The Predator

by K. A. Applegate

  She knew that was dumb, of course. But when you're scared, you start grabbing at anything. You want to believe there's a way out.

  The truth was, there were exactly two possi bilities. Visser Three would kill us. Or Visser Three would turn us into Controllers. He would infest us with a Yeerk.

  «We should stay in animal morph,» Jake said. «l mean, the thing is, if Visser Three learns we are human, he may go after our families next. He may figure we told them something.»

  «Prince Jake is right,» Ax said. «The Yeerks will not want to take any chances that other hu mans know of them.»

  It was true. I knew it was true. I guess I'd known it all along. But hearing it said, it made me want to crawl into a corner.

  My dad. Cassie's parents. Rachel's mom and her sisters. Jake's parents. Maybe even Jake's brother, Tom, although he was one of them. Their lives were at risk, too.

  Suddenly, a window opened in one of the walls. It just grew, the same way the door had before. Like the steel was alive. It formed a round

  123 porthole, large enough for all of us to see - even Rachel, who could only turn her massive head enough to look with one eye.

  I gasped.

  Below us, blue and white and so beautiful it brought tears to your eyes, was Earth.

  Sun sparkled off the ocean. Clouds swirled over the Gulf of Mexico, a big spiral, maybe a hurricane.

  «Look,» Cassie said simply.

  We looked. Through the eyes of the animals of Earth, but with the minds of human beings, we looked down at our planet.

  Our planet.

  For now, at least. For a little while longer.

  Then something different came into view, as the Blade ship rotated away from Earth.

  «This is why the Yeerks opened a window,» Ax said. «This is what they wanted us to see. So that we would despair.»

  The mother ship.

  It was a gigantic, three-legged insect. The center was a single, bloated sphere. The sphere was flatter on the bottom, and from the bottom hung a weird, mismatched series of tendrils. Like the tendrils of a jellyfish. Each one must have been a quarter-mile long.

  Around the sphere were three legs, bent up, then back down, exactly like a spider's legs.

  124 «The legs are the engines,» Ax explained. «The tendrils hanging down below the belly are weapons and sensors and energy collectors. That is also where the shipboard Kandrona is. The Yeerks must bathe in the Yeerk pool every three days and absorb Kandrona rays. There must be one on the planet below, too.»

  «Yeah. We know,» I said. «Your brother told us. For all the good it did us.»

  It just hung in orbit, like a predator gazing down hungrily at blue Earth below.

  «l can't believe people on Earth don't see this on radar,» Rachel said. «l mean, it's huge. It's a city!»

  «lt is shielded,» Ax said simply. «lt cannot be seen by radar. And it would normally be invisible to us. Visser Three is showing it to us. To terrify us.»

  «He's doing a good job,» I said.

  «l've never been in space before,» Cassie said. «l always wished I could. I always wanted to see Earth, all in one piece like that.»

  «lt is a lovely planet,» Ax said gently. «Not so different from mine. Except that we have less ocean and more grassland. I ... I am sorry I brought you all to this. This is my fault.»

  I wanted to yell, "Yes! Yes, it is your fault!"

  But Cassie said what we all knew in our hearts. «Ax, you're only here because your peo-

  125 pie wanted to protect us. Your brother and a lot of Andalites died trying to save us. Nothing is your fault.»

  It was true. But sometimes, when everything hits the fan, you don't want the truth. You just want someone to blame. «0ne too many missions^ I muttered. «This was going to be my last one. Now . . . well, it will still be my last one.»

  I could see an opening in the side of the Yeerk mother ship - a docking port. As I watched, a pair of quick Bug fighters flew in, dwarfed by the size of the opening.

  A minute later, we entered the docking port and were suddenly bathed in deep red light.

  Through the window, we could see Yeerk crewmen - Hork-Bajir, Taxxons, and two or three other alien species, in simple red or dark brown uni forms. And there were humans, too. My first re action was hope. Humans!

  But then I realized the truth. No. Human-Controllers. Yeerks. No different than the Hork- Bajir.

  There was a slight shudder as the Blade ship came to a halt.

  «Ax?» Jake asked. «What's our morph time?»

