The Valuable

Chapter 1

(Rachel! On your right!) I called down. Rachel's grizzly morph is extremely near-sighted, and she needs a little help from time to time. I saw her turn right, and all of a sudden, she could see the human-controller running up on her with a machete. Bad move. Hooaar! Rachel's morph let out a full-throated roar that scared me, and I was a hundred feet above her. She reared up on two legs and laid into a grizzly right hook – the guy went flying. Literally airborne. He bounced twice and stayed down – the smartest thing he'd done yet.

Another, different roar demanded my attention, and I looked to the south. Three Hork-bajir had separated Jake from Cassie, and they were backing him toward the brick wall of the pump station. If I hadn't been using my head to focus my laser-sharp eyes, I would have shaken it derisively – you don't corner a mad Siberian tiger. You just don't do it, I don't care if you are a bladed alien from hell and you've got two of your buddies with you.

Jake probably could have taken them all – at times, it seemed like he was getting to be like a pro in his preferred battle morph. Like a black belt or something. He'd learned most of the tiger's tricks to win a fight, and then he'd added all of his human cunning on top of that. It was hardly even fair. But I didn't want Jake to get torn up too badly in his fight, which could happen when you had roughly eighteen razor-sharp blades slashing at you simultaneously. I folded my wings back and hit a stoop. I locked onto the lead Hork-bajir, intent on evening up the odds for Jake a little. I didn't even see the guy who almost ended my life before I was in a full dive, and the speed of the dive probably saved me.

A weird sound was the only thing that tipped me off right before I was in a world of trouble. Pteww!Pteww!Pteww!Pteww!Pteww! – it was almost like a video game noise, like a laser noise from an 80s arcade game. That was the thought I had right before I was surrounded by bright pink Dracon fire.

Above! Behind! Either side! I was in a cage of pure Dracon beams! It was like it was raining energy from the ground all of a sudden! I instinctively barrel-rolled, breaking off to the right, and skimmed into the tree tops. Branches and leaves burst into flame around me; I felt the edges of my feathers sizzle and instantly felt the loss of maneuverability. Almost off-handedly, I noted the guy who was shooting at me.

One guy. He was holding what looked like a chromed-out Super Soaker, except it wasn't water coming out of this weapon – it was a solid stream of Dracon energy. It was something we'd never seen before – all the portable Dracon cannons we'd ever seen were small, handheld units that looked a little like an early Star Trek phaser. They were powerful weapons, but they'd always been limited to about maybe one shot per three seconds.

Not this one. It was like a machine gun for laser beams. A clearing opened up in front of me, and all of a sudden I was unprotected. I swear, I saw the guy smile as he lined me up. He pulled the trigger, and I said a random, disjointed prayer as I prepared myself to be blown into individual atoms.

When the man pulled the trigger, two things happened. Loud, even over the sounds of the battle that was still raging, the weapon let out a sickly-sounding thwee-WONK! Then, it exploded.

I don't mean blew up a little bit. It was like films of a nuclear bomb going off – one minute the dude was standing there, preparing to blow me away with his new toy. A split second later, there was an intense flash of light that swallowed him up. There was a loud sound that resembled the world's biggest mosquito hitting a Bug Zapper, then he was gone. No shoes, no wedding ring, no fillings left behind – nothing. Gone.

My friends all started yelling at once, which I took as a good thing. It meant none of them had been close enough to the explosion for it to get them. I tried to clear the spots from my vision as I searched the semi-wooded area for anywhere else I might be needed.

It was supposed to be one of those now-common missions we were starting to become way too comfortable with – through our growing sources of information on the Yeerks, we'd discovered that they were up to something involving the water pumping station on the edge of town. Naturally, we had no idea what, exactly, they were doing there. We just knew that if they wanted it, we had to take it away. So that was the plan – go in, cause too much trouble for the site to be worth it to them, and get out. And it had been going fairly well, until the homeboy with the Dracon machine gun showed up and almost turned me into a Red-tailed Fricassee.

