Let's Read Animorphs! The Whole Series! Ch-ch-ch-chaaanges

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Bobulus: Jan 28, 2007

Having not seen the cover, and going off the title, I'm going to guess... at the peak of a very tall mountain, to minimize human contact and maximize view of the sky.

... now I'm picturing Everest as an infestation spot. Everyone who wants to climb it these days is rich, and it's isolated. Plus if anything goes wrong, the occasional accidental death won't raise eyebrows.

# ? Jul 14, 2021 13:24

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# ? May 28, 2024 18:56

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

I'll post the cover when I get home tonight. Its Marco turning into a polar bear.

Epicurius fucked around with this message at 13:57 on Jul 14, 2021

# ? Jul 14, 2021 13:48

Strategic Tea: Sep 1, 2012

Desert adventure! :toot:

# ? Jul 14, 2021 17:34

pastor of muppets: Aug 21, 2007; We were somewhere around the Living Hive, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold...

spotted in the wild

# ? Jul 14, 2021 22:29

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

here's the cover.

# ? Jul 14, 2021 23:52

freebooter: Jul 7, 2009

San Diego Zoo, here we come!

# ? Jul 15, 2021 00:39

HIJK: Nov 25, 2012; in the room where you sleep

oh god this one
should be interesting

# ? Jul 15, 2021 00:57

Tree Bucket: Apr 1, 2016; R.I.P.idura leucophrys

Epicurius posted:

here's the cover.

Marco's outfit dates this book more precisely than the publication info on the first page ever could.

# ? Jul 15, 2021 01:09

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

Chapter 5

quote:

I spilled the air from my wings and slipped through the trees. I landed silently on the ground, my laser-focus eyes locked on Visser Three all the way. If he showed any signs of noticing any one of us landing, we were going to take off without a second thought. That was the plan.

The Visser trotted through the grass, feeding through his hooves like any ordinary Andalite would do. The Hork-Bajir and human-Controllers looked outward, like Secret Service agents around the President.

I watched him closely to see if he noticed as we came in for our staggered landings. Nothing unusual. No sign his guards had seen us.

I flitted through the tree branches. Stopping, flying, stopping again. Till I was just a hundred feet or so from the Visser. Then I dropped to the ground, found cover behind a huge elm tree, and began to demorph.

Even though I�ve done it dozens of times now, morphing never fails to freak me out. I mean, talk about unnatural. It doesn�t hurt, but it�s still just creepy.

An itchiness washed over me as my feathers turned soft and ran together, transforming themselves back into skin. My wings, now pale flesh like a plucked chicken�s, began to shrink and disappear into my shoulder blades. I could feel the bones in my legs creaking as they stretched out to their normal length and grew heavy.

SPLOOT! Suddenly, fingers. I could feel them twitching, but they were attached to my shoulders!

Ugh. My arms sprouted out of my torso like plants growing out of the ground in time-lapse photography, pushing the fingers and hands out before them, reaching their usual length in a few seconds.

I was fully human now, dressed in ugly black cycling pants and a tight, white T-shirt. We�ve never figured out how to morph clothes, other than skintight stuff. Forget shoes. It�s probably not even possible. Andalites invented morphing technology. And since they don�t wear clothes, morphing �artificial skin,� as Ax says, isn�t an issue for them.

I crouched there in the dirt for a few minutes, catching my breath before morphing again. This morph was nowhere near as fun as an osprey. In fact, it was downright gross. I concentrated. I envisioned myself as a fly.

SCHLOOP! My arms and legs shriveled back into my body with a sound like the one you make when you suck a spaghetti noodle into your mouth. Good thing I was crouching when I�d started or I�d have crashed to the ground.

Very annoying. No legs or arms. Unfortunately, every morph is different every time. You never know exactly how things will happen.

Then I began to shrink. The trees around me became taller and taller as I became tinier and tinier. The leaves on the ground next to me looked as big as parking lots. I was fly-size now, but my body was still more human than insect.

I was not an attractive creature right then. Marian would not have asked me out.

My limbless torso began to divide itself into three parts. Six tiny, hairy legs shot out of my sides.

An itchy spot on my back suddenly sprouted tiny gossamer wings.

All that remained of the morph was the part I dreaded most. Suddenly my two eyes began to pop.

The two eyes became four. Then sixteen. Then two hundred fifty-six. And so on. I saw the world through thousands of tiny, fuzzy TV screens, facing in all directions. Compound eyes.

A long tube sprouted out of my face, a proboscis that flies use to cover their garbage with saliva before they chow down.

If I morph to fly a million more times, I will never get over the sheer grossness of it.

We wasted about half an hour hooking up together. Six flies with senses designed to find dog poop. Not easy, but we eventually assembled into a sort of hideous squadron.

We took off. A nervous, disgruntled, testy little squadron of flies on a mission to intercept thecruelest creature on Earth.

Just another fun day of being an Animorph.

I do have to say, I like the line "Suddenly, fingers."

Chapter 6

quote:

<How long until the Visser�s dust-off flight arrives?> Jake asked Ax.

<Five of your minutes,> Ax said. One of the many nice things about having Ax around is that he has a sort of built-in clock that allows him to keep track of the time.

On the other hand � <Ax, I really think you can just deal with the fact that they aren�t our minutes. They are everyone�s minutes.>

Ax ignored me.

<Let�s get this over with,> Rachel replied.

<Okay,> Jake said. <Remember, if anything goes wrong, don�t look back. Get out of there as fast as you can. Ax? What�s the best way to sneak up on an Andalite?>

<From beneath.>

<Okay, you heard him,> Jake said. <We buzz the grass, try to intersect him, come up beneath him, grab some Andalite stomach fur. Any questions?>

<Nah, why would there be questions?> I said. 

<Was that an example of human sarcasm?> Ax asked.

<Ax, it�s sarcasm for anyone, not just for humans.>

<Let�s get this over with,> Tobias grumbled. <Lousy fly eyes. I hate this.>

We kept low, down where a fly likes to fly. Down low where it can smell the rotting food and the animal feces and other wonderful, tasty things.

We skimmed the wild grass tops. It was like flying at treetop level except that these trees were impossibly tall, willowy stalks that bent with every chance breeze.

We buzzed our crazy fly wings and bobbled and weaved and wallowed toward a vague blob of blue fur and bad attitude. Visser Three was still running, but slowing down. He was moving at an angle from us. We�d intersect in a few minutes. Less, if he �

Turned!

<Yah! There he is!> Cassie yelped. <Quick, or we lose him!>

I cut a wild turn. A pair of flies zipped in front of me. Impossible to tell who. The chase was on!

Galumph, galumph, galumph. The Visser trotted, pursued by six panicked flies.

<Stay low!> Jake reminded us. <Go for the belly!>

A wall of blue fur galloped right across my line of flight. I saw two flies zip down and under the heaving curve and disappear from my limited sight. Then two more flies from out of nowhere.

My turn.

I shot through the air. Visser Three loomed straight ahead but I couldn�t see clearly enough to tell whether his stalk eyes were looking in my direction. I focused on his stomach and made a beeline for it.

Six inches away! I did the fly somersault, a midair Shannon Miller kind of thing that brought my legs up and wings down, vectoring in like a wobbly rocket.

Two inches to touchdown! NO! He cut a sharp right and veered away.

I shot toward him again, but now he bolted to the left. <What�s with him, is he drunk?> I demanded in outrage.

<Aren�t you on board, Marco? Everyone else is here,> Jake said.

<No, we�re playing catch. Ahh!>

He�d stopped suddenly. A hand the size of Colorado reached around, trying to grab me! I slammed into reverse, spun in midair, and zipped away. Only then did I realize the true target of Visser Three�s hand.

He was scratching his butt.

<Marco?> A thought-spoken whisper. Jake. <Are you here?>

Suddenly, it got very dark.

A big black shadow, blocking out the sun. Something straight out of a science fiction movie.

A Bug fighter. They�re called that for a reason. They look like a big, black cockroach. A roach the size of a school bus, with two long pincerlike things sticking straight out, like antennae with heavy starch. The Bug fighter slowly lowered until it touched the ground. I froze. Visser Three froze. A doorway - or at least a rectangle of relative darkness - appeared in its side.

The big blue blob in front of me trotted inside.

I followed him.

Inside it was dark. A few lines of light along what was probably the ceiling and floor. An occasional box of light, probably display monitors. The air pressure around me suddenly changed as the entrance closed. I maintained and kept my eyes on the Visser.

<Marco? Are you here?> Jake asked again.

<Attempting rendezvous now, Houston. Ten seconds to contact.>

Visser Three came to a halt. I dove for his underbelly. Just as I felt his fur under my feelers, my brain exploded with the sound of very loud thought-speak.

<Is the Blade ship ready?> Visser Three never whispers.

Something answered. A Taxxon? They�re smarter than Hork-Bajir. Weirder, too. They eat their own.

But I couldn�t see anything but giant blue stalks of fur. On the floor of this jungle was warm, pinkish-khaki skin. I didn�t want to touch that skin. I grabbed a few blue stalks and clung.

<Ax, what was that Taxxon saying?> Jake asked.



<And?> Jake asked.

<And I am afraid we have a problem, Prince Jake,> Ax said.

My fly stomach bounced. Then it bounced again. I clung tighter to the Visser�s fur. We were taking off and I was fighting the fly�s panic reaction:
Things vibrating means MOVE!

