Animorphs re read #19- The Departure

[buffyangellvr23.livejournal.com]

Cassie begins struggling with her feelings about the war and the killing, and decides she has had enough. She says she's leaving the group and runs into the woods where she meets a young controller named Karen and the yeerk Aftran in a meeting that we will later see having big effects.

I've been waiting for this book because I'm extremely curious about our thoughts and comments surrounding the book and its themes.
What do you think of Aftran's comparison of humans' predatory habits and yeerk's parasitic habits?
Do you think many of us would empathize with the yeerks if we were born into bodies like theirs?
hmm...how about, why do you think many yeerks don't feel anything for their hosts? Especially after so much anguish in the host's mind.
Do you think there could be a better way? (this one might be difficult though because there's a tendancy to think of the YPM and the Iskoort...)
I personally don't think it makes what they do right but Cassie and Aftran's talk definately provokes a lot of thought.

I think I can see the distinction between the Visser Three brother thing and Aftran's situation...brother in this case two grubs means born from the same parent yeerks while in Visser Three's case it was like identical twins, two from one grub. In case anyone wondered.

There's a lot of good writing fodder here. I'd love to see stories like Aftran's memory of seeing and hearing for the first time.

Remember the rules...I think it might be okay with this book to bring later stuff like the peace faction and iskoort into it but try your best to stick to this book if at all possible. Start out on topic even if you drift off topic later on. Keep it civil and respectful.

Next week: There's a new Animorph in town.
(what DID happen to our regular re-read host?)

Comments

[aphrodite-mine.livejournal.com]

I haven't been doing the re-read cause I'm up to my ears in schoolwork, but it's been interesting to watch what's going on in the community...

I think I'm going to kick this one off by being totally immature and say: This is the book that sealed my hatred for Cassie. I'd always been a Rachel fan, and for Cassie to question everything and freaking QUIT? That was it. I told all my friends I wasn't going to read a Cassie book ever again. (Which of course didn't last.)

[sporadicfungian.livejournal.com]

This is the book that sealed my hatred for Cassie.
Ha, me too! Of course I still read it like 800 times... (I was a quick reader and an obsessive middle schooler, oh yes).

[deslumbrar.livejournal.com]

Ay yi yi. Okay, Cassie may not be my very super favorite character, but I still like her a whole heck of a lot. Except for in this book. This may very well be my least favorite Cassie book. I can't stand her hypocrisy and self-centered whining, especially during the scene in the barn when she makes her "omg u guys, I can't dooo this, it's too haaaard. But you all go ahead and get yourselves killed trying to save the planet. Have a groovy time." *incoherent keyboard wrecking sounds*

Rachel sums it up perfectly when she says that Cassie has pretty much told the entire human race to go to hell, as long as she, Cassie, won't have to have her delicate feelings hurt. It's like, what, Cassie doesn't care that everyone else in the group is being traumatized by the war, too? Is her trauma somehow more valid because she's "special?" Do I care about her self-righteous drama fest?

Okay. All that ranting said, I still think this is an incredibly important book for the human/Yeerk and parasite/host thematics. Aftran redeems the heck out of it for me, especially by raising these incredibly uncomfortable questions that the Anis haven't really considered before. I think they're a bit of a reality check for Cassie, although she still manages to make it All About Her, but whatever.

As for most Yeerks not empathizing with their hosts, well, you can't do that with someone you're going to conquer and control. YPM aside, it seems most Yeerks buy into the whole deal that they don't have any other choice; it's either a life of blind helplessness or aggressive domination. And, again, it's hard to enslave someone you care about. Better to depersonalize and objectify them, which makes it far easier to slither into their head.

[daphne-23.livejournal.com]

I never read Cassie's quitting as because she was being traumatised by the war (although that was obviously the case); her major argument always seemed to me to be that she couldn't justify committing such violence any longer even to win, that if she continued along these lines they'd be as bad as the Yeerks. (At least this is the way she argues in later books in the series). Hence, I don't see her as self-centred, as this latter argument still seems to me to be an extremely difficult call to make. I agree, however, that her leaving scene in this book could have been handled better as it was a bit rushed and sudden, probably to fit into the required length limit for the book.

I'm surprised that several people have commented that this book made them like Cassie less, as Cassie was definitely my least favourite character until #19; I remember when first reading the blurb for it being thrilled that she was leaving! This was the book that first made Cassie interesting for me, although I agree she can often be the hardest to empathise with. Her decision to remain as a catapillar in this book is incredibly striking; I find it hard to see how she can be read as self-centred after that scene. Although there was a way out (again, probably due to series constraints; I think someone commented on an earlier post in this comm that the book would be stronger had Cassie had to remain trapped in morph, which is true) she didn't know that at the time, so the gesture was equally brave. This is one of my absolute favourites in the series.

