The Conspiracy

by K. A. Applegate

Chapman was climbing his back fence. I hit the wood slats and sent him flying. He rolled onto his back and fired.

  BLAM! BLAM!

  Hammer blows that connected with my throat.

  I staggered, plowed into Ax, and knocked him off his feet.

  Chapman was up and running through the busted fence.

  I was hurt, bleeding, reeling, clinging to consciousness.

  And clinging, most of all, to rage. This creep had tried to gun down my father.

  92 I hit him.

  He flew, hit the ground, and rolled, groaning. The gun was five feet away.

  I backed up a step. Tossed my head. Scented the air and targeted his moaning, prone form.

  Die, Yeerk.

  I charged.

  «No, Jake!» Rachel yelled. «We need him alive! Ax! Stop him!»

  I was going to scrape Chapman across the ground. Stomp him, crush him, dig my horn into him.

  I saw the horror in his eyes as he realized what I meant to do.

  «Prince Jake!» Ax yelled.

  I charged. Then, at last, the injuries were too much. As if someone has sliced my legs off, I fell. My momentum carried me, skidding into Chapman.

  Chapman tried to rise. Ax nailed him with the side of his tail blade. Chapman went down, unconscious.

  I was swirling, swirling down into a black pit. Had to demorph. Demorph. It was dark . . . dark enough that Marco couldn't say ...

  Marco. Had I gotten him killed?

  Melissa must have worked the gag out of her mouth. "Mommy? Daddy, where are you?!" Melissa Chapman wailed.

  93 J. demorphed to the sound of Melissa's terrified cries and the wail of approaching police sirens.

  I stood up, frazzled, confused. Rachel was there, human. Ax was gone. Marco . . .

  Marco reached down and lifted Chapman easily up onto his shoulder.

  "You okay?" I asked him.

  «Demorphed, remorphed, good as new,» he said tersely. «Let's move out. With your permission, mighty leader.»

  We moved. Rachel and me providing what limited visual cover we could for Marco. We ran across the street and down. Back to the vacant "For Sale" house.

  94 We were going to keep Chapman a prisoner right where no one would ever suspect: Within two hundred yards of his own home.

  Ax had disconnected the burglar alarm when we got there. The back door was open.

  We hustled inside. Marco dropped Chapman unceremoniously in the empty, wood-floored living room. Then he popped his fist through the glass of a door connecting dining room and living room. The glass fell toward Chapman.

  With his weak but nimble Andalite fingers Ax tied a rag over Chapman's eyes. Ropes went around his wrists and ankles.

  We stood there, looking down at him. He was in our power. For now.

  "I wonder -" Rachel started to say.

  I shook my head and put my finger to my lips. He couldn't be allowed to hear human voices.

  «He is still unconscious,» Ax said.

  Marco reached down and poked Chapman in the ribs with a finger like a bratwurst. The Controller did not react.

  I went to the kitchen. I found an empty coffee can someone had used to store nuts and bolts. I filled it with cold water, returned to the living room, and poured it on Chapman's face.

  He sputtered and cursed.

  Then he tried to move his hands.

  95 «0kay, Ax, it's all yours,» Marco said, stepping back.

  Rachel and I remained silent.

  Ax moved forward, hooves clopping on the bare, wooden floors, circling Chapman on purpose, letting him hear that his interrogator was an Andalite.

  «So, Yeerk,» he sneered imperiously. «Now you are mine.»

  Chapman started to tremble.

  He whimpered, soft and low.

  I didn't look at Rachel; she didn't look at me. Neither of us was thrilled about this. We had to make Chapman think he was being interrogated by an Andalite warrior.

  We had to make him think he would be tortured. Moments earlier I would have killed him. Even now, I felt no pity for him. But that didn't change the fact that we were trying to terrify another living, sentient creature.

  If you're the kind of person who gets off on that, you need help. I was asking a lot of Ax. Too much.

  But he was determined to play the role.

  «lf you want to live - and I need not remind you that is in my power to end your life right now - you will answer my questions,» Ax said with exaggerated Andalite arrogance. «What is the extent of the Yeerk penetration of Earth?»

