our philosophy and all." He winced. "I

Cool kids, nerds, jocks. All sitting together, talk-
shouldn't complain. I mean, The Sharing has to-
ing, like age or race or whatever didn't matter.

tally turned my life around."

I spotted someone I hadn't noticed before.

"Yeah?"

Jake. He was sitting two aisles up, next to his

"Yeah."

brother Tom.

"Like how?"

I was surprised. "That guy up there," I

He shrugged and started us toward the main
pointed. "Is he a member?"

meeting room. "I used to be messed up, man. My

"Who, Tom? Yeah, Tom is a very senior full
folks had a really bad divorce, you know? It was
member."

this total mess. Fighting and yelling and lawyers

I hadn't been talking about Tom, but the in-
trying to drag me and my sister one way or the
formation surprised me. "You mean like a senior
other. Sick."

kid member?"

I nodded like I understood.

Bill smiled. "There's no such thing as old or

"Anyway, I got kind of weird up behind all
young, not in The Sharing. We don't draw lines
that. Depressed or whatever. Thinking maybe I
like that."

didn't want to go on living. But The Sharing took

I watched the back of Jake's head as a
me out of all that."

speaker mounted two steps to a low stage. I

"Yeah?"

watched him as the speaker talked to us about

He spread his hands wide and smiled. "Not
how the lonely individual in society had been
depressed anymore, right? I'm moving on. Deal-
overemphasized in our culture. There was no true

42

43

achievement unless you were part of something
greater. You had to serve in order to achieve. You
had to join with a larger reality.

"That's why we are called The Sharing," the
speaker said. "Together we achieve happiness, ful-
fillment, meaning. Together, holding each other
up, supporting each other, working together to
overcome individual weakness, individual failing
and pain and hurt."

It sounded good, I guess. I kept watching

Jake. I don't know why.

£ L. TT TT"P T t . f\ t J

I don't think he knew I was there.

D A Y T W E N T Y - F O U R

I guess it was pathetic but I thought that if he
was a member and I was a member, somehow,
someway, stupid thought, lame idea, but some-

You know, you should go out with me," I
how I could become him. And not me. Have his
said.

life, and not mine.

For a full five seconds Rachel didn't say any-
thing. She just sort of narrowed her eyes and
stared straight ahead.

I grinned. She was trapped. Couldn't get away.

We were on a field trip to the natural history mu-
seum. We'd already looked at the big stuffed ele-
phant. We'd looked at the diorama showing early
man cooking barbecue out with the lions. We'd
gaped up at the suspended fiberglass whales.

Now we were in the theater where they were
about to show us an I MAX film entitled DNA: Mir-
acle Molecule. Or some such thing. It was nar-
rated by Paul Shaffer, from Letterman. Weird.

44

45

The screen was about the size of an old drive-in

She was fast. Sharper than I thought. I'd al-
theater's screen, but it was so close I could prac-
ways assumed she was just this total babe. But
tically reach out and touch it.

she was cool. Funny.

So, anyway, we were in the seats next to each

Wow. Fantastic looks and she was funny? How
other, me and Rachel. Beside her was one of her
often does that happen?

friends, Melissa Chapman, daughter of the vice

"You know, I could supply references, Rachel.

principal. The theater was totally full. Rachel

Plenty of females have enjoyed the company of
was trapped.

Marco the Magnificent."

"I don't think so," she said at last.

"Females? What species?"

"Is it because I'm roughly three feet shorter

I barked out a laugh and got a loud "shush"

than you?"

from a row back. I guess someone back there

No answer. Stoic stare.

really cared what was happening to the five-story

"Is it that you think I'm cuter than you?"

green-and-red amoeba pulsating behind Paul's

"Yeah, that would be it."

bald head.

On-screen Paul Shaffer was saying, "DNA is a

I shot a look at Rachel. Was that a faint
fabulous molecule."

shadow of a tiny, possibly imaginary smile I saw

An electron microscope slide appeared, show-
on her perfect lips? Or was it just a trick of the
ing a DNA molecule as long as a train.

amoeba light?

"You know, girls love a guy with a sense of hu-

I fell silent. Wait. Wait.

mor."

"Paul never gets credit for being as funny as

"Yeah. If he's Leonardo DiCaprio. Adam San-
he is," she said.

dler, not so much."

Hah! She was enjoying talking to me. She

Despite myself, I laughed. She could throw it
started it up again. Hah! Well, well, well.

back at me. I liked that.

What would Jake say if I started going out

"Still, we should go out. Do a movie. Eat some
with his cousin? He was my best friend. Had
burgers. I could make you laugh."

been forever. He'd always been there for me. He

"Actually, I think the mere memory of that sug-
was the one guy in the world I could absolutely
gestion will supply me with plenty of laughter."

count on.

46

47

So if he didn't approve of me and Rachel,
out some member of her girl gang around to fend
hey, it would make me real sad to say "Bye-bye,
off losers.

Jake."

"So. What do you think?" I asked Rachel. Up

Hah! She liked me. Or at least my sense of
close it was hard to ignore the fact that I was
humor. No problem-o.

looking almost directly up at her. While she was

Then . . .

looking at the top of my head.

Paul Shaffer's head flickered and melted,

"I think many things," she said cryptically.

erupting in brown goo that merged with what I

"I mean about. . . abou . . ."

believe was an invertebrate.

My mouth stopped moving. My throat seized

"Awwww, man\"

up. I stared. Stared, heart pounding on no oxy-

The film had caught and burned. The house-
gen, stared, pushed Rachel aside when she got
lights came up.

in the way.

"Now we'll never know what happened," I

"It's her," I said. I was aware that my voice
complained. "Did Dave ever make a cameo ap-
had cracked. I knew I looked like an idiot. Didn't
pearance? Or at least Bif Henderson?"

care. I was far away. I was in some frozen uni-

We all stood up. The kids all managed to con-
verse watching would could not possibly be.

trol their disappointment. We filed outside, out

"Who?" Rachel snapped.

into the brighter light of the museum proper. I

"Mom," I whispered.

had to struggle to stay up with Rachel. Somehow,

"Your mom? So go say hi."

and don't ask me to explain it, she had an abil-

I shook my head slowly, slowly coming out of
ity to move easily and quickly through a crowd
my paralyzed trance.

without ever touching anyone, or being touched

She had appeared. Simply appeared. Like
in return. Like she was surrounded by a force
materializing out of the air. Like she'd been
field.

transported down from the Star Trek universe.

But I stayed up with her. And by amazingly

She was wearing a blond wig, but I wasn't wrong.

good luck Melissa made a girls' room run. By her-

It was her.

self. Without Rachel. Which is not something you

She looked shocked, confused. Lost. Angry.

see very often, a pretty girl left vulnerable with-

Scared.

48

49

Then she was moving away, quickly. Heading
for the escalator. Her back was to me.

"My mom! My mom! I have to catch her!"

"Your mom? Isn't she . . ."

"Mom! Mom!" I yelled. I took off. Took off
running like an idiot, yelling and running.

It took a great deal of patience. Days of pa-
tience.

I waited hour after long hour, hope rising and
falling, watching the air lock through the trans-
parent bulkhead.

The big creatures would come toward the
open air lock, nearer, nearer, but never all the
way in.

The air lock was big enough to accommodate
four space-suited Andalites. That was its original
function, to allow technicians to access the outer
surface of the dome.

The only creatures that came into the air lock
were smaller finned creatures. These did not

50

51
seem to possess any natural weapons. Unless,

<Ah!>
somehow, their fins were far more formidable

I slapped the panel.

than they appeared.

The door materialized. The creature was

In my weeks under the alien ocean I had
trapped!

learned one thing: Earth creatures could be

Now what? In order to acquire the creature's
fiercely predatory. The large ate the small.

DNA I had to physically touch him. He did not

In this environment there was not much point
look as if he would enjoy being touched. He had
in being small and weak. I could afford to wait
to be alive at the moment of acquisition. What if
for a chance to acquire something strong. Strong
the removal of water killed him instantly?

and fast enough, I hoped, to make it safely to the

I instructed the air lock computer to draw off
nearest shore, wherever that might be.

ninety percent of the water. This took a few min-

So I waited. Waited and invented names for
utes. When it was done the creature was still able
the various creatures who ignored the open cave
to move, but only in two dimensions. His dorsal
of the air lock.

fin and part of his back were exposed to the air.

Big Mouth. Runny Eyes. Swimming Bird.

His belly scraped the floor.

And the creature I was after, Blue Blade. This

He kept moving, restless. Afraid? Impossible
creature seemed to be composed of triangles.

to say.

Triangular tail, triangular fins, triangular teeth.

<Air lock computer, create a force field to

Its entire body reminded me of a long, flattened
contain the water and prevent its spilling into the
triangle. It was blue, the blue-gray of wet steel,
outer chamber. Allow me to enter the air lock.>
not so far different from my own color.

The computer erected a force field just three

Three days I had waited and waited to spring
feet high, just enough to hold in the water and
my trap. Not that I had anything better to do. I
the creature. Above that three-foot wall of energy
exercised. I conjured up absurd scenarios of how
was open space. I could easily leap over.

Elfangor was alive, had crash-landed among the

However, leaping back out would be harder.

aliens, and even now was forming an effective

The water would be halfway up my side, sub-
guerrilla organization to fight the Yeerks. If any-
merging my legs.

one could do it, Elfangor could.

I waited, watched, timed the creature's move-

But I knew he was dead. Knew it.

ments . . . leaped!

52

53

I flew over the invisible wall, splashed into
strict the creature into a narrow rectangular
the water. My hooves slipped, I sagged down into
space.>
the water, the creature whipped toward me,

The water receded from both side walls. The
lightning quick.

creature slammed into the force-field, retreated.

It surged at me. I stuck out my right hand and

Tried to turn and suddenly could not.

pressed its snout. Acquisition usually creates a

The Blue Blade was now held within what
trance in the acquired creature. Maybe it would
amounted to a very narrow tank. There was dry
work with this creature.

floor on either side of him.

Eventually.

<You might have thought of this earlier, Ax-

The monster jerked its head, broke contact,
imili,> I chided myself. I had long since ac-
swam away, turned in a flash and arced toward
cepted the notion of solipsistic conversation. It
me.

was part of a general psychological decay. On at

Fwapp!

least three occasions I had seen things that were

I hit it, flat-bladed, on the snout.

almost certainly not real. Either that or the struc-

It turned away, but came right back. And now
ture of time itself was different on Earth.

its mouth was open in a grin of triangular teeth.

I jumped into the dry space. The creature lay

Fwapp!

sullen, the vertical gashes behind his mouth

I hit it again. And jumped aside a split second
worked, open, close, open, close. The one eye on
before it could bite my front left leg.

this side glared at me.

<Yah!>

I reached and touched the creature's skin. I

I leaped clear out of the pool and sprawled
pulled away surprised. It was rough-textured. I
clumsily on the floor. Water drained off me.

could have abraded the skin from my hand.

Blood, too. Mine. The creature had swiped my

I touched him again and focused as we are
haunch with a fin I now realized was quite sharp.

trained to do when acquiring DNA.

The creature was fast. Aggressive. Not easily

Sharp teeth, sharp fins, speed, aggression,
discouraged. Perfect for my purpose. Assuming I
and armored skin — I didn't know how danger-
lived long enough to worry about my purpose.

ous Earth's oceans might be, but I felt this crea-

<Computer, form a force field that will con-
ture would be safe in them.

54

55

Marco and I pounded after her. No question
now, she was running away from us. She was the
antelope and we were the wolves.

Of course maybe that's why she was running.

Many people would find it disturbing to be
chased by a couple of demented teenagers.

In the main foyer she broke into a flat-out run
hampered only by the fact that she was punching
numbers into her cell phone.

She had maybe a hundred-foot lead. No way
some thirty-something mommy was going to out-
run me. She ran for the revolving door.

"Hey!"

A man slammed into the glass. She'd knocked

IL don't know why I ran after Marco, but I
him aside.

did.

She was slow getting through the revolving

He was chasing a woman who he couldn't
door. Stupid, I told myself. She shouldn't have possibly be chasing. Maybe I wanted to help him.

taken the revolving door. Now we've got her.

But that's not what it felt like. It felt like . . . I

Marco and I reached the revolving door while
don't know, like I liked chasing someone.

she was still inside it, just exiting. Marco jumped

That's dumb but it may be the truth.

into the next open section. That's when the

He raced down the escalator, trying to shove
woman yanked hard back on the door, spun it
past people. I raced down the steps that paral-
backward, caught Marco off balance and nailed
leled the escalator. I hit the floor first.

him in the face with the brass push-bar.

"There!" he pointed.

Marco sat down hard. He grabbed his face.

I saw a blond woman fast-walking away

Blood leaked through his interlocked fingers.

through the crowd. A woman pushed a stroller

"Hey! You okay?" I yelled to him.

into her path. Marco's ghost shoved the stroller

"After her! Stay on her!" he yelled and
aside and kept moving.

scrambled to his feet.

57

56

All right, I told myself. The boy can focus.

For a split second I met her gaze. Rage. Fury.

I went through a side door. There were stone

I hesitated a split second. But a split second
steps, about a dozen, two hundred feet wide,
later, my own anger answered hers.

heading down to the busy street.

You don't scare me, lady.

Business people bustling on the sidewalk

The wolves were on the scent again. The ante-
below. People coming up and down the steps.

lope ran. Onto the sidewalk, shoving, slamming,

Groups. Individuals.

barreling through businessmen and -women and

No blond woman.

UPS drivers and hot dog vendors and bike mes-

She couldn't have gotten away. No way. Not
sengers.

enough time. She was here, here in view, one of

We raced along the facade of the museum.

the three or four dozen bodies in motion.

She turned a hard right, straight out into traffic.

Wig. It was a wig. The realization came to me

Give the lady points. She didn't scare easy.

in a flash. Marco raced up, stopped, panting be-

Yellow cabs screeched. Drivers cursed. Fin-
side me.

gers were thrust skyward.

"She has dark hair," he gasped.

She ran, we chased, and we gained.

"I guessed that."

She ducked into an alleyway. Now we had her.

He looked back and forth. "I don't see her."

The crowds were her cover. She'd be alone.

"Has to be here."

I turned the corner first, Marco inches behind

"Look for whatever she wouldn't be doing,"

me. Dumpsters and overflowing trash cans. A
he said. "Should be alone, should be going down pile of empty bottles all in racks.

the steps, look for the opposite."

She was not in sight. Only two places she

I nodded. Yeah, he was right. He was upset,
could be. Behind the Dumpster. Or behind the
he was desperate, he thought he was chasing his
stack of bottles.

dead mother, and he still figured that out. Maybe

I looked at Marco. We reached unspoken

I would go out with him. The little guy had a
agreement. He walked softly, sneakers squishing
brain in there.

in filth, toward the Dumpster.

"There!" I yelled.

"Lookout!"

She was brunette now, moving with a slow

The tower of bottles tipped.

group of old people coming up the stairs.

CRASH!

