18 knows about this yet. It's not going to be announced publicly till it's all over. For security reasons."
"What's happening?" Rachel asked eagerly, leaning forward.
"Oh, nothing much," the android said coyly. "Just a summit meeting right here in town. The presidents or prime ministers of Britain, France, Russia, Japan, Germany, and the United States are all coming here to figure out what to do about all the problems in the Middle East."
"Uh-huh," Rachel said, unimpressed. "So?"
"It's the ultimate target," Cassie said. "The leaders of six powerful nations? All in one place at one time? Right here, where the Yeerk invasion is strongest?"
Jake leaned closer to Erek. "You have any reason to believe the Yeerks are thinking about going after all these guys?"
Erek nodded. "The planning is under way. The presidents and prime ministers start arriving day after tomorrow. They'll be staying at the big Marriott resort down the coast."
"This could be an opportunity," Cassie said thoughtfully. "If we could reach these leaders somehow, show them, prove to them what's happening. ... I mean, the Yeerks could be totally exposed."
"And on the flip side, if the Yeerks make Con-
19 trollers of these guys, that's the ball game, we're done," I pointed out.
"One big problem," Erek said.
"Just one?" I said.
"Okay, lots of big problems, and one huge problem," Erek said, not smiling his holographic smile. "One of the leaders is already a Controller. Make the wrong move, approach the wrong leader, and ..."
He let it hang.
"You don't know which leader is the Controller?" Jake asked.
Erek shook his head. "If we did, it'd just be a big problem, not a huge one."
20
Erek left and the four of us just sat there staring at each other. None of us wanted to think about a world where the presidents of the United States and most of the other major powers were slaves of the Yeerks.
We'd have to try and stop them.
"Okay, one thing at a time," Jake said. "We deal with this blue box situation first."
Suddenly, I felt something pass by overhead. Tobias swooped over and landed on the "R" in Burger King.
«No problem,» he reported. «Kid's window is wide open. I can see the blue box sitting on his desk. In and out. I'd have just done it myself, but you said to report back.»
21 Jake nodded like he was nodding to me. Thought-speak only works when you're in morph. Tobias could do it. We couldn't.
Tobias cocked his head and stared harder. «0kay, who died? You all look like you just got news that school vacation's been canceled. Never mind, tell me later.»
In a conversational tone of voice Jake said, "Okay, well, let's get this over with. Rachel and Marco? Let's go."
We went inside, looking like any normal group of kids. Me and Jake went to the men's room. It was a small, single-stall room. There was no one else in there. We locked the door.
I shucked off my sweatshirt. "Don't lose that shirt," I said. "It was signed by Steve Young."
"Marco, it was signed like two years ago and you've washed it at least once since then. The name is totally invisible now."
"I didn't say it was still signed, did I? I said it was signed. It has sentimental value."
Jake looked around at the gloomy surroundings. "Just part of the glamour of life as a superhero."
"Yeah, what happened to those big, walk-in phone booths the old Superman always changed in?"
"You know, I still just can't get used to the new Superman," Jake said.
22 I began to focus on the morph. This was an airmail job. Bird-time. In through the window, snatch up the box, and zoom right back out.
No problem-o, as Rachel had said. Nothing to worry about, especially when compared to what Erek had just told us.
I was very familiar with the morph, an osprey. Ospreys are a kind of hawk. Normally they live near water and eat fish. Very rarely do they hang out in men's bathrooms at Burger King.
I focused my mind and began to shrink. The urinal was suddenly eye level and Jake was looking even larger than usual.
Bomp! Bomp! Bomp! At the door.
"There's someone in here!" Jake yelled.
I continued morphing. My skin turned gray. Gray like a dirty chalkboard. Like I'd been dead for a couple of weeks. It's very disturbing to look down and see your skin turn gray, let me tell you.
But not as disturbing as when the feather patterns appear like line drawings and then sort of flake up, going 3-D.
My fingers stretched out, elongating compared to the rest of my hands and arms. As they elongated, though, they slipped right out of the skin so that they became dry, white, bird-bone.
