I never knew all the things that were going through Rachel's head while I was struggling with my own sense of identity. We had decided to use my journals from that time, but now that we're coming clean, her thoughts deserve to see the light of day. And I wanted to be truthful about what really happened in the end.
Chapter 12
I was just about to go to bed when I heard something. A scratching at the glass. A rustling. And I knew it was Tobias. I almost slipped running for the window. I guess that's why they call them slippers.
<Rachel?>
I didn't care that I was only in a bathrobe. After all, we'd all seen each other in skin-tight leotards dozens of times since the five of us started fighting against the Yeerk invasion. And besides, Tobias didn't really get a chance to wear clothes at all, anymore.
He was a hawk. A red-tailed hawk. But he was also a boy, trapped in feathers, looking through the world with incredibly powerful eyes over a dull grey beak.
"Hi," I said. "I was worried about you!"
<Why?>
Did he really not know? "We weren't very sensitive this afternoon," I whispered.
<Don't be silly. You guys barely escaped being ... you know.> Tobias had watched as the four of us were almost trapped as wolves or... worse. We'd spent too long in our morphs and almost gotten stuck - like he was. But we were so relieved when we all made it out that we didn't really consider how he would feel.
"Come inside. I have my bedroom door locked."
Tobias flew over to my dresser, and I saw him looking at himself in the mirror. Finally he said, <I don't know what's happening to me, Rachel.>
"What do you mean, Tobias?" I gave him my best smile to reassure him.
<Rachel. I think I'm... I'm losing myself.> His dark, unreadable eyes stared unblinking at me.
I bit my lip, but only for a second. "Wh - What ... How do you mean?" I asked.
<Today the hawk we freed ... she was there. At the lake. I wanted to go with her. I felt like I belonged with her.>
"You belong with us," I said firmly. He did! He was an Animorph, and we needed him. Without him keeping track of time, we would all be wolves! And besides... "You are a human being, Tobias."
<How can you be so sure?>
"Because what counts is what is in your head and in your heart." I said, stepping toward him. I could tell the hawk in him wanted to back away from an approaching threat, but Tobias stayed put on the dresser, because I was right. "A person isn't his body. A person isn't what's on the outside."
<Rachel ... I don't even remember what I looked like.>
I'm not much for sentimentality. I don't cry at movies, and I don't hesitate when it's time to act. But I could feel the water in my eyes. As much as I didn't want to, I pitied Tobias. He didn't need my pity - he needed to remember who he was.
I marched over to my nightstand and opened the drawer. It was in there somewhere, wasn't it? Yes! I grabbed the photo and turned it to Tobias. I didn't have to move it close - he could see it from across the room.
<I didn't know you had a picture of me.>
I nodded. "It's not a great picture. In real life you look better."
<In real life...>
"Tobias, someday the Andalites will return. If they don't, we're all lost, all the human race. If they do come back, I know they'll have some way to return you to your own body." I couldn't really guarantee it, but I knew it was true.
<I wish I was sure.> he thought back, tilting his head.
"I am sure." It had to be true, because Tobias didn't deserve to be stuck. We didn't deserve to be locked into a battle for our lives and for the fate of the whole world, instead of living our normal, boring, happy teenage lives. And if the world wasn't fair - well, I'd make it fair. But I was still holding back tears.
I just hoped Tobias couldn't see.
Chapter 14
I can't write much about what happened. I don't want to. My hands are shaking.
But it might be the last time I write about Tobias, and I owe him that much.
I was doing a dumb gymnastics exposition at the mall. A fundraiser, whatever. I was so done with sports when there was so much going on.
And then there was Tobias. A hawk, in the mall, shooting through the air. I pulled out of my handstand, frozen for, like, the first time in my life. Why was he in the mall?
"Tobias!" I didn't care if people heard me. There was a lot of commotion anyway, so...no one probably noticed me. He was flying straight for a wall. He was going to pull up. Wasn't he?
"No!" I yelled.
He pulled up, but still scraped against the wall. Now he was flying straight up toward the skylight. Too fast to turn again, but he tried, smacking the glass ceiling and spinning down, out of control.
No. He was falling too fast. He was going to hit the ground. Everyone around was stopped and staring in amazement. No! He was going to land just at the end of the balance beam. I ran the end, keeping my balance, arms outstretched, and I caught him. I caught him!
We rolled down onto the soft mats below and I whispered, "You have to get out of here!"
