Ram The Blade Ship

[TheWolfEmperor]

     Why assume the Animorphs died? Elfangor and his crew survived ramming the bladeship.

NothingFromSomethin g already mentioned the Ellimist in the Andalite Chronicles. But I just wanted to expand on this, because I have it on tap.

Even if you choose to take the Ellimist out of the equation, Elfangor was surrounded by Yeerk and Andalite ships. So lets just say that he crashes into the Blade Ship that one time, and enough of his ship survives that he can breathe for a little while; there were other Andalite ships there to come to the rescue.

Jake, Marco, and the crew of The Rachel found the Blade Ship in the middle of a part of space that the Andalites are so afraid to enter that one of them had to become a nothlit, just so he could help them find Ax's ship and avoid violating the treaty with the Kelbrid. When they finally locate the Blade Ship, there are no other ships with them. There are no planets nearby, or at least none that we know if and none that necessarily support human life. They're in the middle of space.

And Jake's orders were to "Ram the Blade ship." Not, "Gently tap the Blade Ship." Not, "Hey, we're going to Denny's, ask the Blade Ship if it wants anything."

"Ram the Blade ship" isn't terribly open to interpretation. We can safely assume that if orders were followed to the letter, that one spaceship ran headlong into another. Either the Blade Ship was powerful enough with the help of The One to survive the impact, or the Blade Ship was suitably damaged. Either way, the balance of probability suggests that it is very unlikely that Jake and company survived, or if they did survive, they definitely won't make the return trip to Earth.

[TobiasMasonPark]

     I maintain the belief that the Ellimist will never let them die.

[NothingFromSomething]

Cheapens the entire series, no?

[TheWolfEmperor]

Also, the Ellimist has to choose who lives and who dies all the time in his game with Crayak. We don't know the nature of the current game at the time of The Beginning, but it's fair to say that the Animorphs minus Cassie have all outlived their usefulness as game pieces at this stage.

[NothingFromSomething]

Despite all of his "I don't interfere" spiel being horse-crap, I don't think the Ellimist ever actually directly "God-moded" the kids.  He just stacked the odds in their favor when things were looking particularly grim, but was true to his word in that he was still indirect with stuff.  Masking the Hork-Bajir valley rather than outright ensuring none of the Hork-Bajir colony could be killed, showing the Animorphs various exits and such in battle, but that's about it.

He's not really "choosing who lives and dies" in terms of ensuring it, it's all just tinkering with probabilities and such.  Even with his protection they can still bite the dust.

[NickDaGriff]

There are still a number of things that could happen after Jake gives the order that would prevent anything fatal from happening.  And remember, it ended exactly when Jake said the words (because it was originally intended as a sequel hook), so literally anything could happen after that, like:

A) They miss.  Not too unlikely.  The Rachel would be more agile, but good maneuvering on the part of the blade ship could let them evade or turn it into a glancing blow (and even a glancing blow at high velocities could end up disabling one or both ships altogether).

B) Someone sane intervenes.  I could totally see Menderash preparing to hit the throttle, before Marco, Jeanne, Santorelli, or Tobias stops him and calls out Jake on what a bad plan that is, then proposes a new plan of attack instead.

C) The Blade Ship disables The Rachel.  Maybe a precision dracon shot to the engines, or some other weapon to fry their systems.  In my own fic, I had them use a tractor beam to slow The Rachel to a crawl by the time they hit.

D) An outside force intervenes.  Maybe that weird cluster-of-skyscrapers ship that blew apart Ax's ship jumps out of zero-space directly in between, forcing them to avoid it.  Maybe a patrol of Kelbrid ships jump in, disables both ships and orders everyone to stand down.

I think that if The One is an entity that absorbs consciousnesses, then that probably means it has an interest in keeping them alive for harvesting.  It probably wouldn't want to just outright kill them first thing, and might even work to temporarily preserve their lives. 

So yeah, there's hope.

