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  «MEGAMORPHS»

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  ii ANIMORPHS

  The Suspicion

  K.A. Applegate

  AN APPLE

  PAPERBACK

  SCHOLASTIC INC.

  New York Toronto London Auckland Sydney Mexico City New Delhi Hong Kong

  iii Cover illustration by David B. Mattingly

  If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as "unsold and destroyed" to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this "stripped book."

  No part of this publication may be reproduced in whole or in part, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Scholastic Inc., Attention: Permissions Department, 555 Broadway, New York, NY 10012.

  ISBN 0-590-76257-5

  Copyright © 1998 by Katherine Applegate. All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc. SCHOLASTIC, APPLE PAPERBACKS, ANIMORPHS and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.

  12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 189/90123/0Printed in the U.S.A. 40First Scholastic printing, December 1998

  iv For Michael and Jake

  The Suspicion

  1

  Go forth, mighty warriors! Go forth into space! All the galaxy shall tremble before the Helmacrons. All will obey us. All will be our slaves. For only we are truly worthy to be Lords of the Universe.

  - Posthumous Exhortation of the Emperor. From the log of the Helmacron ship, Galaxy Blaster

  My name is Cassie.

  There are a lot of things about me that I can't tell you. My last name, for example. Or my address.

  I live in a paranoid world. I wish I didn't, but I do. And I have no choice but to conceal, to lie, to mislead. Even while I am desperately trying to tell the truth.

  2 You must know the truth. You must accept what is happening to Earth, to humanity. Because only by knowing can you fight the terrible evil that is upon us.

  I am referring, of course, to the Yeerks.

  Not to the Helmacrons.

  The Yeerks are a parasitic species from a far-distant planet. They originate in an aquatic environment. A Yeerk pool. At some point in their evolution they moved out of the safety and sensory deprivation of the pool and evolved an ability to enter the brains of a species called Gedds.

  For a long time, millennia, maybe, they were content to go that far. They did not know about space travel or technology at all. Like humans, they did not know of the existence of other species in the galaxy.

  At least, that's what our Andalite friend, Ax, tells us. I'm sure it would be fascinating to study the evolution of the Yeerk species. Kind of like it must be fascinating to study cholera or typhoid.

  Study with care. Because as far as humans are concerned, the Yeerks area disease. They are spreading throughout our population.

  They enter through the ear canal. They have the ability to thin out their bodies, displace the portions of the inner ear that are in the way, and

  3 drill into the skull. There they flatten their bodies out, sinking into the crevices on the surface of a human brain.

  They tie into the brain. Like you or me accessing a computer with a keyboard. They can see all of your memories. They know all of your thoughts. All.

  And they can control you utterly and cornpletely. They move your hands. They move your feet. They aim your eyes and tilt your head and make that familiar smile everyone knows is yours alone.

  We call them Controllers. The slaves of the Yeerks. The Hork-Bajir people were the Yeerks' first great alien conquest. Then they infiltrated the Taxxons. They have had skirmishes with a dozen other species. But now they are after their greatest prize: Homo sapiens.

  Humans. Humans, with fingers more delicate and capable than any Taxxon or Hork-Bajir or Gedd. Humans, who could be fed almost anything, unlike the bark-eating Hork-Bajir or the eternally ravenous, cannibalistic Taxxons. Humans, who exist in numbers far greater than all those species combined.

  We are the perfect host bodies. Not as dangerous as a Hork-Bajir can be, but infinitely more adaptable.

  4 Billions of unaware, skeptical human beings. We look, to the Yeerks, like Aztec gold looked to Cortes. We could be the solution to all their problems. We could give them the sheer numbers to explode from Earth and ravage every other species in existence.

  Fighting against this invasion are the Andalites. Outnumbered, outgunned, unprepared. Like firemen trying to put out a firestorm that leaps from building to building, the Andalites try to outsmart and outfight the Yeerks.

  Sometimes they win. Other times . . .

  The Andalites came to Earth to crush the Yeerk invasion. Instead they were destroyed. Ax, our friend Aximili-Esgarrouth-lsthill, made it to Earth and survived to join us.

  His brother, Prince Elfangor, also made it to Earth. Knowing he was about to die, he gave us the ultimate prize of Andalite technology: the power to morph. The ability to touch any living animal, absorb its DNA, and then to literally become that animal.

  And who is "us"? Me. My best friend, Rachel. Jake, our very cute and very fearless leader. Marco, Jake's best friend. Ax the Andalite. And Tobias.

  Tobias is living the downside of morphing. See, there's a two-hour limit. If you stay in morph longer than that, you stay permanently.

  5 Now you know. Now you see what we Animorphs are up against.

  And now you see why we really didn't need a second alien invasion of Earth.

  I mean, isn't one enough?

  6

  O Great Emperor, the Most Wise, the Most Farseeing, we have at last found a planet ripe for conquest! It is a very large planet, filled with very large species. But the larger they are, the lower they will be brought, as they cringe and tremble before our unstoppable might!

