One
Mists clung to the ground that would start the early morning dew. The dirt was moist, the grass, the trees, everything was wet with the humidity. It was hard to realize that during the day it could be so dry in the summer and now, at very early morning, everything was just wet and cool.
Light paws trotted down an old dirt trail. Not one sound was heard from the animal just like evolution had wanted it. Water clung to its legs as they brushed up against the leaves. It was a feeling of extreme relief, that water. It cooled off what the heat wanted steaming hot.
He trotted down hunting for food. Human flesh was usually the main corse of his meal but that was getting scarce. Others of the kind would come up with a group and take them away. Just like that, and he was left with nothing more to eat but musty bones from a few days earlier. It was time to resort to the forest prey. Rabbits, birds, deer. It wasn’t very appetizing but, it was better than nothing.
He stopped, sniffed the air, and sat down in a patch of blooming clovers. The moisture obscured his olfactories but, not by much. He could still smell the garlic on the breath of a zoo guard three miles away. At least, he thought it was garlic. It might be onions.
He sniffed the air once more and looked out at an open field. The wild green oats swayed in the wind underneath the starry sky. No clouds but no moon. Perfect, just perfect. He trotted across the field, pausing every few steps to sniff and listen. The sounds of a bird ruffling feathers, two crickets, and a few grey tree frogs touched his ears. The bird would be fine. Just fine.
He moved through the coverage of the oats until he reached the other tree line. The frogs stopped their droning and he smiled inwardly.
The predator stalks, he thought and then he continued on his travels.
The sound was heard not too far off of the ruffling feathers. In the tree in front of him. He stopped at the base, sat down, and looked up. It had better be a good catch. Had pups to feed and all. Eating for himself and the others would be for later. Now all he had on his mind were the two pups.
He made a small sigh and reared up on the thick truck. The two front paws pressed against the tree and the claws inched out to dig into the moss covered bark. Front-left paw up, back-left dug into the bark. Push up with the back leg, pull up with the front, front-right paw up. And it continued over and over.
It was an almost new sensation to him. It had been so long since he had climbed anything but, he’d rather forget that moment.
He tried to suppress a grunt as he pulled his body on top of the limb and pressed tightly against the bark. There ahead of him was the form of a bird sitting solemnly on the same branch. He slowly placed one paw far in front of his nose and let a back paw slowly follow. His eyes sparked gold momentarily as his face leaned forward, tensed . . .
He blinked once, watching even the slightest movement from his prey . . . Like lightening, he struck. Jaws lunged forward with a push from his back feet, opened and closed, and his head snapped over making the shirring feathers stop instantly. But the momentum was too much and his back flipped over and off the branch.
"Aarrr . . ." he grunted as he held on for dear life to the branch. Back legs and tail slowly swinging back and forth, claws digging as deep as they possibly could in the wet, spongy bark. He dug his teeth into the feathers like he was getting a leg amputated or whatnot. An arm jerked over to grip farther around the branch.
His muscles burned as he tried to pull himself up on the branch. He wasn’t made for this. His front legs alone weren’t, anyway. He pulled, lifted a back leg for another grip.
Slipped! He fell back to where he started with a clatter and scrape of claws against wood. Another arm jerked over, pull, then another, pull. . . .
He pulled up a back leg, clenched his jaws harder, and hoped for the best. The claws scraped and slipped but he didn’t fall back down. He tried again. Catch, please catch, he prayed to not really anyone.
It caught and he pushed up, tried the other foot. It slipped three times before it caught. Now he was precariously balanced on a round branch no wider than two feet. He outstretched a paw to grip closer to the truck. I hate high places, he squeaked to himself. I hate them so much. But the words weren’t really words. Just thoughts that equaled up to something like that.
He dropped to the branch close to the trunk and gave out a sigh of relief that came out close to a snort. He released the bird of prey from his jaw and licked the blood from his muzzle, then licked the blood that had trickled onto his chest. The bird lay with one wing crumpled beneath it and the other hanging off the branch, feathers scattered on the ground below. He wiped his muzzle with the back of his paw to remove one of those rusty feathers.
< Now don’t be scared . . . > a soft voice said.
His head jerked over and down. A voice in his head? As strange as it may be, yes. From that unnatural, mouthless, disgusting looking thing. But it could possibly be food. The pups enjoyed the leg so why not have the rest? He growled, his lips curling up.
< Now, now. Don’t do that. > it said.
He slowly climbed to his feet, another growl rumbling deep in his chest.
< If you want to have it that way, then . . . > it raised a shiny, long object. He didn’t understand the meaning of it. It wasn’t a gun. Maybe a club? Hah! A club against him?
Zzzzzzz!!
The hair on the nape of his neck rose along with every other hair on his body but the others weren’t suppose to rise.
"Yipe!" he screeched as a painful shock traveled through his entire body. He fell, body in muscle spasms, tongue lolling out of his mouth, and he couldn’t move one muscle in his body except for his eyes. He breathed slowly, as if he were asleep, and his heart beat regular but, he couldn’t move! He panicked but it didn’t show.
The thing moved around to the other side of him with a small, dark blue bag. It kneeled over and opened the bag. A small needle was pulled out, then a syringe. It was put together and the item was moved out of his sight. There was a prick on his chest under his arm. He wanted to growl and snap but he couldn’t.
A swob was taken out. The thing gently took his muzzle and swobbed around his tongue and back in his throat. He gagged, a sign the stun was starting to wear. His toe twitched on its own.
