The Journey
Page 6
Globs of stuff floated along next to us. Brushed off the tunnel walls, bounced off our shark bodies. Some were rod-shaped and about the size of grapefruit. Others, just shapeless pieces of material. Still others, fuzzy balls, like Ping-Pong balls stuck all over with cotton.
I’m not much of a sightseer. Generally, sight-seeing puts me in a tedium-induced rage.
This was different.
I was happy to be a tourist, especially if it would keep me from going cannibal. Besides, how many suburban girls get to travel down a human vein as a tiny hammerhead shark?
Disney has nothing on the Animorphs.
Red blood cell. Red blood cell. Red blood cell. After I’d seen a few thousand, I stopped paying attention to them and started to focus on the other floating shapes.
Something seriously small passed in front of my eyes. To the sub-mini shark, it was about the size and shape of a pill bug. A pill bug with little spikes covering it. A 3-D millipede.
The thing looked out of place. Sharp and pointed in a world where everything else was soft and oval.
Again, I spotted the spiny thing. It wasn’t just bumping along in the current. It seemed to have a purpose. A mind or a will. I watched as it brushed up against a red blood cell, probed it, then bounced away.
I’m not big on superstition or New Age crap. Don’t read my horoscope. Never had my fortune told. But I had a feeling about that spiky thing. Some primitive, instinctual part of my human brain didn’t like it.
I powered my tail and caught up.
Ax said.
Ax explained.
Jake said.
Silence.
Then Cassie began to laugh.
Cassie said.
Oh, yeah. That’s the important thing.
We continued down the tunnel that was Marco’s vein. When we reached the branch Jake had pointed out, we followed the bloodstream into a wider tunnel.
The Helmacrons’ voices were growing slightly louder.
Then, suddenly —
Dead end!
The vein just … stopped.
We had stumbled into a fun house. Tunnels opened all around us, in every direction. Above the shark’s head, below its belly. Each one seemed to be a different size and shape. Some big enough for us to pass through. Some far too small.
The current had also stopped. I turned the hammerhead to the right and swam in a small circle. Hovering without progressing.
The blood cells and miscellaneous blobs that had been washing along beside us were still with us, but no more joined them.
Bump.
Tobias, knocking up against me.
I bumped into Jake. Turned to the right, swam in another tight circle.
The shark sensed danger. Not fear. Sharks have no understanding of fear. The shark was calm, confident. But it sensed some sort of change in the liquid surrounding us and it wanted to get out.
Maybe this is how sharks feel swimming in polluted ocean waters. I don’t know. The shark’s mind didn’t offer any explanation. It just said: Haul butt. Now.
I clamped down on the shark’s mind. Now wasn’t the time to panic.
I tuned into the shark’s skin. But there was no pain. Just a dim sort of tingle that wasn’t unpleasant. Nothing like the all-out agony of being in the stomach’s violent digestive juices.
One right in front of me. It wasn’t any particular shape or color. A fat molecule? A tiny bit of adrenaline? No way of knowing. And then …
As if a bomb had gone off inside, the glob silently broke into a thousand pieces.
I twisted my hammerhead and turned in another tight, right-hand circle. Noted a rod-shaped thing a few inches off to my right. And, then, suddenly, it was round and slightly green.
Weird, but true. Some of the molecules were lining up for the girls’ bathroom; others, for the boys’.
I bumped up against Ax.
To the right.
Again.
Suddenly, the current felt stronger. Maybe I was just more aware of it.
About a dozen tunnels went up to the left and up to the right. One tunnel seemed to go straight up.
Ax said.
Thump, thump.
And then …
Click! My brain made one of those sudden leaps. Like two puzzle pieces falling together.
Thump, thump.
Thump, thump.
Louder. Coming from all directions at once.
Jake said.
Marco
When I finally got home from my pathetic attempt at breaking and entering, I put on a long-sleeved sweatshirt. Couldn’t let Dad see my wrist. Didn’t want him to know I’d been trying to rob some kid when his deranged dog took a chunk out of me.
I dabbed some hydrogen peroxide on the puncture marks. Added a little Neosporin. Wished for ibuprofen. My whole arm throbbed.
But so what?
A little dog bite wasn’t going to kill me. The Helmacrons had that under control.
In a way, I welcomed the pain. It reminded me I was alive. For now.
The afternoon dragged on.
And I had no idea what was going on inside me.
Hours passed and all I heard from my friends were occasional strange orders.
Don’t sneeze.
Don’t eat or drink anything.
I wanted to tell them to include me in their thought-speak. Maybe. I mean, did I really want to know what a group of morphing warriors and egomaniacal lunatics were doing to my delicate internal tissues?
I contacted Mr. King. Had the Chee show up for dinner as Jake, Rachel, and Cassie.
Dinner.
I told my dad I was sick.
Just after the sun went down, I fell asleep, sprawled across my bed. About an hour later I woke up feeling weird. Sweaty. Wild. Angry.
Angry … at the Helmacrons! It wasn’t fair that I couldn’t protect myself. Stupid freakin’ …
The usual hang and chill routine was not going to happen. I was way too restless. Needed to do something. Got up and started to pace. Door to windows. Windows to door. Back. Forth.
And the anger continued to grow. Welled and surged and wouldn’t be held in check by my usual habit of black humor, transforming tragedy into comedy. There wasn’t one joke in me.
Maybe I just missed my audience.
Anyway, I was in an exceptionally foul mood.
