Cassie █████

My name is Cassie.

I can't tell you my last name, or where I'm from. But I can tell you where I am now: Darrow.

It's possibly the weirdest city to ever exist. It's like some bizarre intersection of science and magic. It sucks you in, taking you from your home and sort of planting you here. It pits you against all sorts of weird things. Almost anything can happen inside its borders. By rights it shouldn't even exist.

But it does.

And it was about to get a whole lot weirder.

See, where I'm from, there was this invading force, called the Yeerks. Nobody here knew about them. I was from a whole different parallel universe to everyone here — even the people that were from the United States! I was also from about ten years behind Darrow. (That had been weird to get used to.) But the Yeerks, they were sneaking into my home, infesting humans and turning them into Controllers. Nobody was safe. Anyone could have been a Controller. It was awful.

And it was just me and my friends fighting them. We fought against all sorts of monstrous schemes and creatures. The scariest for me — next to Visser Three, the leader of the Yeerk invasion, that is — were the Hork-Bajir. Picture a green, seven-foot-tall kangaroo, but with talons instead of those big, hopping feet. Now picture a beak instead of a nose, and a snake-like neck and head. Kind of freaky, right?

Now picture blades coming out of its head, arms, legs, and tail.

That's a Hork-Bajir. And the Yeerks use them as vicious shock troops. Those blades are their main weapons, and they use them with deadly force.

And as I turned a corner on this particular day, bag of groceries in my hand to fill my Darrow fridge, I realized that I was seeing not one, not two, but three Hork-Bajir-Controllers standing on the street. Right in front of me!

They were looking around, heads twisting and bobbing, in as much confusion as I remembered feeling the first time I woke up here. They had no weapons — no Dracon beams, that is — but they were still dangerous. It looked like they were alone. I hoped they were. See, I knew that, since the Yeerks had come to Earth, Hork-Bajir were used for the grunts. Only important Yeerks were given human hosts. So I knew that these three in front of me were probably just foot soldiers, with no commander, and probably no orders.

That didn't make them any less terrifying. In fact, it made them more terrifying. Because an evil, cruel creature like a Yeerk, without a commander to tell them what or what not to do, was a very dangerous thing.

I was totally frozen in place, staring at the Controllers. I had no idea what to do! No, that wasn't true. I knew exactly what to do. I just didn't know if I could do it, by myself. Jake wasn't here to take over. Rachel wasn't here to make me feel brave. Marco wasn't here with his lame jokes to help us laugh. Tobias wasn't here flying point. I was alone.

With three Hork-Bajir-Controllers, looking more and more agitated by the minute.

And when the first scream rang out at the sight of their vicious selves, they hissed.

And that was when things got bad.

[ The Yeerks come to Darrow! Well, a few of them, anyway. Find Cassie (and three Hork-Bajir) on the corner of Harbor Boulevard and Mulholland Drive. The Hork-Bajir are not armed, but they are armed if you get my meaning. Expect them to cause all manner of trouble, but no deaths, please! More info here. If your pup is a friend of Cassie's, they can expect a vague text from her warning them away from this area. Open to all, forever and always! ]