The Unknown Read online

  «0f course the Yeerks don't know what it is,» Ax said calmly. «They have never been aboard an Andalite Dome ship.»

  One by one, we each stopped walking. One by one we turned to face Ax.

  «Ax, are you telling us you do know what that thing is?» Tobias asked.

  «0f course. I started to tell you, but we were interrupted.»

  «So? So what is it?» Marco demanded.

  «lt's a disposable module of a type used in the old days on the first generation of Andalite Dome ships. When the modules were used up, they were jettisoned into space. They were supposed to be aimed toward a star, so they'd be burned up without a trace. This one must have drifted through space, eventually being caught by Earth'sgravity.»

  «So it's a space engine?»

  «lt's a weapon?»

  128 «No, of course not. It's . . . well, this is a bit embarrassing. It's an Andalite Dome ship's modular waste disposal system.»

  For about a full minute, no one said anything. Then Marco spoke. «You're telling me the Most Secret Place On Earth, the fabled Zone Ninety-one, the Holy Grail of conspiracy nuts, is hiding the secret of an Andalite toiletf»

  «0nly a very primitive model,» Ax said condescendingly. «Since those days there have been huge technological improvements.»

  129 We got out of horse morph and into bird morph and flew home.

  We alone now knew the secret of Zone 91. An entire base built to analyze what they thought was an alien spaceship but was, in reality, a high-tech Andalite Porta-John.

  There was, according to Ax, absolutely zero chance that the Andalite toilet would give humans the ability to fly through space.

  We had done some very important things as Animorphs. We had fought some terrible and vital battles.

  This wasn't one of them.

  I got home just in time to walk into my living

  130 room and realize both my parents were waiting for me.

  They had their angry-parent faces on.

  "Where have you been?" my mother demanded.

  Mom always takes the lead in discipline. She knows my dad will give in too easily. She thinks she's tougher. She thinks that because it happens to be true.

  "I was out with Rachel," I said, more or less truthfully.

  "Out with Rachel doing what?" my mom hissed. "You missed dinner. It's dark out. You didn't tell us where you were going."

  My mom isn't a real big person. Until she's mad. Then she somehow gets larger. She seems to rise up and tower over me. It's weird. I mean, normally she's maybe two inches taller than me, but right then she was at least eight feet tall.

  "We were very worried," my father said in a soft, quiet voice.

  I sighed. I could feel the guilt welling up inside me. I hate it when they say they've been worried. See, I understand about worry now. I feel worry all the time for Rachel and Jake and the others. Sometimes I lie in bed at night and worry for the whole human race.

  "I'm really sorry," I said.

  131 "Where. Were. You. Young. Lady?" my mom asked, doing her one-word-at-a-time voice.

  "I was just with Rachel," I said. "And Jake."

  My parents exchanged a look. My dad put his hand over his mouth. He was hiding a smile. At the same time, he was trying to look extra stern.

  My mom leaned back and put her hands on her hips. "You know we have discussed your dating," she said, "and I thought we decided you were still too young."

  "Dating?" I said weakly.

  My mom sighed. Then she shook her head. "Maybe it's time for us to have another talk about the birds and the bees."

  I swear the blood drained out of my whole head. Then it came rushing back into just my cheeks and neck so that they burned. "Dm . . . I'm not dating."

  "It's nothing to be ashamed of," my dad said gruffly. "You're a normal young girl, you have certain . . . interests, certain . . . fascinations, a natural . . . curiosity."

  At this point I wanted to dig a hole right in the living room floor, crawl in, and pull the rug over me.

  "All we're saying is be honest with us," my mom said, all stern again. "Do not make us worry about you."

  132 "Absolutely! I swear! I will never make you worry again! Can I go now?"

  I raced from the living room into the kitchen. I wanted to make myself a sandwich, carry it up to my room, and try to do at least some of my homework.

  And I really did not want to be subjected to a big talk abut boys. Good grief!

  I was just getting the turkey from the refigera-tor when a thought occurred to me. I tiptoed back to the kitchen door and pressed my ear against it.

