Everyone Has to Start Somewhere (Jullian)

[Richard]

Richard had been left a note saying when he was scheduled to meet with the Morphing Instructor. He was unsure of what he would be doing on his first day, but it would probably be something easy since he was just starting out. Richard walked up to the door of the room that Nineteen had pointed out to his during the tour of the place, and he slowly opened the door.

"Hello. Is there anybody in here?" Richard really hoped that he hadn't missed his scheduled time because he was really looking forward to this class as he was ready to learn all that he could while he was here. The name of the instructor was Jullian if he recalled correctly. "Mr. Jullian?"

Richard had this strange feeling that someone was watching him, and he didn't even know it. He walked into the room and sat on one of the desks to wait. "I should have brought my harmonica to play. It would have kept me from being nervous about this whole thing."

[Jullian]

Jullian crawled under his desk, his little lady bug legs powering away. He hated bug morphs and he'd avoided them through out his entire career right up until he'd become a teacher. You couldn't really ask recruits to morph bugs if you weren't willing to do it yourself. Besides, he had to know what to prepare them for and nothing beat personal experience.

So he'd devoted time to exploring his bug morph and had actually been surprised to find that he liked it after he got over the initial shock. It was like jumping into a pool, cold at first, but good after a while. His antenna jumped and swerved as he heard someone come into his room. For someone who stressed constant awareness of time, he was really bad at keeping a schedule. He couldn't see the clock from here but he knew one of the recruits was due to meet with him soon. He supposed soon was now.

He decided not to demorph right away. He didn't want to freak anyone out right away. <<Hi there,>> Jullian said as he crawled out from under his desk. The ladybug was not happy about leaving the safety of darkness and disliked moving toward the large creature even more but Jullian cracked open the wings on his back and flew up to the surface of his desk. It was like flying up the side of the empire state building. He turned his round little body towards the recruit but he couldn't really see him in the traditional sense. His mind searched for a name and finally came up with one. <<Richard right?>>

[Richard]

<<Hi there,>>

Richard was completely caught off guard by the voice that had just started speaking in his mind. He wasn't sure if someone was going to start pulling a line from the Wizard of Oz, but he had expected for someone to pop out of a hidden room to tell him that it was all a joke, and he could go home right now.

<<Richard right?>>

Hearing his own name brought him back to the realization that everything was real and that he was standing in a room with someone who he couldn't see. "That's me. I am going to make the assumption that this is Jullian that I am talking to." Who else would know his name and be in the Morphing 101 room? Richard was not sure as he was new here, but he liked to think that it was someone he had heard about than someone he had no knowledge of.

His eyes swept the room to see where someone could be hiding, but the only logical place would be under the desk. Richard stared at the desk and hoped that someone would pop up from behind it, but no one came. His eyes looked at the desk for something that could be used as a speaker, but all he saw was a little bug and several things that a teacher might have on his or her desk. Then it hit him and he had to smack himself in the forehead.

Richard knelt down so that his eyes were at the same level as the desk. "Please tell me you are the little insect that is on the desk." He felt like he was going insane since he was trying to communicate with someone who he thought was a bug.

[Jullian]

<<You are correct sir. And the first student to figure it out. I can tell you're going to be a good morpher already, you've got the right mindset.>> He hadn't planned to be a bug when he met Richard but Jullian was a great believer 'in fake it until you make it', and its close cousin, 'always pretend like it was on purpose.'

Jullian twitched his wings and his antenna waved, collecting data about the human in front of him. <<Well I suppose we'll get right down to it. Have you read the text book? Don't worry if you haven't, I'll go over the big points anyway. But you should review it at some point.>>

[Richard]

So the being in bug morph thing was a test, which Richard had apparently passed. This at least made him feel a little bit better about the situation. He should have known that there would be something like this to make up for the lack of a pop quiz. Richard could see it now as if this situation had been one of those short answer questions. 'List a few ways to tell that an animal is really a person in morph.'

Jullian asked him if he had read the text book, which Richard had looked at it but he had not taken in depth notes on it. He had seen no real point to it, but maybe he should have anticipated that there could have been a quiz about it. "I'll be completely honest with you. I have only skimmed certain sections of it, but I plan on reading it before I go to bed tonight."

Richard hoped that the promise of reading it later would prevent a lecture on being properly prepared for class. The last thing he needed was to have a flashback to when he was in high school. He wondered what the punishment around here was for forgetting to do one's homework.

