Animorphs: The Second Coming

#7 New Returns

By: Forlay

Chapter One

    My name's Jordan.
    We were all gathered in Cassie's barn. "Us" being my older sister Ritora-Fuloa-Maheen (Ritora, or Tori to most people here on Earth), my twin cousins Catara-Fitalia-Goraora (Catara or Cat) and Tom, and, of course, the original Animorphs and Ax.
    "So. How do we fix this then?" Catara asked.
    "Isn't the only way to reverse a Sario Rip to create another explosion?" I asked.
    Ax nodded his head, he was in his human morph, which is a combination of Rachel, Cassie, Jake and Marco. But it also has a strange resemblence to me, Ritora, Catara and Tom. It's very distrubing to see a combination of our parents when they were our age and myself and my friends and family. "Yes, that is one way. But it is not a practical solution in this situation. Ation."
    "So, what? We just stop right there? Spend the rest of our lives here? Sorry, but we've got a world to save back home!" Tom objected.
    "The only other viable solution is to make a call through time and ask our future selves to use their advanced resources to bring you home."
    "Excuse me?" Rachel asked. "You mean, pick up the phone and call long distance to the Andalite homeworld and say 'Hey, Rachel! Yeah, it's me, Rachel. Think you could get the others together and find a way to get your kids home? They've been crashing with us for a few days and we figured you'd like to have them back'?"
    "And as long as we're calling the Andalites, why don't we make a call in the present and tell them to hurry up and wipe out the Yeerks?" Marco asked.
    "Making a call during the present is infinitely more complex, due to the need of a Z-Space transponder and more equipment that humans don't have currently. While the necesary equipment to make a call through time can be found in one of your electronic stores."
    Cassie looked at Ax in disbelievement, "You mean we actually will be calling ourselves?"
    "In a way," Ax said. "We shall need access to one of your primitive computers. Puters. And I suggest allowing Jordan, Ritora, Catara or Tom to call, to keep our future selves and us as to keep from altering the past in some way."
    "So when do we go get all this stuff?" Tom asked. "No offense to any of you, I mean, I've had a great time here...despite our little altercation with the Yeerks, but I'd really like to get home. I'm getting really weirded out by this expirience."
    I agreed with him, but kept quiet. It was great hanging out with humans our own age, but what was weird was the fact that they would end up being our parents. You have no idea how odd it is seeing your mother when she was your age, seeing your dad when he was a hawk, and then fighting in battles with them.
    Rachel smiled, "Anybody up for a trip to the mall?"

