cassie morphs yeerk! i've been waiting for this one! tumblr likes it and i have vague memories of it. god, cassie really is our emotional viewpoint char for understanding the other, isn't she? yeerk peace front ftw! ~~~ I continue to say that "Controller" is a very handy way of depersoning a yeerk's victim. Because you only acknowledge the yeerk that is controlling them. You could call them a "Controlled" or a "Puppet" but that puts the focus on the innocent human or hork bajir or whatever you'd be killing. ```Jake was recovering. His face was red. I waited for him to tell them we wouldn’t be going to the dance. I thought he’d say that we had to spend that night doing some kind of Yeerk surveillance or something. But Jake just smiled at me. “We could use a night doing something nice and normal.” “Oh, man,” Marco moaned. “What?” “Every time we try to do something nice and normal it ends up turning out nasty and weird,” he said. “Every single time.”``` every single time. ```Not that Tobias isn’t cute. And he might as well be a new boy. He went to our school for a while, back when he was human. Back before he was trapped in his red-tailed hawk morph. Now no one seemed to recognize him. But, then, he’s totally different from the kid bullies used to pick on. He doesn’t project those I’m-helpless-so-come-and-terrorize-me vibes at all anymore. Partly that comes from living a life where even the good times are dangerous. Partly it’s that he’s sort of forgotten how to express emotions with his face. Smiling when he’s happy just isn’t natural to him anymore, because hawks don’t smile. Now when people look at Tobias, they notice the strangeness of his blank face, not the face itself. Even when he laughs he doesn’t really smile.``` what even are faces. ```Ax’s Andalite body is strange. Strange and beautiful and intimidating, too. Picture this: a blueand-tan deer-like body, a giant scorpion tail, a pair of small arms, a humanoid head with no mouth, and two extra eyeballs mounted on stalks. ``` CASSIE ALSO DOESN'T MENTION HIM HAVING A TORSO!!!!!!!!!!!!! http://andalitetruth.org/ spread the truth!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ```Sometimes when I watch Ax experiencing the sense of taste I find myself thinking about the Yeerks. When they enter a host they get hit with thousands of new sensations. I can hardly wrap my mind around what it must feel like. I have to narrow it down for myself. I’ll pick one thing, like color. Then I’ll close my eyes and try to imagine I have never seen any color of any kind. When I open my eyes the array of colors around me makes me dizzy. And color is only one part of sight. And sight is only one of the new senses Yeerks experience in a host``` that one REALLY Stuck with me. very much an exercise in living in the moment. ```I didn’t bother telling my friends what I was thinking about. None of them are all that interested in considering the joys a Yeerk can find in a host. Not that I blame them. Yeerks are the enemy. It’s easier for us to do our job if we see them as evil. Pure evil.``` the sheer fucking nuance that this series has, not just that even the 'bad guys' can be complex, but that theres empathy and understanding for those who don't WANT the enemy to be complex. oh shit no, is this the one i think it is? where cassie has to perform amature brain surgery on ax? thats right, mr tidwell is with the yeerk liberation front. ```“I am Illim. I control Mr. Tidwell. We are both part of the Yeerk peace movement. We have a message for you from Aftran Nine Four Two,” he continued. I turned and gave Jake an I’m-okay-give-me-a-minute signal. I needed to hear what Mr. Tidwell had to say. He knew Aftran. Maybe that meant Mr. Tidwell was a friend, too. Make that Illim, the Yeerk inside Mr. Tidwell’s head, because that’s really who I was talking to. I felt the muscles in my shoulders relax the tiniest bit``` ```“Aftran has been taken by Yeerk security,” he answered. “When?” I demanded. “Is she okay? What has she told them? Why didn’t you find me sooner?”``` i like her priorities. first is her friend okay. then, operational security. you know its convinieint ax knows exactly what is wrong with him. i never do. ```I couldn’t stop yawning. I felt as if I’d only gotten about fifteen minutes of sleep. Marco and I had taken turns watching Jake last night. Marco was there now. He would be until Tom left for school. We thought in his fever Jake might start talking about something that would prove fatal if Tom overheard.``` man yeah thats a security risk you never think of. ```Only later did it occur to me. Marco had seen the fatal flaw. If I succeeded. If I rescued Aftran. Then what? I’d have an outlaw Yeerk, without a host, and worse by far, without access to life-giving Kandrona rays. I could save Aftran. Only to watch her die.``` rough. ```I didn’t know how Jake did it. How did he make life-or-death decisions and not go insane with guilt and grief?