"Eeeewww!" Jake said, laughing in disgust. "That's something new!"
23 "Oh, man, I don't need to ever see that again!" I said.
Morphing is very unpredictable. It's not just this sort of gradual thing. It goes through phases. Sudden, bizarre, totally gross-looking stages.
The bare bones thing was something new. And deeply, deeply not pretty.
Bomp! Bomp! Bomp! Bomp! Bomp!
"Is someone in there?" a voice demanded.
"Yeah, someone is in here!" Jake yelled. "Jeez!"
"Come outta there, right now!"
"What?" Jake demanded.
"Whackl?" I demanded, having just that moment had my lips turn into hard beak.
"Are you kids in there doing drugs?" the voice demanded.
"No!" Jake looked down at me, exasperated. "Hurry up."
"GET OUT HERE, NOW!"
A new voice. A very authoritative voice. I heard the sound of a key turning in the lock.
"Stop morphing!" Jake hissed. "Stand up straight and keep quiet!"
I stood there, about ninety percent osprey. I was maybe two feet tall, standing on my talons.
Jake swept the sweatshirt over me. He pulled the hood over my head and yanked the string.
24 The door opened. Two people stood there, glaring at us. A teenager in a Burger King uniform. And a manager.
"I'm just trying to let my little brother go to the bathroom," Jake said, patting me on the shoulder.
The kid and the man both looked down at me. I was standing inside a sweatshirt that was so huge it lay in folds around my feet. Which was a good thing, since my feet were talons. The arms hung limp.
"Your little brother?" the manager asked. "Why's his sweatshirt so big?"
"Hey, that sweatshirt was signed by Steve Young!" Jake said. Like that was an explanation.
"Something's wrong with his face!" the kid said.
Jake put his arm around me protectively. "Don't listen to them, Tommy," he said, with a sob in his voice. "Your face is just fine! It's just fine, I tell you! The doctors say someday you may be normal again."
"Hey, I didn't mean anything by . . ." the kid said.
"What is it?" the manager asked in a concerned tone. "I mean, his disease."
Jake went blank. "Urn . . ."
«Beakanoma,» I whispered to Jake in thought-speak.
25 "Beakanoma," Jake said.
«A growth in the shape of a beak,» I explained.
"It's a, uh, a growth in the shape of a beak," Jake said.
«It's especially tragic and all because it only afflicts really smart, really cute people,» I said.
"Oh, shut up," Jake muttered under his breath.
Jake hustled me away. As fast as I could walk on talons while wearing a massive sweatshirt.
26
David lived in a basic kind of home: two stories, a lawn, a backyard with a barbecue and a rusty swing set. Also a pool.
I was instantly jealous. I don't have a pool.
He had one of the upstairs bedrooms.
Tobias, Rachel, and I zoomed past the house at an altitude of fifty feet or so. I could see why Tobias doesn't like to fly at night. In the darkness hawk eyes aren't much better than human eyes. And after the sun goes down you start losing the th
ermals, the warm updrafts that make flying easier.
So it was hard flapping to cover the few blocks from Burger King to David's house. And talk about confusing. You ever tried to tell one
27 house from the next at night? From fifty feet in the air? Not easy. But the pool was lit, and in fact, David was in the water, swimming back and forth.
His room was brightly lit, which helped us see, and I easily spotted the blue cube on his desk.
«0kay, I'm going in!» Rachel said.
«Uh-uh, I don't think so,» Tobias said. «You're too big in that bulky eagle morph. You can't fly through that window. Me and Marco had better go.»
«0h, man!» Rachel complained. But even she could see Tobias was right.
«Give us a warning if David gets out of the pool,» Tobias said. Then he spilled air from his wings and stabilized on a glide path, straight for the bright rectangle of the window.
But I managed to get out ahead of him. «Hah!» I said.
«Marco! Careful if you're going first. You'll need to flare as soon as you pass the windowsill. I mean instantly, or you'll smack the far wall.»
«Hey, I'm not as experienced as you are, Tobias, but I'm not a complete idiot.»
«No, you're an /^complete idiot!» Rachel called down helpfully.