58

59

Wham!

for help. Even then some part of my scared,

Something hit the side of my face. Hard. My
adrenaline-saturated brain wondered what kind
eyes rolled in different directions. Tears blurred
of woman could make a call and have tough guys
my vision. A dark shape, moving fast right for
showing up within seconds.

me. A bottle in her hand.

"Back!"

Swing!

We turned. Trapped. Two big guys behind us.

I ducked, kicked instinctively, and caught

One guy with a sore elbow and Marco's mother
yielding flesh. My vision was clearing but I was
ahead of us.

still wobbly.

Think fast, Rachel. I slid the toe of my shoe

She was down on her butt.

under one of the bottles and flipped it up at the

She slammed the bottle down on the ground.

woman. She flinched and we shoved past her.

It shattered, leaving her holding a broken bottle,

Great. Now all four of them were behind us.

all jagged, ripping edges.

And I didn't see any way out of the alley.

A deadly weapon.

Straight ahead a blank wall. The alley turned

I backed up, heard Marco yell, "Get your
right. We turned right, scrabbling and panting
hands off me!"

and now very seriously scared.

Someone had him. A man. A large man.

Dead end!

This was going very bad very quickly.

Walls. Walls. Walls.

I spun, a nice pirouette. Much easier on the

I tried a door. Locked. Marco tried another.

ground than on the balance beam.

Locked.

I snatched up a bottle and nailed the elbow of

Overhead, a fire escape, the kind that lowers
the man holding Marco.

on springs when a person is descending. It was

"Ah!"

drawn up, hanging in midair. Seven feet up?

Marco slipped free.

The three men turned the corner. The woman

"RUN!" I yelled and yanked him with me.

was gone. I had a feeling it didn't matter. The

We ran. Back toward the street. But suddenly
men looked very serious. Determined.

two new figures loomed in our path.

I stopped short of the tantalizing fire escape.

The cell phone. The woman had called

"Marco! Stand right there!" I pointed at a spot
fin

e i
on the ground, ten feet away from the fire es-

"Yeah. RUN!"

cape.

We topped the fire escape and tumbled over

I raced over to stand beneath the black-
the parapet onto the roof just as something really
painted wrought iron. Turned, cupped my hands
disturbing happened.

together below my waist.

The men stopped firing guns.

"Are you crazy?" Marco demanded.

They started firing lasers.

"You have a better idea?"

"Ahhhhhh!" Marco yelled and ran straight at
me. Jumped, seated his foot in my cupped
hands. I heaved up, timing the movement to use
his momentum.

Up he went. Not far. Just enough. He grabbed
the bottom of the fire escape, drew it down with
his weight. The thing screeched with the strain of
rusted metal on rusted metal.

I caught it before it hit the ground and we
blew up the stairs, crowding each other, frantic.

The springs lifted up.the stairs after us out of
reach of our pursuers, but we weren't going to
stop and toss off any clever comic book, "Take
that, villain!" lines.

We were going to climb till we ran out of
stairs.

Three stories.

BLAM! BLAM!

At first I couldn't figure it out. What was that
incredibly loud noise?

BLAM! BLAM!

"They're shooting at us!" I yelled in outrage.

62

63

My four legs dwindled swiftly. They melted up
into my body. The floor rushed up toward me.

Suddenly my stalk eyes went dark. I could
only see directly ahead of me.

<No!>

I reversed morph. Demorphed. A momentary
panic, that was all. I had felt suddenly blind. The
three-dimensional world had gone flat.

Stupid. I was annoyed with myself. Obviously
the creature I was to morph had only two eyes. I
should have been prepared.

I took a last look around. Through the trans-
parent wall into the dome, at the familiar trees,
at the grass that had nurtured me. I might never

I stood in the empty air lock. The Blue
return. I might never again stand on any part of

Blade was long gone. It was time for me to be

Andalite soil.

long gone, too. I considered waiting. But I was

No point in being sentimental, I told myself.

waiting for nothing, and I knew it.

You are a warrior now.

More waiting would just be cowardice. No one

Unprepared, yes. Without a prince or a mis-
was coming to rescue me.

sion. Too bad. That was how it was. I was alone

I was frightened. There is nothing wrong with
on an alien world that might be infested with
admitting that. A warrior who is not afraid when

Yeerks. And would, most likely, offer me no vi-
he goes toward danger is a fool. Fear is the reflex
able means of returning to my home world.

that keeps us alive.

A movement. Something out past the door,

I focused on the image of the Blue Blade.

past the shell of the dome in the ocean itself. It

Tried to see it in every detail. It was not difficult.

was distorted by the lenses of water and plex.

I had spent quite a while observing it.

Distorted, warping in the filtered green sun-

I focused and I began to change.

light.

64

65

Bug fighter!

themselves, slid down to opposite sides of my

The shock knocked the wind out of me. Bug
head.

fighter! Yeerks! They had found me. They were

I heard the sickening slurp and slush of inter-
here. Coming. Yeerks!

nal organs reforming, relocating, disappearing

I fought the instinct to run back into the
altogether, being replaced by more primitive
dome. NO. That is where they would kill me.

structures.

Without shields up, with nothing but a weak force

My fur that had been melting wax now hard-
field it would be child's play to blow holes through
ened and congealed, forming the stiff, abrasive
the dome and drown the trees, the grass, and any-
skin of the Blue Blade.

thing else that required air.

Faster! Hurry! It was taking too long. The

Morph. Morph. It was the only way. And

Yeerks would see the air lock opening. They
quickly.

would see me emerge.

My ears flattened against my skull and melted

I was almost complete. Only one change re-
away. My arms slid down the length of my torso,
mained, and it came last.

hands flattening, stiffening, sharpening, till they

My face split open horizontally. A gash. An
formed matched fins.

open wound. Muscles attached themselves to

Following my orders the computer was filling
jaw bones. And from those jaw bones grew teeth.

the air lock with water. Cold.

How many? Too many to easily count.

Hurry!

The mouth, my mouth opened, shut. Opened,

I was almost on my belly. My four hooves
shut again with sudden, savage force.

remained, absurd remnants. Then, they, too,

And then, one last thing. One last change,
disappeared and I was a growing, elongating
one last gift from the Blue Blade.

cylinder.

Instinct. The mind that went with the mouth.

My upper body tilted down, coming into line

The hatch opened. I swam out into the un-
with the cylinder. My tail blade split in two, form-
bounded ocean.

ing an upper and lower triangle.

My ocean.

My nostrils drifted across the fluid surface of
my face, seemed to crawl across liquefied flesh
to stop just behind my stalk eyes, which had,

66

67

The Blue Blade had startlingly acute senses.

Smell. Hearing. And some new sense, something
that seemed to be a sort of electrical field aware-
ness. It was as if every living thing near me was
pulsing with a distinct radio emission and I was
a receiver.

I heard the Bug fighter. Moved away from it.

Fear? No. It was not prey. And there would be no
prey near it.

A school of smaller finned creatures passed
by, off to my right, running from the Bug fighter.

Too small for a meal.

I swam, swam, moved, moved, this way and
that, casting about for a scent that would jolt my

J. kicked my tail and surged into the water.

brain.

How to describe the feeling of the creature's

WHHUUUMMMPPPPFFF!

mind beneath and within my own? I sensed no

A noise that filled the ocean. The part of me
intelligence worth noting. This seemed to me a
that was still Andalite understood. The Yeerks
creature of pure instinct.

had imploded the dome. It was filling with water,

The Blue Blade was a creature made up of ra-

I could hear the bubbles erupting, the tons of
zored triangles in mind as well as body. The in-
seawater rushing in. I could hear the trees snap-
stincts were as clean and elegant as a crystal
ping like twigs.

dagger.

No going back. Only forward now.

Move. Move. Move.

I swam.

Kill. Eat.

Sounds behind me. Pursuit. Meaningless. I

Move.

was not pursued. Nothing pursued me. I pur-

And to accomplish these utterly basic ends I
sued.

discovered a whole array of weapons that had not

More sounds. The Bug fighter blew past me,
been visible from the outside.

rocking me with its wake.

68

69

Tseeeeeew!

the lengths of their bloated, vile, pulsating bod-

A blast of energy that set my electrical field
ies.

senses on fire.

I could clearly see the hungry red mouths, the

I turned.

red jelly eyes.

Tseeeeeew!

When they lectured us on Taxxons at the

Heat! Irrelevant. Pain! Irrelevant.

academy they emphasized two things: that any

I turned and dived.

Andalite could slaughter an endless number of

Tseeeeew!

Taxxons in direct combat. The other thing they

This time the Dracon beam missed by a larger
emphasized was that if we fell before the Taxxons
margin.

our fate would be horrifying.

They fired again. Sliced part of my tail off.

The Taxxons do not accept surrender. They

But it was an uneven fight. In the water the Bug
eat the wounded. Even their own.

fighter was slow in the turns, sluggish. I turned in

There were six of the big worms in the water
my own body length.

ahead of me. Six arrayed in battle formation

The Bug fighter dove beneath me. I rose
against one of me.

toward the surface. Shadows on the bright bar-

I attacked. I raced for the nearest one. The
rier of the surface. Something flying low and

Blue Blade sliced through the water, rolled onto
slow.

its side, opened its mouth, and dug triangular

Pah-Loosh! Pah-Loosh!

teeth into too-yielding flesh.

They fell from no great height into the water

I ripped a two-foot hole in the worm.

just fifty feet away. I, the Andalite me, recog-

"Sreeeeeyah!"

nized them instantly, though I had never actually

Taxxon blood and organs and bile billowed in
seen one except in holographic displays at the
the water. Air bubbles seeped from its mouth.

academy.

A second Taxxon. Chomp!

Taxxons.

A third, a fourth, more, more, more! I was

The only species ever to agree en masse to be
mad with killing rage, slashing, darting, flailing
infested by the Yeerks.

like an insane thing, hitting, biting, ripping, tear-

They were large worms. Worms that moved on
ing.

dozens of sharp, pointed legs set in rows down

Out of control!

70

71

The morph had taken over. The creature was
directing the action. No, that made it sound as if
it was thinking. It thought nothing. Even its low
level of intelligence was wiped away, erased by a
screaming, demanding urge to massacre any-
thing it could reach.

Six Taxxons were in pieces, floating.

More were dropping into the water, but these
new arrivals saw what was happening and swam
directly away from me.

No more targets! Nothing left to kill.

I flailed at nothing, bit and slashed the empty

D A Y T H I R T Y - O N E
water. I would have bitten myself if I could.

And then, suddenly, it was over.

The madness gone, replaced by ice-cold in-

Aren't you coming?"

difference.

I shrugged. Tom was framed in my bedroom

I swam away. My Andalite mind regained con-
door. He looks a lot like me; at least that's what
trol. For now.

people say. They always say they can tell we're

My first battle. Six Taxxons. And I had learned
brothers.

one thing: If the rest of Earth's species were any-

"I wasn't going to," I said. I pointed at the
thing like this Blue Blade, the Yeerks had picked
books on my desk. "Homework."

the wrong planet.

He looked disappointed. "Oh, man, that's too
bad, man. I figured you'd be there. There's some
people I wanted you to meet. One of the high-up
guys in The Sharing is coming."

"Yeah?" I said, trying to sound interested.

"Mr. Visser himself."

I had a sudden mental image . . . a vision, al-
most. Strange. A picture that had popped into

72

73
my head. A head without a mouth. Eyes on some-

"It's your honey pie," he said.

thing like snail stalks.

I flushed. I couldn't control it. I shot him a

Whoa. Then it was gone. "Weird name," I
dark look that just made him laugh. I grabbed
said.

the receiver from his hand.

"Yeah, well, he's an unusual guy. But very

"Hi."

smart. Very cool. Look, who's the homework for?

"It's me, Cassie."

Old Lady Hanna?"

"Yeah? Urn, hi. What's up?"

I smiled, despite myself. "Yeah. For Ms.

"I . . . I, uh, I was wondering if, I don't

Hanna."

know . . . "

"Tell you what, you come to the meeting with

In the background I heard a voice I knew.

me tonight, I'll guarantee Old Lady Hanna will

Rachel. "Good grief, do I have to do it for you?"

give you an 'A.' "

"Do you want to study together?" Cassie

"Say what?"

blurted out in a rush.

He shrugged. "She's a member, little brother."

"Is Rachel there?" I asked.

"That doesn't mean she'll let me blow off

"Yes, but she'll be leaving. Sooner than she
homework," I said.

thinks, if she doesn't watch out."

Tom considered for a moment. He blinked

I sighed. On the scale of things I wanted to
and kind of looked away, almost like he was em-
do, study with Cassie was about a nine, going to
barrassed. "No. I don't want you thinking that,"

The Sharing was about a one. A minus one. But
he admitted. "Tell you what, though, come to the

I'd already told Tom I'd do it.

meeting and I'll help you do the homework when

"Cassie, I really would like to but —"

we get home."

"Oh! No problem!" she said, too quickly. "I

Strange having Tom ask me for anything. It
was just, it was only that —"

was like he was pressuring me. Maybe he was

"Cassie, there is nothing I'd rather do than
nervous himself and wanted me around as his se-
study with you. Really. Except maybe get some
curity blanket.

tips from Michael Jordan. But I promised Tom I'd

"Okay," I said. I shut my book.

go to this stu . . ." I stopped myself. Tom could

The phone rang. Tom stepped into the hall-
be right out in the hall. "This meeting."

way to grab it.

"A meeting?"

74

75

"Yeah. It's this thing called The Sharing."

"That would be great."

Silence.

"Yeah."

"Are you there?"

"Yeah."

"Yeah."

"Go kill Rachel now."

"Is something the matter?"

I stepped back out into the hall and hung up

"I . . ."

the phone. Cool. Cassie, tomorrow night. My in-

"What is it?"

sides were churning. Oh, man, what was I going

"I don't know," she said. She sounded con-
to talk about with her?

fused. Worried. "I don't know. I really don't."

Maybe we could talk about why Rachel would

I relaxed a little. Not much. "You know,
keep something secret that Marco wouldn't stop
maybe you're just upset over this thing with
bringing up.

Rachel and Marco."

And maybe we could talk about why Cassie

"Over them going out?"

got weird when I said the words, "The Sharing."

"No, over the whole thing that happened with
them. You know, Marco thinking he saw his mom
and all. The guys with the guns."

"The what?"

I slapped my forehead. "Rachel didn't tell
you?"

"Tell me what?" Cassie demanded. Then, ob-
viously to Rachel, "What didn't Rachel tell me?"

"I thought you'd get all worried," Rachel said
in the background.

"Sorry," I said. "Marco hasn't shut up about
it, and I just assumed Rachel told you."

"Jake, I have to go and cause Rachel serious
bodily pain."

"I understand. Listen, Cassie, how about to-
morrow night? I mean, for studying together."

76

77

Two days ago I'd run into Andy and Tap-Tap
again. In the gym locker room. There were maybe
two dozen other kids in there, so I'd figured I was
safe even though this wasn't my regular class
and I was only there because I'd missed gym two
days in a row. I figured wrong.

