#animorphs 26

- Jake's suicide run over the edge keeps with the dulled tone he has in this book. All he's noticing is the others going down, how he feels like he's failing. There was a Rachel book, #17 I think, where she described herself as feeling like Luke Skywalker blowing up the Death Star, but Jake's really past that.

- Of course he says himself that he gets past the whole depressed and meaningless thing when Cassie kisses him, but these kids are really past the point of no return.

- This is a Berenson book for sure. Jake is doing very well as a leader for all that he feels hopeless and defeated, and Rachel is being very perceptive and switched on while making sure to have everyone's back (threatening to break Marco's arms is having his back). I assume part of why Crayak comes up in #26 is so he can come back in #27. And, thinking about it, he apparently has only noticed Jake at this point — definitely not the full stacked deck until MM4. But #26 ends with Jake ordering Rachel to kill him if necessary and her standing ready to do it. Even their making the plan has them understanding each other and at peak efficiency about Ax needed to be the bait. Rachel has Jake's back and she is standing at it, waiting to snap his neck. And Crayak, who didn't care enough about the war on Earth to poke his finger into the timestream before this moment, is watching. Jake had already annoyed him, made him decide that this little group of ants need to be swept off the board before they try picking up one of his pieces, and Jake just killed a Howler, which Crayak hasn't allowed to happen before. We find out in #27 that his preferred mouthpiece is a wildcard. The Ellimist's wildcards, humanity's contribution to its own survival, mirror each other. They're heroes who understand sacrifice. Kids who come alive in battles that they shouldn't have to fight. One of those wildcards could be devastating if he can play it to negate the other. I need this and #27 animated. The Ellimist is mainly around for Tobias, but Crayak is here for the Berensons. (So am I)

- Also the tension at the end is crazy. They swing from life threatening to nothing twice then go argue with the uh I'll say omnipresents

(#26. jake is dreaming about a traumatizing experience and then gets yoinked into this.)

“And so I saw it again.

A creature. Or a machine. Some combination of both. It had no arms. It sat still, as if it were bolted down, on a throne that was miles high. It could not move, and yet the power that flowed from it was like a hurricane of energy.

Its head was a single eye. The eye turned slowly... left... right..

I trembled. I prayed it would not look my way.

And then it saw me.

The eye, the bloodred eye, looked straight at me.

Through me.

It saw me.

It SAW me!

No! NO! I cried in silent terror. I tried to look away, but my eyelids were transparent, my head would not twist far enough to avoid its gaze.

(oh nooo my motivation. It left me. Wait, why are you full sprinting away from me. Come baaaack)

Anyhoo

- the speed at which Rachel acknowledges that Eric is useful against the Howlers is great. She made a mistake underestimating him, he saved her life before the battle even started and had her team's back. Her bad, happy to have you along, man.

- Jake's apathy and disdain towards the Iskoort and their planet is really depressing. No excitement about new aliens, tech and culture like dude you live the sci-fi every day but this one is fresh! This is just a mission to him, and even then it's a low grade annoyance more than anything. He can't see the board the Ellimist and Crayak are playing on and he really doesn't care about being a piece. And then the terror of being outmatched by a threat that they have to weaknesses to exploit gets him too.

- Ax's big "I am an Andalite dying with honour means dying NOW" thing is an insane move as always. Does facilitate Jake's taking up his mantle as leader again in a new way. Not just acknowledging to himself he's the commanding officer but announcing it, with orders attached.

- Marco gets to use his greatest strength - irritating the Howlers into becoming a little erratic. Jake follows this with making an active taunt to be swatted which is ridiculously brave from the swatted king of bad insect experiences.

Battling with Tumblr to make a 'there's always a bigger fish' joke about the way Crayak destroys planets. Just imagine Qui-Gon.

Some quality animorphs group meeting content featuring Tobias calling them all a clown college and Marco with the quote of all time "I refuse to answer on the grounds that you may tend to snatch me bald" (which would be deserved if she did Marco. Modern teenagers would expect Jake to beat you up on the girls behalf, but Rachel's got this.)

Typical Ellimist behaviour to break into the first downtime these kids have had in a year, enlist them in a war (hey, blue aliens have never done that before, right?) then just peace out and leave them to their totally ruined Lion King performance. The disrespect.

In another telling character move, I think as a kid Erek's appearance read as him having been brought up to speed and warped to the barn. Really, he was probably brought up to speed simultaneously and then chilling there under a hologram the whole time. Which is wild, given what a physical discussion they were having, but makes the most sense.

Rachel is shining (as always. I love her.) She's rational, not actually looking for a fight they don't need to participate in when it's high risk and not their battle, and argues both sides, first protecting Tobias and then Jake.

Tobias' opinion is interesting. Yes the Ellimist has helped them in the past, and the Hork-Bajir are his friends. But he is also a fan of calling him out, so it's his understanding of extra dimensions that lends itself to his argument. It's not unlikely that he's more forgiving of the Ellimist's half measures and tricks because he never expects to be given anything, and as Jake says, he did actually get what he wanted out of their last run in, as well as the indirect interference that let him know about Elfangor — which, again, by Tobias standards is the best familial relationship he's had (excepting Ax).

Tobias was given his morphing power back a while ago now, but it seems unlikely that he would discuss the choice with anyone but Rachel. I guess Jake assumes he couldn't be human and stay in the fight, and remembers what his home life was like, to believe it was Tobias' choice rather than genie logic.

I'm not a fan of the weird almost-Christian God vs Devil higher powers thing the book has going on but I do like the Ellimists vibes