After the destruction of the Yeerk pool, Jake, Tobias, and Marco witness the Yeerks destroying the last remnants of their hometown and watch as the Pool ship lands amidst the destruction. After briefly considering destroying the Pool ship, the Animorphs decide that capturing the vessel would be a better strategy.
Hoping to gain military assistance for the attack, Jake visits Major General Sam Doubleday. Although Doubleday is initially distrustful of Jake, he eventually listens and agrees to Jake's plan after a Controller-major on the general's staff tries to kill Jake. After a Yeerk attack on the general's base, Doubleday evacuates his troops and confines them and himself for three days to eliminate any remaining Controllers amongst his soldiers.
Unfortunately, the confinement of Doubleday and his troops means a three-day delay before the Animorphs can launch their attack on the Pool ship. Sensing that the Yeerks could get the new Yeerk pool that is under construction operational within that time period, the Animorphs decide to take out the Taxxons digging the pool. In the ensuing battle, Jake finds himself underground and in the company of several Taxxons, led by none other than Arbron, a former companion of Eflangor's who became a Taxxon-nothlit several years earlier. Arbron makes Jake an offer: in exchange for allowing his followers to become nothlits and make a home for themselves on Earth, the 1709 non-Controller Taxxons on the surface and on board the Pool ship will defect and join the Animorphs in their fight against the Yeerks.
Animorphs is an English language science fiction series of young adult books written by K. A. Applegate and published by Scholastic. It is told in first person, with all 6 main characters taking turns narrating the books through their own perspectives. Horror, war, dehumanization, sanity, morality, innocence, leadership, freedom, and growing up are the core motifs of the series.
The story revolves around five humans, Jake, Marco, Cassie, Rachel, and Tobias, and one alien, Aximili-Esgarrouth-Isthill (nicknamed Ax), who obtain the ability to morph into any animal they touch. Naming themselves "Animorphs" (a portmanteau of "animal morphers") they use their ability to battle a secret alien infiltration of Earth by a race called the Yeerks. The Yeerks are a parasitic race of aliens resembling large slugs that take humans as a host by entering and merging with their brain through the ear canal. The Animorphs fight as a guerilla force against the Yeerks, led by Visser Three, and their program to take over the human race. Morphing into animals allows them to battle the various armies of aliens that the Yeerks use, but it also protects their identities. As far as the Yeerks know, only Andalites like Ax have the ability to morph, and if they knew that the Animorphs were mostly human they would be able to easily find out who they are. Protecting their identities becomes more and more difficult as the series goes on because though someone with the ability to morph can change into any animal that they touch, they can only stay in a morph for two hours or they will permanently become that animal. Throughout the series, we see how the war affects the characters in different ways, mentally and physically.