<What�s the problem, Ax?> Jake asked.



<How long?> I asked.

<Approximately three and a half of your Earth hours.>

<Uh-oh,> I heard Cassie reply.

<Oh, man!> Tobias said.

<You�re kidding me,> Rachel said.

The reason we weren�t happy to hear this news, of course, is that it meant we were going to have to demorph at some point in flight. Somewhere aboard a ship occupied by Taxxons and Hork-Bajir and Visser Three.

I do sort of wish we knew more about the inner life of Taxxons. Obviously, the only slave races of the Yeerks we see are the Hork-Bajir and the Taxxons (and the Gedd and humans, I guess.). We're told in an early book by a Yeerk that they conquered some other aliens, but they're never referred to again and are forgotten about. The thing is, though, with the exception of humanity, none of these species would likely ever make it to space on their own. The Yeerks are intelligent enough, but they're semiautotrophic filter feeders who are confined to their spawning pools without and because of those limitations really can't develop technology. With the exception of the rare seers, the Hork-Bajir will never come up with anywhere near the knowledge base to develop a society that can understand rocketry. The Taxxons while they're both intelligent and dexterous, are so trapped by their overwhelming hunger that on their own, without Yeerk willpower to control it, aren't able to concentrate on developing it, because they're spending all their time trying to find enough food. I really have no idea where I'm going with this thought, but I find it interesting.

# ? Jul 15, 2021 03:54

Rochallor: Apr 23, 2010; ふっっっっっっっっっっっっｃｋ

Three hours seems like a long time to get anywhere for a space-capable craft, especially when realistically, all of this is in southern California. Is it too much to hope that Visser Three has learned his lesson and is just having the Bug ship fly in circles to make it harder for morphers to infiltrate?

# ? Jul 15, 2021 05:47

Tree Bucket: Apr 1, 2016; R.I.P.idura leucophrys

Epicurius posted:

The thing is, though, with the exception of humanity, none of these species would likely ever make it to space on their own.

Along with thermals, the authors also wished to educate their readers on the Fermi Paradox

# ? Jul 15, 2021 08:46

nine-gear crow: Aug 10, 2013

Tree Bucket posted:

Along with thermals, the authors also wished to educate their readers on the Fermi Paradox

How the Andalites survived the Great Filter is one of the series' greatest mysteries.

# ? Jul 15, 2021 09:13

Cythereal: Nov 8, 2009; I love the potoo,
and the potoo loves you.

nine-gear crow posted:

How the Andalites survived the Great Filter is one of the series' greatest mysteries.

The Ellimist did it. I have no idea if he actually did or not, but it seems like his kind of bullshit.

We've also seen that the Skrit Na apparently made it into space on their own.

# ? Jul 15, 2021 13:16

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

Chapter 7

quote:

<Three and a half of our hours! Where are we going, the moon?> Tobias asked.

<Don�t you start with the our-hour-your-hour thing, Tobias,> I warned.

<No,> Ax replied. <Going to the moon would take less than three and a half of your hours. Our journey will take longer because we will be flying through the planet�s atmosphere.>

<Any idea of our destination?> Jake asked.

<The navigator did not say. I will, however, do my best to gauge our direction as we go along.>

<Ax, you�d have made a great Cub Scout.>

<A what?>

<What are we going to do?> Cassie asked.

Good question. We were trapped on a Bug fighter with our worst enemy. And now we had the choice of revealing our presence - suicidal - or spending the rest of our lives as garbage-eating insects.

BOOOOM!

<What was that?!> Rachel cried. <Man, this fly does not want to sit still.>

 Ax replied.

If a Bug fighter is like a bus, a Blade ship is like a jumbo jet. It�s shaped like a battle-ax from the Middle Ages. And it�s Visser Three�s personal ship.

<This might actually be a good thing,> Jake said. <At least the Blade ship is big enough so we might find someplace to hide and demorph. No way we could demorph on the Bug fighter without being seen.>

<Have I mentioned that I hate this morph?> Tobias added. 

<Yeah,> Cassie agreed. <He stinks. But to my fly brain, he actually smells kind of good.>

<He certainly does not stink,> Ax said defensively. <This is an Andalite body, and Andalites have never been known to stink.>

Suddenly the air pressure changed, ever so slightly. Just enough to make me lose control. I started to fly, then canceled that order and ended up zooming back hard into the Visser�s belly.

<Oops,> I said.

<Oops what?> Jake said tensely.

<Oops, he may have felt that.> I glued my wings down and managed to calm the jumpy fly brain just as six gigantic blue columns crashed down around me, digging across the skin and through the fur like massive plows.

<Oh, man, I�m being scratched!> I cried.

<Cursed parasites!> Visser Three shouted.

<Hey, he�s one to talk,> Rachel said.

<Heads up, everybody,> Jake said. <Be ready to jump at any second!>

The first scratch missed me. As I tried to avoid the Visser�s searching fingers, I jumped from palm-tree-sized hair to palm-tree-sized hair with blazing speed, like Tarzan after a gallon of Mountain Dew.

<Marco, stay still!> Jake shouted.

<That�s easy for you to say!> I shouted back.

Suddenly the fingers stopped raking and formed a cage around me. Trapped!

<I�m about to get pinched!>

<Marco!> Cassie cried.

I felt a slight breeze wash over me. The kind of minuscule air movement only a fly notices. Then I felt a new vibration. Dozens of tiny impacts: the needle-sharp legs of a Taxxon.

<He�s welcoming the Visser back aboard the Blade ship,> Ax translated. <Or he may be telling him his brother is a meteor fragment. I understand Galard, but this morph�s hearing is very uncertain.>

The Visser took his hand from his belly. The telephone pole fingers withdrew.

<Are all the Venber on board?> Visser Three growled.

<Venber?> Ax asked excitedly. <He did say Venber, did he not?>

 Jake replied. <Is that important?>

<Hey, Ax. You�re not holding out on us, are you?>

 Ax said, not exactly answering my question.

<Excellent,> the Visser replied. <With twice as many Venber, our project will be completed in half the time.>

<Well, at least he knows his math,> Tobias said wryly.

And that was it for the better part of an hour. They say combat is ninety-nine percent waiting around and one percent sheer terror. They�re right. We hung out upside down, clinging to Visser Three�s stomach hair, and tried not to let ourselves be overcome by the unholy, screaming willies.

I mean, it�s one thing being a fly when you�re busy. But just hanging out, you start to notice the spit dribbling off the end of your proboscis. And that�s not good.

<So,> I said, <did anyone bring a deck of cards? Anyone seen a good movie lately? Anyone have any juicy confessions they�d like to make?>

We were in what must have been the Visser�s private quarters. A spare room with no furniture except for a computer console. After all, he was in an Andalite body, and Andalites don�t sit.

There were various things hanging from the walls, like art. Some were large and elaborate, made of steel or something like steel. Some had electrical probes. Some had teeth or spikes or saws.

We had an idea they might be instruments of torture collected from around the galaxy.

We had that idea because I recognized one of the artworks: It�s called an �iron maiden.� Not the dinosaur rock band, the Middle-Ages cage with the spikes inside. It was a little depressing to realize that some Earth museum had unwillingly made a contribution on behalf of Homo Sapiens.

And it was even more depressing realizing that we were going up against a guy who thought you should hang an iron maiden on the wall instead of a Baywatch poster.

So, fun fact....iron maidens are probably not actually real, or at least not real as medieval torture devices. They don't first really get talked about until the 19th century, as proof of medieval barbarism. There was, in the late middle ages, a device used in Germany called the Schandmantel, or coat of shame, which was this wooden or metal device that criminals had to wear in public to humiliate them (and it was heavy and tiring). No spikes, though.

Chapter 8

quote:

We�d cleverly come up with two plans. Plan A involved Visser Three leaving the room voluntarily while the rest of us stayed behind and did a quick demorph followed by a remorph. But as time passed and the Visser made no move to leave, it looked more and more like we were going to have to implement the much riskier Plan B.

Fine by me. I was ready to do something or go insane. Inactivity makes for way too much time to think about things like death and destruction and pain and violence. Inactivity makes for fear.

Another good defense against fear is humor. From my point of view, if you�re not laughing, you�re crying. Humor as coping mechanism.

Besides, I sort of consider it my job to keep us loose in these situations. Entertain the troops.

<Say, Rachel, I got a joke for you,> I said.

<No you don�t,> she said.

I ignored the warning. <Two blonds are standing across the river from one another �>

<Hey,> Tobias interrupted. <Remember, I�m a blond, too. It may be dirty-blond, but it�s still blond.>

<Yeah, for a couple of hours a week,> I said. <Anyway, the one blond calls out to the other blond, �How do I get to the other side?�>

<That is very funny, Marco,> Ax said brightly.

 I replied. <And the blond across the river calls back to her, �You ARE on the other side!�>

<That does it,> Rachel said. <Time for Plan B.>

<I�ve heard that one before,> Tobias said, unimpressed.

 Ax replied.

<Tobias, where exactly did you hear that joke before?> I demanded. <A sparrow, an owl, and you, hanging out and swapping stories?>

<Ax, do you have any idea where we are?> Jake asked.



<Still north?> Jake replied. <How much longer until we have to demorph?>

<About twenty minutes,> Ax replied. <of your minutes,> he added, with what I swear was deliberate provocation.

