So yeah, "Chess" was on the other night and...I got inspired to work on this! The first few paragraphs aren't necessarily true--I came up with this idea, and you can read more in "The Anati Chronicles". Enjoy! Welcome, or welcome back!
Long before the Yeerk's ancestors had climbed out of the primordial ooze—quite literally, in their case—a species had evolved in a star system on the far side of the galaxy. It had evolved from lumbering behemoths into sentient individuals. And then, its homeworld's orbit distorted by the work of an asteroid and its malevolent manipulator, the race had nearly been destroyed. The pride of the planet perished. Had it not been for another interstellar visitor, all would have died.
As it was, only outcasts survived. Some escaped, doomed to immortality on a planet far from home. Others remained, culling themselves to keep the limitless population down, only to be infested by Yeerks eons later.
Their home was frigid and unforgiving. Nevertheless, the austere exterior, seen from a distance, sparkled with beauty.
From such a distance did Essam approach it. Its distant sun was so far away at apsis that even the glittering white surface could not reflect enough light to hurt his eyes. The gleaming metal of a hastily-erected Yeerk spaceport was more dazzling: even on such a backward world, the Empire could, and did, rapidly grow.
At the time, the generation had felt as long as it was humiliating. But even reflecting on everything that had happened since the conference had ended, it seemed like it was only a moment ago. The Anati's planet was far starker than Earth...but it was no less exotic.
While Essam had never visited the upcoming conference's site before, he had read the Imperial data files. His host body could not survive too long outside without special protection: good to know. There were few native species of which to be aware—the general sustenance for the hosts was a slight variant of a native strain of moss—but very few animals, and nothing else infestable. That was all he needed to know.
But that was nothing compared with what some of the Anati-Controllers wanted to show him.
"Welcome, Under-Visser!" said an ingratiating low-rank as he exited the transport ship. Essam had fallen far from grace.
"Hello," he said curtly. "Where am I supposed to go?"
"Supposed? The conference will not begin for another rotation of this planet. Why not visit one of the new pools we've installed? The natural tundra has enabled us to minimize—"
"Where am I supposed to go?" he repeated.
"Ah. Yes. The sixth floor, Under-Visser." The Controller pointed to an elevator shaft at the far end of the complex.
Essam had almost reached it when he was interrupted by another Anati-controller. The place was teeming with them—weren't they supposed to be Class Three? "Under-Visser Nine?"
"That's me."
"You'll be analyzing this online?"
"Yes."
"Welcome! I don't suppose you'd like to try infesting an Anati for a while?"
"There are hardly enough to waste for frivolous purposes, are there?"
"Well, you could tell the galaxy what it's like."
"They have their own ways of finding out, we can all access the computers."
"The Anati will become Class Five within a generation or two, Under-Visser!"
"Is that so? I wasn't aware that the breeding projects were anything close to successful?"
"That's only because these host brains don't have clear memories of a standard reproductive process."
"The DNA is accessible, no?"
"If cloning was possible, we'd all be walking around in Andalites!"
"I doubt the esteemed Visser would relinquish his monopoly so easily," Essam muttered. Visser Three had emerged from the Earth debates fully in control of galactic tactics...but only temporarily. Many of his onetime underlings, disenchanted by his sudden departure, had shifted their support to Sub-Visser Fifty-Four, Temar or Etmash or somebody. While no less confrontational than the Visser, Sub-Visser Fifty-Four focused not on planetary action but space conquests, with the aim of capturing Andalite vessels...and technology.
"We're making great progress, though. There's a team of scientists analyzing data from Yeerk reproductive systems."
"Hard to get much feedback on the process," Essam quipped, "as it's a once-in-a-lifetime experience."
The Anati-Controller did not seem to appreciate the pun, and he took advantage of her momentary confusion to enter the shaft and ascend to the sixth floor.
She had been difficult to shake off, but his humor was even harder to escape. Treasonous though it may have been, he had firsthand experience with the reproductive process among hosts. He should have put that behind him, but Visser Three would, of course, be at this debate. And, at least for the past generation, where Visser Three was, Edriss tended to be also.
There were plenty of reasons to envy the Visser, but—oddly enough—his power was not one of them. This was a bizarre environment to be jockeying for power, and it was bad enough for him. Who knew what the Visser would be going through? Had Essam naturally had lips, they would have curled upwards.
The fact that they could arrange to host the conference on such an out-of-the-way planet like the Anati homeworld should have been good news. The Empire was expanding; a generation previous, the planet wouldn't have been safe enough. But the Andalites couldn't break through these defenses...could they?
His quarters, while luxurious, were stocked with food native to the planet, and odious for his host body. "Don't you have anything worth eating?" he raged at the first low-rank he ran across.
"Is the moss not satisfying?" he moronically replied. "I find it simply eck...exquy...exquisite."
"It seems to be producing adverse effects on your host body. As it would mine."
"Oh, no, thassimply thizz...bevreg I drunk. You can've some?" The Controller motioned towards the shaft; the carousing must have been taking place on a different floor. One which Essam planned to avoid as soon as he discovered which one it was.
"No thank you." Essam returned to his quarters. Just because the Empire had expanded this far was no excuse to slack off.
Still, considering all he'd been through, he had things pretty good. As long as ridiculous Anati-Controllers were all he had to worry about, things would be fine.