The Unexpected Page 7
“It will save his life, Yami. And once he’s stable, I can go find a doctor.”
“Yes. I’ll get my mother.” He ran out the door.
I sat on the edge of the bed and studied his grandfather’s worn, rugged face. The old man’s plea echoed through my head: Help me. Did he know what he was asking? Would he want to live with only one leg? Or would he rather we let him die?
But I knew the question was pointless. I wouldn’t let him die when there was still something I could do to save him. I wouldn’t let him suffer through the misery of being slowly eaten away by infection. I wouldn’t let him go when there was still so much he needed to teach Yami.
I’d helped my dad with amputations — a deer, a coyote, a raccoon. All hit by cars. And I’d done surgery without my dad. Brain surgery, on Ax. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but I’d do it again in a heartbeat. To save my friend’s life.
One of my right choices, no doubt.
I patted the old man’s hand and stood up. I needed a blade, a sharp blade, able to slice cleanly through a man’s bone. And I knew where to get one.
I changed back into my leotard and concentrated.
Sschhoooooooop. Sschhoooooooop. Schoooop-schoop-schoop.
Blades erupted from my head, wrists, forearms, elbows. Everything else about me was still human. I was Cassie, the human switchblade.
And I could have stayed that way. I could have stopped the morph right there and used the blades to perform the operation. But I needed more than the blades. I needed the strength to use them, more strength than my young human arms possessed.
Ssscccrrrrruuuuuuuunnch.
My neck stretched up and out, a serpent neck extending from my shoulders. Shoulders that were bulging. Massive shoulders and arms powerful enough to wrench a full-grown oak from the ground. I grew taller. The blades on my serpent head scraped the ceiling.
Cccuuuuuurrrrrrreeeeeeeeekkkkkk.
My body dropped as my legs slammed back and up. My hips rotated and my knees reversed direction. My toes melded together and shot out into four claws on tyrannosaur feet.
Sshhhhrrooooooooomp.
A thick tail shot out from the base of my spine and banged into the table, rattling the bottles of medicine. Skin grew thick and tough. Teeth, like scalpels, sprouted from my jaws.
I was Hork-Bajir. And not just any Hork-Bajir. I had two Hork-Bajir morphs now, but I had chosen to become the one I’d acquired on the airplane, the Hork-Bajir who had vaporized under the Dracon beam. I was a Xerox copy of a Hork-Bajir who could no longer exist except through the DNA in my blood.
And I was not a killer, not a natural terrorist for Visser Three. The Hork-Bajir was gentle, curious, and a little afraid. And he was going to help me save a life.
The door banged open, and I jumped.
“My mother is out in the desert. My aunt went to find —” Yami stared at me in horror. Backed against the wall.
“Your voice.” Yami pressed his hands against his ears.
I said.
Yami pulled his hands down slowly. “You can save my grandfather like this?”
He nodded. “Tell me how to help.”
We scrubbed our hands, or, in my case, claws, and I disinfected my wrist blades. We elevated the infected leg with blankets, then Yami gave his grandfather more of the pain medication his mother had made. Yami found a belt, and we used it as a tourniquet around his grandfather’s thigh. This was tricky because I knew that the main artery lay deep within his leg.
I made a shallow incision below the knee, cutting only through the skin all the way around his leg.
I wiped my blade on a sterile gauze pad and took a deep breath. The air in the little room was boiling. The Hork-Bajir was not built for heat.
I let out the breath.
I needed to make one slice, clean and clear, straight through the muscle. A quick cut would cause the arteries to spasm and help control bleeding.
I positioned my blade over his leg. I slashed, down and around. The muscle fell neatly in half. Blood splurted from the vessel closest to the bone.
Yami nodded. His lips went pale. He grabbed the artery with shaky fingers and squeezed.
I pushed the muscle back to reveal the two leg bones. One slice severed them both.
I demorphed quickly. Yami watched. His face contorted in a silent scream, but he said nothing. He nearly collapsed with relief when my fully human form emerged.
