Content Warnings: Self harm is referenced/implied but doesn't happen. Also the sort of general existential body horror that comes from thinking too hard about the logistics of morphing. Non-graphic references to violence and loss of limbs.

Other Notes: I wrote this almost a year ago and put it on tumblr, but I finally decided to clean it up a little and post it here and on AO3. I still haven't read all the books, but I think I'm going to attempt a full read/re-read again (third time's the charm, right?), because these kids break my heart.

!

It was a morbid thing to get stuck on.

It was, and I knew it, but I couldn't exactly help it once I'd noticed. Or - not noticed, exactly, I mean, we figured out pretty early on that morphing erases most injuries. I have the lack of gaping shark tooth wounds to show for it. That was the whole problem.

It went like this: a couple days after that enchanting high seas adventure, I had a nightmare. The details were pretty fuzzy but the gist of it was that Visser Three was a giant shark and he bit my legs off and ate them.

I've had worse nightmares. But I hadn't, then. And that was when I started thinking about it.

See, I used to have this tiny little scar on the back of my right ankle. There wasn't any big story attached to it, or anything. I tripped outside once when I was a toddler, hit a sharp rock, bam. Baby Jake was more upset than Baby Me.

So anyway, I woke up freaking out about alien sharks and the first thing I did was throw the blanket off so I could make sure I still had both legs. All of both legs. I grabbed my knees and my ankles and my feet and then for some reason I thought of that scar. I don't know why - it wasn't like some huge part of my identity or anything. I didn't think about it much. It was just something I'd always known I had.

I ran across the hall to the bathroom. I don't know why I didn't just stay in my room and turn the light on there. Maybe I wanted to look in the mirror and make sure I didn't have a dolphin face or something. But I went into the bathroom and turned on the light and oh-so-gracefully hopped around trying to get a good look at my ankle. We didn't have a counter, just the sink, and I knew it wouldn't hold my weight.

As you might have guessed, being half awake and half convinced something was trying to eat me (and one-hundred-and-ten-percent remembering that more than one something had tried to eat me), I fell over. Which worked out just fine. I leaned back against the bathtub and finally got a good look at the spot where the scar was supposed to be.

It wasn't.

It freaked me out. I mean it really freaked me out. Part of me was gone. Part of me had been gone for weeks and I hadn't even noticed.

I stayed on the floor for a while. I don't know how long. I finally stood up because I was freezing. I turned on the sink and almost splashed water on my face before I remembered it was the middle of the night and I had to go back to sleep.

And you know what finally hit me? You know what one question I had about the newly revealed magical healing powers of this incredible alien technology I'd been exposed to in order to help fight a secret war?

I looked in the mirror again, and lifted up my shirt, and stared down at my stomach. "Man," I said. "How do we still have bellybuttons?"

I started being really careful. At school, at home. Anywhere around people. I moved a little slower, payed more attention to door frames and furniture and what I was doing with the kitchen knife when I made dinner. I stubbed my toe once and didn't even yell, just stood there and held my breath until I was sure my dad hadn't seen.

Maybe it was ridiculous. I don't know. I mean, I don't watch the people around me to keep track of who's been hurt and whether or not they're acting like it.

But I figured a Yeerk on the lookout for the Andalite Bandits just might.

Cassie was the one who finally noticed. I guess I should have expected that. Even if she did have it kind of backwards, at first.

See, in gym class on Monday someone forgot basketball isn't a contact sport, and I got slammed into the bleachers. My whole right arm started bruising up pretty bad, before I could cover it. Tuesday night we did some fly-bys over the woods, to make sure no one was getting anywhere near Ax's new home away (far, far away) from home. Wednesday, Thursday and Friday I wore long sleeves. Even during gym. The high on Thursday was 86°.

Friday after school we all went to Cassie's barn for a meeting. Usually we just morphed at home and flew out our windows, but we figured it would be more suspicious if we never happened to run into each other, so we got to practice pretending to be ourselves again: Rachel went so they could study together. Jake volunteered to help Cassie clean the barn stalls, and I let him drag me along.

It was a short meeting, and the whole time Cassie kept giving me looks. Worried looks. It didn't take me long to figure out why.

After the meeting, Jake started home to actually do some homework. Normally I would have been appalled by such shamelessly responsible weekend behavior, even from Jake, but lately we all took every chance we had to get anything done that wasn't related to aliens.

Speaking of aliens, our new one said goodnight and tried to make a dignified exit back to the woods - still in human morph. I watched. He fell over twice. Poor guy. Poor infuriatingly secretive guy who I didn't trust as far as I could throw, without turning into a gorilla first.

Anyway. Tobias followed him. Rachel went into Cassie's house to call home and ask if she could stay the night.

I could have run off pretty much whenever, but I thought I'd spare us all the awkwardness of Cassie trying to casually ask me to hang back. As soon as we were alone in the barn, I rolled up my sleeves, before she could tell me to.

"It's the exact opposite of what you think," I said, and I don't know if I meant it to be funny or not. I hope I didn't. I wouldn't have blamed any of the others for… I wouldn't have blamed any of them. Maybe I wouldn't even have blamed me. I don't know.

Cassie shut her eyes and breathed out and leaned against a support beam. I wondered how long she'd been worried.

She opened her eyes. "You got hurt."

"Gym class Monday." I pulled my sleeves back down. "Here's hoping none of my teachers care about me, huh?"

She didn't laugh. It hadn't really been a joke.

"I bashed my knee getting away from a startled horse last week," she said.

I stared at her. I didn't know what to say to that. I said "Oh." Smooth.

She shrugged. "My parents were the only ones who saw. I've been limping around the house. But it made me think…"

I said "Oh" again. Cassie and I don't spend much time on the same wavelength. It's weird when it happens.

She pushed off from the beam. "Come on. We need to talk to Rachel."

"Rachel?"

"I talked to her about it. She's been experimenting with makeup for a few days now, trying to come up with bruises that fit everyone's skin tones."

"…Woah." Why didn't I think of that? And more importantly: "Why didn't you guys say anything during the meeting?"

She turned, and looked me right in the eye. "Why didn't you?"

I had to think about that one for second. "I... guess I didn't want to panic anybody about something we couldn't fix. And I thought maybe you guys would think I was going a little overboard on security."

She crossed her arms. "Exactly. We didn't want to bring it up until we had a solution. Rachel…" She hesitated. She broke eye contact, looked away and suddenly I knew what she was going to say next. She did. "Rachel's planning on acting like it's just something she did in her spare time. Just in case."

"Lying," I said flatly. "She's planning on lying to the team. To Jake."

"We didn't… really think of it that way, I guess." For a few seconds, we just looked at each other. Neither of us knew what to say. Then Cassie shook her head and started out the door. Limping.

"…Yeah," I said, when she was already halfway to the house. I sighed and followed her out. "Neither did I."

We always meant so well.