It sheathed the swob in clear plastic, pulled out another syringe with clear liquid in it. There was another prick at the same spot and he seemed to relax. He didn’t care anymore for some strange reason. It rubbed the area and put the empty syringe back. After, it took out a round, orange piece of plastic with a number plus some kind of small metal thing. There was a sharp pain on his ear and a click.
< There you go. Not so bad, was it? > it said.
He felt his voice come back and his temper come back. So he growled.
< Temper, temper. Don’t worry. You’ll be okay. > And it left at a fast trot.
Minutes later, he groggily got to his feet. His head snapped around in every direction, he sniffed many times, and his ears twist and turned every which way. He growled, snapped up the bird, and left.
Plotting revenge.
Malcolm Dowers bit into a stale donut and shifted his weight in the small chair. He glanced back into the binoculars, a green glow washing over everything in its view, then looked at his watch. Four o’clock.
Goddamn, he thought. Watch has to be broken. I haven’t stayed up here that long.
His perch was in the ruins of an old building at the "construction site" as the children dubbed it. With his recent tracking, he found the relative spot they hung around which was this garbage heap. Perfect hunting grounds for the little buggers so, when he found out, he told a friend of his about it and most of the hobos and crack addicts were hustled out of there.
Malcolm didn’t know exactly where to, knowing that wasn’t part of the deal.
Whoever that strange guy was, he sure was smart and, God, that look he always had in his eyes. Jeez, pretty much pure evil.
He brushed the thought aside, ate the rest of the donut, and looked back through the binoculars. While he was groping for his thermos of coffee, he spotted something moving in the distance. He pulled his hand away from the thermos.
A dark green body flowed past the deserted area to a hole not far off. Its head ducked into the hole. It came back up and looked around, the eyes white and the fur a very dark green. It flicked its tail and then disappeared into the hole.
"Gotcha, you little shit," Malcolm hissed.
He started packing things up.
"You okay, Cassie?" Jake asked from across the lunch table.
She glanced up from the putrid food, then she looked back and continued to poke it with her fork. "Yeah, just bad dreams," she said.
"Oh," Jake said.
"For some strange reason," she laughed, "when I woke up last night and looked out my window, I could have sworn I saw Ax out there wandering around."
"You were probably still half asleep," Jake said.
"Probably. . . ."
Cassie poked at her food again. Her appetite hadn’t quite come back yet since the incident in the barn. The dreams she was talking about was about those . . . those things. Whatever they were. And when she woke up in the dark she had to suppress a scream of terror. She choked it down then and, at the current moment, she choked back tears.
"I have to go, Cassie. Oh yeah, meeting at Marco’s today," he whispered. Cassie nodded but kept her profile low.
Rachel watched Jennifer at lunch. Rachel was sitting alone, eating her lunch, and Jennifer was alone, writing something.
Watching Amanda, Rachel noticed.
Now what would a gung-ho, commando-type girl want with some rock ‘n roll movie buff? Tell me that, Rachel pretended like she was asking Jennifer but she was only thinking to herself.
Jennifer pulled out a vanilla folder and flipped through it, wrote something down on notebook paper, and then munched on a sandwich that was minus the crust.
Ah, preppy, Rachel observed. There was something about this girl that Rachel didn’t like one bit. Probably because she looked tough and acted tough, where Rachel only acted tough when she had to. And then, this girl was smart. They posted test scores the other day and she passed with flying colors. It was some kind of American History exam. Rachel never did care much for American history.
Well, probably because she got the highest F you could get. Hey, you can’t live two lives perfectly. It was just impossible. Get a four point O or either save the world. Which would you choose, eh?
Rachel sipped her water and got up to throw away the rest of her lunch. She dumped it and walked over to Jennifer.
"Hey," Rachel sat down next to Jennifer, "what ya up to?"
Jennifer switched to another piece of paper, casually, and closed the vanilla folder. "Why would you ca’?" she asked and that accent.
"I don’t know," Rachel shrugged. "Just wondering."
"Science report," she picked up the paper and showed Rachel the outline with its Roman numerals, ABC’s, and descriptions, the handwriting taking on an old English style, "nothing special." She placed it back neatly in front of her and continued writing, now on VII B.
Rachel stood up and walked to the other side. She turned around the folder with one finger and opened it. "What’s this?" she asked.
"Research," Jennifer answered calmly.
Rachel saw typed up notes–flip the page–pictures of bones, things out of science text books–flip the page–lists of minerals, plants, animals.
"What’s it on?" Rachel asked, remembering the report was of the author’s choice.
"Fossilization," Jennifer answered.
"Oh," Rachel said curtly.
She was hoping to get something off of her, accuse her of something because she was doing something. Something secretive. Something . . . something . . . but what?
"You mond getting yo’ own resuch material?" Jennifer asked, glancing up at Rachel and then looking at the folder.
"Oh, sorry," Rachel said as politely as she could.
She walked away.
Jennifer pulled the folder over in front of her and opened it. She pushed aside the useless material and privately shuffled through a few papers. There was one paper, in clear color, that had a picture, record, and specs typed up neatly. At the top written in blue pen of Chapman’s handwriting, it read a last name and then Rachel.
She looked up at the figure of Rachel walking away, her hair swaying back and forth with each step, and she cocked an eyebrow.