  "See?" I heard my mother say smugly.

  "You were right, as usual," my dad said.

  "It's the only way. Let's face it, Cassie works so hard already, what can you do? You can't give her punishment work or make her stay in her room."

  "We have a very cool kid."

  That kind of gave me a warm feeling. Your parents have to love you. But I felt as if my parents liked me, too. As a person.

  "Yes, we do have a cool kid," my mom agreed. "But on those rare occasions when she screws up the only way to really discipline her is to embarrass her."

  They both laughed. Hah-hah-hah.

  "Next time we can tell her we're going to have

  133 Jake and his parents over to discuss rules for their relationship," my mom said.

  More laughter. Hee-hee-hee.

  "Or as a backup plan, we could threaten to take her in to Father Banion for a family discussion about intimacy." That was my dad's suggestion.

  So much for my warm inner glow. So my parents knew I liked Jake. And they knew that any discussion of that fact would embarrass me to death.

  Parents. You can never completely trust them.

  I finished making my sandwich and went upstairs. My room was a disaster area. I am not a neat person. I went to my desk, moved some of my junk aside to clear a work space and opened my binder to find my -

  Backup plan?

  That's the phrase my dad had used. And Visser Three had said it, too.

  Backup plan? Why would the Yeerks want a backup plan? After all, they'd penetrated the big secret of Zone 91 and it was a toilet. True, they had not understood what they'd seen, but they obviously knew whatever it was wasn't a Yeerk ship or a weapon.

  So why would they still be interested?

  134 I shook it off. Who cared now? We'd wasted enough time at Zone 91. I had better things to worry about. Like homework. And the discovery that my parents knew more about me than I wanted them to.

  I did some homework and I went to bed. At four o'clock in the morning, I woke up. I sat bolt upright and stared into the darkness.

  "So it's a toilet," I cried. "That's not important. It's an alien toilet! An alien toilet! That's the point!"

  Of course! Even if it was just a toilet, it meant the government had proof of life on other planets. Proof that the Yeerks did not want them to have.

  The Yeerks were invading Earth. One of the reasons they were getting away with it was that no sensible person would ever believe it. Even if I went on national TV and announced that aliens were invading, who'd ever believe me? Even if I morphed right in front of people, they'd figure it was just some other kind of weirdness.

  But if the government came out and said, "Look, we have proof that aliens exist," then people would start listening. People might even be prepared to believe that the Yeerks were among us.

  That's why the Yeerks couldn't just forget

  135 about Zone 91. They couldn't allow the government to have any kind of proof of alien life.

  There was a backup plan. That's what the visser had said.

  And I suddenly had a pretty good suspicion what it was. Tomorrow evening at nineteen hundred hours, The Gardens would be full of people who worked at Zone 91. Just like the sign-up sheet at the base had said.

  I was willing to bet the Yeerks would strike then. What better place to grab some key people from Zone 91 and fill their heads wi
th Yeerk slugs?

  Well, there were probably plenty of better places, actually. But Visser Three was not known for being patient. And the trip to The Gardens would be his soonest opportunity to strike.

  136 I he Gardens is a combination zoo and amusement park. The two sections are separate, of course. Roller coasters and bumper cars on one side of an artificial lagoon, and animal habitats on the other.

  I've spent lots of time at the zoo part of The Gardens. I've spent very little time on the rides. I don't like roller coasters.

  From the air it all looks smaller than it does from the ground. Down on the ground, walking along the pink-and-green concrete walkways, it seems endless. But from the air in owl nnorph, you can see how the pathways curve inside each other like a circular maze. You can see the edges of the park and the world beyond The Gardens.

  137 You can see the endless neon golden arches and Best Western hotels and water slides and putt-putt golf courses.

  Of course, in owl morph you can even see the mice cowering down inside the dark bushes. In owl morph there isn't much you can't see.

  The Gardens at night is two very different halves. Down below us, the tigers were prowling the limits of their wooded, moat-ringed habitat. And the camels were dozing. And the sea lions were huddled together on their blue-painted concrete island. And the monkeys were sleeping and fussing and occasionally picking bugs out of their ears and eating them.