<I killed,> he cried. <You don't understand, Rachel. I'm lost. I killed!>
"No. As long as you have me and the others, you aren't lost, Tobias." But he didn't believe me. What could I have said? Would he have listened to anything? Anyone?
People were trying to pull Tobias off of me, assuming I cared about the small scratches and bruises I was getting as he thrashed in my grasp. Elbowing them away, I used both arms to toss Tobias back into the air. I couldn't let them catch him, or they'd think he had rabies or something.
He flew again, avoiding hands and even a bag some lady threw. But there was nowhere safe to go but up. Up and up he flew, back toward the ceiling.
He had to know that he couldn't break the glass, but he was flying full speed straight at it. He had to know that a head-on collision at that speed wouldn't go well for a hawk his size. Maybe he had spotted Marco, maybe the hawk inside him was so afraid it was controlling him.
But if Marco hadn't been there to throw that baseball, Tobias would have died.
And now he's out there, alone and afraid, if he is in control at all. He isn't lost, but if he thinks he is, he might never come back. It's been days, damn it.
If he'd hit that ceiling, he would have died.
And I think that's what he wanted.
Chapter 17
I spent the next few days locked in my room, waiting for a sound. Anything from the window at all. Anything. School was a blur, and I got so bored waiting that I picked up a book to try to distract myself. Until finally, finally, I heard the soft flutter of wings.
<Rachel?>
The book went flying, and in seconds I had the window open for the red-tailed hawk that had come calling.
"Tobias?"
<More or less> he said, flapping into the room. I tried to grab him out of the air and hug him. He was alive! He was back! But you can't really hug a bird.
I settled for asking "Are you okay? We've all been terrified. Cassie said maybe you were killed or something. There are all kinds of things that can happen. Jake is so depressed."
<I'm okay,> was all he said.
Gone for days, and that was all he had to say? I balled my fists and lost my temper. I hadn't planned on that, but the frustration and fear just all came out at once. "Tobias, what is the deal with you? Why would you just disappear and leave us all worrying for days?"
<It's hard to explain,> he said. <I guess . . . the hawk sort of won out over me. Not that it's really that way. I mean, the hawk instincts . . . they're strong.>
He told me about the day at the mall. How he'd killed and eaten a mouse and how terrible that had felt. I hadn't ever...you know - eaten anything as a morph before, at least not that I wouldn't have eaten as a human. I tried to put on a brave face, but raw mouse meat sure didn't sound appealing.
<I lost control. For the last couple of days, I've been living like a hawk. All the way, like a hawk. I think I was starting to forget . . . me. I was starting to lose touch with humans. Then something happened.>
He explained that he'd seen a man running for his life from the Yeerks at the lake. Blade-armed Hork-Bajir would have killed him for sure if Tobias hadn't led him to safety.
We talked a bit about the guy. He'd probably just been fishing or something, and now he knew just enough about the Yeerks to keep his mouth shut.
"You saved him," I said.
<I almost didn't,> he admitted. <At first, I just saw another predator and his prey. No different from watching the owls at night. No different from what I do myself. Kill to eat.>
That didn't sound right. I thought for a moment, and said, "The Yeerks and their slaves aren't killing to eat. They are killing to control and dominate. Killing because it's the only way you can eat, because that's the way nature designed you, that's one thing. Killing because you want power or control is evil."
<I guess you're right,> he replied thoughtfully. <I hadn't thought about it that way.>
Maybe the mouse wasn't such a big deal. "What you did . . . eating . . . you know, whatever. Well, that's natural for the hawk. Nothing a Hork-Bajir does is natural. They aren't even in control of their own bodies or minds. They are tools of the Yeerks. And the Yeerks only want power and domination."
<I know.>
He didn't sound convinced. "You are human, Tobias," I said softly.
<Yeah. Maybe. I don't know. Sometimes I just feel so trapped. I want to move my fingers, but I don't have any. I want to speak out loud, but I have a mouth that's only good for ripping and tearing.>
I didn't know what to say. Normally I could just tell a story to someone hurting about how I'd felt the same way. But I hadn't, and I hoped I never would.
<Anyway, look, I'm sorry I ruined your exhibition at the mall the other day.>
I smiled. "What do you mean? It was perfect. I was just starting my routine, and you know how much I hate to have to do public shows like that. You put an end to the whole thing real fast."
<I can imagine. I hope no one was hurt by the falling glass.>
"No, everyone was fine. But what were you going to do if Marco had missed with that baseball? You would have hit the glass awfully hard."
