The Escape Read online

  Blood! A wounded animal! Prey!

  But as I turned and turned again, circling back toward more shallow water, I became frustrated. Where was it? Where was the bleeding creature? Where was my prey?

  The others circled nearby. One of them brushed against me, sandpaper on sandpaper. They were seeking it, too. The bleeding prey whose scent filled our heads.

  Where was it?

  The shark brain was confused, uncertain. And in that moment of confusion and uncertainty, the

  107 steel mind of the shark left a slight crack. Enough of a crack. Enough for my human brain to call up the picture of a human hand, bleeding from a small cut.

  My hand! My hand. The human named Marco.

  «0h, my God!» I yelled in thought-speak. «lt was me! It's my blood! That's my own blood!»

  The others didn't care. They continued to turn in ever tighter circles, looking, searching, marauding for the source of the blood.

  «Jake! Jake! Shake it off, man. The shark has you. Jake, come on, man. Get on top of it. Cassie! Rachel. Ax. Tobias. All of you. It's the shark instincts. Fight them. That was my blood.»

  It took a few minutes before we were all back to being ourselves. Tobias dealt with it easiest. I guess that's not a surprise. He's a predator normally. Maybe the shark mind and the hawk mind aren't so different.

  Ax handled it well, too. Not that Andalites are sharklike. It was mostly that he'd morphed a shark already.

  «Yikes,» Cassie said, laughing nervously. «Kind of single-minded, aren't they?»

  «No one else bleed,» Rachel said. «l'll be hungry for hours.»

  We were a little shaken up. We'd gotten cocky

  108 about being able to control animal morphs. But the shark was different. I think at some level, at the most basic survival level, that primitive shark brain was actually superior to our own human brain.

  It knew what it wanted. And there is a terrible strength in knowing what you want and having no doubts.

  We swam around the island, back toward the holographically concealed underwater facility. This time we expected to be able to pass right by the supersharks who had almost taken us out when we'd been in dolphin morph.

  We swam right through what looked exactly like seabed, right up to the facility. With dead shark eyes I stared through the portholes. The one that opened onto a busy cubicle area. And the other one. The one that looked into a more private room.

  The guard sharks swam right past and around us, never paying the slightest attention.

  «That was easy,» Rachel said. «Let's go ahead and do this.»

  «Don't forget: The Leerans are psychic at close range,» Ax warned. «Whatever we do, we have to stay clear of them.»

  This was the point where I'd normally make a joke. But just then I saw a woman entering the

  109 private office. She was distorted by the convex glass, by the water, and by my own water-oriented shark's eyes.

  But I knew her.

  And I forgot to find something funny to say.

  110 «l low what?» Tobias wondered. «We got past the guard sharks.»

  «Now I guess we go take a look inside,» Jake said. He didn't sound too enthusiastic about the idea.

  «Two of the three big hatches are open,» Rachel observed. «Eenie, meenie, minie, moe?»

  «Heads or tails?» I suggested.

  «0ne potato, two potato?» Cassie said.

  «What do these things mean?» Ax asked.

  «These are highly advanced human methods for making choices,» I said. «How about the middle door?»

  «Middle door,» Jake agreed.

  We swam toward the middle door. From a dis-

  111 tance it was big. Up close it was even bigger. It was obviously big enough for the submarine to enter through.

  From the outside the tunnel inside looked dark, but once away from the filtered green sunlight from above, we could see that there were lights on inside the tunnel.

  We swam around, taking our time and trying to look casual. The open door and short tunnel led to a rectangular pool. A boat dock, obviously. Probably used by the submarine. There were other hammerheads there, too. But still they ignored us.

  I rose to the surface, letting my dorsal fin slice its way into the air. I rolled to one side, and raised my left eye above the water. Shark eyes are not made for seeing through atmosphere, but I could still see well enough. I saw a wall of corrugated steel that formed the rectangular boat dock we were in. But other than that I could only look straight up at the rafters overhead.

  «We're not going to see much more staying in shark morph,» Rachel said. «We need to get out and look around.»

