<I told Leareth that when he was upset that on Earth they torture their pigs and chickens and cows. I think that in the past I have felt grief over losses and not - had trouble continuing to do my job - and I am not sure why this time is different.>

:They torture them? Wait, why–: Vanyel breaks off. :Nevermind. I think sometimes it adds up over time. But - I'm pretty sure you'll be all right, soon. You already seem a lot better than when I got here and it hasn't even been very long: 

<If I don't have a good model of what went wrong I can't reasonably try to start doing important things again.>

Nod. :That's responsible. Maybe once you've slept some, you could ask Melody to help you figure it out? She's really good at that: 

<Maybe. Of course, having had a lot of magic done to my brain is itself reason to worry I shouldn't do important things.>

:Is it? I, um, trust my ability to do important things a lot more because Melody's done some magic to my brain: 

<Well, if she's in your command structure I think that's different.>

:I don't think she's technically in my command structure, um, other than being Valdemaran, she reports to Healers and I'm a Herald. Er, we should ask her what she did and whether it's the kind that sticks around or just does something in the moment but you'll swing back to normal by tomorrow: 

<I would like to know that.> Empathy is now catching mostly tired. Confused and sad and very very tired. 

No wonder. What a ridiculous day, poor Matirin. Vanyel keeps holding him. 

Yfandes frees herself and nudges the door open so she can Mindspeak Melody. 

Melody has, in the meantime, been getting some actual briefings from various other people. She comes in still wearing her usual mild expression. 

:Cayaldwin's stable: she tells Matirin. :Not lucid enough to morph yet but he's going to pull through. Ashul is making plans to depart for Earth. How are you feeling now?: 

<I still don't understand why the Yeerks surrendered but I'm having fewer symptoms about it.>

:He wanted to know what you did on him and whether it'll have lasting effects: Vanyel prompts. 

:Oh. Right. It won't, it was a one-off - I did something you could've done on your own without any magic, actually, I just would've had to teach you how and I didn't think I could when you were so, er, unable to parse sentences:

She peers at him, gauging how well he's processing sentences right now. Better, she thinks. :Basically, what you were doing was - having a lot of normal emotional reactions in the aftermath of a very high stakes disaster, which were taking up tons of space in your mind, but you were blocking them out of your conscious mind, which meant that all you noticed was - not having any space in your head to think, and not being able to tell why. And the best way to get more ability-to-think back was to notice the emotions and do some processing, free up the cognition they were eating, so I just poked you to stop blocking it. You could go right back to ignoring all your emotions if you want, although I wouldn't recommend it, please don't do that yet. Does that make sense?: 

<I think so. I appreciate your help.>

:Ready to demorph and take some sleeping drugs? ...Or not, you look exhausted, you might sleep just fine without them: 

He starts to demorph. <I might. Are - the others getting ready to sleep also ->

:Think so. If they're not they should be, everyone's been up since the middle of the night and sleep deprivation makes you stupid, which we can't afford right now. Er, I'm sorry about human morph being unexpectedly bad for this, I do think it helped on my side: 

<Andalites exhibit distress less.> Indeed he's back to showing no signs of it.

:I noticed: Melody herself yawns. :Van, I know you had more sleep than these people, but don't stay up too late doing strategy, it'll be more productive when we have more information to go on: 

:...Can I sleep with the Andalite herd?: Yfandes asks. :I heard Rasha did, on Earth. And I'm the only Companion here right now: 

<Yes, of course.> A flicker of some emotion that isn't tired sadness.

Then Yfandes will follow him out once he's demorphed, and make sure she's snuggled up next to him as the herd assembles. 

And everybody can get some sleep while they leave Velgarth and head back towards Earth's solar system. They're leaving some people behind, just in case this was all an elaborate ruse specifically to get them to get the Dome ship which the Yeerks have been hiding the capability to shoot down. And they're going to land way out far from the planet, for the same reason.

But - but maybe they beat the Yeerks and now the Yeerks have surrendered? No one quite knows what to think about that.