I don't know who panicked first. Maybe it was me. Maybe we'd just had all the fear and horror we could stand. It was like an electric shock went through all of us. We were running before I had a chance to even know what I was doing.
I ran. I gasped for air.
A cry went up from the Hork-Bajir.
"Split up," I yelled. "They can't follow all of us."
Marco and Tobias and Cassie took off in three different directions. Rachel was still right beside me. Glancing back, I saw the Hork-Bajir hesitate, unsure of who to chase.
Rachel and I are the fastest runners. Tobias is totally out of shape, and Marco and Cassie are too short to be really fast. So I figured if the aliens were going to chase anyone, it ought to be us.
I guess Rachel thought the same thing. She slowed down just a little and began yelling and waving her arms. "Come on, come on, you — " And then she said some words I didn't realize Rachel even knew.
The two nearest Hork-Bajir snapped around and took off after us. "Ghafrash! Here! Ghafrash fit! Enemy! Get!"
Even in my panic it surprised me. They were talking some mix of their own alien language and ours.
"Ghafrash fit nahar! I get! I kill!"
I ran. Suddenly my foot slammed something and I was down. I hit the ground hard. The wind was knocked out of me. I tried to fill my lungs again. Rachel ran on. She didn't know I had fallen.
A spear of red light struck a concrete pipe just beside me. The concrete vaporized. The two Hork-Bajir were coming after us, bounding like some devil kangaroos. I was up and running. Rachel must have realized I wasn't with her anymore. She stopped and started to come back toward me.
"Don't be an idiot!" I yelled. "Run!"
She hesitated just a second. But she knew she couldn't do anything more for me. She ran. I saw a dark hole ahead and raced toward it.
A doorway. Inside it was as black as a grave. It was one of the buildings that had almost been completed. Just bare concrete walls and scattered junk. But I knew I had been in here before. Marco and I had walked all through it. There were hallways and little side rooms. It was like a maze.
Marco! Rachel! Had they gotten away? And what about Cassie and Tobias?
I tried to get my brain to concentrate as I scurried across the first big room. There was a corridor… somewhere. I groped in the dark and found a wall.
I heard the sound of clawlike feet, huge, tearing, rending claw feet scraping over the bare concrete. A bottle went skittering across the floor.
The Hork-Bajir was close! And in the total darkness my superior human vision wasn't much use. But I knew my way around the empty building.
At least, I would have known my way around if my brain had been working.
I felt my hand go into emptiness. A doorway. Yes! It led down a hallway. I went through just as the light came on behind me. Someone had brought a flashlight.
"Efnud to tell fallay nyot fit? Whatever order."
"No. No need to capture them. Whoever you find, kill."
The first voice had been Hork-Bajir. The second voice was human. And the weird thing was, that voice sounded familiar. I tried to think. I knew I'd heard that voice somewhere. Where? Where?
"Just save the head," the human told the Hork-Bajir. "Bring that to me and we can identify it.
I slid quickly along the wall.
The light followed just steps behind me.
I racked my brains. Had there been a passageway…? Yes, there it was. As silently as I could, I slipped into it. The flashlight beam was just inches behind me.
I kicked something soft.
"Hey!"
It was a man! He had been lying on the ground, wrapped in a blanket.
"Hey, get outta here. This is my place, and I ain't got nothin' for you to steal."
I started to warn him, but one of the Hork-Bajir was there!
The flashlight landed on the homeless man's face. He blinked like an owl.
There was an alcove. Right behind me. I backed through.
The homeless guy screamed. I heard the sound of a scuffle.
Maybe the guy got away. I hope so.
But I never found out, because with the Hork-Bajir distracted, I ran. I ran and ran and ran. And as I ran, I really hoped it was all just a dream.
Somehow I made it home. I don't know how. I have no memories of anything after that last sight of the Hork-Bajir.
I wish I had no memories of anything that happened that night. If only I could forget it all…
I called around to the others. Everyone was shaky, but they were all alive. Rachel kept trying to apologize for leaving me. Marco just kept asking me if I was sure this wasn't a dream.
I guess I should have had the worst nightmares of my life that night, but I didn't. The world of nightmares was a joke compared to my new reality.
But by the next morning, a Saturday, I half believed it all had been a nightmare. The only thing that seemed real… really real… was the way the Andalite had of smiling with just his eyes.
I woke when my mom started pounding on my door.
"Jake, are you awake in there?"
I was now. "Um, yeah," I groaned. "I'm up."
"Your friend Tobias is here,"
"Tobias?" What was Tobias doing here?
"It's me." Tobias's voice. "Can I come in?"
"Um, sure." I sat up in my bed and blinked several times, trying to get my eyes unglued. The door opened. I heard Tobias say thank you to my mom.
He was glowing. I swear, he was glowing. Not like he was radioactive or anything, I don't mean that. It's just that his eyes were shining bright, and his face was one big grin, and he seemed to be tingling with energy, bouncing like he couldn't standstill.