[NothingFromSomething]

Any info on the "sequel hook" thing?  Pretty sure Katherine planned out the final arc sometime in advance, wanted to end it, and that #54 was intended as the finale.

As for The One, what's to say it doesn't absorb other biological entities by killing them?  Or by nature of being absorbed/assimilated the original being dies?  Seems pretty likely.

In any case, it's left inconclusive by design, it's just that whole "the fight goes on" trope.  The war's over on Earth, but for someone like Jake, no matter how much he wants to be done with it all, the fight keeps coming back for him in ways he can't refuse acting on.  Pretty much like Steve Rogers, or the team on Angel.  They might die in this instance, they might not, but at a certain point they're almost destined to die fighting.

[TobiasMasonPark]

Any info on the "sequel hook" thing?  Pretty sure Katherine planned out the final arc sometime in advance, wanted to end it, and that #54 was intended as the finale.

     Ah, but Animorphs 54 is titled the Beginning. Beginning of what? New Adventures?

In any case, it's left inconclusive by design, it's just that whole "the fight goes on" trope.  The war's over on Earth, but for someone like Jake, no matter how much he wants to be done with it all, the fight keeps coming back for him in ways he can't refuse acting on.  Pretty much like Steve Rogers, or the team on Angel.  They might die in this instance, they might not, but at a certain point they're almost destined to die fighting.

     Ah, the good old mono-myth. Someone knows their Joseph Campbell.

D) An outside force intervenes.  Maybe that weird cluster-of-skyscrapers ship that blew apart Ax's ship jumps out of zero-space directly in between, forcing them to avoid it.  Maybe a patrol of Kelbrid ships jump in, disables both ships and orders everyone to stand down.

     It occurs to me that this makes the most sense, as K.A sort of threw in that conflict between the Kelbrid and the Andalites. Ax was on board the blade ship, and Menderash made such a big deal about Kelbrid space that he trapped himself, so I have no doubt that the Kelbrid were--for whatever reason--were monitoring the area--somehow--and maybe picked up that an Andalite was in Kelbrid space.

     Don't know why I didn't consider this before.

[NothingFromSomething]

Wouldn't "The Beginning" just be in reference to...while the Yeerk conflict's over, something greater (The One) has come for them?  Beginning of something new (never intended to be written about/continued), that new thing not necessarily lasting very long?

They might survive, they might not, but it does seem The One wasn't ever intended as some way to spin the series off into another adventure.  It's just like "we've been through all of this for 4 years or so, we won after a whole lot of blood & tears, and now HOLY **** WHAT IS THAT GOD-LIKE THING COME TO EAT US?!?!" 

[TheWolfEmperor]

There are still a number of things that could happen after Jake gives the order that would prevent anything fatal from happening.  And remember, it ended exactly when Jake said the words (because it was originally intended as a sequel hook),

Any info on the "sequel hook" thing?

I always saw that as KA basically giving fanfiction writers something to work on after the series was over. She introduced the Kelbrid and whatever, so literally anything that we imagine happens after the Jake's orders is speculation and fan theory, unless she says otherwise.

[NothingFromSomething]

Right, yeah.  She never wanted it continued, it's one of those "it's always better in your head anyway, just draw your own conclusions from here on out" things.  Always appreciated that as it goes along with her whole not-talking-down-to-kids thing, but yeah, the fans threw a hissyfit anyway.

[TheWolfEmperor]

Fans Complaining is the name of the newspaper.

[YeerkSalad]

I rather dislike when authors decide do the "you decide" endings. They always feel lazy to me.

Why do you think she added the Kelbrid and The One and all those other things? Couldn't she have openly ended it without throwing in a million new things? Am I right, or am I riiiiiight?

[NothingFromSomething]

She properly ended it by saying the fight goes on, it's never over for Jake.

They go out fighting a new threat to save a friend.  What's more "Animorphs" than that?

[YeerkSalad]

I just think she shoved in a little too much newness. Am I right, or am I riiiiiiight?