J ake raised his bladed elbows and sliced into the wall of Hork-Bajir trying to restrain him. Note to self: Do not attempt to contradict Yeerk security forces. It only leads to mayhem. <Get to the fighter!> Jake screamed. He punched another Hork-Bajir out of his way and raced down the long row of ships. Suddenly — Tseeeeeew! Tseeeeeew! The air around him exploded in a flash of Dracon fire! <No!> Jake disappeared in a cloud of glowing smoke. <Jake!> Cassie screamed. <Relax,> Jake called out to us, panting heavily. <l'm okay. I'm crouched behind a service trol ley.> He was out of sight, but that didn't mean security believed he was dead. All attention, all guns, all Dracon beams swarmed toward the smoky cloud where Jake had last been seen. No one noticed the transformation that was taking place behind other conveniently placed pieces of equipment. A muscular blue Andalite and a red-tailed hawk, growing and morphing where two Hork-Bajir had stood seconds before. Tobias flapped up, high and silent, into the bowl of the dome. Thwack . . . Thwack-Thwack-Thwack! Ax! "Aaghshs ... " Four Dracon beams clattered to the ground. Four warriors clutching fingerless stumps let loose

69 'IS Akka upe ozo oti. Scute! Muta pule." Ax looked at me hopefully. <ls the translator chip working yet?> "Uh, no. Not unless muta pule means something to you. Let's see . . . nope. Nothing." Ax's eyes drooped and he turned back to the contraption they had been working on for the past few days. Few long days, I would add. You should try spending your nights under a tree at Chee Park with a dog for a pillow. The Chee tell some great stories about the last ten centuries. Kings, conquerors, explorers, that kind of thing. Mr. King was the cook on Darwin's ship and Henry Ford's production chief. I mean, that's very cool stuff. Fascinating stuff. But honestly, without HBO, life gets a little scary. "Kino ala ozo nev . . . nev . . . never catch them unless we know they're coming . . . nem zurka kakis loti." "Ax! Hey, for a second there, that was English. You did it." <No,> Ax said quickly. <l am unable to stabilize the programming of the translator chip.> He glanced at my dad. "Could you couple it with this?" Dad lifted a blue wire, then pointed to a green, circular component. <That would take time,> Ax said. <l should just interpret. Or attempt to summarize.> Ax had been sifting interplanetary chatter for hours. And for hours we'd been gathered with him, all of us, in Ax's scoop. We'd come for the unveiling of the Z-space transponder. Dad hadn't mentioned it was still under construction. "So, it doesn't even translate?" Rachel said impatiently. "What does it do?" Ax stopped working and looked at us with his main eyes. He put a delicate hand on either side of the device. It was fairly small. Mini-cooler size. But it

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