Two
Ax trotted through the forest at night. The rain was pouring down but he felt like running anyway. It was a bit refreshing. His hooves clomped against the wet grass and he closed his stalk eyes. He let himself just feel the water fall against his chest, face, and back. Felt his rapid heartbeat, the breathing.
Just relax, Aximili. That’s what you need, he thought.
Prince Jake said he didn’t have to go to the meeting that night. It wasn’t too important and it was probably over by now. Tobias was probably back at his perch by now.
He tried to calm himself, get used to the dark. He still didn’t like the dark since that inccident, as did Cassie. It was so alone. So dark. Foreboding. You never knew what was out there. Never could know. For all he knew, there could be that wolflike thing sitting right behind that bush or that tree. Just waiting to pounce. Waiting to gut him like a fish. Dig into his aortas. Eat him–
Be calm. Just calm down, he thought frantically. Nothing is coming to get you. Nothing. Be calm. Be . . . calm . . .
Be calm.
Yes, he could do that. Be calm. He closed all eyes and jumped over a log in his way. The impact was farther than expected. He fell on all for hooves and opened his eyes to–
The blue blood swirled and mixed into the pools of rainwater, flowing over to his hooves. He could taste the blood in his hooves. The blood that came from those two corpses. Those tow Andalite–
He slowly backed away. What he had of a stomach jumped nauseatingly up to his hearts, made his hearts beat faster. Faster.
Two Andalites laid on their sides on the ground, throats ripped open, the flesh thrown to the forest floor not too far off. Their lower halves were gutted open, skin pulled back, like some dead caribou in a National Geographics picture.
Eaten alive.
One whole, back leg missing, hands gnawed on, chunks of flesh pulled out of the tail.
Ax took a deep breath, eyes wide, wider than they had ever been in his life. He was sick to an excruciating point. Thunder rumbled in the distance. A crack of lightening.
The water inched forward to Ax’s feet. The taste! The taste! That horrible taste. That–
He breathed hard, scanned the scene frantically, he was paralyzed with fear and total disgust. Total–total–total fear. The kind that wrenches your heart, stabs at your soul, boggles your mind. The kind of fear that could bring tears to your eyes, sobs to your lips. The kind of fear that chokes your lunges, doesn’t allow you to breath at all. The kind of fear that leaves every muscle stiff, every action foolish, clumsy, every mind at the brink of insanity.
Lightening flashed with an awful crash that made him jump at least two inches from the ground. The Andalite head–a female, he noticed, a female–fell to its side. The eyes were blank, void of life, void of one speck of a soul.
Another crash and light.
And eyes . . .
He looked up. Six pairs of golden pearls floated in the black of the trees. A flash of light and the silhouettes were clearly defined as stalking shapes coming closer.
If Ax had a mouth, it would have been moving, trying to form words, a plea, a scream, anything, but saying nothing. He backed away and his rump bumped against the slick, muddy wall of a small, collapsed hill. He couldn't jump it even if he tried. That’s why he fell so far to this death trap.
The taste. The god awful taste . . .
He gathered up all his muscles and ran. Ran and jumped over a space between two of the things. They snapped but he made it out just in time.
He ran, jumped over a bush, over a fallen branch, dodge this way, that. He could hear them behind him. Their steady breath, the snarls, the brushing up against the bushes.
He jumped over a log, stumbled but got up again. A thorn bush! Perfect! He jumped over and looked behind him with his stalk eyes. They went around, one went through a clear spot.
< Tobias! > he shrieked. < TOBIAS! >
< What? > he asked, lazily.
< They’re after me, Tobias! They’re going to kill me . . . > he wept. He was afraid. So afraid, and he felt so alone.
Why? He was being hunted! You don’t get hunted! His kind hadn’t been hunted in millennia and even then, they weren’t that smart at all. Now! Now he was smart. He was sentient. Sentient beings don’t get hunted by animals!
< What?! > Tobias shrieked. < Who’s chasing you? >
< Them! THEM! > he yelled. He dodged around another tree but they were gaining. Gaining fast.
< I’ll go get help! > Tobias said.
< No! No! There’s no t–argh! > he got bit in the back leg, < time! > he continued. < No time! >
< Ax! To the left of you! There’s a road. Got there! > Tobias yelled.
< Why? > Ax panted. < They’ll just . . . >
< Now! There’s a truck going down the road. Busy highway. >
Ax swerved left and galloped through a field that just suddenly appeared in front of him.
Faster, Aximili. Faster, he urged himself.
< Yah! >he screamed as he tumbled to the ground, a jaw clenched tight on his leg.
He looked back. It growled and shook its head like it would a toy rag. He cried out in pain. He pulled back his tail and sent it flying, blade first. Shing!
It sliced into the ground, nothing but ground.
< Get up, Ax! > Tobias yelled. < Get up! >
He scrambled to his feet and ran. A sheering pain laced up his leg, up his spine, and pounded in the back of his neck. He jumped a fence line. Four lane highway!?
But he didn’t hesitate instead, he ran full on. Dodged a car, jump over a hood. A pileup started with the cars. Screeching metal, brakes, horns, head lights! Last lane! He increased his speed but not enough.
WHAM!
His whole back, legs, tail, hunches, were hit by a Mac Truck. It sent him flying, butt first, into the trees that made up the next tree line. The truck hit its brakes instantly after impact.
< AX! Get up! They’re coming to see what you are! > Tobias screeched.
