That's almost what it was. A city.

There were buildings and sheds all around the rim of the cavern. And we could see yellow Caterpillar earthmovers and cranes at work on the far side of the cavern. They seemed weirdly normal in this incredible place.

And there were creatures everywhere. Taxxons, Hork-Bajir, and other things I couldn't even begin to guess at.

But mostly, there were humans. A lot of them.

At the very center of the cavern was a pool, like a small lake, maybe a hundred feet across, and perfectly round. Only the water wasn't exactly water. It moved more like melted lead, and was about the same color. The sloshing sound we could hear was the liquid of the pool being rippled and splashed by hundreds of fast-moving things below the surface.

I knew what they were. Yeerks. Yeerks in their natural, sluglike state. They were swimming and cavorting in the pool like kids on a hot day.

Near the edge of the pool were cages. In the cages were Hork-Bajir and human beings.

84 Some of the humans screamed for help. Some cried silently. Some just sat and waited, all hope lost. There were adults there. And kids. Women and men. More than a hundred, packed ten to a cage.

The captive Hork-Bajir were kept in separate, stronger cages. They paced and howled and slashed at the air with their bladed arms.

I almost lost hope. I felt like my heart had stopped. This was a place of unimaginable horror.

And we were so few, and so weak.

Below us on the stairs I could see the Controller cop and Cassie. He was dragging her roughly whenever she stumbled. They had reached the bottom of the stairs.

"I'm going to morph," I said. "I'm going to get Cassie away from him."

Marco put his hand on my shoulder. "Not time yet, dude. Be cool."

"Cassie's okay, Jake," Tobias said. "She isn't hurt. Just scared,"

"He'd better not hurt her," I said. "Keep an eye on them, Tobias."

There were two low steel piers built out over the pool. On one, Hork-Bajir-Controllers politely guarded a line of humans and Hork-Bajir and Taxxons.

This was the unloading station.

One by one the people knelt down, bent over, and dipped their heads toward the slimy surface of the pool. The Hork-Bajir helped them.

As we watched, a woman calmly bent over, her head just inches above the lead-gray pool. A Hork-Bajir held her elbow gently, to help her keep her balance.

Then we saw the thing dribbling, sliding, squirming, crawling out of her ear.

A Yeerk.

"Oh, no . . . " Rachel moaned. She sounded like she might be sick. "Oh, no. No."

When the Yeerk was all the way out of the poor woman's head, it dropped into the pool and disappeared beneath the turbulent surface.

Instantly the woman cried out. "You filth, let me go! Let me go! I am a free woman! You can't keep doing this! I am not a slave! Let me go!"

Two Hork-Bajir grabbed her. They dragged the woman to the nearest cage and threw her in.

"Help!" the woman screamed. "Oh, please, someone help. Help us all!"

85 CHAPTER 23

"Help! Please, someone help us!"

We had been hearing cries like that all the way down those steps. But now we were close enough to give the cries a human face. It cut straight to my soul.

There was a second steel pier. That was the loading station. There the host bodies were dragged from their holding cages to have the Yeerks reenter their heads. It was a pretty basic process. They grabbed the hosts, whether human or Hork-Bajir, and forced their heads down into the pool.

The people sometimes fought and screamed, and sometimes just cried. But they always lost.

When their heads were yanked back up out of the pool, we could see the slugs still slithering into their ears.

After a few minutes they would become calm again, as the Yeerks regained control. Then off they went, once more slaves of the Yeerks.

It was a horrible assembly line, from the unloading pier, to the holding cages, to the infestation pier. They moved the poor victims through at a pretty speedy rate.

But there was another area we could only now see. There humans and Hork-Bajir waited on comfortable chairs, sipping drinks and actually watching TV. Taxxons squirmed around like gigantic spiny maggots.

I heard the faint sound of a television set. I was sure I could hear laughter from the humans.

They were watching the show and having a good laugh.

"Those are the voluntary hosts," Tobias said. "Collaborators."

"What are you talking about?" I demanded.

"You remember, what the Andalite told us. Many humans and Hork-Bajir are voluntary hosts," Tobias replied. "The Yeerks persuade them to let them take over."

"I can't believe that," Rachel said. "No person would ever let this happen to them. No one would ever give up control of himself."

"Some people are scum, Rachel," Marco said. "Sorry to burst your balloon."

"The Yeerks convince them that taking on a Yeerk will solve all their problems. I think that's what The Sharing is all about. People believe that by becoming something different, they can leave behind all their pain."

"Like spending all their time as a hawk," Marco pointed out.

Tobias had nothing to say to that. He spread his wings and flew up and away.

"Tobias! Come back," I called to him.

86 "We have to get moving," Rachel said. "We've been standing here staring for too long." She looked at Marco. "Don't be a jerk to Tobias, okay? We need everyone."

Tobias came swooping back toward us. "Cassie," he said. "She's on the pier. The infestation pier. They're going to turn her into a host."

With my normal human eyes I couldn't see that well in the purple gloom. I could just make out the cop's uniform and the small shape beside him.

"Do you see Tom?" I asked Tobias.

In answer he flapped his powerful wings and gained altitude. I saw him high over the pool.

Then he came back toward us in a power dive.

"I see him," he said.

I hesitated before asking. I wasn't sure I wanted to know the answer. "Is he in the cages? Or is he . . . voluntary?"

"He's in a cage," Tobias said. "He's yelling his brains out at the Hork-Bajir guards."

"Yes!" I knew Tom would never have gone voluntarily. I knew they must have taken him kicking and punching.

"Cassie is getting near the end of the pier," Tobias warned. "We only have a few minutes before they infest her!"

It was time. We were at the bottom of the steps.

We ran over to hide behind a storage shed of some kind. Marco pulled me around the corner, drawing me close so that I could hear him whisper. "Look, before we do this, there's one thing, Jake. You have to promise me."

I knew what he was going to say.

"If I have to die, okay. But don't let them take me. Don't let them put one of those things in my head."

"It'll be okay — "

"You!" a voice yelled. A human voice. "You two. Who are you?"

I spun around. A man. Just one man. But beside him, flanking him, was a big Hork-Bajir, looking suspicious. And on the other side, a Taxxon.

Somehow the man hadn't seen Rachel. She was just around the corner of the building. But he had seen Marco and me talking. I guess it hadn't looked quite right to him.

"Us?" Marco asked. "Who are we? Hey, who are you?"

"Take them," the man ordered.

87 The Hork-Bajir advanced on us. The Taxxon slithered forward on its dozens of sharp spiny legs, red jelly eyes quivering, mouth opening and closing in anticipation.