Текст книги "Animorphs - 18 - The Decision"

Автор книги: Katherine Alice Applegate

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 2 (всего у книги 6 страниц)

I ran faster now, no longer concerned with eating, but just wanting to feel the impact of raindrops on my face and my chest. If I could run fast enough, all the drops would hit my face and chest and none would fall down on my back.

I saw a wooden rail fence. Almost too high to jump. But I ran straight at it, kicked, tucked my front legs, and sailed over.

There was a "thump!" as one hoof nicked the top rail.

I landed easily and realized I was panting.

I slowed down and trotted back toward the woods.

I could have beaten him, I told myself.

I could have forced the fight. I could have struck again before he had a chance to get away.

Another part of my mind answered, No, you would have lost. He's taller, bigger. He's more experienced. The Andalite body Visser Three controls used to belong to a great warrior. Visser Three has all of that warrior's skill and experience.

You went tail to tail with Visser Three and let him get away.

I went tail to tail with Visser Three and at least I didn't run away.

You wanted to. You were frightened.

I'd be a fool not to be frightened. But I didn't run. He did.

I realized I'd come to rest, standing beneath a particularly tall pine tree just back from the edge of a meadow. Tobias's meadow.

What's up, Ax-man?"; he called down from the darkness above.

Are you awake?"; all yeah. I have this slight tendency to wake up when big, blue, scorpion-tailed alien centaurs go crashing around in the woods like a herd of ruptured elephants."; Tobias is sometimes harsh when awakened. It is a human characteristic that he has not lost.

I apologize for waking you. How do elephants come to be ruptured?"; Tobias sighed. He floated down to a lower branch, then sailed over to a fallen log.

ally're stewing, aren't you?"; What?"; Stewing. Going over things again and again in your head. Around and around in circles, asking yourself the same questions again and again, then starting it all over again."; How did you know?"; Look, Ax, the first time I saw Visser Three ... and you know when that was ... I cried, I was so scared."; He was an alien. He was unfamiliar to you."; Elfangor was an alien. He was unfamiliar. He didn't scare me. Visser Three did. Not because of what he looked like, but because I could feel something coming from him. Like a dark cloud. Like a smell, almost. This feeling, I don't know any other word for it. Like I was looking at something that needed to be destroyed. He was evil. I felt it. And I had this horrible understanding, this knowledge, that one way or the other, that evil was going to touch me and change me. So I just cried."; I have met Visser Three before,"; I said stonily. I should not have been afraid."; What could you have done?"; I could have forced the fight."; What if you'd lost?"; What if I'd won? It would have been a terrible blow against the Yeerks. I would have avenged Elfangor. I would have done a great service for my people."; Look, Ax, you went up against him. He backed down. Not you."; He was surrounded and outnumbered. He thought each of you was another Andalite warrior ready to demorph and attack. He retreated with honor."; Honor,"; Tobias said derisively.

He's a cold-blooded killer. He's an invader in someone else's land. He's just another gangster. Murderers don't have honor."; I should let you go back to sleep."; Ooookay. You want to drop it, it's dropped."; He looked around, blinking, almost as blind as a human in the darkness. Hard to sleep when it's raining, anyway."; Tobias. The bird that Visser Three morphed? It was an Andalite bird. It's called a kafit bird. From my home planet."; ally're thinking, what? That Visser Three must have been on the Andalite home world in order to acquire it?"; all yes. I am worried that the Abomination has set foot on the Andalite home world."; I felt Tobias grow tense. Now he was beginning to understand. But he said, Sometimes people must take animals off the home world, right? I mean, just the way you can find an African lion in a zoo in America, Europe, wherever. Right?

So, okay, someone totally innocent takes one of these birds off your planet. They get hijacked or whatever. And it ends up in Visser Three's hands."; I wanted to believe it was possible. So I said, all yes, that could be it."; But I didn't believe it. I believed that Visser Three had either been to my world. Or that some ally of his had been there.

