Gregor the Overlander

Ripred’s eyes open, and he sees Gregor’s eyes wide in horror, about to scream “No!” The look on Gregor’s face is enough for Ripred: “[H]e flipped onto his back and slashed his terrible claws. The sword cut across the rat’s chest as Ripred tore a deep gash along Henry’s arm” (236). Everyone wakes up. Luxa and Aurora get into battle formation, ready to strike, and Ares flies straight for Ripred. Gregor gets there first. He puts his hands directly between Henry and Ripred and screams at them to stop: “Unbelievably everyone paused. Gregor guesses this was the first time any of them had ever seen someone try to come between a fighting rat and a human” (237). Gregor exclaims that anyone who wants to kill anybody else has to go through him first. Luxa tells Gregor the rat will kill them all if he doesn’t move, but Gregor tells everyone it was Henry who first attacked Ripred. 

Henry says “Yes, and he would be dead now were it not for the Overlander” (238). This confuses Luxa, as she doesn’t know what side to take. Gregor pleads with her to stop, saying they need to stick together. She listens. Gregor insists they need to patch the two of them up; while Luxa patches up Henry, she tells him never to do that again—he cannot take Ripred alone. He mocks her and says she sounds like “that old fool Vikus.” Luxa is hurt and says: “No, I speak as myself […] And as one who wishes both of us to survive” (241). This moment is one of the first times we see dissent between Henry and Luxa. While they appear inseparable at the beginning of the story, here, the reader sees their different perspectives.

Then, Gregor realizes that Boots is sick, Luxa and Ripred help give her the right medicine to calm her fever, but she looks to be in danger. Boots is in too much pain to ride with Gregor, so he places her on Temp’s back alone. The questers keep walking and arrive at a bridge between two landings. Gregor shines his flashlight and sees 20 rats right above their heads, waiting for them to arrive. Ripred commands the companions to cross the bridge. Gregor runs forward and then realizes Boots is behind on Temp. He tries to go back, but Ripred forces him forward with his tail, so Gregor flies onto the other side of the river. Gregor sees that Tick is the only thing between Boots, Temp, and the 20 rats running after them on the bridge. Gregor screams for Boots and then the unthinkable happens: “Temp put on a burst of speed for the end of the bridge, and Tick turned to face down the army of rats alone. As they bounded at her, Tick flew directly into the face of the lead rat, causing it to startle back in surprise” (246). The lead rat runs forward and crushes Tick’s neck in his jaws. Temp gets to the other side of the river safely with Boots, as the other questers break the silk ropes securing the bridge. All the rats fall below into a sea of piranhas. 

Ripred urges them forward, but Gregor is deeply moved by Tick’s sacrifice for Boots. When at last they rest, Gregor starts to weep for Tick: “Brave little Tick, who had flown into the face of an army of rats to save his baby sister […] Just a roach who had given all the time she had left so that Boots could have more” (249). Temp thanks him for weeping for Tick, and Gregor is filled with anger at the other questers who were trying to break the silk ropes holding up the bridge before Boots had even gotten all the way across. 

Luxa tells Gregor they would have caught Boots and Temp if they’d fallen, and Tick too. Gregor suddenly remembers that the Underlanders don’t see falling the way he does. He says she must think he’s dumb for crying because she isn’t shedding any tears over losing a crawler. She tells him she hasn’t cried at all since her parents died: “Gregor felt more tears slipping down his cheeks […] He forgave Luxa everything at that moment. He even forgot why he needed to forgive her” (251). This is a moment where we really see Gregor and Luxa connecting on a human level. She also tells Gregor if he makes it back to Regalia without her, to tell Vikus that she understood why he left them with Ripred. She sees now that he was just trying to protect them. 

When Gregor heads back to the group, Ripred says “Take heart, Overlander, your father is nearby” (252). Gregor asks how far and finds out, it’s an hour’s walk, no more. The questers do a quick inventory and realize they are at the end of their light supply. Gregor has two batteries left, Luxa one torch and that’s all the light they have besides Gregor’s helmet which is their last resort. Once they get his father, it is determined that the bats can fly without light, and they will have to lead the way home. 

Two rats spring at them from out of nowhere, and Ripred rips one’s throat out and then kills the other with his back claws. Gregor realizes that even among rats, Ripred is lethal. He learns they’re the guards to his father’s prison passage. Ripred describes where they’re going: “We are about to enter an open space. Stay against the wall, single file, for the earth is unstable and the fall immeasurable” (254). They follow the passage to the end, arriving at a circular pit, and Gregor sees what’s left of his father struggling to stand in the pit below.

Gregor sees his father on all fours in the pit below, too frail and weak to stand. Gregor drops to his knees and extends a hand at the edge of the pit. Luxa and Henry fly down, help Gregor’s father onto Aurora and carry him up. He grabs his father's hands and says “Dad, it’s me. Gregor” (258), but his father doesn’t believe he’s really there. The prophecy had mentioned “one lost up ahead,” but Gregor never imagined the shape he’d find his father in: “He was skeletal and weak—and what has happened to his hair and beard? They were snow white” (258). Gregor sees that he’s also wearing a cloak of rat fur. Luxa tells Gregor his father has a fever, and they need to get him back to Regalia at once. 