[deslumbrar.livejournal.com]

...her major argument always seemed to me to be that she couldn't justify committing such violence any longer even to win, that if she continued along these lines they'd be as bad as the Yeerks.

I see your point, and that *is* something that the Anis as a whole address several times in the course of the series. Thing is, Cassie knew right from day one that this was not a diplomatic matter, where they could all sit down and draw up a treaty and have done with it. That they have to fight is awful, and scary, and it does wreck any semblance they have of normal lives - but what else are they supposed to do? Yes, Aftran and the YPM offer an alternative, one that eventually comes to fruition. But for the majority of the series, the Yeerks who are willing to compromise are in the minority. Most of them, at best, have few qualms about taking human hosts; at worst, they'd love nothing better than to totally enslave Earth before moving on to the next planet.

So on one hand, yes, the group, including Cassie, has to draw a line for how far they're willing to go before becoming the enemy. On the other, at this point they've collectively agreed that they cannot stand back and just let the invasion happen. Bottom line: it's not about them, it's about the human race. For Cassie to step out so suddenly interrupts the group as a cohesive defense and, ultimately, diminishes their chances for success. Her choice, in the long run, is right, and helps create a viable alternative to fighting it out. In the context of book #19, though, I still think it was ill-timed and selfish.

[daphne-23.livejournal.com]

You make good points :) I agree, though I didn't make it clear in my previous post, that Cassie leaving the Animorphs in the way she does in the context of #19 was a bad choice and did leave the rest of the group in an unfair position. However, I think I tend to sympathise more with the stress Cassie was under and therefore not view her as selfish, rather as impulsive and temporarily blinkered. Previous to this book other Animorphs (Marco in #5, Rachel in #7) considered leaving (esp. Marco), so she's not the only one to have been tempted, and I think that even without the entire Karen/Aftran incident she would definitely have returned reasonably quickly. It's true that she knew the terms of the war from the start, but that's not the same as experiencing prolonged fighting on the front line & I find it quite believable that she might suddenly snap.

However, I definitely admit that a lot of my sympathy for Cassie's shortsightedness at the beginning of this book comes from my admiration for what she does at the end of it with the catapillar morph incident (sorry I seem to be unable to spell catapillar properly!) and so maybe her previous actions do deserve to be judged more harshly. My favourable impression of her character in this book as a whole remains the same, though.

I agree the Chee raise a similar issue but this post is already too long... :) I do love #10 as well for its exploration of Erek's dilemma.

[deslumbrar.livejournal.com]

I have mixed feelings on the book's ending. I really respect Cassie's point, that it's possible to establish trust with one's enemy, however tenuous it may be. I also feel that it was seriously undermined by the Deus Ex Butterfly thing, but I'd rather have Cassie saved by a loophole than be out of the series only 19 books in. And as annoyed as I get with her in this one, her reaching out to Aftran was huge, and I don't think anyone else could have done that.

[apatheticity.livejournal.com]

I agree completely with you - I think Cassie was arrogant and self-centered and any other bad words I can think of.

But that raises the question of the Chee. Erek had the power to rewrite the programming of ALL Chee, not just his. And instead, he rewrote his own for a few minutes to save everyone. If they had the help of the Chee in battle instead of just in information giving, the war could probably be theirs.

Instead, Erek re-rewrites his programming for no violence, and the end of that book is Jake and Marco throwing the Pemalite crystal into the ocean (wtf is up with that, anyway? How does that make ANY sense?).

Does the fact that Erek and the rest of the Chee hate violence, but could have possibly won the war for the Animorphs make them selfish?

What I really hate is that the Chee know what they're fighting for - free world and possibly the freedom of the universe and all that - and still stand by their refusal to fight. And all the Animorphs agree with Erek when he goes all 'I can't ever do that again I need to rewrite the programming again wahwahwah' just because they've been a peaceful race for millions of years and that was the first time a Chee or Pemalite took the life of any creature.

All the Animorphs make sacrifices, including Cassie. Even if she can be selfish. What right do the Chee have to go all 'we hate the Yeerks but we still can't help you much'?

