The battle had been all too brief. Prince Jake and the others had been victorious in this mission. They would live and the human race would be free for a little while longer. He had gone the way of a true warrior, captured in the face of battle.
At least, that's what Aximilli kept telling himself. Prince Jake and the others live. Prince Jake and the others live. Prince Jake and the others live. Those six words repeated over and over like a mantra to ward off the coming night. Prince Jake and the others live.
They live.
They had come back for him, would have died in battle for him had he not told them to leave him. They had all looked back. They had all called his name. They had all sworn they would be back. The Animorphs. His friends. His allies in the war. They were not coming back. He had made them swear in the final moments that they would not return. Aximilli would perish at his own tailblade and die a warrior's death.
The Yeerks, Gedd-Controllers, Human-Controllers, Hork-Bajir-Controllers, Taxxon-Controllers, had pushed him into this cramped, solid cage. Wait, Visser Three had said. Wait for the others to come. We will have them all.
< Visser Three thinks he has won. He has not. Prince Jake and the others still live. So do my brothers and sisters in the war. They still live. They will fight the battle. >
"I wouldn't count on it, Andalite." A single voice rings out in the confines of the small, stinking cell. The voice is sour and cynical and bitter. It fits the cell perfectly. The voice belongs to a human female, about the same age as the Animorphs. She is dressed in shabby rags, her body thin and worn. Her face is anciant and young at the same time. Her eyes bespeak a terrible hell.
Aximilli approaches her angrily, his tailblade uprised. < Silence. Who are you, Yeerk, to say that? They will win. They will all win. > A faint quiver in his voice betrays his fear.
The female stares at hims with old, old eyes. "Oh, by all means, go on ahead and kill me. See if I care. In fact, I'd owe you one in the afterlife. We can all rot in the flames together. You and me and the Andalite Bandits and Visser Three and your brother--"
< I SAID SILENCE! My brother will not burn in any life! HE WILL NOT! > His tailblade aches to spill the blood of the Human-Controller. < You and all your filthy brethren will pay for what you have done, my people will stand victorious-- >
"Your people will die," she laughs cruelly. "Just as the Hork-Bajir homeworld was destroyed so will the Andalite homeworld. Those of your people who still exist will live in cages or with Yeerks in their heads." She rises to her feet and stalks around the cell, her words growing more vehement with every step she takes. "They will all die. It is inevitable. My filthy kind will pore into every crevice in the universe, kill all that lives, all that moves, all that which will not submit to our control! That is what will happen, Andalite! That is what will happen, brother of Beast-Elfangor! That is what will happen Aximilli-Esgarrouth-Isthill!"
< You are mad. > He steps away from her in shock. She stands before him, staring at him with her anciant eyes.
"My only claim to madness lies with my species." She chuckles darkly. "Not with my mind."
< Why are you in here? >
"I thought you ordered my silence, Lord Andalite," she replies with a sarcastic edge to her voice.
< If I am going to die, it will not be with this one last thing on my mind, > he says with almost as much of an edge to his own voice.
"I tried to help you and the other Bandits."
< What? > He pauses a moment to think. < You lie. >
She paces around the tight metal confines. Her hands are behind her back and she walks, ceaselessly, endlessly until Aximilli thinks he himself will go mad if she doesn't stop. Her pace is smooth and even. Dull thuds of footsteps echo off the metal walls.
"I don't lie, Andalite. It's a waste of time. I'm in here because I was caught downloading files from Visser Three's own personal disk space. His personal reports and thoughts and plans. Not much to go on, crazy as he is. But I thought you might be able to find something you could use." Her pacing stops and she looks him in the eye. "Something you might even find out about your brother."
Aximilli strikes her with the flat of his tailblade. She falls to the floor with a muffled thud, holding her shoulder. His hearts race and his mind whirls. Why not just kill the raving lunatic and have only silence to listen to until his death? Because to attack anyone, even the enemy when they could not fight back was the way of a coward. The way of a Yeerk. However foolish that may be in battle, he could not kill her defenseless.
< And just what do you think I will find out about my brother? That he was secretly in league with the Yeerks? That he worshipped them from afar? That he was leaking information to them that helped them win battles? Is that what you think I will discover? > In a distant part of his mind he thinks. Sarcasm. He has learned how to use sarcasm. Even Marco would understand this sarcasm. Aximilli's fear had been replaced with a cold hatred. There was no longer any fear of the death to come. Only a cold hatred of the huddled being before him.
