the Yeerk Eslin had given me. I had an hour to plan and prepare, now that I saw the ground we were on.
I looked at the meadow. A stream, perhaps three feet across, cut the meadow in half. The grass grew tall by the stream bed.
I tried to guess where the Visser would run. Would he go to the left or the right? I would only get one chance, so I had to guess right.
I imagined where I would go, if it were me. Visser Three was in an Andalite body. Maybe he would move like an Andalite.
I stepped out into the blazing sunlight and walked to a place I thought would do. It was beside the small stream. A place where the grass was a bit shorter, and where it would be easy for Visser Three to step into the stream.
Then, I saw them: the hoofprints. Andalite hoofprints.
Visser Three. Yes, he had been there, perhaps a few days earlier. Eslin was right. This was the place.
I had to wait, concealed. Ready to attack at the right time. I could never hide in my Andalite body. But there were other options.
The rattlesnake. That would be the morph to use. What better way to strike suddenly than with the body of a snake?
I focused my mind on the snake. I concentrated on the change. I felt it begin almost immediately.
It was unlike any morph I had done before. Usually my legs would become some other type of leg. My arms would become some other type of arm, even if they were only fins.
But this time there were no arms, no legs. Nothing of my own body would find an echo in this new shape, except for my eyes and tail.
My legs simply melted away. Withered. DisÂappeared. I fell to the ground, a legless stump.
My arms shriveled and evaporated.
I heard the sounds of grinding inside my body, as all my bones melted together into my spine.
I was shrinking, but since I was already lying on the grass, it didnât seem as extreme as it sometimes did. The stalks of grass grew higher around my head, and the purple flowers grew larger, but there wasnât the usual feeling of falling as I shrank.
What I did feel was a terrible sense of utter weakness. I had no arms! I had no legs!
But my tail . . . ah, that I kept, although in a very different form. The blade of my tail suddenly broke up into a sort of chain. There were dozens of raspy blisters, all connected. The rattlerâs tail.
My fur disappeared very swiftly, and over my bare skin scales grew. Like tiny, interlocked armor-plates that formed a pattern in brown and black and tan.
I grew a mouth. A huge mouth for the size of my body. I was a tube, and the open end was my mouth. It was a shocking body. A bizarre body. Stranger even than morphing an ant or a fish. I was a creature with no separate parts.
My Andalite stalk eyes went dark. A large, amazingly long, fast-moving forked tongue grew in my mouth. But it wasnât like a human tongue. This tongueâs sense of taste was beyond anything a human tongue could ever achieve. This tongue tasted the very air.
And then, I felt the feature I had waited for. Huge, long, curved fangs. Fangs that were each a tiny, hollow needle. Above them venom glands grew and filled with toxin.
I felt the snakeâs mind emerge beneath my own awareness.
It was not a hot, driven mind like in some animals. It did not overwhelm me with fear and hunger. It was a slow, calm, deliberate mind. The mind of a predator. A hunter. A calm, deliberate killer.
And the senses!
The lidless eyes saw strange colors, but they gave me a good range of vision.
The tongue, which shot out from a slit on the bottom of my mouth, taste-smelled the air. It brought me an incredible array of sensations: the scent of grass and earth, the scent of insects, and the scent of living, warm-blooded creatures.
Just below and behind my snake nostrils were two pits that sensed heat, especially the levels of heat put off by prey.
Yes, this was a good morph to use. The Visser would not expect me. The Visserâs Andalite body was fast, but it was not faster than the snake. I knew
I looked at the meadow. A stream, perhaps three feet across, cut the meadow in half. The grass grew tall by the stream bed.
I tried to guess where the Visser would run. Would he go to the left or the right? I would only get one chance, so I had to guess right.
I imagined where I would go, if it were me. Visser Three was in an Andalite body. Maybe he would move like an Andalite.
I stepped out into the blazing sunlight and walked to a place I thought would do. It was beside the small stream. A place where the grass was a bit shorter, and where it would be easy for Visser Three to step into the stream.
Then, I saw them: the hoofprints. Andalite hoofprints.
Visser Three. Yes, he had been there, perhaps a few days earlier. Eslin was right. This was the place.
I had to wait, concealed. Ready to attack at the right time. I could never hide in my Andalite body. But there were other options.
The rattlesnake. That would be the morph to use. What better way to strike suddenly than with the body of a snake?
I focused my mind on the snake. I concentrated on the change. I felt it begin almost immediately.
It was unlike any morph I had done before. Usually my legs would become some other type of leg. My arms would become some other type of arm, even if they were only fins.
But this time there were no arms, no legs. Nothing of my own body would find an echo in this new shape, except for my eyes and tail.
My legs simply melted away. Withered. DisÂappeared. I fell to the ground, a legless stump.
My arms shriveled and evaporated.
I heard the sounds of grinding inside my body, as all my bones melted together into my spine.
I was shrinking, but since I was already lying on the grass, it didnât seem as extreme as it sometimes did. The stalks of grass grew higher around my head, and the purple flowers grew larger, but there wasnât the usual feeling of falling as I shrank.
What I did feel was a terrible sense of utter weakness. I had no arms! I had no legs!
But my tail . . . ah, that I kept, although in a very different form. The blade of my tail suddenly broke up into a sort of chain. There were dozens of raspy blisters, all connected. The rattlerâs tail.
My fur disappeared very swiftly, and over my bare skin scales grew. Like tiny, interlocked armor-plates that formed a pattern in brown and black and tan.
I grew a mouth. A huge mouth for the size of my body. I was a tube, and the open end was my mouth. It was a shocking body. A bizarre body. Stranger even than morphing an ant or a fish. I was a creature with no separate parts.
My Andalite stalk eyes went dark. A large, amazingly long, fast-moving forked tongue grew in my mouth. But it wasnât like a human tongue. This tongueâs sense of taste was beyond anything a human tongue could ever achieve. This tongue tasted the very air.
And then, I felt the feature I had waited for. Huge, long, curved fangs. Fangs that were each a tiny, hollow needle. Above them venom glands grew and filled with toxin.
I felt the snakeâs mind emerge beneath my own awareness.
It was not a hot, driven mind like in some animals. It did not overwhelm me with fear and hunger. It was a slow, calm, deliberate mind. The mind of a predator. A hunter. A calm, deliberate killer.
And the senses!
The lidless eyes saw strange colors, but they gave me a good range of vision.
The tongue, which shot out from a slit on the bottom of my mouth, taste-smelled the air. It brought me an incredible array of sensations: the scent of grass and earth, the scent of insects, and the scent of living, warm-blooded creatures.
Just below and behind my snake nostrils were two pits that sensed heat, especially the levels of heat put off by prey.
Yes, this was a good morph to use. The Visser would not expect me. The Visserâs Andalite body was fast, but it was not faster than the snake. I knew
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