  Over in the amusement park, however, it was a flashing neon extravaganza. The Tilt-a-Whirl was a blaze of blue; the merry-go-round was red and yellow; the roller coasters were wild dragons of racing sequential lights.

  I saw a flash! It was the log ride. They shoot photographs of the people in the logs as they fall down the final drop. I heard screams of giddy excitement and fake fear.

  In addition to having wonderful eyes, owls can hear a mosquito's wings beating from ten feet away. Tobias was not so lucky. He didn't have an owl morph, so he was his usual red-tailed self. Red-tails don't see or fly well at night.

  Wait a minute! Flashbulbs at the log ride?

  138 «Hey! There are people down there! There aren't supposed to be people. The people aren't supposed to be here till eight o'clock!»

  «lf they're here, then the Yeerks are here, too,» Rachel said grimly. «What are they doing here? I thought you said the sign-up sheet at the base said eight o'clock!»

  «Actually, it said nineteen hundred hours. But that's eight. Right?»

  «Uh, no,» Marco said. «0h, man, these guys have been here for an hour already! The Yeerks may have already infested their targets!»

  «Are those the right guys down there? Are they Zone Ninety-one guys?» I wondered aloud.

  Jake kept his tone carefully neutral, not wanting to make me feel bad. «There are a lot of sort of twenty- and thirty-year-old guys down there with short hair. Definitely a military-looking crowd. »

  I had put it all together very early that morning. The Gardens occasionally leases out the entire amusement park to private groups. Especially on slow nights like Sundays.

  Zone 91 had leased the park for its soldiers and their families. Of course, on the reservation they were not listed as "Zone 91." They were listed as "Gondor Industries."

  I'd spent the day researching on the Internet,

  139 just to be totally sure. There was no Condor Industries. It was a fake corporation. I was totally prepared and proud of myself for being so smart. Unfortunately, the hour we should have had to prepare was already gone. All because I could not read military time.

  «So who's back at Zone Ninety-one guarding the Toilet From Outer Space, I wonder?» Marco asked.

  «l'm sure there are still plenty of guys back there,» Jake said, «and in any case, that's not our problem. Our problem is we have zero time to figure out the rest of the Yeerk plan. All we know is that they may be attempting to use this night to infest several members of the Zone Ninety-one force. But where? Where in all this big amusement park would they do it?»

  No time! And it was my screwup. My screwup. Oh, man, I had totally messed up. Now innocent men and women might be turned into Controllers because of my stupidity!

  Think! Where? Where would the Yeerks try it? «Two possible places,» I said. «They need someplace where they can grab people without being seen, right? The log ride is dark inside. Or the House of Horrors Ride. Those are the only two places.»

  «0kay. We split up,» Jake said tersely.

  140 «Cassie, you and Marco come with me for the log ride. Rachel, Tobias, and Ax check out the House of Horrors.»

  We split into two separate groups. Jake, Marco, and I flew swiftly toward the log ride, me cursing myself the whole time. «How could I have been so dumb?»

  «You weren't dumb,» Jake said. «We wouldn't even have known about this if you hadn't figured it out.»

  «For future reference, all you have to do is subtract twelve,» Marco said.

  «Huh?»

  «To translate military time. Just subtract twelve.» Then, as an afterthought he added, «Duh.»

  The log ride was made to look like a mountain. Of course it was really just cement and fake bushes, but it was kind of convincing. We landed on top of it.

  «Now what?» Marco asked. «We need to get inside. Can we fly in?»

  «Yes, but if we're in owl morph we won't be able to do anything much except flap our wings,» Jake pointed out. «We need to get human again.»

  We demorphed as fast as we could and a few minutes later we were climbing down the side of the fake cement mountain, wearing our morph-

  141 ing outfits. And no shoes. Fortunately, at The Gardens people dress even more strangely than that. Some people turned to stare, but not for very long.

  The lines were short since the only people in the park were a thousand or so people from Zone 91. Some had brought their kids, so we fit in okay, even though most of the people in line were older guys with short hair and neatly trimmed mustaches.

