There are no more five-person meetings at the Swan household. They're a circle: Bella-Andi-Robin-Ethan-Trouble-Bella again. They meet in twos, threes, pass around information, get it all down in Bella's cipher in Bella's notebooks. They have a list of members of the Sharing, mostly procured by Ethan and to a lesser extent Trouble, but no safe way to learn if these people's behavior has changed; they have seen no more aliens, observed no more disintegrations, caught no one ducking into anything that is an alien hideout.

The twins try to behave normally with their father or his pod person, whichever the person who calls them is, for a value of "normally" that involves adamantly continuing to want nothing to do with the Sharing.

And sometimes crying and refusing to tell Renée what's wrong.

School proceeds. No one's grades see more than a minor downturn as a result of all the alien business.

Andi and Robin play music. Andi's getting pretty good on the drums, although her teacher moves away and she has to hunt up another one, who she sticks with for four lessons before deciding to go self-taught.

Bella tightens up her cipher. It began as a letter substitution and since then has evolved to include plenty of personal shorthand - she turns the ratio of shorthand to straightforward letters up as far as she can and still read the thing herself. She abbreviates, she leaves out spaces, she names things in roundabout ways, she refers to things many notebooks ago that she can find easily that anyone else could spend hours hunting for, if she has to record names she finds ways to describe the spelling without ever placing all of the characters in sequence. Maybe the aliens have super-cryptanalysis and super-OCR and can eat her notebooks in one bite and know everything they know; but maybe not, and maybe if she's careful enough she'll look like she's writing her paranoid diary and not like she's taking notes on the quiet invasion.

Trouble comes over a lot. He stays over a lot. Renée has a quiet conversation about him with Bella, in which Bella is vague, pretends ignorance, suggests that maybe he just likes it here, maybe his folks are allergic to gluten and won't eat his baked goods? Renée leaves it alone.

May begins.

