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  There were no Na that I could see. Aside from the Skrit, the bridge of the ship was empty.

  «So far, so good,» I muttered. «l'm going to close the hatch. We'll demorph, power up, and be off-planet before they know what's hit them.»

  «Yeah. Okay,» Arbron said. «Ready?»

  «Yep.» I focused on my breathing, trying to fight the raging Taxxon hunger and my own fear. «Okay, do it!»

  Arbron punched the pad to close the hatch door. It slid shut and made a snug vacuum seal SHWOOMP!

  I focused all my thoughts on demorphing. I wanted out of that Taxxon body. The two of us could barely move in the cramped bridge, let alone fly the ship. The idiot Skrit kept banging against me, unable to find a way to go around.

  I demorphed. I shed that vile Taxxon body as fast

  13 as I could. I felt the awful hunger weaken and my own Andalite mind rise above, freed of the Taxxon's instincts.

  THUMP! THUMP! THUMP!

  The Gedds were pounding on the hull. "Rrrrwhat arrrre you doing? Open rrrup!"

  I ignored the noise and punched the engine power. The main engines began to whine as they powered up.

  And then I realized it. Arbron was not demorph-ing.

  «Arbron, what are you waiting for? Demorph!»

  Arbron didn't say anything.

  THUMP! THUMP! THUMP!

  "Rrrr-open up! Powerrrdown rrryou fool!"

  «Arbron! What are you up to? Demorph!» I yelled. I guess I hoped that yelling would make it happen. But I already knew. He stared at me through those shimmering red jelly eyes, and I knew. More quietly, almost begging, I said, «Come on, Arbron. Demorph.»

  «l really wish I could, Elfangor,» he said. «l really wish I could.»

  14 There was no time to talk about it. We had to

  get the Skrit Na ship up and out of that cradle before it occurred to the Yeerks that we were stealing it,

  No time to talk about it. But time to feel something of the terror Arbron felt.

  I had been in Taxxon morph. I had felt the hunger. I'd rather be dead than be trapped in that body forever.

  Arbron's weak Taxxon "arms" pushed all the right buttons, and I felt the soft vibration of the engines reaching full power.

  The Gedd-Controllers outside must have felt it, too. Suddenly they stopped pounding on the ship. They were probably running for dear life. The radiation blast of the engines would be captured and contained within the cradle. But if you were still hanging around on that cradle when the engines came on, you wouldn't last long.

  «Ready?» I asked Arbron.

  «Ready.»

  15 «Then hang on, because I don't know how much of a kick these Skrit Na ships have.» I punched up a burn and we rose from the pad.

  Unfortunately, we didn't rise very quickly.

  «What is the matter with this thing?» I yelled. I looked at the air speed indicator. We were doing a bare thousand miles per hour. And the acceleration rate was way too slow.

  «lt'll take us ten minutes just to get escape velocity^ Arbron cried.

  «Yeerk ships will be all over us before we can even think about going to Zero-space,» I said.

  «The Time Matrix!» Arbron said. «We can use it! We can escape through time!»

  «No! We don't know how fast it works. If we try to activate the Time Matrix, the power signature will light up every Yeerk sensor within a million miles! What if it takes ten minutes for it to work? Besides ... we don't know who else might get mad if you use that thing.»

  «What? You're worried about what some prince will say if we survive?»

  «No. I'm not worried about our superiors. Or at least, I figure my career in the military is already destroyed. »

  «Then what are you . . . » Arbron fell silent. Then he laughed. «Are you kidding me? You're worried about some mythical Ellimists?»

  16 «Mythical? That's what some people used to say about the Time Matrix itself. Someone built that machine. Who else, if not the Ellimists? And do we want to take the chance of making them angry?»

  I felt a little foolish. My parents had told me El-limist stories when I was a child. Stories of the all-powerful, inexplicable creatures who sometimes interfered in the affairs of simpler species. I halfway expected a snide remark from Arbron.

  But Arbron didn't answer. He was staring at his display board. At least, I guess he was staring. Taxxon eyes don't exactly focus normally. «Yeerk patrol ship coming up on an intercept vector! It's a Bugfighter!»

  «Can we take on a Bug fighter?»