They started to stuff me into one of the taller
lockers the football team uses. I was yelling, kids
were laughing. Not just Andy and Tap-Tap. It was
like every kid in there wanted to see me get hu-
miliated.

Then these guys, these two ordinary kids I'd
seen at The Sharing, came over. I didn't even

i
know their names. I still don't.

was used to the place now. I felt comfort-

One guy said, "Hey, let him go."

able there. Weird feeling. Weird to be comfort-

Andy stopped stuffing my face back with his
able.

hand. "Are you talking to me?"

I'd been to several meetings of The Sharing.

"Let him go."

Once some new kids started teasing me, but the

These two Sharing guys didn't have Jake's
real members shut them down fast.

easy ability to convince people they were serious.

No one gave me any grief at The Sharing.

But they were determined. The other guy walked

They acted like I was an equal. Like I belonged.

over to a weight rack. He picked up about a

Or at least like I could belong.

twenty-pound weight and carried it back to Andy.

Tonight was the night. I had to decide. Join or

"Let him go, or I'll bury this weight in your
not. Become a full member or stop coming.

head."

It wasn't that hard a decision for me. What

Andy blinked. Tap-Tap giggled.

else did I have going on? Where else was I going

Class was changing. New kids were arriving.

to go?

One of them was Sharing, too. He didn't even ask

And there was another factor.

what was going on. He just moved in beside his

78

79
two friends. Now it was three of them against

I nodded. "I know. Some Sharing guys saved

Andy and Tap-Tap.

my rear end the other day. I know what it's about."

They let me go.

"The individual has to give up something to

My rescuers didn't even hang around long
get something in return," he said.

enough for me to say thanks.

"Yeah. I know. I've been listening to the

They'd made their point. That's what it meant
speeches and all."

to be Sharing, not throwing your weight around or

"You trade a little bit of freedom for a lot of
anything like some gang or whatever, just the
belonging to something bigger than yourself." He
knowledge that there were people backing you
moved closer and lowered his voice to a conspir-
up. Looking out for you.

atorial whisper. "Bigger than you can imagine."

Bill was still my advisor. Only now I was beat-

I felt wary. What was he talking about?

ing him at pool.

"A full member of The Sharing is a special

"I'm going to do it," I said to him. Then I
person," Bill said. "A rare and special person."

nailed the four ball.

He waved his arm around at the room full of kids

"Do what? Kick my butt by running the table?"

and adults. "This is just the surface, Tobias. We

I laughed. "No. I want to join. I want to be a
are about bigger things. We are going to make
full member."

this a better world."

He put down his cue, came over, and gave me

"Yeah?"

a sort of arm's-length hug. He held me out to get

"Yeah. Change is coming, Tobias. And you'll
a good look at me.

be part of it. You have no idea. You think you're

"That's cool, Tobias."

just some kid, some kid going to school. You

"Yeah," I said. I was feeling kind of embar-
have no idea of the untapped potential deep in-
rassed.

side yourself. You have no idea what you can be-

"Now, you know this is a big step, right? I
come. What you can accomplish."

mean, we want you to join. We all want you to be

I nodded like I had some clue. I didn't. But it
a full member. But there are responsibilities that
excited me. Scared me, too, a little. But there
go along with it. It's not just games and fun all
was something about The Sharing they don't tell
the time."

you right at first: You have a few weeks, a month

80

81
even, but then you have to choose. You can stay

That came out much harsher and more pa-
and be a full member, or you have to leave.

thetic than I'd intended.

Leave The Sharing. And do what? Go back to

"Tobias, you're not a loser," he said.

my lovely life?

Which just made it worse. It's bad enough be-

I spotted Jake. He came in with Tom. Tom
ing a loser. You don't want the winners like Jake
gets a lot of respect at the meetings. Even adults
feeling sorry for you.

are respectful to him.

"Hey, join or not, no problem," I said.

I caught Jake's eye. He came over to see me.

"It's j u s t . . . " He looked down at the floor, Cool. For once I wasn't running to him like a lit-then over at Tom who was shaking hands and
tle puppy dog. He was coming to see me.

laughing with a group of guys and girls. "I don't

"What's up, Tobias?"

know. People start talking about how the individ-

I shrugged. "Nothing much. Except I guess
ual has to give way to the group, I just, I don't
tonight is the big night for me."

know. I get kind o f . . . jumpy. Besides, how can

"Yeah? Why's that?"

I join any organization where Mr. Chapman is a

"I'm going to become a full member."

member?"

He looked at me kind of sideways. "Congratu-

He meant that last part as a joke. But I didn't
lations, I guess, right?"

want to laugh. "Don't you want to be a part of

"Sure. You should do it, too."

something big and important?"

"Uh-huh. That's what Tom keeps telling me."

He shook his head very slightly. "No. I don't

"So why don't you?" I asked.

want to be 'a part.' Maybe it's just me. Maybe it's

He looked uncomfortable. "I don't know. I
just my own mental block. But anytime someone
guess it's just not my thing."

starts talking that stuff, I start looking for the exit

"Oh, you're too cool?"

door."

He looked sharply at me. "I wasn't trying to

"You're a part of lots of things, Jake," I said.

offend you, man."

"You're part of a team. You're part of your coun-

"You didn't offend me," I said, sounding of-
try."

fended. "Not at all. I'm just curious. Why don't

He nodded. "No, I didn't make the team," he
you want to join? Tom's a member, so it's not like
said darkly. He forced a happy face. "Hey, I'm
it's just for losers like me."

just down because of this conversation I had.

82

83

Cassie. Kind of bothered me somehow. Not your
problem, though. So how about I say congratula-
tions, and wish you luck and all."

"Okay. Cool."

"Yeah."

There were four of us slated to become full
members. There was a police officer named Ed-
ward. There was a newspaper reporter named

Kiko. There was a guy who managed local bands.

His name was Barry.

And then, there was me.

Why me? The question was impossible to
avoid. How did I fit into this group? Was it really
true that The Sharing didn't care if you were young
or old, male, female, black, white, Asian, Chris-
tian, Jew, Muslim, Buddhist, atheist, straight, gay,
rich, or poor?

I mean, that's what they said. But lots of
people say that. They don't always mean it.

84

85

Mostly people look for ways to treat other people

The door opened. The door that hadn't
like dirt.

opened before. Mr. Chapman. Our vice principal

They put us in a small room, dimly lit. Like a
at school. So far my meetings with Mr. Chapman
dentist's waiting room only with mood lighting
had been in his office. Him asking me to tell him
and no magazines. There was the door we came
who had beat me up. Or who had pantsed me
in. And a door that hadn't opened yet.

and shoved me into the girls' bathroom. And me

I looked at the others. Edward and Kiko paid
refusing to tell.

no attention to me. Barry nodded. They must have

"Kiko?" Chapman said.

been wondering what some kid was doing there.

She jerked to her feet. Straightened her trim

Adults have an automatic prejudice against kids.

skirt. Chapman gave me a friendly wink and led

They never take kids seriously, even when they

Kiko away.

pretend to. At least that's my experience.

Barry fell silent. He was nervous.

I said hi to Barry.

The policeman wasn't in uniform, but I knew

"Hi, kid. What's your name?"

he was a cop. My uncle has been arrested a cou-

"Tobias."

ple of times in his life and cops are the one thing

"Good name. You like music?"

he really gets passionate about. He's always

"Sure."

pointing them out. So I know a policeman when

"Ever hear of Format Cee's Colon?"

I see one.

I shook my head. He looked disappointed.

Basically, I figured if my uncle hated them,

"Yeah, well, you will. Next big thing. You heard it
they were probably all right. It set my mind at
here, first. They just need a break. We've got a
ease a little seeing him there. I mean, if he was
video, but we can't get any play on MTV."

joining it had to be okay. Right?

I nodded like I cared. "I guess you need that,

The door opened again and I jerked involun-
huh?"

tarily.

"Absolutely. They say they can help."

It was Bill. "Hey, switch to decaf, man," he

"Who?"

joked.

"The Sharing. Who else?"

"Sorry."

"Ah."

"Let's go."

86

87

I stood up. Barry gave me a nod of encour-

"Tobias," Chapman said.

agement. The cop just stared blankly ahead of

"Yes, sir?"

him.

"Bill tells us that you are ready to become a

I walked through the door.

full member of The Sharing."

Bill led me down a hallway. Suddenly, in the

I nodded.

middle of the hallway he stopped and gave me a

"Why do you wish to join us?"

mysterious look. He pressed his hand against a

I shrugged. "Because . . . I . . . because you
small rectangular panel set about chest-high.

know, what they're always talking about. What

Suddenly a door appeared. It opened on dark-

Mr. Visser was saying. Being part of something
ness.

greater than myself. Part of something big."

We stepped through. Not completely dark.

Chapman glanced at Mr. Visser. Nervously, I

There was a red light. Metal stairs, leading down.

thought.

I hesitated. Bill laughed. "Don't worry, it's

Mr. Visser took a deep breath. "Is all this nec-
just a bit of melodrama."

essary?"

Down. Not far. Three flights. To a landing, and

Chapman said, "Receptivity is helpful, Visser.

another door, and another hallway. Another door.

There is less chance o f . . . of problems later."

Open. Inside, a table. Six chairs. Chapman

"Yes, yes, but get on with it."

sat at the head of the table. Beside him, imperi-

Chapman forced his features back into a pleas-
ous, impatient, almost menacing, was the man
ant smile. "Are you ready, Tobias? Is this what you
who had spoken at the meeting earlier. Mr.

truly want?"

Visser.

What I wanted? I wanted to fly. To spread my

Kiko sat to Chapman's right. She smiled at
wings, catch the breeze, feel my talons leave the
me. A weird smile. The side of her face spasmed
branch, soar as the thermal raised me up to the
suddenly, but then she was smiling again.

clouds.

In one corner was a sort of metal tub. Like

What?

the whirlpools the football team uses. Stainless

Bill nudged me. "Yes," I said.

steel, just big enough for one person. There was

"And you will surrender yourself to The Shar-
some sort of harness or whatever on the lip of the
ing?"

tub, and a steel chair.

"Yes." The image had been so strong. So real.

88

89

"What is this?" I asked. "What are you doing?

Flying high, seeing through eyes that were like

I mean, what's going to happen?"

telescopes.

"Your whole world is going to change, To-

Chapman nodded to Bill. Bill held my shoul-
bias," Bill said soothingly. "You will see and
ders from behind and guided me to the whirlpool
know and understand everything."

thing.

"I don't think I . . ." I couldn't breathe. A

"Sit there," he said.

voice in my head was screaming, Run! Run! My

I sat. The chair was cold. The surface of the
mind was reeling. "I think I changed my mind."

liquid in the tub was still. Dark. Heavy-looking,

Bill suppressed a smile. "You want to leave
as if it maybe wasn't water.

The Sharing? You want to leave all of us? All your

No big deal, I told myself. Lots of organiza-
friends? After all we've done for you? Okay, To-
tions have weird initiations and stuff. No prob-
bias. But what will you do, then? Where will you
lem. But I felt off now. The vision, what was it?

go? What's your future?"

Some desperate fantasy?

My heart was pounding. "I don't know," I said

"Place your right hand here," Bill said.

desperately. "I just. . . I . . ."

I placed my hand in what could only be a

"There is no ' I , ' Tobias. What are you? One
shackle. A handcuff. My insides were churning
lonely, messed-up kid. No one loves you. No one
now. I was placing myself totally in their power.

cares. No one but us. Put your head in the har-

What was I doing? What was I doing?

ness."

Bill fastened the cuff.

I shook my head, wildly, firmly. "No. No. I

"Now your left hand."

don't want to do this."

No, no, this was insane. No, this was wrong.

Bill smiled. He laughed. "Well, guess what?

No. No. Handcuffs? I looked pleadingly at Mr.

It's too late."

Chapman. He was the vice principal, he wouldn't

He grabbed my head in his two hands and
be part of anything bad, would he?

shoved it down.

But Mr. Visser was in the way. It was his bored

"No! Mr. Chapman! No!"

face I saw.

Chapman got up and came over. He helped

I placed my left hand. Bill fastened the cuff.

force me down. I was screaming, crying, yelling

"Now lay your head down, sideways, in the
now. Helpless. My hands held firm.

harness," Bill instructed.

91

90

"Let me go! Let me go! Let me go!"

The harness was closed over my neck, around
my head. I couldn't move it. I could barely move
my mouth to beg for mercy.

Bill and Chapman stepped back. There was a
whirring motor somewhere close. The side of my
head was forced down toward the surface of the
liquid.

"No! No! No!"

"You see, in the end we have to use force,"

Mr. Visser said.

"True, Visser, but we only have this problem
in twenty-one percent of the cases of willing
members. And there are sixty-four percent fewer
incidents of contested control with voluntary
l—ook, son, I just want to try and help you.

hosts."

But I can't help you if you don't talk to me."

"I know the statistics," Mr. Visser snapped.

I had lived on the surface of planet Earth for

"Just do it. I have thirty minutes left before I
several days. I had accomplished some things. I
have to demorph."

had observed that a species called humans were

I heard all this like it was coming from far
the dominant life-form. This had taken some
away. I listened hoping to hear some note of
time.

mercy, some sense that maybe this was all a ter-

For one thing, I wanted to guard against the
rible joke, a hazing, something.

problem of cultural prejudice. Coming from a rel-

My ear touched the water.

atively large species myself, I tended naturally to

A moment later, something touched my ear.

look first to species that were of a similar size.

I didn't want to be a victim of my own expec-
tations. So I deliberately investigated a number
of other fairly ubiquitous species. But none of

92

93
those species possessed even rudimentary tech-

"That's not exactly a name. That's just some-
nology.

thing someone called you."

I considered a species called cows. In places

"Ah. When will I receive ree-seeeve the
they were numerous. But despite their superficial
cookies-zuh? They are delicious, mmm-mmm."

similarity to my own species, I determined that

"Well, to tell you the truth, the nurses don't
they were not highly intelligent.

want you around at cookie time. You made quite

"You're making this awfully hard on me. How
a scene yesterday."

can I prescribe for you if you won't even talk to

This was disturbing news. "No cookies?"

me? I know you can communicate. You've com-

He shook his head back and forth and looked
municated with other patients."

at me with his two small eyes located on the front

"Yesssss," I said. "I can communicate. Cate-
of his face. "No cookies."

uh. I can-nuh com-yew-yew-nicate. Is it not time

"Then I must go elsewhere in search of cook-
for cookies?"

ies," I said. "The cookies formed by two thin,

In the end it became clear that my first in-
round, black discs with a layer of adhesive white
stinct was correct: Humans were the dominant
substance between them are the finest accom-
species.

plishment of your species!"

I had acquired a human morph. And I had

"My species?"

learned to pass as a human. In fact, I had been

I had made a mistake. I had allowed my agi-
asked — forcefully — to adopt a particular loca-
tation over the cookies to cause me to be care-
tion as my primary residence.

less. This was not the time to reveal myself.

"You have to at least give me your name."

