Erek King

Erek King
Biographical information
Species	Chee
Gender	Male
Hair color	Brown
Eye color	Brown
Born	Created thousands of years ago
Family	Mr. King ("father")
Occupation	Student Slave (formerly) Butler (formerly)
Affiliation	Pemalite Chee Animorphs (formerly)
Behind the scenes
First appearance	The Android
Last appearance	The Beginning
Portrayer	Dov Tiefenbach

"He appears to be a normal human boy. But of course that is merely a very advanced holographic illusion. Beneath the hologram is an android of gray and white metals, somewhat resembling an Earth dog walking on two legs. [...] However, even though they cannot do battle, the Chee have managed to infiltrate the Yeerk organization on Earth. And from time to time Erek brings us useful information."

―Ax

Erek King is a pacifistic android called a Chee and an ally of the Animorphs.

Biography

History

Erek King is a Chee, an android race created to be pacifists, much like their makers, the Pemalites. After the destruction of the Pemalites at the hands of the Howlers, Erek, along with the rest of the Chee, escaped to Earth, and has lived there for thousands of years, using incredibly advanced holographic technology to pass as human.

Past Identities on Earth

"A normal-looking boy. Or that's what you'd think. The "boy" was a holographic projection. Inside the illusion was an android. An android who'd helped build the pyramids, who had taken on a hundred different human forms, letting each one seem to age, letting each one seem to die, then reappearing as some new holographic projection."

―Jake

Erek's previous lives include a laborer that assisted in the construction of the Great Pyramids of Giza for the Ancient Egyptian empire, a citizen of a country ravaged by Attila the Hun, a witness of the first performance of Hamlet by William Shakespeare in the 16th century, Catherine the Great's hair dresser, Ludwig van Beethoven's valet, and President Franklin Roosevelt's butler.

Erek King and the Animorphs

"The Chee are incapable of violence. A prohibition against violence is written into their programming. Yet with our help, Erek was once able to disable that programming. He saved our lives in a terrible battle. But he chose then to surrender the power to do violence."

―Ax

Marco discovered his friend Erek King is an android with a hologram covering. Erek explained about the Chee secretly living on Earth to the Animorphs. Additionally, several Chee, including Erek, had infiltrated the Yeerk forces on Earth, specifically The Sharing. The Yeerk's technology is not sufficient to distinguish them from humans, allowing them to easily enter undetected. These Chee have taking in Yeerks willingly, keeping the parasitic slugs captive while providing their own Kandrona Rays to the Yeerks inside them and accessing their knowledge. When the time then came to return to the Yeerk pool, they simply project a holographic Yeerk leaving them and "struggle" like an average host.

Erek wanted to want help stop the Yeerks from invading his adopted planet and through the use of the Pemalite crystal, he reprogrammed himself to remove his inability to do violence and slaughtered about two dozen Hork-Bajir, but, unable to cope with the memory of violence and unable to forget it, he vowed never to fight again. The Pemalite crystal was discarded.

Erek in Android form, as seen by Marco's spider morph (from the inside cover of Book 10 The Android)

Erek and the Chee continued and aid the Animorphs by providing intell and masquerading as the human Animorphs while the real Animorphs were away on a mission, or even assisting the Animorphs on some of the missions. Generally Erek was the Animorphs' default Chee ally, although on one occasion Ax asked the Chee posing as Erek's father for assistance in hacking into an Andalite computer.

During the final battle against the Yeerks, the Animorphs forced Erek's hand, taking advantage of his non-violent programming to force him into acting in situations that he felt were morally reprehensible. After the defeat of the Yeerk empire, Cassie told Erek that Jake said for him to leave the ship if Erek wanted to keep the Chee identity secret since the Andalites were coming on board. This was not a friendly parting since Jake (and maybe others) blamed Erek for the death of Rachel, since Erek drained the Dracon beam so Jake would not be able to defend the ship and possibly kill others, while Erek was horrified by Jake's decision to vent the Yeerk pool, killing those Yeerks feeding therein. The Blade Ship manned by Jake's brother Tom was going to fire on the Pool Ship, thus Rachel had to attack Tom to stop it. Both ended up dying. Erek left telling Cassie to take care of Jake since Jake would need her.

In the Animorphs TV Series

Erek, as he appears in the TV series.

Erek's portrayal in the TV series is much like that of the books. He follows Jake and Marco back to the barn, where he confronts the Animorphs with the knowledge that he's aware that they're the "Andalite Bandits" that Visser Three's looking for. He then asks for the Animorphs' help in retrieving the Chee holographic crystal.

No mention is made of the Pemalites in the TV series.

Appearances

Books

• The Android
• The Escape
• The Decision
• In the Time of Dinosaurs (mentioned)
• The Departure (mentioned)
• The Discovery
• The Threat (mentioned)
• The Solution (mentioned)
• The Extreme
• The Attack
• The Exposed
• The Experiment
• The Sickness
• The Reunion
• The Conspiracy
• The Separation
• The Illusion
• The Prophecy
• The Hidden
• The Journey (mentioned)
• The Unexpected (mentioned)
• The Revelation
• The Resistance (mentioned)
• The Diversion
• The Answer
• The Beginning

TV series

• My Name is Erek
• The Front

Trivia

• "Erek King" was the name of a real Animorphs fan who won a competition on the Animorphs Official Site to have his name included in one of the books.
• Erek has passed as Marco on several occasions, despite his tendency to clean Marco's room, much to the Animorphs' dismay. Marco has complained to Erek about this on several occasions, but Erek has ignored him.
• Erek's worth in U.S. dollars is, according to himself, "well into the billions."

Gallery

Erek King in real life

Erek's winning entry (from the scholastic web site)

Erek "morphing" from his human to Chee form in the TV series