I zoomed, down, down through the night, aimed straight for that window. It was cool. Like
28 what it must be like to land a jet on an aircraft carrier at night. Just a little, glowing target in the darkness.
«Make sure you stay clear of that stick,» Tobias said. He was just six feet behind me.
«What stick?» I asked, and then the window was suddenly right in front of me! It was a trick of the light! It had seemed farther away.
I tried to slow down, ready to flare once I was in. And then I saw the stick. The stick that was propping the window open.
Thwack! My left wing hit the stick.
«Wha!» I yelled.
BLAM! The window fell shut with a horrendous slam.
Bonk! Tobias hit the closed window.
BONK! I hit the wall, too distracted to flare.
I hit, I fell, I landed behind a dresser. I was wedged in a space of about three inches, unable to move. All I could do was slowly slither down to the carpet.
«Tobias!» Rachel cried.
«I'm okay,» Tobias said. «Professor Plum did it in the conservatory with the candlestick!»
Tobias was alive. But he must have hit fairly hard. He seemed to be reliving a game of Clue.
I wasn't exactly in great shape myself. I scooted sideways, inch by inch.
" M rrrrrrr-ooowwwrr!"
29 Uh-oh.
I scooted faster. Faster, desperate to get out from behind the dresser.
I felt something batting at my exposed talons. I knew what it was.
One wing free! Then my body. And then . . .
"Hhhhsssssssss!" the kitty said.
The very big kitty. The big, gray tabby, with its mouth drawn back from needle teeth.
«Good kitty,» I said. «Gooood kitty.»
The kitty didn't like big birds in its bedroom. And it really didn't like big talking birds in its bedroom.
"MmmmrrrrOOOOWWWWWRRR!" Kitty said, explaining its feelings to me.
«Miss Scarlet? Was it Miss Scarlet with the plum in the professor?» Tobias wondered.
«Marco! Get out of there!» Rachel yelled. «l saw a cat.»
«Yeah. I kind of noticed him,» I said.
We've all seen house cats. I've seen lots of house cats. But they look radically different when you're a bird. Even a big, tough, predatory bird.
Slash!
The cat swiped at my wing, claws extended.
«0kay, Mr. Kitty, you want to do this? You want to throw down? Fine. I'll kick your butt!»
Mr. Kitty was not impressed. Mr. Kitty
30 jumped. He went from being two feet away to being zero feet away in just about a billionth of a second.
«Aaaaahhhh!» I yelled.
"MrrrOOOOWWW-hsssssss!" the cat said.
Suddenly it was a wild tangle of claws and talons and beaks and teeth and I swear we must have looked like one of those cartoons where Bugs Bunny and Yosemite Sam are fighting and all you see is swirling dust and cartoon stars.
We fell apart, glaring and panting at each other. I had gotten in a few good hits. But Mr. Kitty was fast. And Mr. Kitty had clawed my belly down to the skin, bitten me in the neck, wing, other wing, and left leg. All in approximately six seconds.
I wasn't up for a second round. I did not want my obituary to say "died from injuries sustained while battling a fat house cat." That would be embarrassing.
I could demorph. Or I could escape.
Out through the shut window? No.
Through the closed door? No.
Which left demorphing.
Except that right then Rachel decided to rescue me.
CRASH!
The window exploded! In blew a rock, followed by a massive bald eagle, wings folded.
31 She flared. Her wings practically stretched from wall to wall. She landed on the bed.
"Rooowwwrr!" Mr. Kitty said in a very surprised voice.
«Come on, let's bail!» Rachel yelled.
And that's when the door slammed open. In came David. The cat screeched and leaped onto the curtains beside the window.
«Out the door!» Rachel said.
«I'm with you!» I said. «We have to grab that cube!»
«I'll distract David. You grab it!» Rachel said. She began flapping her wings madly and lashing all around with her talons.
"Whoa!" David yelled.
Rachel began tearing up the pillows. Feathers fluttered around the room. The cat was climbing toward the ceiling. I hopped and flapped over to the desk. The cube! There it was!
