The Invasion (28 page)

It was time. We were at the bottom of the steps.

We ran over to hide behind a storage shed of some kind. Marco pulled me around the corner, drawing me close so that I could hear him whisper. “Look, before we do this, there’s one thing, Jake. You have to promise me.”

I knew what he was going to say.

“If I have to die, okay. But don’t let them take me. Don’t let them put one of those things in my head.”

“It’ll be okay—”

“You!” a voice yelled. A human voice. “You two. Who are you?”

I spun around. A man. Just one man. But beside him, flanking him, was a big Hork-Bajir, looking suspicious. And on the other side, a Taxxon.

Somehow the man hadn’t seen Rachel. She was
just around the corner of the building. But he had seen Marco and me talking. I guess it hadn’t looked quite right to him.

“Us?” Marco asked. “Who are we? Hey, who are
you?”

“Take them,” the man ordered.

The Hork-Bajir advanced on us. The Taxxon slithered forward on its dozens of sharp, spiny legs, red jelly eyes quivering, mouth opening and closing in anticipation.

I knew I had to morph. But I was frozen with fear. Then I saw Rachel. She had gotten around behind the Controllers. And she was getting very, very large.

R
achel was getting larger very fast. Huge leathery ears sprouted suddenly from the side of her head. Her nose stretched and stretched till it was longer than her body had been to start with. Her arms and legs were big as tree trunks. And from her mouth grew two enormous, curved teeth.

My cousin Rachel now stood almost thirteen feet high and weighed about fourteen thousand pounds.

The weird thing was, I was happy about all this.

Ha HA!
I heard Rachel’s triumphant laugh.
I did it.>

The Hork-Bajir and the Taxxon came closer.

Rachel began twitching her little ropy tail. Her front legs pawed the dirt floor of the cavern. She raised her massive head and stuck out her three-foot-long tusks.

The Taxxon was the first to notice her with his all-around red-jelly eyes, but I guess he didn’t know how to react.

Rachel charged. One minute she was standing there, and the next minute she was barreling forward like an out-of-control eighteen-wheeler.

The Hork-Bajir was fast. He spun around and slashed at her trunk with his elbow blade.

Too little. Too late.

Rachel was moving, and no little flesh wound was going to stop her.

Puny little nothing!
Rachel cried, outraged.
You attack ME?!

The Hork-Bajir went down, crushed under her monstrous feet. He bellowed, but Rachel’s trumpeting was louder.

The Taxxon tried to run. It turns out Taxxons can move when they want to.

It also turns out elephants are faster than you think. They can be
very
fast.

Rachel’s foot caught the Taxxon’s back end. The needle legs collapsed, cracking like broken twigs. Yellow goo oozed from the popped flesh of the big worm.

She just kept rolling over him, leaving behind a big, extremely disgusting pile of goo. The foul smell of the squashed Taxxon nearly knocked me out.

The human was still just standing there. He said, “An elephant?” Like he couldn’t even think about
it
being real.

Rachel wrapped her trunk around his middle.

Yeah,
we heard Rachel say.
An elephant.