<Good. Plan B. Let�s do something, anything.> Rachel. Of course.

<Yeah. Guess we should,> Jake said without much enthusiasm. <Ax, are you ready?>



<Break a leg, Ax-man,> I said.

<Whose leg?>

<It�s just a � never mind.>

Everything was quiet for a few seconds. Then our brains were bombarded with the sound of very loud thought-speak.

<Guard! Come in here immediately!> Ax bellowed. A pretty decent imitation of Visser Three.

I sensed a breeze filled with the scent of a Hork-Bajir warrior.

Visser Three�s sudden, startled movement felt like a massive earthquake. I clung tightly to my chosen hairs.

<What are you doing, fool?!> Visser Three shouted at the Hork-Bajir. <What is the meaning of this interruption?!>

The Hork-Bajir muttered.

<Get out!> the Visser raged. <Get out or I�ll feed you to the Taxxons!>

The guard left.

<Again, Ax,> Jake said.

Ax bellowed.

Another breeze. I smelled a different Hork-Bajir. I could feel Visser Three quaking with rage.

<What?!> he screamed. It was like being in a front row seat at a Beastie Boys concert. Right by the big speakers. I thought my head was going to explode.

A sudden muscle spasm. I knew right then that the Visser had snapped his deadly tail. Seconds later �

WHUMPF!

Something big hit the floor. I didn�t want to think about what it was. Who it was.

<Once more ought to do it, Ax,> Jake said. I could sense his hesitation.

I almost felt sorry for the Hork-Bajir. They�re just helpless slaves of the Yeerks. Whatever they do is at the command of the evil Yeerks in their brains. In fact, before the Yeerks conquered them, the Hork-Bajir were a peaceful race. They�re just big, dumb, bark-eating lizards. And kind of sweet,
really. Innocent victims in a war that didn�t seem to have any other kind.

Ax shouted a third time and I whiffed two Hork-Bajir entering. I guess they thought two at once would help.

It didn�t.

The Visser lunged, out of control with rage. Toward the two Hork-Bajir, toward the door. Out!

<Everybody off!> Jake yelled. <Stay low!>

I let go and shot through the air. I watched as the huge blue blob disappeared through the doorway. The door shut behind him.

<Demorph and remorph as fast as you can!> Jake instructed.

I landed on the floor and immediately began to demorph.

Morphing�s never logical. It never happens the same way twice.

This time, the first thing that changed were my eyes. Thousands of them went POP. Just like that, I had my human eyes again.

This was not necessarily a good thing, since it gave me the chance to watch everybody - including myself - demorph. And it gave me a real good view of the poor Hork-Bajir on the floor. At least he was in one piece. He might still live. Hork-Bajir are a sturdy bunch. Yeah, he might live. If the Taxxons didn�t find him first.

So Visser Three really likes his privacy, and once again, his management skills need work.

# ? Jul 16, 2021 03:37

Fuschia tude: Dec 26, 2004; THUNDERDOME LOSER 2019

As much as people talk about quality decline with the ghostwritten books, so far, I have not really noticed a difference in the writing with this book. This author seems to have the style down, and the series concept.

# ? Jul 16, 2021 09:30

Pwnstar: Dec 9, 2007; Who wants some waffles?

Love Tobias disapproving of blonde jokes then just being disappointed that he already heard it.

# ? Jul 16, 2021 11:28

Terror Sweat: Mar 15, 2009

I remember this was the first time I had heard of dirty blond hair

# ? Jul 16, 2021 17:34

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

Chapter 9

quote:

Rachel�s change was especially weird. At first, she just grew. Before my eyes she went from being a little speck to a five-foot-tall, thousand-eyeballed insect, with blond hair sprouting from the back of her head.

Cassie has a talent for morphing. She does it better than any of us, even Ax. In a few seconds, she looked totally normal - except for the two gossamer wings attached to her back. She looked like an angel or a fairy godmother.

I looked at my hands. They were hairy claws, gigantic versions of a fly�s leg. I watched as the thick hairs disappeared, replaced by my own body hair. The ends of the claws cracked open like eggshells. My fingers slowly slithered out, like five baby snakes emerging from their shells.

�Everybody take about two deep breaths and remorph,� Jake whispered when we all were completely demorphed. Four humans, one red-tailed hawk, and one young Andalite.

Easier said than done. Morphing is like running a two-hundred-yard dash at top speed. You�re not ready to collapse afterward, but you�re not ready to do it again right away, either.

I took a few deep breaths and concentrated on becoming a fly. I imagined those thousand eyes and those hairy legs. That disgusting proboscis.

Jake was already changing, getting smaller and smaller. Rachel�s arms began to shrink and grow black hairs. Cassie�s wings were sprouting. Tobias�s intense hawk eyes began to double, triple, quadruple, while his hooked beak grew outward, transforming itself into a tube.

Ax and I seemed to be behind everybody else. Then we heard a faint hissing. We exchanged worried glances before turning our eyes toward the door.

The door slid open.

The unconscious Hork-Bajir�s luck had just run out.

Taxxon! A tree-trunk-thick centipede with needle legs and weak claws and a red-rimmed mouth and raspberry Jell-O eyes.

It saw me, only half-morphed. It was puzzled.

Then it saw Ax. An Andalite. No longer puzzled. Terrified! The Taxxon hasn�t been born who can confront an Andalite.

<Ax!> Jake shouted. <Pretend you�re Visser Three!>

<What is the meaning of this interruption?!> Ax shouted.

The Taxxon didn�t reply. He wasn�t fooled. He was motoring back out the door. And that couldn�t happen.

Just then my human eyes became compound fly eyes. I didn�t see Ax�s tail snap through the air like a bullwhip.

I heard fwapp!

A soft impact sound followed, like someone had dropped oatmeal on the floor.

An extremely foul smell filled the room. I knew that smell.

 Ax said.

<Is it dead?> Jake replied.

<In a manner of speaking,> Ax continued. <One half of it is consuming the other half.>

Taxxons are the universe�s most dedicated cannibals. They don�t just eat other Taxxons. They even eat themselves, given the chance. Hunger defines their world. In death, the Taxxon was acting out of some awful instinct.

<Ax,> Jake said, in his very calm, no-one-freak-yet voice. <Finish morphing to fly and let�s get out of here. Everybody stick close together. Hug the ceilings. Follow me. C�mon!>

We shot out of the room into a long hallway. The walls and ceiling of the corridor were black.

The floor seemed to be an illuminated path. Four thin tubes of solid light hung where the ceiling met the wall.

<Ax, what are these lights along the ceiling?> Jake asked.

<Each color designates the path to a certain portion of the ship. For example, on Andalite ships, following a green line will take you to the control room. A red line will take you to the engine room.>

<Do you think these light lines function in the same way?> I asked.

<It is likely. Everything the Yeerks have they stole from us. However, my fly vision cannot distinguish the colors of these various lines of light.>

<What would be the quietest part of the ship, Ax?> Cassie asked.

<Storage bays. They are most likely aft.>

<Can you tell which direction the ship is flying right now?> Jake asked.

<The ship is still heading north, Prince Jake.>

<So we want to go south. Let�s do that.>

<Uh, a little warning before we make any turns, please?> I said. <In this light I can barely see a thing.>

<Ditto,> Tobias added.

<If we can�t see each other,> Rachel said, <it�s unlikely Visser Three and his walking woodchippers are going to see us. I think.>

<Think again,> Cassie said. <Look who�s coming.>

A familiar blue blob. A now-familiar aroma.

<Stick to the ceiling,> Jake said.

Visser Three trotted right past us.

Right past us and into his room.

Then his voice was exploding in our heads like a nuclear bomb.

<Guards!> A moment�s hesitation as he put it all together. Then, <The Andalite bandits! They are on board!>

The hallway was suddenly filled with the smell of Hork-Bajir.

<Ax, what light path do we follow?> Jake asked.



<JUST PICK ONE!> Jake roared.

<Follow me,> Ax said meekly.

Jake almost never yells. When he does, you have to know it�s time to do what he says. There were four lines of lights, and all of them looked the same hazy gray-green to me. To all of us. But Ax picked one.

<Get the Andalites!> the Visser screamed in an absolute frenzy of rage and excitement. <Here! On my own Blade ship! Ah-hah! I will slowly kill the fool who fails me! Do you hear me? Get them! Get them! GET THEM!>

We blew out of there as fast as our little fairy wings would take us. We chased that ribbon of light, hoping it wasn�t leading us into an even uglier death trap.

I assume that Visser Three knows the Animorphs are on board are because of all the dead bodies? They really need to be more careful.

Chapter 10

quote:

Ax found the storage bays and led us there like he�d been born and raised on that Blade ship.

<They know about insect morphs,> Cassie said. <We�re vulnerable. They could flood the ship with insecticides.>

<I�m not dying as a fly,> Rachel said. <They want me, I�m taking some of them down with me.>

She was already demorphing. And as far as I could see, she was right: Forget dying as a bug. If the Yeerks were going to catch us, it wasn�t going to be with a can of Raid.

We were about as trapped as we could get. Visser Three knew we were on his ship. It was only a matter of time. And as far as this battle was concerned, the Yeerks owned time.

In our normal bodies again we could see how scared we were. I could see the way Jake was gritting his teeth, Rachel�s mean grin, Cassie�s worry, tinged with sadness. It would almost have been better to remain in morph. In morph you could hear the fear, but you didn�t have to look it in the eyes.

