C H A P T E R 1

  Whummph!

  BAAAM!

  I slammed the Hork-Bajir into the concrete. Pinned him against the subbasement wall with two massive tiger paws.

  His red eyes burned with hatred. His face was a twisted horror as he pushed back, desperate to free his tail blade from behind his body. I strained to reach the scarred, saddle-leather flesh of his neck. To rip out the throat. By the way, I'm Jake.

  Can't tell you much more than that. Like my last name or where I live. I can't even tell you where I go to school. Here's what I can tell you: Earth is being invaded by parasitic slugs called i Yeerks. Still with me? Pretty hard to believe, instant too long. He pushed me down onto pipes huh? See, humans seem to be their latest prefert h a t . . . ence in host bodies. They take thousands a day. Tsssssssssss!

  Make them into slaves. They just squeeze into

 

  your ear canal. Wrap themselves around your My fur was smoking, my flesh scalded!

  brain. Tap into your memories and dreams. And Adrenaline cracked through my chest like a then they tpke over. You can't even decide when whip. I was up again, face-to-face with a Yeerkto blink. No control at all. It's like your skull beinfested Hork-Bajir. comes a prison. And you're trapped in your own I had one more chance with this guy. This head. No way out.

  was it. And suddenly the vividness of the scene My friends Marco, Rachel, Cassie, Tobias, an seemed to recede.

  alien kid we call Ax, and I are the only active resisDon't get me wrong. My guts were still spilling tance. So now you're asking yourself, "How are out of my belly. Exhaustion still pressed on my six kids preventing the total takeover of Earth?" shoulders like a granite slab. But I was in a new Well, we were given the power to turn into any anizone. It was him or me. mal we touch. To actually acquire the animal's Claws bared, teeth flashing, I leaped.

  DNA. To morph. The Andalite technology was a gift

  WHAM!

  to us from Ax's older brother, Elfangor. After he Heaved him into the wall.

  crash-landed, and before he was murdered.

  WHAM!

  So anyway, we're the only ones fighting back. Plowed him into the concrete. His skull hit We managed to slow the Yeerks down a little. But hard.

  it was getting harder to keep up the fight. Harder

  WHAM!

  to keep it together.

  His tail dropped. His eyes went lazy, then

  "Hhhhhrrroooowwwwrrrr!" I roared. rolled up into his head. He groaned weakly and He faltered and I lunged forward. Missed! His slid down the wall.

  tail broke free and he slashed!

  We were three floors underground, in the

  And carved a hole in my underbelly!

  dark, dank subbasement of a downtown highI watched, stunned and helpless. Those were rise. Pipes and ducts ran close overhead. You my guts, spilling from my body! I froze up for one could hear cries and growls from floor to ceiling 2

  3

  and wall to wall. I wheeled around. And only then Tobias swooped and plunged, talons first. One did I see how insanely bad things were.

  Hork-Bajir fell off, clutching his eyes. Cassie We were completely outnumbered.

  clamped on to another's heel and yanked her Cassie was one against two. Marco one on

  steel-trap jaws from side to side.

  four.

  Rachel was still helpless.

  I had to help them!

  I backed up nervously. I was surrounded,

  But I'd drawn a living barrier. Five battleclosed off from the others by the approaching hardened Hork-Bajir, holding their blades like Hork-Bajir barricade. My butt hit the concrete cocky gunslingers, were closing in on me like the wall.

  walls of a collapsing room.

  I reared up and roared. Seven hundred pounds Just beyond the Hork-Bajir was what looked of ripping claws and slicing teeth. Fluid strength. like — what I hoped was an exit. A steel accorMercurial speed. The male Siberian tiger. The dion door thirty feet away, opposite the stairs. biggest cat in the world.

  I But my roar echoed back unmasked. I heard yelled, but the other screams and cries and false confidence. I detected despair.

  crashes drowned out my words.

  "Ghafrash nyut!" said a voice like gravel.

 
  "Die!"

  them!> My best friend, Marco. Every quaking sylThe nearest Hork-Bajir lunged, blades flashlable told me he was at the end of his strength. ing.