He didn't answer, and that told me everything I needed to know. Another thing I couldn't say I'd ever felt before. It took all my willpower to keep from crying. Instead, I walked over to Tobias. I had to say the right thing. The words had to come now, or never.
Brushing the top of his head with my hand gently, I said, "What I told you the other day, Tobias . . . remember? You're not lost as long as you have Jake and Cassie and me. Even Marco. He came through for you, big time. We're your friends. You're not alone."
He just stared back, but I could tell he cared.
"And someday, the Andalites will come. . . ."
<Someday.>
Chapter 27
It felt like the least important thing that had happened all month, but we did it. We destroyed the gigantic Yeerk watership. We'd hoped to reveal it at high enough altitude that the whole world would see, but Tobias had had to destroy the ship too low. The wreckage was removed quickly and efficiently by the Yeerks, leaving no proof that we could show to the world.
I was right that we needed Tobias. We had been trapped in the ship and ready to go down fighting, but I begged him to destroy the ship...with us in it. I didn't know how I expected a red-tailed hawk to destroy a spaceship, but he'd managed it with one of their Dracon rayguns, and we'd all managed to shift to our bird morphs before we would have fallen to our deaths below the burning ship.
Thanks to Tobias, we all made it out alive.
Except for Polly. At least that was the name the car salesman had given her. Tobias had seemed pretty shaken up when we reconvened and privately, I'd asked him why. She'd been by the lake, and when the Yeerks were blasting every bird that moved, they'd gotten her. He'd seen it all. I knew how much the hawk meant to him, and what she represented.
He'd been called to her. A sense of normalcy - that his life could have meaning even if he could only be a bird. But she was also a sign of his inhumanity.
No, that was wrong. She was a sign of his hawkness. Tobias wasn't just human, and he wasn't just a hawk. He was both, for better or worse, and I think I liked that.
Learning that she'd been shot down, I did something stupid and impulsive, and really risky - typical Rachel, right?
It wasn't until the next day when I showed him.
"Hi, Tobias," I said, knowing he'd drop by. "Come in. It's safe."
He flew to his usual place - the dresser.
"Look, um, Tobias . . . maybe this seems crazy. But I thought - well, let me just show you." I wasn't wearing my typical pajamas. I was wearing my morphing suit. Surely, he'd noticed. Taking a deep breath, I started to morph. A beak, but not the yellow one of my bald eagle. No, a grey beak protruded from my face. Brown feathers sprouted from my arms. I collapsed in on myself, legs melting into talons and arms shrinking into light, long wings.
I could tell he knew now. I was her. I was turning into the hawk by the lake.
<I went back to the lake,> I said, sharp, hawk eyes meeting his. <I buried her, Tobias. But first, I thought - maybe she should live on. At least her DNA?> Suddenly I felt really self-conscious, just the way he was looking at me. <Did I do it wrong? Was I just...being crazy?>
<No, that doesn't sound crazy, Rachel,> he said softly. <Not crazy at all. Just human.>
<Well, we are human. All of us.> I replied, even though we were both birds.
<Yes,> he finally agreed. <I knew I was human when I realized how . . . how sad I was that she was killed. See, a hawk wouldn't care. If she had been my mate, I would have missed her, been disturbed. But sadness? That's a human emotion. I know it seems strange, but I guess only a human would really care that a bird had died.>
<I didn't want to just leave her there.>
<That's the way it is. Her body would have been eaten. By a raccoon, or a wolf, or another bird. Maybe even another hawk. I guess worms, now that you've buried her.>
<That's the way it is for wild animals, Tobias. Not humans.> I couldn't believe he'd just said that!
<Yeah. I know. That's how I know that you are wrong, Rachel, at least partly. I am a human, yes. But I am also a hawk. I'm a predator who kills for food. And I'm also a human being who. . . who grieves, over death.>
Now I knew what it felt like to want to cry but to be unable to. Only humans cry, of all the animals. Tobias was a boy and a hawk, just like I'd thought. Not just the good, and not just the bad parts - of both. I thought transforming into the female hawk would make him feel better, but in some ways, it didn't make him feel anything.
I didn't know what to say, and he seemed to understand that. He flew to the open window, glancing back at me. The day was bright and warm. I could have stayed there, but that's not what a red-tailed hawk would do.
He flew out, and I followed, warm air lifting us effortlessly into the air. We didn't say anything. We didn't have to. We just were.
Two hawks. Two humans. Some strange mix of the two, flying together.
Free.
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