Chapter Two

    Rachel, Ax, Jake and I would be going to the mall to pick up the electronic stuff that Ax needed to build this thing. The others were staying back to do...I don't know exactly what. I could have stayed with them, but I decided I'd rather go to the mall.
    Ax quickly demorphed and morphed back to human so he'd be good for another two hours and we helped him to the bus stop where we'd catch the bus to the mall.
    The ride was uneventful. Not nearly as interesting as the bus ride we'd taken when Prince Aximili arranged for all of us to take a trip to Earth and we made a stop to the mall, and it wasn't as fun as the bus ride we'd taken on the filed trip. Of course, I was a fly then, maybe that has something to do with it.
    The mall itself was very different from my time. The outside looks pretty much the same, but inside it was a whole new world.
    For one thing, everyone acted like a normal human here. In my time, Andalites were all over the place, and while they were in human morph, they definetly didn't act like a normal person. At least not around food.
    And the stores were different, too. There's lots of food shops and electronic stores in the mall in my time, they probably out number clothing stores by 50 percent or so, but here the clothes stores outnumbered the all other stores by a huge margin.
    After some prodding by Jake and I to get Rachel away from Old Navy, and pulling Ax away from the Cinnabon (one thing that hadn't changed), we managed to get to the Radio Shack. Ax started looking around, pulling things off shelves that probably looked as foreign to him as they did me.
    "Hey, Ax, need any help?" I offered after standing around watching him. I was getting a little self concious about standing around in the middle of the store.
    He looked puzzled, "Could you see if you can find something that may pass as a Z to N Decoder? Oder. deCODEr?"
    "Sure, I'll look around." I went to the opposite end of the store and started looking up and down the shelves systematically. Finally, I pulled a rectangular thing with a variety of buttons off the shelf. I looked at the tag under it that identified it. "Television Remote Control" I read silently to myself. I looked at the thing again and nearly laughed. This was nothing like mine at home! It was at least twice as large! And so many buttons...Earth technology must have grown by leaps and bounds in the few decades that were between this time and my own.
    I carried the remote back to Ax, "Think this would work?"
    He took it from and inspected it carefully, "Yes, I believe this could pass as a primitive Z to N Decoder. Primitive, ive. Vvvv. Interesting sound. Vvvv."
    Jake came up and took the remote from Ax, "Yeah, 'Vvv' is a very interesting sound. You have everything you need? The clerk is begining to get suspicious."
    "Yes, es, Prince Jake."
    "Just. Jake."
    "Yes, Prince Jake."
    Jake sighed and took the basket that was hanging on Ax's arm to the check out counter to pay for them all. This was one thing that always ammused me, the concept of money. In my time, actual money is only used for food. Otherwise, credits, like on that 'Star Trek' show that I occasionally catch on TV, or barter is used.
    "Can we get a delicious cinnamon bun? Licious. Cious." Ax asked as we left the store.
    Rachel sighed, "No, Ax. We're flat broke after having to buy all that electronic stuff. Let's just get home so we can build this thing."
    Ax hung his head dejectedly, but followed as we led him out of the mall. We waited for a few minutes for the bus to pick us up, then rode back to Cassie's barn, where everyone was waiting.
    "I think we'd better wait till tomorrow to do this," Cassie said as we all sat down in various places. "It's getting late."
    Jake nodded, "You're right. Can everybody meet here after school?" Marco, Cassie and Rachel nodded.
    "Um, what about us?" I asked. "Are we going to school again, or hanging out around here?"
    "Oh, my mom said all of you could hang out at our place tomorrow," Rachel said. "Nobody's going to be home all day, and she figured you guys wouldn't want to go to school more than necesary." We all agreed to the plan.
    "Great," Jake said. "Now, I've really got to go. I am backed up on my math like you wouldn't believe. See all of you tomorrow!" He started to leave.
    "Same here," Marco agreed. "Coming, Tom?"
    "Yeah," Tom said.
    "Hey, Jake, wait up!" Marco called. He got up from his hay bale, with Tom right behind him.
    "C'mon, Ritora. I've got stuff at home to do, too," Rachel said. "See ya' tomorrow, Cassie, Cat, Jordan."
    Cassie double checked a few animals, then we went inside, too. It was nearly 7:30, and Cassie had homework, too.