  I caught a glimpse of Rachel, hobbling toward Mouth open, I leaped. My fangs sank in deep, the sound of shock troops pouring down the past the armor of skin. Into the meat.

  stairs. Her voice cracked. Blood He jerked back and fell under my weight. I gushed from gashes around her eyes, blinding rolled off and slammed to the floor. My right ear!

  her. She slashed her grizzly Still stuck to his wrist blade! Sliced off!

  bear paws wildly.

  Two more were on me. I'd forgotten any

 

  thought of victory. Now it was simply a mindless Three Hork-Bajir struck. Ran her across the struggle. A blade embedded in my left hind room like a football-tackling dummy.

  leg . . . Focus, Jake. Survive.

  "TSEEER!"

  FWAAP!

  4

  5

  A tail blade cleaved the air above me. Blue Cassie squeezed out through the opening.

  fur.

  Then Ax. Tobias.

  It was Ax.

  It was Rachel's voice. Raving Fwaap, fwaap, fwaap!

  like someone possessed. floor. A third screamed and cradled his knees.

  Marco roared.
 

  will.>

  Movement.

 
  I cried. cut the Yeerks off or it'll be too late!> He was Ax ducked. The bladed body of a Hork-Bajir breathless, but insistent.
  way out.>

  Then there was a fierce metallic crash and A Hork-Bajir emerged from the steam cloud, hiss.

  saw me, and broke into a run. Time was definitely Psssssssssh h h h htttttt!

  not on my side today.

  A cracked steam pipe! An explosion of steam!

  Lose everyone, or lose two?

  Pressurized fog billowed across the floor. It enI dropped and rolled under the door, sprang veloped the room, everyone and everything. Conup and broke the glass box that housed the emerfusion took over. gency close switch. Engaged the switch.

  Now or never.

  What alternative did I have? What choice?

  I ordered. It was impossible The door ground to a halt, hesitated, then to see more than an inch ahead. The scalding changed directions, descending like a slow but cloud burned my skin and eyes and throat. Chokcertain guillotine. Cassie's wolf eyes fixed on me. ing on steam, bodychecking Hork-Bajir, I ran for

 

  mass on the weight-sensitive panel. The door began to creak open, inching up at first, then rising rapidly. Six inches, twelve inches, eighteen. 6

  7

  tween the floor and door. The gears shrieked to a crawl.

  Then the pipe began to bend.

  Cassie screamed.

  The crunching metal door was just inches from the floor when thick, black fingers wrapped around the bottom. And with inconceivable strength, C H A P T E R 2

  Marco heaved it up. Forced Rachel through. She was a bloody mess.

  Marco stooped, crawled under the door, and released the pipe. Four Hork-Bajir dove for the opening. Slid, clattered, reached the door just as . . .

  BOOM!

  The lone Hork-Bajir dove and skidded under It crashed shut. No Hork-Bajir made it through. the door. I grabbed him, mouth and claws. We In one piece, anyway.

  tumbled. It was like being stuffed in the clothes

  I yelled.

  dryer with ten razor-sharp kitchen knives. We raced up the empty, spiral parking ramp. I used my weight, my fangs, the last of my I demorphed as I ran. Orange-, white-, black-, strength. When his muscles finally slackened, I and red-striped fur thinned to a fuzz, then disapstumbled away. The accordion door was almost peared. My tail shrank into my coccyx. The guts closed.

  that hung from my belly were drawn back in. I looked through the crack and there, like a Bones shifted, rearranged, and threw me onto mirage, was Marco's gorilla form emerging from my hind legs. I tripped and stumbled against the the steam cloud. He was dragging a roaring, wall. My front legs were absorbed and then reslashing Rachel. And not more than six feet beissued as human arms. Back legs extended, paws hind them, a dozen Hork-Bajir.

  minimized, claws grew into toes and fingers. Ax grabbed a length of pipe and wedged it be"Let's get out of here!" 8

  9

  We plateaued onto level pavement, our transshushing her, and looking back over my shoulder. formations complete. We sprinted, breathless, The Yeerks could still be on the trail.

  down a row of parked cars. Shot past a dumb"Every day w
e're more like them," she perfounded attendant who saw a hawk and five kids sisted. "Aren't we?" Tears welled over her lower in spandex tear into a downtown street.

  lids. "Jake?"

