As soon as she opened the door, Alniss could hear raised voices.

"I still don't get why you won't at least try and bloody do something!" The voice coming from the living room was high-pitched and loud, its owner clearly frustrated.

Alniss glanced sideways at Carla, biting her lip with anxiety. The human's face was hard and unreadable, a toughness masking the fear Alniss was sure Carla was feeling.

Carla didn't say anything, but stepped past her, walking determinedly down the hallway with a measured pace. Alniss hurried to catch up.

"We can go straight to the bedroom if you want. I'll bring you something to eat," Alniss offered.

"No thanks. She'll know I'm here anyway, I may as well get this over with. Anyway, I want to see Kalran."

Carla pushed open the living room door, only to unleash an even louder wave of sound on the three of them.

"No, YOU listen to ME! I'm the only one making sense right now!" Sara's voice was shrill as well as loud, going through Alniss like a Pool alarm.

Carla shuddered slightly, but didn't break her pace, stepping firmly through the door. Alniss hurried through after her to find Kalran sat huddled against Ilkiss. Her host Sara, a tall brunette, was standing before her with her hands on her hips, glaring exasperatedly at her Yeerk. Sara had made Alniss nervous from the moment she'd first met her, a few weeks after Alniss had received her new human body and moved into the flat. Once Carla had come to live with them, she'd asked Kalran to try and avoid Sara coming over, which had been successful until now. Alniss hadn't fancied her chances of saying no when Sara had arrived earlier that evening, her eyes blazing, to comfort a sobbing Kalran. Half an hour later, however, the arguing had started.

"There's nothing we can do," Kalran murmured, her voice barely audible, in contrast to her host's. "We just have to accept that."

"You can't know that!" Sara whirled round, pacing angrily to the window and back. "I could tear my hair out, Kal, I really could. You're impossible."

"I agree with Kalran," Ilkiss said softly, his deep voice choked with tears. "Much as I wish it weren't true, we have to accept we're powerless."

Sara raised her eyebrows and pointed to herself. "Resistant involuntary host. Or at least, I started out that way. By definition, I'm not very good at the whole accepting-powerlessness idea."

Alniss stole a glance across at Carla, to see how she was taking this news. Alarmingly, Carla's face was set in harsh lines of anger, and her mouth was opening. Alniss started to move towards her, desperate to stop her saying anything, but it was too late.

"Leave her alone!" Carla snarled. "Can't you see how hurt she is?"

Kalran gave a sharp gasp at Carla's words and looked up quickly. "Carla! I didn't realise you were home." Her eyes strayed anxiously to her host, who had jerked round at Carla's comment and was staring at her incredulously.

"Carla?" Sara repeated. "Home…" She trailed off for a few seconds, her forehead wrinkled with puzzlement. "You're a human and you live here? Really?"

Carla nodded sharply, and crossed the room so determinedly that Sara was forced to step aside. Alniss hoped her shock wasn't visible: she'd had no idea Carla was capable of such confidence. Reaching the sofa, Carla sank into the cushions beside Kalran and took her hand.

Sara was still looking baffled, glancing between Kalran and Carla. Alniss searched her mind for some way of distracting Sara, getting her away before she could find out who Carla was.

"Maybe you should go home, Sara," Alniss said cautiously. "It's late."

There was no reply to that. "Why on Earth would you choose to live with a bunch of Yeerks?" Sara asked Carla slowly, the anger in her voice replaced with curiosity. "I had enough of them when I was infested. Although I guess maybe if you've never had a Yeerk in your head…"

Kalran was shifting anxiously in her seat, looking helplessly at Alniss. "Sara…"

Carla looked past Sara, staring at the wall. "I have had a Yeerk in my head. She was Alniss' sister. I- I wanted her there."

Silence. Alniss felt sick as she took a few steps closer to Sara, ready to grab her arm and restrain her if she had to. She watched the lines around Sara's dark brown eyes harden from confusion into outrage as the realisation hit her.

"Tell me," Sara spat, her voice like ice. "Did they actually manage to get a TV loud enough to drown out the screams or did you just ignore them?"