[apatheticity.livejournal.com]

whoo longer comment than I wanted XD

[deslumbrar.livejournal.com]

Hmm, interesting argument about the Chee. (Also, if they were supposed to be totally pacifistic, why'd the Pemalites give them a capacity for violence at all?) I think Erek's situation had a key difference. Even though his decision had major philosophical/cultural/psychological repurcussions, in the end? It didn't impact the Chee's safety. You could argue that Cassie's decision to drop out of the fight would have a detrimental effect on the group's success, both in individual missions and in the overall war. Like Rachel said, Cassie basically told the human race to screw off so that she wouldn't have to turn into Rachel.

Also, there's a big margin between sitting out of a fight and turning oneself into a superweapon, and I think that's a far more valid area for Anis to consider drawing the all-important line. Yes, having the Chee flip out like vaguely canine ninjas all over the Yeerks would've won the war, but there's little difference between that and, say, just nuking the heck out of the local Pool from orbit. And again, the Anis *had* to take on the responsiblity of defending the planet, and they made the choice to uphold it. Sticky as it is, it's not really their place to just decide that, hey, the Chee need to suck it up and fight, too.

Besides, who wants to spend several weeks trying to convince the Chee to reprogram themselves, when the time could be spent doing fun stuff like morphing moles? ;)

[kletta.livejournal.com]

I think Florence Meyeres has translated “...so long as you, Cassie, don't have to end up turning into me” into French as something like “...so long as you, Cassie, don’t become what I have become.” (This was the first Animorphs book I skimmed in French, the one in which I first saw terminology like Vysserk—AFAIK, visser in French means “to screw (in/on)”.)


"YPM aside, it seems most Yeerks buy into the whole deal that they don't have any other choice; it's either a life of blind helplessness or aggressive domination."

Does exactly this book show a third choice? It might not even mention Yeerks being able to quickly release and take control while in a host, as Iniss does in #2. And like I’ve said in a comment to an earlier post, I wonder why Cassie would become a caterpillar rather than continue as Aftran’s voluntary host. Also, wouldn’t some kinds of alternatives depend on the actions of others, rather than the Yeerks themselves?

[deslumbrar.livejournal.com]

That's true; voluntary hosts would be a third option. And I think that ties into, as you said, some alternatives depending on others rather than the Yeerks themselves. If I remember right, a character in #29 explains to Cassie that he's formed a symbiotic relationship with his Yeerk. He even says something like how he feels "empty" when it's not in his head.

I suppose Cassie could have done the same and let Aftran infest her, but I can't help thinking that once the other Anis found out, they'd freak and try to starve Aftran out of her. Also, if Cassie kept Aftran with her, she'd have to go to the Pool every three days to let Aftran feed, not to mention that she'd be privy to everything Cassie knew about the group.

[tallyslium.livejournal.com]

Aftran was unique in that for the first time you had a Yeerk that sympathized with humans, and really felt uncomfortable about what she was doing to her host. This book, I think, kind of sets up the plot for #29.

Also, while I didn't like that Cassie had essentially abandonned her friends, it was good that in the end that she had kept her promise to Aftran and morphed into the caterpillar. Though of course there was a way out of it and no consequences XD

[kon-no-yume.livejournal.com]

Wow, most of what I was going to say has already been said. Cassie's whining did get on my nerves, but I think her arguments about "being as bad as the yeerks" is important and something that comes up again. It's especially important because it's easy in kids books to have consequence less violence, and I like that that isn't the case with Animorphs.

I also loved Aftran and the perspective we get from her in this book. It's one of the things I really like about Animorphs is that KAA never lets you get comfortable with the idea "yeerks are evil, must kill to save world." She makes sure there's ambiguity which I think makes it a much stronger and more realistic series.

[iapetusneume.livejournal.com]

Cassie got on my nerves in this book, but it didn't last because it helped show that she's human. It helped show that she isn't perfect, and what happens when the stress of real life interacts with one's morals. I've always related the most to Cassie, and so a part of me dies each time I have to see her make these hard choices that I'm sure would destroy me.

It also isn't like they got out of this mess unscarred. I always thought this was the first dramatic turn in Cassie and Rachel's relationship. I don't think they were ever able to reach the level it was before after this point.

[starsong24.livejournal.com]

Slight change of tone: I LOVED Cassie in this book.

The way she talked about not being able to feel any more -not being able to sympathise or grieve -really hit me in the gut. I liked Cassie so much because she felt for people, and for her to have that loss of feeling seemed somehow worse than if anyone else had been feeling it. And the fact that she chose to leave instead of continue with slowly losing herself seemed both realistic and valid.