A soft knock at the door. It opened. My dad stuck his head in. “Marco, hey, I thought I heard you moving around. How are you feeling?”
“Um, fine.”
Dad pursed his lips. Came in and put a hand against my cheek. “You’re flushed. And you feel a bit hot.”
I turned away. “I said I was fine!”
“Okay, okay.” He was taken aback by my reaction. “Well, if you’re feeling better … Nora and I have that dinner party. It’s a work thing. If you don’t need me to stay with you.”
I immediately saw the opportunity. “Go,” I said soothingly. “I’m just going to rest. Read that book for English.”
He probably didn’t buy that last part, but he headed for the door.
“Okay,” he said. “Well, I’ll leave the number on the refrigerator. Give us a call if you start to feel worse.”
“I’ll be fine,” I said again, through suddenly clenched teeth.
Dad left.
Ten minutes later I heard the car pull out of the driveway.
I waited another couple of minutes. Then I went down to the basement. Rooted around in the freezer until I found a steak. Upstairs in the kitchen, nuked it until it was defrosted and warm. Then I got my bike out of the garage.
I was going to get the camera.
So what if I couldn’t morph? So what if my friends couldn’t help me? So what if Cujo had practically ripped my arm off?
That camera was mine.
The ratty-looking Chee was still on guard. That meant that the camera, if not the kid, was still inside.
For about half a second I wondered if I should ask for his help. Maybe he could throw a holo around me, make it easier to sneak into the apartment.
Rejected the idea. It would probably violate the Chee’s code of nonviolence. What a joke.
I could do this alone.
The kid’s apartment building looked even more decrepit at night. But I felt no fear. I walked straight over the fence and across the concrete lot to the fire escape. It was still hanging down the way I’d left it. I charged up.
Cujo was waiting.
“Rrrrrrr!” He growled deep in his throat when he saw me on the fire escape.
Then he flung himself madly against the window. Totally airborne. Toenails clicking on the wooden sill. Drool flying. Teeth gleaming.
I grabbed the bottom of the rickety window and yanked it up about halfway.
“ArfARFARFARFARFARF!” Cujo’s snapping jaws were inches from my throat.
“Stuff it,” I said, tossing the steak into the room.
He lay down with it between his paws. Licked. Slobbered. Seemed to be having a hard time eating it. Something was wrong with his jaw. Maybe he’d lost a tooth gnawing my arm off.
I heaved the window open farther. Dropped down onto the floor and eased around the slavering dog. The camera was a few feet away, still sitting on the kid’s desk.
I’d just closed my fingers on the bright yellow box when I heard voices in the hallway, surprisingly close.
Cujo heard them, too. He rose to his feet and growled at me. Blocking my only exit.
Door. People. Cops. Juvie hall.
Window. Cujo.
Two options.
Both bad.
Either way, I was going to get caught.
Rachel
Thump, thump.
Pause.
Thump, thump.
As we swam the beating grew louder and louder, until it was impossible to hear anything else. Impossible to know if the Helmacrons were near.
Ax didn’t ask questions. Tobias didn’t make any dark observations. Jake didn’t talk strategy. Cassie didn’t point out landmarks.
We were overwhelmed by the incredible reverberating noise surrounding us. The sound of Marco’s heart beating.
THUMP! THUMP!
Pause.
THUMP! THUMP!
Each beat vibrated through my body, overpowering any human thought or emotion. We didn’t have a plan for capturing the Helmacrons. I didn’t try to think of one.
Closer. Closer. Thump, thump. The sound became so intense I felt it would blow me apart. But it was a wonderful sound. As long as we experienced that thump, thump Marco was still alive.
The red blood cells we were chasing had changed color. They were darker now, maroon, the color of a scab. Cassie didn’t need to explain what was happening. I’d read the Magic School Bus, too.
Close to the heart, the level of oxygen in the blood cells was low. The cells would pass through the heart and then into the lungs to pick up more oxygen.
Less oxygen in the blood cells meant less oxygen for the sharks. But we couldn’t turn back. We had to stop the Helmacrons from killing Marco. Do or die.
The vein through which we were traveling grew larger. Other veins emptied into it and the current picked up. This time, it was like moving from a small street to a larger road to a busy thruway. And finally, to a six-lane superhighway.
Ahead was a sort of aperture of flesh. As the current swept us along, it opened wider, wider. Fluttering in front of the opening were three
red sheets of flesh. They moved like curtains blowing in an open window. Like those felt strips at the beginning of a car wash. As the valve widened, they blew inside.
The current was smooth but powerful. The heart was sucking us in.
Closer …
Closer …
Closer! Then —
SLLLUMP!
The aperature closed. The curtains of flesh sealed together with a wet, sucking noise.
We slowed, stopped. We were in a vast opening just outside the heart, surrounded by an ocean of blood.
THUMP!
THUMP!
The valve began to open. The curtains began to billow in.
Then — we flowed into the first chamber of the heart.
Things happened fast.
Furious turbulence! Blood was flowing past so fast I could hardly suck in any oxygen. Imagine swimming up Niagara Falls. And the walls were contracting like a trash compactor!
I couldn’t see the Helmacrons. But I could smell them. Somewhere in the heart. Five of them. Maybe tangled in one of the tissue sprays that connected the walls like chaotic gothic arches. Maybe bobbing in the thrashing ocean of blood.
I didn’t know.
I didn’t care.
And I didn’t care what had happened to the other four Helmacrons. Maybe the liver had taken them. Maybe they had been washed away by the last heartbeat.