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CHAPTER 12: Down into the Dark
(MIKE’S POV)As I waited for the others to arrive, I spent a while gazing at the family of Dolphins swimming happily in the water. I couldn’t wait to try out that morph, but I would have to wait until book 4 for that.
Suddenly, I spotted Rachel, Cassie and Tobias making their way towards me, but there was no sign of Jake or Marco yet. Still having fun in the Tiger enclosure I assumed.
“Hey guys, check out these Dolphins.” He called out to them.
“They’re really something aren’t they?” Cassie agreed.
“We don’t exactly need to morph them though,” Tobias pointed out. “We can only use them in water after all. Besides, I’m happy with my Hawk morph!”
“I guess that means you didn’t acquire anything new then? How about you two?” I asked the girls.
“I got an Elephant morph.” Rachel grinned. “But then Cassie insisted we come find you guys in case you’d been caught by security. Have you seen Jake and Marco?”
I shook my head.
“I haven’t seen them since we split up when that old guard spotted us, but I’m pretty sure they got away.” I told them. “Let’s head over to the front gate, they’ll probably meet us there.”
“So did you get a new morph Mike?” Tobias asked me as we started walking back to the entrance.
“Jaguar.” I answered. “It was a damn close call though. I knocked it out with the acquiring trance, but then the second one started chasing me! I barely made it!”
“Yeah right,” Rachel replied sceptically. “As if you could outrun a Jaguar!”
“Hey I can run pretty fast when something is trying to kill me!” I insisted.
“There they are!” Cassie interrupted us before we could continue arguing.
Marco and Jake were a short distance away, crouching low as they made their way to the front gate. Obviously they had only recently escaped from the Tiger enclosure and were worried about the guards spotting them again.
“What did you do, morph into a midget?” Rachel asked, looking slightly amused as Jake and Marco looked up at us.
“The guards were after us.” Jake said. He still looked a little shaken up.
“Oh, quit playing around Jake,” Said Rachel. “Let’s get out of here. I have to be home for dinner.”
Marco started telling the others all about their near-death experience with the Tigers, but Rachel didn’t seem to believe him.
“You guys are all alike. Mike was just telling us how a Jaguar nearly ate him too.” Rachel rolled her eyes.
“I’m serious, we could have been killed!” Marco pouted. “It was down to a few centimetres.”
“Yeah, whatever.” Rachel said. “Don’t obsess over it. After all, we still have tonight to deal with. Whatever danger you think you had today, it will probably be nothing next to what’s going to happen tonight.”
“And I haven’t even
thought about studying for that test tomorrow.” Cassie said.
Rachel laughed.
“We may not have to worry about tomorrow.” She pointed out.
“Thank you Little Miss Cheerful.” Marco muttered under his breath.
*
I was back in my Harris Hawk morph once again, flying above the forest back to my new home. I’d just finished talking to the others about our plan of action for later that night, and then I decided to head home and kill some time until the big battle coming up that night.
I won’t deny that I was feeling nervous about that night. Terrified actually, but excited at the same time. I was trying not to think about it all too much, but I couldn’t help it. I had so many choices and potential outcomes flowing through my head that I really didn’t know what to think. Can I let Tobias get trapped in morph? Could I save Tom from being re-infested? Should I call Erika? Is she really a controller? Does she actually like me? Can I save her if she is infested? Does it really matter what I do?
It was the last thought which worried me the most. Did anything I did matter? Would any of it make a difference in the long term? After all, that was why I was sent here, to change things for the better. Am I supposed to know if my actions were going to have good outcomes? What if I just made things worse? How was I supposed to know what would happen?
“It doesn’t matter what the outcome is, as long as you follow your heart…” I had no idea where that thought had come from, but with it came a strong sense of déjà vu. I suddenly felt certain that I’d said or at least heard those words before, but I didn’t have a clue where or when…
I shrugged it off, but wherever that thought had come from, it was good advice. I was in this universe to save lives after all.
I landed on a tree opposite my house, and used my incredible Hawk eyes to glance at the digital clock in my room. I still had at least an hour and a half left in morph so I decided to fly around for a while. Flying is one hobby that never gets old! I was no aerial acrobat, but I was definitely getting more used to flying. Again, I was tempted to believe that Tobias getting trapped as a Hawk wasn’t completely accidental, but I was damned if I was going to just let him be trapped. As cool as flying is, being trapped in any morph would be a nightmare come true.
After flying around for a while, I realised I was near Cassie’s barn.