The whole Aftran part seemed very much tied into Cassie's ethics -she doesn't want to cause pain, doesn't want to kill a child, doesn't think that the ends justify the means. That she chose to let Aftran/Karen live was sort of a call-back to her previous decision to kill.

It wasn't necessarily a happy book, but it was beautiful. There was so much sadness and anger, and yet there was hope, too.

[arglefumph.livejournal.com]

I'd agree, kinda. This book seemed necessary for Cassie because it gave her someone to fight for. It reminded me of Book 5, where Marco was planning on quitting the war, but decided not to once he learned about his mother. He's in the war because he's fighting for his mother. Similarly, Jake is fighting for Tom, and Rachel is fighting for Melissa. But Cassie never had any such person. She needed this book; she needed someone like Aftran so she could have somebody to fight for.

Or at least, that's how my middle-school self justified the book to me.

As for the escaped leopard and the butterfly/natural morphing stuff...those were a lot less realistic to me than Cassie's decision to leave the group. I mean, natural morphing, talk about a total BS way to keep Cassie as an Animorph.

[kletta.livejournal.com]

What do you mean by “fight for”? In #29, it becomes obvious that Cassie must fight to protect Aftran and others like her from the Yeerk Empire, but I don’t remember this book counting such a danger among Aftran’s sacrifices. Although it does show how much she has to fear from her superiors, and I’ve even wondered about how “freeing Karen” sounds like the other Yeerks will just forget about her family.

To me, the book rather sounds like Cassie wants to continue being an Animorph so she can continue interacting with Yeerks and try to make peace with them--but is that the only way to do that? Even from #29, I’m not sure exactly what Aftran thinks about it. Though all along, she did want Cassie to demorph into her usual (morph-capable) form, so that seems to follow from the characters’ intentions.

[sporadicfungian.livejournal.com]

I mentioned in a response upthread that this book sealed my Cassie-hate, and this is true, but I do have to say, I don't hate her as a person, and I do sympathize with her--honestly, if I were put in that situation, I'd probably react more like Cassie than any of the others. I just found her sort of irritatingly self-righteous, and her books tended to be dull compared to everyone else's, IMO. In retrospect, I also felt like her books were sort of monotonous--everyone else shifted and changed and had to deal with that as the series progressed, but Cassie just dug her heels in where she was.

Plus, she's probably the least funny character, and funny goes a long way with me. Heh. Also, most of my favorite parts of the books were the interactions between Animorphs, and she's on her own for most of this book. Those kinds of books didn't generally sit well with me. (huge exception: 33, because I was a giant Tobias fangirl).

I did really like the ethical questions raised by this book, because I was a weird 12-year-old and was intellectually excited by having these books present to me questions like, can you really blame the Yeerks for what they are doing, and can you really justify so many casualties no matter what the outcome.

[kletta.livejournal.com]

Like daphne_23, I think this book (and most of the others) is constrained by requirements for the series: most of the story depends on the fact that over decades, even if anyone on any side (including home fronts) who knew about the existence of the morphing technology has thought of the Yeerks getting it (or the Taxxons, or Andalites simply feeding Taxxons), then no one in a position to offer it has heard and liked the idea, even as a tradeoff. It also depends on a breach of the law of Seerow’s kindness, and then near the beginning, I think Aximili lifts all limits on what knowledge he’s willing to share. But even if that law forbids not only giving people info about Andalite technology, but also just letting them use it, the surest way to prevent people from morphing might be to offer to make them nothlits …

Still, this book focuses on the limited possibilities of Aftran, Cassie, Karen, and the other Animorphs at this point in time. Actually, I find it interesting how, AFAIK, we don’t see Karen take part in the discussion beyond showing she doesn’t want to remain Aftran’s host. Anyway, it sounds to me as if Cassie’s (and her allies’?) view might include a kind of “doctrine of acts and omissions”: not “you have a duty not to harm, but no duty to help”, but rather “you have a duty not to harm and to help people avoid being harmed by others, but no duty to help people who just happen to be suffering”. Or at least I don’t remember the option of long-term voluntary hosting even mentioned in #19, and in later books, especially before #50, I don’t know how much importance characters give to giving (peace movement) Yeerks bodies, as a goal in itself. Aftran eventually accepts Cassie’s view, but perhaps some Yeerks who take involuntary hosts might not?

