"I imagine some people were discomfited. No one said anything to me, though, and as far as I can tell it did not result in any drama." 

<How about that.>

<Do Yeerks mostly want to do... math? When they aren't fighting a war?>

"I get the impression that was mostly this specific Yeerk. They have a wide range of interests, though, and I think most would prefer peacetime so they can focus on their interests." He tries to think of the Yeerks and hosts he's spoken to. "They like sharing experiences. Watching television with their human hosts and arguing about who should fall in love with whom, for example. They like company in general, I think. And they seem to find it satisfying to help solve humans' minor life problems for them; one Yeerk helped her host get on speaking terms with her son again, which she had not been able to do alone for a long time." 

<Huh.>

<Seems rather... serendipitous that anyone managed to find a Yeerk they liked under the circumstances. Though I'm not sure what better circumstances would look like, putting the Yeerks one at a time in a particularly tolerant person and prospectives talking to them that way I guess?>

"Yes, I know, it was surprising; I think it was not most hosts by any means, but - a surprising number. I suppose many in the last five years were recruited semi-voluntarily, although the operational security makes the consent part questionable. Anyway, they were talking about using personality metrics to try to match hosts and Yeerks, and then yes, initial conversations and then trial periods if they got along promisingly well." 

<Huh. How many Yeerks are there doing that right now, are we going to run into - paired - engineers, while we're talking about lightbulbs?>

"There are a fairly small number in hosts right now, I think, probably you will not run into any this week by coincidence. The Andalites wanted all of the humans who had been Yeerked until their surrender, even the voluntary hosts, to have some time to reconsider it, which is reasonable of them. And we are still working out the protocols for the new voluntary host program. There is a website for people to sign up, and considerable interest, but the details of how we should screen people and other precautions are complicated and we want to take our time building a sensible system here." 

<A website! Wow. That's so - that's really something after such a long war - well, it's not over yet, I guess ->

"It is not over yet. I am concerned the other planets will be much worse, and messier to handle. The Yeerk invasion on Earth was secret right up until the Yeerks surrendered to us - until days afterward, in fact, we requested the Yeerk-controlled governments be freed so they could discuss things with us before making any announcements to the public. But, in any case, for most humans the first they heard of this was after the surrender, when we could announce upfront that the Yeerks would no longer be permitted involuntary hosts. And the existing faction of Yeerks in favour of voluntary hosts made things easier; they had already been thinking about how they could handle it if they were ever able to advertise, for example." 

<I didn't even know there was a faction like that.>

"Neither did I until afterward. I am unsure it exists on the other worlds, which is one reason things may be harder there." 

<Anything else we should cover this meeting?> inquires Ismea.

Leareth considers it for a moment. "No, not that I can think of. We can schedule more time later if you think of anything, though I do expect to be off-planet some amount; you are welcome to talk to Nayoki, if I am not available, or whichever of my staff I leave in charge." 

<Which one is Nayoki?>

"She is quite recognizable." Leareth pushes a memory of her to them via Mindspeech. 

<We don't have practice telling you apart but if she's the only one in that color it should help. Thanks!> And off they trot.

Leareth smiles to himself, catches up on some notes about their conversation, and then goes back to his work. He does another iteration of tests on the forced-demorphing setup, murdering another rabbit and troubleshooting the cause this time. He thinks it's getting closer but it's still very finicky to work with. He practices tail-sparring whenever he needs a break. 

:Cayaldwin?: he sends, a couple of days later. :I am going to meet Mhalir to talk about war plans this morning - do you want him afterward for morph research?: 

<Sure, I'll have him, if you do the magic the same way.>

:Certainly, I can do that:

He Gates over and talks to Mhalir for a while about war plans. Most of it isn't that sensitive, and he can do it while Mhalir is with Amanda. Some of the more secret elements, he's planning to cover on the trip back to the Andalite base. 

<...All right, I will go with Leareth again now> Mhalir tells Amanda eventually. <I will be back by tomorrow night. Enjoy your break> 

Have fun. Don't let the Andalites murder you.

Mhalir is pretty sure the Andalites don't intend to murder him even a little bit. Probably plenty of them want to, but - well, he's providing a lot of help to Cayaldwin on the morph research, and extensive planning with Leareth on taking the rest of the Yeerk worlds, and also he's the one holding together the various coalitions of Yeerks on Earth and holding off a literal rebellion from the less Andalite-friendly ones. He's not very worried about murder. 

Leareth casts all of the usual compulsions and then holds Mhalir to his ear. He bids Amanda a good afternoon and Gates out. 

:- I was thinking: he tells Mhalir as he walks through the base looking for Cayaldwin. :We are fairly sure the Yeerk high command has no way of knowing what happened on Earth. We have an excellent opportunity to send you in, in someone who can composite-morph Alloran-with-Gifts, and you could buy a significant length of time by giving them fake updates while that person took advantage of the opportunity to mind-control literally everyone important. I think this would only be safe once, it would be too likely afterward that a message could have gotten out without our knowledge, but for this... I think it is worth risking: