Animorphs - The Unknown Part 13

Until the big huge drop!

"Ahhhhh!" I cried.

"I think Ca.s.sie just figured out where we're headed," Marco said.

"Ahhhhh!" I confirmed.

Another sharp turn. b.u.mPb.u.mPb.u.mP! SQUUUUEEEEGEEE!

And then, just a few dozen feet ahead, just ahead of the log boat we had been in, I saw another boat suddenly disappear. And I heard screams. Happy screams. Totally different from my scream.

"Aaaaaahhhhhh!"

I was racing toward a waterfall. And there was nothing I could do to stop it!

"No! No! Noooooo!"

"Oh, man! No! No! Noooooo!"

"This is insaaaaane! Nooooo!"

"I'll get you kids for this! Nooooooo!"

And over the edge we went. I skidded on my b.u.t.t down a fifty-foot water slide. Which was bad enough. But just a few feet behind me were two guys and an angry man.

And just a few feet farther back was another log boat. A log boat that would squash us all like bugs if it hit us.

Down I fell, screaming the entire way!

BAH-LOOOOSH!.

I hit the lagoon and rolled to my left as fast as I could move my waterlogged body. Something hit me, but it wasn't a boat.

"Hah! Cindy Crawford! You think I don't remember your name? You are under arrest!" Captain Torrelli cried exultantly.

But then he slipped and his head went under the water and I was out of there.

We joined up just outside the exit from the log ride. Three extremely wet, barefoot kids in bike shorts and aerobics suits.

"You know, basically that was fun," Marco said. "If you set aside the whole could-have-been-crushed-by-a-log-boat thing."

Jake squeegeed the water out of his hair. "Okay, so it's not the log ride. No Yeerks there."

"House of Horrors," I agreed. "Definitely the House of Horrors."

We ran for the House of Horrors. But as we ran there came the sound of a not-too-distant voice crying, "Po ice! Security! Police!"

So we ran faster.

Chapter 24.

We ran for the House of Horrors, bare wet feet SLAP-SLAP-SLAPPING all the way. It was halfway across the amus.e.m.e.nt park. I was panting and sweating and holding my sides from the pain by the time we got there.

"Now what?" Marco asked.

"Now we find the others," Jake said.

"But they could be in morph. We don't even know what we're looking for," I pointed out.

"Exactly. And then we have to figure out if the Yeerks are using the House of Horrors to kidnap and infest guys from Zone Ninety-one."

"Even though we don't know if the Yeerks will be plain old human-Controllers or Hork-Bajir or whatever," I said.

"Exactly."

"And in the meantime," I concluded, "we have to avoid getting arrested by an Air Force captain who is frantically trying to protect the Most Secret Place On Earth, where they are hiding an old Andalite toilet."

Marco laughed sardonically. "Does anyone else ever think maybe we've all just lost our minds? You know, like maybe none of this is real and we're escaped lunatics from the local hospital for the hopelessly wacko?"

"Hey, we're saving the world here, Marco," I said.

"That's what all lunatics say."

"Come along, my wacko friends." Jake led the way toward the House of Horrors entrance.

This ride involved cars on tracks as opposed to log boats in water. I was relieved that at least there wasn't any water.

The three of us piled into one of the cars. A fourth person was seated with us. He was a man, maybe thirty years old. He smiled at me.

"Sure this isn't too scary for you kids?"

"No, sir. We're pretty good at handling scary stuff," I said.

"I don't see the others," Jake muttered under his breath as the car lurched away down the track.

"Boo-ah-ah-hah-HAH!" a mechanical skeleton shrieked.

"Beware! Beware all ye who enter here!" a loud, booming recorded voice cried. "Beware the horrors that lie within!"

Then, "Aaaaaarrrggghh!" A mechanical pirate holding his own severed head jerkily waved a sword at us.

A huge snake turned and aimed its cobralike head at us, staring with glittering green eyes.

"Yeah, yeah, big deal," Marco said. "Could this get any faker?"

"Why are you kids so cynical?" the crew-cut man asked.

"We watch too much TV," Marco answered.

The car spun and banged backward through a doorway into the next room of the House of Horrors. In a flash of lightning I saw the car behind us. In it were also four people. Captain Torrelli and three uniformed Gardens security guys.

"What is with thai guy?" I asked.

"Hey, Captain, havin' fun?" crew cut yelled back to Torrelli.