  «We have been in morph for forty percent of allowable time.»

  I did the math. «So we've used up forty-eight minutes. Leaving what, seventy-two minutes?»

  k

  126 «Yeah,» Tobias confirmed. «Not a lot of time for you guys. Maybe Rachel is right. Maybe we should just go out in a blaze of glory. Attack as soon as they open the door. At least we can let them know we were here.»

  I saw Jake extend his claws, as if he were thinking about using them. He glanced at where the door had once been, like he was measuring the distance. I knew that he was listening to the tiger in his head.

  Then he seemed to relax. «No,» he said. «We have to have hope.»

  Cassie sidled up next to him and nuzzled him with her wolf's muzzle.

  I guess it should have been funny. The wolf and the tiger, sharing a tender moment. But all it did was make me a little jealous. They had each other.

  «We gave them a pretty good fight, didn't we?» I said. «0ur little circus? We did some damage to them.»

  «Yes, we did,» Rachel agreed.

  «Do . . .» Ax hesitated. Then, «Do humans fear death?»

  «Yes. We're not crazy about death,» I answered. «How about Andalites?»

  «We're also not crazy about it»

  Through the window we could see a lot of

  127 Hork-Bajir and Taxxons and humans running around, racing to get somewhere. They were lin ing up. And now, I noticed, there were distinct kinds of uniforms, one red-and-black, the other gold-and-black. The brown uniforms were all around the edges, like they were less important.

  Suddenly, without warning, the window stretched open into a large, arched doorway. Fetid air rushed in, smelling of oil and chemicals and something else.

  A ramp rose up from the steel floor outside to meet us. We were standing like a display at the top of the ramp. All around, filling this side of the docking bay, were uniformed Hork-Bajir, Taxxons, and humans. Most were in red-and- black. Perhaps two hundred creatures, standing in stiff rows, arranged by species.

  About a quarter of the total were in gold-and- black. There were more humans in this group, but also some unusually massive Hork-Bajir.

  «Jake? I have a feeling. I don't think the reds like the golds.»

  «l think they are troops of two different Vis- sers,» Ax said. «!...! think I overheard my brother talk about that. Each Visser has his own private army in their own uniforms.»

  «Swell. I wonder which group gets to have us?» I said.

  128 Far at the back of the rows of alien troops, there was a movement. A party of creatures walk ing to the front.

  Visser Three was at the center, followed by two big Hork-Bajir in red.

  And just to his left was a human. A human woman with dark hair and very dark eyes.

  That was when I stopped breathing. Because I knew. Even before I could see her face clearly. I knew.

  They marched up to the bottom of the ramp. A dozen soldiers leveled Dracon beams at us, just in case we wanted any trouble.

  Then, in thought-speak that all could hear, Visser Three turned to the woman beside him. «You see, Visser One. I have taken the Andalite bandits. The crisis is over. Your trip here is wasted, and you can return to the home world.»

  Visser One nodded. She looked up at us with those dark brown, human eyes.

  Eyes I knew. Eyes I remembered.

  The same eyes that watched me sleep every night from the framed pictur
e beside my bed.

  My mother.

  Visser One.

  129 J. sat down. Very suddenly. I'm sure it looked funny. A big, hairy gorilla simply falling down.

  I would have laughed if I'd seen it.

  My mother. Not dead.

  Alive!

  I wanted to yell. "Mom! Mom! It's me, Marco!"

  But Jake was in my head, a loud, urgent whis per. «Marco? Don't say anything. Don't do any thing. Do you hear me?»

  So I wasn't just imagining it. Jake had recog nized her, too.

  «Marco? Listen to me, man. You have to hold it together.»

  My mother. . . alive.

  My mom.

  130 «Come on, Marco, stand up. Don't make them suspicious.» He was speaking just to me.

  I could hear Jake. I could. But it seemed to come from far off. He didn't understand. It was my mom. My mom!

  «Marco? That is not your mother. Not any more. That is not her.»

  «Jake? It's my mom. Look, it's her.»

  «No, it isn't, Marco. Not anymore. They have her. She's one of them. One of them»

  «Why, Visser One,» Visser Three sneered, «you seem to have frightened the humanoid one.»