She looks up at him with eyes full of a kind of perverse pity. "No. I think you'd find just how much Visser Three feared your brother. You'd find the lengths he went through to try to destroy him. You might find that even Visser Three could see his honor, as blinded by hatred as he was." Aximilli stared at her, uncomprehending what she was saying, what she was implying. "I saw your brother die and he fought with a fierocity and honor that will never be seen again in this universe."
< You talk as though you knew him. >
"I did. Through Visser Three's personal files. His thoughts and memories are recorded in those files." She sits up, wincing at the fresh pain in her shoulder. "You pity me, don't you? You pity my kind. It's not compassion, for compassion is free from disgust. Yet you still pity me."
He thinks at her words and looks down at her. Yes. She is right. He pities her. Pities her with a disgust one feels for the vagrant on the street, scabbed and diseased. A self-rightous, arrogant pity. But pity nonetheless. He kicks a small cloud dust into her face with his front hoof. < It would be so much easier if we could just hate you and forget that your hosts have faces. >
The Human-Controller rises to her feet and once more stares him in the eyes. "Then I'll tell you something that will make you hate me again. I'll tell you why Visser Three hated your brother and hates your kind with such a singular hatred. Do you want to know why? Do you really want to know?"
< What lies do you wish to spead this day? >
"He wants to be an Andalite."
Aximilli scoffs at her words. < He despises my kind. >
"He infested another Andalite, one before War-Prince Alloran."
< You are lying once more. >
"Her name was Aldrea. She was the daughter of the infamous Seerow."
< She died ages before he even came to existence. >
"He was in her mind only an instant before the Hork-Bajir he infested earlier pulled him out of her head."
< You don't even have the wits to create an original lie. >
" 'In all the universe, I have seen no beauty save one. Save one memory from a life lived so long ago. I wretched it from the mind of the daughter of Seerow. Fitting. That she be the one. That she give me that gift. The gift of that beauty. There is no greater beauty to be found in this universe than that sweet memory. The overwhelming beauty of an Andalite running free.' His exact words."
Aximilli pauseed in his mocking tone of voice when she began to speak. As she had continued, he reliezed the truth. Her truth. She speaks no lie. Her words are true.
"He hates your kind because you possess what he and nearly every other Yeerk wants. Your brother was there when he seized control of Alloran. Elfangor most likely blamed himself for that, I guess. It doesn't matter. Visser Three gives him credit for it, deserved or not. It doesn't matter that he has an Andalite body now. He will still never be an Andalite, one of your kind. That's why he hates your brother. He put him as close as he'll ever be to finding that. But he reminded him at every step that he could never truly be an Andalite. Just like you do now." Her words were said. She slumps to the floor, her arms around her knees.
< What do we possess that your kind wants so much that they will destroy all that stand in their path? We have nothing that we were not willing to share in the begining, what Seerow began. We wanted merely to find another intellegent species, not to create the plague your people would become. > His words are almost desperate in their sincerity.
Why? That was the one question that every Andalite, every Controller wanted to ask of the Yeerks. Why do you do this? Why do you live to see this pain that you cause? Why do want to hurt us so badly?
The pale figure on the floor of the metal cell snorts. She picks up a handfull of dust and casts it about nowhere. "You flatter yourself, Andalite. It's not what you have. It's what you are. You can see. You can feel. You can touch."
< I do not understand. > He senses something terrible coming. Some terrible revelation that will forever change what he is, who he is. Some terrible bridging of the gap between enemy and ally. Between friend and foe. It looms over him and above him like a tidal wave. Some terrible truth that will make him a traitor to his people, human or Andalite.
"Didn't think you would. What if you went blind? Never to see again. Not in morph, not in natural form. Blind. To exist in darkness. But what if you lost it all? The only thing you could do is exist. You couldn't live. But it would be existing in hell to know that you once lived. Wouldn't it?"
< So you think this justifies your actions, don't you? > he replies in a low voice.
"Nothing could justify our actions, Andalite. I'm one of a few who can see that." A loud clank draws their attention from one another for a moment. "Greed for power never justifies any action."