Alniss felt the words like a stab to the stomach. She stared at Carla, desperate for the host to look at her, but Carla maintained her blank stare at the opposite wall, her expression unchanging.

"Sara!" Kalran's voice was suddenly far more forceful, her hand gripping Carla's tightly.

Sara turned her eyes to her Yeerk. Alniss had thought she was angry before, but this seemed an altogether different kind of anger. Sara's voice and demeanour were much calmer, but also far colder.

"You should have told me."

Kalran shifted anxiously in her seat, as though trying to escape the force of her host's eyes. "I'm sorry. It wasn't my secret to tell."

Sara snorted. "It isn't like she cared about your species violating anyone else's right to privacy, why should I respect hers? How long exactly were you planning to carry this on for? Making excuses to meet me anywhere but here… telling me you still hadn't found someone to take Jilran's place... you should have told me."

"Okay, I know. I'm sorry. Please, Sara, I really can't… not today…" Kalran's eyes were damp, and she turned her head towards Ilkiss' shoulder.

Sara rolled her eyes and sighed impatiently, but her expression had softened slightly. "Okay, Kal. Not today. And I'm sorry I got so angry with you… about Oglud, that is. She," Sara jerked a thumb at Carla without looking at her, "is probably right that it wasn't helping. I just wish… I wish you could try and do something… it hurts to see you like this."

She took a step closer to Kalran, reaching down to squeeze her Yeerk's free hand, and spoke far more gently. "Call me anytime if you need to talk."

"You're leaving?" Kalran asked, looking pleadingly up at her host. Alniss understood the expression on some instinctive level: her Hork-Bajir host hadn't been voluntary, and they'd had no contact since the war, but Alniss still missed her in some strange way.

"It seems best," Sara said, her tone surprised. One eyebrow lifted slightly towards her curly hair.

"I don't mind if you stay," Carla said quietly, breaking her stare at the opposite wall to glance sideways at Kalran, a concerned furrow in her brow. "Not if your Yeerk needs you."

Sara's nose wrinkled in an unmistakeable gesture of contempt. "I wasn't asking you."

Alniss felt the anger that had been building within her over the last few minutes suddenly bubble over. "Shut up!" she snapped harshly.

Sara turned to her. "I don't take orders from you, Yeerk. I've only been tolerating the lot of you over the last few years because Kalran asked me to. I'll listen to her… well, sometimes… because she risked her life to try and free us. Ilkiss, too," she added, inclining her head towards the tall man who had his arms wrapped around Kalran's waist and his face pressed into her hair. "But don't make the mistake of thinking I've forgiven you for what you've done, Alniss."

Alniss ignored this. Pushing aside the ranting of involuntary hosts was second nature when you'd been indoctrinated by the Empire, and Alniss had never fully retrained herself not to do it. "Leave Carla alone. I think you should go."

"No!" Sara spat incredulously. "Don't order me about, Yeerk."

"This happens to be my home," Alniss growled, her ability to control her anger not helped by noticing that Carla's hand had begun to shake.

Kalran abruptly pushed herself to her feet. "That's enough. Don't speak to my host like that." She glanced at Sara, who was beginning to open her mouth at the word 'host', her expression furious. "Sorry, Sara, but that's the only way Alniss might understand."

Kalran was right, Alniss did understand. Whatever the Empire had tried to do to suppress it, all Yeerks felt a certain protectiveness for their hosts, even involuntary ones. Alniss knew many Yeerks who'd had arguments with the Pool guards about scratches, cuts and bruises their hosts had sustained during feedings. The relationship was deeper with voluntary hosts, which Alniss supposed in a way Sara was, though she would never say so to her face. But Alniss could still feel her stomach twisting with anxiety for Carla, her heart hammering with rage.

"Once she stops speaking to my host like she's dirt!" Alniss snapped. A few seconds later, she realised what she'd said, and quickly turned her eyes to Carla.

Her expressionless stare at the wall finally broken, Carla was staring openly at Alniss. By the Kandrona, Alniss cursed to herself, she'd been careless with her words.

"Yours?" Sara said with a slight sneer. "I thought you said she was your sister's host."