  "It is called a gorilla," Visser One said coldly. "If you are going to be in charge of Earth, Visser Three, you should at least learn something about the planet."

  «And take a human host body, like you did? No, I think not. Human bodies are weak. I much prefer this Andalite host.»

  My mother looked at him and curled her lip. "I took a human host and learned about the planet and the humans. And because of that I was able to begin the invasion that you have now endangered with your criminal incompetence!"

  Visser Three's deadly Andalite tail twitched, as if he was going to stab my mom . . . Visser One. The red troops tensed up. The gold troops let their hands edge toward their weapons.

  131 «0oookay,» Rachel said. «l think we were right. These two definitely don't like each other.»

  She didn't know, I realized slowly. Rachel didn't know. But she had never met my mother. Neither had Cassie or Tobias. And Jake had kept our talk private.

  Visser Three slowly relaxed. «You would like to provoke me, Visser One,» he said. «But the fact is that I destroyed the Andalite force. I shot down their dome ship. I killed Prince Elfangor myself and heard his dying screams. And now I have eliminated this last, pathetic rabble of An- dalites.»

  My mom . . . Visser One . . . just smiled. "You want to be Visser One? You think you can take my title? We shall see. The Council of Thirteen does not like Vissers who make mistakes. And you have made mistakes. Be careful of your own am bition."

  She snapped her fingers, and every one of the soldiers in gold turned. Then she walked away, followed by her gold-uniformed troops.

  That was not my mother. At least not the creature who called herself Visser One.

  Visser One was the Yeerk inside my mother's brain.

  But the sickening thing is, you see, that the host mind is still alive. It is still aware. Some-

  m

  132 where inside that head, behind those painfully familiar eyes, my mother still lived.

  «Take it easy, Marco,» Jake said. «l know how it is. I know how much you want to do some thing. But now is not the time. They'd cut us down before we got two steps.»

  «l know,» I said dully. I hated myself for not trying, but I knew there was nothing I could do. I had to hide inside my morph. Never let my mother know it was me. Never let her know . . .

  Slowly, heavily, I stood up. I felt weak. A very strange feeling for a gorilla.

  I think right then, if I had been in any other morph I would have just surrendered and let the animal mind take over. Let instinct rule, and wash away my human emotion.

  But the gorilla was too much like a human. Its instincts were gentle. Like humans, it was a crea ture with emotions. It could not protect me from the pain.

  «Don't tell the others, Jake,» I said. «You're the only one who recognized her.»

  «0kay, Marco.»

  «You can't even tell Cassie, okay?»

  «lt's okay, man. You are my oldest and best friend. You know that. No one will ever know from me.»

  Visser Three still stared at us. I think he wasn't sure what to do next.

  134 «Six Andalites,» he said. «Six Andalite bod ies that could be used by my most loyal lieu tenants.»

  Ax exploded. «And then there would be others like you, you filth! Other Andalite-Controllers. More unnatural abominations like your vile self!»

  Visser Three cocked his head thoughtfully. «Why are you the only one who speaks? You're right of course: Why would I allow anyone to ac quire Andalite morphing powers? But you are a child. Why do the others remain silent? And why do you all still hide in your morphs? Curious. Very curious.»

  He seemed to think it over for a minute. Would he realize the truth? Would he figure out that the reason we remained silent was so he wouldn't guess that we were human? Would he figure out that's why we stayed in morph?

  He seemed to shrug.

  «Take them back to a holding cell. Triple the guard. If there is the slightest trouble, kill them

  133

  They marched us down a hallway. Rachel, still in her huge elephant body, filled the hallway like our ant bodies had filled the tunnels in the sand. Tobias rode on my shoulder, unable to fly in the cramped space.

  The place we ended up was just like the bare, black-steel prison we'd been held in on the Blade ship. But this time no window appeared.

  There was dim light that seemed to radiate from the ceiling. But nothing else at all.

  I slumped down in a corner.

  «What's our time look like, Ax?» Jake asked.

  «You have only thirty percent of your time left.»

  135 «Thirty-six minutes,» Jake translated.