  «Are you kidding? All the Skrit Na ever have are secondhand, low-power Dracon beams the Yeerks sell off for scrap. That Bug fighter has twin Penetrator-Class Dracon beams. We can't trade shots with them!»

  He was right. And I should have remembered that. But I was shaken. Confused. My brain was spinning at a million revolutions per second and going nowhere.

  I had to think. Focus.

  The air speed gauge now showed two thousand twenty miles per hour. The hull was blistering hot from the air resistance. «Wait a minute! Bug fighters

  17 are slow in atmosphere, right? They can't handle the heat. We can! So far, at least. We're doing better than two thousand miles per hour. We're faster than they are in atmosphere!»

  «You're going to try and outrun them in the at-mosphere?»

  «You have a better option?»

  «We have a second Bug fighter on us!» Arbron answered. «Two more launching!»

  «We're going to the grass,» I said, hoping I sounded more confident than I felt. «l'll need direct vision. Real time, real aspect. Open a window.»

  Arbron played his console, and suddenly the panel in front of me became a window. I could see the superheated air, blazing around the ship.

  I nosed the stubby, round ship down. As we dropped we picked up speed. «Passing three thousand miles per hour!»

  Down, down, down at over three thousand mph! The brown dust of the Taxxon world leaped up at us.

  Spacecraft are designed for the almost total vacuum of space. Usually they are barely functional in atmosphere. But the Skrit Na were scavengers who went from planet to planet, kidnapping and stealing and performing their inexplicable medical experiments. So they needed ships that could handle atmosphere.

  18 But nothing is really designed to do three thousand miles an hour in atmosphere. Let alone fifty feet off the ground.

  We had been seven miles up, right at the outer edge of the Taxxon atmosphere. We dropped back down to ground level in five point eight seconds.

  «Yaaaaahhhhhh!»

  «Yaaaaahhhhhh!»

  We both screamed in a mix of utter terror and shocking excitement. Let me tell you something: Millions of miles an hour in empty space is nothing compared to three thousand miles an hour going straight for the ground.

  «Pull up! Pull up! Pull up!»

  I pulled up, as the collision warnings screamed in the Skrit Na language.

  We blew across the Taxxon desert, trailing sonic booms that must have sounded like nuclear explosions going off in our wake.

  «Can you get the Bug fighters on visual?» I asked.

  «On screen !»

  I saw two Bug fighters racing after us, one behind the other. Their hulls glowed bright with friction heat. But they weren't backing off.

  «Fine,» I muttered. «Let's see who's faster.» I raised the burn and felt a slight lurch as the engines pushed harder still.

  19 «Three thousand two hundred miles per hour,» Arbron reported. «Three point three K. Three point four K. Hull temperature is ... you don't even want to know. Three point five K.»

  Three thousand five hundred miles an hour. The ground was a blur. We were a blazing meteorite. We were an arrow of flame as we shot across the Taxxon world at impossible speeds. The scruffy bushes and stunted trees of the Taxxon world burst into flame as we passed over. We were drawing a line of fire around the planet!

  «Pull up!» Arbron yelled.

  Mountains rose up like a wall. «Where did
they come from?!» I cried as I pulled up, straining every atom in the Skrit Na ship.

  The ship bucked like a dying beast in its final agony. But we climbed. Up ... up ...

  «Are we going to clear?»

  Before I could answer, we shot over the mountain wall. I swear I heard the bottom scrape as we cleared the height.

  Unfortunately, the Yeerks knew the local topography. They'd been ready for them. They had adjusted easily and had gained on us.

  TSSSSEEEEWWWW!

  A red Dracon beam lanced past us, missing by inches. They were close enough now to shoot.

  20 We were approaching the dividing line between night and day. I could see it rushing toward me.

  Suddenly, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the lead Bug fighter simply explode! The air friction had finally worn down its compensators and the craft had burned to a cinder in a split second.

  «Yah-hah! One Yeerk fried!» I exulted.

  «Elfangor, we're next if we don't slow down,» Arbron warned.

  «There are still three Bug fighters on our tailr» I said.

  «We are about five minutes away from burning up,» Arbron said. «Can you guarantee those Bug fighters will cinder before we do?»

  «What do you have in mind?»