Author: instar	There are no more five-person meetings at the Swan household. They're a circle: Bella-Andi-Robin-Ethan-Trouble-Bella again. They meet in twos, threes, pass around information, get it all down in Bella's cipher in Bella's notebooks. They have a list of members of the Sharing, mostly procured by Ethan and to a lesser extent Trouble, but no safe way to learn if these people's behavior has changed; they have seen no more aliens, observed no more disintegrations, caught no one ducking into anything that is an alien hideout. The twins try to behave normally with their father or his pod person, whichever the person who calls them is, for a value of "normally" that involves adamantly continuing to want nothing to do with the Sharing. And sometimes crying and refusing to tell Renée what's wrong. School proceeds. No one's grades see more than a minor downturn as a result of all the alien business. Andi and Robin play music. Andi's getting pretty good on the drums, although her teacher moves away and she has to hunt up another one, who she sticks with for four lessons before deciding to go self-taught. Bella tightens up her cipher. It began as a letter substitution and since then has evolved to include plenty of personal shorthand - she turns the ratio of shorthand to straightforward letters up as far as she can and still read the thing herself. She abbreviates, she leaves out spaces, she names things in roundabout ways, she refers to things many notebooks ago that she can find easily that anyone else could spend hours hunting for, if she has to record names she finds ways to describe the spelling without ever placing all of the characters in sequence. Maybe the aliens have super-cryptanalysis and super-OCR and can eat her notebooks in one bite and know everything they know; but maybe not, and maybe if she's careful enough she'll look like she's writing her paranoid diary and not like she's taking notes on the quiet invasion. Trouble comes over a lot. He stays over a lot. Renée has a quiet conversation about him with Bella, in which Bella is vague, pretends ignorance, suggests that maybe he just likes it here, maybe his folks are allergic to gluten and won't eat his baked goods? Renée leaves it alone. May begins.
Author: aeskhyne	Trouble decides one day that everybody should go swimming together. He names the following Saturday and orchestrates all the arrangements; they meet; fun is had. After everyone is out of the pool, he volunteers the location of a nearby hole-in-the-wall that serves exquisite jalapeno poppers. It's only a fifteen-minute walk. Ethan vouches that the place is divine, and Trouble leads them there, across a few streets and down a few more and through a desolate architectural graveyard where the rusting skeletons of never-finished buildings throw ominous spiky shadows along the dusty gravel. By the time they're finished eating, the sun has set and the shadows are considerably more ominous. But they're going to have to cross if they want to catch the next bus; it's a big lot, and going around would more than double their travel time.
Author: pandion	"This place is spooky."
Author: instar	"The alternative is walking for half an hour. Although I'd walk that far for those poppers, they were about fifteen million times better than the outside of that place suggests."
Author: aeskhyne	Trouble beams.
Author: palmofyourhand	"Our boy Trouble is a connoiseur of the delicious yet suspicious," says Ethan.
Author: instar	"Maybe we should've got a to-go box. They're probably not as good leftover, but still."
Author: pandion	"Ooh. But I wanna go home, I'm kind of tired. Next time Mom can give us a ride."
Author: hold_infinity	"There should definitely be a next time," asserts Robin, hopping casually over a fallen girder.
Author: alicornucopia	There are many lights overhead. It's dark; there are stars. There's a blue-white shooting star. That... changes speeds. And gets closer.
Author: hold_infinity	"...The hell is that?" says Robin, staring.
Author: instar	"Hmm?" asks Bella, carefully picking her way around a gravel heap.
Author: hold_infinity	"Th—holy shit," says Robin, freezing in the middle of raising her arm to point, "it's a bloody spaceship." And indeed, the point of light is coming down fast, close enough now to be identifiable to anyone with good distance vision.
Author: instar	"Holy shit, hide," Bella says.
Author: pandion	Andi dives behind a pile of sand.
Author: hold_infinity	Robin ducks into the building frame next to her, just behind the ten-foot vertical slab of concrete that is its only solid wall. She drags Ethan with her.
Author: aeskhyne	Trouble is out front of everyone else, almost halfway across the flat empty space between four skeletal buildings. He picks a direction - left - and runs, but he's not going to make it to cover before the ship lands. Or crashes. Crashes is also looking like an option.
Author: alicornucopia	It doesn't crash. It stops, about a hundred feet above the clearing. It has an egg-shaped front part, a school-bus-length corridor with stubby wings aft, and a curvy scorpion tail arching up over it from the end. It descends. It lands. The blue lights all over it go off, but even in the starlight it's possible to see black streaks of damage on the hull.
Author: instar	"Damaged but no bullet holes," Bella says. She's hiding with Andi, and Ethan and Robin might just be able to hear her too. "Not Earth-weapon damage. Aliens aren't all friends? Don't know which kind this is though..."
Author: aeskhyne	Trouble, not five steps away from a stack of enormous concrete pipes that could hide him easily, trips and falls flat on his face. He rolls to a sitting position and glances fearfully back at the ship. His own reasoning must lead him down a similar path to Bella's, because he gets to his feet and heads for the damaged vessel, brushing clouds of chalky construction-site dust from his jeans.
Author: morphbox	The ship opens. The mechanism isn't clear; but a shape of light dilates until it's a full circle in the nose of the ship. An alien steps delicately out. He isn't the sharp kind. Or - not the same sharp kind. The end of his tail is definitely sharp. The rest of him looks harmless, gentle, deerlike - a blue centaur, with extra eyes on stalks, extra fingers on his hands. He has no mouth, and his nose is just three vertical slits. He's got a burn all down his right side.
Author: aeskhyne	"That looks nasty," breathes Trouble, somewhat enviously.
Author: morphbox	The alien looks at Trouble, with all four eyes for a moment, and then the stalk ones go back to scanning what his main eyes don't cover. He staggers. <Yes. I am dying,> he replies.
Author: aeskhyne	"I'm sorry," says Trouble.
Author: morphbox	&ltWill your friends come out? I will not harm them,> the alien says. <I bring a warning.>
Author: aeskhyne	...Trouble glances back at said friends. He can't see any of them.
Author: pandion	Andi peeks. She peeks a little harder. She whispers to the others, "This isn't the same kind. Trouble looks okay."
Author: hold_infinity	Robin peeks, too. And then she steps out.
Author: palmofyourhand	Ethan follows.
Author: pandion	Andi goes after none of them are immediately vaporized.
Author: instar	Bella follows, clutching her sister's hand, maybe for balance.
Author: aeskhyne	Trouble turns back to the alien. "A warning about what?"
Author: morphbox	<An invasion. The Yeerks. They are parasites.> And then everyone gets a picture of - A greenish-gray slug, large for a slug but easily pocket-sized. <They need hosts. They enter through the ear. Without them they are almost powerless, but when they become Controllers - when they wrap around a host brain and take over their thoughts and actions - they are dangerous. They prefer cooperation. They do not need it. We had hoped to stop them, but soon they will be here to obliterate all trace of me and my ship.>
Author: aeskhyne	"Talk about pod people," mutters Trouble. "So what are you warning us for? How do we know who to spill to? A bunch of kids aren't gonna stop an alien invasion by themselves."
Author: morphbox	<I...> The alien turns all four eyes towards Trouble again, even as the others approach. <I may be able to give you some small advantage. It may help. If you go into my ship you will find a blue box, very plain.>
Author: instar	"How many Yeerks are there? How do you understand English? How can we identify Controllers if we're not sure? Can we get Yeerks out of people? What about the other aliens with all the blades? Are there more of you coming to help? What powers can you give us?"
Author: aeskhyne	"Going," says Trouble. He heads into the ship to look for the box.
Author: morphbox	<There are many millions of Yeerks. And they can breed quickly when there are hosts for them. On this planet - I do not know, but tens of thousands, at least. Controllers can mimic their hosts perfectly if they wish, but Yeerks must leave their hosts once every -> He pauses to make some kind of calculation. <Three Earth days, to go into a Yeerk pool and feed on Kandrona rays, from their home sun or an engineered duplicate. Longer than that and they begin to starve.> He pauses again, main eyes shutting briefly, perhaps in pain. <If you have seen a bladed alien that was not my kind it was probably a Hork-Bajir. They are peaceful of themselves, but their world fell years ago and are now all infested by Yeerks. More Andalites like myself may come to help here but I know not when. And -> He holds his hand out for the blue box.
Author: aeskhyne	Trouble hands it over.
Author: morphbox	<I can, if you are willing -> His stalk eyes crane upward, scan the sky. <I can give you the power to morph. Any animal you can touch and concentrate on will be yours to become. The Yeerks do not have this technology. There are limits, but it may help you.>