Either way it meant only one thing. The Yeerks had begun to reach into the one safe place in the galaxy: my home.

We met at the barn where Cassie and her father care for sick or injured nonhuman animals.

It is called the Wildlife Rehabilitation Clinic. It is a large, dark building made of wood. Within it are numerous cages made of steel wire. And within the cages are the sick animals.

Tobias was high in the rafters. From up there he can see out through a sort of window and can warn us if anyone is approaching.

Everyone else was on the ground level.

Cassie was working, pushing piles of dirty hay with a very large, three-pronged fork. Prince Jake would occasionally lift something out of her way.

Marco and Rachel were just chilling.

That's what humans call it. I believe it refers to the fact that when humans sit very still and do nothing, their body temperature drops. Thus, "chilling."

Someday, when I am old, too old to be a warrior, I will write a book about humans and their strange habits and speech and technology.

For example, did you know that humans invented books before computers? Because of this they believe computers to be superior, despite the very obvious fact that it takes one of their computers as much as thirty seconds to "load" a page, while a book page can be accessed with zero effective delay.

One would almost dismiss humans as a quaint, unimportant, backward race.

Except for two things. First, these are, after all, the creatures who have raised the art of taste to incredible levels. Humans may be technologically primitive, but they have created buttered popcorn, the Snickers bar, chili, and cigarette butts. (although humans themselves become very upset by the idea of eating cigarette butts.) And let us not forget: Humans, for all their faults, have created the cinnamon bun. Some day, after the war, there will be pilgrimages of Andalites streaming to Earth to morph into humans for a day and do nothing but eat cinnamon buns.

Get the extra frosting. It's worth it.

"Ax, are you paying attention?" Marco asked.

I snapped out of my daydream. all yes, of course."; "Because, see, I've said the same thing to you twice now, and you just keep staring off into space like you're a million miles away."

Please tell me a third time and I will pay attention."; "I said, by Visser Three morphing an Andalite bird, maybe he was sending a message. I mean, he still thinks we're all Andalites. He was pretty sure he was chasing an Andalite in morph, right? So he chooses to morph an Andalite bird? That's not a coincidence. That's a message."

And that's the second reason not to dismiss humans as unimportant. They are unbelievably quick to adapt. Just a few months ago, Marco didn't believe there was life on other planets. Now he's accepted that fact, absorbed an entirely new world view, found himself in the middle of a war using morphing technology he doesn't understand, and even managed to have insights that I miss.

all yes,"; I said slowly. all yes. But why? What message?"; Marco shrugged his shoulders. "He's rattling your cage. It's like, "Hey, pal, while you're stuck here on Earth I've been in and out of your house, hanging out with your buddies, and eating your mom's cookies.""

My mother does not make cookies,"; I pointed out. The sense of taste is unknown among–"; "The Visser's yanking your chain," Rachel said.

"Messing with your mind," Cassie agreed.

Jerking you around,"; Tobias said.

"Trying to baffle you with ... oh, never mind,"

Prince Jake said. "The point is, you have two questions: How did Visser Three acquire this bird? And why did he morph it to attack you?"

"That's not the real question, though," Cassie said.

"The real question is what are we going to do about this Hewlett Aldershot the Third?"

Marco stuck up his hand. "Get him to change his name?"

"You know, it's a pretty good plan Visser Three has," Prince Jake pointed out. "He acquires our man Hewlett Aldershot the Third, then he walks into work at the Secret Service offices, punches up anything he wants on the computer, sits in on secret conferences, and ends up knowing everything the Secret Service knows."

What does the Secret Service know?"; I asked.

"A lot," Marco said.

Ah."; "It's not just what he can find out, it's who he can talk to and get access to," Rachel said.

"He can find out if any information about Yeerk activities ever gets to–"

"Whoa!" Marco shot straight up on his two wobbly legs. I can never get past thinking humans will topple over when they do that.

