"That is your name, isn't it? Your original Hork-Bajir name? You've run us a nice chase, but it's time to come home now."
Visser Three seldom bothered to whisper his thought-speak. I guess when you're that powerful it never occurs to you to worry that someone might overhear.
Ket Halpak, he had called the Hork-Bajir. So it was not Jara Hamee. This was his kalashi. His wife.
They had her surrounded. Two humans carrying shotguns and Visser Three, armed with all the lightning speed of an Andalite. Not to mention morphs from all the dark corners of the galaxy.
There was no way to save the Hork-Bajir female. I'd have to take Visser Three out, and that wasn't going to happen. See, Andalites - even false Andalites - are impossible to sneak up on.
Those extra stalk eyes, turning this way and that, always looking in every direction, made it impossible.
Unless . . .
Unless there was a distraction. I knew the Swainson's hawk tended to roost in one particular elm tree. The light was too dim to see him. He might not even be there. But if he was . . .
I flapped hard to gain altitude. Not too much, there wasn't time. Just enough. Forty feet. Fifty
feet. Sixty feet. Then ... I folded my wings and plummeted toward the ground.
"Tseeeeeeeeer!" I screamed in the voice of a red-tail.
"Tseeeeeeeeer!" I called again, making sure the Swainson's hawk would hear me.
And down I came, wings back and tail narrowed for maximum speed. I aimed straight for Visser Three.
If the Swainson's hawk wasn't home, I was toast.
Then, a rustling sound from the elm! From the corner of my eye I saw wings flapping. The Swainson's was coming out to defend his territory against the pushy red-tail.
I've never been so relieved to see a fellow hawk.
"That bird! It's probably one of them!" Visser Three shouted, pointing at the Swainson's.
The two human-Controllers spun and raised their shotguns to their shoulders. And Visser Three, bless his evil heart, turned his stalk eyes toward what he thought was a threat.
"l'm a friend of Jara Hamee," I said to the Hork-Bajir. "Get ready!" Talons forward! Beak thrust out! A sudden flaring of wings to adjust the angle and . . .
Strike!
My talons raked Visser Three's exposed stalk eyes from behind.
"ARRRRRHHHH!" Visser Three bellowed in pain.
"Now, RUN!" I told the Hork-Bajir.
BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! The shotguns fired.
And we were out of there! Out! Of! There!
The Hork-Bajir bolted. I flapped like my life depended on it. It did.
The Swainson's hawk turned so hard, so fast, I thought he'd been hit.
But then he was hauling his tail feathers outta there, too.
"Andalite filth!" I heard Visser Three scream in my head.
But by then I was out over the trees and the Hork-Bajir was running flat-out below me, and I was just screaming like an idiot from the sheer insane rush of it all.
"Yesss! Yesss! Bird-boy shoots, he scores! Yah-HAH!"
lara Hamee and Ket Halpak were reunited in the shelter of the cave.
We were all exhausted and scared and confused. But we also had that slightly lunatic rush that comes from cheating death.
Marco and Cassie were both fretting about being late getting home. And everyone was getting close to the two-hour morphing limit. But despite all that, it was kind of sweet seeing the two Hork-Bajir together.
They didn't exactly hug. I guess hugging doesn't work all that well when you have blades all over. Ket Halpak did touch the healing wound Jara Hamee had made in his own head.
"Look, we have to get out of here," Rachel
said. She was still in her Hork-Bajir form. "l'll be grounded for the weekend if I don't get home. And I have the feeling we're going to be busy this weekend, so I can't get grounded."
"Your mom wouldn't ground a Packard Foundation Outstanding Student, would she?" I asked.
There was a kind of embarrassed silence. I wasn't supposed to know about Rachel's award.
"lt's not that big a deal," Rachel said. She looked down at the ground.
"What do we do about these guys?" Jake asked. He was still in tiger morph. There were scratches and cuts on his sinuous orange-and-black fur. While I was off rescuing Ket Halpak, there had been a skirmish between the rest of my friends and some Controllers.
No one had been hurt. But once again, I wasn't there when the real fighting started.
"You guys go on home," I told the others. "l'll keep watch over our Hork-Bajir friends here."
"You can't keep watch all night," Rachel protested.
"Hey, I have nothing else to do. I'll take a perch in the tree by the cave entrance. Not a problems
"l will help keep watch, too," Ax chimed in.
"let's, um, go outside and talk about this,"
Jake said. To the Hork-Bajir he said, "Jara and Ket? You have to stay in this cave till we come and get you. Tomorrow some time."
"What will you do with Ket Halpak and Jara Hamee?" Jara asked.
"We really don't know yet," Jake answered honestly.
"We will wait. Here."
"We fellana ... we thank you," Ket said.
Outside it had definitely turned dark now. No stars in the sky yet, but it was just a matter of minutes. Everyone demorphed while Ax and I kept a nervous watch.
"Okay, so what do we do about this?" Jake asked, once everyone but me was normal again.
I kept pace with the others by flitting from branch to branch. I'd let them walk a little way ahead, then fly a few yards ahead of them and wait till they caught up.
"We have two real live aliens," Rachel said. "We could take them to the media. How can you deny there is a Yeerk conspiracy when you see those two?"