  A busy downtown street.

  I didn't have the energy for this. The doubt,

  "Look out!"

  the introspection, the analysis. I just didn't have Honk! Honk!

  the energy.

  Drivers slammed on their horns. Cars screeched

  "No," I said flatly.

  to a halt.

  Why was she doing this? Why now? Yeah, we'd I jumped back between parked cars on the

  just had one of the closest calls I could remember. side of the street. Rachel and Marco ran for the We'd had to scrap the mission and now the new sidewalk.

  Yeerk-pool entrance would open on schedule. But

  "Cassie!"

  the brutality was nothing we hadn't done a hunShe was in the middle of the street, frozen. dred times before.

  I ran back into the lanes. A driver opened his She began to cry almost noiselessly. I knew car door. "Punks!" He shook his fist. "Bunch of she needed to talk things over. She needed to no good . . . "

  work through the confusion we all feel after a I grabbed Cassie's arm. Yanked her out of battle and she wanted me to help.

  traffic. Dodged into the alley where Marco and But I walked away.

  Rachel had turned in, following Ax.

  Marco and Rachel were up ahead, farther

  "Cassie!" I shook her roughly. She came to. down the alley.

  "Four of them," she said anxiously. "I may

  "You're wrong!" Rachel cried, still pumped. have killed four back there, maybe five." She

  "I could have brought them all down." Her fist searched my eyes, her usual calm shattered. slammed the Dumpster. Marco kicked it even

  "Jake!" she whispered. "How do I deal with more violently.

  this?"

  "You had blood in your eyes! You couldn't I gently pushed her down along the alley, even see the reinforcements swarming down the 10

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  stairs. You acted like an idiot. A selfish, crazy,

  "Oh, that's really great! What a guy. So he's whacked-out..."

  off the clock now?" Marco walked around behind

  "Relax," I said, stepping between them like the Dumpster and began to morph. "I'm going the leader I was supposed to be. Marco didn't lishome." ten.

  I kept watching the sky. Rachel, already

  "You're about to blow, Rachel." His face was morphed to bald eagle, powered her body up past bright red, hot from exertion and frustration. the bricks. I knew she was going after Tobias.

  "Haven't you learned anything? You put everyone Ever since a Yeerk sub-visser held and tortured at risk by hanging back when Jake said to bail. him, Tobias hadn't been the same. Even more We can't always cater to your personal need to time spent alone now than before. Withdrawn, bash heads."

  despondent.

  "But as long as we follow Marco's righteous Not good.

  program, everything's fine?" She picked up an

  "Prince Jake," Ax said. "Should we meet in empty can and heaved it across the alley. the barn tonight and attempt the mission again

  "Mighty Marco can just. . ."

  tomorrow?"

  "Forget about saving your life next time?" I sighed. Cassie's sobs were intermittent now.

  "I said relaxl" I shouted. She rose from the pavement, from the shadow of There was a sudden rustling on the far side of a pile of cardboard boxes, and walked slowly the Dumpster. We tensed instantly.

  toward the street.

  Around the corner peeked a boy, an oddly

  "I don't know, Ax," I said, watching Cassie. good-looking kid.

  "Will you do me a favor, though? Will you make Rachel gave a snort.

  sure she gets home okay?"

  It was Ax, in human morph.

  "I have not heard from Tobias," Ax said to me.

  "Try again. Ask him if we're clear." I looked up at the strip of late-evening sky visible from the alley. A raptor's form floated over then disappeared behind a glassy high-rise. 12

  13

  The garage. It seemed so far away. I was so tired, my muscles ached . . .