  «We take a shot. One, two, three. They won't be ready. They won't expect it»

  I turned my stalk eyes to stare at Arbron. «No one can make that shot»

  «l can,» he said.

  «With Taxxon eyes?» I didn't want to throw that in his face, but I had to be realistic. «With Taxxon reaction times? With Skrit Na targeting comput-ers?»

  «l can make the shot, Elfangor,» he said calmly.

  «Look, Arbron, I want to come out of this alive.»

  «And you think I don't care if I live or die, right?» he said bitterly. «Maybe you're right. This

  21 hunger. . . Elfangor, you've felt it. You know. But I can still make this shot»

  «You always laugh at me wanting to be a hero,» I said. «Now who's playing hero?»

  He didn't answer.

  I looked at the hull temperature readout. He was right. We would cinder in a few minutes.

  You know what's funny? I wanted to ask the captain what to do. It seemed ridiculous that I should make a life and death decision like this. Princes made those kinds of decisions. Captains made those decisions.

  Only I was the captain. And if I was wrong, we would dig a hole in the Taxxon dirt at three thousand miles an hour.

  «Okay, Arbron,» I said. «ln ten seconds. Ten . . . nine . . . eight. . . »

  22 «Three . . . two . . .»

  S kii!ed thrust and punched the air brakes.

  SHHHHHRRRRREEEEEEEKKKK!

  The Skrit Na ship shook; it bucked; it rattled; it vibrated; it bounced wiidly just fifty feet off the grass

  S was thrown off-balance, I sprawled across the deck. But Arbron's rows of Taxxon legs absorbed the punishment. He never wavered. He kept his Taxxon claws on the targeting controls.

  Our speed dropped from nearly three and a half thousand miles per hour down to half that. In mere seconds! Too fast for the Bug fighters to react.

  What happened next would make Arbron a hero,

  Our speed dropped off; the Bug fighters rocketed forward and blew past, doing fifteen hundred mph faster than us.

  Arbron fired! TSSSEEEEEWWW!

  Fired! TSSSEEEEEWWW!

  Fired! TSSSEEEEEWWW!

  23 Three shots at three targets doing a relative speed of fifteen hundred mph. Three shots in atmosphere! Three shots from a vibrating, bucking wreck of a Skrit Na ship.

  I dragged myself up and stared in disbelief out of the forward window.

  Three spinning meteorites, three balls of flame, slammed into the ground. They dug craters in the Taxxon dirt and extinguished themselves.

  «Nice shooting!» I said. «Seriously nice shooting^

  «Thanks. It turns out Taxxon senses and reflexes are good at this kind of thing. Guess that's why the Yeerks use Taxxon-Controllers to fly their Bug fighters. It's nice to know there's something useful about this disgusting body.»

  «We're going to find a way to get you out of that Taxxon morph,» I said. I tried to sound like I meant it. What else could I say?

  Till that moment I'd been too busy trying to stay alive to really think about what had happened to Arbron. Maybe we'd never exactly been best friends, but it was still horrible to look at his foul Taxxon body and think that this was how he would remain. To look into those emotionless red jelly eyes and realize that he was in there, looking back at me.

  And I knew what he was feeling, now that the

  24 battle was done. The terror. The despair. The awful Taxxon hunger.

  I turned the Skrit Na ship around and headed back toward the rushing line of daylight.

  «What are you doing?» Arbron demanded.

  «l need a place to land and conceal this shipr» I said. «l need daylight. And I need to be chaser to the spaceport. We can't just leave the others behind.»

  «Others? You mean Alloran?»

  «And the humansf» I said. «They are our responsibility

  «We are not going back to the spaceport,» Arbron said. «The Yeerks are back there. And Taxxons. They'll catch us. Do you know what they'll do if they catch me? They'll eat me alive, Elfangor.»

  «Arbron, you have to hold on. You have to try and hold on.» We weW racing back across the dark mountains. Back toward the retreating line of daylight.

  «Hold on? Hold on? Are you insane? If we go back there, they'll eat me! Turn this ship back. I'm going to use the Time Matrix! I'm going back in time. I'm going back to my life!»