Kalran looked worriedly at Alniss, who felt frozen in place. Had she really begun to feel like that? It was ridiculous, she'd never once been inside Carla's head, how could she possibly feel that bond for her? But it was true, Alniss saw with a few moments' introspection. The feeling was so clear, so strong, that she couldn't understand how she'd mistaken it for so long.

It was Tafnik who came to her rescue. "Alniss loved her sister very much, Sara. She wants to protect the people who were important to her."

There was silence for a few moments.

"I have a solution," Ilkiss said slowly. "Why don't we all-" he gestured to include Sara, Kalran and himself, "go to your room, Kalran? That way we can talk without disturbing anyone else, or getting into arguments."

That seemed a reasonable idea to Alniss, but Kalran shook her head. "Hallim," she said quietly.

Sara's face, if it were possible, became even sourer, her lip curling. Alniss wasn't sure why at first, then remembered. Hallim had been a Pool guard: Sara must have watched her force countless heads under the water for reinfestation and drag her fellows to and from cages for years. Hallim might even have done it to Sara herself.

Ilkiss looked guilty. "Of course. Sorry. Unless she came out here while we went in there?"

Sara shook her head. "I'll just go," she said. "Kal, Ilkiss, come with me if you want. You're always welcome to stay over, you know that, right?"

Kalran took a hesitant step forward, which finally pulled her hand away from Carla's. "Yes please."

Once Sara and the two Yeerks had left, Alniss walked hesitantly over to Carla. "Are you OK?"

Carla's responding smile was reassuring. "Sit next to me?"

Alniss didn't need inviting twice. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Tafnik slipping away, presumably giving them some space. Carla leant her head against Alniss' shoulder: Alniss could feel the prickle of her hair against her neck.

"I don't mind," Carla said softly. "You can call me your host if you want."

"I'm sorry. I didn't realise what I was saying, I-"

"I care about you, too," Carla whispered.

Alniss felt the weight in her chest lighten at Carla's words, but only slightly. "I'm sorry about Sara."

Carla shrugged. "I don't care what she thinks of me. I'd never get her to like me, anyway."

Alniss slid an arm around Carla's shoulders, squeezing tightly. "It must still hurt you."

"Not really. I've worked out by now what side of this war I ended up on. I didn't really mean to end up there. Like… I wanted the help from the Sharing, and I didn't want to piss them off because I figured they'd just infest me anyway. After that, I just didn't want to disappoint Silrin. But there's no point feeling sorry for people like Sara. They're never going to give a damn about me. Most humans hated me even before the Yeerks."

"I'm sure that's not true," Alniss said softly. "You're… you're a wonderful person. Surely at least someone…"

Carla snorted. "You say that because you're a Yeerk. You see me so differently to how other humans do. Silrin did too."

"Humans are very different individually," Alniss argued, disturbed by the way Carla seemed to feel about herself and her place within her own species. "They can't all respond to you in the same way."

"They don't. Sara didn't try to punch me. Most would, and many want me dead. She just doesn't want me anywhere near her. That's one of the milder reactions I've seen."

Alniss said nothing for a few moments; she had no argument to return to that. Instead, she stroked Carla's hair lightly, letting her breathing slow as she appreciated the comfort of the cushions beside her, the warmth of Carla's body against her side. She let her eyes stray to the picture of Earth's mountains opposite her, but it did not produce the fascination it normally did. She was still too worried, chewing over Carla's words in her mind. Then, something occurred to her.

"What about Elsa?"

"Hmmm?" Carla murmured sleepily.

"What about Elsa? You told me she was quite nice to you when you saw her that time."

Carla lifted her head slowly, turning to look at Alniss. "She was just pretending. Why would she want to be friendly to me? She hates Yeerks, she never stopped fighting them."

Alniss shrugged, seeing it was useless to pursue the point further. "You're probably right. Well, whatever they think of you, you know that I…" she trailed off, uncertain how to put the emotion into words. Would 'love' give the wrong impression? Her feelings for Carla were completely platonic, but humans didn't tend to use that word to express non-romantic feelings unless they were talking about family.

Carla seemed to understand anyway, letting her head sink back down onto Alniss' shoulder. "I know."