Ax was concerned for a moment by the numerical designation, but when the human stopped at only one digit, he relaxed. That was not the system the Yeerks used, but neither did it sound like a human name. "Brain-ee-ack five," he repeated, quietly. "That is an unusual name. Mine is Phillip, Phil-lip-pah." He used the name Prince Jake had given him for his day of school, and couldn't help but emphasize the last syllable. The P sound was so satisfying to say with human mouthparts, almost as good as Z. "I am from out of state." He felt certain this explanation would account for any small lapses in his excellent imitation of human behavior.

There were many, many questions he wanted to ask, but Ax began with the most important. "Why are we here?" He stood up straight, careful not to become unbalanced (two really was an inefficient number of legs), and showed the human the metal pieces on the chain around his neck. "And why do we have these? I tried to explain, plane, that this is not my name."