  «As what?» Jake asked. «We'd need something that fit in here. Something these Controllers wouldn't notice. But something with decent senses.»

  «F!ies,» Cassie suggested. «Everyone except Tobias has a fly morph.»

  112 «0h, great. I get left out again,» Tobias complained.

  «l think the bad guys might notice a red-tailed hawk flying around in their underwater facility^ I said. «Although there are probably rats infesting this place, too, so the Controllers may appreciate your being here to eat their pests.»

  «We'd have to morph back to human under-watery Jake pointed out. «Then morph to fly. All without drowning.»

  Scr-EET! Scr-EET! Scr-EET!

  «What's that?»

  «An alarm! Oh, man. They know we're here!»

  Suddenly a rush of hammerheads was coming straight for us. I saw them first as dark shadows in the water. They loomed larger and larger. We turned to face them. But it was impossible. There had to be fifty of them!

  On they came, whipping the water with their long tails.

  Then . . . they swam past. They kept swimming for the far end of the dock. And now we could distinctly hear the sound of a mechanized door opening.

  WHRRREEEEEEE!

  «Those are definitely not normal sharks,» Cassiesaid.

  «Let's follow them,» Rachel said. «They may lead us where we need to go.»

  113 «Yeah, or they might lead us right into where they make the new Oscar Mayer Shark-meat Lunchables,» I said. «Hammerhead slices, American cheese, crackers, and a cookie.»

  We went after the sharks. We followed them to the far end of the dock. A new door had opened. There was actually a line of sharks waiting to get in. The pathway narrowed till soon we were single file.

  «l'm starting to think Marco was right,» Tobias said. «This sure feels like some kind of shark slaughterhouses

  «l don't think so,» Cassie said. «l'll bet this is something more medical. Besides, we'd smell blood if the other sharks were getting hurt.»

  «Unless they're getting boiled alive,» I said. «Boiled and canned, and in one process. Then it's Chicken of the Sea shark meat.»

  Suddenly I heard Cassie yell, «Ahhh!»

  She was right in front of me. And before I could react, I knew why she had yelled. Steel claws reached out from each side and grabbed me just behind my hammer head. The claws held me tightly, but not painfully. I was drawn upward till I was vertical. I was out of the water. My gills gasped in the air. My body writhed in panic.

  I saw a line of us. A conveyor belt of hammerhead sharks, all hanging vertically. There were

  113

  ^|W^

  114 human-Controllers and Hork-Bajir manning equipment boards and looking totally uninterested.

  We turned a corner into a second room and up rose a robot arm festooned with tools whose purpose I couldn't even guess. The robot arm arced toward the shark two spaces ahead of Cassie. From out of nowhere a long, thick needle appeared. It plunged into the back of the shark's head.

  «What the ... We have to get outta here!» I cried.

  But there was no time. The conveyor belt kept moving. Too fast!

  The robot arm moved with machine precision. It plunged the needle into the back of Cassie's head.

  «lt's okay,» Cassie managed to gasp. «l think it was just an immuniz
ation. Maybe.»

  But what came next was not okay. The robot arm hesitated. It popped out a sort of meta! detector or something and moved it over Cassie's shark head. Then it extruded a drill.

  Not like a dental drill. Like a drill you'd use to make holes in wood.

  The drill bit spun and it plunged.

  «What was that?!» Cassie cried in alarm.

  The drill bit withdrew. But a bright steel probe lanced into the hole. In it poked, then

  115 withdrew. A wisp of smoke curled away from the hole as it was cauterized by a green laser beam.

  «Cassie! Are you okay?» Jake yelled.

  «Uh . . . yeah. I guess so.»

  And then it was my turn. There was a sharp prick of pain, but sharks don't care about pain.

  The drill withdrew. And seconds later, I was dropped into saltwater. In fact, I quickly realized, I was back in the same boat dock I'd been in before. There were other hammerheads all around me. My friends were being dropped practically on top of me.

  «What was thata\ about?» Tobias asked.

  «They injected us all with something,» Cassie said. «Right into our brains. But... oh. Oh! Aaaarrggghhh!»