Chapter Three

    The next day, Cassie's alarm clock went off around 6 AM. Cassie had to get up to get ready for school, but Catara and I didn't, so should we have had to get up at such an early hour? No. Did Cassie make us? Yes.
    "If I have to suffer, so do you," she said.
    Complaining the whole time, I got up, ate breakfast, and showered once Cassie had finished. Around seven, Cassie ushered Catara, who seemed fully awake, and me out the door. SHE had to go catch a bus, we didn't, but once again, we had to go with her.
    Catara and I left her waiting at her bus stop at the end of her street. That was one thing we weren't going to do with her.
    We reached Rachel's house at 7:30, just as Rachel was rushing out the door.
    "Hey Jordan and Cat! Sorry I can't stay to talk, but I'm running late, bye! Just let yourselves into the house, the door's open!" she said as she passed us.
    "Um, bye," I shouted after her. Catara and I looked after her for a moment, then walked up to her front door and let ourselves in.
    "Hey, Jordan and Cat!" Ritora said as we walked in.
    "Hi, Ri--Tori," I said, barely catching myself.
    "Hi, girls," a woman said as she flew into the room. "I'm Rachel's mom, Naomi. And you are...?"
    "I'm Cat, this is Jordan," Catara introduced.
    Naomi looked surprised, "Another Jordan? Wow. I'd love to stay and chat, but we're all running a bit late this morning. Jordan and Sara are still getting up. Would you two mind helping Tori get them off to school?" Without waiting for an answer, she checked her watch, "Oh, shoot! I've got to leave now or I'll be late for my meeting! Nice meeting you two!" She quickly picked up a briefcase that was sitting on the kitchen table and flew out the door.
    I sat down next to Ritora on the couch, "Is everybody always this rushed around here?"
    She laughed, "No, but Naomi forgot to set her alarm clock last night, which threw everybody off."
    "Wish I could stay here," I muttered under my breath.
    "What?" Ritora asked.
    Catara smiled, "Jordan's just being her regular self and complaining. Cassie made us get up at six this morning."
    Ritora laughed. "Aw, poor Jordan." I just glared at her, which made her laugh again.
    Just then, a girl about my age thundered down the stairs. "Did Mom leave already, Tori?"
    Ritora nodded, "Yeah. Jordan? I don't think you've met my friends. This is Cat and Jordan," she pointed to each of us in turn.
    Jordan raised her eyebrows, "Jordan? You mean some other mother has actually tortured her girl with the name Jordan."
    I shrugged, "It's not so bad. I like it, sets me apart from the crowd."
    Jordan shook her head, "You must live in a much more understanding area than I do. 'Jordan's a boys name,' everybody says." She turned to Ritora, "Did Mom leave anything for breakfast?"
    "Yeah, but I don't think you have time. You need to catch the bus," Ritora said. She got up and walked to the staircase, "SARA! Get down here now!"
    "I'm coming, I'm coming," a muffled voice yelled. A minute later, another girl, this one a few years younger than me, ran down the stairs.
    She picked up her backpack from the kitchen table, it was pink and had 'Barbie' plastered all over it. Whatever Barbie was. Jordan picked up her bag from a chair, a black canvas one. "Bye, Tori!" Jordan shouted over her shoulder as she ushered her younger sister out the door. "Bye Cat! Bye Jordan!"
    "Jordan?" Sara asked. "Why'd you say bye to yourself? Bye Tori!" Jordan shut the door.
    I laughed once they were gone, "You're gonna make a great mother someday, Ritora."
    She wrinkled her nose at me, "What would make you say that?" Just then, the doorbell rang. Ritora sprang up to answer it. It was Tom.
    "Hello, girls," he said, walking into the room, followed by Ritora. "What's up?"
    "Just making fun of Ritora," I said, grinning.
    "And you didn't wait for me? I'm hurt, Kid. Really, I'm hurt." He sat down next to me, "What about?"
    Ritora rolled her eyes, "You had to be here. Anyways, what're we gonna do today?"
    Catara, Tom and I all shrugged. "What is there to do?" I asked.
    "Um...Oh! Rachel gave me her internet password so we can go on there and do stuff!"
    "Cool!" I said, jumping up. "Lead the way to the computer!"
    "Yes, oh fearless leader," Tom said, bowing mockingly.
    Ritora rolled her eyes again, "Come on, it's up in her room."
    The four of us spent the day on the computer, each taking hour and a half turns. Whoever wasn't on the computer went down stairs to watch TV, or read a book, considering daytime TV isn't any better in this time than in mine. Talk show after talk show after soap opera after soap opera. No variety. How can people stand it?
    "Tori? Cat? Jordan? Tom? Anybody here?" Rachel called around 3. I was on the computer so I quickly "logged off" and ran downstairs to meet her. The others were already downstairs, watching the slightly better early afternoon programs on TV.
    "Hey," I greeted, "We heading over to Cassie's?"
    "Yeah, just let me put my bag up in my room," she said, running up the stairs. A moment later, she was back and ready to go.