"I did it," Tobias said.
I tried to get my hair to go in one direction by raking my fingers through it. "What are you talking about?"
I was yawning when he answered. "I became Dude."
I stopped yawning. My mouth actually snapped shut. Dude is Tobias's cat. "Huh?"
Tobias glanced around like there might be spies in the room. "I became Dude. Just like the Andalite said."
I just stared.
"It was so amazing. It didn't hurt or anything. I was petting him, and thinking about the whole thing last night, right? So I thought, why not give it a try?" He was pacing back and forth, snapping his fingers, bursting with enthusiasm. Very unlike Tobias.
"I didn't even know how to begin. So I just made sure the door to my room was locked. Fortunately, my uncle was still asleep."
Tobias has the most screwed-up family I know. He never knew who his father was, and his mom just decided to leave him a few years ago. Since then he'd been shuttled back and forth between his uncle here, and his aunt, who lives on the other coast. His aunt and his uncle can't stand each other, and it's like Tobias is some burden they each try to shove off on the other. I get the feeling neither of them cares about Tobias.
"So there I was, just sitting on my bed, thinking about it. Concentrating. Thinking about becoming Dude. I looked down at my hand." He grinned at me. "What do you think I saw, Jake?"
I shook my head slowly. "I don't know."
"I had fur, Jake. And I was growing claws. You should have seen the real Dude. He went nuts. I had to put him outside before I could morph all the way. He clawed me up pretty good." Tobias stuck a sliced finger into his mouth.
I swallowed hard. Okay, this was definitely crazy now. "Um, Tobias, is it possible you maybe just dreamed all this?"
"Not a dream," he said. Now he was serious Tobias again. The grin was gone. "It's all true, Jake. All of it."
His eyes met mine. I knew what he was saying. He had tried to pretend it was all a nightmare, too. But it was real. I looked away. I didn't want to start believing it had all been real. I wanted it all safely stored away in my head, just another bad dream. Bad dreams should stay in your head, not come jumping out into real life.
"I just kept concentrating on changing," Tobias said, "and in a few minutes, I was… not myself anymore."
His eyes bored in on me. "You have no idea what it's like, Jake. Being a cat is so… it's… I can't even describe it. You're so strong, for one thing. Just all this coiled power, and the way you can move! You know what I did? I jumped onto my dresser Three feet straight up in the air, and I landed like a feather. Three feet! You know how high that is when you're a cat? It's like a person jumping maybe thirty feet straight up."
He stopped suddenly and looked at me. "You don't believe me, do you?" he said. "Look, Tobias, it's just that sometimes it's hard to tell the difference between something real and something you're just imagining or dreaming."
"You think I'm crazy."
I considered for a minute. "I don't know, Tobias, let's review the facts. You say you turned into your own pet cat. Turned into an actual cat. Yes, I have to say that sounds crazy to me."
Tobias nodded thoughtfully. He gave a little smile. "I understand, Jake. You still don't want it to be true."
"What? You mean do I want to believe that you can change yourself into a cat? And all the rest of it? Do I wanted believe that Earth is being invaded by slimy slugs who live in people's brains and turn them into slaves? Do I want to believe that… that… Duh! No! I don't want to believe any of it."
"And how about the Andalite?" he asked in a quiet voice.
I hesitated. I don't know why, but I didn't want to just pretend the Andalite away.
Tobias put his hand on my arm. "Stand right there."
"What? What are you going to do?"
"I'm going to help you decide whether it's real or not."
"Tobias… "
"Just wait And don't scream or anything." So I waited.
For a few seconds, nothing happened. Tobias just stood there. I glanced at his face. His eyes… his eyes were different. The pupils weren't completely round anymore. I swear there was a reflective greenish light in them. And his mouth was protruding a little, puffing out.
He was shrinking. Growing smaller right before my eyes.
The neck of his shirt was loose. His pants started scrunching up at the ankles. He was shriveling. And at the same time fur — yes, fur! — began to grow on his hands and neck and face. It was gray, striped with black, just like Dude's.
I had this absurd desire to start giggling. Tobias was becoming a tabby cat! But I knew if I started giggling I'd just keep on and on and never, ever be able to stop.
Tobias was more cat than human now. The pointed ears rose atop his head. The whiskers stuck straight out from beneath his delicate pink nose. He had dropped to all fours, clothing now half-draped over him, like so many rags. His tail twitched. Yes — his tail.
I wondered if I would just drop dead from the lump that had filled my throat, or from the jack-hammer pounding of my heart. Then I wondered if I was still asleep.
But if it was a dream, it was a really convincing one.
I was standing there in my bedroom, staring down at a gray-black cat that less than two minutes earlier had been my friend, Tobias.
"I hope I'm asleep," I muttered. "I really do."
<You're not asleep.>
"Is that you?" I demanded of the cat.
<Can you hear me?> Tobias sounded surprised. Although "sounded" wasn't quite the right word.
