Animorphs Megamorphs 1

The Andalite's gift

K.A. Applegate

*Converted to EBook by Dace K

Chapter one: JAKE

My name is Jake. Just Jake. No last name. Or at least no last name I can tell you. I am an Animorph. I guess that makes me one of the most hunted, endangered species on Earth. The Yeerks want me dead. They want my friends dead. So if they knew who I was, and how to find me, I wouldn't have a chance.

That's why I won't tell you my last name. And I won't tell you what city or state I live in. Because I want to go on living. I want to go on living so I can go on fighting them. Are you one of those people who looks up at the night sky and wonders whether there is life out there among the stars? Do you wonder about

UFO's? Do you wonder whether aliens will ever come to Earth?

Well, stop wondering. The Yeerks are here.

They're a species of parasites - just little slugs, really. Little slugs that crawl inside your head and wrap themselves around your brain and make you do whatever they want you to do.

When that happens you stop being a true human being. You become a Controller. That's what we call a human who is under the control of a Yeerk. When you talk to a Controller, you may be looking at a human face, you may hear a human voice, but what you're really talking to is a Yeerk.

And they are everywhere. If you think you haven't seen one, you're wrong. The policeman in his patrol car, the clerk at the grocery store, your teacher, your pastor, your doctor: Any of them might be a Controller. Your mother, father, sister, or best friend: They could all be Controllers.

I know. My brother Tom is one of them. They have taken my brother from me and made him an enemy. I sit at the breakfast table every morning and make small talk, knowing all the while that Tom is not Tom anymore.

And they have taken my best friend's mother. Everyone thinks Marco's mother is dead. Only he and I know the truth: She, too, is one of them.

They are everywhere. They can be anyone.

They tear lives apart. They do unspeakable things. And we stand against them alone. Only we know the threat. We six: five Animorphs and one Andalite.

Five human kids with the power to become any animal we can touch. And a kid from another planet who looks like some weird mix of deer, human, and scorpion. The six of us against all the might of the Yeerks, and all the evil genius of their leader, Visser Three.

Which is why Rachel was worried about leaving, even for a weekend. 3

We were all together that Friday evening - Marco, Cassie, Tobias, Rachel, and me. Ax wasn't there because he would have had to change into his human morph. He doesn't like to become human. I think he feels naked without his deadly tail. So it was just the five of us in Cassie's barn, surrounded by all the chattering, snuffling, chirping, preening (and smelly) animals in their cages. The barn is also the Wildlife Rehabilitation Center. Cassie's parents are veterinarians. They use their barn to take in sick or injured wild animals.

"It's just this stupid, two-day gymnastics camp I signed up for a long time ago," Rachel was saying. "It's no big deal. It's something I was going to do back . . . you know, before."

"Rachel, you should go," Cassie said. "Our entire lives cannot be about fighting the Yeerks. We have to try to be seminormal. I mean, it can't all be danger and battle and fear, right? So go. But for now, help me lift up this crow's cage. He's going up on that shelf." Cassie was trying to get us to help clean up the barn. We used the barn to get together. It was one of the few places we could meet with Tobias. See, he can't exactly go to the mall.

<Crows,> Tobias said, in thought-speak that we heard only in our minds. <I can't believe you're saving a crow. I hate crows. You know how he probably got that broken wing?

Trying to mob a respectable hawk, that's how. Crows are total punks.> Tobias was perched high in the rafters of the barn. From up there he could fly in and out through the hayloft. Tobias is a red-tailed hawk. Actually, in his mind, in his soul, he's human. But the power to morph has a terrifying downside. Stay in morph for more than two hours, and you stay forever. Tobias was trapped forever in a body with long, powerful wings, ripping, taloned feet, and fierce, angry eyes that stared at you around his hooked beak.

You would never guess that he had once been such a gentle guy. I guess he still is that guy. But he's also a hawk.

<Yeah, I'm looking at you, crow,> Tobias said in mock threat. Obviously, the crow did not understand thought-speak.

Cassie smiled. "Tobias, I promise when we release this guy, we'll take him far from your territory."

"I already told Melissa Chapman I wasn't going," Rachel said, going back to her own topic.

"She went up to the camp this afternoon, right after school." Marco, who had been lying back on a big bale of hay and staring at the ceiling, sat up.

"Rachel doesn't think we can survive without her for two days. After all, she's the mighty Xena-Warrior Princess."

It was Marco's teasing name for Rachel. Rachel has a tendency to be very bold. Anytime there's something borderline-insane that needs to be done, Rachel is always the first volunteer.

"Marco? You have hay stuck in your hair," Rachel said. He ignored her remark. "Rachel thinks if she's not here and we have trouble, we'll all just run screaming and yammering like a bunch of scared little kids." He put on a phony-serious expression. "All I want to know is this: Why don't you dress like Xena? I mean, the whole leather and sword thing would really work for you."