  - From the log of the Helmacron ship, Galaxy Blaster

  ?Cassie, what are you doing?"

  I stood up, feeling the ache in my back. I was

  in the bed of my dad's pickup truck. I had just

  lifted a somewhat rusty bicycle up there to join

  the rest of the stuff we were givin
g away. I wiped

  7 the sweat from my forehead and looked down at Rachel.

  As always, she looked like she'd just stepped off a page of Mademoiselle magazine. Rachel is the only person alive who could be run over by a bus, buried in a mud slide, and thrown two miles by a tornado, and somehow emerge from it with perfect clothes, perfect hair, and perfect makeup.

  Sometimes I swear it's something supernatural.

  Whereas I had spent the morning mucking out the stables, giving a suppository to a very annoyed Canada goose, and then collected giveaway stuff for a run to Goodwill. And I looked . . . well, I looked like I'd been run over by a bus, buried in a mud slide, and thrown by a tornado.

  "I'm working," I said grumpily. "Maybe you should try it sometime."

  Rachel wasn't at all offended. "I just have two words for you, Cassie: Ralph. Lauren. It's one thing to wallow in dirt, but do you have to do it while wearing boys' jeans from Wal-Mart? That's why we have Ralph Lauren. For the outdoorsy types."

  I slid down to the ground. Then I grabbed a dirt clod near my feet. "Come here. I just want to see if it's even possible for dirt to cling to you."

  8 "Do not throw that dirt clod at me."

  "It's an experiment. I have to know whether you're really human! You're like the Undead. Only you're the Un-dirty!"

  I did a gentle, underhand lob of the dirt clod. Rachel calmly snatched it out of the air and let it drop.

  "Okay, show me your hand," I demanded. "That was wet dirt. It should have stuck to your palm."

  Rachel laughed and refused to show me her hand. "So here we are. It's a beautiful Saturday morning. We have no mission, at least as far as I've heard. You going to work the rest of the day? Or are you going to come with me to the mall, buy a new bathing suit, and then come with me to the beach? I need to refresh my tan."

  "My tan is already pretty fresh," I said. "And I do not want to spend the day baking in the sun while you look at guys. I have stuff to do."

  Rachel crinkled her face. "Hey. What's that?"

  "What's what?" I followed the direction of her stare. She was looking at an old, hand-operated water pump. It wasn't something we used. It was more of an antique that my mom liked the look of.

  Attached to it was a small, silvery object. "It's a toy," I said. "A toy spaceship. Star Wars or Star

  9 Trek or Star Something, I guess." I pried the little thing off the pump. "Huh. Must be magnetized."

  "You look worried."

  I shrugged. "Coincidence." I looked around to make sure no one was listening. "The pump is where I hid the blue box. You just unscrew the mechanism from the base plate, and it's in there."

  "That's where you hid the blue box?"

  "You have a better place?"

  The blue box has some official Andalite name. Several, actually. It's the device they use to transfer the morphing power to an individual. A kid named David found it not so long ago. We'd used it to make him an Animorph, but David hadn't handled the power well.

  David was a rat. Literally. He would live a rat, die a rat.

  It wasn't something I liked thinking about. In any case, once we'd gotten the box back, I'd been the one chosen to hide it.

  And now a toy spaceship was attached to it. I lifted up the silver toy and examined it. It was about three or four inches long. It was shaped like a baton, with three clusters of three long tu bes at the far end and a fierce, alien death's-head bridge at the front.

  I grinned at Rachel. "Romulan?"

  10 "Marco would know. Or Jake. I guarantee you, either of them would be able to take one look at this toy and give you a ten-minute explanation on what show it's from and what stories it was in."

  "I'll throw it in with the other Goodwill stuff," I said. ! did. Then I looked up at the sky. Bright sun peeking through fluffy clouds. "Okay, I'm not a beach person, but this day is too good to waste. I'll go with you. I'll just go find a pair of my mom's Bermuda shorts to wear. The big, striped ones."

  The look on Rachel's face was perfect: horror struggling with disbelief.

  "Kidding," I said. "Just kidding. I'll go get my suit. You are so easy, sometimes."

  11

  Most Powerful Emperor, Lord of the Galaxy, disaster has struck your bold minions! Our engines have malfunctioned. We searched the planet for a power source we could tap. But now, even as me replenished our strength from a strange source of transforming power, one of the alien monsters of this planet has attacked! We have sustained damage, but we are undaunted! Perhaps the weak and unworthy captain of the Planet Crusher will assist us so that we may achieve everlasting glory!

  - From the log of the Helmacron ship, Galaxy Blaster

  We spent a couple of hours at the beach. I have never been so bored in my life. I'm sorry, but I basically hate the beach. Still, Rachel enjoyed it, and she is my best friend.

  12 We wore our suits home and it wasn't till I was walking up the driveway that I realized Jake was waiting.

  Jake is the leader of the Animorphs. Mostly because he's the only one with enough sense of responsibility to take on the job.