Luxa asks for Henry’s help, but he refuses to answer her: “Henry stood apart from them. Not helping. Not hurrying. Not even bothering to seem anxious. ‘No, Luxa, we have no need to hurry now’” (259). Ripred instantly puts two and two together and realizes he’s not the only spy among their number. Henry whistles, and the patter of rat feet scurry toward them in the distance. Henry turns to Luxa: “Sorry cousin […] but I had no choice. We were headed for disaster under Vikus. He would ally us with the weakest, when our only real chance of survival is to ally ourselves with those who are powerful” (260). Henry insists she join forces with him and the rats so they can rule together. Luxa refuses and says she’d rather die than join him. Henry says he’s tired of having weaklings as allies and that the rats have offered him a throne. Ripred says he’s a fool to believe King Gorger will deliver what he’s promised. 

Fifty rats show up and encircle the questers. A huge silver rat appears with a gold crown on one of his ears—Luxa gasps, as it clearly belonged to one of her parents. King Gorger looks at Gregor, the warrior, and says he expected a lot more. Ripred tells the King not to judge Gregor too quickly: “I have found him delightfully full of surprises” (263). Ripred tells Henry to go stand with his friends. Henry trips and accidentally steps on King Gorger’s tail. The other rats laugh until the King whips his tail around and slashes Gox the spider in half. The King menacingly asks who’s next and says they should eat Boots.

Gregor, determined to save his sister, suddenly remembers the last lines of the prophecy: “The last who will die must decide where he stands,” and Gregor realizes it’s him: “It was Gregor the rats wanted. He was the warrior. He was the threat” (264). Gregor hurdles over King Gorger and runs as fast as he can, leading the rats away from the party. His flashlight dies, and he keeps running, using the light on his hat as a last resort. He hears the rats chasing after him and comes upon the canyon of immeasurable depth. Gregor thinks again of the prophecy “so bid him take care, bid him look where he leaps” and knows he must jump. He doesn’t want the rats to eat him. If he’s going to die, it’s better this way. He puts on a final burst of speed and leaps into the canyon. 

Gregor feels himself falling, like when he came to the Underland, except this time, he knows there’s no going back. He suddenly realizes he has company: “The light from his hard hat lit up an astonishing scene. The rats who were chasing him and it must have been about all of them, were falling after him in an avalanche of stone” (268). The ground had given way, bringing the army of rats down with it. Gregor sees Henry among the rats, falling too, and is confused. Only one more quester was supposed to die. Then, Gregor sees Ares flying overhead. The bat dives at top speed. Henry calls out for him, as Gregor feels his own body slam into something hard. He realizes Ares chose to rescue him instead of Henry. The rats and Henry all crash into the bottom of the canyon. Before Gregor knows it, he’s above ground, back with his friends. 

Gregor sees Ripred with three rats who must have joined their side in the last moments of fighting. Gregor asks Ripred what he’ll do, and Ripred says he’ll run. Like the river. He wishes Gregor well, and the rats head off on their way. The questers take flight on their bats and begin the journey back to Regalia. Ares says “I did not know, Overlander. I swear to you, I did not know” (270). Gregor tells Ares he believes him. Ares also says they have trouble because he and Aurora don’t know the exact way back to Regalia. Gregor asks what Luxa thinks they should do and then learns that Luxa has lost the ability to speak because she’s in shock. 

Ares also tells Gregor that Aurora’s wing is torn and needs mending if they are to continue. Gregor suddenly realizes that he is in charge. They land on a cliff, and Gregor sews up Aurora’s wound. He looks at Ares, who is devastated by Henry’s betrayal. He then tends to his own injuries as best he can: his nose is broken, but he decides to leave it until they make it to Regalia, but he doesn’t know the way. Temp suddenly asks Gregor if he hears more rats; Gregor looks down and sees a host of new rats climbing up the side of a waterfall to kill the questers. All hope seems lost until a miracle happens: His father regains consciousness. Gregor is too afraid to go by himself to see his father, so he takes Boots with him. Boots showers their father with love. Gregor finally runs forward and hugs his father. Their father asks how they got to the Underland and where they are. That brings Gregor back to reality: “We’re above a waterfall in the Dead Land. A bunch of rats are trying to scale the wall. A lot of us are hurt and we’re totally lost” (279). 

Gregor’s father sharpens in concentration. He sees Aurora’s wing and asked how Gregor sewed her up. Gregor takes out the metal needle and gives it to his father, who then rubs the needle against a rock. He tells Gregor the rock is a lodestone with a magnetic iron core, and with it, they can make a compass which will show them the way back. As Regalia is in the Northern part of the Underland, and compasses always point north. The needle moves 45 degrees, pointing north. Gregor shows the bats and the questers fly off just as the rats near the top of the cliff. 

They fly high, the carnage of war beneath their feet, and Luxa still in incredible pain and shock. At last, they make it back to the High Hall of Regalia. Dulcet grabs Boots, and Gregor’s father is wheeled away in a stretcher. Luxa doesn’t know how to process everything that’s happened: “There she stood, pale and lost, not even noticing the whirlwind around her. Her beautiful violet eyes were vacant, and her hands hung limply at her sides” (285). Vikus appears, Gregor tells him in short that Henry was working for the rats and made a deal for the throne. Vikus extends his arms to Luxa, who looks up at him vacantly. Gregor tells her “It’s your grandpa” several times before she finally understands and runs into Vikus’s arms.