"Orcas are hard to miss. I might need a map to tell me where to find an owl."

"True," says Trouble. "All right, we'll find maps."

"Trouble, since you're the limiting factor on things that bite - how many times do you think you can morph in one night?"

"You rhymed!"

"A coincidence."

"Plenty," he says. "Getting a lot of practice helps with that, it turns out. Morphing's easier than it used to be. I don't have hard numbers, but if I got fucked up and had to morph, like - ten times, I wouldn't expect that to be a problem. As long as they weren't all in the same five minutes."

<Humans must have ludicrous endurance,> says Ax. <A professional estreen could work for years without having that much potential to morph repeatedly in a short time.>

"You can be a professional estreen?"

<Morph-dancers. Yes.>

"Cool," says Trouble.

"I know what I wanna be when I grow up!"

He giggles.

"Ooh, Dad, I should show you some of the cute things I can do if I stop partway through the right things. If I go part butterfly I can be a tiny fairy, and if I do just the ears on the way to an Andalite morph -"

<I beg your pardon?>

"Elfangor scored a few hits on Visser Three. Me and Andi and Trouble all acquired from the blood, and Trouble also thought to ask Elfangor before the Visser landed, so he has two. Nobody has acquired you, although if you'd let at least Dad and Robin and Ethan, that would be convenient."

There is an uncomfortable silence from the garage.

"Is some part of this a problem?" inquires Ethan.

<Not as such. I think Prince Alloran's consent can - be presumed. And it sounds as though my brother gave Trouble permission.>

"He did, yeah."

<I will consider allowing the three of you without any Andalite morph to acquire me.>

"Thank you." Bella pauses in writing. "Hey, Ax - does morphing deal with poison and venom as well as it does with injuries?"

<If a morph is bitten, yes. The body is reconstructed the next time that morph is accessed. If one's natural form is poisoned or bitten, the toxins will remain in that form, although they will not affect others, until they have had time to leave the body in whatever way they normally do. Are we going to acquire venomous creatures?>

"Maybe. I'd like some kind of suitably vicious snake. Sounds like a bit much to add to everything else, though, if the venom would stick around."

"I wouldn't mind," says Trouble. "We could save it for last or something."

"Okay. If you're up to it when we've raided the other major clades."