I stitched the main arteries and veins, but left the skin flaps open. If I closed them now, the wound wouldn’t drain, and infection would set in again. A doctor could stitch them closed when we got to a hospital.
Yami’s grandfather stirred. His fever had broken. His face was drenched, but it had lost its deathly pallor.
He moaned and rolled his arm out over the edge of the bed. Something black and heavy clanked to the floor.
I picked it up. It was the chunk of Bug fighter.
As I stared at the metal, a shadow darkened the room. And I knew what it was before I looked out the window.
Visser Three’s Blade ship hovered over the brush. A port on the bottom of the ship yawned open, and a Taxxon dropped out onto the red Australian plain.
The Blade ship hung low in the sky, black and silent against the setting sun. An army of Taxxons and Hork-Bajir leaped from its belly. They spread out over the scrub, trampling bushes and grass. The Hork-Bajir were armed. They fired Dracon beams at anything that moved.
I leaned against the window. It was happening again. I’d led innocent people — Yami and his family — into danger.
His family!
I whirled. “Yami, where did your mother go?”
He motioned toward the door. “On the other side of the outstation, beyond the gum trees.”
I nodded. “Good. Where’s Tjala?”
Yami’s eyes widened. He ran toward the door. “Tjala!”
The pup tore inside, wiggling and wagging.
Yami pressed his hands over his ears. Tjala yelped and flattened himself against the floor.
Three minutes. I stared out the window. I couldn’t fight all those Taxxons and Hork-Bajir. Not alone.
And I couldn’t hide. It would only put Yami and his family in more danger. Visser Three would kill them all just to flush me out.
I had to give him what he wanted. I had to come out in the open. If he saw me, he’d leave Yami’s family alone. If he knew where I was, he wouldn’t have to blast the desert into confetti looking for me.
One last Taxxon tumbled to Earth, then the port of the Blade ship rippled shut. The sky shimmered and the ship vanished, concealed behind a cloaking beam.
But Visser Three wasn’t gone. He was hiding. Watching.
“They have no right to be here.” Yami stood behind me, watching the strange alien beings ransack his desert.
“They’re here because of me.”
“No.” Yami’s grandfather touched my arm.
I looked down, startled.
He drew a sharp breath. His face twisted in pain, but his eyes stayed bright and alert.
“They’re here because they’re evil.” His voice was a low rasp. “You fight these creatures, yes?”
I nodded. “Yes.”
“If you did not fight them, do you think they would leave us alone? Do you think they would stay away from this place and never hurt us? No. They would come. They would take our land, destroy our home. Our li
fe would be gone forever. This I know.” He swallowed. “Do everything you can, and anything you must.” He closed his eyes. “I only wish I could help.”
I touched his cheek. “You already have,” I said.
I eased the door open and peered out into the shadows. Nothing. I slipped onto the porch.
I needed strength, speed, and endurance. A morph that was desert-ready. I focused on kangaroo.
Crrreeeaaaacccckkkk!
My hips swung forward. Thighs bulged into hulking mounds of muscle. My feet shot out, longer than my forearms. Toenails thickened and stretched. The two middle toes on each foot melted into one solid, claw-tipped bayonet.
Shhhhuuuuuuurroooooomp.
A tail shot from my spine, a column of pure muscle, as long as the rest of my body and as thick as my neck. The skin on my belly stretched to form a pouch.
Ssssccuuuuuuuurrrunnch.
My skull shifted back and out as my nose and jawbone sprouted into a muzzle. Ears stretched and shot to the top of my head. Dense fur spread from my whiskers to the tip of my tail.
I was Information Central, sensing everything at once.
My eyes peered through the long shadows on the porch, picking up the slight movement of grass twisting in the wind.
My ears flicked and twitched. I could turn them in any direction, like two satellite dishes, tuning into the scuffing sound of Taxxon belly scraping against sand.
