The Threat

by K. A. Applegate

  I dropped backward, flat onto my back on the floor. Something no falcon would ever do. Something David's eagle instincts would never expect.

  The eagle flew over me. I scuttled under the bed, my talons scrabbling wildly on the exposed wood flooring. Again, something no falcon would do.

  «How long do you think you can hide under there?» David mocked. But I could hear frustration in his voice.

  He stuck his big eagle's head down and

  148 peered, almost comically, beneath the bed. He could come in after me, but he'd be crammed in tighter than I was. He'd be unable to move.

  He flapped over to the window opening. And when I peered after him, I saw his talons growing. He was demorphing.

  A mistake. David might have all my morphing power, but he didn't have my experience. He would be helpless while he was in midmorph. I could escape.

  Only I didn't want to escape. Not with Tobias lying dead on the bed above me.

  I'd gone into lots of battles against Hork-Bajir, Taxxons, Visser Three himself. I'd always gone in hoping to win. But I'd never gone in consciously hoping to kill.

  This was different. I didn't want to escape. I wanted to destroy David. I wanted revenge.

  Human feet began to emerge from the talons. I timed it carefully, then I scrabbled back out from beneath the far side of the bed and flapped my wings.

  David stood there, maybe three feet tall, still covered in feathers. His face was an eagle's face. But there were human fingers beginning to emerge from the wing tips.

  He reached over and clumsily grasped a jagged piece of wood about as long as a baseball bat.

  149 «Come on, little birdie,» he said. «Try for the window, go ahead.»

  I flapped hard, making a lot of noise with my wings. But I didn't fly. I skimmed across the floor on my talons, using my wings to get up speed.

  David saw what I was doing and tried to bend over to slam the stick down. Just one problem: He was still more bird than human. And birds don't have a waist.

  WHAP! The stick missed me, and I was under his guard. Under his guard and now flying straight up, up at his face.

  He staggered back. He batted at his face with his half-formed hands. But I was too close and he was too clumsy.

  I raked his face with both talons.

  "Aaaaahhhhh!" he cried with a mouth more human than bird.

  I dug one talon into his emerging nose and -

  THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP.

  Footsteps racing.

  WHAM! The broken door blew back on its hinges. Hork-Bajir poured into the room.

  David was still blinded by my feathers and the blood in his face. I immediately let him go, dropped straight down, and turned for the window. I blew through it with Hork-Bajir claws tearing at my tail feathers.

  David leaped! Out the window. I was airborne,

  150 but his falling body slammed me out of the air. We went down together. Hard. The swimming pool was behind us.

  David was on his back, but already remorphing.

  Hork-Bajir leaped fearlessly out into the dark yard. They were a species raised in the trees. A ten-foot drop meant nothing to them.

  FWUMP!

  FWUMP!

  FWUMP!

  Three big Hork-Bajir landed on the grass. Their T-rex feet dug deep into the sod. Their blades flashed dully in the dim light. I lay stunned, my feathers muddy and stiff. David was morphing as fast as he could. His human features were already almost gone.

  But neither of us was going to get airborne fast enough to clear the fence and get away. I'd need a running start to get that high that fast, and with the pool behind me I was trapped. The Hork-Bajir ran straight for us.

  It would be over in a few seconds. I tensed up, waiting for the blade slash that would cut me in two.

  But then, something flew overhead! Over the fence. Over the pool! No, it didn't fly, it soared!

  Ax cleared the fence and the pool and dropped almost daintily down between me and the advancing Hork-Bajir.

  151 «l thought you might wish some assistance, Prince Jake,» Ax said calmly.

  "Andalite!" the biggest Hork-Bajir spat.

  «Yes, Andalite,» Ax said with all the natural arrogance of his people. «What a pity for you, Yeerk.»

  Now, one Andalite is not a match for three Hork-Bajir. But the Yeerks have a very healthy respect for Andalite tails. So the Hork-Bajir hesitated.

  They didn't hesitate for long, but it was long enough. Ax reached down, scooped me up in his many-fingered hands, and leaped backward over the pool.

  «Whoa! I didn't know you could do that!» I said.

  «l didn't, either,» Ax said.

  Hork-Bajir raced around the pool, coming for us. Now that they were past their first hesitancy, they were fixated on the one Andalite they could see and be sure of.

  They abandoned David.

  Ax turned around and leaped the fence, facing forward. The Hork-Bajir didn't bother to leap. They came barreling straight through, wiping out the fence in an explosion of splinters and a barrage of noise.

  Lights snapped on in neighboring houses.

  But too late for the Hork-Bajir. Too late for

  152 them to see that the neighbor on this side also had a pool.

  Ax skipped clear of this swimming pool. The Hork-Bajir plowed in.

  PAH-LOOOSH!

  The three seven-foot creatures weren't going to drown. The pool was only six feet deep. But they weren't going to catch us, either.

  Overhead I saw the eagle fly.

  «l have to go after him!» I said.

  «Wait till I can morph and come with you!» Ax said.

  «No. We can't lose him!» I said. «Don't follow me. Get help. Get Rachel, she lives close. She can use her owl morph to find us. Maybe.»