Ax’s head was dizzy. Literally, every bone in his hips and tail were shattered completely. Blood flowed freely onto the ground to the gravel near the highway shoulder. He wanted to close his eyes and sleep but that voice was just nagging at him and nagging at him
"It was probably a deer," a man yelled over the noise.
"A deer?" the truck driver yelled, ecstatic. "That was no fucking deer!"
"It was a deer," the other man argued. "Nothing more than a deer. Probably with mad cow disease or rabies."
The truck driver pulled Ax’s tail blade out of his radiator. He held it up in the Controller’s face. "Then what the fuck is this? A deer does not slash my radiator with this! A deer doesn’t have a damn blade on its whole body!"
Tobias thought for a half-second. < Ax! They’re after you! Those things are after you! >
Ax jumped up as best as he could, jumped over the rusted fence with great pain and difficulty, then limped away. He got a few yards and collapsed. Tobias fluttered down to the ground next to his friend. < Ax? . . . Ax? > he asked softly.
One eye stalk swivelled over.
< Morph, Ax. You’ll feel better. C’mon, I’ll morph with you. > Tobias offered.
There were shouts and flashlights being shown not far off.
< C’mon, Ax. > Tobias pleaded.
And slowly, very slowly, Ax morphed human and Tobias urged him on by
morphing along with Ax. Tobias wrapped an arm around Ax’s waist and helped him up. They look back to see one of the things pacing back and forth behind the fence on the other side of the highway, every once in a while it looked up to them. The others were just eyes in the scene of blacks, blues, and dark greens.
Ax started shaking and breathing hard.
"It’s okay, Ax," Tobias reassured. "We’ll find a safe place for you."
She walked in the rain covered by only one military rain slicker for protection. She gave a out a sigh through her nose that became a soft snort. This was stupid. No. This was degrading.
She peeked through the hole in the grate. Water was collecting in an unnatural pool that led the water out the back. She dropped in through the entrance, boots splashing in the pool. She crouched down in the tight spot. She hated small places. They just unnerved her for a perfectly natural reason.
Over the noise of falling rain and the gurgle of the small stream, she heard tiny whimpers. She looked in the shadows, her eyes already adjusted to the change, for what she was sent to get. Two teeny eyes glistened in the shadows. She smiled softly and walked in a hunched over fashion because of the low ceiling.
She picked up the two wolfen pups, muzzled them, and was about to leave when something caught her eye. In the hollow, there was a leg, bits of blue fur still slightly attached and the black hoof gnawed on continuously to where the black was almost white. She picked it up also.
She protected the pups under the rain slicker and hid the bone under her arm under the rain slicker.
The rain was starting to subside.
Three
Malcolm Dowers trudged through the wet construction site. The ran had stopped completely for the moment and he was glad for that. His nameless "friend" along with two comrades were with Malcolm. Each one armed and then one of the comrades had a large pet carrier, the other a brief case. He didn’t seem too happy but he never complained.
"This better be worth something," Nameless grumbled. "I’m not a business man to be toyed with."
"Yes, sir," Malcolm said, "I understand that. But the wait is worth it. . . . You did say something about needing attack dogs or something."
"I said nothing about anything," Nameless answered.
Malcolm grinned. "That is understood." He moved the light’s beam to the broken grate. "Here it is."
"Good," Nameless snorted.
Malcolm ducked down into the grate and slowly made the light wash over the area. There were no pups in there. He lowered his body in, agitated. Moments later he lifted up a human head, partially eaten, partially rotten--it was going to be thrown out that day.
"This is what they can do, Mister . . ." Malcolm waited him to offer a name.
"Just call me ‘Visser.’ Now tell me what this skull has to do with these animals you talk about," Visser demanded.
"They literally feed on human beings. Some reason they were just evolved that way. But you want man killers for anything particular? You got them right here in this innocent little city."
Visser snorted at "innocent." "Now, exactly what capacity is their brain case?" he asked.
"I’d say as big as a human’s, I guess. Maybe a little larger. You know, you have to fit the larger sight, smell, and hearing sensory."
"Yes, yes," Visser cut him off, "so are there any in there?"
"Not . . ." he threw the head back in with disgust, "at the moment."
"Thank you then," Visser said. He signaled the man with the brief case over. "Here is your pay. My men can catch them on their own."
Malcolm pushed away the money. "I just want them caught and, if possible, killed or put through some kind of horrible experiments."
"Don’t worry," Visser smiled, "they’ll go through much worse." Malcolm grinned. "Thank you."
Ax sat there in the hayloft of Cassie’s barn shaking uncontrollably in human morph. He was on the verge of tears. Soft hay was practically on all side of him, the wood roof slanted and met at a point not too far above his head.
"Now, Ax," Jake said calmly, "tell us what happened."
There was no answer so Jake looked over to Tobias. Cassie rushed up the latter with a quilt from inside her house.
< He was chased by those . . . things. Those things that almost killed Cassie. > Tobias answered softly. < I saw them behind him. Six, I think, but they were moving way too fast. >
Cassie wrapped the flower adorned quilt around Ax tightly. He started steadily rocking back and forth, eyes looking at thin air, legs tucked under his chin, arms wrapped tightly around them.
"The other’s are on their way," Cassie whispered as she wrapped an arm around Ax. He didn’t push it away. He didn’t acknowledge at all.
Cassie looked at Jake and Tobias. She whispered, softly and calmly, "I didn’t tell you but, this guy came over to my house the other week--Malcolm was his name, I think–and asked about those things. He told me they were called . . . um, wolfen. Some kind of thing he’s been hunting for some time. He . . ."
