7 | Broadcast Mind
[You are the only Andalite on Earth. No one but you survived the battle that saw the Dome ship destroyed and your brother dead (part of you still cannot believe he is gone, though you know it is true). It is your duty to help defend this planet, along with these humans, until your people arrive.
The five young humans are not warriors. They are not even warrior-cadets like you (too young to fight, according to the laws of our people, Cassie said, echoing your own words). Yet you have already faced death together, and you have already accepted their prince as yours. Humans are surprising and confusing, like their planet, but you know your trust in these humans is not misplaced. Somehow, they heard your call, and braved many dangers to rescue you. Tobias has already suffered for the war that is not his people's; he is a nothlit, stuck in a hawk's body.
You must morph human to stay inconspicuous and help them in their fight, which is also (much more) your fight, your people's fight. You do not hesitate as you carefully touch Cassie, Prince Jake, Marco, and Rachel's faces in turn, acquiring their DNA so that you can become a mixture of them.
They turn away as you morph, and you do not know why, but you are too distracted to puzzle it out, as your arms become heavier and stronger, but with only five fingers on each hand, and your tail and your front legs shrink away and vanish, leaving you standing on two legs, less delicate than your own, but with no hooves. They feel much less stable than four.
You find the hole that has appeared in your face alarming, even though you have had a mouth before (the creature you became from the Earth ocean had extremely impressive rows of teeth). You have never been able to use a mouth to speak before.
You put on the artificial skins the humans seem to find necessary, and Prince Jake asks, "Ax, are you male or female?"
"I chose to be-be-be-be-be male," you say, and the sound of your own voice startles you. It feels so strange to make noises to talk! "I chose to be male because I am male. Word. Male. Is that a good choice? Ch-oy-ce? Chuh chuh choy-yuss?" You stick out your human tongue, testing the different ways it can move. The 'chuh' sound is quite enjoyable, and the feeling of your human mouth parts moving to make the different words is fascinating.
Marco and Prince Jake help you rearrange the artificial skins so that the one you pulled up over your two legs covers your human torso instead, and the one you had on your head is now covering your lower body. You are not sure what difference this makes.
You try to turn your human head around. It can move more than your own head, but humans have only the two weak eyes. You do not like that at all. "How do you look? Lookuh. LooKUH. KUH. How do you look around? Ound. Ow, ow, ownd, behind?"
Prince Jake catches you when trying to see behind yourself makes you lose your balance.
"Ax?" Cassie says. "Don't talk to any strangers on the way home, okay?"]
[ooc: Dialogue lifted right from book 4. XD]