  It hit me a few seconds later. How can I describe the pain? You know how I said sharks don't care about pain? Well, this wasn't any pain that any shark had endured. I felt my brain exploding. Like some mad animal was trapped inside my head and trying to claw its way out.

  I screamed. «Aaaahhhhh! Oh, oh, oh! Stop it!»

  And then, through the water, a sound reverberated. Like a WHOOO-WHOOO-WHOOO.

  The pain stopped. In its place came a wave of pleasure. It was like the taste of prey in my shark mouth: the ultimate shark pleasure.

  116 «What is happening?» Ax demanded.

  «l don't know, but it's kind of nice.»

  Then, the weirdest thing ... I felt the shark mind, that simple killing-machine mind, seem to open up. The shark mind looked out through its eyes, and for the first time ever, noticed things that had nothing to do with finding prey.

  The shark eyes noticed the pattern of the corrugated steel that formed the dock. The shark sense of smell took note of scents like oil and rust and seaweed that had nothing to do with killing and eating.

  «This sounds insane,» I said, «but I think this shark is getting srnarter.»

  «Like the sharks that attacked us,» Rachel agreed.

  «My shark brain just wondered,» Cassie said, sounding amazed. «lt wondered whether there would be prey later.»

  «That sounds sharklike,» Jake said.

  «No!» Cassie yelled excitedly. «Sharks don't "wonder." Sharks can't even form the concept of a future, let alone wonder about it. It's completely impossible!»

  «So what does it mean?» Tobias asked.

  Cassie answered. «!t's the Yeerks. They've altered these brains. That's why the sharks were able to work together the other time. The Yeerks

  117 are mutating these shark brains. We just got the first treatments

  «Why?» Rachel wondered.

  Ax said, «There's only one reason to alter the physiology of these brains. To make it possible for the Yeerks to enter them. The natural shark brain is too small, too simplistic for the Yeerks to control. They are mutating the sharks to make them capable of being made into Controllers. They will need to add ear canals as well. So that the Yeerks can enter and leave the brain.»

  «A new version of Hork-Bajir,» I said. «That's it! The Yeerks want water-going Hork-Bajir. They need dangerous, tough, deadly shock-troops that can go where Hork-Bajir can't: in the water. What better soldier than a s/7a/7r-Controller, if you need troops in an underwater environment?»

  «Yes,» Tobias agreed grimly. «And what worse nightmare for any peaceful species to face?»

  118 «We have to find out more,» Jake said. «lt's time to get out of the water and go look around in this place.»

  It was going to be hard and dangerous. We had to return to human form. Then morph again. All in the water. Without being seen, or drowning.

  I was relieved to be getting out of the shark morph. I hated sharks, I'd decided. I didn't want to be one anymore. Let alone a sort of super, self-aware, thinking shark.

  I was happy when my legs reappeared. When my fins became hands, when my teeth ground and itched away and became the tiny, blunt, pitifully weak human teeth.

  But I knew I'd never hold my breath clear into

  119 a new morph. I poked my head above the surface and looked around with human eyes for the first time. The others popped up nearby. Tobias looked like a drowned rat. He stood on Rachel's head.

  There was a dark ceiling high overhead. And I could hear machinery. But I saw no humans or Hork-Bajir or Taxxons standing around the dock. Maybe they were all busy back in that office room we'd seen through the portholes.

  "Looks kind of empty," I whispered to Jake.

  "Yeah. We'd better be careful, though. Morph here in the water. It won't be any problem for the fly, I don't think."

  He was right. The water didn't bother the fly morph. Something else did.

  I focused on the fly DNA within me, and I began to shrink. I had done the fly morph several times before, so I was prepared for the way the spiky legs grew out of my chest. The way all my internal organs melted away, replaced by simpler insect organs. The way my mouth and nose sprouted out to become a horrible, long proboscis.

  I was in the water, breathing air from a bubble, when it began. I realized my head was exploding. And that was not just an expression.

  «Aaaahhh! Aaaahhh!» I screamed. My head was still maybe two inches wide, almost entirely

  120 fly, with only a few shreds of human left. But I stopped the morph instantly.