  And to be honest, I kind of like Jake. As in like. He's Rachel's cousin, and the two of them are very similar in the way both are brave and bold and decisive. But Rachel has an edge of recklessness that Jake doesn't. And Jake is almost as oblivious as I am to clothes and makeup and all that.

  Jake saw us coming and looked like he wanted to hide. It suddenly occurred to me that he'd never seen me in a bathing suit. Now I wanted to hide.

  "Hi!" he said, giving a little wave and keeping his eyes rock-steady on my face.

  "Oh, man, this has got to be trouble," Rachel said, loudly enough for Jake to hear. "Okay, Jake, whose butt do we have to go and kick?"

  Normally he would have smiled. But he just swallowed, darted a look at the rest of me, blushed, and once again, grimly focused on my face.

  "He thinks I look dumpy," I muttered to Rachel under my breath.

  13 "Cassie, you are so hopeless. What you know about guys could fit on the head of a pin. Good grief. That is not a 'she looks dumpy' look. That's a 'whoa, she looks hot, but I better not show any reaction or she'll get offended' look."

  We came up to where Jake was standing. "I, uh, I brought some stuff over for you to take to Goodwill. Remember, you said I should. So I did. Some stuff and all. I gave it to your dad, and he took it. He just left."

  I had to admit, this was more stammery than Jake usually got. Rachel had drifted around behind him so she could roll her eyes and do a mean parody of him looking embarrassed.

  I was fighting the urge to laugh when I spotted something that made me freeze.

  There was another toy spaceship attached to the water pump.

  I leaped toward it. "Jake, did you get this off the truck?" I asked.

  "What? No. What is that?"

  I looked hard, blinked, and looked again. The toy spacecraft was back. Only it wasn't the same. This one was shorter, broader, with two big "engines" at the back instead of the clusters of smaller ones. And the death's-head bridge was different, too. Still a death's-head, but different.

  14 "It's not the same," I said to Rachel. "It's similar, but it's not the same."

  Rachel stopped rolling her eyes. Jake looked at each of us, puzzled.

  And then, to our utter amazement, the little "toy" ship separated from the water pump, turned to a level position, and flew swiftly away, missing Rachel's head by inches.

  "What was that?" Jake demanded.

  Rachel shrugged. "We thought Romulan," she said.

  "Jake, you know what's hidden in that water pump?"

  "Of course I do." He shook his head slowly. Then he snapped into his "leader" mode. "Okay, the weekend just got canceled. Cassie, you and Rachel morph right now, get to the woods, and bring back Tobias and Ax. I'll find Marco. Back here in half an hour. Go."

  15

  We assembled. Jake, Rachel, Marco, Ax in his own, natural Andalite body (which is a cross between a blue deer, a centaur,
and a scorpion), and Tobias who, though he regained his morphing power, is a red-tailed hawk.

  We assembled and tried to figure out what, if anything, we should do about a flying toy spaceship.

  But, really, there were only two possible things to do. One was to talk to Ax.

  "Ax, is there any way the Yeerks would use some kind of tiny, miniaturized ... um ... flying thing to locate the blue box?" Jake asked.

  «A flying thing, Prince Jake? What is a flying thing?»

  16 "That would be a thing that flies," Marco added helpfully.

  "Like a ... like a toy spaceship," Jake said, ignoring Marco.

  «Why would they use a toy spaceship?» Ax wondered. «They have real spacecrafts Ax kept his main eyes attentively focused on Jake, while his stalk eyes looked at Marco and me.

  Jake shrugged and looked at me. I shrugged back.

  Which brought us to the one other thing we could think of doing: going to Goodwill and finding the "toy" my dad had delivered earlier.

  We morphed to seagulls and flew there. All except Tobias, who has his own wings.

  We demorphed and Rachel, Jake, and I went in. We glanced quickly around the shelves and realized the toy we were looking for was not there.

  I went to the clerk, a college-age guy.

  "Hi. My dad dropped off some toys about a couple hours ago, along with a bunch of other stuff. And, well, it turns out we gave you some stuff we shouldn't have."

  "Yeah. His toy spaceship," Rachel said, pointing at Jake.

  "That's right. My toy spaceship."

  "If it just came in it would still be in the back.

  17 They would have sorted it and probably stuck it with other toys."

  "Okay. Can we go look for it?" I asked, smiling my most winning smile.

  "What kind of spaceship was it?" the clerk asked.

  "Toy," Jake answered.

  The clerk rolled his eyes. "I mean, what kind? Romulan? Federation? Klingon? Dominion? Ferengi? Or maybe it was from the Babylon 5 universe: Minbari? Shadows? Or was it from Star Wars? Was it a TIE fighter?"

  Rachel and I both looked at Jake.

  "Romulan," he said.

  The clerk jerked his thumb over his shoulder. "Back there. But don't try and grab anything that isn't yours. You better come out of there with a Romulan ship."

  "Of all the clerks in all the Goodwills in the world, we have to get a science fiction fan," Jake muttered.