I was watching Rachel, trying to decide for the millionth time whether she was brave or just insane, when I happened to focus past her.

Rising up behind her was a pillar of glass. A cylinder ten feet, twelve feet tall, and half as broad. Inside the cylinder was a vague shape, blood-red and midnight-blue slashes highlighting a glistening silver body.

Yes, body. Because despite the frosted glass and the mist that filled the cylinder, that ten-foot-tall tube contained something biological. There was a row of the cylinders spaced across the cargo bay.

Maybe ten in all.

�They look like creatures of some kind,� Cassie said.

I could feel the cold emanating from the cylinders. I reached out to touch one, but my fingertips went numb before they�d gotten within an inch of the surface.

�Okay, this is a totally unnecessary new weirdness,� I said.

<They look almost like �> Ax began.

�Like what?� I demanded.

 Ax said. <But they cannot be �>

�What�s a Venber?� Rachel asked.

<An alien race from a frozen moon several dozen light-years from here,> Ax explained. <We learned about them in school. They were among the earliest evidence we obtained of life beyond our own planet. But the Venber have been extinct for thousands of years.>

�Yeah, well, speaking of extinct,� I said, �we�d better get morphed or we�re gonna end up the same way.�

Cassie was trying to peer through the mist, struggling to get a closer look at the big, silver creatures. �What would Visser Three want with some extinct aliens? What do you know about these guys, Ax?�

<They never got beyond primitive tool use, though they may have had the intelligence to evolve further. Had they survived. They lived in very cold conditions - two hundred of your degrees below zero.>�

Now they�re our degrees, too?� I muttered. �Hey, here�s something to think about : The bad guys could be here any minute. Any one of our minutes. Do we want to spend the last few minutes of our lives talking about extinct alien Popsicles?�

I must have sounded a bit hysterical. Jake actually smiled. �Marco�s right. Get ready.�

Suddenly Ax looked alert, like he was listening to far-off music. <We are descending. Possibly preparing for a landing.>
�Fine, whatever, let�s morph,� Jake said.

Descending? I wondered. Preparing to land? Why would Visser Three let the ship land? If he landed, we could conceivably escape.

A mistake?

I shook off the worry. I had enough worries already.

Minutes later, we were as ready as we were going to get. Jake was in tiger morph; Rachel was a grizzly bear; Cassie was a wolf; and Tobias and Ax were their own handsome selves. Me, I went gorilla.

Together we were a tough, deadly fighting team. And then �

Shwooof! To our left a door opened.

Shwooof! To our right a door opened.

Shwooof! The door opened right ahead of us.

Each door was big enough to frame a dozen Hork-Bajir. Peering over their shoulders were more HorkBajir.

And right then I realized why Visser Three had let the ship land: He�d located us. He knew he had us. And we were definitely dead.

I'll point out that this chapter is noteworthy, because it's the first time Ax paid attention to something in school.

# ? Jul 17, 2021 04:57

Fuschia tude: Dec 26, 2004; THUNDERDOME LOSER 2019

Terror Sweat posted:

I remember this was the first time I had heard of dirty blond hair

Same. Not this book, though; it was mentioned in the first few books, then after the earliest ones were published and the covers were made (with a model who wasn't exactly), that descriptor got dropped for a while.

# ? Jul 17, 2021 06:55

nine-gear crow: Aug 10, 2013

Epicurius posted:

I assume that Visser Three knows the Animorphs are on board are because of all the dead bodies? They really need to be more careful.

Or just the assumption that Visser Three knows exactly how many people he has personally killed on this flight up to the Pool Ship and that since there's more bodies laying around than he's personally dropped, it means the Animorphs are here too.

# ? Jul 17, 2021 08:23

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

Chapter 11

quote:

I stopped breathing. Hork-Bajir were everywhere. Everywhere!

This wouldn�t be a fight. This would be a slaughter.

Then, at the center door, he appeared.

<Well, well, well. Here aboard my own ship. How nice of you to come around to see me. Can I offer you anything? Something to drink? To eat? Or maybe just a quick death?>

The Visser laughed. He had reason to laugh. Three doors open and filled with Dracon-armed Hork-Bajir.

<Give the word, Jake,> Rachel whispered. <Give the word and I swear I can at least get him.>

Three doors? Wasn�t there a fourth door? And why wasn�t it open?

<Ax!> I said urgently. 

Ax swiveled one stalk eye. <Yes! It must lead to the exterior of the ship. But there is a control pad protecting the emergency manual release. It is undoubtedly coded. It would take me hours to find the security code.>

Of course. And Visser Three knew that. But maybe this wasn�t a case for subtlety. I flexed my canned ham fist. <Jake! There�s another door behind us. A keypad. Maybe I can break it open.>

<And get fried before you twitch,> Jake pointed out.

<No. The Yeerks will not fire weapons in here. Not with those canisters,> Ax said. <They are obviously valuable specimens.>

Jake reached a very fast decision. <Rachel. Next word Visser Three says, you slam the nearest canister. Marco? The keypad. Ax, back up Marco. Tobias, Cassie, and me, straight at Visser Three, a feint.>I was getting ready to make a lame pun about �feint� and �faint� when the Visser spoke.

<Surrender now and ->

Before he could get to his fourth word, Rachel struck! A mountain of grizzly slammed hard into the nearest cylinder.

WHAM!

Nothing!

Too late, I�d already spun around and bounded toward the keypad.

<KILL THEM!> Visser Three screamed.

�Tseeeeer!� Tobias screamed.

�Hraawwwrrr!� Rachel bellowed. She slammed all her weight this time, all her strength.

Crack!

A single crack, a small, pathetic crack, appeared in the cylinder wall. The mist began to seep out.

Jake, Cassie, and Tobias attacked. No other option now.

I saw a flash of orange and black leaping straight at Visser Three. No less than half a dozen Hork-Bajir enveloped him, blades flashing.

I saw the keypad. I drew back my pile-driver arm and slammed it with all my might. It crumpled like a tin can.

<Rip away the metal!> Ax yelled, even as he used his reversed stalk eyes to aim a sonic-boom tail snap at a rushing Hork-Bajir.

Rachel withdrew, backed up a dozen feet, and ran all out, full speed, on all fours at the cylinder.

A small army of Hork-Bajir leaped after her.

Just then, I saw Cassie flying through the air. Not a leap. She�d been thrown, bloodied and broken.

Tobias was in the air, harassing Visser Three, aiming for his vulnerable stalk eyes.

WHAM!

Rachel hit the cylinder. A flailing mob of Hork-Bajir literally covered her.

And then the cylinder shattered.

CRASH! It fell in pieces.

Whoosh! The mist inside billowed out. Hork-Bajir screamed and tried to back away. But too late! The clouds of mist caught them, freezing any body part it touched.

Not freezing, as in it made them cold. Freezing, as in solid. Like stone gargoyles. I saw one puzzled Hork-Bajir gape in horror as his left leg simply broke off and lay on the deck like a piece of a statue. The mist hit Rachel, too. But she had a thick coat of fur. The fur froze and shattered off like thousands of brittle needles.

I ripped away the loose metal of the keypad.

<Squeeze that handle!> Ax ordered.

I squeezed.

Too late, Visser Three saw his mistake.

<Bridge!> he roared. <Bridge, get us up! Get us up!>

The outer hull door began to slide. It opened onto empty whiteness.

<Jake! Cassie! Everyone! Door open! Bail!> I yelled.

The freezing mist was swirling around the floor now, forcing the Visser to back up. But that didn�t mean he wouldn�t send his troops into it.

<After them! After them!>

Hork-Bajir plowed through the mist and found themselves on frozen feet. Feet with toes that broke off, with ankles that snapped.

Jake coiled his tiger muscles and took the mist at a leap. Tobias was first out the door. Cassie lay unconscious in a heap, with mist advancing on her.

Without hesitation, Rachel walked into the mist and lifted Cassie�s wolf body with her teeth. The grizzly�s left foot stayed where it had frozen. Rachel staggered to the door on a stump.

One by one, we tumbled out of the door and into emptiness.

Once again, limbs are lost.

Chapter 12

quote:

We landed about twenty feet below in a pile of fur, claws, wings, and hooves. I hit hard, facedown. I was under hundreds of pounds of morphed humans and one alien.

There was a huge whoosh. The Blade ship, following Visser Three�s orders and going for altitude. Bad timing. I could practically hear him screaming, <No, no! Down! Down!>

I scratched at the ground and tried to pull myself out of the squirming pile. But the ground was slippery. Ice. I could feel the black, leathery skin on my chest burning against it.

Just a few inches from my face, I could see Jake�s claws scraping at the ice.

I tried to push away, to get out from under the grizzly bear lying over me. But not even my strength could move Rachel till she rolled away. I tried to stand up.

I felt my skin tearing as I pulled away from the ice.

<Ow ow ow ow!> I screamed.

But then I saw Rachel�s foot. Or at least the stump where the foot had been. She was demorphing as fast as she could. Grizzlies can take a lot of pain. But nothing likes losing an entire foot.

Cassie was reviving, turning her wolf snout back and forth like a person having a bad dream.

Then, <Yah! Oh! Oh, man! Wh-where are we?>

<Someplace cold,> I said. <Really cold. You better demorph and remorph, fast!> I could see the Blade ship. It had shot into the air, up through the clouds, and was still hauling away. But it would be back.