"What whoa?" Prince Jake asked mildly.

"Whoa, as in whoa, Rachel is right. H.a.

Third can talk to anyone, right? He can talk to his boss, right? So, if he was to walk in and say, "Boss, guess what? Parasite slugs from outer space are invading Earth!"

Well, okay, they'd throw him in the nuthouse.

But if he was to walk in and say, "Parasite slugs from outer space are invading Earth, and guess what, I can turn into a rhinoceros," and then he actually did turn into a rhinoceros ... well. Suddenly, boom! The secret is out. The Yeerks are screwed."

"Unless his boss is a Controller," Rachel said.

"If she were a Controller, why would Visser Three be bothering with H.a. Third?" Cassie pointed out. But then she turned to Marco. "What exactly are you thinking? Are you talking about morphing Mr. Aldershot?"

"Duh. Yeah."

"We don't do that," Cassie said. "I thought we decided we don't do that. We don't morph humans."

I morphed Prince Jake,"; I said.

I was excited by Marco's idea. But there are times when my human friends are reluctant to do whatever it takes to hurt the Yeerks. Sometimes so am I.

And Cassie morphed Rachel that time,"; Tobias said.

"First of all, Ax, you're not a human, so maybe it's okay if you morph Jake. Besides, Jake would have given his permission if he hadn't been infested with a Yeerk. And Rachel did give me her permission," Cassie said.

"Excuse me," Marco said with an edge of sarcasm in his voice. "Our man H.a.

Third can't give permission. He's a vegetable. He's a carrot. He's a cabbage. He's a tomato."

"I thought tomatoes were fruit," Rachel interrupted, trying to provoke Marco.

"It's called a "persistent vegetative state," thanks so much for your sensitivity, Marco," Cassie said. "But we don't know if Mr. Aldershot is that bad off. He could just be in a coma. We don't have the right to go stealing his DNA."

"The man is a brussels sprout," Marco said.

"We'd never get in there, anyway," Prince Jake said. "Visser Three knows we know. We have to be in human form to "acquire"

Aldershot's DNA. You think we could do that with Visser Three on guard? Not likely."

Everyone looked downcast. Prince Jake was correct.

But then Cassie said, "Oh, man."

"What?" Marco demanded.

Cassie sighed. "I'm totally against this. But ..."

"But? But? But what?"

Cassie turned to me. "Ax, is it possible to acquire DNA from blood alone?"

all yes. It should be."; "Blood?" Rachel made a face.

"We're gonna get this guy's blood? Not me, my friend. Hepatitis, HIV, uh-uh."

Diseases cannot be transmitted during acquiring,"; I said quickly. The acquiring process absorbs only DNA, and that DNA is isolated, encapsulated within your own bloodstream in a super-low temperature–and thus very stable–naltron molecule sphere. You see–"; "I think my brain just fell asleep,"

Marco interrupted. "So, okay, the blood is safe for us. So, Cassie, how do we get it?"

Cassie explained.

All the other humans, even Tobias, said "gross." They said "gross" very loudly and repeatedly.

I've learned something from my time with humans.

When they say something is gross, they are almost always right.

"So how do I acquire it without it acquiring me at the same time?" Prince Jake asked nervously.

"Don't be a big baby," Marco said. "Like you've never been bitten by a mosquito?"

"Never in cold blood," Prince Jake said.

It was several days later. My human friends attend school five days in a row, then do not attend for two days. They don't know why. But they try and arrange for missions to take place on non-school days.

We were in the barn, surrounding a transparent glass box. In the box were a number of small, fragile-looking flying insects.

"You need to catch one in your hand. Don't squeeze too hard or you'll kill it,"

Cassie said. "Like this." She stuck her hand in the box. After two unsuccessful attempts, she enclosed a mosquito in her hand.

She withdrew her hand, covered the box again, and began to focus on the mosquito. After a moment she opened her eyes. "Okay, who's next?"