Almost. These days, almost dead was just a pretty common state for us. By us, I mean the Animorphs – the crazy people this particular story is centered around.

While I'm at this part, guess I ought to do a little explaining. You know, as to why I was flying around above an alien installation as a Red-tailed hawk while the rest of my friends ran around below me, attacking said aliens in various, dangerous animal morphs of their own.

Our planet has been officially invaded. Not by aliens you can see; no, this is more of an Invasion of the Body Snatchers-type of deal. Sure, the Yeerks have their Hork-bajir slaves and their Taxxon allies; those you would recognize as outworlders. In fact, the very first thought you'd have upon seeing one is, 'Holy Alien Centipede, Batman! That thing is not from around here.'

Yeerks are just alien slugs, though. I'm not being racist or speciesist or whatever – seriously, in their natural state they just look like big ol' Earth slugs, minus the stalk eyes. They're parasites, and they have the terrifying ability to completely take over a human body. Or Hork-bajir, or Taxxon, or any other sentient species with a brain and an auditory canal.

They do this in secret, which is why we're in deep danger of losing this war. Once they have enough human bodies under their control, I'm sure they'll take great delight in dragging the rest of us screaming from our homes. Well, those of us who have homes, anyway.

I'm lucky, in that regard. I'm a nothlit, which means I'm stuck in morph. Again, luckily, it was a hawk body I got myself stuck in. I'm useful to the cause because of my mobility and my eyesight, which Superman would seriously be jealous of. I can read a paperback novel from a half a mile up, given that the reader holds the book relatively still. Not to mention, it would be impossible for the Yeerks to make a controller out of me. The worst they can do to me is kill me. Like I said, I'm lucky.

Prince Elfangor was not so lucky. Me, Jake, Rachel, Cassie, and Marco were walking home from the mall, using the abandoned construction site as a shortcut like a bunch of idiots. Elfangor crash-landed his fighter in front of us, told us what was going on, and gave us the power to morph. We can change into any animal we can touch; even I can still morph, even though normal nothlits can't. In addition to your everyday aliens bouncing around the galaxy, you've got your uber-powerful beings, too. One of them called an Ellimist used me for my help and rewarded me by giving me my morphing powers back. I can even morph myself, my human self. Just like any other morph, though, I can be trapped in it. And the Ellimist made it pretty clear that this is my one mulligan, as far as morphing goes.

Anyway, by some stroke of coincidence (or maybe something a little less random,) we rescued Ax off of the ocean floor about a month after we met Elfangor. Aximili is Elfangor's brother, although he's just a kid like us. Well, he's got two advantages over any human kid that might have joined our fight – he's an Andalite, a sworn enemy of the Yeerk, and he pretty much knows everything about them. Also, he's an Andalite aristh – like a rookie in the military. 'A rookie?' you might roll your eyes. 'We have to count on five kids and a rookie to beat the Yeerks?' Well, all I can say is that an aristh is better than nothing, especially when he's your encyclopedia on useful information pertaining to the Yeerks.

Jake leads us. He didn't volunteer, didn't want to do it; which, I guess, is why he ended up as the leader. He's not some bossy jerk who likes to steal the show, he's just a guy with a good heart that happens to be good at making decisions under pressure. He also happens to be the only one of us mentally tough enough to take on the title; I honestly think that without Jake, we wouldn't have lasted this long.

He's Rachel's cousin, and I already mentioned her. Rachel is unique. One time, before this whole mess started, I watched a video on Joan of Arc. I remember thinking, 'This girl must have been one hell of a warrior to get all of those guys to follow her, especially in that age of exaggerated sexism.' Now that I knew Rachel, I wasn't really all that impressed with Joan anymore.

