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Korin 220 isn't sure enough to interrupt Visser Three but she's worried enough to put it in his morning briefing.
> Unusual sensor readings in Alaska on three occasions over the last two weeks, consistent with shielded in-atmosphere transit. If it is enemy traffic they've improved their shields since last observation on Leera. Trajectory has at no point been reliably pinpointed.
This order is less confusing because they're assuming it's a ruse of some kind. They pass it along.
<And> point of no return but they already passed it <broadcast the same signal to Canada again do it NOW>
And now there's really nothing else to do but wait, he's dealt all his cards.
Mhalir doesn't think he's ever been this scared.
Leareth is daring to hope now, and that almost hurts more.
Also he's very confused, and starting to tug at it, why is the Visser appears to be actually listening to him and implementing his suggestions.
"- Andalites blew up," Visser 3's staffer reports, thirty seconds later. "Pool ship's badly damaged but intact, Blade ship's gone -"
<Direct everyone available in space to repair the Pool ship> If it even matters. The Andalites have a Dome ship. It's on Velgarth, right now, but they have communications, Leareth confirmed that.
It's...probably too late, now, Leareth's best guess here is that Matirin interpreted the communications as a trick - so reasonable of him, really - and now that the ship's blown up, with Matirin's people on it, Leareth finds it really unlikely he'll - be in a headspace to consider de-escalating right this second.
...Was the ship firing until it blew up because that seems like relevant information actually, Matirin won't risk replying to the surrender broadcast if it could give away his location but he might, just might, have tried to get his people off the ship...
Mhalir thinks someone would have said something, surely, but...
<Review all the sensor logs. Find out if there was any length of interval before the explosion when the ship was not firing. Do it now>
It takes a few minutes; the best timestamped records are on the Pool ship and they need corroborating with the other ships and several of the timestamps don't match because there's a lot of damage to every ship involved.
"Uh - looks like seven, eight tenths of a second before the explosion they stopped firing. Or paused firing, we don't know if they actually meant to stop..."
...It could be a fluke. But it could also mean that Matirin listened, to the second message claiming surrender, and they got the people - or some of the people - or tried and failed to get the people out...
It's hard to model Matirin's current state of information and the inferences he's made, but Leareth thinks it's probably worth talking to them more.
Hmm. It's a pretty difficult spot! The only thing that might, repeat, might change Matirin's mind, here, is if the Visser is telling the truth to Leareth - Leareth can't tell at all, his Thoughtsensing isn't working - and is in fact willing to make some really heavy concessions.
Leareth really doesn't know what would do it! Maybe if the Visser agreed to stay in Leareth's head, in a body they know to be crippled of its Gifts, and go alone to a neutral location, and allow himself to be knocked out by a Healer, and then Nayoki can set-command both of them and read the Visser's thoughts...
Leareth wasn't really expecting him to. It's a gamble and the Andalites might, at this point, straight-up murder him anyway. Both of them, technically; Leareth can't manage much emotion about that, right now. He's died before anyway. Been murdered by people he thought were his allies, even. Lots of times.
They could...offer to get their ships out of orbit around the planet, hand Earth over to the Andalites while getting the poor baby Yeerks out of danger. Can the Pool ship do a hyperspace jump?
Because the Andalites might have sensor coverage to pick up on it, and do not currently have anything they could use to take it out anyway, Leareth is the only mage who could plausibly have Gated directly there to Final Strike and they...don't have him. And it'll put a bit more oomph behind the surrender message.
- Alloran is also confused by Mhalir, at this point. Presumably this is not the first time it occurred to him that Andalites would destroy Earth rather than let him have it? A similar thing played out on the Hork-Bajir world, after all - a bioweapon -
No, that's not the new information, Mhalir thinks absently.
- What is the new information? It's a little hard to name it. That Leareth - endorses surrendering in conditions like these, despite, as far as he can tell, thinking exactly the way Mhalir does? That Leareth, despite being - who he is - was able to get Andalites on his side, well, join their side, but same difference, Matirin trusted him with so much...
<Broadcast another message> he tells his people. <Tell them that Visser Three will consider returning Leareth, verifiably not infested, as an offer of good faith. However, we will likely need some assistance from them on this front, since I worry that if we leave him free for any length of time he will be forced by the mind-editing precautions he took to explode and kill himself>
"...Visser," says his staff member. "Uh, I am ...concerned about the possibility that the host's magic powers are...affecting you."
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