"Just hand me your mosquito," Marco said.

"It probably already bit you, so maybe it's not hungry anymore."

"We can't all morph the same mosquito,"

Cassie said. "Only females suck blood.

Males are useless."

"Amen," Rachel said, then laughed.

"So what's that mosquito in your hand?" Marco demanded.

"Like I know?" Cassie said. "I don't have a magnifying glass that good. And even if I did, how exactly do you tell a male from a female?"

"That's easy," Marco said. "The males think loud belching is funny and the females don't."

"Is there any chance we could just get on with this?" Prince Jake asked.

all yes,"; I said. I do not fear the bite of these tiny insects."; I put my hand inside the glass cage. I had some difficulty grabbing one of the creatures, though. Human hands are stronger and faster than Andalite hands. In the end, Cassie grabbed a mosquito and handed it to me.

Thank you,"; I said, and began to acquire the necessary DNA.

When we had all finished Prince Jake said, "Okay. Let's go."

We morphed to birds of prey to fly quickly to the hospital. With harrier eyes I saw that the human Hewlett Aldershot the Third was still in his hospital bed. But there was a major difference.

There were now four large humans seated around him.

In the room next door to the left, we saw four more. And in the room next door to the right, another four.

Human-Controllers, no doubt. And no doubt heavily armed. Twelve armed humans to protect Hewlett Aldershot the Third from us.

Kind of flattering, actually,"; Rachel said. Twelve guys? And maybe more we don't see."; The Yeerks must have some high-ranking people in this hospital,"; Cassie observed. To get two private rooms just for guards like that?"; So how do we get in?"; Marco wondered.

How about a diversion?"; Rachel suggested.

I go into elephant morph, Jake does his rhinoceros, and we rip that place apart!"; I said, As I understand, we each hope to bite the human, so that we can be reasonably sure of extracting sufficient blood. But Rachel, before you can go from elephant to mosquito you must pass through human. I, on the other hand, have no need of an intermediate stage. And nothing would draw the attention of a bunch of Controllers better than an Andalite."; It made perfect sense. Prince Jake agreed that it made sense. So while the others went up to the roof and morphed back to human in preparation for becoming mosquitoes, I landed in a dark, open window at the far end of the hospital.

I fluttered inside, waited, listening. I heard human breathing. My harrier eyes adjusted to the darkness and I could make out a young human female, looking very frail in her bed.

I demorphed as quickly as I could, shedding feathers and growing fur.

Suddenly the girl's eyes opened.

"Who are you?" she demanded. "Are you a fairy?"

ationo. I am an Andalite."; It was all I could think of to say. Besides, I felt reluctant to lie to a sick child.

"What's your name?"

My name is Aximili-Esgarrouth– Isthill."; "That's a funny name," she said. Then she closed her eyes and began to sleep once more.

I took a deep breath. I moved to the door as silently as I could. I opened it and stuck one stalk eye out into the hall. Two humans in white were at the far end of the hall.

I took another deep breath. Well, I thought, I am supposed to create a diversion.

I opened the door and stepped out into the hallway. The two humans did not see me till I had nearly reached them. Then their mouths opened very wide. And their faces began to change color: one turned white, the other red.

I don't know why.

"Holy ..."

"What the ..."

Obviously they were not Controllers or they would have been yelling "Andalite!" rather than "Holy" and "What the." These were innocent humans.

Hello,"; I said. Please, do not be alarmed."; "It's ... it's some weird, mutated deer!"

"It's some kind of trick. It's gotta be a trick. All right, Terry, you can come out now.

Hah-hah, big laugh."

I passed them by and kept walking toward the heavily guarded room of Hewlett Aldershot the Third.

A human went past pushing a cart loaded with food on trays. He never looked up. He just kept looking down as he went. Then I guess he noticed my hooves.

"Aaaahhhh!" he cried, and shoved the cart so hard it turned over.