Humans use their mouths for eating — much

"I am called Hey Moron. Hey! Moron-nuh!"

as the Blue Blade — which I learned the humans

The human before me closed his eyes and
call a shark. But humans possess an incredible
used his five-fingered hand to rub the flesh
sense that goes beyond anything the shark could
stretched across his forehead. Then he rubbed
boast: taste.

the back of his neck. Then he exhaled breath

Taste! And such tastes! Cigarette butts,
through his mouth. He was called Dr. Duber-
baloney sandwiches, grape juice, Vaseline, and
stein. Early in my stay at this location I had not
best of all, the indescribably vibrant, mind-
fully understood his function. Now I did.

altering, overwhelming taste of cookies!

94

95

Especially the cookies formed by two thin,

He had seemed unsurprised.

round, black discs with a layer of adhesive white

John told one of the nurses that I was an alien.

substance between. Someday I hope my fellow

And for a moment I was quite concerned. But the

Andalites will be able to visit Earth and morph to
nurse seemed bored by this fact. And it seems
human simply for the intense pleasure to be had
that many of the residents of this particular
from eating cookies with a mouth.

group habitation are aliens.

"I meant our species."

It took me several days before it occurred to

"You said your species."

me that the humans in this group were not en-

"Evidently I am insane. May I go now?"

tirely like the broader spectrum of humans. They

The human raised his hands vertically and
suffered from mental illnesses. But, on balance
said, "Why me, Lord? Why?"

they seemed less aggressive and hostile than the

I left the small room and went back out into
humans portrayed on the two-dimensional audio-
the larger room where numerous humans wan-
visual display screen called a TV.

dered back and forth holding discussions using

So I stayed with them. But now, if there were
mouth-sounds. At first I had assumed that these
no more cookies, I would clearly have to leave. In
discussions were being transmitted by some sort
any case, it was time for me to be about my pri-
of very small communications link since they
mary mission. Whatever that was.

were addressed to persons who were not in evi-

I waited till darkness, when the orderlies turn
dence.

out the lights and the first Elvis Presley sings an

Later I understood this, as well.

awful musical composition about a place called

The humans had various names. Two of them

Heartbreak Hotel.

were named Elvis Presley. One was named John.

I demorphed. I used my tail blade to slice

He was the one who had first witnessed me de-
open the steel wire mesh that covered the win-
morphing.

dows.

It was an accident. I'd hidden within a small

I was out in Earth's night, wiser about hu-
enclosed area used for voiding biological wastes.

mans, and about cookies, but no closer to finding

But John had caught me. He had seen me in my
an answer to Elfangor's fate. Or a way home.

natural state.

Humans lacked the technology for Zero-space

96

97
travel. Their spacecraft was laughable explosive

In my time at the residence for insane hu-
devices used to propel satellites into orbit. They
mans I had learned to locate structures within
were centuries away from Z-space travel.

the gridwork of streets. I knew the location of a

Which left me just two possibilities: One was
television studio. And I knew at what time they
to hope that some Andalites survived and were
would begin a "live" broadcast of news.

present on Earth.

My method of discovering whether the Yeerks

The other possibility was only very slightly
had infiltrated the human species was quite sim-
more likely: the Yeerks.

ple: Show them an Andalite.

Were the Yeerks on Earth? I didn't know. I
knew that they were in orbit. I knew that they had
located the sunken Dome ship. But were they en-
gaged in a conquest of Earth?

And if they were, what were the odds that I
could steal a Bug fighter and escape?

I needed a plan. I needed to learn whether
the Yeerks were here. But how?

How? TV.

I had come to understand at least some as-
pects of human technology, in particular their
communications technology. They have tele-
phones, which communicate only the spoken
mouth-sounds of their primary communication.

They have an inexplicable artifact of which they
are absurdly proud called the Internet, which is
evidently meant to be a sort of adjunct to other,
more effective technologies. They have books, of
course, models of efficiency. And they have TV.

TV is immediate, pervasive, and transmits
sound, images, and text.

98

99

presence. A mind. It was . . . I didn't hear it,
didn't see it, but it was there, there and touching
my own thoughts.

Suddenly my hands, which had been clenched
in rage, relaxed. The fingers hung limp.

I felt a chill. Cold as death.

No. It couldn't be.

All at once memories were spilling out. Like I
was thinking back over my life, only I wasn't. I
wasn't, I didn't want to. I was sitting there,
standing, hovering, I don't know where I was, but

I was there watching as my memories were re-
played at hyper speed, tumbling, spilling out.

My mouth said, "I have him."

X felt it enter my ear.

My mouth had moved! Lips, tongue, throat,

I've never felt anything like it. It wasn't that it
all had worked to form words I didn't mean to
was painful. It wasn't, not really. But something
say.

was crawling into my ear. Into my ear.

"Let me up, this is rather uncomfortable," my

"No! No! No! Help me, someone help me! Mr.

mouth said.

Chapman, you have to . . . Bill, help me!"

My voice! I heard my own voice with my own

It wasn't stopping. It kept writhing, forcing it-
ears but I hadn't spoken. Had I? Was I losing my
self into my head. I could feel it through a numb-
mind?

ness. I could feel it inside my ear, deeper, oh

"Report," Mr. Visser said.

God, in my head!

Only he wasn't Mr. Visser. He was Visser

"Let me go. I'll do anything you want. Let me

Three. Not a human at all. An alien.

go! Please, please:"

Okay, this was all a dream. This was all not

Deeper.

happening. None of it. Aliens called Yeerks who

Then . . .

infested other species?

Then I felt the first tingling sensation of a new

Insane! I was dreaming or something.

100

101

My mouth said, "Odret-One-Seven-Seven, of
orders do you bring from the Council of Thir-
the Culat Hesh pool. Reporting for duty."

teen?"

A Yeerk. In my brain. In my brain, scan-

The Yeerk in my head, I could see his
ning my memories, moving my mouth, rubbing
thoughts. Not all, but enough. I knew he was
my chafed wrists, stretching my fear-strained
wary of Visser Three. But not frightened. This
back.

Yeerk was under the protection of another power.

All of them, it's what they all were. Chapman,

But not the Council of Thirteen! He had lied

Bill, Tom, all the full members. Them, and thou-
to Visser Three. Or at least twisted the truth.

sands more. Policemen, politicians, newspeople,

"The council congratulates you on taking
businessmen, teachers, writers. And kids.

command of the Earth invasion," my mouth said.

Why kids? Because kids are never suspected.

"The council wishes you to know that your re-

They can be used anywhere.

quest to alter the tactics established by Visser

I tried to look at Chapman. But I couldn't

One is denied. Earth will be taken by infiltration
move my eyes! I wanted to scream. But my
and subversion. It will not be openly attacked."

mouth, my vocal cords, it was like being para-

Visser One. Yes, Odret was her ally. Visser One
lyzed. Paralyzed and no one even to know that I
was Visser Three's enemy. She had been the first
was there, frozen, frozen inside my own body.

Yeerk on planet Earth. She had discovered the

Out of the corner of eyes I could no longer
planet and launched the invasion.

aim, I saw Bill smirk. He leaned close. "I know

But Odret was leery even of Visser One. She
you can still hear me, Tobias. Now do you see
told some story of being instantaneously trans-
what I meant? You have to give something up hu-
ported from her ship to a museum on the planet.

man, to be a part of something larger."

It made no sense to Odret.

He laughed.

Visser Three had begun to demorph. He was

But Visser Three snapped, "Shut up, fool. Get
becoming an Andalite. The Yeerk inside me, in
out."

my head, the slug creature who had wrapped

Bill disappeared from the room. Fast. Very
himself around my brain and gained total control
fast.

of me, knew about Andalites.

"All right, Odret-One-Seven-Seven, you have

They were the enemy. Duplicitous, hypocriti-
your human host," Visser Three said. "Now, what
cal, sanctimonius, deadly, and dangerous. Visser

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103

Three had the only Andalite host body in all
the Yeerk Empire. The Andalite in question was
morph-capable.

It made Visser Three very dangerous. Odret
was worried. And Odret was confused. He did
not understand why Visser One opposed using
greater force against the humans.

That was not his concern, he told himself. His
concern was to stay alive. To do so he — I — had
to obey Visser Three while pretending to obey the

Council of Thirteen and avoid so angering Visser

Three that his life would end in hideous torture.

My life, my very mind, everything that was
me, had been stolen. Stolen by a creature who

" Look, Tom, it's just not me, okay?"

was almost certainly doomed.

"Yeah, whatever," Tom said. He was mad. He

Bill came back into the room, rushing.

was hurt. He felt like I was rejecting him. "It's

"Visser! On the TV! Right now!"

just that tonight was kind of special, with Mr.

<What, you idiot?>

Visser being there and all. I mean, right now

"An Andalite."

probably your friend Tobias is becoming a full
member. He's probably already one of us."

"That's good for him. And for you," I said. I
was losing my patience. The whole thing was giv-
ing me the willies. "But you know what? The
more you pressure me, the less I'm interested."

We got home. Tom slammed in through the
front door. I slammed through behind him. I
didn't need this. Just because I didn't want to

104

105

"Special effects," I said. "It must be for some join some stupid club. I had homework to do. I'd
movie or whatever."

passed up a chance to be with Cassie.

"Tom!" my mom called. "Turn on channel

"Besides, he's not my friend," I said to Tom's
seven." Then, to me, "I don't think the anchors
retreating back. "He's just some guy from school."

expected this. They look scared to death."

My mom was in the kitchen paying bills. She

I shot a look toward Tom, illuminated by the
had the TV on as background noise. The local
glow of the TV in the family room. He was stand-
news.

ing up. Rigid. Staring. But not amazed or amused

I entered in search of junk food. Tom started
or curious.

to take off upstairs, then I guess he reconsid-

His face was a mask of rage and hatred.

ered. He flopped down in the family room and

The TV screen went blank. Up came a still
snapped on the TV. Some game was on.

shot saying Sorry, we are experiencing technical

"Hey, Mom, what's up?" I said.

difficulties.

"The electric bill," she muttered. "What

"That was weird," my mom said.

the . . . What is going on, is that some kind of

"Yeah," I agreed. But I was watching Tom.

gag?"

His fists were clenched. He bolted for the stairs

I followed the direction of her amazed stare.

and took them two steps at a time.

It was the familiar news set with the familiar

"You want some chicken? There's some in the
newspeople.

fridge."

But standing in front of them was something

"No. Thanks," I said. I headed for the stairs.

decidedly unfamiliar.

I didn't know why. I crept up them, moving as

It was a centaur. No, not a centaur. Not like it
silently as I could.

was half-horse and half-human, more like it was

At the top of the stairs I paused, measuring
half-muscular blue deer, half-human. Only with a
my breath, quieting my heart.

face that was definitely not human. For a start, it

" . . . I saw," Tom said into the receiver.

had no mouth. But it had two additional eyes

I waited. Hugged the wall.

mounted on moveable stalks atop its head.

"It will take ten minutes —"

And it had a tail like a python with a blade at

I peeked around the corner. Tom yanked the
the end.

107

106

receiver from his ear. Someone was screaming
abusively. I could hear the sound if not the
words.

"Immediately!" Tom said and dropped the
phone. He ran into his room and came out a few
seconds later. He was shoving something into his
waistband up under his jean jacket.

It was impossible to avoid thinking it was a
gun. I walked past him, pretending not to notice.

He grabbed me. Pushed me against the wall.

"I have to go out. Cover for me. If Mom or Dad
asks, I'm studying. Got it?"

I nodded. It wasn't so different from any num-
ber of times Tom had playfully put on a similar
act. We both knew not to take it seriously. Just

Wherever Tom was going he'd have to take
one problem: This time Tom was deadly serious.

my mom's car. He wasn't thinking clearly if he
thought I could cover for that. My dad wasn't
home yet and when he got home he'd see my
mom's car was out. How was I supposed to ex-
plain that?

Besides, this was bigger than some concern
over getting grounded. Tom was into something
dangerous.

If he was going to avoid being seen by my
mom he'd have to take the stairs down to the
basement then go out that way. That gave me
about five seconds' lead time.

I slid my bedroom window up and shinnied
out onto the pitched roof. Rolled down, checked

108

109
out they'd go nuclear. My parents didn't spank,
to make sure I was on the right side of the fence
and anyway Tom was way too old. But if they
separating front and backyards, grabbed the gut-
learned he had a gun, Tom was going to live out
ter, and prayed it would hold my weight.

the rest of his years till his eighteenth birthday

I dropped to the ground and ran to the back
locked in his room having his food shoved in un-
door of the garage. The automatic garage door
der the door.

around the front was just starting to rise.

What was he doing?

I popped the back door of the minivan, jumped

A siren! The cops. Thank God. They'd pull
in, cursed myself for making the springs bounce,
him over. They'd slow him down at least, writing
pulled the door down, and went fetal behind the
him a ticket.

back row of seats.

The siren was right behind us. I could see red

I heard the driver's-side door open and slam.

flashing lights swirling against the seat back. I

The key, the engine. We squealed out of the drive-
rose cautiously to peek out. Just as I did the po-
way. Fishtailed onto the road and blew through
lice car turned off its siren and lights.

the subdivision at three times the speed limit.

The cops pulled around us, revving their big

I knew where we were heading. Knew it in my
engine, and started the siren again.

bones. We were heading for channel seven. Too

They were escorting us! We blew through red
much coincidence for anything else.

lights, through stop signs, jerked into oncoming

And Tom was armed.

traffic.

What was I supposed to do? What could I do?

Wait a minute, was Tom some kind of under-

Only one thing was sure-. I had to stop Tom before
cover cop or something? Insane. Stupid. He was
he got himself in some kind of serious trouble.

in high school.

He was my big brother and he was supposed to

Suddenly the cop car screeched to a halt.

protect me. But that had to go both ways if he

Crouched down I could see the big blue-and-
was the one who was in trouble.

white channel seven logo.

A gun? Did Tom really have a gun? The idea

Slam!

made me sick. Who owned handguns? Criminals.

I opened the door, slid out cautiously. Tom

Pathetic people who thought it would make them
was running up the front steps of the four-story
important. Nuts.

station building. Two cops were right with him.

One thing was for sure. If my parents found

111

110

Both had guns drawn. And Tom . . . Tom was

No! He'd shot at me. He'd shot at me! Did he
armed as well. Only it wasn't like any gun I'd ever
even know it was me? Had he recognized me?

seen.

One of the cops aimed.

Absurd, I thought. Ridiculous. It was all part

BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!

of some elaborate practical joke. Had to be. Be-

The glass behind me shattered and fell in a
cause otherwise, the only other explanation was
hail of shards. The cop emptied his gun. But I
that my big brother was carrying some kind of ray
was hugging the floor and crawling behind a dis-
gun.

play bearing artwork. Paintings. Photographs.

They shoved through the smoked-glass doors

The firing stopped. Holes had been blown
into a dimly lit lobby, already looking like a busi-
through the pictures.

ness shut down for the night. I grabbed a side

By the time I worked up nerve to look again,
door, just off to the right.

they were all three gone.