"Okay, shut up, I'll go," Rachel said. "I'll go. I'm going. Just to get away from Marco for a couple days. I'll catch the bus tomorrow morning."

"Think of me when you're on the uneven parallel bars," Marco said. But it wasn't to Marco that Rachel looked. It was to Tobias. "You guys will stay out of trouble while I'm gone, won't you?"

<We'll be fine, Rachel,> Tobias said.

I saw Cassie smile, and my gaze met hers. She gave a slight nod. Cassie has a theory that Rachel and Tobias like each other. Not that Rachel has ever said anything, even though Rachel and Cassie are best friends. Cassie thinks it's sweet and romantic. I just think it's kind of sad. I mean, as far as we know, Tobias will never be fully human again.

"We should all just enjoy a nice, normal weekend," I said. "Have normal fun. We've had plenty of danger and excitement."

Marco sent me a sly, resentful look. "Some of us are going to have more fun than some others. Some of us are going to pool parties that some of us were not invited to." He shook his fists melodramatically at the ceiling. "Why? Why? What does that girl have against me?

I rolled my eyes. "Here we go again."

Cassie rescued me. "I need someone strong to come outside with me, help me carry in some new cages from the truck. Marco?"

"Oh! My back!" Marco cried. "A sudden, shooting pain."

"I'm coming, Cassie," I said. I gave Marco a shove, pushing him back on his bale of hay.

"You are so pathetic."

"Don't strain yourself," Marco said with a cocky grin. Outside, out of the golden glow of the barn's lights, it was getting dark. A full moon had risen, and you could just see the first stars off to the east. The pickup truck was piled precariously high with wire cages. I climbed up and began to untie the rope that held them in place.

"It seems strange - Rachel going away - even for a couple days," Cassie said. "And it seems even stranger that it would seem strange. I mean, it should be no big deal." 5

"Well, I guess when life turns completely crazy, it's the normal things that start to seem strange."

Cassie nodded slowly. For a while she said nothing. She just stood there with her arms crossed, looking up at the moon.

I climbed down off the truck. "What's bothering you?" She shrugged. "Nothing. Just... a feeling. I don't know. Bad dreams, I guess."

"I have those, too," I said. "We all do. You can't live through all this and not have it bother you. What's the dream about? The ant thing?"

We'd morphed ants once. We'd gone down into an ant tunnel and had been attacked by an enemy colony of ants. No one wanted to go through that, ever again. Not ever.

"No, not the ants," Cassie said. "At least not directly. It's . . . it's dumb. There's . . . something. I don't even know what it is. But it's not a good thing. And it asks me to make a choice. In the dream I have to decide who lives and who dies." I moved closer to Cassie and put my arm around her shoulder. There were goose bumps on her bare arms.

"I never used to be afraid, Jake," Cassie said. "Not of anything. And now it's like I'm afraid all the time."

"You deal with it, though," I said. It made me nervous talking about feelings like this. I guess I think if you just don't talk about the fear, it will go away. "You always deal with it," I repeated.

"So far," Cassie said softly. "So far."

Chapter Two: Rachel

My name is Rachel, I live with my mom and my two little sisters. We live pretty close to Jake, who lives pretty close to Marco. Cassie is the farthest one out because she lives on a farm.

I guess we're a pretty average bunch of kids. I mean, we were a pretty average bunch. Marco lives with his dad. I live with my mom. Jake and Cassie each have both parents around. We go to school. We do homework. We hang at the mall. We listen to music. Go to movies on the weekend. Normal. Boringly average.

Until one night when we happened to hook up together at the mall and decided to take a shortcut through an abandoned construction site off the highway. We weren't a "group" back then. Jake was my cousin, but we didn't really see each other, except at school. Cassie was my best friend, and had been for a long time. But Marco was just Jake's friend, not mine. And Tobias was this guy Jake felt sorry for because he came from such a messed-up home and got picked on by bullies.

That's Jake: When he sees some guy getting his head stuffed in a toilet at school, he is absolutely going to stop it. Jake isn't some big tough guy or anything. It's just that when he tells you, in that calm, reasonable voice of his, to stop picking on someone, you stop. You just do.

Jake is sort of the one in charge. It's not something he ever wanted. It just seems natural for him to take over.

Not that Jake is without his own level of stupidity. I mean, he was right there with us, walking through an isolated, abandoned construction site that night. Wasn't the smartest thing we ever did.

But the way it turned out, the real danger that night was not from some mad slasher. The real danger was from a totally unexpected direction.

See, that's where the damaged Andalite spaceship landed. Right there in the construction site. That's where we saw our first alien. That's where we learned about the Yeerk threat. And that's

where the Andalite, Prince Elfangor, gave us our power to morph. It's where Elfangor died, too. We watched it happen. We watched that brave, decent, kind creature be murdered by Visser Three. Murdered for trying to protect the people of Earth. Anyway. That's when we became a group. It was Marco who came up with a name for what we were. Animorphs. Persons who can morph animals.