``` ```Mr. Tidwell smiled. “You were always a good student. Unlike Jake, who never completely applies himself.” I sighed. “Well, I wish Jake were here now. It’s time. I have to do this. It’s kind of gross to watch.” “I think I can handle it.” ``` understatement o the year ```The floor rushed up to meet me as I fell off the chair. I hadn’t begun to shrink yet, and I lay there, the world’s largest slug. My entire body made up of slick, squishy flesh. Only my eyes remained unchanged. They stared straight up at the ceiling. Mr. Tidwell appeared above me. His face contorted in horror. I think he was screaming. I couldn’t hear him.``` seriously cassie, "kind of gross" was so misleading. you traumitized this man. ```My sonar picked up a new shape. My Yeerk instincts kicked in. Hard. I stuck out two little protrusions. Felt around until I targeted the small opening. Then I was moving in. Slithering right into Mr. Tidwell’s ear canal. It was a tight fit. I squirted out some kind of painkiller to deaden the canal and squirmed, stretched, pushed bones and tissue aside with surprising strength. I penetrated. Deeper. Puncturing flesh now. Deeper inside. I inched along until I felt the faint tingle of electricity. Yes! This was what I was looking for. The brain! The neurons fired microvolts around me as I stretched. I was paper-thin. Spread like hammereddown Silly Putty. I pressed myself into the cracks and crevices of the brain. Ah! Now I could feel it. The neurons were connecting to me. Making me a part of this strange, wondrous new body ``` just absolute chad level of empathy. becoming the 'evil slug' ```I was blind, almost deaf, and mute. But here’s the strange part. I didn’t care. I was with my brothers and sisters, soaking in the Kandrona rays my body craved. If I’d had a mouth, I would have let out a long ahhh of satisfaction. I was home. I was home? I gave myself a mental slap on both cheeks. I’d let my Yeerk instincts take over for a minute. This was definitely not home.``` so its not all bad. oh god i forgot this. to acomplish her goals, cassie takes over a host she didn't preagree to. they're a voluntary but still. talk about gray morality. ```I gave a squirt of painkiller and wriggled through the ear canal. I spread myself out over the brain. The microvolts of electricity set my body tingling. And I was connected. I frantically opened the girl’s memories. She was a member of The Sharing. This girl - she was a voluntary host. A collaborator. I couldn’t let her get anything from me. No thoughts. No emotions. Nothing even the tiniest bit Cassie``` like jesus. she felt guilty having mr tildwell's memories and now just. this. ```My feet slammed against the metal pier as I launched myself at him. The only thing my host girl was going to get from me was commands like I rammed into Visser Three as hard as I could. He spun toward me, tail blade raised. But he was too shocked and amazed to react. I snatched at Aftran. The Visser closed his fist. But Andalite hands are weak. I bit his wrist. Aftran dropped. I snatched her out of midair and ran. Ran with nowhere to run.``` cassie calls herself a coward yet ran at visser three AS a human while being in yeerk morph controlling said human. ```A bird-poop bull’s-eye.``` im p sure birds can't control their poop like mammals can you know i don't remember how this ends but it occurs to me that Erek can literally generate a portable kandrona (he does it for his own captive yeerk) oh god, she puts a yeerk she HOPES is aftran into ax without his consent. to save his life, because the yeerk can find out where it is. jesus. cassie. you are so reckless and hopeful. ``` Aftran said. Aftran sounded nervous. What would happen to her if Ax’s Tria gland burst while she was still inside his head?``` at the same time, aftra probly figures she's going to die soon from starvation. at least this way she can help her friend before she does. ```“That was one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen,” Erek said with a laugh. “And I’ve seen a lot.” Aftran announced. ``` ```“What’s wrong?” I cried. “Am I hurting him?” Aftran said, her voice suddenly flat. “Ax, listen to me. The Yeerk is Aftran. She helped me save your life,” I cried. Aftran told me. “He doesn’t understand,” I answered. she insisted. ``` poor aftran. poor ax. ```I turned back to Ax. He kept rubbing his ear. I knew he was feeling violated. Repulsed by what I had done to him. “Visser Three was planning to interrogate Aftran tonight,” I said softly as I returned to stitching up Ax’s incision. “He discovered she was part of the peace movement.” he spat. I made the last stitch. “That filthy Yeerk helped save your life. And she very nearly gave her life for peace between human and Yeerk. And now, unless I can think of some way to save her, she will die a slow death of Kandrona starvation.” Ax didn’t say anything. Maybe when he’d gotten some rest, he’d think it over``` ``` she said gently. ``` thats right, they help her become a nothlith whale