  96 Chapman shuddered but stayed silent.

  «Do not defy me, Yeerk filth!» Ax roared. «Name all the Yeerks in positions of power!!»

  No answer.

  «l will keep you here, you know,» Ax said, changing tactics and using a silken, deadly thought-speak voice. «Kandrona starvation, Yeerk. It is a terrible way to die. How long since you visited the Yeerk pool? How many days, how many hours do you have before the terrible need begins to -»

  I'd seen and heard enough. I jerked my head toward the door. Rachel and Marco followed me. Marco demorphed as he went.

  Ax's words had conjured up a dark, miserable picture in my mind.

  The death he had falsely promised Chapman was the one my brother Tom was going to suffer, because the Yeerk in his head would be cut off from Kandrona rays.

  "Jake?" Rachel whispered, once we were outside.

  I shook my head. Couldn't answer.

  I headed for home past the crowd of neighbors and cops and emergency vehicles that had clustered around the Chapman home.

  So far, the plan had worked.

  Ax would continue to interrogate Chapman.

  Maybe get rough with him.

  97 This was what I'd led us to. Marco nearly killed. Melissa Chapman terrorized. And Ax left to spin tales of horror for a helpless captive.

  Marco wouldn't need to take another vote: I was done being the leader.

  98 J. lay awake all night.

  Tense.

  Listening.

  Listening to the sounds coming out of the darkness.

  Waiting for Tobias, who had settled down two hours ago in the tree outside my window, to suddenly shout, «The Yeerks are coming, Jake!»

  It didn't happen.

  At 3:30, I slid out of bed, careful not to step on the creaky part of the floor, and tiptoed into the hallway.

  My father's door was half-closed.

  I peeked in.

  99 He was sleeping, the moonlight shining on his face.

  I inched further down the hall.

  Tom's door was closed.

  I held my breath and pressed my ear to the door.

  Nothing.

  Palms sweating, I gripped the knob and without wiggling it, sloooooowly cracked open the door.

  Tom's bed was empty.

  I shivered.

  Closed the door and hurried back to my own room.

  My brother was gone.

  Probably out with the rest of the Controllers, searching frantically for Chapman. Tobias must have seen him go but didn't want to wake me up.

  I climbed back into bed and lay there, wide-eyed and listening to the house settling.

  Wondering what my brother was doing. How he was feeling.

  And imagining how frantically the Yeerks were searching for Chapman.

  How scared and desperate Tom's Yeerk must be by now, knowing he was suddenly just priority number two.

  100 "Are you scared, Yeerk?" I whispered into the darkness.

  I thought about how I'd feel if my friends left me to the Yeerks to save someone more important.

  Not a good feeling.

  And what about the real Tom inside?

  What was he thinking?

  I didn't know and I couldn't stand the thought, but I couldn't stop thinking about it.

  Couldn't let it go.

  I was the leader.

  I should have been able to come up with a better, surer plan.

  If I couldn't f
igure out a way to save my own family, then how could the other Animorphs rely on me, anyway?

  How could I rely on myself?

  My numb, foggy brain begged for sleep but it wasn't happening.

  The hours crept by.

  «Hey, Jake, are you up? Are you awake? If not, wake up. Your brother just snuck in through the back door,» Tobias said as the sun rose and my bedroom was filled with brilliant, golden sunlight.

  I couldn't answer. Wasn't anything to say anyway.

  101 I heard Tom creep past my room. Heard him open, then close his bedroom door.

  I swung wearily out of bed and opened my window.

  Time to go check on Chapman.

  102 J. used my peregrine falcon morph and flew to the empty house where Chapman was being held hostage.

  I was tempted to continue holding Chapman and starve his Yeerk to death. Let the Yeerk Empire know that they were vulnerable, too. That we could be cruel enough to kill, when pushed far enough.

  The sick, dark anger inside of me wanted to. And had nearly tried, last night in rhino morph.

  I landed in a tree near the window.

  Ax was still inside.

  «Everything going okay, Ax?» I asked from outside the house.

  «Yes, Prince Jake,» Ax replied. «l was careful

  103 to walk directly over the glass from the broken window, making it crunch very loudly. I believe this Controller will use the glass to sever his bonds once I have left.»