Tears were slowly rolling down Ax’s cheeks. Cassie looked over at him.
"Dead . . ." he whispered, "all dead."
He started rocking harder and he pursed his lips to hold back the tears as best as he could. His eyes were darting around at the hay covered floor.
"Ax? Are you okay?" Cassie asked softly.
". . . dead . . ." he whispered.
"Who is dead, Ax?" Jake asked, trying to hold back the confusion and panic in his voice.
". . . they were eaten . . . alive . . ." Ax whispered, horrified.
"Who?!" Jake almost screamed. He was horrified now.
Ax looked up at his Prince and then looked back down. He started to cry. Cassie gave her a shoulder to cry on and tried her best to comfort him. His rocking stopped but his sobs were constant. He was in the deepest pit of fear and confusion. He didn’t know what to do.
"That can’t be true," Marco said. "It’s impossible."
< It’s true. > Tobias answered for Ax. < Two Andalites. One male and one female. >
"So it looks like Amanda may not be what she seems," Rachel said.
"Forget you," Marco spat, "Amanda’s not an Andalite."
"I didn’t say that," Rachel retorted. "I meant, she’s the daughter of Malcolm. She should know why these things are here."
"No way," he said. " No. Way. She doesn’t know anything like that."
"Think back," Jake told Marco, "did she ever even hint about anything like that?" There was a hesitation from Marco. "Yeah . . ."
"Ha!" Rachel spat.
"Hold it! I didn’t finish!" he spat. "She said her dad was hunting down something but she never knew what it was."
Ax stood, tail blade cocked and ready, in the hayloft, ears keen to any sound, eyes keen to any sight. < They hunted the two. > he said, clearly half there. < But not as much for food. > Everyone looked over.
< It may not have anything to do with Amanda, > Marco shot a look at Rachel, < but it may have something to do with Jennifer. She also came at the time these wolfen appeared. >
Each person showed surprise at that comment. They all thought he had feelings for that girl, which he did but at the moment he was scared out of his mind.
"Okay, so three people come at the same time these animals appeared," Cassie mumbled to herself.
She squeezed herself deeper into the hay. She tried to replay some of the scene she had witnessed. It made her shiver. Those eyes, the face, the cry, and those pictures that man showed her.
"Cassie? Cassie?" She felt Jake’s hands on her shoulders.
She jerked up and she noticed the warm tears going down her cheeks and her hands shaking.
Jake stood up and looked at the others. "We have to talk to the Chee. If these things are what that guys says they are, then the Chee should know."
"Now what did you say?" Erek asked. "Wolfen?"
It was the next day and the Animorphs were in the Chee’s little dog park underground. Erek and two of his friends were with them.
"Yeah, the guy called them ‘wolfen’. Why, I have no idea but, it’s been attacking lately. Cassie once, Ax twice. And then there were two . . . uh . . . other Andalites . . ." Jake said.
"I don’t recall anything called wolfen," Erek looked over at his comrades. They shook their holographic heads.
"Oh, hold on," one of them said. She got up and trotted over to another Chee. They chatted for a second and both came over. "This is Emily. She was a Black Plague victim at one point." Emily looked grim at that statement. Her hologram flashed off. "And not very proud of it either. It brought back very vivid . . . memories. . . ."
"We’re sorry about that. And we’re sorry to bring it back in your mind," Cassie said. "But we’re in desperate need for a little bit of information. Like, if they come from Earth or are they linked with the Yeerks."
"There were," she sat down in the grass as part of their circle, "stories back then about wolves. Nothing they called wolfen but, there were things close to werewolves, vampires. Things like that."
"You’re kidding, right?" Marco asked with a laugh. "The movies and books made those creatures."
"Not . . . exactly," Emily answered.
"So there actually were people out there that could turn into Satan’s blood hounds, seagulls, and bats?" Marco asked.
Emily looked at him skeptically.
"Never mind . . ." Marco mumbled and looked down.
"Actually, Braum VanStroker was the one that made Dracula able to turn into those things. He’s the one that got the idea of blood suckers and things. Vampires weren’t like that," Emily said. Marco looked up.
"They weren’t really called vampires either," Emily continued. "It was only a rumor though. Pure fluff in human history. . . ."
"Go on," Jake urged.
She took a deep breath. "I was a little girl in a village in Germania when I first heard it. The village was slowly dying from the Plague. A Chee was the Chieftain and he was the only one that kept the people from moving on to another village. He knew it was the only way to help keep the rest of the country free from it," she seemed lost in thought for a moment.
She shook it off. "But anyway . . ." A hologram enveloped everyone with black. "Please, try not to be disturbed by this," she said, more to the other three Chee and to herself then to the Animorphs.
A scene appeared on the black. A little girl, at the age of eight with blonde hair and bright blue eyes, sat there. Her eyes looked sunk in, circled in black, her skin was pail, splotched with rosy red circles, and her lips were with a tinge of blue. It was Emily at that time. She was sitting next to a sick woman with the same condition except much worse. Kneeling next to the woman was a much older woman, grayed hair, wrinkled, and hunched over from long set in arthritis. All around them was death. Darkness and death.
"It’s a curse," the old woman’s words were turned into English, "a curse from God."
There were tears in the little girl’s eyes. Marco could have sworn that the Chee was crying at the present time right then if they could even cry.