<Marco�s right,> Jake said. <Jeez! Is it cold enough?>

My arms were already starting to lose their mobility. It was intensely, horribly cold. The stillwarm blood on my chest gave off a steamy mist in the frosty air.

I was a jungle creature. Big and furry, but not really adapted for anything less than hot and sticky.

And we were a long way from hot and sticky.

Cassie was human again, standing barefoot on ice. �Th-th-think I�ll re-m-m-morph,� she chattered. Rachel wasn�t far behind her.

�What is this, Alaska?� she demanded, steam escaping from between her lips. As out of place as we all were, no one looked more out of place than Rachel in human form.

<Could be Alaska,> Tobias said. <About a mile that way I see some kind of base or even a town. Lots of gray, corrugated metal buildings. One bigger than the rest. Big doors like those on plane hangars. There�s like this giant bowl attached to the roof. And that�s the hawk report, boys and girls. I am morphing before I end up in the frozen foods section next to the frozen chicken.>

<That settles it,> I said. <It ain�t Hawaii.>

I couldn�t see the base in any detail. Just a vague outline in the distance. But to my right was an endless body of half-frozen water, a jigsaw puzzle in ice.
On our left, a hundred yards from the shore, was a huge outcropping of craggy rocks, the foot of an enormous mountain range that swept up and away into the distance. No trees, no grass. Just a ridge of black rock and white snow.

<Not the Caribbean, either,> I said, trying to ignore the fact that my big gorilla feet were freezing in place.

<Oh!> Cassie cried. <I�ve never felt cold like this! I�m a wolf and I�m cold!>

<Tobias!> Rachel shouted. He had suddenly collapsed. He lay on the ice, flapping his wings lamely.



Rachel scooped him up and tucked him into her chest with hands half-human and half-bear. She morphed, growing huge around him, all the while keeping him pressed to her fur.

I slapped my big hands against my arms and rubbed, trying to work feeling back into my fingers.

I looked up and saw the Blade ship, an ominous black shape against the clouds.

<He is not coming back this way,> Ax said. <He will be heading for his base.>

You�d think that would make us feel better. But no one thought for a minute that he was just going to let us go.

No, he just figured there was no hurry. Unlike us, he knew where we were. And he knew we weren�t going to get far.

No thermals. Also, more seriously, this is bad. In a temperature this cold, unprotected, you die, and you die fast.

# ? Jul 18, 2021 05:04

SSJ_naruto_2003: Oct 12, 2012

Just morph whale

# ? Jul 18, 2021 08:25

HisMajestyBOB: Oct 21, 2010; College Slice

I must have read this one because most of the chapters seem familiar, but I have no idea what happens.

# ? Jul 18, 2021 13:16

pile of brown: Dec 31, 2004

They all die, the remaining books are about Visser Three feeding 90s pop stars to Taxxons

# ? Jul 18, 2021 22:23

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

pile of brown posted:

They all die, the remaining books are about Visser Three feeding 90s pop stars to Taxxons

Visser Three isn't the hero we need, but he's the Hero we Deserve.

"Gentlemen, I'm afraid that you will no longer be n synch."

"Sadly, those boyz never had the opportunity to grow II men."

# ? Jul 18, 2021 23:44

Comrade Blyatlov: Aug 4, 2007; should have picked four fingers

# ? Jul 18, 2021 23:51

Soup du Jour: Sep 8, 2011; I always knew I'd die with a headache.

<Soon, your bodies will be 0 degrees! Kelvin! MUAHAHAHA>

# ? Jul 19, 2021 02:12

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

Chapter 13

quote:

<We need to get moving,> Jake said. His tiger morph was doing fairly well, I guess. Or else he was just refusing to complain. Which was fine. I�d complain for both of us.

<Ax?> Cassie asked. <How are you holding up?>�

 he said. <But I am slowly freezing to death. I doubt I can maintain brain function for more than a few more minutes.>

<Ax, you really need to tell us these things,> Jake said. <Hang in for a few minutes. We need to move out. We need distance.>

I took off as fast as I could, which was pretty slow, considering I could no longer feel my feet.

Every gust of wind felt like a punch in the face. Tears streamed down my cheeks and froze before they reached my chin. The blood on my chest became a coating of pinkish ice.

We didn�t get far.

Ax stumbled. <Prince Jake! I am not sure I can continue.>

<Okay, look, um � okay, Ax! Tobias!> Jake commanded. <Neither of you has a good coldweather morph. Morph to fleas and hide in Rachel�s fur!>

<Come on guys,> Rachel shouted. <I�ve got you!>

Rachel stood over Ax while he began to morph. Tobias, still in her arm, began to shrink. Then Rachel scooped Ax�s still-morphing form and held him to her chest as well.

<Okay, now we move. We need distance, we need cover. Before the Yeerks can come out after us. Let�s go!> Jake said.

We took off again, a staggering, miserable little gang of biological misfits. A tiger, a bear, a wolf, and a gorilla.

I started giggling. Gorilla! Here in the snow. Funny.

Just tired. That was the thing. Tired.

I looked back up again for the Blade ship. Nothing in the sky. But the cloud above was kind of pretty. Looked like a horse. No, a unicorn. Yeah. Pretty.

We ran and kept running. Along the frozen shoreline. Beneath the shadow of the gloomy rocks.

Every step was torture. My feet were numb, but the pain still burned in my legs. I ran on all my fours, gorilla-style, and my knuckles were soon raw and bloody.

The wind came in sudden gusts, lashing my face, cutting straight through my fur. I hated the wind. It made me tired. Couldn�t see right.

Just follow the orange kitty, I told myself. Follow the big orange-and-black kitty.

Take a thousand ice cubes, fill a bathtub with them, and crawl in. You might get a fraction of an idea what I was feeling.

Now imagine the prick of a very sharp pin. Imagine a solid sheet of pins slapped against your face. Again and again. That was the wind.

We ran on bloody frozen feet and now I saw rocks looming higher and higher beside me. Hide. Hide in the rocks. Yeah, that way the � the guys � the ones who were chasing us, wouldn�t be �

I realized I was confused. The thoughts jumbling together in my head weren�t making sense.

Were they?

<Okay, in here!> Jake said. <We can take a break.>

In where? Rocks all around us. Tall piles. Like � like rocks. Yeah.

 Cassie panted, her breath turning to plumes of steam.

 Rachel complained.

<What?> I said. 

I looked down stupidly at my bare feet. Swollen. Huge. Nearly double their usual size. I closed my eyes. Tired. Cold.

<Okay, everybody,> Jake said. <We have to figure out what to do. Rachel, I know you�re cold, but can you stand it?>

<For a while,> Rachel said. <Not for long. Aren�t grizzlies usually hibernating in a cave somewhere in the winter?>

<Cassie? How about you?>

<Well, wolves are cold-weather animals, but I can�t stand weather this cold. At least not for long.>

Not for long.

Voices. Faraway voices.

I dropped to the ground. And then I noticed I was on the ground. I had a sudden urge to stay there. Sitting on the frozen ground.

<Marco!> Jake yelled. <What are you doing?>

Everything was turning kind of gray.

<Marco, you have to keep moving,> Rachel shouted.

<What�s happening?> Tobias asked from somewhere on Rachel�s body.

<He�s going into shock,> Cassie said, strangely calm.

<Marco!> Rachel yelled. She grabbed me with her big bear paws and shook me. <You�ve got to stand up!>

<Stop,> I mumbled. Angry. She�s always angry.

<Marco, morph out!> Jake yelled at me. <Morph out!>

<Yeah.> I tried to nod.

Rachel shook me harder. <Come on, Marco! Don�t lose it!>

But I wasn�t listening. I didn�t care. I was floating through space.

No, not floating. Flying. Just like an osprey. Through empty space.

Wait! A light up ahead. Calling to me. Drawing me to it. Very bright. Like � like the lights around the bathroom mirror.

I tried to flap my wings, but I didn�t have any. I didn�t need them. Not anymore.

Marco comes close to death a lot in his books. You ever notice that?

Chapter 14

quote:

<Marco!>

<I�m coming,> I whispered.

Almost there. Then everything would be perfect.

<Marco!>

<Okay, okay � ooooo-kay.>

WHAM!

Something bashed me in the face. Blinding pain. I felt some teeth drop onto my tongue.

<Marco! Wake up!>

I opened my eyes. Jake, Cassie, and Rachel were standing over me. Rachel had blood on her big hairy paw. My blood. From my flat gorilla nose. Now somewhat flatter. Her paw was raised, ready to smack me again.

<Hey, hey, hey!> I yelled, gently touching my crushed face with a frozen hand. <What is your problem?>

<I�m trying to save your life, you idiot,> Rachel said. <Don�t know why, but I am.>

<Well, try a kinder, gentler method next time,> I whined, spitting out something that felt an awful lot like bloody teeth.

<We were losing you. You have to demorph, Marco,> Jake said. <Then remorph as a wolf. It�s the best morph we�ve got for this climate. Rachel, you too, if you think it�s best. I�ll take Ax and Tobias while you go first.>

<They can stay on me,> she said.

<Um, Rachel?> Jake said. <You have to pass through human on the way to wolf.>

<Like we�d see anything?> Tobias said with a laugh. <We�re fleas!>

I began to demorph. Slowly at first. Everything very slow. Brain not thinking too good.