This reminds me of what a character says in the third chapter of Broken (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/2287860/1/Broken) by Anifan1: “A lot of people in the world are starving. They would probably agree to Yeerk control if it meant that their living conditions would be improved. ” Here (http://www.felicifia.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=135) I read last year that cataract blindness can be cured for about 22 U.S. dollars. Karen might be an heir to a small fortune--in the future, she might meet many more people who were born with much less than her. I thought of writing a post-war fic about these issues, but then realized I don’t know whether extreme poverty exists in the Animorphs’ world (long) after the war.

When Cassie talks about how Karen wants to, but can’t, tell her mom she loves her, does she mean that Aftran won’t say it for her, or that that’s not the same? (I’m not sure what Yeerks acting just like their human hosts exactly means: in #2, their other concerns lead to showing noticeably less love; in the example in #10, they lead to a noticeable end to all problems in a relationship.)

Wikipedia describes Aftran as the founder and/or leader of the YPM, but is this said in this book or anywhere else? Also, #29 repeatedly describes Aftran as fighting, but I don’t know the details. Wouldn’t she and the other Yeerks have at least as many issues about fighting the empire as Cassie and its other enemies have? The greatest damage I can remember them doing is cutting a tentacle off Esplin, which wouldn’t matter after he demorphed. The YPM seems like one of those groups to whom the Animorphs could give the morphing power, but don’t...series constraints again, I guess: this story is about six people (as Jake purposefully chooses in #54).

BTW, I think that at Torrey’s Animorphs forum, there might have been a user named Aftran whose official name was Karen.

[kletta.livejournal.com]

Sorry, my comment was too long, so I'm posting one part separately: about the Yeerks’ alternatives (I don’t strongly believe in the existence of objective morality, so I wouldn’t call anything “better”).

About the Iskoort: I don’t think the relationship between Yeerks and hosts depends primarily on whether they’re able to live without each other, and it’s not obvious to me that it would help them to lose the ability to live without each other. Perhaps artificial symbiotes would be better in that they’d be constructed not to suffer from Yeerks, but then would they be given a consciousness of their own at all?

About what actually happens later (some of which I’ve said in a previous comment): well, in this book, the Animorphs accept Aftran living as a blind slug instead of dying. In #29, she becomes a whale, still without hands and perhaps unable to regularly communicate with her previous acquaintances. That, too, is shown as an alternative to death; they don’t mention that Erek (who does play a major role in that book) can produce Kandrona rays. Other peace movement Yeerks don’t seem to get the morphing power then. I don’t know what shape the Yeerks get in #54, and what little is said about their lives might sound like what Aftran, who calls Earth “the most beautiful planet in the galaxy”, describes as an undesirable alternative: “Back to our home planet, with Andalite Dome ships in orbit above us, waiting for one of us to try and rise from the sludge, then blow us apart”. absolutezero273 has even said here (http://community.livejournal.com/animorphs/322792.html?view=5071080) that the Yeerks might become extinct in one generation.

Personally, I think that the ability to morph (not being a nothlit) could be very useful for all kinds of species, and the series also tells about Andalites morphing for art or fun, so I’d also like for the Yeerks to have it. Perhaps the Animorphs compromise with the Yeerks and meet many of their preferences, but aren’t very devoted to fulfilling as many of them as possible? Then again, it could just be that more generally, the series might not explore all the possible everyday uses of the morphing technology, like healing injuries.

[acts_of_tekla]

What do you think of Aftran's comparison of humans' predatory habits and yeerk's parasitic habits?

(a) The animals we eat aren't sapient.
(b) In general, they're raised for food.
(c) There are a lot of people who argue for, and fight for, better conditions for livestock animals.

So I'm going to go with "invalid comparison".

Do you think many of us would empathize with the yeerks if we were born into bodies like theirs?

*shrugs* I'd assume so. I suppose the closest human equivalent would be someone with severe handicaps.

hmm...how about, why do you think many yeerks don't feel anything for their hosts? Especially after so much anguish in the host's mind.

I agree with the above poster who said that they couldn't let themselves empathize.

Do you think there could be a better way? (this one might be difficult though because there's a tendency to think of the YPM and the Iskoort...)

I'd support the use of voluntary or created hosts over the nothlit idea, since, as mentioned earlier, that would result in the voluntary (or "voluntary") extinction of the Yeerks. It's not like they don't have their own culture, or that they're valueless. Ax's sneering about how the Yeerks don't create, but only steal, is kind of...not baseless, exactly, but there are definitely examples of Yeerk-created technologies in the books (though unfortunately the only examples I can think of are in #33 -- and speaking of that, didn't Taylor say something about the Yeerks' extraordinary knowledge of the brain?).