Chapter Four

    Everyone had already gathered at the barn. Ax was in human morph, and using clumsy human fingers to try and build the communicator thing.
    "How long's this going to take?" I asked him.
    "That depends endzzz. I am having trouble using large human fingers to do such delicate work."
    "Here, I'll build it, you just tell me what to do. I'm used to using "large human fingers" to do work," I offered. Ax stepped back from the work bench where the device was half assembled. With me building and Ax telling me how to do it, it was finished in fifteen minutes.
    I picked it up gently, "Where're we gonna do this?" I asked.
    "We can take, ake it back to my scoop. I have the appropriate electronic needs there."
    We walked through the forest untill we reached an area sheltered by lots of trees, behind Tobias's meadow. There, Ax had all the conveniences of home, and then some. He had a TV, a World Almanac, a picture of a Cinnamon Bun, of all things, and a pile of clothing for when he morphed human. It was pretty small, compared to the scoop where his family lived back on the Andalite homeworld (Prince Aximili spends most of his time at the military base), but it seemed to work for him.
    He took a small wire off the TV and handed it to me, "Plug, ug, this into the back. Ack." Carefully, I did so. The device emitted some static from the speaker.
    "It's alive, alive!" Marco joked.
    Ax gently picked up his TV, which was sitting on a stand. "You may place the device on here. I sahll make the connection to my future self, just concentrate on my name, and you'll keep in contact with him." He pressed a few buttons and turned a few knobs, before a staticy voice came through the speaker.
    "Who is this? Identify yourself immediatly."
    Ritora jumped into leader mode, "Prince Aximili, it's me, Ritora."
    "Ritora! Where are you! Your parents have returned and are worried."
    "We're on a field trip," Tom said. "About, oh, 30 years in the past."
    "Sario Rip," I explained.
    "We have your past self here, he says you need to close the rip for us so us, and the pilot of our ship can get back to our own time," Ritora said.
    "He is in a different time?"
    "As far as we know, yes. There's no sign of him or his ship in the area. The past you has some long drawn out theory on that, but none of us really understand or care."
    "I shall start working on it immediatly. You should be back with in five Earth hours."
    Marco looked like he was about to speak up and say something about them being everybody's hours, but Rachel stepped on his foot. He clamped a hand over his mouth to keep from shouting, but glared daggers at Rachel, who glared right back. It was almost funny.
    "Thanks, Prince Aximili," Ritora said, then looked to Ax, signaling that she was finished and needed the transmision cut. Ax pressed a few more buttons, and the static died.
    "Well, I guess we're still gonna be here for awhile," I said. "What're we gonna do?"
    "How about just hang out?" Tom asked. "We've got five hours here, we might as well just hang around here. I mean, we have a TV, what more could we ask for?"
    < And These Messages might be on! > Ax said excitedly. He'd demorphed back to his Andalite form.
    "These Messages?" I asked.
    < Yes. The delightful short programs the interrupt the longer ones. >
    "Is he talking about 'commercials'?" I whispered to Rachel.
    She shrugged, "As far as we can tell, yeah. But he gets a kick out of calling them short TV shows, so we're just gonna let him for awhie," she whispered back.
    We all helped roll a log towards Ax's scoop so we'd have a place to sit while watching TV. Tobias perched in the trees above us so he could watch for people and the TV at the same time.
    "Well. This is fun," I said sarcastically as Tom was channel surfing. Absolutely nothing was on at 4:30 in the afternoon that we could all agree on. Ax agreed with everyone on what to watch, but the rest of us had varied tastes. Pop Up Video was just coming on, a weak spot of mine, so I wanted to watch that. Ritora told me I watched it too much, and wanted to catch the last half of "The Rosie O'Donnell Show". She'd seen some of Rosie's movies on the movie channel, and wanted to see what she was like on her own talk show. All the guys wanted to watch sports, but couldn't decide what one, so they ended up arguing over what sport was the best. Rachel wanted to watch a fashion show, and Cassie wanted to watch an animal show on the Discovery Channel.
    And nearly all of us are related in some way. Whoddathunkit?
    Just as the boys were getting really involved in their argument, Ritora and I were arguing over how good Pop Up Video was, and Rachel was arguing with Cassie over the importance of clothes, I was enveloped in a blinding white light.

