#ani 17

like, yes: she's the "let's do it" person and most of the time it is because she really does want to do it, but here in #17 she's just forcing herself to go through with it even though she's very much uncomfortable with the mission. she can't let the cracks show, she knows, so she says "let's do it" almost subconsciously. especially when they were all about to dig the tunnel as moles and marco (teasingly) nominated her: she very much did not want to do it but she said she did — for her own sake and for the team's.

to me it's most evident in the marco books, but the rest of the team does see her as this sometimes crazy (insane, some might say), almost suicidal, almost enthusiastic, very ruthless girl who isn't afraid to go on the missions. it's a separate post why this is most evident in marco books (and the central point to that argument would be his description of her in #5), but the point is how they see her, and how she thinks they see her, and how she truly feels and what she doesn't want them to see.

there's another bit in #17 specifically. rachel saying that she needs cassie on a much deeper level. she needs cassie to hold up the morals and be the "good" one so that rachel can be "ruthless." i'm avoiding any spoilers for future moments in the series but this is, has been, and will be a recurring theme. rachel "hiding behind" her fellow animorphs, trying to pass herself off as just another one of them. rachel holding herself to those standards. rachel discovering who ("what") she is and deciding, right then and there, that no one can ever know the extent of it.

Obviously there's Visser Three, cannibalism king, munching on his enemies and subordinates alike since his very first scene. There's also his brother, who has to become a cannibal to survive because when he's cut off from the pool he decides his continued existence outweighs his brother yeerks.

There's Jake eating a spider during his first morph of the green anole, which sticks with him (and every other narrator) until Tobias has a breakdown over eating a rat. After that, the spider doesn't get brought up much anymore and Tobias learns how to be a predator.

But then I noticed the similarity between Tobias and Arbron.

Tobias has already been a nothlit, but it's not until he hunts like a hawk that the reality sets in in full.

And when Arbron is trying to get Elfangor to kill him...

It's not just being a taxxon that sends Arbron into a suicidal spiral: it's eating like one and understanding that if he survives his wounds he'll still likely be eaten like one.

For both of our nothlits, hunting and consuming something like a thing is the point where you cannot reverse becoming it. Tobias often sees his hawk body as a predator first and the flying that comes with it comes second.

In a way even though he didn't become a nothlit this applies to Jake as well: Marco coins the name "Animorphs" for their group immediately following Jake's return from the anole mission. Eating the spider didn't technically change anything, but heck if it didn't coincide with the point of no return.

Aside from that, we also see how alien diets play a huge role in how the species develop and the role they play in the wider series with andalites, hork-bajir, taxxons, and yeerks.

Andalites were a prey animal that had to eat on the run to avoid being eaten. So they developed into a very defensive species that after wiping out their own predators tries to assert control and order over the rest of the galaxy to feel safe.

The Hork-Bajir Chronicles will delve into this a bit further, but by 13 we learn that Hork-Bajir are designed around their diets and that very design (sharp blades for cutting bark) becomes the reason the yeerks see them as weapons.

Taxxons are always insatiably hungry. They cannot control their own appetites to the point of cannibalistic feeding frenzies and aligning with the yeerks. They're another group we'll get into more later in the series too.

And of course yeerks rely on Kandrona to live. The Animorphs strike their first major blow against the empire by destroying the Kandrona generator in 7, which continues to ripple throughout the series. Yeerks cut off from Kandrona starve to death so unless they're able to figure out the cannibalism thing like Esplin 9466 the Lesser they have no way of leaving the empire. The only other alternative they've found drives them mad by replacing their brain stem. In this way food becomes a weapon of the Animorphs.

And this is why you don't rely on one person to the moral center of the team. Or to be your moral compass for you. If they get confused or presented with a situation that they realize that they crossed a line it will take them time to recover and think about what is right themselves. And they know that they can't ask anyone else in the group for help.

oh gods she always gets the worst injuries ough and for poor tobias too! she's such a knight/shield. i love her but ough it hurts to

the pleading of the victims making her more willing to suicide mission shark devour the yeerks is so good ugh

an ANT girl? i know you didnt have alot of time to think but it really seems like Rachel's mind goes to the worst case scenario every time and she dives headfirst toward that fear just to prove she can, like she deserves it or like it's the only way forward god

- I’d forgotten how much the early books reference each other. Like yeah, Jake and Cassie just had a huge fight over whether this specific guy deserved to die. Rachel fell through her kitchen last time she was narrating. Marco is trying to reassert that he’s a clown, not someone to be pitied. Also, this is a really good book for Rachel’s relationship with the other full time human animorphs.

- Seriously, Rachel and Marco will take shots at each other, but earlier in the series it was some genuine dislike. By #15 you could see it was a little bit “you need to antagonise me as an outlet and I respect that” and here it’s “the only thing better than dunking on each other is dunking on Jake”. The kids all tale their roles very seriously, and Rachel and Marco both have the most choice in their own roles and play into them the hardest. #7 was essentially Rachel marching into the grizzly enclosure as Monster from Epic: The Musical played, and #12 was the last day off from that she’s ever gonna get.

- It’s funny how much Rachel compartmentalises, though her childhood was probably scheduled to the second so it does make sense really. Rachel needs the compartments, the separation of expectations for each different part of her life. At home she’s the older sister who yells at Jordan and the responsible eldest daughter who keeps track of things and offers to cook dinner. At school she’s a model student. With the animorphs, she’s the tank. It’s the separation that keeps her driven - her personal life only breaks down when she can’t keep everything separate any more. But she keeps everything so far apart it doesn’t really occur to her to apply skillsets to different circumstances aside from gymnastics and the way she moves in morph. She manages her family and still thinks “well, Jake’s gotta be the responsible one, I can’t.”

- Speaking of Jake. Both Marco and Rachel know he’s a kid, it’s why they’re fairly ungovernable and do a good solo run in the Yeerk pool. But this book reads as a precursor for the next few - Ax isn’t really fitting in with humans, Cassie is struggling with her hold on morality, and Jake and Rachel are struggling with their roles a little. Jake isn’t allowed to be funny any more (to be fair, it was a bad joke, but so were everyone else’s), and Rachel, though she understands her role in the group, sort of doesn’t understand Jake’s. She respects he’s taking responsibility, and doesn’t want to herself but she also a couple of times thinks ‘he’s not the boss of me’ (best example of them being related, and evidence for the fanon of Rachel being a few months older) given the force with which their relationship will come together in the David trilogy, it’s interesting to watch.

Rachel?

No one volunteered. No one even moved. We were a haggard, unhappy-looking bunch of kids. Sweating and pale from the stress of fear and the constant morphing. "I'll do it," I said. "It's my turn."

You good?

But I didn't. In fact, I was the strongest voice for going forward. See, I wasn't going to let the claustrophobia scare me. I wasn't going to let fear dictate what I did. Or maybe I was just a fool.

See, it's not that our disaster daughter won't back down...

He was right. I had to force myself to stay very still and not start running. If I started running, I'd never stop. <If you're scared, I'll go in,> I said. <I'm scared,> Marco confirmed. <Help yourself.> There must be something kind of liberating, just being able to say "I'm scared" like it's no big deal. I can't do that. I don't know why. I just can't.

She can't back down. She can't let herself admit that the digging that's been giving her nightmares about being trapped in a coffin and buried alive is bothering her. She has to prove herself.