There was a uniformed security guard fretting

I couldn't breathe. My heart was hammering
nervously, obviously not sure what to do.

like it was trying to bang its way out of my chest.

"Hey, glad you're here," the guard said.

A ray gun. A laser or whatever. Just like Marco
and Rachel. Marco would think I made it all up

"There's some kind of a, I don't even know what
to top his story.

it is, but it's in the —"

If I lived long enough to tell him.

Tseeeew!

I heard screams from some other part of the

I jerked in surprise. A bright red lance of light
building. I heard the strange "tseeew" sound of
had shot from Tom's weapon.

the laser beam or whatever it was.

The guard fell back. There was smoke billow-

What could I do? I wasn't armed. I wasn't
ing from his uniform.

some action hero. All I could do was hide. Hide

I yelled. Not a word, just a yell of surprise and
right here, right where I was, till the cops showed
shock and horror.

up. Only the cops were already here.

Tom spun. He peered at me through the

So I hid. For half an hour I just crouched,
gloom. He fired.

waiting for it all to end.

Tseeew!

But then . . . then something started to hap-

Miss!

112

113

pen to me. My hands were changing, flattening
out. And orange-and-black fur was growing. And
my fingernails were extending, curving, forming
claws!

What was happening to me? What was hap-
pening?

Then, instantly, my hands were normal again.

Stress. That was it. I was imagining things. Freak-
ing.

Losing my mind.

There came the sound of yelling, loud protests,
cries of rage and fear.

D A Y T H I R T Y - T H R E E

I peeked again from behind my flimsy protec-
tion. I looked through a bullet hole that had
made an extra eye for a portrait of a woman.

Jake wouldn't talk in my house. He was too
jumpy. So we went out to the barn.

A dozen guys, all armed, some with guns,
some with the laser gun things, were herding

It was Saturday morning. No school. And my
seven handcuffed people between them. The
dad was at Home Depot buying materials for
some improvements in the bam. He'd be gone for
anchorpeople were among them, makeup turning
hours.

their faces orange.

Tom was there, calmly supervising.

Rachel showed up about ten minutes later

Through the smoked glass I could see a lim-
with Marco. Jake had called them.

ousine pull up. My assistant principal, Mr. Chap-

Jake didn't waste time. "I was shot at," he
man, stepped out and held the door for Mr.

said.

Visser, the guy from The Sharing.

Marco had just sat down on a hay bale. He

And then, last to step from the car, was To-
jumped back up. "Okay, what is this? Are you
goofing on Rachel and me?"

bias.

"No." Jake had a look I'd never seen before.

114

115

There was not the slightest hint of lightheaded-
the last person on earth who'd imagine some-
thing like that."

ness in his expression. He was serious. Grim,

"She was there," Marco said. "I just don't
even. He seemed older.

know how. And I don't know why she wouldn't

"I was shot at. With guns. And with some kind
stop. I mean, any answer I come up with sounds
of laser. Just like you two."

like something you'd hear in a conspiracy chat

Weird. Once again, I had this weird feeling.

room. I don't believe that stuff. I don't think the

Deja vu. The sense that we'd all been here, to-
big corporations or the mafia or the CIA or little
gether. Not once, but many times. Only . . . only
green men from Mars or whatever are secretly
there was something missing.

controlling our lives. That's crazy, wack-job stuff.

My eyes rose to the rafters. Something miss-

But what am I supposed to think when I see my
ing.

mom, and I chase after her, and these guys end
up shooting at Rachel and me?"

"What is this?" Rachel exploded. "Someone

"With laser beams," Rachel added. She was
has a grudge against us? What did we ever do?"

pacing back and forth, an almost funny reflection

She peered at Jake. "We're cousins, does this
of a recovering raccoon behind her that was pac-
have something to do with that?"

ing its cage.

Marco flopped back on the hay bale. Like he

Jake nodded. He seemed like he wanted to
did sometimes. Like he'd done so many times.

say something, but he was hesitating.

And yet never done. He'd never been in our barn

"What is it?" I asked him.

before.

"Maybe I'm a crazy wack-job," he said.

Jake shook his head. "I don't think it has to

"I . . . I think maybe there is a conspiracy."

do with us directly. Marco says he saw his mom.

Rachel stopped pacing. "Say what?"

Only she's dead." He saw Marco flinch. "Sorry,
man."

Jake sighed. "I was following Tom. This thing
happened on TV, on the news. Suddenly there's

"Yeah. But it was her. Look, you know me,
this alien-looking thing. Very weird. Kind of cool.

Jake, you've known me my entire life practically.

Anyway, I'm thinking it's some kind of publicity

Have I ever hallucinated? Have I ever seen some-
thing. But Tom is freaking out. Like eight seconds
thing that wasn't there?"

Jake shook his head. "No. You are probably

116

117
later he's grabbed my mom's car and he's tearing

Jake nodded. "So they claim. But it's kind of
out of there. I stash in the backseat. He goes
a big coincidence."

straight for the TV studio. And he has a gun."

"How about this alien thing you saw on TV?"

"Whoa! Tom had a gun?" Rachel demanded.

Marco asked.

"Did you tell your parents?"

"What about it?"

"It's past that," Jake said. "At the TV station, He shrugged. "What'd it look like?"

he shot someone. Two cops were with him. They

"I don't know, like a—"

helped him. They shot at me, only they didn't

"Like a blue deer," I said. "Only it had a kind know it was me. They grabbed everyone at the
of human face. And a long tail."

station and hustled them out of there, and Tom

Jake looked at me in surprise. "You saw it on
was in charge. And by the way? The gun he had?"

TV, too?"

"Don't even say ray gun," Rachel said.

"No." I shook my head. "No. I've never seen

"What are you even talking about?" Marco
it. But I know that it has two eyes on top of its
said. "I thought my story was bizarre."

head, on these little stalks."

"Tom and the cops dragged those people out

No one moved. The three of them just stared
of there in handcuffs. These famous newspeople
at me.

and all. Then Chapman showed up."

"And I'll tell you something else. He should

"Chapman? Chapman Chapman? Our Chap-
be here." I pointed to a spot off to one side. My
man?"

arm was goose-bumped all the way up and down.

"Yeah. And this guy named Mr. Visser. And

"He should be standing right there."

Tobias. You know, the kid who was hanging with
us for a while? They're all there, too."

Marco said, "Why? Why them? Tom, Chap-
man, Tobias. Mr. Whatever? The cops?"

Jake shook his head slowly. "I don't even
want to say this, but Tom, Chapman, Mr. Visser,
and Tobias are all members of The Sharing."

"Aren't they just like some family thing or
whatever?" Rachel asked.

118

119

since, I don't know, for weeks I've had this feel-
ing deep down inside that things weren't right.

There's supposed . . . " I let go of Jake and threw
up my hands. "I can't explain it. Just that every-
thing is wrong. This alien, I heard him talking,
kind of, only he was out in the water somewhere.

And I have these dreams, these amazing dreams
where I'm not me, I'm an animal. A bug some-
times and I'm scared. Or a wolf. Or a bird."

I spotted Marco rolling his eyes. I also spotted

Rachel sending him a "keep your mouth shut"

look.

But Jake looked at his hands like he'd never
seen them before. "Or a tiger," he whispered to
himself.

There's something wrong," I said.

And once more I was drawn to look up. Up at

"Do you think? There's plenty wrong," Rachel
a particular spot in the rafters. "Just now I had
said. "Marco and I get shot at. Jake gets shot at.

the feeling that someone was missing. Two some-

We got some kind of cult. My cousin has a ray
ones. The alien is one. He's supposed to be here.

gun and is shooting it while cops stand around

And . . . and I know this sounds crazy . . ."

and do nothing. Marco's mom is walking around

"Noooo, sounds perfectly sensible to me,"

alive, wearing a wig."

Marco said not-quite-under-his-breath.

Jake came over and took my hand and bent

". . . there's supposed to be a bird. A big one.

down to look into my eyes. It was so sweet. And I

Right up there. Anyway. Anyway, just now when
so needed it.

you said Mr. Visser, I got this chill. He's . . . some-

"Cassie, what do you mean?" Jake asked.

how he's part of it, too."

I felt wetness on my cheeks. Why was I cry-

"Where are Mulder and Scully?" Marco won-
ing? I was the only one who hadn't been shot at
dered.

so far.

Jake nodded, like he half-believed. But he

"I thought I was going nuts," I said. "Ever

121

120
looked away, too, like you do when someone says

Marco said, "Rachel, what are the four of us
something crazy. "You had a bad feeling from the
going to do?"

start about The Sharing."

"I don't know!" she yelled in frustration.

"Something! Jake? What do we do?"

Pity. Great.

"Yeah. What do we do, Big Jake?" Marco

Rachel had this angry-concerned look, like
asked, half-mocking.

she didn't know what to say or do to help me out,

"What do you mean, what do we do?" Jake
but she'd gladly yell at anyone who gave me any
shot back. "Why are you asking me?"

trouble.

Marco shrugged. "You're the leader, man."

I'd just spilled my guts. And the result was that

"What are you talking about? The leader of
the three of them, including my best friend and
what? And why am I the leader?"

the guy I liked more than ever, were all thinking I

"Because you are," I said. The words were out
needed to see a shrink.

of my mouth before I could think about them. I

"Oh, man," I said. "I am losing it, aren't I?"

felt as i f . . . as if I was a judge and had just

To my surprise it was Marco who came to my
passed sentence on Jake.

defense, in his own way. "Yeah, you are losing it.

Marco jerked his thumb at me. "What the

You're crazy. Insane. Nuts. The only thing crazier
crazy chick said: Because you are."

than what you said is some guy who thinks that

Jake looked at Rachel, dumbfounded. Rachel
his big brother, the assistant principal, and To-
looked at me. An eerie look. Like she was listen-
bias the Mega Dweeb are shooting up a TV stu-
ing to me talk, only I wasn't saying anything.

dio. And the only thing crazier than that is some

Then Rachel said, "What do we do, Jake?"

kid who thinks his dead mom is running around

For a long minute it felt as if the entire barn
town with laser-shooting bodyguards."

was frozen. The three of us looked at Jake. He

"We have to do something," Rachel said de-
looked back at us, each in turn, this helpless, al-
cisively.

most hopeless look on his face.

"Do what?" I asked her.

And then he said, "We have to find out what's

"I don't know. Something. There really is
going on. We start with Tom. He's the obvious tar-
some kind of conspiracy. I mean, what are we
get."

supposed to do, just do nothing?"

122

123

Jake. Decisive, once the moment for decision
arrived.

"Let's grab him, tie him down, threaten to
give him up to the FBI unless he tells us what's
up," Rachel said.

Rachel, bold, ready to act regardless of con-
sequences.

"If he really shot someone, Tom's danger-
ous," Marco disagreed. "Which means whatever
we do has to be subtle. If there's some kind of
conspiracy involving The Sharing, we're not go-
ing to know if anyone we talk to is hooked up

D A Y T H I R T Y - F O U R
with them. We need proof before we make a
move."

Marco, cautious and clever.

I was helpless. Powerless. Unable to move

A chill crawled up my spine. I felt as if the
an eye. Unable to lift a finger. Unable to speak.

universe had just shifted. Like . . . like for weeks

Unable to alter a facial expression. To smile.

I'd been riding a bike with the chain always slip-

Frown. Give any sign that I was alive within my
ping. And like the chain had just caught again.

own body, a captive inside my own brain.

Things weren't right. Not right. But more right

I had watched, helpless to cry out, as the
than they'd been since we'd left the mall to-

Yeerks had dragged the poor men and women
gether.

from the channel seven studio into vans. Had
driven them at breakneck speed toward a water
tower that concealed a secret entrance to the
vast underground complex of the Yeerk pool.

I'd been unable to cry out in horror as one by
one they were dragged, kicking and crying and
begging, down the steel pier. The Hork-Bajir-

Controllers had held them tight and kicked them

124

125
to their knees, and shoved the heads down into
thing and everything. Not even making an effort
that seething cesspool.

to conceal disasters like the sudden appearance

Every one of them was infested. Every one
of an Andalite.

would now agree on the same cover story to ex-

Why?

plain away the odd appearance of the blue-furred

<What a pathetic life you've led, Tobias,>
alien. No charges would be filed. The guard Tom

Odret said to me.

had shot survived, but would never be free. He

<l guess I have.>
was infested in his hospital bed. I was there, ob-

<l find nothing in your memories worth seeing
serving.

again. Nothing was worth seeing a first time.>

And now I was in my room. At home. Odret

<Well, that's how it is, right? The Sharing is a
was still playing the role of Tobias. Still being
magnet for losers. They go for the weak. So what
me.

did you expect?>

Odret, the Yeerk, was growing ever more ner-

To say that I hated myself would be an under-
vous. I could sense his emotions at times. Some-
statement. Odret had rifled through my memo-
times he would sift through my memories, looking
ries, each more embarrassing than the one
for a thrill, an escape. Like someone scanning the
before. I'd had to relive too many things I had
shelves at Blockbuster, looking for a movie to take
tried to forget.

his mind off his troubles.

Most painful of all was the image of myself

I had to laugh, down in my corner of power-
swallowing everything The Sharing told me. I had
lessness. Odret had the wrong host if he wanted
walked, willingly, to my own destruction. At the
a lot of good times.

time I'd seen no alternative. Now I saw nothing

He was nervous because of Visser Three. The
but alternatives.

visser was not behaving as he should, somehow.

Was my home a dreary, awful place? Yes. Was

It wasn't anything obvious. More a question of

I somehow marked as a bully magnet? Yes. Was I
something missing.

different, strange, not-quite-normal? Yes.

For one thing, Visser Three had a reputation.

And to fight all of that I had destroyed myself.

He was notoriously volatile. He would blow up

Brilliant, Tobias. Brilliant. All of life's pains com-
over very little. But he was treating Odret with
bined could not have equaled what I now en-
elaborate courtesy. Allowing Odret access to any-
dured.

126

127

Even now no easy answers leaped to mind. I
peared. I waited for it, impatient. Odret was hun-
could not easily have stood the bullying. I could
gry. He needed Kandrona rays. He needed to
not easily have survived the loneliness. In my
feed in the Yeerk pool.

fantasies I could construct fantastic escapes, but

The car drove us to McDonald's. We went in,
in reality there was no easy way. My life was non-
went up to the counter and gave the counter girl
fiction, not some story where the endings are al-
there a code word. Ten minutes later I stepped
ways happy. I couldn't simply become a different
off the last stair and into the Yeerk pool complex.

person. I couldn't just have some great insight

I walked self-importantly toward the first pier.

that would save me from myself.

Two Hork-Bajir were standing guard, checking

All I could have done, really, was wait. I could
people off on a sort of palm-top computer.

have endured. I saw that now. It wasn't a dra-

"Odret-One-Seven-Seven," my mouth said.

matic answer. Wasn't exactly inspiring.

Suddenly I was aware that two more Hork-

Endure. Outlast. Outwait.

Bajir were standing behind me. Not in line to

I might have been able to do that. I'm not a
feed. Standing poised. Ready.

fool, I know that school was just a part of my life.

