Free The Predator by K. A. Applegate

I guess I shouldn’t have been. We all kind of treat Jake like he’s the leader, but he’s never been pushy about it.
    “What are you going to do Sunday?” he asked.
    That took me by surprise again. “I don’t know. Some Sundays we go to my mom’s grave. Leaveflowers and all. But this is the two-year thing.” I shrugged. “I don’t know, man.” He just nodded.
    “But I’ll tell you one thing, Jake. A year from now I don’t want my dad going to leave flowers at
two
graves.”

CHAPTER 17
    T his is wonderful! Wonderful! Flying!>
    The six of us were all together. Flying. It was the first time for Ax. He just kept saying how wonderful it was. He wouldn’t shut up. It was the most excited he’d been since he’d discovered coffee.
    Which was cool, because flying really
is
wonderful.
     Ax said.
     Tobias said.
     Ax said.
     I asked.
    We were sailing above a patch of woods. It was almost solid green below us. We had risen high on a beautiful thermal. A thermal is a warm bubble of air that acts like an elevator, letting you soar high with almost no effort.
    We hoped there were no bird-watchers down in the woods. We made a very unlikely flock—a red-tailed hawk, a falcon, a harrier, a bald eagle, and two ospreys. We kept some distance between us so it wouldn’t be too obvious that we were together.
    Also, the eagle, who was Rachel, was carrying something that looked like a small TV remote control. She was the biggest bird. She got stuck lifting the weight.
     I said.
     Cassie said. She meant it to be lighthearted. It sounded just a little too serious.
     Tobias announced.
     I said. We made a large circle over the area, looking foranyone who might be in the woods. But there was no one.
    We spiraled down from the sky. Down into the deep, open gash in the earth that was the gravel quarry. It was a desolate place. Just a big hole in the ground with some water in the lowest spots.
    A few minutes later we were back in our usual forms. Minus shoes, of course. And wearing our motley collection of morphing clothes.
    “We look like a trapeze act from a cheap circus,” I said. “Way too much spandex.”
    “Don’t start with the uniforms again,” Rachel said.
    It was an old debate. I would say how we needed some decent superhero uniforms. You know, like the X-Men or whatever.
    But now, I realized, I shouldn’t be talking that way. As if we were all going to be together in the future.
    I couldn’t tell if Jake had told any of the others that I was quitting. Probably he had told Cassie. I doubted Rachel knew, or she would have said something. The same with Tobias.
    And Ax? Who knew with Ax? He was still a mystery to us. It was one of the things I would miss after I quit. I mean, how often do you get to hang out with a real alien?
    That and the flying. I would miss the flying. But if I was out, I had to be out all the way.
    I guess I must have looked morose, sitting there on a pile of rocks, thinking. Jake came over and kind of gave me a shove. You know, in a friendly way.
    “Come on. We need to go back under that overhang. Out of sight.”
    “Great,” I said. “The rocks will fall and crush us and we won’t have to worry about the Yeerks.”
    There was a sort of shallow cave in the quarry wall. Not deep at all, but it would hide us from anyone flying over.
    “Well,” Jake said. “Let’s try this out. Ax? You ready to trigger that