Applegate Katherine Alice. The Animorphs 54. The Beginning

Continuing on immediately from The Answer, Rachel attacks the Yeerks in control of the Blade ship, and kills Tom Berenson and his Yeerk, before dying at the hands of his Yeerk allies shortly after; the Ellimist briefly stops time to memorialize her death, tells his own story to her, and she dies. Tom's morph-capable Yeerks escape in the Blade Ship, abandoning the disabled Pool Ship to the Animorphs. Visser One, realizing that he is defeated, leaves Alloran-Semitur-Corrass's body after being knocked unconscious by Ax. The remaining Animorphs, as well as Alloran (freed after more than two decades under Visser One's control over his body), contact the Andalite fleet, and after hours of negotiations, the Andalite fleet promotes Ax to rank of Prince, and declares the war over. The Animorphs attend Rachel's funeral, where a statue is erected in her honor, and Tobias flies away with Rachel's ashes. It is also revealed that the Animorphs lived in California, a fact that had not been revealed through the course of the series.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.