." She looked away. "He . . ."
"He took care of the Hork-Bajir," Rachel said. "I saw some of it. I was still conscious."
I was confused. "How did Erek take care of the Hork-Bajir?"
"He destroyed them all."
Ax said.
I almost laughed. "Erek took out two dozen Hork-Bajir?"
No one laughed with me. Erek had stopped sobbing.
I thought, Why would a robot cry? "AII the Hork-Bajir."
Ax said. "AII the human-Controllers. All of them."
I stood up. I could see the Matcom building. It was only a few hundred yards away. There was a big hole in the front glass.
I had a very bad feel- ing about what was on the other side of that glass.
All I could think of to say was, "All of them?"
"It lasted about ten seconds," Rachel said.
She closed her eyes, trying not to remember what she had seen. But I guess the images weren't easily shut out. She opened her eyes again, and to my utter amazement, I saw tears.
That's what brought the horror home to me -- Rachel's tears.
"lt was extremely brutal." Ax said. "Very brutal, and very swift. He carried us here. He revived you. He even reattached my arm."
I saw a scar on Ax's left arm.
"He hasn't said anything since then,"
Cassie said sadly. "He won't talk to any of us."
"He saved us, though, right?" I said.
"Yeah," Cassie agreed, smiling a deeply sad smile. "He saved our lives. And lost his own soul."
I went to Erek. I wanted to thank him. I wanted to tell him he'd done what was right. He'd beaten the bad guys. Saved the good guys.
He stood up as I came over.
"You okay, man?" I asked him.
He looked at me with holographic human eyes. Maybe he had to choose to make them cry. Maybe he had to choose to give them that empty, hollow look. I don't know what the connection is between the android Chee and his projected human body.
But his expression answered my question.
No. Erek was not okay.
"You saved our lives, Erek," I said.
"How do you . . . how do you live with the memory?"
he asked me.
I knew what he meant. See, win or lose, right or wrong, the memory of violence sits inside your head. It sits there, like some lump you can't quite swallow. It sits there, a black hole that darkens hope, and eats away at everyday happiness like a cancer. It's the shadow you take into your own heart and try to live with.
I shrugged. "I guess I try not to think about it. I try and forget. And after a while, the nightmares don't happen as much."
Erek put a finger to his head. "Android," he said. He made a bitter, ruined smile. "I can't forget. See? I can never forget . . .
anything."
I looked at him. Already in my own human mind, the memories of that night's horror were fading. The flash of blades and the pain and the sickening feeling of my fist closing around the Hork-Bajir's throat . . . they were being covered over by scar tissue.
What if I could never forget? What if all those memories were fresh forever? I realized then why the Pemalites had forbidden their creatures to kill. The Chee lived forever. Forever was a long time to remember what Erek had done.
"I'm sorry," I said.
Erek nodded. "Yes." He held out his clenched fist, palm down. I knew what he was doing. I didn't want it. But I held out my own hand, and took the Pemalite crystal from him.
"I've changed my programming back," Erek said. "We ... I ... maybe at times I can tell you things. Information. But I'll never fight again. I can't join this war, my friend."
He walked away. We went to our homes and crawled into beds our parents never knew we'd left.
I was beyond exhausted. But I couldn't sleep.
Too many images. Too many memories. And I was afraid of the nightmares.
There are evil things in life, and I guess there are times when a human being has to fight those evils.
I closed my eyes and wandered lost and afraid through my nightmares.
And already, my mind was forgetting.
Teah! Yeah! Go boy!"
Homer ran flat out, kicking up divots of sand as the Frisbee soared over his head. With a burst of speed, Homer got out in front of the Frisbee, jumped, pivoted in midair, and snatched the disc out of the air. His jump carried him to the water's edge and he landed in the surf.
"Yeah! Good boy!" Jake said.
"Not bad," I said. "He's not quite that Frisbee dog we saw on TV, but he's not bad."
"Hey, that was a professional Frisbee dog. Homer's just in it for the sport.
Homer doesn't even have any endorsements."
Homer came trotting back across the sand with the Frisbee in his mouth.
It was a week after our battle for the Pemalite crystal. Jake and I were at the beach. Tobias was high overhead, riding the thermals. I didn't know where the others were.
And my hair had finally grown out a little. But I'd gotten used to having it shorter. I decided to keep it that way, just to spite everyone.
There weren't that many people on the beach because it was a little too chilly for lying out. Instead, people came down and flew kites, or walked along, looking for sand dollars and shells. And they played with their dogs.
Jake knelt down and tried to take the Frisbee from Homer. But Homer, like just about every dog in all of history, refused to give it up.
"They just don't get the point of this whole game," I said. "You throw, they catch, they bring it back for you to throw again. Why is that so hard to figure out?"
Jake scratched right behind Homer's ear, and Homer dropped the Frisbee. "Oh, they know how to play the game, all right," Jake said with a laugh.
"For them, the game is "I throw, they catch, they bring it back, they get a good head scratch, then they give up the Frisbee.""
But just then, Homer lost all interest in the Frisbee. Two dogs were trotting by, tails in the air. Homer jogged over to greet them. They sniffed each other by way of introduction, then took off, running like the giddy, happy, always-excited, dog goofs they were.
It made me smile to watch them.
"It must have been a nice place," I said.
Jake knew exactly what I was talking about.
"Yeah. A planet where the people were as sweet and decent as dogs. Yeah, that would have been okay."
"I ran into Erek at the 7-Eleven yesterday,"
I said. "I think he was looking for a place to "accidentally" run into me. Anyway, he gave me a phone number. He says it's an absolutely safe phone. He says the Yeerks couldn't tap it or trace it if they tried."
"Yeah? So?" Jake asked.
I shrugged. "So, he says if we ever need him we could leave a message at that number. And if he has something to tell us, he'll record a message for us."
"Huh," Jake grunted. "Think anything will ever come of it?"
"I don't know," I said honestly. "But I think the Chee are going to go on fighting the Yeerks.
They'll just be doing it in their own way."
I reached into my pocket and drew out the small, diamondlike crystal. "I still have this, by the way.
I don't know what to do about it. Erek didn't even want to talk about it. But this is the most powerful computer ever created. It could rewrite the Ghees' programming. It could take over every computer on Earth. The Pemalite crystal. We almost died getting it. What am I supposed to do with it?"
Jake and I stood there, looking down at more power than any human had ever held in his hand.