Megamorphs #4; a "special" book in the series Animorphs by K.A. Applegate.

Disclaimer: If you've heard of Animorphs and you're thinking "Aww, how cute," maybe you should read my introduction to the first book to see how wrong you are.

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Megamorphs #4
by K.A. Applegate

Summarized Plot:

Buckling under the pressure of leading battle after battle, Jake succumbs to a strange offer from Crayak through the Drode: he can make it so the night at the construction site never happened and they never got the morphing power. As their lives go on in the alternate timeline, Ax's escape from his sunken ship, the Yeerks' invasion, and the Animorphs' friendships play on in different ways, but Cassie feels the strangeness of the whole thing and keeps coming up with inexplicable knowledge of their alternate lives. Eventually, when it becomes known that Earth is under attack, Jake still ends up in a position of power, but at various stages of the battle all of his friends except Ax die. They still come very close to defeating the Yeerks with one of their own weapons, but after dead Animorphs keep reappearing, the Drode and the Ellimist appear, claiming Cassie was an anchor for the timeline because of some anomaly about her. The original timeline is restored, and only Cassie has a slight memory of what could have been.

About this book:

Narrators: Jake, Cassie, Tobias, Ax, Marco, Rachel

New known controllers:

  • Bill, member of The Sharing
  • Ms. Hanna, a teacher
  • Kiko, a new convert
  • Tobias

New morphs acquired:

  • Jake: None
  • Cassie: None
  • Marco: None
  • Rachel: None
  • Ax: Shark ("Blue Blade"), random human (both deleted due to alternate timeline)
  • Tobias: None

Notable:

  • Interesting that this book finally acknowledges that no one knows why Rachel and Cassie are best friends. It's been pretty clear all along that they've nothing in common.

  • Cassie refers to herself as "African-American" in this book, which she hasn't done before, and also expresses some unprecedented insecurity about whether being black might affect how Jake, who's white, feels about her.

  • In the other Megamorphs books, the chapters in which Ax narrates are labeled "Ax." In this book, the first Ax chapter is labeled "Aximili-Esgarrouth-Isthill." The others are labeled "Aximili."

  • Other books suggest that Rachel has a capacity to think Marco is cute. In this book, both seem to acknowledge that each other are good-looking, but what they're attracted to in each other is all intellectual--daring, decision-making skills, bravery.

  • The Yeerk that infests Tobias in this reality is called Odret-One-Seven-Seven.

  • President Clinton is mentioned as being in office, solidly dating the story.

  • The Drode is complaining about "a group of six supposedly random humans that contains these four," but earlier in the sentence one of these "four" was "Elfangor's brother," Ax. He's not a human.

Best lines:

The Drode: "It will happen, Jake. You know that. The cave. The day will come. You know what the cave is, Jake. You know what it means, that dark cave. You know that death is within. When she dies, when Cassie dies, it will be at your word, Jake."

Cassie (about Rachel): I wonder where she gets the indifference. I wonder how she can have every boy in school throwing himself in her path, and be indifferent.

Rachel: "How do you expect to get through life without an appreciation of what goes with what?"
Cassie: "I expect life will just be one long struggle."

Marco: "Great. A meteorite falls out of the sky and totally misses the school. That is so not fair."

Marco: "You know, you should go out with me."
Rachel: "I don't think so."
Marco: "Is it because I'm roughly three feet shorter than you?"

Ax: I had learned one thing: If the rest of Earth's species were anything like this Blue Blade, the Yeerks had picked the wrong planet.

Jake: "I don't know. People start talking about how the individual has to give way to the group, I just, I don't know. I get kind of . . . jumpy. ( . . . ) I don't want to be 'a part.' Maybe it's just me. Maybe it's just my own mental block. But anytime someone starts talking that stuff, I start looking for the exit door."

Dr. Duberstein: "You have to at least give me your name."
Ax: "I am called Hey Moron. Hey! Moron-nuh!"

Ax: "Then I must go elsewhere in search of cookies. The cookies formed by two thin, round, black discs with a layer of adhesive white substance between them are the finest accomplishment of your species!"
Dr. Duberstein: "My species?"
Ax: "I meant our species."
Dr. Duberstein: "You said your species."
Ax: "Evidently I am insane. May I go now?"

Ax: "Are you able to run on those two legs?"
Jake: "Dude, we can fly on these two legs."



Next book: The Familiar, Animorphs #41