[Jullian]

<<Oh, don't worry about it. I expect you to know all that stuff by the time you finish, not on your first day,>> Jullian said, quick to reassure him. <<I only ask because it means we can skim through the boring lecture about how morphing works and such, and get right down to morphing itself, which, after all, is what you're hear for.>>

Jullian flipped his wings almost as an expression of happiness. He loved new students and he loved seeing people gain the power to morph. <<So I'll just go over the basics ok? Morphing is based on DNA. To acquire an animal you just picture it in your mind and to morph it, you do the same thing. While in morph we communicate this way, with thought speak. Now, if you'll step back a bit, I'll demorph and we can get you started.>>

[Richard]

Richard was glad to know that he wouldn't be required to have everything memorized at the beginning of the school year. He was also glad that he got out of a long lecture on morphing and got to jump right into the fun stuff of the class. It was always good to tackle something head on instead of sitting around and talking about, or at least that is how Richard thought things should be approached.

The brief summary that Jullian gave over what morphing was very helpful as it brought back some of what Richard had read in the book. At his instructor's request, Richard took a few steps back so that Jullian could demorph. He had to mentally prepare himself in case what he saw was a tad disgusting in nature. "So what is first?" He figured that talking while someone else demorphed would help him get through the experience of seeing someone change like that even if it might distract the person morphing.

[Jullian]

Jullian concentrated on the image of himself and the changes began quickly. He wasn't concentrating on making the morph look pretty but it did have a smoothness to it that was just unconscious for him.

His antenna slowly rolled back into his head first along with his extra set of legs. He began to grow on the desk and he remembered to lean back before he got too big and fell off. His remaining legs turned into legs and arms while his colorful exoskeleton turned into his colorful morphing outfit. It was a bit disturbing when his head grew his own, wavy hair while most of his face was still buggish but the eyes soon shrank into normal human eyes and his mouth and nose appeared out the the ladybug's mouth parts.

Throughout the whole demorph Jullian kept talking. Switching from thought speak to normal speak when his mouth finally grew back. <<First you get the morphing power. Then I'll show you what morphs you have to choose from and you pick one to start off with. You'll get a few more later but we're just going to work with one today. I'll talk you through it and then we'll practice it a few times. Sound good?"

[Richard]

Richard was glad that he had eaten a light meal before coming to this class. The transformation that he was seeing would have made him hurl if had eaten his normal amount that he usually did. For a second, he thought it wouldn't matter how much he ate as the exoskeleton disappeared, but he managed to keep down his food.

All the while, Jullian had been answering Richard's question about what was next while switching between types of speech. "Sounds like a plan to me." Richard hoped he didn't choose a wimpy morph or something that seemed a little weird to everyone else at the academy. He didn't want people labeling him 'that guy'.

[Jullian]

Jullian had ended up in a sitting position on his desk so he hopped down to the floor. The hop wasn't necessary so much as fun and an expression of the amount of energy he had. He'd already worked with one recruit today but working with new people always excited me. He found that everyone morphed a little bit different and he enjoyed seeing people's individual styles develop.

"Alright. Well I'm sure you've heard rumors about this little device," Jullian said as he pulled out the Academy's Escafil device from a locked compartment of his desk. It didn't stay here most of the time but he'd taken it out for the day, knowing he'd be meeting with everyone. After today it would return to Seiya's office to await the next batch of new recruits.

"Just touch it and we can begin."

[Richard]

Richard watched as Jullian jumped off the desk with so much enthusiasm. He seemed to be full of energy that it made Richard feel like he was a little bit lazy or something. He had never reached that level of enthusiasm even when fighting. Maybe it was a side effect of certain morphs or something.

Jullian pulled out a blue box that Richard had read the name for in the book, but completely forgot what it was. "This is the thing where the morphing power comes from if I remember correctly." Doing as Jullian said, Richard put his hand on one side of the box. He got this tingling sensation when his hand touched the box. He waited a few minutes before removing his hand.

"So now do we get to the hard part? The choosing."

[Jullian]

"Yeah, that is the hard part. I want to morph everything eventually but probably best not to start with everything," Jullian said, putting the morphing cube back into his desk. The Animorphs Academy had one of the largest blood banks that the organization possessed. It didn't have the complete collection of samples, that would have been dangerous, but it had a large part of it. No one was stupid enough to feel %100 safe anywhere on the planet. But the Academy was as safe as any of the animorph bases got and so they'd started to concentrate important resources and personnel here. Frankly, it made Jullian a bit nervous. He felt like they were painting a target on their back. But he understood why it was important and he had to agree that they were certainly able to defend themselves.