Clang-clash-Wham!

Thus began the diversion. Suddenly doors opened. Heads stuck out and looked and screamed.

People came running down the hall. Most turned around when they saw me and ran the other way.

"Oh, no! Did you see it? Did you see it?"

"It's a monster!"

"I knew they were doing genetic experiments down in the labs! It's some kind of freak!"

It would almost have been insulting, if I were sensitive.

But then the door to the right of Aldershot's room opened. Out stepped a human. He gaped at me for a second, then yelled, "Andalite!"

He gaped one second too long. He yanked out a gun. I snapped my tail forward and he quickly dropped the gun.

"Andalite!" he screamed again, but with extra hatred this time.

Now the guards came boiling out of all three rooms. They jammed into the hallway, too many to move freely. Human guns were being drawn.

And I saw a couple of handheld Yeerk Dracon beam weapons, too.

In a split second they would all start shooting. The lead slugs from the human weapons would be most dangerous. Not just to me, but because they would rip through the walls and might hit innocent people.

"Shoot! Shoot him, you fools, or Visser Three will have us for lunch!" one of the humans roared.

FWAPP!

I whipped my tail, left to right, a millimeter from slicing open the front row. They backed up, stumbling back into their fellows.

FWAPP!

I whipped again, but now they were ready to start fighting. And I was seriously outnumbered and worried about innocent humans being hurt.

Obviously, I had not planned the diversion very well.

And that's when it occurred to me. The one way to keep from getting shot.

I surrender!"; I cried. I want to defect.";

"What?"

I wish to defect. I am interested in joining the Yeerks. I would like to become a Controller. Do you have any information on membership? Is there a fee?"; A dozen weapons were leveled at me. From behind me, at that end of the hall I heard other human voices.

"What is going on around this place?"

"Is that a horse?"

"Look at the eyes on its head!"

"Where's security?"

The leader of the Controllers made a snap decision. He hustled me out of the hallway and into the room where Hewlett Aldershot the Third was sleeping his comatose sleep.

The room was small. Too small for all the guards. There were only five of them now. Much better odds.

"You want to join us?" one of the Controllers asked dubiously.

Actually, no,"; I said regretfully.

FWAPP!

I struck and the nearest guard leaped back, plowing into his men. I had about half a second before they'd recover and shoot.

FWAPP! CRASH!

I shattered the window with my tail blade.

Here's a trick I learned from Visser Three!"; I yelled. I ran three steps, ducked my upper body, flattened my stalk eyes, tucked my legs, and flew through the shattered window.

Down I fell!

allyaaahhhh!"; Too far, way too far, but better than getting shot.

The window's open, Prince Jake!"; I cried. And the Controllers are–"; WHAM!

CRUNCH!

?–distracted."; I landed in a bush that cushioned some of my fall but also tripped me. I rolled and tried to scramble up, but then realized, as ridiculous as it seemed, that I was trapped inside the prickly, clawing branches of the bush.

Blam! Blam! BlamBlamBlam!

The guards were firing from the window. Bullets tore the branches and slammed into the damp soil all around me.

Human weapons operate on a principle of exploding gases that drive a solid metal pellet along a tube. The tube acts to spin the bullet, thus improving accuracy. It's no Yeerk Dracon beam, or Andalite Shredder, but it does a very good job of blowing large, messy holes in you.

I needed to get small. Small enough to get away!

I began to morph the mosquito.

We're in!"; I heard Prince Jake say. Ax, are you okay? We think we hear gunshots, but our hearing in these morphs is fuzzy."; ally are correct: You are hearing gunfire,"; I said tersely.

Are you okay?"; Tobias asked.

ation really. But I hope to be soon."; If I live that long, I added silently.

I was shrinking rapidly, and now there were sirens wailing at a distance, coming closer.

"Police!" I heard a human voice cry from above. "We can't get arrested."