"Airman Jones!" Torrelli yelled. "Don't let those kids get away!"

"These kids?" Airman Jones asked, pointing at us.

"Yeah. Those kids! At least that girl and the boy with the smirk!"

Our car jerked violently back around and we were being shrieked at by a flight of ghosts pa.s.sing overhead.

"That Captain Torrelli. What a joker that guy is," I said weakly to Airman Jones.

"Captain Torrelli has never joked in his life," Jones growled. "You kids are gonna have to stay with me till the captain can talk to you."

We pa.s.sed beneath the flying ghosts. And that's when the ride got weird. Really weird.

See, somehow, whoever had built the ride seemed to have created perfect, life-size replicas of six Hork-Bajir warriors. And standing behind them, also frozen in place, was a creature with the body of a deer, the tail of a scorpion, and a mouthless face. They were all very lifelike. Probably because they were alive.

Visser Three was in the House of Horrors.

"Okay, now'm scared," Marco said.

"Where are Rachel and Tobias and Ax?" Jake asked in a low voice.

"There," I said. I pointed to a frozen, life-size replica of one of the scariest things on Earth: an eight-hundred-pound grizzly bear. The grizzly was on its hind legs, reared up. It was standing perfectly still. Except for the fact that you could see it breathing.

Sitting atop the grizzly bear was a bird. It was too dark to make out the tail feathers, but I could guess what color they were.

And completing this odd tableau, a rattlesnake was coiled around the grizzly bear's up-stretched paw.

Rachel and the others must have seen the Yeerks moving into place. They'd gotten there first and were now waiting for the Yeerks to make their move.

The loudspeaker blared. "Nyah-hah-hah-hah! Beware the graveyard ghouls!"

In between the Hork-Bajir, the visser, and my friends the bear, the hawk, and the snake, were really fake-looking tombstones topped with greenish skulls.

"This is the best part of the ride," Jones said. "Those big blade monsters there are really cool!"

I rolled my eyes. My stomach rolled all on its on.

"This is so totally going to turn ugly," Marco said.

Chapter 25.

Have you ever known something was going to happen right before it did happen? It almost seems like you're psychic. But usually it's just that your brain has put things together and figured something out.

Well, in the split second before everything cut loose, I realized something: Out in the Dry Lands, the visser had talked about having a list of the humans who would be useful. And who would be more useful to the Yeerks than the head of security for Zone 91?

No time to be subtle. "They'll go for Torrelli!" I yelled.

Our car was turned forward and we were past the tableau of Hork-Bajir and Animorphs. But I heard a loud scream and I knew it wasn't one of those giddy, happy, fun-house screams.

Jake leaped from the car. I leaped after him and collided with Marco. The three of us barely missed being cut in two as the car we'd been in slammed through a narrow door.

I fell to my knees. We were on the tableau! We were suddenly a part of the House of Horrors Ride. And that ride had gone totally gruesome.

Six big Hork-Bajir bounded toward Captain Torrelli's car. It had been his scream we'd heard.

One of the uniformed guards raised his gun. Too slow! A hundred times too slow to beat a Hork-Bajir!

SLASH!.

The Hork-Bajir swept its wrist blade.

"Aaaaahhhhh! Aaaahhhh! Aaaaahhhh!" the man bellowed in pain.

The Hork-Bajir yanked the guards up out of their seats and literally threw them back into the scenery. Captain Torrelli was alone in the car. But then two Hork-Bajir grabbed him, careful not to injure him, and lifted him up like he was a doll.

And all the while, the stupid loudspeaker was yammering, "Nyah-hah-hah-hah! Beware the graveyard ghouls!"

But Captain Torrelli was not alone.

"RRRRRAAAWWWRRR!" Rachel roared in her big grizzly bear voice. She flung the rattlesnake straight at the nearest Hork-Bajir.

The snake - Ax in morph - wrapped itself tightly around the alien's neck and sank poisonous fangs deep.

"Tseeeeeer!" Tobias launched himself, talons outstretched, and ripped at the vulnerable eyes of a second Hork-Bajir.

But that still left four of the big, bladed monsters, not to mention the visser himself. And not even Rachel could handle them all. Although she tried. I swear she grinned a bear grin as she swung one frying-pan-sized paw into the head of a Hork-Bajir.

FWUMP! The Hork-Bajir rocked back and fell unconscious.

SHLUMP! He hit the floor.