"Why are we cursed?" the little girl asked. She was playing a part that she didn’t want to play.
"God has seen the evil. The Protestants brought the curse. That is why they burn the Protestants. Because of what they have set loose here. But," the old woman paused and held a shaking finger in the air, "those who have sinned will be dragged down to the pits of Hell by Satan’s dogs. Remember that."
"Satan’s dogs?" the little girl asked and wiped away a tear.
"Yes, they come and drag away the souls of those who have sinned. When they die we bury our loved ones but, Satan wants them to himself so he sends his hounds out at night to dig them up. We have watched and you remember that. Don’t you sin. And don’t sign the devil’s book either. Many have gone to the point. Many have died from Satan’s followers but those followers will be punished in their time."
The old woman then placed flowers in the now dead woman’s clothes.
The image flicked off.
"And that is all I know," Emily said. "You would have to ask the others if they’ve actually seen those things."
Erek and the others held expressionless faces. The Black Plague was like watching the Premalites die all over again. The first time was bad enough.
Emily shot up from her spot, still in the form of Chee. "The book!" she exclaimed.
"Book?" Jake asked, tears in his own eyes were starting to go away.
Her eyes went blank, if that’s even possible, like she was thinking. She answered moments later, "There was a book written a few hundred years later. It’s in German but it’s there and it talks about something like you guys describe."
Four
There was a scuffling outside Amanda’s window.
Old Father tried to make as much room as possible for the rest of his Family. He peered through the window into a dark room, Amanda’s room. The pups were gone and the familiar sent there was of Malcolm. Malcolm posed a threat just like those blue things did.
The door opened. He dropped low on his stomach and flattened his ears. The lights didn’t turn on but he could see perfectly that the girl walked in, took some clothes, and walked back out.
Amanda started the water for her shower.
She hated this house. It stank for some reason even though it looked brand new. It smelled like the people who lived there before owned dogs or something. It just smelled . . . bad. And it was small. She hated small spots. They gave her the willies every time she even thought about it. And she had a perfectly good explanation She turned on a wall radio and turned it up. She stripped her clothes off and started the shower.
The handle jiggled once on the balcony door. There was more shuffling outside, mere fluff to human ears. The door wasn’t locked at least. I mean, they knew how to pick locks, they’ve done it before, it’s just that they wanted this to go by easily.
The handle jiggled again, turned to point down, and paws appeared on the glass. They pushed sideways, the handle popped back up in position, and the paws smeared mud on the clean glass as they slipped back down to the ground.
Six images slunk into the room, silently, effortlessly, and no one ever knew. At least, not yet.
The sound of rushing water, radio, and television touched their sensitive ears. They twitched to the sides and then one pair slid back to rest on the brown furred head. A few heads turned to the others and eyes flashed momentarily from the light coming from the crack in the door.
One trotted over and scratched gently at the crack. It slowly slipped open with a small creak from the hinges.
< Which way was her house, Ax? > Jake asked from his owl morph.
< Not far, Prince Jake. I will know it when I see it.
< Okay, > Marco went over the plan one more time, < so we go in while she’s probably asleep. Pin her down and hope no one hears, like her big brother which may come in at any time. Threaten to kill her in our big, bad battle morphs while asking her a few questions that come in mind. >
< Yep. > Rachel responded.
< Ain’t that just a bit risky? > he asked.
< Yep. > she said again.
< Thought so. > Marco mumbled.
Malcolm laughed at something from the television. He was extremely content with himself. Enough to relax and not think about what might exactly be the consequences of his exploration in the construction site.
He sipped his Heineken and wished it was a bit colder. He didn’t seem to notice the sound of a door opening. Moments later he closed his eyes, gulped down the rest of his Heineken, and opened his eyes to a wolf for in front of him.
He was too stunned to yell. His mouth dropped open. He groped for his glock.
HHWHAM!
His chair was flipped on its back and he stared at the brown eyes, the fur, the face, his own arm in its jaws, watch and all.
And he screamed.
He stumbled out of the chair, backed away holding his stump of an arm that was gushing out blood onto the brown carpet. Five more joined the first, growls and fangs present on them all. He gulped, gasped, and then screamed again in pure fright. Pure panic. Pure God knows what else.
His arm was tossed carelessly to the side.
What are they doing? Just standing there? They could kill me right now! Just go ahead and kill me! he thought. Kill me!
But no, they wanted him to die painfully. They wanted to know where the pups were.
He was pounced on and pushed to the floor. Fangs gingerly closed around his neck, blood only trickling through in little bits, any vocalizations shut off. Another grabbed his other arm roughly and they dragged him to a more spacious area.
He felt pain, a hot knife, sliced down his chest, through his shirt, through his skin and muscle. Tears started streaming down his face. He tried kicking them off but it only made two others hold down his legs roughly. Painfully.
All pain. It was all pain while he was sliced open. Neck to navel. And then, AH!, extreme pain. Unbelievable! Like something was boring through his stomach. Boring through his body! He felt a crunch of bone, a snap, and his whole torso was jerked up and dropped. He no longer felt the pain in his legs. From middle and down he felt nothing. He could move nothing. All he could see was one furry ear. He heard snorts and the mashing and squishing of flesh, muscle, tissues. And then with a jerk of the wolflike muzzle, everything went black for Malcolm.