I began to change, shrinking back to my normal size. My frozen, swollen fingers thinned. My black fur sucked itself back into my body, leaving me even more vulnerable to the cold.

A few seconds later I was back in my human form, with nothing on but a pair of black cycling pants and a white T-shirt. Not a good body for the weather. I morphed swiftly to wolf.

Relief!

Not total relief. The wind still sliced through me with its cold steel edge. But I had fur that was at least designed for fairly cold weather. And feet that were evolved for something other than padding around on heat-rotted vegetation.

Cassie demorphed and remorphed as a wolf. Rachel was right with her. Jake morphed as well. I know he�d suffered in his tiger morph. But Jake, being Jake, wouldn�t complain till everyone else was safe.

 Cassie said thoughtfully. <Unless we get to open water. Then my whale morph would be good. I don�t know about dolphin or shark. I think they�re both more warm water. Still, these wolf bodies are not equipped for the Arctic or Antarctic or wherever we are.
We might be able to survive for a few hours at a time, long enough to remorph and regenerate, but we�re still vulnerable. Too vulnerable to be fighting.>

<Point taken,> Jake said. <We stay out of fights, if we can.>

I stuck my head out of the alcove to see what was going on back down the slope. With this slight elevation I could see the base clearly, if not in detail.

But it wasn�t the far-off base that got my attention. There was very little alive anywhere near us, and thus almost nothing to smell. So when the new scent drifted our way, all our wolf heads perked up.

You probably know how well a dog can smell and hear. Well, a wolf is to a dog what a Ferrari is to a Hyundai.

Smell! Sound! Sight! All locked on like some computerized targeting system.

<What the heck are those things?> I cried.

There were two of them. About eight feet tall. Humanoid. Torso, head, and limbs in the usual places. Only their heads were shaped kind of like a hammerhead shark�s, oblong with big, dark globs on each side that must have been eyes. Each creature had two thick upper arms growing out of broad shoulders. The upper arms split at the elbows to make two forearms.

Big, burly, nasty-looking beasts. Silver, with flashes of blood-red and midnight-blue along their flanks, along their shoulders, and converging in their faces.

I�d seen that color scheme before.

They were sliding toward us on long, ski-like feet. They used two of their forearms, one right and one left, to propel themselves forward.

And they glistened in the light like diamonds or crystals.

With their third and fourth forearms, each carried a chunky black tube of some kind.

<Ax, we�ve got aliens coming,> Jake said. 

Jake described them.

 Ax cried. <A perfect description of a Venber.>

<Venber? What happened to them being extinct?> I cried.

<Reports of their extinction may have been exaggerated.>

<Ax, are you developing a sense of humor? If so, stop it, okay?>

<Well, whatever they are, they�re coming this way in a hurry,> Rachel said. <And judging by those big guns in their hands, I don�t think they�re welcoming us to the neighborhoods.>

<Yeah,> Jake said. <Let�s get out of here.>

The Venber kept coming, making strange, crunching noises. Regular, repeated sounds that seemed to ricochet off the rocks behind us in a weird, distorted echo.

Crinch! Crinch!

Sproing! Sproing!

They seemed to know exactly where they were going. Or at least they knew exactly where we had gone.

<They�re echolocating,> Cassie said. <Pinging us with those sounds.>

<Into the rocks,> Jake said. <They can�t echolocate in there, can they?>

<They should not be able to now,> Ax pointed out. <We are already in the shadow of the rocks. This must be a very sophisticated sense to pick us out of the clutter. Very impressive.>

<Swell, you can ask one out on a date, Ax, you like them so much. Do you have anything useful to tell us?>

<Yes. They would have difficulty dealing with temperatures above freezing. Liquid water, for example.>

<Well, then we have nothing to worry about. We offer them a vacation in Florida and we�re home free!>

<Marco, why didn�t I just let you freeze?> Rachel wondered.

The Venber were about fifty yards away from us when they stopped. Then they raised those big tubes and pointed them our way. They didn�t look like cameras.

<I�m thinking we should duck,> I said.

So they might not have the chance to freeze to death.

# ? Jul 19, 2021 02:54

Fuschia tude: Dec 26, 2004; THUNDERDOME LOSER 2019

I realize I've been saying this too often, but I don't remember anything from this book. But, I've owned it all along, too. :psyduck:

Fuschia tude fucked around with this message at 03:52 on Jul 19, 2021

# ? Jul 19, 2021 03:47

freebooter: Jul 7, 2009

I was thinking that a Siberian tiger would do pretty good in the cold but Jake has the orange-and-white stripes of a Bengal tiger, then was googling and realised that all this time I've assumed white tigers are the Siberian types when in fact they're a genetic anomaly that can occur in either kind, and both Bengals and Siberians are orange and white! And looking at a Siberian's historic range, it includes Manchuria, south-eastern Siberia and parts of central Asia... maybe not as cold as Alaska or Nunavut or wherever they are, but still pretty drat cold.

# ? Jul 19, 2021 03:57

Mazerunner: Apr 22, 2010; Good Hunter, what... what is this post?

Fuschia tude posted:

I realize I've been saying this too often, but I don't remember anything from this book. But, I've owned it all along, too.

it's so weird how stuff sticks with you, I remember the strips of coloured lights as guidelines, and the description of rachel's fur freezing and Marco ripping skin off, but nothin else. unless we get there and my brain goes "actually, you do know this"

# ? Jul 19, 2021 05:30

Terror Sweat: Mar 15, 2009

I really remember the ending lines of the book

# ? Jul 19, 2021 06:27

Cythereal: Nov 8, 2009; I love the potoo,
and the potoo loves you.

I don't think I read this book. I'm guessing the Yeerks have gone all Jurassic Park and cloned the Venber to be hosts, maybe specifically for arctic conditions and ice worlds.

# ? Jul 19, 2021 20:32

Bobulus: Jan 28, 2007

Cythereal posted:

I don't think I read this book. I'm guessing the Yeerks have gone all Jurassic Park and cloned the Venber to be hosts, maybe specifically for arctic conditions and ice worlds.

While that seems likely, it also seems like that might have some difficulties. For example, how is a Venber-controller going to go to a caldrona pool? Venber temperatures are too cold for the slug to survive outside the host, and apparently, based on what Ax said, above 0 C temperatures would be fatal to the Venber. You'd need, like, a little slug ear-canal airlock or something.

# ? Jul 19, 2021 20:41

freebooter: Jul 7, 2009

Mazerunner posted:

it's so weird how stuff sticks with you, I remember the strips of coloured lights as guidelines, and the description of rachel's fur freezing and Marco ripping skin off, but nothin else. unless we get there and my brain goes "actually, you do know this"

I definitely remember Rachel losing a whole foot to nitro freezing as one of the grislier combat moments in the whole series. Up there with Cassie picking a sliver of Hork Bajir flesh out of her teeth long after demorphing.

# ? Jul 20, 2021 00:57

Comrade Blyatlov: Aug 4, 2007; should have picked four fingers

I could absolutely hear Alloran using Robin Sachs - the VA for Zaeed Massani. That kind of gruff, take-no-poo poo voice. Pity he dead.

# ? Jul 20, 2021 03:22

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

Chapter 15

quote:

We crouched low, skulking wolves
.
TSEEEEEEW! The horizon filled with a blinding green light.

About four tons of rock upslope from us became four tons of gravel.

Ka-BOOOOM!

It was gravel rain! Rock hail.

I�ve been shot at by Dracon beams before. They�re plenty scary. These things were about ten stages past scary.

<Holy!> Jake yelled. <What are those things?>

<Dracon assault cannons,> Ax replied. <They are used for attacking hardened ground facilities from orbit.>

 I cried.

<Forget the rocks, hug the shoreline,> Jake said. <They want a chase, we�ll give them a chase.>

We took off along the dead rock and slush shoreline.

The Venber followed. Sliding along on their ski feet, pushing themselves forward with those massive forearms, they followed. Every few minutes one of them would stop and take a shot with its assault cannon, blasting the already lifeless scenery.

<Spread out,> Jake said. <One well-aimed shot could kill us all.>

We ran and ran down that shoreline. One good thing about being a wolf is the ability to run for hours without having to stop. A wolf can run all day and all night.

The Venber kept after us. They were bigger, they were stronger. We were faster. And they couldn�t match our endurance. But unlike the six of us, the two alien ice monsters didn�t have to demorph every two hours.

<This makes no sense,> Ax said as we ran. <The Yeerks could not possibly infest the Venber. The Yeerks would freeze. They must be controlled by some other means. Unless, of course, the Yeerks managed to find a method of keeping themselves from freezing inside the Venber�s body.>

<Whatever,> Rachel said. <Point is, we�re out front. I don�t even see them anymore. Maybe they�ve given up.>

I turned to look over my shaggy gray shoulder. I couldn�t see the Venber. Couldn�t smell them, either, despite the wind blowing from behind us.

<No way they gave up,> Tobias said. <We have to keep moving.>

<So says the flea all nice and warm in his honey�s back fur,> I muttered.

<What did you say?> Rachel demanded. I guess she was shocked that I�d dare to make any remark suggesting she and Tobias were more than just friends and Animorphs. Like that was some big secret. We slowed our pace a little. My footpads were numb and swollen. Frostbite. Again. I couldn�t feel the tips of my ears.