"If we let the Andalite escape we'll get worse than arrested! Keep shooting!"

"I can't see what I'm shooting at. The bushes. And it's all in shadow."

I was shrinking faster. Leaves that had seemed quite small now were as big as my face. Branches that were twisted and tiny were growing larger, larger. They no longer trapped me. I could have walked out of the bush, except for the fact that my legs were dwindling even faster than the rest of me.

Someday Andalite scientists will find a way to make the morphing technology totally predictable and logical. But for now it is often erratic, weird, and totally illogical.

Especially when morphing bizarre Earth animals.

My hind legs had finished shrinking when they were still as big as an Earth cat's legs. Then they began to reverse and grow again. My hind legs thinned, becoming mere sticks, but their length became ridiculous. Longer than the rest of me all together!

My front legs became somewhat shorter stick legs and a third pair grew from my arms.

I was no longer on all fours. I was on all sixes. I was standing on insect legs, yet most of my body was still Andalite. A very small Andalite, but far too large to move around on insect legs.

My stalk eyes crawled forward across my head, down to a point just above my main eyes.

They began to extrude. They grew like some horrible fast-sprouting tree. A long, bare stick that then sprouted new branches: short, stunted, twisted branches. Bulging round pods popped from my head at the base of these hairy sticks–these antennae–and began to move them around.

My main eyes were still functioning, but from the antennae I received a whole onslaught of new sensory input. Temperature! Wind direction! Sound waves from the rustling leaves, from the muddy, far-off voices, and sharp, disturbing sounds from the explosions of gunpowder and the impact thud of massive bullets all around me.

I was no longer worried much about the bullets.

I was too small to hit except by the most amazingly unlucky shot. I was less than an inch long and getting smaller.

The dirt looked like a field strewn with boulders. The trunks of the bushes sprouting up from the ground were thicker and taller than any tree on Earth or my planet.

My nostril slits closed and began to twist and push outward. Two stubby, hairy palps appeared, and these immediately began feeding an entirely new set of data to my brain.

Smell! But not smell as an Andalite or human knows it. This was specific, targeted, directed smell. It wasn't smell that waits passively for whatever comes along. The palps were searching the molecules of the breeze, sampling, looking ...

Hungry.

Gossamer wings rose from the melting flesh on my back. My body pinched into three distinct segments: a tiny head, a muscular thorax, and a swollen, vast abdomen. Overlapping armored plates clanked down the bottom of my abdomen.

And yet, through all this, a tiny, shrunken version of my Andalite main eyes continued to function.

I wish they hadn't. I wish I'd never had to see what happened next.

From my chin, from the place where a human would have had a mouth, it grew. A spear! A needle!

Impossibly long. On the end were tiny, serrated teeth, almost like the teeth of a saw.

Inside the spear it was hollow. It was a straw. A tube for sucking blood.

A retractable sheath grew along with the spear.

A sheath that would help keep the needle sharp.

Blood.

That was my goal. That was my hunger.

Blood!

I fired my gossamer wings and rose, unsteady and wild, upward, upward, to where my palps had located the scent they sought: the sweet scent of exhaled animal breath. The guidepost that pointed the way to food.

That's when my eyes stopped working. I was blind for a few seconds as the morph completed. I shrank some more, and suddenly from my forehead popped two bulging compound eyes.

Through them I saw a vision of reality shattered into thousands of tiny pictures. Thousands of tiny pictures, each different from the next, each a fragment of distorted light and eerie colors and nightmarish swirls of energy.

I never lost control of the morph. I mean, I never forgot who I was, or what I was, as sometimes happens in a morph you're doing for the first time.

So it wasn't that I lost my mind. It was simply that the hunger of the mosquito was so great, so powerful, so totally clear and forceful, that I felt myself going along with it. Accepting it.

I was flying, and knowing who I was, and yet as the mosquito's instincts cried, "Blood!

Blood!" I answered, "Yes! Yes!"