  «Thirty-six minutes and I'll spend the rest of my life as an elephant,» Rachel said. «Not that the 'rest of my life' is likely to be much time.»

  For a while everyone talked about various plans for escape. It was all just talk. We knew we were trapped. We knew it was over. We were aboard the Yeerk mother ship. It was huge. If we had a week to learn our way around, we'd still have been lost in its maze.

  There were hundreds, probably thousands of armed Yeerks - Hork-Bajir, Taxxons, and a few other shapes we'd never seen before, and of course, humans.

  Like my mother.

  My mother - Visser One. Most powerful of the Vissers.

  When had it happened? Had the Yeerks taken her much earlier? Had she already been a Con troller for those last years when she was with us?

  When she had come to my bedroom to say good night, had that been a Yeerk slug, just playing a part, like an actor?

  When I tried to fake sick to get out of school, had it been a Yeerk who saw through my story and kidded and joked me into admitting it?

  Was it a Yeerk, handing out the presents on Christmas morning? A Yeerk, singing in the

  136 church choir? A Yeerk, pulling the puppet strings of my mother's body when she dragged me through J. C. Penney's and made me buy school clothes I didn't really like?

  Was it a Yeerk I used to find making out with my dad like a teenager when they didn't think I saw them?

  All of it an act? All of it fake? For how many years?

  How much of what I'd thought was my mother, had been . . . one of them?

  One thing was sure. Her death had been faked. The so-called drowning accident. No body recovered.

  But the body had been recovered, hadn't it? The Yeerks' mission had been accomplished. The invasion of Earth had been started. Visser One was leaving Earth in the hands of Visser Three. And so she had to disappear and not leave any one asking questions.

  «There has to be something we can do!» Rachel was saying.

  Ax said, «My people have a saying - grace is the acceptance of the inevitable.»

  «Yeah?» I said suddenly. «Well, I don't ac cept. That's what they wa
nt. They want the en tire human race to lie down and accept the inevitable.»

  137 Jake turned his big, yellow tiger eyes on me. I saw Tobias's eternally fierce glare.

  I stood up.

  «l have a saying for you. I got it from a for tune cookie. Tall down seven times, get up eight.' You know what that means? That means you don't ever just lie there. You always get up. You always come back for more. You never sur render. Maybe you die, but you never surrenders

  They were all looking at me now. Through the eyes of a wolf and a hawk and the big, sad eyes of an elephant.

  «Ants,» I said. «We can morph to ants again.»

  Cassie was shocked. «You're saying that? You? I thought you hated those ant morphs as much as I did.»

  «l did. But it may work. We morph to ants. Maybe there's a crack here somewhere. We escape into the walls and the machines. We can hide, then morph into something more danger ous, attack, and then disappear again. Maybe even find a way to destroy the Kandrona.»

  «That's nuts,» Rachel said. «l like it.»

  «At least we can hurt them a little before they catch up with us,» Jake agreed cautiously. «Ex-cept for Tobias.»

  «You have to do what's right for the group,» Tobias said. «l'll have to take my chances. I'd

  138 feel better knowing you guys were still out there somewhere, making trouble for the Yeerks.»

  «lt may work,» Ax said. «The Yeerks are not very familiar with morphing, except for Visser Three. They may not expect an insect morph.»

  «AII right, then,» Jake said. « let's - »

  The door opened. It simply appeared silently in the wall.

  Standing there were three Hork-Bajir. They were wearing gold uniforms.

  Lying on the floor were four other Hork-Bajir. They were each uniformed in red. They were ei ther dead or unconscious.

  «Don't move,» Jake snapped as he saw Rachel and me tensing up for a charge.

  The lead Hork-Bajir, a huge creature maybe eight feet tall with head blades that were more than a foot long, eyed us.

  He spoke. It was surprising, because he did not speak the usual strange mishmash of lan guages the Hork-Bajir used. This one sounded like he'd been educated at Harvard.

  "This hallway goes on in that direction for a hundred feet." He pointed to his left. "Then comes a guard station, where there will be two Hork-Bajir and a Taxxon. From there, four hallways. Take the one furthest to your left. Follow it to a dropshaft. Take the dropshaft down fif-