  «You can't light up that Time Matrix. The power signature will be visible to every ship in orbit, every satellite, every -»

  «l don't care! I don't care if I die, just let this

  25 hunger stop. Stop it. Stop it. Stop it! You fool, don't you know I could eat you right now?»

  I turned my main eyes toward Arbron. I knew that inside there was a scared Andalite aristh. But what I actually saw was the nightmare worm. What I saw was the sloppy red eyes, the round, gasping, eternally hungry mouth.

  For a moment that seemed to stretch and stretch, we stared at each other. I don't know what was going through Arbron's mind right then. I don't know what conclusions he'd reached. I only know what he did.

  "Sssrrrreeeeyyyyyaaahhh!" he screamed in his slithering, high-pitched Taxxon voice. He reared back, practically laying the upper third of his body horizontal. And then he slammed down on me.

  Slammed his upper body down, red mouth open wide.

  I could have killed him. He knew that, of course. He knew that no Taxxon could hope to outfight an Andalite. But I could not kill him. Not even if that's what he wanted.

  I dodged to my right.

  He slammed hard into the instrument panel. Sparks erupted!

  He swept his upper body toward me, hoping to slam me against the bulkhead and stun me.

  26 I leaped inside his reach and struck!

  SLASH! Two of his needle legs went rolling across the floor.

  SLASH! And two more legs were gone.

  Arbron sagged. The front part of his body could no longer be held up. He lay, fully prone, a huge, helpless worm.

  «Just kill me!» he screamed.

  But I was busy. The control panel had been half-wrecked. The ship was bucking and yawing. It was unstable. I reduced power. We had shot across the line into twilight. But I couldn't see into the deep shadows between the mountain peaks.

  «You can't leave me like this!» Arbron cried.

  «l'm going to get you help,» I yelled. «But I have to land this ship!»

  «Elfangor! You know what happens to wounded Taxxons! You know»

  «'\ protect you,» I cried desperately as the ship bucked and shook harder and harder. The two co-cooned Skrit seemed about to break loose from their moorings. The active Skrit had gone to the cargo hold. Maybe, even as unintelligent as the Skrit
are, he knew better than to be anywhere near a hungry Taxxon.

  «You can't protect me. Fool! Nothing can stop them! Nothing can stop the hunger. I couldn't stop it. Alloran couldn't stop it. Don't you understand? I

  27 ate, Elfangor. I ate that wounded Taxxon. I couldn't help myself!»

  «Shut up!» I screamed. «Shut up!»

  I didn't want to hear anymore. I couldn't. I had to focus. I had to land the ship or we'd both die. I had to shut Arbron up.

  I swept my stalk eyes around the bridge. Where would the Skrit Na keep weapons? There. A green panel marked with Skrit Na script.

  I stretched my left arm to reach the panel. Popped it open. Yes. A handheld Dracon beam. Old and dusty and probably badly maintained, like most Skrit Na things.

  I found the power setting. I set it at the lowest intensity.

  «What are you doing?» Arbron yelled.

  «l have to land this ship, Arbron. Keep quiet or I'll stun you.»

  «lf you fire that thing, you'll kill me,» Arbron said. «You have the settings backward. That's originally a Yeerk weapon. Setting one is the highest setting, not the lowest»

  Suddenly, I knew what Arbron would do. He couldn't rise up, but he could still scuttle forward. He came straight for me, rushing and slithering, as if he were aiming his round red mouth at me.

  He was trying to force me to shoot him. To shoot him with the Dracon beam set on maximum! But

  28 I was too fast for him. I twisted the dial to ten. I fired.

  And just as my finger was tightening on the trigger ... I realized Arbron had outsmarted me. He'd lied, and I'd fallen for it. Arbron had always been a better student than me. He was a qualified exo-datologist. He knew alien systems far better than me.

  I tried to stop. But my finger squeezed. The Dra-con beam fired. On maximum power.

  But by chance, or maybe by some desperate, too-late twitch of my finger, the beam missed Arbron by a millimeter.

  Instead, it blew a two-foot hole through the hull of the ship.

  After that, everything was noise and spinning and pain and confusion.

  29

  I woke up.

  I was on my side, lying in the dirt.

  I looked up at a night sky. Stars, galaxies, three tiny moons.

  Where was I?