I felt the sudden spike of Odret's fear.

You spend eighteen years as a kid, then maybe

"Come with us," one of the Hork-Bajir said.

seventy years as an adult. And what you are as a

Odret hesitated. But only for a moment. He
kid isn't what you'll be as an adult, not always,
knew it was pointless. The Hork-Bajir were Con-
anyway.

trollers. They were following orders. Nothing he

Endure. I could have done that.

could say would change their minds.

Now, too late. My nose itched. I could not

They marched me into one of the shabby,
scratch it.

temporary office buildings. It looked like an old

Odret checked the clock. He got up, moved
barracks or something.

my legs and arms, aimed my eyes. I walked past

Odret knew who was waiting for him. When
my uncle.

the Hork-Bajir opened an office door he was not

"Where do you think you're going?"

at all surprised to see Visser Three in his Andalite

"Out," my mouth said.

host body.

"Not if I say you don't!" he yelled.

<Ah, Odret-One-Seven-Seven,> he said.

I/we ignored him. Out the door. A car ap-

"Visser," Odret answered neutrally.

128

129

<You've come to feed?>

But if you speak only for Visser One . . . well,

"Yes. Obviously."

that's a very different matter.>

<Then I'm sorry you've been at all delayed.

"I've told you—"

Go. Enjoy.>

The Andalite tail flew so fast that human eyes

Odret did not move a muscle. He knew.

could not track it. The blade stopped a millime-

Visser Three laughed. <There is just one thing
ter from my jugular vein.

before you go, Odret. I'll need the truth.>

<Yes. I know what you say now. The question

"What truth is that, Visser?"

is, what will you say in a day or so? What will you

The Andalite body moved with liquid ease.

say when you are starving, Odret?>

The mouthless Andalite face moved to within

I felt the Yeerk's fear rise several more
inches of my own. Both main eyes and one of the
notches to an intolerable level.

stalk eyes bored into me. <l know that you are

"You will pay for any harm that comes to me!

faithful to Visser One, Odret. That much I know

You don't dare to defy the council this way!"

beyond all doubt.>

<Very simple, Odret: Work for me, and feed.

Odret's fear was seeping into me. Releasing

Work for Visser One, and starve. Take him away.>
my own adrenaline.

I saw in Odret's mind's eye the results. So did

"I serve the Council of Thirteen, Visser Three,
he. Kandrona starvation was a horror that could
as you know. And if any harm should come to me
not be endured.

they would investigate very thoroughly."

I looked straight into Visser Three's Andalite

The visser was unimpressed. <As I said,
eyes. "The council knows nothing. Visser One

Odret, I know you are Visser One's minion. The
hopes to convince them to restrain you. She sent
question is about the order you transmitted to
me to delay you till the council issues the order.

me. The order to avoid open war on the humans.

But it will come."

I need to know whether that order came from the

Visser Three nodded. <As I suspected. I will
council, or whether Visser One is its source.>
have to move quickly. Very quickly and present

"I gave you the orders of the council," my
the council with a done deed. Then their order
mouth said.

will be irrelevant.>

<Maybe. And if so, I shall have to obey them.

"I work for you, then?" Odret asked pitifully.

130

131

Visser Three laughed. <You betrayed Visser

One, Odret. Should I keep you around to betray
me? Kill him.>

A Hork-Bajir pressed a Dracon beam against
my head. I felt it. Felt Odret's terror. Felt my own
shock, fear. Regret.

"No!" my mouth cried. "NO!"

Felt slight pressure as the Hork-Bajir's finger
tightened.

Felt —

D A Y F O R T Y

It was almost impossible following Tom. We
tried, but he could drive, and none of us could.

Marco and I searched his room when he was
out.

"Careful. Watch for any kind of little telltales
he might leave," Marco said.

"What are you talking about?"

"He might place a hair in a certain way, say,
wedged into a drawer to see if it's been opened."

I stared at my friend. "What do you know
about this?"

He grinned. "I read, man. You know, books?

John le Carre. Tradecraft, dude. It's all about
tradecraft."

I was going to ignore him. Then I saw the hair.

132

133

It was wedged into the closet door so that if the

"What's going on?" Marco wondered.

door was opened it would fall.

The screen showed a definitely inhuman face.

Marco noticed and gave himself a little, "Am

Two main eyes, two stalk eyes. No mouth. But it

I smart, or what?" flourish.

was speaking anyway.

I took the hair. Opened the closet and searched

I scanned quickly. Channel nine, channel five,
it carefully. Nothing. I replaced the hair carefully
channel four, all the local channels were carrying
and closed the door.

the alien. All but channel seven.

"Nothing here, man," Marco said. "He's got

< . . . are a parasite species.>
these telltales around just to see if anyone's been

"Whatthe. . ."

here. He wants to know if he's suspected of any-

It was the alien. The blue deer. Making his
thing. But he's not dumb enough to leave his ray
second televised appearance. But this time he
gun just lying around."

wasn't on the news set. This was a remote. Prob-

I led Marco back out into the hallway, down to
ably on tape.

my room. My dog Homer was asleep on my bed,

<ln their natural form they are similar to your
snoring.

Earth slugs. They enter the body through the ear

"Maybe we're just crazy," I said.

canal, releasing numbing chemicals to dull the

The phone rang. I jumped about two feet.

pain. They wrap themselves around the brain,

"That's good, Jake, very cool. Not at all like a
and tie into all neural functions.>
guilty guy."

"He's not making any sounds — he doesn't

I waited two rings to see if my folks were
even have a mouth — but I can hear him," Marco
home and would pick up. Then I answered the
said.

call. It was Rachel.

The phone on my parents' nightstand rang. I

"Turn on the TV," she said.

snatched it up. "Yeah, Cassie. I see it."

"Why?"

<Humans who have been affected become

"Just turn it on. Channel nine."

Controllers. They will appear to be normal. But

I grabbed Marco and went to my parents'

they have lost all control of their bodies. These
room, the nearest TV. Mine was being repaired. I

Yeerks — >
flipped channels till I saw it.

"Yeerks?" Marco echoed.

134

135

< — have already enslaved three sentient

I lifted the phone receiver. "You still there,
species, the Hork-Bajir, the Taxxons, and the

Cassie?"

Gedds.>

"Yes."

"Hork Ba-what? This is some kind of goof?" I

"What does this all mean?"

wondered.

"I watched it and . . . every word he said, I

"On all local channels at the same time?"

was like 'Yeah, yeah, that's it. That's the truth.'

Marco said. "All but channel seven? This is like

Jake?"

a tape loop or whatever. The stations aren't cut-

"Uh-huh?"

ting in, they aren't, like, putting any scroll or bug

"We call him Ax."

or even a logo under the picture."

"What? The alien?"

"What?"

"I know this sounds crazy. But we're sup-

"Man, do you know anything?" Marco said.

posed to know him. He's supposed to be our

"All that stuff that's on the screen. You know,
friend. We call him Ax. And sometimes he can
they'd put words under this, a title, like 'alien
become human. Crazy."

spokesman,' or whatever. No, man, this is boot-

"Cassie, nothing sounds crazy. Not anymore."

leg. Someone is cutting this in."

"What do we do?" she asked me.

I nodded. "Only channel seven was prepared.

I looked at Marco. He jerked his chin toward

They thought this might happen. They were
the screen. Two local newspeople were babbling
ready."

and looking very lost. ". . . don't know how this

<l am an Andalite. My people resist the
person, or creature, or prankster managed to . . ."

Yeerks throughout the galaxy. But we are not here

I flipped to another channel. ". . . some
in sufficient strength. So you humans must fight.

Howard Stern type of prank. Viewers should not be
alarmed. We . . ."

You must —>

The screen went blank. I hit the button on the

Another channel had gone back to Jenny

Jones.

remote. Channel five, blank.

"I have to pee," Marco said. He went into my

"They cut him off," I said.

folks' bathroom.

"That's what Tom is, Jake. A Yeerk. Or what

"What do we do?" Cassie repeated.

did he say? A Controller. My mom, too. She's not
dead, she's one of them."

"I don't know, Cassie. But it's not a joke. It's

136

137
real. We have to find out who is taking this seri-
lieve any of it. Impossible. Tom? Not even with
ously: cops, FBI, whoever. We have to let them
an alien in his head. No matter what, Tom wasn't
know what we know. About The Sharing. About
going to hurt us.

Chapman and that Mr. Visser and Tobias."

Marco and I walked down the stairs, through

"And Tom?" she asked softly.

the empty family room, the front door. I opened

"Yeah," I said. "Yeah. Tom, too." I hung up the door. A car was just screeching to a halt,
the phone feeling like a hundred-pound weight
there to pick Tom up.

was suddenly sitting on my shoulders.

The car door opened. A man's voice yelled,

A noise. I spun.

"Lookout!"

Tom. He was standing in the doorway. I didn't

Tom flinched. Too late! The baseball bat came
have to ask whether he'd heard. He had. The ray
down hard on his gun hand.

gun in his hand told me he'd heard.

"Ahhh!" he yelled.

"I can kill you, or you can come along peace-

The ray gun clattered down the steps.

fully," Tom said calmly. "Your call."

The bat came up fast, caught Tom in the face.

A flash of movement. Marco charging out of

Then, one! Two! Three!

the bathroom, rushing Tom like a linebacker.

Three stiff, hard blows and Tom was down,

Tom sidestepped, tripped Marco with a toe,
curled in a ball, groaning, eyes rolling, blood
and bashed the back of his head as he fell past.

gushing from his nose and ear.

Marco lay sprawled, stunned, on the floor.

I stared at my cousin. Rachel was breathing

"Let's go. You, too, Marco. And don't make
hard. But her outfit, hair, and makeup had re-
me mad, I have a very busy day ahead of me with
mained perfect.

all this. If you slow me down . . ."

He let the threat hang.

Down the stairs. I couldn't believe it, couldn't
imagine it. Couldn't think of what to say to him.

He wasn't him. I had no trouble believing that,
because there was no way Tom was doing this.

No way.

I wasn't even scared because I could not be-

138

139

"The car!" I cried.

Jake took aim, fired.

Tseeeew!

A hole burned and sizzled in the car's engine
compartment.

Tom was getting up, staggering down the
stairs, trying to catch us from behind. I swung low,
caught him in one knee. Hard. He went down. He
wasn't going to be walking anytime soon.

The injured guy from the car was groaning,
rolling onto his side, ready to shoot again. I was
on him.

Wham!

People will drop a weapon really fast if you hit
their arm with a baseball bat. I grabbed the ray
gun.

Torn was down. Someone was running from

The driver of the car was out on the street,
the car. Someone big.

running, yelling into a cell phone.

Jake dove, landed hard, but snatched up the

"Shoot him!" I yelled at Jake.

ray gun. He rolled, came up to his knees, and

"No, he's leaving."

yelled, "Freeze!"

I raised my newfound ray gun and took aim at

It was so NYPD Blue.

the fleeing man. Jake yanked my arm upward as

The running man slowed, raised a weapon . . .

I squeezed the trigger. I sliced a couple of

"Shoot!" Marco yelled.

branches off an elm tree.

Tseeeew!

"We don't shoot people in the back," Jake
snapped. "And we don't shoot people who are

Bright light stabbed from the weapon in
willing to leave us alone."

Jake's hand. The man screamed. His left leg be-

I shoved his hand away. "Hey, who died and
low the knee no longer existed.

made you president? What are you, the boss?"

He fell, and fired wildly. The ray sliced into
the eaves of Jake's house.

141

140

"Yes," he said. Then his expression softened.

It was not a plane. It was not a weather

"And by the way, thanks."

balloon, or swamp gas, or a trick of the light. It

"No problem, cousin," I said. "What about
looked like a stylized metal cockroach, only

Tom? What about that guy there?"

where there might have been legs there were just

"They'll have reinforcements here soon,"

two forward-aimed, serrated spears.

Jake said. "We have to get out of here. Cassie.

It was, beyond any doubt, an alien ship. And

We have to get her before they do. Tom knows I
it was slowing as it approached Jake's house.

was talking to her."

"Run!" Jake yelled.

"Yeah," I agreed, feeling a sudden pang of

"Yes, run! Run! Run, ah-hah-hah-hah," Tom
worry for my best friend. I'd come to Jake's house
jeered giddily. "Run, humans, run!"

right away, as soon as the alien was off the air.

TSEEEEEW! TSEEEEEW!

We live just two blocks apart, less if you know the

Two huge beams of light chewed furrows in
backyard routes. Cassie lived farther away.

the lawn on either side of us.

Tom had dragged himself painfully to the

We ran. Across the lawn, the next lawn, the
steps. He was sitting there holding his knee, not
next lawn.

sure which part of him hurt worse.

TSEEEEEW! TSEEEEEW!

"You can run, but you can't hide," he said,

A garage to our left blew apart, burning splin-
spitting blood through his teeth. "We'll take you.

ters.

We'll take you all!"

Marco tripped. I grabbed him and hauled him

"Where's that baseball bat?" I wondered.

to his feet. We turned a corner. Jake yelled, "This

"The soft invasion is over," Tom jeered. "The
way!"

real war is about to begin. We'll have you all!

We scrambled over a fence, raced through a

You're our meat! You're our meatl"

backyard. I jumped a Big Wheel. Another fence,

"Come on," Jake said softly. "Quick, before
taller. No problem. Amazing what you can do
another carload of —"

when you're being fired on by a spaceship hover-

"Forget carload," Marco said.

ing a few hundred feet up in the air.

He was looking up toward the sky. I followed

TSEEEEEW! TSEEEEEW!

the direction of his gaze.

The pool in the next yard blew up in a gey-

142

143
ser of steam. My face stung, eyes watered. We
my face. My ears were ringing like Quasimodo
couldn't outrun this thing. There was no way: We
was in the belltower. My skin was singed. My
were on foot, it flew.

mind wouldn't come together, little fragments of

But I had underestimated Jake. He was head-
thoughts, little bits of me . . .

ing for a little patch of woods over behind the

I looked around. Jake was just getting up. He
community playground. The trees. He was look-
was slapping fire off his shirttail. Marco was on
ing for cover. Just one problem: that was three
his back like he was enjoying a day at the beach.

long blocks and we were already getting tired.

I climbed up, woozy, fading in and out, but

People were coming out of their houses, star-
more or less in one piece.

ing slack-jawed up at the spaceship. The aliens

"Marco! Let's go!" I yelled.

weren't even bothering to hide. Tom had told the

I ran to him. Stopped. Looked down. Not
truth: This was war.

comprehending. Not believing.

"Rachel! Here. Stand. Aim!" Jake ordered.

Jake grabbed me from behind. "Run!"

I stopped. We were back against a tin tool-

"But Marco!"

shed. The ship would reappear just over our

"Run! Just run!" Jake sobbed. "Run!"

heads as it came around for another shot. We'd
see it just as it saw us.

Jake and I held our ray guns straight up. Marco
panted, bent over with hands on knees.

"Fire!"

The steel bug slid into view. Our ray guns
burned. The ship jerked. It didn't explode or any-
thing, but it jerked visibly, like someone who's
been slapped.