Amanda shut off the water and stepped out of the shower. She dried herself off and then rubbed her brown and strawberry blonde hair with the towel before wrapping herself up with it. She shut off the radio to hear the
familiar sounds of the late night news. She flipped off the lights in the bathroom and opened the door. She went on her way to her bedroom, her eyes always cast to the floor. She saw a movement in the corner of her eye and didn’t think about it because it was down the hall and into the living room where her dad was at but, when another movement came she had to look over. It wasn’t a normal thing, that last movement.
She saw a brown tail swaying back and forth from behind the couch. A leg stepped backwards and seemed to steady whatever else was behind the couch. Her heartbeat quickened and her breath caught in her throat. She clutched the top of the towel and stepped forward.
The only light came from the flickering glow of the television. Everything else was pretty much black.
She stepped forward again and peered over the couch. Six animals were surrounding something. It didn’t quite catch in her mind yet as to what was happening. When she peered over, two blood stained, wolflike heads raised up to look at her and licked their muzzles; one tore off a chunk of flesh and gulped it down; two were sat down next to the body, casually licking themselves clean; one was the owner of the tail and leg and it was yanking on the leg, its head jerked and twisted before getting a good chunk of flesh.
Amanda stood there, her brain trying the best it could to see this as a real picture and try to understand what they were eating. The animals had enough time for all of them to be able to look up and stare at her.
She took a deep breath like she just realized that these things were in her house, that there was blood all over the carpet, an empty Heineken on the floor long with her father’s gun and . . . his arm. She let out that breath and took in another deep breath. She started to back away and they started to flow over to her. One jumped up on the top of the couch, leaving blood smeared over the cream colored fabric. Another one joined.
They growled and a few showed red tinged fangs.
That’s when she screamed.
< No, no, no, Ax. You must be mistaken. > Marco said. < That’s Amanda’s
house. >
< No, this is Jennifer’s appartment. > Ax said. < I was there. >
< Yeah. And I was there too, Fi– >
< Fifth floor. > Ax broke him off. < This is Jennifer’s apartment building. >
They were circling the building slowly, trying to decide whether or not they should land there.
< Look, we can’t just-- > Jake started but was cut off by a scream.
Jake dove and everyone followed. They dropped and landed on the railing of the balcony. Ax hopped down and demorphed as quickly as possible while the screams continued.
< Alright, Prince Jake. > he said quickly. He trotted in the room and out the other door, only to back right back into Amanda’s room in terror.
"What is it?" Jake yelled.
Ax summed up his courage and darted back in with his tail arched. < It’s the wolfen. > he reported.
Marco ran in through the door to see Ax fighting them off as they snarled and snapped. He looked behind the pack to see Amanda squeezed into a corner, face pale, eyes wide, and shaking uncontrollably.
"Amanda!" he yelled to her.
FFWAP!
She jumped and looked up.
WHAM!
Marco was knocked flat on his back and was trampled over after getting snapped at once. He scrambled up and watched everyone else get herded away from the balcony by the wolfen. And they disappeared through there. Everyone ran to the balcony and looked down to find nothing.
Five
Marco ran the other way to Amanda. He put his hands on her shoulder and looked into her eyes.
"Are you okay?" he asked softly.
She nodded jerkily.
"Good . . . good . . ." He noticed all she had on was a towel and then ran to get a blanket.
"Ax," Jake said, "see if you can find something. Something of importance." Ax nodded and started to walk out the door when Jake stopped him.
"Morph human. We don’t know if anyone’s going to be coming," Jake told him. He nodded again and started to morph. Jake walked close behind him and stopped at the doorway. He saw Ax head down the short hallway and then looked over to see Marco wrapping Amanda up in a blanket. He was talking to her softly, trying to calm her down. Jake looked behind himself to see Cassie looking at paw prints on the glass, talking to Rachel about something.
"Cassie," Jake whispered.
She looked over and then got up to walk over.
"Yeah?" she asked.
He pointed to Amanda. Cassie nodded, knowing what he meant, and then walked over to Marco and Amanda.
It didn’t make sense. Why attack these people? They only ate people that had no home and were sick anyway. You know, sick die and strong prosper. There should be something in this apartment to tell some answers. They needed answers.
Jake went to the living room. He took one look at the body and looked away, extremely nauseated. He looked over to Ax who was also turned away with a pale face.
Jake took a deep breath and turned around to face the mangled body. He slowly approached it and looked down. There wasn’t much left. A few broken bones, skin, hair, clothes, a few organs–strangely, the stomach was fully intact and then one lung was left alone–a bit of meat, and an immense amount of blood. Malcolm was cut roughly down the middle and Jake could see the spine was snapped in half. His had on oval shape of punctures around his neck, wrist, and ankles.
He held in his lunch and stepped over the corpse to a table. He shuffled through a few drawers for something and he found something. There was a flier that announced that someone was looking for attack dogs. There were two numbers circled in pink highlighter. Jake folded that and was about to put it in a pocket when he realized he had none so, he held it tightly in a sweating palm.
"Prince Jake," Jake looked around to Ax, "I think I have something."
Jake stepped over the body once more to the television stand. There was a telephone and Caller ID sitting next to it. Jake unfolded the paper and looked at the calls. Two were made from Marco, all the rest consisted various other numbers, one being from the paper.
"Good work, Ax," Jake whispered and put and hand on his back. "Write ‘em down on something."
Ax nodded. Jake guessed he was still stunned. Stunned and . . . well, he couldn’t even guess.