  Into the log ride we went. We took a log, me and Jake in the front, Marco behind us, and a man and woman behind him in the last seat.

  The log slipped along the water channel toward the chain lift.

  "This would be fun if it wasn't a matter of life and death," Marco said. "I love the log ride. Not as good as the coaster, of course. But the big splash at the end is cool."

  "That voice!" someone said. "I know that voice!"

  I turned around and looked to see who was talking. To my complete horror, I found myself making eye contact with none other than Captain Torrelli, our interrogator from Zone 91. And at just that moment, the log hit the chain lift and engaged with a loud CHUNK!

  "You!" the captain said.

  Marco turned around. "Uh-oh."

  142 "What?" Jake asked.

  CLANKCLANKCLANKCLANKCLANKCLANK! Up the slope we went, pressed back into our damp seats.

  "You are under arrest!" Captain Torreli said.

  "Honey, what is going on?" his date asked.

  "Yeah, what is going on?" Jake asked me.

  "It's the guy from Zone Ninety-one," I whispered in Jake's ear. "He's recognized me and Marco."

  "Uh-oh."

  "None of you better move!" the captain said.

  And at that point we reached the top of the lift. For a second we were poised there. Then the log tipped forward and gravity took over.

  "Ahhhhhh!" the captain's date yelled.

  "Ahhhhhh!" I yelled because I hate thrill rides.

  "You two are mine" the captain yelled.

  And down we went.

  WHOOOOOOOSH!

  Then . . . spuh-LOOOOOSH!

  Water everywhere! The log careened along the narrow channel past big fake models of a logging camp dominated by some great big plaster Paul Bunyan thing.

  "If the Yeerks are going to strike, they'll do it in the tunnel up ahead," Jake whispered. "It's like a tunnel of love thing. Real dark."

  143 I wanted to ask how he knew about a tunnel of love. But I stuck to business. "Eithe
r way, we need to bail out there. Otherwise we'll never lose the captain."

  Marco turned back in his seat, draping his arm over the partition between him and the captain. "You know, I don't think you can really arrest us. I mean, you're military police, right? And this is not a military base."

  The captain glowered. He whipped a cell phone from his jacket pocket and punched in a number. "Hello? Gardens security? This is Captain Torrelli, security code number eight-seven-two-niner-niner. I need -"

  "Good work, Marco," Jake said, rolling his eyes.

  "This really complicates things," I whispered.

  "Here comes the tunnel," Jake said. "Get ready."

  The log boat banged through a doorway into total, absolute darkness.

  "Now!" Jake hissed.

  I stood up. I turned left. Nothing but darkness. I turned right. Just as dark. Not dark like in-your-room dark when you sleep at night. This was dark like you might as well be blind.

  I stepped off the boat, trusting everything to luck.

  144 I lever trust anything to luck.

  My foot didn't touch anything. I tried to pull back, but it was too late. I pitched forward.

  "Aaaahhh!"

  SPLASH! Water up to my waist! BANG! The side of the channel. "Owww! My head!" I slipped and fell face-first in the water. I felt the current carry me away.

  Then Marco's voice: "Ooof! Owww!"

  "You kids aren't going to get away that easy!"

  PUH-LOOOSH! "Aaarg!"

  "Owww!"

  "Hey! Watch where you're driving that boat!"

  BONK!

  A hand grabbed me! I swung a clenched fist.

  145 "Oww! I need that shoulder!" Jake yelled.

  "Sorry!"

  "You kids stop where you are!"

  Suddenly, there were lights! Lights everywhere! I had been swept along in the current back out of the tunnel. I was back in the night air again, gazing up at neon and incandescence.

  I stood up. But the current was too strong. It swept my feet out from under me. I fell and floated.

  Behind me, another log boat filled with crew-cut guys. Between me and that boat, three heads bobbed in the water: Jake, Marco, and a really angry Captain Torrelli.

  "Cassie! Climb out!"

  "Oh, no, this is insane!" Marco moaned.