  «Good,» I said.

  «No, Prince Jake, nothing about this is good,» Ax snapped. «This is not behavior suitable to a warrior. I will not do this again.»

  «Understood, Ax,» I said.

  «The human daughter of this Controller has walked through the neighborhood crying for her father. I have heard her. As I have heard the terror of this Controller. I will gladly fight this Controller and even, in fair battle, kill him, but I am not a torturer.»

  I'd never heard Ax this mad. Never even close.

  «lt's my fault, Ax. My responsibility. You only did what I asked you to do, as your prince. This is on me.»

  «No. My actions are my actions and are my responsibility^ he said, but his anger had softened a little. «l am sorry to have expressed anger.»

  «Ax-man, you are entitled,» I said wearily.

  He didn't say anything for a while, and I sat, miserable and ashamed, in the tree.

  «l must play out the charade,» Ax said wearily.

  104 «Yeah.»

  I sat there, fluffing my feathers against the morning chill, watching as the first early commuters headed for their cars, slung their briefcases and laptops in the backseat, and headed off for work. Normal. A normal day in a normal American suburb.

  Except that across the street a girl cried for a father she'd long ago lost without knowing it, and here, a creature part man and part Yeerk was threatened with painful death.

  «Kandrona starvation, Yeerk. That is what awaits you. The slow weakening ... the growing madness . . . the terror as you begin to realize that nothing, nothing can save you. Is that what you want? Help me, Yeerk. Help me help you.» Ax could have used private thought-speak, thought-speak only Chapman would hear. But he wanted me to hear.

  «Your last chance. I will leave you here, bound, helpless, the thirst and hunger of your human host body adding to your own desperate need.»

  If Chapman answered I didn't hear him. I guess he did answer, though, because Ax said, «Your choice, Yeerk.»

  Moments later Ax was morphed to osprey and soaring away from the house.

  Chapman would escape. We had left the bro-

  105 ken glass there deliberately. Chapman believed we were all Andalites. He would think we were too unfamiliar with the human world to know that glass can cut.

  «And he will return to his people a hero,» Ax said. «This will become an oft-repeated and much celebrated chapter in Yeerk history. My name will become legend, synonymous with ineptitude. A brutal fool of an Andalite.»

  «Ax, I wouldn't have asked you to do it if it wasn't so important.»

  Ax looked at me, fierce hawk eyes glittering. ^Important to you, Jake, or to the war effort?»

  I didn't answer him.

  I wanted to believe it was important to both, but my weary brain couldn't even form the words to convince myself, much less him.

  Ax flew back to his woods, muttering something about cleansing rituals.

  I flew home and relieved Tobias.

  «Everything looks cool, Big Jake,» Tobias said. «So, what's the plan? How do we follow you guys up to the mountains?»

  «We leave at noon. We were supposed to leave earlier, but my dad has some stuff to do this morning. I'll meet you all at Cassie's barn at nine to set the plans.»

  «0kay. Later.»

  Tobias flew off.

  106 We were leaving for Grandpa G's cabin in two hours. By the time the others realized I wasn't going to meet them at the barn we'd be long gone.

  I was done using my friends on this mission. I was tired of Marco's doubts and Ax's honor and even Cassie's wary sympathy.

  This was my family. My brother, the killer. My father, the target. And me, the fool in the middle.

  Just the three of us.

  If my brother Tom, in a desperate, last-ditch attempt to save himself, tried to kill my father, then I would morph.

  And the last thing my brother would see was me, his brother, his unknown enemy, rear up and destroy him with all the ruthless, savage power that was mine to command.

  I had told myself that I would do whatever had to be done, and I would.

  Suddenly, I needed to talk to Cassie. And maybe, when it was all over, I would.

  107 Homer had already been taken to Rachel's, where he'd spend the next four days being petted and pampered and played with.

  Too bad he and I couldn't have changed places.

  And now my father, Tom, and I had eight hours of boring, highway driving ahead of us.

  Tom sat in the front with my father, sulking and giving monosyllabic answers to my father's forcedly cheerful questions.

