The Predator

The Predator by K. A. Applegate Page A

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Authors: K. A. Applegate
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claustrophobic, with the earth all around me, and my friends close ahead and behind me. But my ant mind was at home in tunnels.
    I was traveling down. I knew my head was pointed down, but gravity seemed less important than it did when I was human.
     Rachel said. She was in the lead. Big surprise.
    
    
    
    
     I said, trying to joke away the sudden clutch of very human terror.
     Jake said.
     Ax reported.
     Jake said.
    Quickly we were out of the sand boulders and in a canyon. That’s what it seemed like, anyway. Like a deep, deep canyon. A crack in the concrete foundation.
    We clambered over craggy rocks and squeezed along the narrow crack. All the while the breeze grew stronger.
    Then we were out of the canyon. We were on a flat, vertical plane.
     Cassie suggested.
    
     I said.
    

     I said. I couldn’t wait to get out of that ant body.
    First I moved away from them. It was totally dark, so I didn’t have to watch the changes in myself. But trust me, feeling them was bad enough.
    Once I was human again, I began to look for a light. Then I froze.
    My huge, human feet could crush my friends!
    I stood perfectly still and ran my hands along the wall. Nothing. Nothing. A bulletin board. A desk! Phone. Some kind of machine, probably a fax. There! A lamp!
    The sudden light was blinding. I blinked and covered my eyes with my hand. As soon as I could see, I looked around. I was in a very small room, like a windowless office. I was alone.
    Then I looked down at my body. Arms. Legs. Feet. Yes! Human! Completely human.
     Jake said.
    I could see them now. Four tiny ants, huddled against the corner of the wall. It took my breath away.
    Had that been me? I had been one of them? Down there?
    I flicked the light. Seconds later, they began to demorph. I turned away, and focused on rifling the desk.
    “That was gross beyond belief,” Cassie said. She was the first to complete her change. “Yeah,” I agreed.
    “I don’t want to do that again,” she said. I could hear the shiver of fear and disgust in her voice.
    I didn’t answer. I was too scared to want to talk about it. If I talked about it, it would become real, you know? Better not to think. Better to shove it out of my mind.
    “This is the place,” Rachel said when she had grown eyes and a mouth again. “I recognize it. Chapman’s office. I was a cat when I was in here, but this is it.”
    “Let’s get this done. In and out,” Jake said nervously. “Ax? Find that transponder.”
    Ax, now fully Andalite again, immediately began removing a panel from the thing I thought was a fax machine.
    I continued looking through Chapman’s desk. Nothing much there. No papers. No files.
    Ax looked at me and smiled in that way Andalites have of smiling with just their eyes. He touched a small cube I thought was a paperweight. The paperweight lit up and projected a picture into the air in front of me.
    “Cool,” I said. “A computer, right?”
    

    I poked the air, pointing at a symbol that looked like it would be a folder. It opened. The document was written in some totally alien alphabet.
    
    “Sure. Why not? This is a few hundred years more advanced than ours

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