Unusual lights in the sky have long been taken as signs of activity in the heavens. Once, any meteor might have been worth noting; today, meteors are ordinary if rare, and stranger lights get called UFOs, those oddly-behaved alien invaders.
This particular streak of light appears to be a meteor. Meteorite, even.
It lands in the ocean, not far from a beach.
On the beach are beachgoers! They play volleyball. They grill meat products. They sit on blankets and wade in the surf and apply sunscreen to each other.
A wader steps on the meteorite, oblivious.
The wader experiences a peculiar rushing sensation, perhaps best likened to the feeling of electricity passing through their body if they have been so unlucky as to experience this — or perhaps equally mistakable for a strange water current.
What might be on this wader's mind? What are they here for, what are they taking a vacation from, what do they find best in life?
She is a twelve year old girl looking for hermit crabs and if she doesn't find any she will go back to building sandcastles. She's here because it's a Sharing meeting and her parents are members so they're hanging out with Sharing people and it's okay, she guesses, but she did really want to go to Debbie's birthday dinner and isn't going to make it because her parents insist on staying for the whole day. It's Sunday and tomorrow she will go back to school and give an oral report on Little Women, which she has not read and substituted with listening to half of the cast album of the musical with Sutton Foster. The best thing in life is her dog, Peachy Keen ("Peach" for short) who she has brought to the beach, but he is asleep under the beach umbrella.
A tiny fraction of that which she unintentionally freed stays with her; its opinion on the dog, the potential crabs, the water, and all is awwwww!
The rest scatters on the wind. Wind blows, air diffuses, and eventually it is breathed.
The girl, Carrie, finds a nice seashell and goes to plunk it into her sandcastle. One of Dad's friends, Mr. McSomething, wanders by and asks her how it's going. "It's pretty much done," she says.
Castle building: also good. Not to be disturbed.
The wind has blown past Mr. McSomething, and left something behind. How's he doing?
Don MacReady is going AAAAAAAAA!
Ondrest 78442 is complimenting the sandcastle and moving on to get a burger.
Their new companion, whose name might be written Decorating-The-Hidden-Places, also has the opinion AAAAAAAAA. Horrified, it slips into the air again to find a host less screamingly unhappy, and broadcasts news of this threat to its fellows as they spread out.
Carrie's, whose name might be written Flight-Upon-New-Wings, sticks around with newfound protectiveness.
Carrie eventually has a burger and potluck sides and more cookies than she'd be allowed if Mom were looking. They pile in the car as the sun sets and go home.
While they're traveling the thought drifts into her mind that she should pet Peachy.
Peachy is happy to be petted. He maneuvers over from the other side of the back seat to put his head in Carrie's lap.
(Oh good, the dog is not also having a bad time.)
This is an excellent way to spend time stuck in a car until they get home, yes?
She almost falls asleep. At home she tells her mom that the cookies were all gone when she got to the table and can she have a rice pudding, and her mom pats her head and says sure, and she gets a rice pudding.
This rice pudding is delicious, like she's having it for the first time!
When she gets to her room and there isn't anything definitely next to do there's a thought waiting politely in a corner of her brain.
Hello!
She doesn't think much of that at first. Sometimes words can get stuck in your head like song lyrics maybe. There's a Lady Gaga song that starts with 'hello'. She Googles it and puts it on Youtube and dances around her room to it.
Perhaps introductions can wait. For now, dancing.
Elsewhere, they spread on the wind and on travelers. They had merely been exploring for new people and new experiences, but they had not been expecting the horror of these ‘Yeerks’, and now they urgently search for knowledge and allies. Does it seem that the Yeerks are still establishing themselves in hiding, or do they secretly or openly already control the world's organizations?
Does anyone know of the Yeerks who has not been caught by them?
The Yeerks have footholds in local government but haven't worked all the way up. It's possible to find a couple of people who suspect, and even one ex-host who had an accident and enough head trauma that they figure he'll be written off if he talks. Also he's missing an arm now, not a very good host any more.