live long enough to become human again!
Jake’s voice. Then,
My waist would snap. The mandibles would not release me.
Then, suddenly, the pressure around my waist was gone. Instead, I felt the sandy soil pressing against me.
I was growing!
I couldn’t breathe. Sand blocked the air. Pressure. Then, the ground around me opened up. I swear it was like climbing up out of a grave. The air! Fresh, clean night air!
I exploded up out of the sand.
Jake was on top of me, pushing against me as he grew. And the others, who had been only inches away in the tunnel, also pressed together in a rapidly growing heap of misshapen bodies. I tried to squirm away, but it was awkward. I was only half human.
But at last I lay there on the ground, staring up through human eyes at the stars.
It was Tobias.
“Cassie?” Jake asked.
“I’m okay,” Cassie said.
“Me too, Jake, thanks for asking,” Rachel said. We were all alive. All in one piece. Four humans and an Andalite.
I looked down and saw the disturbed sand, where we had pushed our way up and out. Thousands of ants, almost too small to see, were racing wildly around.
There, too, in the dirt, was the transponder. I picked it up.
Rachel was stomping the ground back down, trying to flatten it out so it wouldn’t look strange.
“Jake?” I said. “Let’s not do this again any time soon.”
He nodded shakily.
“One day I’m a lobster. Then I’m an ant. I figure the next step down the evolutionary ladder is a virus or something. And I just want to say right now, I’m not doing it. I am not going to become phlegm, even to save the world.”
It wasn’t much of a joke, but there was a kind of lame little laugh from everyone. And Rachel stopped stomping the ants—I mean, the ground.
That night, when I went home, I took a shower. I found the head of an ant. It was still locked on to the skin of my waist.
Lots of people think only humans fight wars. That only humans are murderous. Let me tell you something — compared to ants, human beings are full of nothing but peace, love, and understanding.
A month or so after the experience with the ants, I picked up a book about ants. The author said, “If ants had nuclear weapons they would probably end the world in a week.”
He’s wrong. It wouldn’t take them that long.
CHAPTER 15
I was cool. I was fine. I slept okay. There were dreams, but I just put them out of my mind.
When I got up the next morning, I ignored the fact that my dad’s eyes were red, like he’d been crying. He was getting worse, not better, as we got closer to Sunday. To the second-year anniversary of my mom’s death.
But I had to put that out of my mind, too. I had to put a lot of things out of my mind. It was getting to be a habit.
I saw Jake in the hallway at school. I pretended not to notice him.
I saw Rachel, too. She had a dark look in her eyes. Like she hadn’t slept. Like something was
really
wrong.
Even Cassie seemed grim. It had gotten to all of us. It’s not so easy to just forget terror. It’s not easy to just ignore the memory of your leg being ripped off.
Of being dismembered. Torn apart.
One of these days, I thought, one of us is going to go crazy. Totally, lock-me-up-in-a-rubber-room nutso. It was too much. This wasn’t how life was supposed to be.
One of us would snap. One of us would lose it. It could happen, even to strong people.
I knew. It had happened to my father. I used to think nothing could ever destroy him. But my mom’s death had.
He used to be an engineer. A scientist, really. He’s incredibly smart. We had a nice house. We had a nice car. I used to live practically next door to Jake.
I know all that stuff isn’t important. I know having things isn’t what life is about. But it was still hard when my dad just stopped going to work. Jerry, his boss, tried to be nice. He gave him a couple of weeks to deal with losing Mom.
But a couple of weeks was not
My waist would snap. The mandibles would not release me.
Then, suddenly, the pressure around my waist was gone. Instead, I felt the sandy soil pressing against me.
I was growing!
I couldn’t breathe. Sand blocked the air. Pressure. Then, the ground around me opened up. I swear it was like climbing up out of a grave. The air! Fresh, clean night air!
I exploded up out of the sand.
Jake was on top of me, pushing against me as he grew. And the others, who had been only inches away in the tunnel, also pressed together in a rapidly growing heap of misshapen bodies. I tried to squirm away, but it was awkward. I was only half human.
But at last I lay there on the ground, staring up through human eyes at the stars.
“Cassie?” Jake asked.
“I’m okay,” Cassie said.
“Me too, Jake, thanks for asking,” Rachel said. We were all alive. All in one piece. Four humans and an Andalite.
I looked down and saw the disturbed sand, where we had pushed our way up and out. Thousands of ants, almost too small to see, were racing wildly around.
There, too, in the dirt, was the transponder. I picked it up.
Rachel was stomping the ground back down, trying to flatten it out so it wouldn’t look strange.
“Jake?” I said. “Let’s not do this again any time soon.”
He nodded shakily.
“One day I’m a lobster. Then I’m an ant. I figure the next step down the evolutionary ladder is a virus or something. And I just want to say right now, I’m not doing it. I am not going to become phlegm, even to save the world.”
It wasn’t much of a joke, but there was a kind of lame little laugh from everyone. And Rachel stopped stomping the ants—I mean, the ground.
That night, when I went home, I took a shower. I found the head of an ant. It was still locked on to the skin of my waist.
Lots of people think only humans fight wars. That only humans are murderous. Let me tell you something — compared to ants, human beings are full of nothing but peace, love, and understanding.
A month or so after the experience with the ants, I picked up a book about ants. The author said, “If ants had nuclear weapons they would probably end the world in a week.”
He’s wrong. It wouldn’t take them that long.
CHAPTER 15
I was cool. I was fine. I slept okay. There were dreams, but I just put them out of my mind.
When I got up the next morning, I ignored the fact that my dad’s eyes were red, like he’d been crying. He was getting worse, not better, as we got closer to Sunday. To the second-year anniversary of my mom’s death.
But I had to put that out of my mind, too. I had to put a lot of things out of my mind. It was getting to be a habit.
I saw Jake in the hallway at school. I pretended not to notice him.
I saw Rachel, too. She had a dark look in her eyes. Like she hadn’t slept. Like something was
really
wrong.
Even Cassie seemed grim. It had gotten to all of us. It’s not so easy to just forget terror. It’s not easy to just ignore the memory of your leg being ripped off.
Of being dismembered. Torn apart.
One of these days, I thought, one of us is going to go crazy. Totally, lock-me-up-in-a-rubber-room nutso. It was too much. This wasn’t how life was supposed to be.
One of us would snap. One of us would lose it. It could happen, even to strong people.
I knew. It had happened to my father. I used to think nothing could ever destroy him. But my mom’s death had.
He used to be an engineer. A scientist, really. He’s incredibly smart. We had a nice house. We had a nice car. I used to live practically next door to Jake.
I know all that stuff isn’t important. I know having things isn’t what life is about. But it was still hard when my dad just stopped going to work. Jerry, his boss, tried to be nice. He gave him a couple of weeks to deal with losing Mom.
But a couple of weeks was not
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