Aximilli says quietly, < I know that we will win this war, Yeerk filth. I know this in my hearts. >
"You'll all die. It's just a matter of time. A matter of time before your death, before mine. And when we're dead, the war will continue and more will die in our place. We will die fighting a war that started before either one of us were ever born. A war that by all rights should have ended with those who started it."
< I fight because I know that what I do is right. >
"So you think this justifies your actions, don't you?"
< It does. >
The two reguard one another with a critical eye. Both try to teach the other, the enemy, something. Something which is lost on the other. But not for lack of trying. She sighs, he stares. He twiches his tailblade, she looks towards an invisible door. Both lost.
She furrows her brow in concentration, for a moment. Thinking. She digs in the rubble in a corner. The female tosses a small container that thunks at Aximilli's hooves. He looks at it with a cautious stalkeye, then lifts it up using the broad side of his tailblade. He opens the lid only to find a small empty space. But the container itself.... It is a thought-speak recorder.
"His files. They thought I destroyed them. They're yours." She looks away from him, towards the wall. "You'll survive this battle. You'll make it out."
< Why.... >
"I still think you'll loose. But there is a chance. However hopeless, there is still a chance."
He says bitterly, < But what is the price? >
"There is no price. That is free for the taking." Again she paused. "There are two things I want you to do for me."
Aximilli thrust the box at her stiffly. < Take it. I'll have nothing to do with this price. >
She laughs. A cold, bitter sound. "You don't have to do anything. Just two insignifigant things. It's just that-- When you get free, and you will, run. Just once, run across an open feild and think of all that you have. Of the sight of the ground, and the feel of the wind, and the scent of the grass. Think of me. Just once, think of me as you run."
< And the other insignifigant price? >
"Kill me."
< What? >
"You heard me. They will and it won't be a clean death. I was going to heal my host's brain and tell her to go out to the woods. I was going to leave her and she was going to do it. But she can't. She's comatose. She'll never be able to wake up. She'll die; she's already dead. I'm the only one who waits."
< I can't-- >
"You won't have a choice." She slumps over. The change startles him. With a sickening plop, a small Yeerk lands on the ground and begins to move about blindly on the dusty floor of the confining cell.
Without warning, an explosion rocks the cell. Aximilli is thrown off his hooves next to the small Yeerk. Thought-speak screams in his head. < Stand away from the door, Ax! We've almost got you out! > A searing flash of Dracon light and screech of protesting metal. He can barely think, barely move. In a dim haze of mind he picks the small Yeerk off the ground and places it almost gently in the thought-speak recorder disguised as a container.
The next explosion rocks his entire body. The wall implodes, showering him with blazing shrapnel. Rachel tears in heedless of the molten metal still hanging on the metal walls. She picks Aximilli up roughly with clumsy bear paws. He clings to the box.
And the world fades away.
They wait outside of the Yeerk pool, worried expressions on their faces. One stalkeye opens blearily to peer at the blue sky and dark green trees. A maineye opens to see into the worried faces of friends. Prince Jake. Rachel. Tobias perched gently on her shoulder. Cassie. Marco.
He lives. Prince Jake, the others, and he, still live.
Hands roll him akwardly to a position where he can attempt to stand. One leg is brusied and weaker than the others, but he will walk. Aximilli searchs for the box. Marco holds on to it.
"How do you feel?" Prince Jake asks.
He replies,
They all stare. Marco sputters out a loud laugh. "The Ax-man just made a joke! He just told a joke!" The others laugh.
< No. That was sarcasm. >
Their laughter is good to hear.
< Prince Jake, I am in need of the box Marco carries. It contains important personal files of Visser Three. >
When Marco holds the box out with one hand and pinchs his nose with the other, Prince Jake groans. "Don't call me Prince and Marco give him the box. What's in it?"
He hesitates before answering. < The personal files of Visser Three. Some of them may refer to my brother. I would like to reveiw the files in private. >
Before Prince Jake can answer Cassie answers for him. "Open the files, Ax. We want to hear if you find anything important, okay?"
Aximilli looks towards Prince Jake. "Not just anything important, but everything."
In the silence he takes the box and ran. He doesn't look back at his human friends. He just runs. The trees and brush rush by in a blur of green and brown. He doesn't notice the wide wingspan of the hawk above him. He leaps over fallen logs and over creeks and over ditches filled with dirt and rock. On and on he runs, until he feels as though his hearts would burst. Finnally, he comes to a wide feild.
