Chapter 5 "What's for dinner?" I asked my mom as soon as I got home. The walk in the woods had made me hungry. Being outdoors always does that to me. So does fear. I just kept picturing the Yeerk pool. The cages full of involuntary hosts, humans and Hork-Bajir, temporarily free of their Yeerk parasites. I kept hearing them. Crying - that's what most of them did while they waited to be reinfested. Others screamed. Some begged for mercy. Or worse. My mom was standing by the kitchen counter. She was more dressed up than she usually was in the evening. She was munching nervously on some Doritos and kind of staring off into space. "Mom? Hello?" She looked like she hadn't noticed me. "Oh, hi, honey." "What's for dinner? I'm starving." "Your father is coming over tonight. For dinner. He said he would pick something up." I felt my stomach clench. Something was wrong. Since the divorce, my dad never came over for dinner. My two sisters and I spent one weekend a month overnight at his apartment in the city. Plus the every-other-weekend outing. But he did not come over for dinner. I wasn't hungry anymore. "What's

Chapter 4 The entrance to the Yeerk pool?" I echoed. "Where? How?" I looked around at the others to see their reactions. See, we had already invaded the Yeerk pool in an effort to save Jake's brother, Tom. Not a happy memory. I saw Cassie shudder. "Ax is the only one who wasn't there for our little vacation in the Yeerk pool," Marco said. "As the rest of you know, the Yeerk pool is in a huge underground cavern. It's practically a small city down there. It's under our school, but it's so big that it also runs beneath the fire station, a couple of gas stations, and most of the mall." Ax nodded. <Yeerk pools are generally large and elaborate. They are an important part of Yeerk life. The centers of their lives, really. The pools are, for the Yeerks, what forests and meadows are to Andalites. > "Tobias and I have been working out a pattern of surveillance," Marco went on. "For the last week, we've followed our very favorite human-Controller, Assistant Principal Chapman, everywhere we can. Tobias tracks him from the air. Then I follow him when he goes into a building." "Why didn't you let the rest of us in on this?" I demanded. Marco shrugged. "It was a two-person job, that's all." Jake looked as annoyed as I felt. Then I realized why Marco had kept this quiet. Jake had just been through the terrifying ordeal of being infested by a Yeerk. For three days he had been a human-Controller, a prisoner in his own body. Marco had been letting him rest. "So?" I asked, a little more patiently. "So what?" Marco answered. "So where is this entrance to the Yeerk pool? Duh." "Well, I was hoping to amaze and entertain you all with the

assault of damp air, rich with a mineral scent. I had smelled that aroma before. Memories came rushing into my head. Memories I wished I could forget. <Let's go!> Jake yelled. We tore down the wall, hit the carpet, and blazed for the doorway. The feet of the Controller were just ahead of us, monstrous building-sized shoes that lifted and swung ahead, disappearing from sight. In we went after the Controller. The door closed behind us. <We're in.> Jake said. <Oh, goody.> Marco replied. Down into the Yeerk pool. The very last place I ever wanted to go again. 29