  I stared around me with eyes more fly than human. The watery world was a shattered mirror of images. The fly's compound eyes saw with a thousand tiny, irregular, bewildering TV sets, each tuned to a slightly different channel. And because we were underwater, I saw even less than usual.

  But then, by luck, Rachel drifted near. Just within range.

  Seeing a morph is always horrifying. I mean, we get used to it, but it never stops being creepy beyond belief. And nothing is creepier than watching a human being turn into a fly. Trust me, that is enough fuel to keep you in nightmares the rest of your life.

  But what I had just seen, floating past me in the water, was worse.

  «Everyone, stop morphing! Stop now!» I yelled, just as the others all started groaning in agony.

  «What is it?» Ax asked. «l am experiencing a terrible pain.»

  «l'm not surprised. Demorph! They put something in us.»

  «What are you talking about?» Rachel asked.

  «l mean when the Yeerks drilled into us, they

  121 left something inside! When we shrank to fly size, this thing, this whatever it is, was too big! Our fly bodies were smaller than the thing inside us. We'd have killed ourselves.»

  «What did it look like?» Tobias asked.

  I surfaced again, human once more. "I couldn't tell. I just saw Rachel's head being all twisted and bulging from trying to shrink with this thing inside it!"

  "Some kind of control device," Jake said. "I should have realized! That's why we got drilled when the other sharks didn't. We didn't have the control device in our heads. The Yeerks are using it to control the sharks until all the treatments are done."

  «That's what caused that surge of pleasure,» Tobias said. «The Yeerks use that feeling to keep the sharks happy. To summon them and control them. Make them forget the pain of the brain mutation. It's tied to the underwater sounds they broadcasts

  "So what do we do?" I asked.

  "We get these things out of our heads!" Rachel yelled. "If we have to stomp every Yeerk in this facility!"

  "Oh, good, the subtle approach," I sneered.

  "Rachel may be right," Jake said. "We can't have this. Period. We cannot have Yeerk control

  122 devices in our heads. We're underwater, with implants in our
brains, and psychic Leeran aliens running around. This is seriously not cool."

  "There may be hundreds of Controllers here," I pointed out. "We can't just get crazy and get away with it."

  "No," Jake agreed. "But we need a distraction. Two teams: one to get to the controls of this place. The other to, as Marco said, get crazy and keep the Yeerks busy. Ax, Marco, and Tobias in the first group. Rachel, Cassie, and me to cause a distraction."

  "Finally. We get to do something."

  That was Rachel, of course.

  123 Me, Ax, and Tobias. We couldn't morph anything small with the Yeerk control devices still implanted in our heads. Not bugs, anyway. So how we were supposed to go wandering around the underwater facility without being noticed?

  "I think someone might notice a pair of wolves running around," I said. "We need to go airborne. The bird heads are obviously big enough to allow for the control chips. After all, Tobias returned to his normal hawk body okay. Besides, people have a tendency not to look up."

  A few minutes later, I was in osprey morph. Ax was a northern harrier. Tobias was Tobias. And we were all wet.

  124 A wet bird is not a happy bird, I can tell you that.

  We flapped, unseen, up to the roof of the facility. It was made with open steel beams. You know: like the inside of a Toys "R" Us store. There was a slight curvature to the roof, probably to help carry the load of water pressure.

  From up near the ceiling we could perch and look down at the entire facility. There were three identical dock slips like the one we'd been in. One housed the transparent sub. There was no one aboard but a couple of Taxxons doing maintenance work.

  We saw two buildings separated from each other by the center dock. The buildings were identical, windowless rectangles painted white. Like warehouses. There were other smaller buildings around as well. The kinds of buildings they use as "temporary" classrooms.

  «Big mistake,» Tobias pointed out. «No windows. I guess it never occurred to them they might want to be able to see around inside this place. The only windows look out into the water.»

  «They aren't expecting enemies in here. No one is supposed to make it past the sharks,» Ax said.

  «Whatever is happening is happening inside those buildings,» Tobias said. «So which one do we go for? Left or right?»