He opens the box. The Yeerk still lies inside. Aximilli's mind reels at what he is considering. He looks out over the feild, golden grass swaying gently in the breeze. The same breeze ruffles his fur slightly. A hawk cries out in otherwise perfect silence.
" 'What if you went blind? Never to see again. Not in morph, not in natural form. Blind. To exist forever in darkness. But what if you lost it all? The only thing you could do is exist. You couldn't live. But wouldn't it be existing in hell to know that you once lived? Wouldn't it?' "
His hearts are torn with indecision. Swiftly, before he can change his mind. He scoops the Yeerk out of the box and holds it to his ear. The dying Yeerk's instincts force it into his head. Aximilli cries out in pain when it bores through his ear canal and into his mind.
< I did not ask for this, Andalite! I asked for freedom from this life! Not another one to destroy! >
< You flatter yourself, Yeerk. I will not run for you. You will have to do that for yourself. You trusted me to kill you. Now I must trust you to set me free. >
His silent words are lost to the Yeerk. It controls his eyes, his legs. He takes a few hesitant steps. Then he runs. Faster, swifter, surer than he had ever run in his life. Bounding, leaping, whipping his tailblade through the air. The earth thuds beneith his hooves. The air sings in his ears, sweeps along his flanks. Sharp scents he was never aware of blossom into his mind.
Freedom.
After what seemed an enternity, he stops. Aximilli's lungs billow air in and out. His flanks heave with the effort to keep air going. His hindquarters are ablaze with fire and weakness. Never in his life had he run so far, so fast. Some secret emotion wells within his mind but keeps hidden. He ignores it.
A crash in the brush alearts him to the others. The Animorphs. His friends surround him, each in battlemorph. Silence covers the feild with an almost unpenitrable sheild. Marco breaks the tense moment. < Um, Ax? This is just a question and all, so don't take it the wrong way, but did you put a Yeerk in your head? I can understand why you'd be offended, but Tobias was following you to provide emotional support or something and swears he saw you do just that. I think he's nuts, ate some bad roadkill or something. But uh, you know,> Marco shrugs breifly in gorrila morph,
Without warning, memories and sensations and thoughts run through his mind. The first brilliant flash of light. Color. Scents. The weak eyesight of the Gedd but the joy of seeing for the first time. Suddenly being able to run. Love from the host's parents, their joy at seeing their child alive again.
Then, horrors beyond his imagining. The fear and hatred of Visser Three. The death of Elfangor. Human-Controllers slumping in the corner, their minds blasted from infestation. Taxxons ripping each other apart. Screams of hosts awakening in their own private hells. Hork-Bajir crowding around each other for protection and vague comfort.
He falls to the ground on his knees clutching his head crying out in pain. The others move in closer, but stop at Jake's < Get back! > His cries cease.
< What did you do to me? > Aximilli demands of the Yeerk.
< Call it a gift. I can't select what memories to give you. Have to take the good with the bad. Sift through it and you'll find tactical information along with the nightmares. See you in the afterlife, Andalite. > No more words are said. The Yeerk oozes out of his ear and lies writhing on the ground. Aximilli struggles to his hooves. The others stare at him and at the Yeerk upon the ground.
< Are you all right? > Jake asks hesitantly.
Aximilli ingores him.
< Ax? >
He raises his tailblade and strikes at the Yeerk. To the others, his aim is true.
< Ax-man? >
< It is over Prince Jake. I have much to explain. >
At first they do not understand. In the end, Cassie and Jake come closest to grasping what Aximilli himself doesn't yet comprehend. They will be weary of him for a while, watch him for a while, but they still trust him. The day turns to night and he runs through the woods. He has a task to complete.
Lator that night, Tobias speaks to him. < The others still can't get over what you did. I can't. >
< I am not a traitor, Tobias. >
< We know that. It's just that you're the last person we'd expect to ever have sympathy for a Yeerk. >
< I know. >
< So what did you do with the Yeerk? >
< I don't understand. >
Tobias laughs. < Of course not. >
< He knows, > Aximilli says silently to himself. Suddenly, he understands. He understands the strange emotion that welled within him towards the end. He understands.
Compassion.
Somewhere, amoung the Chee, a twisted tangle of wires and glass holds a dreamer. It hovers on the edge of life and death in its impromptu mess of a nest. And it dreams.
Of the overwhelming beauty of an Andalite running free.