<We need to find somewhere to demorph and remorph,> Jake said. <What�s our time?>

<We have twenty of your minutes left,> Ax replied.

I swear he emphasized �your� minutes. We trotted back over to the rocks that continued to follow the shoreline all the way to eternity.

We ran on till we found a deep, steep-walled alcove. It was still cold as the dark side of the moon. But at least the wind was left behind to howl and moan impotently.

We huddled around Cassie, trying to keep her warm as she demorphed first. Then we took turns demorphing and remorphing, huddling together like a litter of newborn puppies.

Weird. A bunch of wolves pressing flank to flank. It was a strange and kind of wonderful experience. It brought back memories I didn�t know I had. From when I was very little. Sitting on the couch with my mom, snuggled up against her, watching TV and sucking my thumb.

Corny. Probably the cold was getting to me. Or maybe it�s just that in the cold, in an environment that is ready to kill you without thought or mercy, simple animal warmth, body and body, breath and breath, seems to touch something deep inside you. Millions of years of Homo Sapiens, huddled
together, body and body against the killing wind.

Until at last humans learned to make fire. Of course, that involved matches. Or at least stick.

<So now what?> Rachel asked when we�d all remorphed. Ax and Tobias had remorphed as fleas and were hiding in Jake�s fur. I guess my undiplomatic remark about Tobias and Rachel had made them self-conscious.

<We have to keep moving,> Jake said. <I�m sure the Venber are still tracking us. But we also have to find somewhere to hide for the night. No way we�ll survive this cold without shelter.>

<Maybe we can find a cave,> Cassie said. <Or a snowdrift and dig a hole in it for a lair.>

<Or a McDonald�s,> I suggested. 

<What we really need to do is find some cold-weather animals to morph,> Rachel added.

<I�ll second that motion,> Tobias said.

When we were semi-thawed, our frostbite all replaced with healthy flesh in the new morphing, we moved on. It was getting dark. According to Ax it was only two o�clock - you know, in our hours. But the sun was already disappearing. That could only mean it was going to get colder.

So what Marco said in that chapter about wolves being able to run forever is true. Wolves (and people, too, although most people don't take advantage of the fact anymore), are what are called endurance hunters, able to run for a really long time without getting tired. Lets say you challenge a horse to a sprint. The horse will win, any time. Horses run a lot faster than people. Now, lets say you challenge the same horse to a marathon. In my case, the horse would probably still win, because I'm slow and clumsy, but a horse would lose a marathon to a person. Horses, even though they can run fast, get tired really fast. We're built, and so are wolves, with the ability to run for a really long time. If you're interested, here's a segment David Attenborough's Earth, where a group of San from the Kalahari (one of the only groups of people to still do endurance hunting) run an antelope down over an 8 hour chase.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=826HMLoiE_o

Chapter 16

quote:

We trotted along the shoreline in the fading light. Sometimes we ran. Every once in a while I�d look back in the direction of the Yeerk station. I couldn�t see anything. But now and then I caught a smell that I was pretty sure I recognized.

Venber. Still hunting us.

The ice along the shore was more solid here. It extended in a lumpy sheet from about a quarter mile to several miles from the shore. Beyond that, the water was thick with chunks of white.

Ax had said that water might be dangerous to the Venber, so we considered going right out onto the ice and closer to its outer edge. But if we stayed out in the open, the Venber might be better able to track us with their echolocation.

And out on the ice there was no shelter at all from the terrible wind. We decided to stay closer to the slope of the ridge beside us. There, too, we�d be able to find cover in the rocks if it came down to combat.

The sun started to disappear on the horizon, giving the ice an orange glow. As the sun dropped, the wind shifted direction.

A sudden scent! Like a flashing neon sign to my wolf nostrils. Everyone caught the scent at the same time. We all stopped.

I sniffed again, concentrating, letting the wolf mind that existed beside my own provide a rough translation: a scent similar to Rachel�s grizzly bear morph, but not quite the same.

I turned my ears toward the wind, toward the scent. Yes, just barely, I heard something. A steady, easy, confident gait. Ice and snow crunched by enormous weight. Four feet.

<Let me guess,> I said. <The Abominable Snowman.>

<Abominable something,> Rachel agreed. <Might be our dinner. Even a wolf needs to eat.>

We quickened our pace and began to turn in a wide arc toward the unseen creature. Cassie spotted him first as he emerged from the shadow of an ice heave.

<Over there,> she said.

My wolf�s eyes locked onto a spot of black.

His nose.

Then two black dots above it.

His eyes.

The nose and eyes moved. And in the near darkness, the rest of him began to take shape. A humongous mass of off-white fur.

<Polar bear!> Cassie said delightedly. 

 Ax sniffed from down deep in Jake�s fur.

It was weird. This creature you only saw on TV or at the zoo: a polar bear. Sitting on the ice, scratching himself.

We stood there and stared at him. He stopped scratching and seemed to be staring back. He sniffed at the air, and then lifted his big bear butt and started lumbering toward us on four thick legs.

<I�m thinking that this guy is not going to be our dinner,> Rachel said.

<Two-to-one odds we end up being his,> I agreed. <Let�s run away. Fast.>

<Uh-huh,> Jake said, starting into a trot.

<What is this polar bear?> Ax asked from Flea World.

<Polar bear,> Cassie said. <The largest land predator in the world.>

<What do you mean largest predator?> Rachel protested, as if Cassie had just insulted her. 

<Grizzlies aren�t true predators. Let�s face it: You�ll eat berries, given a chance,> Cassie answered. <Anyway, polar bears can actually be heavier, if they�ve really packed on the blubber. Although grizzlies are normally built thicker.>

<Just how much public television do you watch, Cassie?> I asked. <No, I really don�t want to know.>

 Rachel muttered. But she didn�t sound too sure.

<Predators?> Jake said. 

<Not polar bears,> Cassie replied, breaking into a full run now. <But this might actually be good news for us. Where there are predators, there are prey.>

The bear kept after us, lumbering along the ice in a casual way.

<What do polar bears eat?> Jake asked.

<Dumb kids playing hero,> I muttered.

<Seals, usually,> Cassie said. <Other things, too. But mostly seals.>

 I said. We were running at full speed now. I looked back and saw the bear had slowed down. Apparently, we were not his main concern.

<Of course you don�t see any,> Rachel said. <They�re hiding from the polar bear!>

<Now that we�re on this topic,> Jake said, <what exactly are we supposed to eat?>

<We could try fishing,> I suggested.

 Rachel said. <Grizzlies fish, right?>

 Cassie said. <Grizzly bears fish in streams. I don�t think fish come anywhere near the surface in this part of the world.>

<Great,> I said, <so I guess we just go ahead and starve. Why not? Everything else is going so well.>

Things were looking pretty hopeless: polar bear to the right of us, Venber behind us, and cold all around. And now it was almost completely dark. The temperature was beginning to drop from shockingly cold to hideously cold. And the wind was howling off the water.

<We�d better find somewhere to hide for the night,> Jake said.

<I�m just glad the Chee are covering for us back home,> Cassie said.

Usually Cassie knows the right thing to say. Not this time. The last thing I wanted to think about right then was my home, my warm home with my warm bed and my warm TV.

I�ve been hurled sixty million years into the past, and been trapped on alien planets, but I�d never felt so far from home.

One of the things we've learned about polar bears is that they do eat plants...grasses and berries, when they can't find anything else. They don't get a lot out of them, though, calorically, though.

# ? Jul 20, 2021 04:46

OctaviusBeaver: Apr 30, 2009; Say what now?

Horses are pretty good over long distances too. There's an annual horse vs human race that was started to settle a bar bet, it is a little shorter than a marathon though.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_versus_Horse_Marathon

# ? Jul 20, 2021 06:15

freebooter: Jul 7, 2009

I like how any idea of the mission has just been immediately dropped in favour of sheer survival. Don't think they've really been in a situation like that except the dinosaur book, and it's always interesting to see how they cope with it when literally their only asset is their morphing ability.

But the thing to do with that polar bear would have been to all go elephant/grizzly/rhino, gently caress him up, and keep him alive long enough to acquire. Sorry buddy but it's for the greater good.

# ? Jul 20, 2021 06:18

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# ? May 28, 2024 18:56

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

Chapter 17

quote:

We dug a lair in a snowdrift on top of some rocks looking out over the ice. And by �lair� I mean a big hole. A big, wet snow hole.

 I said. No one laughed.

For what felt like the tenth time that day, we demorphed, one by one. We shivered in our human bodies for just long enough to turn blue (all except Ax, who was already blue), then remorphed. The temperature continued to fall. We heard the ice cracking and groaning like a never-ending thunderstorm echoing through the darkness. It was an amazing sound.

You know how they say all the continents used to be one big continent, and that over millions of years they broke up and drifted apart? That�s what it sounded like. The continents leaving each other behind. We spent the night huddled together in our makeshift cave, trying to keep each other from freezing to death. Each of us took turns standing guard, which basically consisted of sticking a nose out in the frozen air every couple of minutes to catch wind of anyone or anything dangerous.

Once in a while, I caught a vague, alien scent.

The Venber were still tracking us. But as long as we were hidden underground, their echolocation would fail to find us.

<Say, Ax,> I said some time in the middle of the night. <You sleeping?>

<No, Marco,> he replied from somewhere on my chest. He and Tobias had moved after Jake began complaining of some suspicious itchiness.