For today's class Jullian had unfrozen precious little of their DNA banks. The blood samples he had with him would only stay viable for 42 days and that meant, most of it would be wasted. But he'd wanted to give Richard a decent selection for his first morph and he'd brought some of the more standard land animals with him today.

"Ok, so for your first morph we're going to do something easy. Most medium to large sized mammmals are pretty easy to control since their brain chemistry is closer to ours. Even smaller mammals are easier than say, something like a bug or a lizard. So for your first morph I've selected a few land mammals for you to choose from. You'll also be allowed to choose more morphs in later classes but we'll get to those when we get to them. One thing at a time."

Jullian took the briefcase that had been under his desk out and placed it on the desk surface. He opened it and showed Richard the small vials of blood that were contained inside, each securely sitting in the foam hole that matched it shape. Each vial was labelled with the type of animal it was. Jullian had chosen, Dog, Cat, Fox, Monkey. There were no breeds specified since no one really kept track of those things. What breed you got was largely a matter of chance.

[Richard]

At least he wasn't the only one who wanted to try and morph into anything that he could possibly get his hand on. It would probably be hard to remember what morphs he had in the end, but he would cross that bridge when he came to it. It was not like he would forget the most important ones anyway, so there shouldn't be a problem later. He just hoped that he would be able to control whatever morph he did get because Richard didn't want to be seen as someone who wasn't cut out for this type of life.

Richard decided that starting with something small was a good idea, so he decided to go with a dog morph as they did seem to be the most useful of morphs. He picked up a random vial and dipped his finger in the blood while focusing on the image of a dog. He could feel that same tingly sensation as when he touched the box, but it wasn't as strong this time. It was probably because it was just blood and not a real animal or something like that.

After acquiring the animal, Richard was not sure if he should go straight into trying to morph it or waiting for Jullian to give him the okay signal. He thought that maybe Jullian needed to make sure that he would be able to stop Richard in case he did something that was too out of control. "So do I start to morph now or is there something else that I need to do first?"

[Jullian]

Jullian watched him choose a dog and wondered what type he would become. There was only really one way to find out but he wanted to make sure they didn't have any avoidable accidents first. Dogs were pretty friendly naturally and they weren't that destructive unless instructed to be so, so Jullian wasn't too worried on that front. But he had a dingo morph that was pretty similar to a dog and he knew how happy and excited they could be. It was like having a 90lb, fully motor functional two year old in the room. And there were certain things you didn't leave around a two year old. Like breakable vials.

Jullian closed the case and put it back under his desk. Then he walked over and closed the door so that Dog-Richard wouldn't go running around the rest of the ship. The Bladeship was much too large and Jullian wasn't about to have one of the recruits get stuck as a dog because he'd forgotten to close a door.

"Alright," Jullian said, turning back to Richard. "Go ahead, try it out. Remember, when you morph you get the creature's instincts too so just stay wary. Don't forget you're Richard."

[Richard]

Richard watched as Jullian put the case of blood samples back under his desk for safe keeping. He was glad that there would be precautions against his morph being too wild. He was not sure what it would be like as a dog, but he was pretty sure that his sense of smell and hearing would increase to something beyond his comprehension. With Jullian's okay, Richard decided that it was time to start morphing.

He made a mental picture of a dog in his mind and hoped that nothing would happen to break his concentration. The first thing to happen was white and black fur started to appear across his body. Then Richard could hear the bones in his body start to crack as they began to move into the necessary positions for the morph. He hit the floor as his knees began to switch their position to be shaped the same way dog's were. Then his bones began to shorten to the size of the dog that he was morphing. His new tail grew out to its full size. Richard's hands had become paws by the time the dog's muzzle started to form on his face. The final change was his eye color as his black eyes became a shade of brown.

Richard had forgotten to keep his mind focused on keeping the animal mind in check. All he could think of was the new smells that his nose picked up. He put his nose to the floor as his dog brain interpreted one of the strongest smells as being a mixture of suntan lotion and pine trees. He followed it to the boy in the room, and the first thought that popped into his head was did this boy have a ball. His tail was wagging at the prospect of getting to play with someone, but the boy's face had a look upon it that reminded him of his father. Wait! Richard was a dog, so how could his father have a human face?

All the pieces fell into place as Richard's mind slowly came into control of the dog morph. <<I think I lost it for a minute. I didn't think the dog's mind would be so hard to control, but the feeling of being happy and the new smells does make it difficult, huh?>> Richard really hoped that this was common for everyone who started out. At least he would have an interesting story to tell the grand-kids if he ever got around to having kids first. <<Also, did you know you smell like suntan lotion with a hint of pine?>>