Oh s**t! I thought.
I forgot to stop Cassie following Jake to that full members meeting! She’s going to be kidnapped by that cop! I started flapping frantically; speeding towards Cassie’s as fast as I could. If I stopped the cop grabbing Cassie, then the others wouldn’t be waiting around for her at the school, Tobias wouldn’t morph the Hawk too early and maybe I could save him!
I arrived at the barn but Cassie wasn’t there.
Okay, don’t panic. I told myself.
She’s probably up at the house with her parents. I flew over to the house and looked through each of the windows, searching desperately for Cassie. Trying to land as gently as I could, I dived down and landed outside the living room window. A man I assumed to be Cassie’s dad was sitting down watching TV, but her mum was on the phone in the hallway. She looked worried about something, so I used my sharp hawk ears to listen through the glass.
“… home for dinner. She went out to feed some of the animals and didn’t come back.”
Damn it! I cursed. I’m too late!
That must be Jake on the phone trying to find her for the big fight. I better get over there. It was only then that I realised: I had no idea where the school was.
This whole saving the world thing is a lot harder than I thought it would be. I sighed inwardly and took off into the sky once again. I really should have asked somebody where the school was…
*
“What do you mean she isn’t here?” I demanded, trying to act surprised at the news of Cassie’s absence. Acting angry was easy enough though; I was still pretty mad at myself for making such a stupid mistake.
I had just arrived at the school after flying as fast as I could from Cassie’s house. Annoyingly, I had gotten lost several times before I found the school. Luckily I managed to get there while Tobias was still human, which surprised me as I was sure that Tobias had already been a hawk by the time Jake arrived and Jake was already here. Maybe it was just another small thing that had been affected by my presence in this world? I wouldn’t have been worried about that, except for the fact that small things had a habit of becoming bigger somewhere down the line. I would have to be very careful during my time here to make sure I didn’t screw anything up… Like getting Cassie grabbed by a cop Controller. Sometimes I really hate irony.
“What we mean is that Jake called Cassie before he left and she wasn’t at home,” Marco informed me. “Her mum says she went out to feed some animals and didn’t come back; and when we got here she wasn’t here either.”
I hated to admit it, but he was right. I looked at the others, but I only saw Jake, Marco, Rachel and Tobias. Cassie had obviously been taken down to the Yeerk Pool already by that cop Controller. And it was all my fault. My fault because I’d been so absorbed in my own thoughts that I’d forgotten to protect Cassie from that creep.
“Tobias can you morph hawk and have a quick look around for her?” Jake asked.
“No problem Jake.” He replied.
“Are you sure that’s a good idea Jake?” I jumped in quickly before Tobias started morphing, trying not to show my anxiety. “I mean maybe Cassie’s already inside? And either way we need to hurry if we want to save Tom.”
“Sorry Mike,” Jake answered. “But I know Cassie wouldn’t go down there without us, and Tom can’t have been down there very long. There’s nothing wrong with having a quick search.”
I would have argued more, but it seemed obvious that I couldn’t make them listen without blowing my cover. So I let Tobias morph, and he flew up high until he was barely visible to my human eyes. The others kept straining their necks looking at the sky for any signs of good news, but I didn’t bother. I knew that this search was futile, Tobias wouldn’t find anything.
I cursed silently when Tobias returned, a whole fifteen minutes later with no sign of Cassie. Why did he have to take so long? I just prayed that we could escape from the pool before his time ran out.
We sneaked into the school through a broken science room window and, after some debate, agreed to act like controllers and enter the pool.
When the secret entrance opened behind the janitor’s closet and I took my first step through, I knew I had entered a hell which mankind had never seen. Down into the dark, step by step into the most evil place on Earth.
Host bodies, humans and Hork-Bajir alike, were locked away in cages. They were temporarily free of their Yeerk captors, but were unable to use this brief period of freedom. They were helpless. Nothing to do except wait to be plunged back into the pool and have their lives taken away again.
Some of them, the few who still had hope, still cried out for help or roared angry threats at the Hork-Bajir guards. Most of them however, the many who had given up all hope of escape, merely sat in silence without plead or protest. I could almost see them drowning in the deep depths of their own despair. They knew that no pleas or threats would get them anywhere.
Even the smell of the place made me think of morgues, graveyards, and Nazi death camps. As if the air itself was contaminated, and killed off the hope of all who breathed it in.
The sights, the sounds, the smells, they all spoke of death, darkness, decay, and despair. This was the Yeerk Pool alright, no doubt about it…