B33C24 - Maneuvering

Ax's tail slapped the door handle.

Fwapp!

The nearest Hork-Bajir went down, not even knowing what had hit him.

Sudden explosions of violence. A flash of Marco, huge and powerful in gorilla morph. A tiger, slashing. Hork-Bajir running. The wolf, so fast, so accurate with its dangerous white teeth.

And the bear.

The huge, slashing, bellowing, death-dealing grizzly bear in a rage.

Rachel.

She looked at me. Even with dim bear vision she could guess what had happened to me.

Five Hork-Bajir were dropped in as many seconds, three of them from swift, brutal encounters with Rachel.

Marco shoved Taylor rudely aside. He had no way of knowing who she was. What she was.

"A gorilla!" she yelped.

<Oh, it's a gorilla, all right, lady!> Marco yelled. <But this here is the new, improved gorilla morph. Now with tools.>

He reached the wall and heaved a grappling hook into the air. Over a steel beam. It clanked and connected.

"Stop him!" Taylor yelled. "Stop him!"

<Climb, man! Climb!> Jake coached.

Three Hork-Bajir dashed after Marco. Jake let rip a fearsome roar.

The remaining row of warriors lunged. Seized on Jake with blades flashing and harsh shouts roared in the Hork-Bajir tongue.

"Ghafrash!! Gulferch Andalites!"

But they hadn't checked their backs.

A blur of Andalite tail blade and one was down. A snarl and chomp of wolf jaws and another fell to the floor, cradling his leg. That left five. Five dazzling, muscular machines of destruction.

Marco leaped at the wall. Feet against it, hands clutching the rope, he climbed quickly toward the ceiling. Nostrils flaring. His small eyes widening as he strained in rhythmic grunts toward his goal.

<The girl!> I yelled.

Taylor was running for the weapon cabinet, torture device in hand. Cassie grabbed her heel. Yanked back and forth.

"Get off me! Yahhh!" She slammed Cassie across the muzzle with the control device.

Cassie yipped and lost her hold.

Marco was swinging from conduit to conduit now. Flying across the ceiling like a giant monkey in the rain forest canopy. Two Hork-Bajir were in pursuit, just one swing behind. Another midway up the rope. It wasn't hard to tell they had evolved as tree-dwellers. Marco grabbed for a smaller pipe.

<Waaaaahhh!>

It was no pipe at all! Just a bundle of wires, unsecured. They began to snap under Marco's weight.

Kkkkkkkeeehh! Kkkkeh!

Sparks flew as the wires broke. But Marco held on, clutching the cable like a vine, swinging desperately to reach the cube. One of the Hork-Bajir dangled from a nearby beam. He raised his elbow blades into position and slashed the wire.

Zzzzzzz. Kkkkkkk. Zzzzzz.

A blue flash!

A visible charge of controlled lightning arced from the wires to the Hork-Bajir. He shook and trembled in the grisly grips of electrocution. I looked away. He dropped to the floor.

Thwoomp!

Two mammoth gorilla feet struck the top of my cube. It swayed violently and smacked me against the wall.

<Sorry, man!> Marco yelled as he wrapped a giant hand around the steel cable that suspended the cube. <But there's a time for delicacy and this ain't it!> He tightened thick fingers around a bolt head, securing the top of my cube to the cable. He twisted with all his might, trying to loosen the connection that held me a helpless, dangling prisoner.