Chapter Five

    "What the...?" I asked. Okay, not the brightest thing to say, I'll admit.
    I looked around. We were all back on the ship! The pilot included. I looked out the view screen, the Blade Ship was still there, and just about to power up it's weapons. We must have been returned to the moments before the Sario Rip occured.
    "Get us out of here NOW!" Ritora ordered the pilot.
    The pilot turned a stalk eye back to Ritora and glared at her with it, < I do not take orders from juvenile human females. >
    Not the best thing to say to Ritora. She walked up to him and stared him straight in the eye...the eye facing her, that is. "You are going to get us away from that Blade Ship, or you are going to be in a world of hurt. In case you haven't noticed, we have ties with Prince Aximili, and I don't think you want to be on his bad side."
    I don't know whether Ritora got to him, or he decided that arguing with her while a Blade Ship was in front of him was a bad idea, but we got out of there, and we got out of there fast.
    Once we had landed, we all morphed our bird of prey morphs and got home fast. Sure, here we hadn't been gone an hour, but who knows when our parents got home? We'd been gone for around 4 days, they could have arrived at anytime between now and four days from now.
    "Lindsey? David? We're back!" I announced as Ritora and I walked into our house.
    "Already?" Lindsey asked from the kitchen. Apparently she'd been getting a snack. David was in the living room watching TV.
    "Yeah, it was a short trip," I improvised.
    Just as Ritora, Lindsey and I settled down in chairs in front of the TV, someone came in the front door.
    "Hey, guys! We're back!" Mom yelled.
    "Mom!" I shouted and jumped up from my chair to run to her and Dad.
    "Oof!" Mom said as I ran into her. "Great to see you too, Jordan. Anything wrong?"
    I backed away a bit. "Nah, just glad to see you. It feels like it's been ages!" I walked over and gave Dad a hug, too. Ritora was right behind me.
    "You guys have fun while you were gone?" Dad asked.
    "Oh, yeah, tons," Ritora said sarcastically. "We got to hang out around here the entire time!"
    Mom raised an eyebrow, "No Yeerk activity?"
    "Umm...we'll tell you about it later," I said. I noticed the bags Mom had set on the floor. "Ooh. What's in here?" I leaned down to open the bag, but Mom snatched it away.
    "We'll show you once we've unpacked all our stuff," she said.
    "Then hurry up!" I said impatiently. I picked up one of her suitcases and started hauling it towards the stairs. "Come on, Ritora, Lindsey, David. Help me move this stuff!"
    We all pitched in and within an hour all of Mom and Dad's stuff had been put away. Time to see what we got!
    "Well, since we spent most of our time in big cities, I just so happened to stop by a few malls--" Mom was saying as she opened one bag, Dad cut her off.
    "More like you insisted, and dragged poor Cassie with you."
    Mom glared at him, "I can tell my own story, thank you! As I was saying before I was so rudely interupted, I stopped at a few malls, and bought new clothes for you all. I noticed that Lindsey and David didn't have a wide assortment of clothes, and you two are begining to out grow yours, and the lack of designer clothing in this house is painful."
    "This is all?" I asked. "Clothes?"
    "Don't worry, I had some imput in present buying, too," Dad said.
    Ritora and I each got new LDs, the 21st century version of Earth CDs. Lindsey and David each got their own LD player, and one LD each.
    Once all the presents had been handed out, Mom cooked supper while the rest of us watched TV, not for long though. She was in for an easy supper tonight. Nachos.
    Once we were finished eating, Ritora and I both said goodnight and went to bed. We were still tired, the Sario Rip hadn't reversed the effect of having to get up at 6 AM.
    Mom and Dad came in as I was turning out my light. "You okay, Jordan?" Mom asked, sitting down on the bed next to me.
    "Yeah, Mom. I'm fine, just tired."
    "Why don't I believe you're 'just' anything, except hiding something?"
    "Why would I be hiding anything?"
    "Oh, just the fact that you said you'd explain stuff to me later. This would be later. What's up?"
    "Did you ever meet me before?" I asked.
    They both looked confused, "What do you mean, Jordan?" Dad asked.
    "I mean, did you ever meet me before I was born. Maybe when you were about Ritora's age?"
    They both laughed, "How could we have met you then?" Mom asked.
    I shrugged, "Just asking. I'll explain it to you in the morning. I'm really tired now, can I go to sleep?"
    "Of course," Dad said, leaning over to kiss me on the forehead. "Good night."
    " 'Night."
    Around 10 o'clock that night, Ritora came into my room and woke me up. "Did you ask Mom and Dad if they'd ever met us before? Or something equally as stupid sounding?"
    "Huh? What do you mean?" I asked, still waking up.
    "I heard them talking downstairs. Let me guess, they said no, they hadn't, right?"
    I nodded, "Yeah, I figured since Ax--Prince Aximili--reversed the Sario Rip, they must have forgotten about it as well."
    She shook her head, "Nope. I heard them talking when I got up to use the bathroom. Something about how we must have expirienced the weird Sario Rip while they were away."
    "So?" I asked impatiently. I wanted to get back to sleep.
    She shrugged, "I don't know, just thought you might be interested."
    I glared at her, "You woke me up just to tell me something that I might be interested in? Something that could have waited untill morning?" She started to say something in defense, but I cut her off, "I'm going back to sleep. Good night." I turned over so my back was to her.
    "Fine. Then I won't tell you everything they said."
    "Ritora, if you have something to say, say it!"
    "I have good news, according to them, things are less turbulent on Earth. David and Lindsey and them are going to be gone within the week."
    I bolted upright. "YES!" I have nothing against Lindsey or David, or any of our other visitors from Earth, they just get a little annoying sometimes.
    Ritora shrugged, "I guess it's a good thing they're going, I was just hoping we'd double the size of the Animorphs, maybe do some larger battles with the Yeerks."
    I raised an eyebrow, "Didn't Prince Aximili veto that idea? Lindsey suggested it, and he went into this long lecture on stealth."
    "If it was vital to a mission, if we needed more people than the five of us, they'd have come along.
    "Well, get over it," I said, laying back down. "Good night, Ritora."
    She sighed, annoyed at my lack of interest, "Good night, Jordan."
    As she walked back out of the room, I fell into a deep sleep. But not deep enough to keep from dreaming. I dreamed of what we'd done the past four days, which had ceased to exist in this time line. From announcing to the Animorphs who we were, to our fight with them against the Yeerks, and surfing the internet for the first time.
    I tried to memorize everything we'd done with the Animorphs over thse four days. They were memories I'd cherish forever. How many kids get to meet their parents when they were their age? And, better yet, who got to find out they had such cool parents as I did? Sure, my dad spent a good part of his life as a bird, but he was still cool at any age.
    Yep, I'm pretty lucky, Yeerks and all.

Back to the Journal
Back to FFAP