human again, with my own hands and feet and eyes and mouth.

No time for that now, I told myself. Get to the others. Hurry!

I took off at a run. Amazing! It was amazing to be running. To be down at ground level with things rushing past.

The ground was so close below me. It was scary, in a way. I kept thinking, pull up, pull up! In my guts I felt this need for altitude.

It's dangerous, flying too close to the ground.

And no matter how I tried to hurry, the raccoon body was not built for speed. It lumbered along. It seemed to need to stop constantly to sniff at this or that.

It wasn't that I couldn't control the body. I could. That part had been fairly easy. I mean, the instincts of the raccoon, the urgent need for food, the fear of predators, all that was normal to me.

I just couldn't get the stubby legs to move fast enough. My friends were half a mile away! I'd never reach them in time to help.

I stopped. I was panting heavily. The raccoon heart was racing. What could I do? What could I do? I'd ended up in a useless morph!

I craned my raccoon head upward. I couldn't see very well, but I knew the sky was up there. I could see a faded sort of blue through the trees.

Wait . . . was it possible? Could I remorph back into my own body?

My red-tailed body? DNA isn't affected by injuries. If I morphed back to red-tail, I wouldn't have the broken wing.

Would I?

The others had done it. They had morphed out of injured bodies. Then when they re-morphed, the bodies were whole again.

I had to try. It was so stupid! I'd been left out of so many missions because I couldn't morph. Now I could morph and I was totally useless.

I focused. I closed my weak raccoon eyes and focused on a different body. A body with feathers and wings. And slowly I became myself again.

I flew.

I'd only been without my wings for a few minutes, but still I felt weirded out. I mean, I know the others are used to being in different bodies. But I'm not.

I peered ahead with my hawk sight. I saw no helicopters. I did see a few shaking treetops. Large beasts were moving beneath those trees. Taxxons and Hork-Bajir.

I flew on and soon saw the tail end of the Yeerk search army.

Human-Controllers, their human bodies wearing out, staggered up the hill.

Ahead of them, Hork-Bajir warriors. They were stronger and faster than the humans. Their

sergeants had to keep holding them back so they wouldn't leave the human-Controllers behind.

And out in front of them all, the Taxxon trackers continued their search.

I flew hard and fast. And then, at last, I saw the helicopters. They were low to the ground. They were spread out in a line abreast. And unless I was totally mistaken, they were past where my friends would be.

I felt a chill of fear. I knew what they were going to do. This time it wasn't the Ellimist telling me what would happen. It was my own predator's instincts. I knew my friends were being hunted. And I knew how the Yeerks would do it.

The helicopters were a mile away, maybe a little more. So I heard nothing of them. But as I watched, I saw the sudden red spear that shot down to the ground.

Again and again and again the helicopters fired their blazing Dracon beams down at dry trees and even dryer underbrush.

They were starting a forest fire!

Within minutes, a wall of smoke was advancing through the trees. The wall of smoke had to be a mile long, end to end. It would block Jake and Rachel and the others. It would stop them and turn them back. Back toward the waiting Taxxonsand Hork-Bajir warriors.

As I watched, a flutter of pale brown. Some bird escaping the flames.

A stab of red! The bird flamed and burned in midair!

Had it been one of my friends in morph?

"What am I supposed to do?!" I yelled at the Ellimist. "This is impossible! I can't stop those helicopters. Are you just going to stand by now and do nothing?"

There was no answer. I was not surprised. As Ax had said, the Ellimist was playing his own games. He didn't care if I thought it was fair.

I dropped down, down below treetop level to avoid getting Draconed myself. The wind wasn't as strong down in the trees, but I had the worse problem of having to dodge branches.

And then, just a glimpse below me! A pale blue deer with a scorpion's tail.

"Ax! Ax, it's me, Tobias!"

"Hello, Tobias," Ax said as calmly as if nothing were happening.

"Where is everyone?"

"They are nearby. We seem to be in a trap."

"No kidding," I said. Then, aiming my thought-speak at all my friends, I said, Everyone keep your heads down. Don't try and fly or anything. The Yeerks are shooting anything that rises above the trees."

I came to rest on a rotting log. I was so exhausted I almost missed my landing and crashed.

A huge brown bear about the size of a mini-van came lumbering up.

"Rachel, I really hope that's you, because I've had all the close calls I can stand for one day."

"lt's me, Tobias. Chill. Take a rest. We figure we have maybe five minutes before this whole thing closes on us."

The two Hork-Bajir appeared, accompanied by Jake in his tiger morph.

Cassie and Marco came running from the direction of the helicopters.

Cassie's thick gray fur was singed. I could smell the reek of burned hair.

"More helicopters coming up to join those three!" Marco reported. "0h, hi, Tobias. There you are. I figured you'd flown off to somewhere safe." I decided not to take offense. I was just too tired to care what Marco said.

"Jake, there's no way around that wall of fire," Cassie said breathlessly.

"No Yeerks!" Jara Hamee said fearfully. "Jara Hamee and Ket Halpak free!"

"We'll have to fight!" Rachel said. "We go straight at those Taxxons, blow past them, catch the Hork-Bajir by surprise, no problem. We can . . ." She stopped. Even she didn't believe what she was saying.

"They won't stop till Jara and Ket are dead," Jake said flatly. "The Yeerks are not going to give up. They are flat-out never going to allow two Hork-Bajir to escape."