Mosquitoes do not fly with the speed and acrobatic genius of a fly. Or with the precision and power of a bird. They fly wildly, blown by chance breezes. The legs dangle long and drag at the air. The wings are underpowered. But the mosquito gets where it's going.

It seems a harmless insect when you see it. But I have done some research.

Mosquitoes transmit bacteria, viruses, and parasites. They carry the diseases encephalitis, yellow fever, and malaria.

Malaria alone kills two million humans each year. Mosquitoes are the greatest mass murderers on planet Earth.

Ax! Ax! Talk to me,"; Prince Jake called, and I realized suddenly that he'd been yelling for some time.

I am fine,"; I said. I have morphed to mosquito."; Good,"; he said. Look, I know what you're feeling right now. Don't fight it. The hunger stops once you bite."; Follow the smell,"; Cassie said.

That's carbon dioxide your palps are smelling. It comes off animals, including humans. Go for it."; I rose, hungry, to the open window. But there I was confused. There were many warm, carbon dioxide-emitting creatures.

The one I was looking for was lying down. Lying still. I focused on the mosquito senses. I struggled to put together the sound waves from my antennae, the smell of carbon dioxide from my palps, and the shattered, lurid view through my compound eyes.

Huge, huge, vast beyond imagining, stretched my target. Hundreds of times my length, millions of times my weight, Hewlett Aldershot the Third lay prone, oozing attractive aromas.

I fluttered on gossamer wings and landed. I was on a rough, uneven surface. There were bumps and ridges of warm, pink flesh. Here and there, like lone trees scattered on a dry plain, hairs rose like curved spears from the flesh.

The flesh was alive. It moved slightly, causing me to rise and fall. The human was breathing. But more fascinating than the slow rise and fall of breath, was the Thump! Thump! Thump!

of a drumbeat beneath my feet.

A pulse. The beating pulse of blood rushing through arteries and veins.

And then ...

POP!

There was a distinct popping sound and suddenly, instantly, I was no longer a mosquito tapping into a human's vein.

I was in space. White, empty Zero-space!

Whaa ...? What? Z-space?"; I cried. Maybe not the most brilliant comment. But I was confused.

I kicked my legs instinctively. My Andalite legs. I was back in my own body.

But there was nothing to kick against.

I felt no sensation of movement, no air was rushing over me. Already the lack of oxygen was beginning to cloud my brain. My eyes were going blind. My limbs were numb.

Zero-space! It was impossible. And yet here I was.

I looked around frantically. I turned my stalk eyes in every direction. I saw my own body, inside and out. An n-dimensional jigsaw puzzle, twisted so that I could see inside my own body.

And there, to one side of me, were four human bodies spread out in the same way–weird cross sections. I saw Prince Jake's face, but also his beating heart and the muscle tissues of his legs and the inside of his brain. The same with the others.

They were all writhing in agony.

And there was one bird, very still.

Prince Jake! Tobias!"; I cried.

But of course they couldn't answer. There was no air to carry their mouth-sounds. There was nothing, not even the few stray atoms and molecules that float free in regular space. There were no stars or planets. Nothing exists in Zero-space.

I happened to catch sight of a silvery, graceful creation, perhaps half a mile away.

A ship! As with the bodies, I saw the inside and outside of the ship all in one picture. I could see distorted individuals inside, going about their duties.

But even mind-numb and gaping at a confused nightmare vision, I knew what sort of creatures they were.

Andalites. It was an Andalite ship!

Its Zero-space engines burned brightly, but it was not moving away.

It hit me in a flash. I knew what had happened. As any Andalite knows, when you morph something much smaller than your own body, the excess mass is extruded into Zero-space.

It hangs there, a wad of randomly arranged matter.

Or at least that was the theory. There was nothing random here. Because we were outside of normal three-dimensional space, I could see the insides of everything and everyone. But the bodies were still definitely human and Andalite bodies.