The ship hauled away. We ran.

Two blocks before the ship found us again.

TSEEEEEW! TSEEEEEW!

Three cars and a parked RV blew apart. The
concussion knocked me down. I felt grass in

144

145

it. Blowing up a man's garage? And how about
that RV? You think insurance is going to cover
that?"

"Either way, I'm buying that Sony big screen.

I don't want to miss any of this!"

"Yes, sir. Can I interest you in our extended
warranty program?"

I had heard similar opinions from other hu-
mans. They assumed that technological superior-
ity must necessarily be linked to moral superiority.

A natural impulse perhaps for an ignorant and

D A Y F O R T Y - O N E
primitive species.

Suddenly all the many TV's went blank. The
two humans used small handheld devices to

Videotapes of the Bug fighter were shown on
change frequencies. But they, too, were nonfunc-

TV. Endlessly. I watched in a portion of a large
tional.

establishment called a Circuit City. Circuit City

The entire establishment had grown very
was devoted to archaic electronic devices: com-
quiet. None of the electronic equipment was
puters, videodiscs, music players.

functioning.

Humans in the establishment stared in dis-

"Power went out," one man said.

belief. They shook their heads. They discussed

"Uh-uh. The lights are still on. It's not the
among themselves. Some were of the opinion
power."

that these invaders were simply misunderstood.

I used my human mouth to explain what

Benign, but provoked by some obscure human
should have been obvious. "Electromagnetic
behavior.

pulse," I said. "The Yeerks have simply fired a

"They're advanced, right? I mean, look at that
burst of powerful radiation that has rendered
thing! If they're way beyond us and all, they must
primitive electronic devices inoperative. Ray-
believe in peace."

dee-ay-shun. It is a complex word. You will dis-

"Yeah? They have a heck of a way of showing
cover that any device containing a simple human

146

147
computer chip will have been overloaded. Chip is
in a hundred Yeerks had a host — mostly Hork-
a very short word."

Bajir, Taxxon, and Gedd. Gedds were severely

The human looked at me in bewilderment.

limited as were the Taxxons. The Hork-Bajir were

"No TV?"

excellent host bodies, but Andalite actions had

"No TV," I confirmed.

severely reduced the number of surviving Hork-

"Why would they knock out the TV? Is it all

Bajir hosts.

the violent shows? Are they sending us a mes-

But here, on this planet, were nearly six
sage?"

billion potential hosts. More than enough to

"Yes, they are sending you a message," I said
supply every living Yeerk with a human host. Hu-
impatiently. "The message is: We are coming to
mans were physically unimpressive, but they did
enslave and destroy you."

have excellent hands and very good senses — all

I left the establishment. My duty was not
the Yeerks needed.

clear: I could attempt to assist human efforts to

Six billion hosts. A planet stocked with suffi-
resist the Yeerks. But how? These people were so
cient raw materials for building ships. If the
primitive their vulnerable circuits were un-

Yeerks took Earth and held it, they would be un-
shielded. How could they resist the Yeerks?

stoppable.

Or, I could try at all costs to contact the home

If only the Andalite fleet would arrive. It was
world.

a perfect opportunity! The Yeerks would rush

The Yeerks would move quickly to increase
transports full of Yeerks, as many as they could
the pace of infestation now. And my own actions
move. The ratio of unhosted Yeerks would rise in
might have caused them to rush.

proportion to the number of hosted Yeerks. A fat

How many Yeerks would they have in Earth
target. A once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

space? It could easily be a hundred thousand. Or

If Zero-space had not changed configuration,
twice that number. Their goal would be to secure
the fleet could arrive within weeks. If. Zero-space
the planet for additional shipments of Yeerks.

was inherently unpredictable, altering and shift-

Newly arriving Yeerks would be a mixed bless-
ing randomly. A jump that might take a week one
ing for the enemy. The Yeerks suffered from a
day could take a year the next.

lack of sufficient host bodies. Andalite intelli-

By now the high command realized that our
gence had always estimated that fewer than one
task force was missing. But they might not know

148

149
landed, forming a loose perimeter around the
why. And they would certainly not guess that the
mall parking area. Hork-Bajir jumped out, armed

Yeerks had located an almost perfect target
with Dracon weapons.

species for massive infestation.

An interesting move. Yes, the Yeerks would be

The larger war could be won. Right here.

able to take several hundred humans at once. It

Or lost. Right here.

made sense.

But the fact, the terrible fact was, that the

Several human cars attempted to exit. They

Yeerks would be more vulnerable once they be-
were blown apart.

gan shipping large numbers of Yeerks to this

I had a perfect view as well of the black, dan-
planet. And that would not happen until human
gerous shape that swooped confidently down
resistance was subdued.

from the blue sky and settled arrogantly atop the

That is an unhappy thought, I told myself.

mall roof.

These are simple, primitive creatures. But I

A Blade ship. The Blade ship of Visser Three.

would not want to see them slaughtered to afford
us a tactical advantage.

What was I to do?

Do both. Contact the fleet. Then help the hu-
mans, and forget the fact that helping humans
now might cause the Yeerks to be more cautious.

Yes. That would be my plan. The policy of a
half-trained aristh. How would I ever explain my-
self to my superiors? I could picture incredulous,
outraged faces of great war princes staring at
me and saying, <Your policy, aristh? Your policy?

And when, exactly, did galactic policy fall into
your hands?>

I had walked from the Circuit City, down a
hill, closer to what humans called a "mall."

I had a clear view of what happened next. Bug
fighters began dropping from the clouds. They

151

150

Jake, Rachel, and I had wandered here and
there. We had no real plan. What could we do?

What could we do, three kids against the mo-
mentous events that were unfolding around us?

The TV showed commentators endlessly dis-
cussing what it all meant. Some people believed
these Yeerks were the hope of humanity. Some
believed the Andalite who had hijacked local sta-
tions to broadcast his warning. Some thought it
was all a monstrous prank.

President Clinton urged everyone to remain
calm. He said that just in case, our military forces
were being mobilized.

There was a feeling of everything moving in
slow motion. A feeling of a world hovering on

Marco was gone. He'd never even been a
the brink of something unprecedented. Waiting.

friend of mine. But now he was gone.

Waiting.

Jake couldn't return home. Tom was there,

The three of us couldn't do much about
and Jake had to worry now that his own parents
any of that stuff. All we could do was keep mov-
were in the camp of the alien enemy.

ing and hope to keep living. We'd hidden in

Rachel, too, was trapped. Where could she
stores, in libraries, in the school, here and there.

go? She had beaten Tom with a baseball bat.

In plain sight during the day, undercover at

I called my parents and told them I couldn't
night.

come home, either. Tom knew me as well.

"I'll grab us some munchies," Rachel said as

My parents demanded that I come home im-

Jake and I collapsed into the cheap plastic chairs
mediately. They told me that in all likelihood
at the mall food court.

these aliens were friendly. This was all a wonder-

Jake looked unspeakably weary. There were
ful opportunity for the human race.

dark bags under his eyes. The eyes themselves

Maybe they were naive. Or maybe they had
seemed to have caved in. He was scared. More,
been taken, too.

153

152
he was devastated. Marco was his lifelong friend.

Scared as I was, I had to admire the girl. She

Tom was his brother.

knew the mall.

"I hope the animals are okay," I said.

We started running. Past Express. Past some

Jake didn't answer.

shoe store.

"I mean, my folks will take care of them," I

People were screaming. Ahead, people run-
said. "They don't really need me."

ning out of The Gap.

I saw Jake's eyes flicker. He was looking past

Then, it stepped into view. It had to be seven
me. I turned around. A group of people were
feet tall. It had a tail with spikes like a dinosaur's
and big, taloned feet to match. There were
rushing toward the mall exit door, their voices ris-
blades on its arms, legs, head.

ing excitedly. They were rushing to see/Some-

It was a monster of destruction. A creature
thing.

from a nightmare.

"What is it?" I asked.

And I said, "Hork-Bajir."

"Don't know." He stared. He couldn't see any-

No one asked how I knew. The Andalite had
thing more than me, but he must have sensed.

used the word on TV. And this, I knew, was a

"Rachel!" he yelled.

Hork-Bajir. More of the monsters poured from

I spotted Rachel at the Taco Bell counter. She

The Gap.

had caught the tone of Jake's cry. She snatched

I should morph . . . what? What was I think-
up the burritos she'd been paying for and came
ing about?

running.

Behind us, Hork-Bajir coming up the aisles of

The crowd at the mall door came rushing
the mall. Not after us. They were rounding
back now, running away.

Rachel met us as we started to run.

everyone up, forming people into little groups
and holding them under guard.

"Rachel. You know this mall. Where can we

"What do we do?" I cried. "We can't fight
hide?" Jake demanded.

those things!"

"Any of the stockrooms. Urn, no, too many

"I'm going to try," Rachel said through gritted
people there." She looked around frantically.

teeth. She drew a weapon from her waistband.

"Furniture department at the department store.

One of the ray guns she and Jake had taken. She

Big armoires and stuff. We can get inside."

154

155
was grinning. She was vibrating with a dangerous
lator slammed us into one of the monsters as he
energy.

was disintegrating. It was like grabbing an elec-

Back out into the mall. Hork-Bajir had cor-
trical power line. I was knocked flat. Rachel fell
nered a lot of the shoppers. But other people
on top of me. I watched helplessly as her weapon
were running around in panic. One had a gun. He
clattered away.

fired at a nearby Hork-Bajir. The Hork-Bajir fired

The escalator deposited us in a heap on the
back. The man sizzled and disappeared.

landing. Jake jumped up. The remaining Hork-

Rachel fired. The Hork-Bajir emulated his

Bajir loomed over him. Jake looked so small. So
own victim.

weak. There was nothing he could do.

"Up the escalator," Rachel said.

The monster was going to take us. Infest us.

We ran for the escalator. It was still operating.

The Yeerk pool, that dark cavern, that hellish

We ran, taking the moving steps two at a time.

place. I saw it in my mind, but I had never seen

Then, at the lower landing, a Hork-Bajir ap-
it!

peared.

"Why?" I asked the creature as he loomed over

He leaped! Jake tried to fire, but the monster
us.

was on him. Jake and the Hork-Bajir slammed

He did not answer. Instead, his head rolled
back into Rachel and me. We rolled, bunched
off his shoulders, hit the escalator, and bounded
and tangled, while the rising steps kept punch-
heavily toward us. The forehead blades caught. It
ing me in the back.

stopped, staring, expression unchanged.

Jake had lost his weapon! Rachel had not.

The body fell. But as it collapsed a thin arm

But she couldn't get a clear shot. I dug in my
and many-fingered hand snatched the ray gun
heels, braced her, and yelled, "Do it!"

from its lifeless hand.

She fired.

We reached the top. And there, holding the

Tseeeew!

weapon, was the blue centaur. The Andalite.

The Hork-Bajir sizzled.

He ignored us and started away. But three

We were up and climbing the escalator to the
more Hork-Bajir were on him now.

next level. Two more Hork-Bajir!

He whipped his tail. The closest Hork-Bajir

Tseeeew!

fell. But the other two were too close to avoid.

Rachel fired. The Hork-Bajir fired. The esca-

Slash!

156

157

The Andalite's flank was deeply cut. The hand
hand and knocked the weapon away. The An-
holding the weapon hung limp.

dalite snatched it up with his good hand.

Jake lunged. Slid on the polished marble

<And now, a third. Again, thank you.>
floor, slid beneath the staggering Andalite, tried

I said, "Ax! Ax . . . Axim. Ax . . ." The word
to grab the weapon.

was there, on the tip of my tongue, but I couldn't

But he was nearly stomped by flashing An-
quite reach it.

dalite hooves and the huge Tyrannosaurus feet of

The creature's stalk eyes jerked toward me.

the Hork-Bajir.

<Do we know each other?>

That's when Rachel stepped swiftly behind

"Yes," I said. I wiped the puke from my mouth
one of the Hork-Bajir. She was carrying the head.

with the back of my sleeve. "Not here, not this

The bladed Hork-Bajir head. She lifted it high
way. I don't know how, but someway, somehow
and slammed it down, blades out. She buried the
yes, we know each other."

Hork-Bajir's head blades in his comrade.

He scanned behind himself with one stalk

"Aaahhh!"

eye, raised the weapon, and fired over his shoul-

Jake yanked the weapon from the Andalite,
der. A Hork-Bajir took a glancing blow that disin-
spun, and fired.

tegrated his right arm and shoulder. The creature

Tseeeew!

toppled over the rail and fell.

A Hork-Bajir dropped, sizzling, seeming to fry

"Andalite!" it screamed.

as it disappeared.

The effect of that one word was electric. The

<Thank you,> the Andalite said calmly.

Hork-Bajir below us who had not seen the battle

I bent over and threw up.

on the second floor immediately forgot about

<Give me the weapon, please,> the alien de-
their human captives.

manded.

<Are you able to run on those two legs?> the

"I don't think so," Jake snapped.

Andalite asked skeptically.

<l am attempting to save your species,> the

"Dude," Jake said, "we can fly on these two

Andalite said. <And I observe that you have lost
legs."

two weapons already.>

<You must lead me to the roof of this struc-

Fwapp!

ture. There is a very slight chance that we can

His tail snapped like a bullwhip. It hit Jake's
succeed.>

158

159

The Andalite aimed and fired. Smart boy. He
fired into the mass on the stairs, not the couple
who'd already made it to the top. That would
slow the ones coming up and make the couple al-
ready up here feel cut off.

We raced past them.

"There! That hallway! Right by Sam Goody!"

Tseeeew! Tseeeew!

The glass front of the CD store blew into
shards.

Down the hallway, panting, running, sneakers
squeaking on tile. Down, past the bathrooms,
turn left.

Tseeew! Tseeew!

"Follow me," I said. I hauled toward the ser-I felt the heat of it. Hah-hah! Missed me!

vice corridor that would lead to the roof.

Ten feet to the door. I slammed hard against

All the bad guys were coming upstairs now.

it. Backed off, scrabbled at the doorknob. "It's

Up the stairs, up the escalators, even trying to
locked!"

jump the fifteen feet or so straight up. And fail-

Fwapp!

ing.

The Andalite's tail snapped. A gash appeared

It was insane! No way we'd make it. We were
in the sheet metal of the door. I reared back and
done for. We were dead. Like Marco.

kicked it. It popped open.

And yet, I was blazing! I was jazzed like noth-

Inside a metal stairway. Ten steps and a land-
ing I've ever known before. I had gone after a
ing. Ten more and another landing. Ten more and
seven-foot-tall alien monster and taken him
we were at the door that led outside onto the
down! Me!

roof.

Narrow stairs ahead, crammed with what

"Ax, or whatever your name is, shoot the

Cassie had called Hork-Bajir.

stairs!" Jake yelled.

160

161

The Andalite hesitated. I don't think he ap-

Our kind of idiot.

preciated being told what to do. But Jake was

The Andalite kicked up the gravel. We raced
right.

along behind him. Something was coming down

The Andalite leaned slightly forward and fired
the ramp.

at the stairs themselves.