  I answered a few, but my heart wasn't in it either, and after about ten miles, my father just stopped trying.

  I sat tensely in the back, watching Tom, searching for any signs of Kandrona withdrawal.

  108 Nothing.

  Maybe he'd fed last night, in between searching for Chapman.

  It wouldn't matter though, because we still wouldn't be home before the three-day limit.

  I tried to imagine life without Tom. Without my older brother. I'd be an only child. Marco was an only child. So were Cassie and Tobias.

  But I wasn't and I didn't want to be. Saving Tom was the reason I'd agreed to be an Ani-morph. I hadn't wanted it, any of it. But then I'd learned the Yeerks had taken Tom and made him one of their own.

  It was for him that I had endured that first horrifying morph. It was to save him that I had gone down into the Yeerk pool, that unsuspected house of horrors.

  I wasn't going to lose Tom to the Yeerks. I had to keep that hope alive.

  But I had to keep my father alive, too. The Yeerk in Tom's head was locked in battle with me, though he didn't know it. We were deadly enemies on a field of battle where two innocent people, my brother and my father, stood directly in our line of fire.

  After an hour or two, I fell asleep.

  Woke up four hours later as we pulled into a rest stop.

  109 We used the bathroom. Wolfed down lukewarm hamburgers and stiff, cardboard fries.

  Headed back out on the road.

  Finally, when I was numb with nerves and cramped from sitting, my father turned the car down a hidden, gravel road.

  "We're almost there," he said tiredly.

  I sat up.

  So did Tom.

  Thick forest lined the road, the tree branches seeming to reach for the car. The air was cooler, cleaner, and smelled of dark, moist dirt.

  A mouse scurried out onto the road in front of us. Sat up,
unafraid, and watched as we slowly approached.

  "Tseeeer!" A hawk swept down out of nowhere and seized it. Carried it off.

  "Survival of the fittest," Tom murmured, his mouth curving into a small, secret smile.

  I looked at the side of his head. I looked at his ear, wanting to picture the foul, gray slug that was inside his brain.

  Do you have a plan, Yeerk? Are the woods full of your allies? Do the Hork-Bajir lie in wait? Do the Bug fighters hover above us, waiting for the signal?

  Or, like me, are you planning on handling this by yourself?

  110 Don't take me on by yourself, Yeerk. You won't win.

  Survival of the fittest, Yeerk.

  "Finally," my father said, sighing and parking the car. "Everybody out."

  My boots crunched noisily on gravel and pine needles. The sound of car doors slamming was both loud and insignificant in the quiet of the woods.

  Grandpa G's cabin sat in the middle of a small, grassy clearing surrounded by dark, towering pine trees. There was a well-worn path leading from the front door straight down to the dock at the lake.

  Silence. Then, my mother and my grandparents spilled out of the cabin. We were hugged and fussed over, fed and herded back out to the porch to relax.

  "It makes me sad to think that Grandpa G isn't here anymore," my mother said quietly, watching as the sun set over the lake. "He really loved this place."

  "I remember when he came home from the war," my grandfather mused. "He was a different man. He said he wanted nothing but peace after seeing so much."

  "Some people just can't deal with the reality of war, I guess," Tom said offhandedly, earning shocked looks from my parents and grandparents.

  111 "And what would you know about war, Tom?" my grandfather said levelly, like he was trying not to sound as angry as he felt. "I don't recall hearing about your enlistment."

  "You're right," Tom said quickly. "That was a stupid thing to say. I guess I was just thinking about Grandpa G spending all his time out here, alone."

  Everybody relaxed and went on reminiscing.

  But I didn't. I just sat and watched and listened.

  I had no plan. No plan but to react when Tom struck. I was waiting, playing defense again.

  Your move, Yeerk.

  Ill

  112 Why couldn't they have the funeral tomorrow?" Tom said later that night, once we were in the attic bedroom. "I mean, Sunday or Monday, what's the difference?"

  "Grandpa G wanted it that way," I answered, looking around the small, dark room. "And besides, Mom said they never bury people on Sunday around here. Sunday is for the wake, Monday for the burial."