  I pushed open the door. Forget about my normal clothes. My parents, if they were home, would probably just think this morphing outfit was some new fashion. You know — something Rachel thought up. Well, she says this is cutting C H A P T E R 3

  edge or something.

  :

  My brother Tom, my brother with a Yeerk in his head, would never buy that one.

  But Tom wasn't home. Friday night meant he was at The Sharing. The front organization for Controllers.

  I opened the fridge, grabbed a leftover slice I headed home alone.

  of pizza, and started to stuff my face. I left the I demorphed in a tree in my front yard. I knew kitchen to climb the stairs to bed. One, two, it was risky, being so close to the house and all, three . . . I could feel it already, my head hitting but I was drunk with exhaustion. When I dropped the pillow, sleep descending. Dreams would to the grass, my legs went limp under me. come. No nightmares. Just dreams of. . .

  The gravel stabbed my bare feet as I stag"Jake?" gered up the path. The porch light was on. The My head snapped up. A piece of pizza crust other lights out.

  lodged in my throat.

  I paused with my hand on the doorknob and The voice was loud and mocking. "Bare feet?

  glanced down at my body. Spandex bike shorts You been riding your bike barefoot? At night?" and tight T-shirt. I looked like I should be giving It was Tom. He stood at the top of the stairs. a testimonial on a Tae Bo infomercial. I had reguTall and confident. Blocking my path. Guess it lar clothes stashed in the garage. I needed to put was a quick night at The Sharing.

  them on.

  I coughed, hacking up the pizza crust.

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  15

  "Hey," I said, forcing a half-smile. " I , uh . . . I My breathing stopped.

  was over at Marco's. Watching the game. It went Sometimes, when you demorph, the blood of into overtime and, well, Detroit scored and Marco battle stays behind.

  jumped up and smacked a Pepsi all over my jeans

  "Uh." My voice faltered. My brain slowed. and sneakers. I left them there to get washed."

  "You know about my bike. It stinks. The stupid

  "Yeah?" Tom said, frown fading. "Well, you chain catches my skin. I should get Dad to buy look pretty stupid. But that's really not unusual, me a new one." I dropped back onto my pillow. is it?" He was smirking now.

  Switched off the light.

  "Whatever," I ran up the rest of the stairs and Waited.

  jabbed him in the stomach, the way a little Tom let it go.

  brother would.

  But when I glanced once more at my bedroom He fell to the floor, feigning injury, but hooked doorway, Tom's shadow was still there. Did he my foot and tripped me as I walked into my have something more to say?

  room.

  I was too tired to ask. Sleep was dragging We laughed.

  down my eyelids.

  "I'm gonna crash," I said, recovering my balWhatever it was could wait till morning. ance. "I'm beat."

  Eyes closed, I saw Cassie. Watched her soli"Yeah. Fine." He headed for his room. Did he tary figure walking down the alley. Away from buy it? Did he believe the lies I'd grown so used me. Toward a busy street where cars flashed to telling? The fake-nice routine I put on for a past.

  brother who's not a brother at all anymore, but I saw Tom's leery eyes. Always watching. Policthe enemy?

  ing. Scheming. Eyes controlled by the very small, I dropped into bed. Pulled the blanket up to but very real parasitic slug in his brain. The Yeerk. my neck. Began to shut my . . .

  The race of alien invaders, pressing ever forward in A noise in the doorway.

  stealthy conquest of humanity.

  I shot up. Flicked on the lamp.

  And suddenly, I stood before a giant wall, ris"Hey, Midget?" Tom poked his head around ing leagues above my head and running for miles my door frame. "Was that blood on your leg?" in both directions. I had my hand crammed 16

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  against a small hole, from which water slowly seeped and bubbled. On the other side I heard the raging sea. Pummeling. Pounding. Weakening, with each lashing, every fiber of the wall. And I wondered: Just how long would it hold?

  C H A P T E R 4

  • l

  IE-DEET! DE-DEET!

  The alarm was like a jackhammer to the head. I groaned.

  DE-DEET!

  Enough, already! I felt for the clock radio. The snooze button. Just five more minutes.