Tseeeew!

Tseeeeeeeeew!

Now nothing was coming down the ramp.

He held the trigger down till the metal twisted

Under the shadow of the ship! We hit the
and bubbled and burned away. I had to pull back
ramp. Hork-Bajir above us.

to avoid having my eyebrows scorched off.

Tseeeew!

When I looked again two flights of stairs were

More! Aiming at us.

gone.

"Yaaahh!" I screamed and lunged.

The Andalite said, <When we exit, we will

I felt the wind off the Hork-Bajir arm as it
need to move swiftly and decisively. There is a
blew past me. I never felt the wrist blade.

ship. We are going to take it.>

I hit the corrugated steel floor. Rolled onto my

"Say what?" I blurted.

side. Saw bright lights and moving shapes. The

<Follow me.>
movements grew slower. . . slower. . .

We opened the door and stepped out onto the

Stop.

acres of gravel roof.

And there, fifty yards away, approximately on
top of Williams-Sonoma and Eddie Bauer,
crouched a black ship that was all sharp edges
and mean attitude.

We started running, with the Andalite out
front.

There was a ramp leading up into the ship.

Fifty yards. And not a Hork-Bajir in sight. Not a
guard. Of course not, why bother? What kind of
an idiot was going to try and run toward that
ship?

162

163

Cassie sizzled and disappeared. Simply evap-
orated.

I stared at the blank space where she had
been. I stared at my hand. I was moaning. A
weird sound. Moaning. Like a hurt animal. No
sound that any human would make.

<Come!> the Andalite snapped.

I realized everything was quiet now. The Hork-

Bajir bodies were everywhere. The air reeked of
charred flesh.

I followed the Andalite, stumbling blindly.

Down dim corridors. Past locked steel hatches.

A hatch opened, a Hork-Bajir head appeared.

It stared in shock. "Andalite!"

"Rachel!" I cried.

Fwapp!

Cassie was screaming. Screaming like she'd

The Andalite struck. I realized now that it had
never stop.

been hurt again. It was staggering. Bleeding. But

I grabbed Cassie. Pulled her to me. Dragged
determined.

her with me. Couldn't look back. Couldn't see

<The bridge. Have to reach the bridge.>
what had happened to my beautiful cousin.

We emerged from the hallway into a wider,

Tseeeew!

more open space. There were display monitors

The Andalite fired again and again. I saw a ray
that seemed to hang, formless, in midair. Three
gun on the floor, clasped in a dead hand. I pried
monstrously huge centipedes manned controls.

it free.

And standing in the middle of it all was an-

I was holding Cassie by the hand. Pulling her
other Andalite. Older-looking. Different.

along with me.

The Andalite called Ax stopped suddenly. He

Tseeeew!

was weaving like a drunk.

I felt the charge jolt my fingers. I let go of a

<Visser Three,> he said.

hand that was no longer there.

<Yes. And you must be the Andalite who es-

164

165
caped from the wreck of the Dome ship. How en-

Cassie came rushing over to me. She knelt
terprising of you.>
down and helped me to my feet.

"He's one of your people," I muttered.

The Andalite stared weirdly at me. And more

<No,> the Andalite said. He sounded weary.

so at Cassie.

<Looks can be deceiving.>

"It's breaking up," Cassie said.

The Andalite raised his weapon.

"What is?"

Fwapp!

She shook her head. "I don't know. I . . . I

The creature called Visser Three struck with
don't know what to call it. But it's falling apart."

his tail. The Andalite stared stupidly down with

The Andalite calmly shot the three big cen-
his main eyes at the stump of his arm.

tipedes. Then he stepped to the controls and

The Andalite was between me and Visser
seconds later the bridge was sealed off.

Three.

<They can break through, eventually. But

I raised my own weapon . . .

Yeerks are rigidly structured. All commands must

Visser Three lunged.

come from the bridge. They will not have an aux-

. . . fired.

iliary controls

Tseeew!

I hugged Cassie close, disbelieving. I'd seen

Missed!

her die. Hadn't I?

Fwapp!

"What are we doing?" I asked the Andalite.

I hit the ground.

<l am currently broadcasting a request for

Then Cassie fired.

help to any and all Andalite fleet elements.>

Tseeeew!

"Your guys can save us?"

Cassie?

<No,> he said. <But they may be able to save

Visser Three's upper body sizzled and disap-
your people. What we can do is make the arrival
peared. The deerlike lower half fell over, lifeless.

of the Andalite fleet less dangerous for them and

"No, no, no!" It was a voice that dripped sar-more beneficial for your kind.>
casm and contempt. But it was annoyed, too.

"How are we going to do that?"

"She's dead! The girl was dead! This is really too

The Andalite didn't answer. Instead he or-
much!"

dered a transparent panel to appear. I was look-

166

167
ing out at Earth. I could see the North American
powerful weapons — and I will annihilate the
continent clearly.

Pool ship and every Yeerk on it.>

We had lifted off and flown into orbit without

<ln five seconds . . . >
my noticing a thing.

<Four. . . >

And then there was a gorilla. It was just there.

<Three . . . >

Squatting in the corner.

"Oh, this is wrong!" the angry, grating voice from nowhere cried again. "This isn't it at all!"

"What's that voice?" I asked. "And what's a
gorilla doing here?"

<Gorilla? I'm a gorilla? Ahh! I'm a gorilla.>

Marco? It was his voice. Coming directly from
the gorilla.

"It's coming apart quickly now," Cassie said,
still staring weirdly around, like nothing she was
seeing was real.

"Ax! What is all this? You're the alien, man,
what is going on?"

The Andalite winced a little at the question.

Then, obviously reluctant to admit ignorance, he
said, <l do not know.> He looked at Cassie with
both stalk eyes. <Perhaps she does.>

"It's all a part of it," Cassie said in a sort of
whisper. "It's coming apart."

<There it is. The Yeerk pool ship,> the An-
dalite announced.

"What now?" I demanded.

<Now, I will aim every weapon this ship pos-
sesses — and it possesses a great many very

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169

he was kind of bluish. And glowing. I had the
sense that he was no such thing, but that was his
appearance.

This creature, this old man, laughed. "It's not
so easy, is it, Drode?"

"You cheated me, Ellimist," the Drode
snapped. "We had a deal, a trade-off. You were
allowed to meddle with the time line in the Falla

Kadrat situation, and we, my master Crayak and

I, were to be allowed to tempt this young jackal
here." He stabbed a finger at me.

"I kept my bargain," the Ellimist said. "I have done nothing to bring about this result. The girl
is an anomaly. She is sub-temporally grounded.

c Iw

< iwo . . . >

You were careless."

"Oh, all right, all right!" the disembodied

"She's a freak of nature!" the Drode screamed.

voice cried. "Stop it, stop it."

The Ellimist nodded. "Yes. She is."

A thing, an alien, I suppose, something, any-

Marco said, "What is going on here?" He was
way, that looked an awful lot like a small di-
no longer a gorilla. "I'm pretty sure I was dead,
nosaur with the skin of a prune, appeared.

then I'm a gorilla."

The Andalite stepped back from the controls,

"Oh, I see it now, I see it now," the Drode
ready to shoot this latest enemy.

said, ignoring Marco, ignoring all of us. "Subtle

He fired. The energy beam traveled half the
as always, Ellimist. Your meddling came before,
distance to the alien, then froze. Simply stopped.

didn't it? How could we not have seen it? Elfan-

"It was the girl, wasn't it?" the prune thing
gor's brother? His time-shifted son? This anom-
said, rolling its green-rimmed eyes upward. "She
alous girl here? And the son of Visser One's
corrupted the time flow."

host body? A group of six supposedly random hu-

Now a second figure appeared. He could have
mans that contains those four! You stacked the
been a little old man. If you ignored the fact that
deck!"

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171

"Did I?" The Ellimist laughed. "That would
see beyond those walls. Can see other rooms, as
have been very clever of me."

though the walls were translucent. You felt the

The Drode spat in disgust. "You knew the girl
change. You sensed that things were not right.

was an anomaly. You knew she was sub-tempo-

You could see, only dimly, but still you could see
rally grounded. And you knew that whatever time
beyond. You could see what should be, where
line I built, her presence would eventually de-
you belonged, and without consciously knowing it
stabilize it. She knew from the start that the
you were working to repair what had been torn
time line had shifted. She felt it. I might as well
apart. To reconstitute time as it should have
have terminated this exercise then. I saw the sud-
been. You were a virus in the software. You de-
den, inexplicable transportation of the mother, I
graded the subtle workings of the Drode's artifi-
thought, well, it's a glitch! The hands morphing
cial time shunt."

to tiger. All the little breakdowns of logic and se-

"I have absolutely no idea what you're talking
quence. I still thought it might hold together."

about," Cassie said.

Cassie said, "Is anyone going to tell us what

"You were in this time line, but of another.

is going on here?"

That is an anomaly. An impossibility. One of the

The Ellimist winked at her. And suddenly,
two time lines was doomed to fail. You grounded
alive, in the room with us, were Rachel and that
the true time line. And thus, this time line began
kid Tobias.

to fall to pieces."

"Does this feel more right, Cassie?" the El-

"Who are you two?" I demanded of the Ellim-
limist asked.

ist and the Drode.

She nodded. "This is everyone. Only Tobias

"He's an old cheat," the Drode snapped.

should be . . ."

"There are rules, Ellimist!"

As I watched in amazement, Tobias seemed

"Yes. And I obeyed them. I allowed you to
to melt, to shift, to dwindle. In seconds there was
create this alternate time line. And in this time
a hawk where he had been.

line these humans and this Andalite came very

"Most creatures live entirely within their time
close to annihilating the Yeerk presence. You sus-
line," the Ellimist said. "Like a person trapped in pended the exercise. Not me. You can continue
a single room. They see only what is within those
this time line, or allow these young ones to return
four walls. Others . . . like yourself, Cassie, can
to their own times."

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173

The Drode's face was twisted with hatred.

Tobias said, <l wouldn't. I wouldn't have done

"Crayak will have him yet."

it, would I? I couldn't have ever gone to The

He was talking about me. I knew it suddenly.

Sharing. That was wrong. No way.>

I knew who I was. I knew it all. I was myself once

"Of course you wouldn't," Rachel growled.

more. Leader of the Animorphs.

I said, "Ellimist, is there anything better in

With that knowledge came a sledgehammer
our real time line? Will it happen any better,
of guilt.

there? Will it, at least, ever end?"

It was all my fault! I had weakened. I'd said

The Ellimist looked at me. Just at me. Sadly,
yes to the Drode. I'd given in. Marco, Rachel,

I thought. Pitying.

Cassie, Tobias, all dead — at least in this real-

"It will end," he said. "It will end."

ity — because I had weakened and taken the

I wanted to ask him more. But I knew that

Drode's offer.

was all I'd get.

"Perhaps, Drode. Perhaps Crayak will have

"So, what happens now?" Cassie asked.

him," the Ellimist said. "But, then again, per-

The Ellimist took her hand and held it affec-
haps he will have Crayak."

tionately. "What will happen now? Only you will

The Drode disappeared. The six of us, the An-
ever recall so much as a dim memory of this time
imorphs, stood there on the wrecked bridge of
line."

the Blade ship with the nearly all-powerful crea-

Cassie nodded, as though she'd half expected
ture called the Ellimist.

him to say that. "But I'll say nothing about it.

"At least we'd have won in this time line," I

Tobias can't know that he might have become a
said.

voluntary Controller. And Jake can't know that he

He shook his head. "Yes. But you all would
ever weakened enough to take the Drode's deal."

have died. And millions of humans, too, before

"You are wise," the Ellimist said.

the victory."

"Yeah, and I sure don't want to know that I

"I gave in," I whispered. "I gave in."

ever dated Marco," Rachel added.

"You have been strong for a long time," he said.

"How do we get back?" I asked. "How do

"He shouldn't have to be," Rachel erupted
we—"

angrily. "None of us should have to. This is
enough. This has gone on too long!"

174

175

I sat up. I knew the voice.

The Drode stood by my desk. It wasn't large.

It perched forward like one of those small di-
nosaurs. It had mean, smart eyes in a humanoid
head. It was wrinkled, dark green or purple
maybe. So dark it was almost black. The mocking
mouth was lined with green.

The Drode was Crayak's creature, his emis-
sary, his tool. Crayak was . . . Crayak was evil. A
power so vast, so complete that only the Ellimist
could keep him in check. A balance of terror: evil
and good checking each other, limiting each

D A Y Z E R O
other, making deals that affected the survival of
entire solar systems.

TTelp me. I'm cold."

"Go away," I said to the Drode.

Another battle. Another horror.

"But you called me."

Couldn't anything make it end? Was there no

"Go back to Crayak. Leave me alone."

way out? Was I trapped, fighting, fighting till one

The Drode smiled. He got up and moved
by one my friends died or went nuts?

closer. Closer till his face was only inches from

I lay on my bed. Stared up at the ceiling.

my own.

"Help me. Please. I'm cold."

"There is a way out," the Drode whispered.

Into the cave, Cassie.

"Say the word and it never was, Jake. Say the

All for what? For nothing. To delay the Yeerks,
word, Jake, and you never walked through the
but never to win. And someday, to lose.

construction site. Say the word and you know

Was there no way out?

nothing. No weight on your shoulders. Say the

"There's always a way out, Jake the Mighty,"

word."

a voice said. "My lord Crayak holds out his om-

"Go away," I said through gritted teeth.

nipotent hand to you, Jake the Yeerk Killer. Jake

"How long till your cousin Rachel loses her
the Ellimist's tool."

grip? You know the darkness is growing inside

176

177
her. How long till Tobias dies, a bird, a bird\ How
words and you know nothing, have no power, no
can he ever be happy? How long till Marco is
responsibility."

forced to destroy his own Controller mother? Will

"What words?"

he survive that, do you think? How long, Jake, till

"One is Crayak. The other is please."

you kill Tom? Then what dreams will come, Jake

I wanted to say no.

theYeerk Killer?"

I wanted to say no . . .

"Get out of here. Crawl back under your rock."

I wanted . . .

"It will happen, Jake. You know that. The

I opened my mouth to speak.

cave. The day will come. You know what the cave

"Oh, forget it. Never mind," the Drode said
is, Jake. You know what it means, that dark cave.

angrily.

You know that death is within. When she dies,
when Cassie dies, it will be at your word, Jake."

I covered my face with my hands.

"My master Crayak offers you an escape. In
his compassion Great Crayak has struck a deal
with that meddling nitwit Ellimist. Crayak would
free you, Jake. Crayak would free you all. All will
be as it would have been if you had simply taken
a different path home."

I saw that moment again. At the mall. Decid-
ing whether to take the safe, well-lit, sensible
way home. Or the route that would take us
through the construction site, and to a meeting
that would change everything.

Undo it. Undo it all. No more war. No more
pain and fear and guilt?

"Just one word, Jake," the Drode whispered.

"No . . . no, two, I think, one must not sacrifice good manners. Two words and it never was. Two

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