the departure

[instar]

Trouble did a very good job of not leaving breadcrumbs leading to the other Animorphs any more than was already inevitable. Still, the cops - who may or may not have been Controllers - talked to Bella just because Trouble has been known to hang out with her; they talked to Renée a little too. Bella thinks she did a good job of affecting ignorance and dismay. Andi didn't, but Andi defaults kind of expressionless anyway even though her braces have been off for a year and a half.

At school - now in its very last days - everyone knows that Trouble borrowed fifty dollars from Amber Jefferson and made off with it. Amber is very gossipy and can afford to lose fifty bucks; he chose well.

Bella hasn't heard from Trouble - or for that matter Aspret - yet.

Comments

[aeskhyne]

"Good question. I'm not sure," says Trouble. "He got the job from Visser One, and that's pretty much all I know about Visser One, so maybe Visser One will come back or maybe somebody'll get promoted."

[pandion]

<How does the general structure of Vissers and so on work?>

[aeskhyne]

"There's a Council of Thirteen back on the home planet, and they're the big bosses. Then there's Vissers - no idea how many - the lower the number, the more important they are, and a bunch more Sub-Vissers with the same deal. The rest of them have numbers too - Aspret is Aspret 112 - but that just means they're the umptieth Yeerk born with that name."

[pandion]

<Are the local Yeerks in pretty regular contact with the higher-ups?>

[aeskhyne]

"Well, Aspret sure wasn't. If anybody else was, she didn't hear about it or it didn't seem important."

[pandion]

<What about ordinary Yeerks on other planets?>

[aeskhyne]

"What, are these ones in contact with them, you mean? No. The higher-ups might be; the grunts aren't."

[pandion]

<Interstellar communication is expensive? No one thinks it's important? They're on radio silence for security reasons?>

[aeskhyne]

"I think it's more like a hierarchy thing. You have to get a ways up the ladder before you're allowed into the fancy shit."

[pandion]

<What sorts of things earn rewards like that?>

[aeskhyne]

He hesitates.

"...Being useful," he says at last. "Like Aspret's biochemistry, or Visser Three's Andalite host. The Yeerks want to conquer or destroy every other species they can find. The better somebody is at helping get that done, the more stuff they get."

[pandion]

Write, write.

<Did she have any guesses about the chemical warfare stuff?>

[aeskhyne]

"Not that she told me about."

[pandion]

<Do you have any based on what she told you?>

[aeskhyne]

"Not off the top of my head."

[pandion]

<Will you let me know if you think of any?>

[aeskhyne]

"Sure."

[pandion]

<Did she know anything that could let us sabotage Kandrona generators?>

[aeskhyne]

"Nope," says Trouble. "She didn't even know where the one in Phoenix is."

[pandion]

<So it isn't, say, essential to station it exactly ten meters above the exact center of the pool, or anything. Damn.>

[aeskhyne]

"Nope, no such luck."

[pandion]

<Thoughts on how likely it is other Yeerks we manage to take alive will take the duck deal and not sell us out?>

[aeskhyne]

"Most Yeerks wouldn't even think of taking the duck deal. Aspret was just, you know, fed up and terrified."

[pandion]

<What about it wouldn't they like, exactly?>

[aeskhyne]

"...When I say they wouldn't even think of it, I mean it like... that almost doesn't make sense as a question. Like, imagine you went up to a random person on the street and offered them twenty bucks to shoot the President. I bet you can guess most people wouldn't take it, but I sure couldn't tell you exactly what about it would put people off, except, you know, some kid just offered them twenty bucks to assassinate the President? Maybe some people wouldn't go for it because they believe in democracy, and some people wouldn't go for it because they don't want to kill anybody, and some people wouldn't go for it because it'd be dangerous, and some people wouldn't go for it because they wouldn't even know how, and some people wouldn't go for it because twenty bucks is too low, or a bunch of those reasons or a bunch of completely different reasons or just because there's no room in their head to even take an idea like that seriously."