Jake walked down the hall to the bedrooms. Cassie was trying to coax Amanda out of the corner while Marco kept saying she could stay wherever she felt safe. Then they started arguing.
"Shut up!" Jake hissed in a whisper. "Just get her off the floor and keep her out of the living room."
"What’s in the living room?" Cassie asked.
"You don’t want to know," he answered.
Jake walked into Malcolm's room, or what he guessed was Malcolm’s room, and scanned the room. He flipped on a light. What to look through first? He decided that the filing cabinet was the best. He was there in a few strides.
"Jake?"
He turned around to see Rachel.
"What are you doing?" she asked calmly.
"Something’s up," he said simply. "I’m snooping."
"For what? We know he’s dealing with these wolfen things and that’s all." "Then who is Jennifer?" Jake asked. He rummaged through the filing cabinet to find nothing.
Rachel walked over to her cousin and put a hand on his back. He jumped. "Jake, Jake, calm down. We can think about this later. Like tomorrow," she said.
He shoved the paper into Rachel’s face. "Look at this," he pointed to a number, "You know what the number belongs to?"
Rachel shook her head.
"The Sharing," he hissed. "This is their number. Now what exactly would the Yeerks want with these things? Certainly not attack dogs. They have Taxxons that could do better work."
Rachel nodded. "You’re right," she agreed.
"Jake?" came a whisper from the doorway.
Cassie stood there with a Priority Mailer in one hand.
"Yeah?" he asked, then signaled her to come in.
"I found this," she said as she walked over.
She pulled out the contents and laid them on the bed. Jake and Rachel walked over to the bed.
"It has stats on those things," Cassie whispered.
Jake turned to Rachel. "Go get Ax but, leave Marco with Amanda–wherever they’re at–because we can tell him later."
Rachel went off. Cassie spread out the papers and the one cast of a paw print. There were photocopies of the German book they saw earlier, on the back they were translated to English, blurred snapshots of the wolfen, black and white sketches, and a list of measurements, behavior, and likes and dislikes–most had "indecisive fact" written in red ink next to it. Rachel came back with Ax.
"Where’s Tobias?" Jake asked her.
"He morphed owl and started surveying the area," Rachel said. "He’s freaked."
"I can understand why," Jake answered. He pulled Ax over to the papers.
"Can you make something of this?"
Ax searched through it in his human morph while Jake told him about the Yeerks being involved. There was a minute pause before Ax answered.
"They are capable for infestation," he whispered in dread as he read some other information. "The brain case and ear canal seem large enough to hold a Yeerk and this would be a great weapon if they just found enough. . . . And then . . ."
"You mean . . ." Jake stopped and a second later he said, "They saw us."
"Exactly," Ax answered. "Exactly."
"Pack it up," Jake told Cassie. "We’re taking it with us."
"What?" Cassie asked, bewildered. "That’s stealing."
"We have more things to worry about," Rachel said. "Like what are we going to do with Amanda? And what about the body? And then we have to find out where Jennifer is and if Jennifer is her real name anyway."
Ax was silent at that.
Amanda had to live in Ax’s scoop for that night. It was the only safe place but it took some assuring from Marco to keep her from going completely nuts about the idea. It was pitiful. She cried the whole night and Ax didn’t really know what to do. Tobias finally morphed human and tried his best to comfort her. It didn’t help much. She ended up crying herself to sleep. The next day each Animorph still went to school. They went to find something out about Jennifer. Rachel found out something once she hit the door that morning in a most appealing way.
"Whoa . . ." she stopped and backed up to look at a guy.
He was older but not by too much. His skin had a perfect tan, his hair was black, cut short, and gelled. His eyes were a charming hazel and rusty orange. He was strong, muscular, but not too much were you would consider him on steroids. He wore a white tank top under a black, unzipped vest, navy green cargos, and black military boots. On the right side of his vest, there were medals of honor, bravery, and rank.
Girls that had seen him already were swooning over him. She saw stares from every single girl in the area and she heard comments about him that she was thinking herself.
Don’t get her wrong, she loved Tobias but, this guy was flat out gorgeous to where it made butterflies in her stomach. She would seriously hesitated on saying no if he had asked her out.
She didn’t catch herself following him on the other side of the hall. Those medals caught her eye. She didn’t know where they came from but he had to have done something, in some kind of battle or something, to achieve those. Just the thought of a military man now made her extremely interested.
He noticed Rachel staring. He smiled and made a small nod. She blushed and looked away. She looked back moments later to find him looking away.
She witnessed him try and flag down someone. She found it to be Chapman. Strange, she thought.
She eavesdropped.
"Sir?" he asked.
Awe, man, his voice. Just listen to that voice, Rachel unconsciously thought. She noticed and shook it off.
Chapman turned around. "Yes?" he replied.
"Um," the guy put him hands in his vet pockets, "I’m Collin, Jennifer’s brother?"
Chapman nodded. "I remember her." Rachel thought it was weird that he did. Collin looked sad for a moment and then said. "Jennifer won’t be coming back to this school. We would have called but our phone lines haven’t been put in."
"And why not?"
"She . . . uh," he took a deep breath, "she had a little accident and she’s going to be home schooled for now on."
"Then follow me to the office. I have to put this on record and send a note to the secretary," Chapman said and waved him to a general direction.
Collin nodded and Rachel could swear that tears were coming in his eyes.
She was positive when a tear rolled down his cheek.