David lurched to the desk, like he was going to attack me. But instead he yanked open a drawer and whipped out...
«A gun! A gun? This kid has a gun?!» I yelped.
From far off I heard, «Actually, Miss Scarlet, I think you should have used the wrench.»
32
«Gun? What gun?» Rachel yelled.
Pop! Pop! Pop!
Something stung my bare belly. «He's got a BBgun!»
«He could put someone's eye out with that!» Rachel cried in outrage.
«Yeah, mine!» I said. I closed one talon over the cube. It was too big! I used both talons. I could hold the cube, but I could barely stand. I flapped like a madman and managed to fall off the desk, still holding the cube.
Pop! Pop!
«0kay, now he's ticked me off!» Rachel said.
«Don't hurt him!» I said. «He's just an innocent bystander.»
33 «Innocent, my-»
Pop! Pop! Pop!
I flapped hard and scooted along the carpet toward the door. Rachel did a little better, but once in the hallway her wings hit the walls with each stroke.
"Oh no, you don't!" David yelled. "Give me back that blue box!"
Off we went: two dragging, scuffling, staggering, BB-stung birds, one hauling a blue box. Followed by an outraged boy yelling and firing a very lifelike gun.
Down the hall!
«0w!»
«Look out!»
"Give me back my box!"
Pop! Pop! Pop!
Down the stairs!
«0w!»
«Hey, watch it!»
"Give me back my box!"
Pop! Pop! Pop!
Through the empty family room where the TV was on, showing Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
«Whoa, I forgot to set the VCR!» I said. «We're missing Buffy.»
Pop! Pop! Pop!
«Owww! Oh man, I am so going to find a way to hurt this kid tomorrow at school,» Rachel
34 threatened. «I'm going for the sliding glass door. Distract him while I get it open.»
«Distract him? By doing what? You figure I should do my Lord of the Dance impersonation?»
Rachel grabbed the sliding glass
door handle with her beak and yanked. David ran straight for me. Straight for the box.
I could either jump up and rake his eyeballs, or give up the box. But David was not a Controller. He was not an enemy. And even I don't think you can just go around tearing into innocent bystanders.
I jumped back from the box. The door slid open. And Rachel and I flapped across the back lawn, over the pool, above the fence, and out of there.
"Yeah! And don't come back, either!" David yelled as he fired off a final BB.
«l am so not looking forward to explaining this to Jake,» Rachel said.
«We got our butts kicked by a kid with a BB gun. That's just pathetic.»
A hawk rose up to join us.
«Tobias?»
«Yeah. Man, that was a bad bump I took. I was having this weird dream. I was trapped in the conservatory with Professor Plum. So, how'd everything go?»
35
It was not our finest hour. We backed off, regrouped, and decided to try again the next evening after David had calmed down. We still had to get that blue box back before dealing with the much bigger problem of how to save the leaders of the free world.
Plus, I was supposed to be doing a makeup science paper to replace the paper I'd forgotten to do last week.
The next day was another school day. You know the routine: get up way too early, shower, dress, stand around waiting for the bus with the usual collection of dorks, try to cram for the first-period test while the bouncing bus bruises your butt bones.
36 Then it's that first sight of the school building, followed, in my case at least, by a sinking sensation. Then you spot some cute girl who hasn't called you "Beavis" yet and you start thinking, Okay, I guess I can stand another day.
Homeroom. Class. Class. Lunch.
The long wait in line as the aroma of something dead wafts toward you. Brussels sprouts? Eggplant? No, it's cauliflower.
"You said your name is Marco, right?"
I swiveled around but continued to push my plastic tray along the line. It was David. I jerked like a guilty perpetrator being questioned by Lieutenant Sipowicz.
"Yeah. Marco," I said. "David, right?"
He nodded. Then he looked at the food steaming and reeking. "The food was better at my last school."
"That would pretty much have to be true. It couldn't be any worse. Not unless your last school was a prison."
He didn't laugh. He just looked at me kind of intensely. "I don't have any friends here yet. Something really weird happened to me yesterday. Very weird. Want to hang?"