  «Good hunting, Prince Jake.»

  Normally I would have said "Don't call me prince." It's a running joke between me and Ax. But this wasn't a night for jokes.

  «Ax? I think Tobias is dead,» I said. «l think David killed him.»

  «That would be a most terrible thing,» Ax said.

  «Yeah. Get Rachel. If David's killed Tobias, we may have to do a terrible thing, too. Get Rachel.»

  I took to the air and raced after the golden eagle.

  153 e saw me. He knew he was stronger than me in the air, but still he flew on.

  On through the night, as fast as we both could fly. We passed over the school. We passed over the construction site where the others and I had first encountered Elfangor and become what we were today.

  I thought he was flying back toward Cassie's barn. But he kept going, apparently without any specific idea of where to go.

  «You've been a long time in that morph, Jake,» he called to me. «Better demorph.»

  «Not as long as you've been in your morph, David.»

  «l guess you're right. I was looking for the

  154 right place to do this. But I guess I'll have to take whatever comes up,» he said.

  I didn't know what he meant. But then I saw him gliding downward. Down toward the empty mall below us.

  He disappeared behind a stack of air-conditioning equipment on the vast mall roof.

  I looked back, trying to see if Ax had decided to follow me. But no, he'd have done what I asked. He'd have gone to get Rachel.

  Nothing. The sky was empty.

  I glided down toward the mall roof, avoiding the area where I'd seen David land.

  I came to rest on the gravelly roof, exhausted from the endless flapping. I looked carefully, fearfully into the darkness. I strained my hearing. But no one was near.

  I watched to see if David would fly away again. But in my heart I knew he would not. David had picked this place. David wasn't going to run.

  I demorphed and soon stood there, feeling out of place, conspicuous. And yet I was invisible to anyone on the ground. A raised edge went all around the mall roof. Behind me and to the right were the walls that rose up to the third floors of the big department store
s. I was two floors up above the main mall itself.

  155 I began to morph again.

  "All right, David," I said to the darkness. "You want this fight? You can have this fight."

  The orange-and-black fur swept across my body.

  The long tail extended out behind me.

  I fell forward onto footpads the size of frying pans. I tested my claws, extending them slowly from their sheaths.

  I felt the tiger's instincts welling up beneath my own. I had done this morph many times. I had long since learned to control the tiger's bloodthirsty instincts.

  But I didn't want to control them. Not this time. Not with Tobias lying dead.

  I sniffed the breeze and smelled him. I listened and heard the stealthy pad of feet on the gravel and tar paper.

  I looked, with eyes that were indifferent to darkness.

  He was fifty feet away. His mane ruffled in the breeze. His tail swooshed restlessly back and forth.

  «You never answered me, Jake,» he said. «Lion versus tiger. Who do you think will win?»

  «Let's find out,» I said.

  Instantly he was a tan blur, racing straight at me, low to the ground.

  156 So fast! Faster than a human could react. So fast that human prey would not have had time to scream.

  But I wasn't human.

  Like a runaway train he came at me, yellow fangs bared. I sat back on my haunches, gathering power into my legs and lowering my own sleek head.

  We hit! His jaws raked past my ear. I twisted and sank my teeth into his ...

  Into his mane! My teeth closed on nothing but hair!

  «Aaaarrrggghhh!» I cried. I felt as if someone had shoved red-hot spikes into my shoulder.

  His teeth sank deep into muscle and sinew. I twisted, but that only made the pain worse.

  I rolled onto my back. My belly was exposed!

  He released my shoulder and darted in for the kill, hoping to disembowel me. But I was ready. I curled my back legs up and slashed!

  His head snapped back. Blood flew from his muzzle.

  Like lightning, I was up on my feet. Fast as only a cat is fast. With liquid speed and vicious grace.

  I was up! But the lion, too, is cat.

  The paw hit the side of my head so hard my eyes exploded in fireworks. I jumped away and barely avoided those deadly yellow fangs.

  157 Suddenly we were both circling, circling, head-to-head, tails twitching, waiting for the other to make a careless move.

  He was as fast as I was. I was bigger and heavier, but not by enough to matter much. And he had that mane that kept my teeth from the one target they wanted most: the arteries that pumped blood through his neck.

  I stared into his eyes. He stared into mine. We were electric! Tingling, bristling, buzzing with power and speed and energy.

  He leaped!

  We hit, shoulder-to-shoulder, and rolled across the roof.

  I was on my feet in a flash. But suddenly I realized I wasn't on gravel. My feet were slipping. My claws had nothing to grip.

  I was standing on glass. The skylight!

  Below me I saw the dim night-lights of the mall. I caught a strange, unreal glimpse of the Waldenbooks and the Baby Gap beside it.

  It was a twenty-foot drop to the upper mall concourse.

  David leaped. I couldn't grip well enough to move. So I stood, defenseless, as the tan blur came at me like a truck.

  He hit! His mouth was aimed at my throat. I jerked aside, he slammed into me, and there was a huge, world-filling shattering of glass.