The Andalite left us the burden of fighting the Yeerks, and gave us that one weapon: the power to morph. Like all weapons, it has dangers even to those who use it for a good cause. Just ask Tobias.

But it is an awesome power. We have done some damage to the Yeerks. And to be honest with you, sometimes the morphing power is just plain fun. Right now, though, my "normal" life was calling.

It was already getting! warm by the time I walked over to school the next morning. The bus to the camp was due to come at eleven. I got to school an hour early. I stopped on the sidewalk in front of the school and checked my watch. The sun was climbing fast, and you could tell it was going to be a really hot day. I smiled. It would be a good day for flying.

I crossed the athletic field and headed for the woods behind the school. I wanted to check in with Tobias before I left. It's no big thing. It's just that I kind of take care of stuff Tobias needs. I bring him books sometimes. You know - things he can't get in the woods. But Tobias isn't always an easy guy to find. Especially in the morning, when he's likely to be out hunting his breakfast. I knew I would need great eyes and speed to find him and still get back in time to catch the bus.

It's funny how it never even occurred to me that I was in a very dangerous position. See, my mom and my friends all thought I was heading to camp. They wouldn't expect to see me for a couple of days. But the camp people didn't think I was coming. So they wouldn't expect to see me, either.

But none of this occurred to me. After all, what did I have to worry about? Little did I know.

So, I entered the woods, put my outer clothing in my bag, hid it beneath some low-lying bushes, and took a quick look around to make sure I was alone. Then I began to morph. I focused my mind on one of the many animals whose DNA is part of me. Every morphing is unique. The changes never happen the same way twice. This time, the first thing to change was my mouth. My lips grew hard and stiff. And when I rolled my eyes downward, I could see my mouth become bright yellow and bulge outward. As that happened, I began to shrink. The pine needle-covered ground came up toward me as I lost a foot of height with a few seconds. Then another foot. The strangest thing, though, was my skin. The flesh on my bare arms began to melt like candle wax. It melted and ran together. It formed intricate patterns, like a tattoo of feathers. Suddenly, the painted feather patterns were no longer just designs. Actual feathers began to emerge.

The feathers were dark brown, except for the ones that replaced my blond hair and the skin of my face and neck. Those feathers were all snowy white.

By the time the morph was nearly complete, I only stood about two feet tall. My feet had split open and formed yellow talons, each of which ended in a wicked, hooked claw. My arms rose up, horizontal. Long feathers sprouted from them, even as my solid, heavy, human bones became hollow and light.

It took just a few minutes for the transformation to be done. I was no longer human. I was a bald eagle.

I turned to face the breeze and opened my wings. They stretched six feet from tip to tip. I felt the wind press against my feathers, stretching my muscles. I flapped several times with great power, and then ... I was airborne! I drew my talons up snug against my body. I flapped and rose. I flapped more, and soared above the trees. The top branches reached for me but missed. I flapped still more and caught a good, strong headwind. It was like an invisible wedge that forced me up and up.

Up and up! I rose till I was several hundred feet above the treetops. I could see the school down below. I could see the bus parked in the empty lot. And, being an eagle, I could see a great deal more.

Looking through the eyes of an eagle is like having built-in binoculars. From hundreds of feet in the air I could see field mice just poking their noses out of their holes. I could see ants crawling up the trunks of trees. I could look down through the water of a stream and see the tiny fish feeding there. I could see everything, like no human will ever see. I turned toward the deeper woods where Tobias lived.

Maybe there is something better than flying free, high above the trees, riding the wind, but I doubt it. It was freedom beyond any dream of freedom. I loved it. For all the pain that has come from the war with the Yeerks, I swear sometimes just being able to fly makes it all worthwhile.

I was close to Tobias's territory when I spotted something interesting below me. It was a deer-like animal, running swiftly through the trees. When I focused my laser-intensity eagle sight, I could see the semihuman torso and face and the deadly scorpion tail. Ax! Or, Aximili-Esgarrouth-Isthill, to use his complete name. Ax is an Andalite. The only Andalite to survive a terrible space battle with the Yeerks. Prince Elfangor was his brother. It was fun watching him run. I've never seen anything that can look as delicate and cute one minute - and as dangerous the next - as an Andalite.

I decided to swoop down over Ax and say hi. I spilled a little air from my wings and dropped, thrilled by the feeling of a controlled fall from hundreds of feet up. It's like jumping off a skyscraper, knowing you can survive.

I dropped toward the trees.

I actually had time to notice the nest in a high branch. Just out of the corner of my eye. I had time to think, Isn't that cute? Baby birds.

And then they hit me.