Paradise Lost . . . .
[A/N: This one is a two parter for Character Sketches. I know I haven't been doin' a lot of writin' lately, but I've been incredibly busy with The Past Trilogy, and my column, Omnipotent Authors. Anyway, back to this story, Part One is this, Paradise Lost . . . . , and Part Two entitled . . . . . Paradise Regained should be out in a week or two, depending on how much school work I have. I don't particularly like this one, but, hey, it was just lying on my disk, and I had to finish it, but I'll probably rewrite it, eventually, after I finish The Traitor.]
My name is Aftran Nine-Four-Two of the Hett Simplat Pool.
A Yeerk.
Or maybe I should say a slug. Or Yeerk scum. After all, that's what the rest of the world calls me.
I can just hear them sneering, "Oh, Yeerk scum."
Like it's such a horrible thing.
You know how old I am, human? You know?
I'm approximately twelve Yeerk years.
Around fourteen of your human years.
Look, I don't have a choice.
I was born as a slug. And I'll always be one.
It started, when I was in the Yeerk Pool, and I was first offered a host.
A chance to see, they all said, those other Yeerks who believed in the empire. A chance to aid our empire.
And young and stupid as I was, I took the offer.
So, I took the host.
No, there wasn't a part of me that felt guilty about it. Really.
I mean at the time, it was just a host. And they were there to serve us.
I fed myself all that hypocritical crap.
And for a while, I actually believed it.
Oh, I believed it in the day, when I was moving around, and alive, and giddy, surrounded by all the colors.
That was with my Gedd host.
Just common labor and things to that effect.
But I'd heard whispers, traveling from Yeerk to Yeerk about the Hork-Bajir, about the sheer power and life in it.
So I got promoted, by pulling a few strings.
Then I had a Hork-Bajir host.
And for the first time, I really saw something beyond the yellows and grays of the Gedd vision. Color, I saw, but not clearly enough to make anything distinct. But some color is better than none, and I reveled in it, every moment I could.
But then . . . . then . . . . . I was in battle.
I felt the terrifying highs of war, and the pain that it caused, and learned the ways of killing.
Other Yeerks said it was better than manual labor.
I hated it.
Then I met another Yeerk, who called himself Rhian Four-Two-Eight.
He, too, had seen the ways of war, and hated it.
And then he offered me a way out. The Yeerk Peace forces.
I turned him down.
It was too risky.
But then, I didn't have to be in a Hork-Bajir host form.
I took another assignment, so I could be in a human host.
I can still see that first time in my mind, that moment when I crawled into her ear, and all the memories soaked in.
Memories . . . .
Memories of running wildly through the sprinkler, laughing, looking at the vivid green of the grass.
Petting a cat, with a pale yellow coat in stripes which purred against her, with the dainty touch of fur against her cheek.
Going to a birthday party, looking at the presents, opening them.
I treasured those memories. Even more, now, I treasure them, because they're all I have left of that world.
It was strangely wonderful, being in that form.
And even more so, it was ecstasy.
You humans, you see things, and it's nothing to you.
You can't see, see the true beauty of the colors, the perfect focus you have to read print in a book, to turn a light on and be bathed in the warm yellows.
To me, it was everything.
But at the same time, I had the host to deal with.
She was only the fourth host I'd ever had. The two Gedds had been too worn down to fight back. The Hork-Bajir had only been able to fight in that dim way with it's poor Hork-Bajir mentality.
But this one . . . . this girl, Karen, she was different.
At first she cried, not knowing what had happened to her.
And then after a while, she fought.
And after that, when she realized it was all futile, she stayed in the back of my mind, screaming at me to die.
She, this child, ten, when I infested her, wanted me to die.
Karen spent her hours trapped in her own head, every waking moment of those hours, imagining my death.
And then, only then, I started to doubt myself. Seriously. Whether what I did was right or wrong.
But there was no way out.
If I wanted to stay alive, that was.
Selfish, yes, I know. But is it so truly selfish just to want to see something?
To be able to catch those glimpses of another world, even if it's through someone else's eyes?
In all my life, I've met only one person who truly understood me.
Cassie.
I don't know, maybe it was the fact that we were so totally different.
Or that we were both entirely the same.
Human, Yeerk.
Both with consciences.
I guess, in a way, we were both killers. And moralists.
That part about us was the same.
And the difference?
She accepted what she was. And I denied it.
I guess, in a way, she was a far better person than I was.
She made a deal with me.
One human, one Yeerk.
Look, I didn't mean for her to be trapped. I didn't! Really!
All I wanted to do was to test her.
To see how willing she was for this bargain.
And she went through with it, all the way.
What could I do then?
I kept the bargain.
And yet . . . . and yet, now, as I slip down into the depths of the Yeerk Pool . . . .
There's only one thing I can think of.
Humans live in paradise, and they don't even know it.
And I'm throwing it all away.
For what? My mind asks, silently, and it always responds the same thing. For freedom. For a cause. So a little girl could be free.
Strange though.
What am I?
I am a Yeerk, yes. A slug. But I'm also who I make myself.
And now, by leaving my human host, I try to make the first step toward making humans and Yeerks live in peace.
By leaving paradise behind . . . . .
[A/N: Well? Liked it, loved it, hated it? Send any and all replies to me at anifuture@hotmail.com. And take a look at my webpage, at http://anifuture.hypermart.net.]