<What�s the deal with these Venber?> I asked.

<Every Andalite knows the story of the Venber,> Ax began. <In fact, the story of the Venber has much to do with the modern Andalite policies and methods of interstellar interactions.>

<Tell us the story, Ax,> Jake said. <Obviously, none of us can sleep. And we have to demorph soon, anyway. So what do you know about the Venber?>

<Just what everyone knows,> he said. <I mean, what any Andalite knows. They were a primitive species with a highly unusual physiology. Unique, actually. They do not seem to have required radiant energy of any kind. Obviously they are not carbon-based.>

<Obviously,> I mocked.

<They were discovered back toward the dawn of Andalite space travel. Not by us, by some other race. The Five.>

<The five what?> Cassie asked.

<No one knows. They just called themselves The Five. No doubt it meant something to them.>

<Maybe they lived between The Four and The Six,> I suggested.

<Anyway, The Five discovered the Venber and began to trap and export them.>

<Say what?>

<They basically harvested the Venber. It seems that a Venber melts, burns, in any case becomes liquid at temperatures above freezing. And the resulting liquid has many uses. Particularly in the creation of superconductors for the primitive computers of that era.>

<But� But these are sentient creatures, aren�t they?> Cassie asked.

<Yes,> Ax said simply. <They were. The Five extinguished them. They annihilated a sentient species to speed their computers. The Venber disappeared.>

<That�s sickening,> Cassie said. <That�s just evil.>

<Yes,> Ax agreed. <But if it is any comfort, The Five are no longer in existence, either. Soon after we encountered them for the first time they� well, no one knows for certain what happened to The Five. But Andalites in that era are not the Andalites of today.>

There was a long silence after that. You couldn�t say there was a chill in the air since it was already freezing. But our already low spirits had been plowed under.

<Good bedtime story, Ax,> I joked. <If you ever have kids, they�re going to need night-lights. Just one big question: If the Venber are extinct, why are they trying to kill us?>



<So they regrew them?>

<Probably they coupled the Venber DNA with some other species. These would be a hybrid: part Venber, part something else.>

<What else?> Cassie asked.

Ax hesitated. <You would want to use a species with the most complex DNA structure available. It would make it easier to attach new DNA.>

<And what creature would that be?> Tobias asked.

<Of the species available to the Yeerks?> Ax said. <Humans. Those Venber may be a hybrid of Venber� and humans.>

After that we fell silent and stayed that way.

We curled up against one another, four wolves and a pair of fleas, deep in a hole in the snow, lost in a frozen wilderness, thinking of faraway tragedies on dark, frozen moons.

I�d have traded my left lung for a fire.

I get to add two more species to the list of genocides. And man, that's a depressing story. Melting down a sentient species for superconductors.

Chapter 18

quote:

Throughout the long, long night we demorphed and remorphed one at a time, time and again. We were so much more than exhausted.

Ax and Tobias started freaking out after a while. It was amazing they lasted as long as they did in flea morph. They demorphed and stayed for a while in their own forms, huddling between the four of us, regaining a sense of the reality they�d lost as nearly blind, bloodsucking fleas.

It was not a good night. It did not pass easily. I was cold, scared, hungry, cold, hungry, and also cold. We were without a plan. Without a clue. As lost as it was possible to be. And more tired than I would have thought possible.

Morphing was probably the only reason we survived that night. After about an hour, the cold became so severe we thought we were going to die. The morphing process would bring us back to full health so we could start freezing to death all over again.

Many hours and many morphs later, the sun began to creep through the hole of our lair.

I am not known as a morning person, but I was the first to crawl out and take a look. The temperature had risen. It was probably a balmy thirty below.

I sniffed the air and caught the scent of the Venber. <Those guys just do not give up!> I complained.

I smelled something else, too. Very close. Out on the ice a half mile away.

The polar bear. It took me a while to find him. I couldn�t see his black nose or eyes. When I finally did spot him, I realized why his eyes and nose weren�t visible.

<Hey, guys, check this out,> I said. Jake, Rachel, and Cassie crawled out of the hole and stood beside me at the lookout post. Jake was carrying Ax and Tobias again. They�d promised not to bite.

 Cassie said. <But I can�t see him.>

<Try a little to your right,> I said. Like this helped. The horizon was nothing but a vast sheet of white paper, with a dark edge where the water began.

<Oh, I see him,> Rachel said. <What�s he doing?>

Our pal had his entire head stuck in the ice, ostrich-style. He was a giant set of four pillarlike legs with no head.

<He must be seal hunting,> Cassie said.

We sat and watched him. The predator part of my brain was riveted.

We hadn�t eaten anything for almost twenty-four hours. The extreme cold was sapping our energy badly. If we didn�t get something to eat soon, we�d die. And the nearest Taco Bell was probably a thousand miles away.

The polar bear pulled his head out of the water, shook it, and lumbered further out on the ice. Finally, when he was about twenty yards from the water�s edge, he dropped onto his stomach and slithered along a few feet at a time.

The polar bear stopped. He�d found something.

Suddenly he raised one of his giant paws and slammed it through the ice. I heard a desperate squealing and saw a pair of gray shapes scurry out of the hole his paw had made. The shapes scurried off and jumped back into the water a few yards away. The bear kept his paw in the hole, reaching around for the seal he�d trapped.

Then he stuck his head through the hole. He stood up on his powerful legs. He raised his head. The seal was in his jaws. But the seal was too fat to fit through the hole.

He pulled it out anyway. The process made for instant, shredded seal.

<Oh my god!> Cassie cried.

<Geez,> Rachel said.

 I muttered.

<What happened?> Tobias asked. <What did he do?>

We watched him eat. He sat upright on his fat white hinder, holding the big seal in both paws. He bit off huge chunks and gulped them down. Once he put down the seal carcass, scooped some snow off the ice, and used it to wash the blood off his face and paws.

It was disgusting. Even worse than some of the stuff you see in the school cafeteria. But I watched it greedily. I hoped he would leave us at least enough for a small meal.

 Jake said quietly. Calmly. His wolf tongue licked his wolf lips.

<Yeah,> Rachel said warily. <We have to eat, don�t we?>

<We haven�t eaten anything for at least a day,> I added.

I looked over at Cassie. She had to be freaked by what none of us had the nerve to suggest we were suggesting. I mean, I was freaked by what we were not suggesting. But unlike Cassie, I wasn�t willing to let my moral sense live while the rest of me died of starvation.

<Cassie?> Rachel said.

<What?> she replied, a hint of anger in her voice.

<What should we do?>

<Why are you asking me?>

I said, <We�re not equipped to hunt in this environment, in these morphs. We�re freezing. If we don�t eat soon we�ll be too weak to plan our next move, let alone finish what we came here to do. Destroy that satellite station.>

I know this sounds weird, but I�d kind of forgotten that we had a goal. All I�d been thinking about was staying warm and fed. And alive.

<But you�re waiting for me to give my approval? Is that it?> she said.

<Look,> I began again. If I had to be the jerk in this situation, that was fine. I was used to it. I was usually the first one to state the obvious, no matter how ugly it was. Just call me Mr. Ruthless. <In case you haven�t noticed, there doesn�t seem to be a Mickey D�s around here.>

 Cassie said, a little annoyed. <It�s obvious what we have to do. And not just to the bear�s leftovers, but to any live seal we can find. What I don�t understand is why you�re asking me for permission. Do you guys think I�d put an animal�s life over yours? Or mine, come to think of it?>

 I started to say.

<You don�t know? When did you start thinking I was some kind of fanatic? We�re freezing, we�re starving, and I�m going to go all tree-hugging, never-eat-anything-with-a-face on you?>

<Well, I can never tell what you�ll think,> I whined, taken aback and feeling like I�d insulted Cassie.

<Here�s a clue. Don�t kill a sentient creature except in absolute self-defense, try not to wipe out endangered species, and if you�re going to raise animals for food, treat them as well as you possibly can. But when you�re a wolf, a starving wolf wandering around the frozen Arctic, and you see a meal, eat it.>

Cassie is obviously not a morning person, either. This was grumpier than I�d ever seen her.

Probably, despite her tough talk, she was not looking forward to eating cute seals for breakfast.

Come to think of it, I wasn�t, either.

The two seals who�d escaped the bear were visible some distance off. We looked at them with the intensity of hungry wolves.

<Nature isn�t pretty,> Tobias said, reassuring us. <It isn�t supposed to be.>

<Yeah, survival of the fittest �> Rachel muttered.

<A good philosophy,> Ax said mordantly, <unless it turns out that the Venber are fitter than we are.>

Good line by Ax there. Also, good use of the word 'mordantly', which you don't see a lot. Also, some people have complained that the ghostwritten books oversimplify the characters and their motivations, but this book, I think, gets Cassie right. She loves animals, she doesn't believe in cruelty, and she thinks that people have a moral responsibility towards animals, and will go to lengths to protect them. But she's not a fanatic, and she realizes that sometimes you have to do what you have to do to survive, even if it means eating cute little seals. And she's not a morning person. Honestly, so far, my only complaint about the book's characterization is that Marco has been a little too Marco, if you know what I mean? But I know it's a judgement call.

# ? Jul 21, 2021 04:17

The Something Awful Forums > Archives > Comedy Goldmine > Let's Read Animorphs! The Whole Series! Ch-ch-ch-chaaanges

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