I sniffed. The sweet sharp scent of some desert plant mingled with the wretched odor of Hork-Bajir. I shuffled to the edge of the porch, using my tail as a prop while I balanced on my front feet and swung my back legs forward.
I spotted the boomerang lying on the bench. The boomerang Yami’s grandfather had given me. I reached for it. The kangaroo’s front paws were amazing, almost like hands, without a real thumb, but with five nimble, clawed fingers. I gripped the boomerang in one paw, held my pouch open with the other, and slipped the boomerang inside.
Bummmph. Bummmph. I leaped out onto the open sand.
Bummmph. Bummmph.
I hopped between the houses of the little settlement. My nose twitched. Foul Taxxon breath drifted toward me on the desert wind.
One of the Hork-Bajir looked up. Then a Taxxon. One by one the Yeerks stopped combing the desert and watched me.
I stood upright, ears flicking, ready to make my move. A gunfighter facing off against a gang of outlaws.
I had to let the Yeerks know I was the Andalite bandit, not just a misguided kangaroo. And then I had to run as fast as I could for as long as I could and lead them as far away as I could.
Bummmph. Bummmph. Bummmph.
I leaped to the edge of the settlement and faced the empty spot in the sky where the Blade ship had vanished.
I could almost hear Rachel: “Let’s do it!”
And Marco: “Are you insane?”
Maybe, I said silently. No.
TSEEEEEEEEEWWWWWWWW!
The ground exploded at my feet.
I bolted. My legs were like coiled springs.
Bummph. I landed on both feet.
I leaped again, soaring what felt like the length of an eighteen-wheeler, my tail curved out behind me for balance.
Taxxon and Hork-Bajir-Controllers crunched through the scrub behind me. I veered off, away from the settlement, away from the clump of gum trees and Yami’s mother.
Bummmph. Bummmph. Bummmph.
The tendons at the backs of my legs were like rubber bands. I landed, and the rubber band shot me back into space. The faster I hopped, the more energy I had. I could leap forever.
TSEEEEEEEEEWWWWWWWW!
A Hork-Bajir jumped out ahead of me.
I turned.
TSEEEEEEEEEWWWWWWWW!
Another Hork-Bajir and a Taxxon.
I whirled. Another Taxxon, dead ahead. He slithered toward me, his centipede legs shooting him across the sand.
I leaped! He lunged! Hundreds of Taxxon pincers, like lobster claws, latched onto my fur.
I raked at him with my front paws. His pincers held tight, pulling me closer, closer. His Jell-O eyes quivered. Drool spilled from his mouth. His razor teeth slammed together like a guillotine, an inch above my neck. I leaned back, supporting my kangaroo body on the muscled coil of my tail, and kicked.
THUMP! Thwuump-thwuump.
The massive muscles that had propelled me across the desert now released their force on the Taxxon. My back legs struck, again and again. I shredded him with my dagger claws. He sank back from me, Taxxon goo oozing onto the sand.
More Taxxons swarmed toward us. I turned and leaped away. The Taxxons let me go.
Their rabid hunger zeroed in on their mangled comrade. The Yeerks inside their heads powerless to stop them. The Taxxons ripped into their fallen colleague. The wounded Taxxon himself turned and, with his last dying breath, slurped up his own guts.
Their little snack break bought me some time. I bounded across the scrub, surrounded on three sides. Taxxons and Hork-Bajir behind me and to my left. The settlement and grove of gum trees to my right. Only one way lay open, directly in front of me: the spring.
The Yeerks had already trampled Yami’s homeland and terrified his family. Now I was leading them to the sacred spring of his ancestors.
My choice. I had to get them as far away from Yami and his family as I could.
The Taxxons had finished feeding and were now slithering after me. Most of the Hork-Bajir had fallen behind. The desert was an oven, even with the sun going down. Their heavy Hork-Bajir bodies couldn’t take the heat.
But they were still armed.
TSEEEEEEEEEWWWWWWWW!
The sand exploded under me.
TSEEEEEEEEEWWWWWWWW!
A bush burst into flames.