  158 Down we fell!

  Down we fell, slashing and biting and trying to kill, even as the floor rushed up to slam us.

  And then, in midair, twisting to get my feet beneath me, I felt the teeth.

  I felt them sink into my neck.

  I felt the blood gushing.

  The tiger's blood.

  My blood.

  Falling . . .

  Falling . . . and already the darkness ... the darkness . . .

  To be continued. . .

  159 Don't miss

  he sun was just thinking about coming up as we approached Marco's house. It was already bright as day to me, of course. But I could tell the difference just the same. The black sky was becoming gray in the east.

  I felt like I was boiling inside. Like pressure just kept building up in me. Like I was going to explode.

  Too much swirling through my brain. Tobias, dead. Maybe Jake as well. David, a traitor with all the powers of an Animorph.

  And at the same time, we had the biggest mission of our lives. The heads of state were still meeting. Controllers, including Visser Three himself, were still conspiring to enslave the most powerful of all humans.

  It was too much. Way too much. I couldn't think about all that.

  One thing at a time, Rachel, I silently told

  160 myself. Priorities: David was number one. Everything else was number two.

  David had to be stopped. Before he could stop us.

  But still, somewhere in the back of my mind, it bothered me that Jake had sent Ax to get me. Me, specifically. Once he knew that extreme measures might be taken, he said, "Get Rachel."

  What did that mean? Was that how Jake thought of me? As some crazed, violent nut who would do anything?

  No, of course not. He just knew I was good in a fight. That's all. It didn't mean anything.

  Besides, wasn't it true? another part of my mind argued. Wasn't it true? Wasn't I just the person to call if you needed to kill an Animorph?

  Marco's house. Marco's window. Open.

  Open? Did Marco leave his window open? Yes, if he'd already flown out of it. Maybe that was it. Maybe Marco wasn't home, had already left. Maybe he'd sensed we needed him.

  But as I wheeled to traverse the back of his house, bringing myself closer to the window, I saw Marco inside, in bed.

  «This smells bad,» I said to Ax.

  «You have a sense of smell in that morph?»

  «l meant it, you know, figuratively. Visser Three laid one trap for us. David laid another. I am finished walking into traps.»

  161 « Agreed. »

  «Marco!» I called in thought-speak. «Marco! Wake up! Wake up, now!»

  I wanted to see him wake up and look around. I wanted to make sure he was alone in the room. He was asleep face down. He rolled halfway over and gave the blankets a kick.

  «Wake up!» I yelled.

  Suddenly he sat up and looked around. He scratched his face. Then he looked around again.

  «Marco, it's me, Rachel. I'm outside. Are you alone in your room?» He didn't smile or leer. He just nodded. Yes, he was alone.

  «0kay, let's go,» I said.

  Ax was ahead of me. He swooped down toward the window. Marco stood watching, smiling almost. His hands were behind his back.

  Swoooosh! Ax swooped through the window and -

  Marco pulled his hands out from behind his back. The Louisville Slugger swung in a short, sharp arc.

  WHAM!

  The bat hit Ax square in the face. I saw a piece of shattered beak go flying, twirling away like shrapnel from an explosion.

  Ax fell to the grass outside. Marco laughed quietly. I saw his sides shake.

  But of course, it was not Marco at all.

  162 David. David had morphed Marco.

  Ax lay on the grass, unmoving. Marco/David held up one finger. Then another. Then another. One, two, three.

  He was counting how many of us he'd killed.

  One, two, three: Tobias, Jake, Ax.

  But... it should have been four! What about Marco?

  Of course! Marco was still alive because Marco had been human. David had said it himself: He would never take down a human life. He would only kill animals. A hawk, a tiger, a harrier. Not a human.

  As I watched, I saw Marco/David begin to blur. The nose and eyes became subtly different. Now he was just David. But he was still morphing when he stepped back out of sight.

  I had to think.
David was wiping us out, one by one. What was his next move? What was his next morph? Jake would know. Jake was the leader, not me.

  I had to get to Ax. No! That's what David wanted.

  No, I had to get to Marco. The real Marco, who was probably unconscious inside the house.

  No, wait, that wasn't right, either.

  And then the golden eagle came flapping out of the window. Another of David's morphs.

  It was one on one. Him and me. Golden eagle

  163 against owl. He was faster. Stronger. But it was still mostly dark and the air was cool, with none of the warm lift it would have later in the day after the sun came up and baked the ground.

  He was faster and stronger, but the night belonged to me.

  I turned and raced away. He followed. Ax lay still on the damp grass. But he was breathing. And to my infinite relief, he was no longer entirely a harrier.

  «Follow me, David,» I said. «We'll see who wins this aerial dogfight.»

  «Brave words,» he sneered. «But you're mine. Just like that Bird-boy of yours was mine.»

  And that's when the pressure inside me evaporated. I was cold again. Cold as a frozen lake. I knew what to do. And I wanted to do it.

  I shouldn't resent Jake for thinking of me, I realized. It's what made him a good leader: He knew all us all. He knew me.

  «For you, Tobias,» I whispered. And I led David toward his doom.