"Rachel? How are you doing in there?"
51 I jerked in surprise. A very un-catlike movement.
It was Tobias. He had to be fairly close for me to be able to hear his thought-speech. He must be on the roof or perched on a nearby tree branch. I strained my sensitive cat hearing. The birds under the eaves were silent. They were afraid of the big hawk.
"I'm fine," I said. "But you scared me half to death!"
"Sorry. I was just worried."
"Well, don't worry. I'm following Chapman down to the basement. "
"Why?"
"Because that's where he's going. Duh," I said. Somehow, Tobias's human words were annoying me. He wanted me to pay attention to him and it was hard to do. The cat didn't care about his words. The cat just wanted to go down and look around the basement. Fortunately, that's what I wanted to do, too.
I trotted down the rough wooden stairs after Chapman. Very weird, by the way. Going downstairs as a cat gave me a feeling of vertigo. I mean, I was going down head first. It's strange.
"Look, Tobias, I appreciate you looking out for me. But I'm kind of busy right now."
"I understand. I can't hear you very well, anyway. You're getting farther away. "
"Yeah, I'm going down." I waited. He said nothing. "Tobias?" I called. But there was no answer. We're still learning about thought-speech. We know there are limits on how far it can be "heard." But we aren't sure what the limits are.
The basement had paneling all around. The ceiling was bare wood and full of spiders and other interesting things. No mice, though. Nothing that could be considered actual prey. But many things that might be fun to chase.
Chapman is the prey, I reminded myself. We are hunting Chapman.
There was a sort of TV room with a pool table and some old chairs and a couch. But it was obvious that no one had used them for a long time. There were no human scents on them.
There was dust everywhere and I could hear that there were spiders inside the TV set.
The only part of the basement that appeared to have been used was a path right across the floor. I smelled the scents that Chapman had tracked there with his shoes.
He walked in a straight line across the basement to a door. It was a simple white-painted door. Chapman pulled a set of keys out of his pocket. He unlocked the white door.
He opened it and stepped through. Five feet beyond the white door was a second door. This one was made of gleaming steel. It looked like the door to a bank vault.
52 Beside the steel door, there was a small, square white panel of light. Chapman pressed his hand against it.
The steel door opened. It slid into the wall like the doors on Star Trek.
I knew I had to go after him. But my human mind was afraid. And my cat mind didn't see any reason why I should walk into that dark place.
To both of us, it felt like a trap. Like a place we couldn't get out of.
But I had to. I had to go in there . That was the whole point of this spying trip.
And Chapman was my prey.
At the last second, just as the door swooshed shut, I bounded into the room.
It was dark at first, not that it bothered me. Then Chapman turned on a low light. It was strange, because I could actually see better in the dark than I could with the low light.
There was a sort of desk set into the wall. It was gray steel and very unusual-looking. There were more little light panels in various cheerful colors. And there was something that looked like a small but complicated spotlight hanging down from the ceiling. In front of the desk was a chair. A totally normal office-type chair. Chapman sat in it.
He ran his hands over a blue panel. Then he looked at his watch. He sat patiently, waiting.
For about a minute, nothing happened. I tried to look nonchalant, like I had just happened to wander in. But at the same time I was careful to stay behind Chapman so he wouldn't see me.
I remembered Jake's warning. About how any one else would just assume I was a plain old cat. But Chapman knew about morphing. The Yeerks knew about the Andalite morphing technology. So if Chapman or any Controller ever saw an animal acting the wrong way, they could suspect the truth.
Suddenly a brilliant light snapped on. My cat eyes adjusted instantly, but even so, the light was painfully bright. It came from the little spotlight thing. Chapman turned around in his chair to face the light.
The light began to change. It took shape. It turned different colors.
The four hooves appeared. The bluish fur. The many-fingered hands. The flat, intelligent face with no mouth and only slits for a nose. The penetrating, almond-shaped main eyes. Then the strange extra eyes, mounted on stalks that turned this way and that, looking around the room.
Last came the tail, the wicked, curved, scorpionlike tail.
An Andalite. Just like the Andalite prince who had given us our powers.
But I knew this was no true Andalite. Dread washed over me. Dread too strong for even my cat brain to ignore.
53 This was no true Andalite. This was the only Andalite body ever seized and taken over by the Yeerks. The only Andalite-Controller in all the galaxy.
This was Visser Three. Leader of the Yeerk invasion force. The evil creature who could morph into monsters acquired from all over the universe.
This was Visser Three, the creature who had murdered the Andalite prince while we cowered in terror.
This was Visser Three, who had nearly killed us all in the hell of the Yeerk pool.
"Welcome, Visser," Chapman said in a very humble voice. was Iniss two two six of the Sulp Niaar pool submits to you. May the Kandrona shine and strengthen you."
"And you, Iniss two two six," Visser Three said. I was shocked to hear the Visser's voice. In his Andalite body he had no mouth. Andalites communicate telepathically, just the way I do when I'm in a morph.
The second shock came from what they had said to each other. "Iniss two two six." That had to be the name of the Yeerk slug who controlled Chapman.
The cat part of my brain was busy with a different question. Was this apparition real? No.
There was no scent. No scent at all. Only light and shadows.
It was a hologram, I knew. But it was a very convincing hologram. Visser Three seemed almost solid. He looked around as though he could see from his holographic eyes.
I prayed he wouldn't look at me.
"Report, Iniss ."
"Yes, Visser."
Part of me just wanted to run. Even a hologram of Visser Three makes your skin crawl. But now that he had figured out it wasn't real, the cat part of me was just bored.
I realized why I could hear Visser Three -- the hologram projector must not be able to transmit thought-speech. It translated it into regular speech.
"Is there progress on locating the Andalite bandits?"
"No, Visser. Nothing yet."
I knew who he meant by "Andalite bandits."
That was us, the Animorphs.
"I want them found. I want them found NOW!"
Chapman jumped back in surprise at the Visser's command. I could smell fear on him.
54 In a calmer tone, Visser Three went on. "This cannot go on, Iniss two two six, it cannot go on. The Council of Thirteen will hear of it. They will wonder why I reported to them that all Andalite ships near this planet had been destroyed and all the Andalites killed. They will be suspicious. They will be angry. And when the Council of Thir teen is angry with me, I am angry with you."