I kept hopping. The ground sloped downward. The scrub became thicker. Ahead lay the spring.
And in front of it, between me and the water, a group of large animals grazed in the grass.
No! I couldn’t believe it. I’d led the Yeerks right to the kangaroos.
One of the ’roos, a female, bounded toward me, her joey bouncing along in her pouch. I recognized her. She was the doe I had untangled from the fence.
My own kangaroo’s identical twin.
TSEEEEEEEEEWWWWWWWW!
A crater erupted at the edge of the spring.
The kangaroos scattered, thundering over the grass. Bummmph. Bummmph. They hopped in every direction, looping back and forth, surrounding me.
TSEEEEEEEEEWWWWWWWW!
A boomer fell at my feet. The stench of burning fur filled the desert.
I had to break free. The Yeerks were firing at anything that moved. They didn’t know which kangaroo was me!
I leaped away from the spring, toward the open desert.
Most of the female kangaroos had scattered across the plain, but the males, the big boomers, didn’t move as fast as the does. They were twice as big. And twice as heavy.
Two of them were locked in combat with a Hork-Bajir, swiping with their claws as he slashed with his blades. Another lay on the grass, unmoving. Ravenous Taxxons descended upon him.
One of the boomers leaped toward the water. Another followed. And another.
They looked like they were fleeing, backing themselves into a watery corner in their panic to get away. Taxxons scrambled toward the spring in frenzied anticipation. They didn’t know the boomers were leading them into a trap.
Or trying to.
I turned back toward the spring. The boomers were fighting my battle, and I couldn’t let them fight alone. I leaped into the water.
The doe I’d rescued stood on the shore.
I kicked toward deeper water. My entire body was submerged except for the uppermost curve of my rump and the top of my head �
�� eyes, ears, the long ridge of my muzzle, nose. Powerful hind legs paddled, moving almost as well in water as on land.
More Taxxons slipped into the spring behind me. The Hork-Bajir followed, splashing in to the tops of their talons. Then they stopped. Couldn’t go any further. Their dense, tree-climbing bodies would sink in the mud at the bottom of the spring.
So they raised their Dracon beams instead.
TSEEEEEEW-buh-LOOOOOOSH!
A blast shot over my head. Heat singed my ears.
TSEEEEEEW-buh-LOOOOOOSH!
Water boiled around me.
Taxxons motored toward us. Their lobster claws propelling them headlong into the waiting roos.
The Taxxons lunged. The kangaroos threw their heads back and clawed. Pulled the bloated Taxxons down in the water!
A Taxxon barreled down on me, backing me toward the cliff. Another circled and came at me from behind. Claws snatched at me, front and back. I raked and kicked. The Taxxons pressed in. Pushed me under!
I fought to keep my face above the surface. Leaned back. Water lapped into my ears. A slurping Taxxon mouth bore down on me. My ears slipped under, then my eyes. My muzzle. My mouth. Only the tip of my nose remained above the water.
The Taxxon lunged. I kicked. Slashed! The water churned around me. My nose buried in foul Taxxon flesh! The Taxxon was on top of me now, pushing me down. I plunged deeper and deeper into the cool bottom water.
I struggled to break free. Taxxon claws, locked onto my fur, pressing down, down. Thrashing … legs and shoulders dragged through the water. Lungs burning!
I dug my paws into the Taxxon’s skin. His fat body bobbed like a beach ball. I pulled my hind legs up and around, so that I was on my back, under the Taxxon.
Schloooomp. Schloooomp.
I kicked. My middle toes plunged into the soft flesh of the Taxxon’s belly.
Spuh-LOOOOOOSH.
The Taxxon exploded! Popped like a big, nasty pimple.
The force of the eruption propelled me to the surface. Air! I sucked in lungfuls of air. The other Taxxons writhed toward the site like maggots.
I jetted away from them.
TSEEEEEEW-buh-LOOOOOOSH!
The water sizzled.
I whirled. A Hork-Bajir aimed at my head.