See, if Joan had gone to all the soldiers and said, "God told me to fight! He told me to lead you in battle!" and they had all laughed at her, that would have been the end of the story. She probably would have died in obscurity. If Rachel had been in Joan's shoes, she would have gotten the guys fired up just with her own attitude. I swear, I can see her in my mind's eye, wearing a suit of plate mail and looking amazing, yelling at her soldiers. "Let's go! Let's do it, you wusses! I'd get your mommies to come, but it's a hard ride and we need to save the horses. Let's get going, let's rock!" All the while she'd have this psychotic, beautiful grin on her face, and she'd be swinging her sword wildly over her head. And if the soldiers had all told her to go screw herself? Rachel would have charged against an army of 5,000 men by herself, anyway. That's Rachel.

I'm always fascinated by Rachel. That's what drew me to her – she's not confrontational, but she sure knows how to handle it. Confrontation, I mean. I wanted to get to know her better because I wanted to understand how someone could be so confident all the time, so totally sure of themselves. Little by little, I found out the truth – Rachel isn't always sure of herself. But she never lets anybody else see that – she even hides those little moments of doubt from herself, if she can. But for some reason, Rachel feels the same way about me that I do her. At first, when I got stuck in hawk morph, she pitied me. Now that I can morph and fight again, that pity is slowly turning into respect. Rachel respects my decision to live as a hawk in order to be able to fight with her – with everybody. And, thankfully, every day our relationship gets a little more equal.

I'm not the only Animorph with a little more than a battle bond with another member. Jake and Cassie are more or less a couple. I say more or less, because neither of them will openly admit it. But when you're a hawk…with all of this free time and super vision, naturally a bit of people watching is going to happen. And I see how couples act all the time. Jake and Cassie are definitely a couple.

I guess it's Jake's idea to not park the relationship bus out front and center. I have mad respect for Cassie; the girl does every bit as much for the cause as the rest of us, and then she shames us all by doing triple the amount of chores and still holding down an A-average. But I have the feeling that if Jake were to tell her, "I'm through playing games," and kissed her passionately, we'd be privy to the two of them holding hands forever and ever.

Maybe that's a little unfair. I don't want to give you the impression that Cassie wouldn't sacrifice anything for our resistance – she has, already. It's just that Cassie's more easygoing than Jake, more likely to go along to get along. Unless an issue of morality comes up – when that happens, you can be sure Cassie's going to pipe up and be heard. Sometimes it's annoying; most of the time, it's what keeps us from crossing the line.

Don't tell that to Marco, though. Marco's the fifth human member. He's of the opinion that any lines that might be drawn as to the morality of our actions were erased when the first Yeerk landed here. He fiercely believes that we have to do anything and everything in our power to stop the Yeerks, and we don't have the luxury of stopping and asking ourselves, "Oh, wait, is this right? Morally, I mean?" He makes the point that if we're not immoral now, we won't be around to make the good choice later. Most of the time, I secretly agree with him.

It's his way of presenting his ideas that needs the work. Half of the time, I can't tell if he's kidding or not. When he gets really serious about something, he comes on way too strong. Insults, jokes, comic relief? Marco does all that for us. But when he needs to present an alternate course of action in a logical and calm way? You'd be more likely to get that out of a piece of construction paper than Marco.

(I believe we have done the necessary damage to this structure,) Ax called. (Prince Jake, shall we start the planned retreat?)

(Good work, Ax. Yes, strategic retreat. Everybody okay?) Everyone checked in that they were. (Good. Take the planned routes back to Cassie's barn.) With that, I saw his large feline form slink into the deeper woods and away from my eyes.

I wheeled and scanned the area one last time before leaving. There were several controllers of different species scattered around the property. Some were still unconscious; most were already moaning and treating injuries to their host bodies. Through the broken window of the pumping station, I could see a huge panel of important-looking computers – it was crumpled on one side and still throwing sparks all over the place. Satisfied, I turned to the east and headed back to base – Cassie's barn.