The Andalite Chronicles

I guess most people know about the Skrit Na. But in case you don’t, I’ll tell you what I know.

The Skrit Na don’t care what anyone else in the galaxy thinks about them. They don’t belong to the Yeerk Empire. They aren’t one of our allies. They don’t care about laws or customs or anything.

All the Skrit Na care about is collecting things and owning things.

The Skrit Na are unusual in another way: They are actually like two different races. The Skrit look like huge insects, almost as large as an Andalite. They have fourteen legs and six sets of antennae, and aren’t really very intelligent. But the Skrit each eventually weave a cocoon and a year later, out of the dead Skrit there pops a Na.

The Na are a whole different story. The Na have four very slender legs. Sometimes they rear up and walk on just two legs, using the other legs as hands. They have large heads shaped like Andalite heads, only they have just two huge eyes.

Skrit Na are constantly going to peaceful planets and kidnapping the local species. Sometimes they perform medical experiments on them. Sometimes they just fly around with them and then let them go. But often they carry local creatures away to add them to zoos on the Skrit Na home world.

Like I said: a weird species. No one understands the Skrit Na. Personally, I don’t think they understand themselves.

I pulled our fighter up alongside the damaged Skrit Na ship and turned on the tractor beam to hold the two ships tightly together.

The Skrit Na decided to make it easy. I guess they figured they’d made us mad enough. Skrit Na are no match for Andalite power.

I married my hatch to the Skrit Na hatch and popped it open. I equalized gravities and marched as boldly as I could into the captured ship, with Arbron just behind me.

There was smoke in the other ship. And there seemed to be storage boxes strewn here and there. Two clumsy Skrit lumbered past, kicking through the debris. The ceiling pressed low, and I had to duck my head or risk bruising my stalk eyes. A pair of cocooned Skrit were more or less glued to a corner of the ceiling. One looked about ready to hatch a Na.

There were three Na that I could see. The Na captain was pressed back against his command console. He looked scared. But not of me. He was glaring at a bizarre creature that had a Skrit Na hand weapon, a modified Yeerk Dracon beam, pointed at the Na captain.

The bizarre creature stood just a bit shorter than me. And what was incredible was that it stood on just two legs.

Just two. It had arms, but you could see that it didn’t use them to walk. They wouldn’t have been long enough.

The creature’s face was the same size as mine, but rounder. There were two small bluish eyes on the front of its face. And the lower third of the face was split open horizontally.

Many species have such openings. They’re called mouths.

Its body had no fur, but did have brightly colored skin that seemed to hang loosely in some areas. Its upper body was covered in loose, almost billowy, white skin with tiny pastel patterns. Its two legs were covered in a rough-textured blue skin that stopped suddenly at its hooves. The hooves were white and adorned with what looked like thick threads or cables laced together.

But what caught my eye was the hair that sprouted from its head. It was long and wavy and as gold as a yellow sun.

“Freeze, horse-boy,” this bizarre creature said, making the sounds with its mouth. It turned the Dracon beam on me. “One move and I pull the trigger. I don’t know what this gun will do, but I’m willing to bet you won’t like it.”

Of course, at that point all I heard was gibberish sounds. The translator chip, which all members of the Andalite military have implanted in their heads, requires a few minutes to begin to understand new languages. Some languages it never does get right. Fortunately, almost all species can understand our thought-speak since it works at a level beyond mere words.

“Be careful, Andalite friend,” the Na captain said. “They are savage, violent beings. Crazy! Wild! Oh, yes! This female is a vicious beast! Better to kill her! Or even better, let us cage her again. Yes, yes, that would be best. As soon as you mistakenly fired on us, she sprang up and grabbed my weapon. Wild and dangerous, oh, yes!”

The translator chip handled the Na language easily. I didn’t bother to answer the Na. Everyone knows Skrit Na will lie to anyone about anything.

The Na captain winked one of his big eyes at me. As if he and I were on the same side. His fellow Na officers all looked scared. The Skrit went on with their simple duties like nothing was happening.

To be honest with you, I didn’t know what to do. I was as confused as the Skrit Na.

The only one who seemed to have a clue was the bizarre two-legged creature herself.

<Talk to her,> Arbron suggested. <Use your charm, Elfangor.>

“Yeah, right. Hey. Hey, wait a minute! I can hear you in my head, but you’re not really talking.”

Suddenly the translator chip had heard enough. It began providing instantaneous translation. I could understand her.

<I am in charge here,> I said firmly. <Drop the weapon!>

“Uh-uh. Nope. I don’t think so, horse-boy. I’m tired of being kidnapped and dragged off by giant cockroaches and little green men from Mars.”

<Excuse me, but we are here to rescue you,> Arbron said.

<Exactly. What these Skrit Na have done to you is wrong. That’s why we captured this ship.>

I spoke like I would to a child. Obviously, this species was primitive. They didn’t even have tails.

<What little green men?> Arbron asked. <They aren’t green. The Na are gray.>

The female narrowed her already narrow eyes. The Dracon beam in her hand wavered. “I’d already captured this ship before you two came along. Me and the other guy. And we’re both just kids, which shows you that these Martian jerks aren’t all that tough. He’s in the back, knocked out. The other guy, I mean. But I grabbed this gun away from Twinkie there.” She jerked her head in the direction of the Na captain.

The translator chip had no translation for the word “twinkie.” Evidently “twinkie” was some kind of word for “alien.”

<Well, we don’t mean you any harm,> I said as calmly as I could. <How about this idea? You can keep the Dracon beam, just don’t point it at anyone.>

The female looked at the weapon. “It’s called a Dracon beam, huh? What’s it do?”

Arbron answered before I could suggest he shut up. <It fires an energy beam which causes an exceedingly painful death. Which is why we’d really prefer it if you didn’t fire it.>

“Oh. A phaser. Like on that old Star Trek show. I can’t believe they took that off the air. Now it’s just on reruns.”

I had nothing to say to that because I had no idea what she was talking about. I looked to Arbron. He shook his head. No, he didn’t understand, either. Translator chips have limits.

“Earth?”

“Yeah.”

“Human. That’s what we are: humans. Me and the other guy.”

Arbron had gone over to the nearest Skrit Na control panel. He was downloading a copy of all their computer files as Prince Breeyar had ordered. It’s standard procedure whenever you board an alien craft.

“You look like centaurs, only with scorpion tails. And the extra eyeballs up on top of your heads … ” She seemed to hesitate. Suddenly she turned the Dracon beam around and handed it to me, handle first.

<Thank you,> I said. I reached to take the Dracon beam from her and my fingers brushed hers. For some reason I looked at her long golden hair.

“My name is Loren,” she said. “This is all kind of amazing. Most humans don’t even believe in aliens. But, well, here you are. Real and all. Unless I’m dreaming.”

<Do humans dream?> I asked her, surprised.

“I do. Every night.”

Then Loren smiled. It’s a thing humans do by turning the corners of their mouths upward. “Maybe,” she said. “Maybe not.”