“'Marco, you don’t understand. If she turns up without a host, without me, they’ll know something went on. They’ll dig till they get the answers, Marco.’
‘She needs to die, Mom. You need…Dad and me…we need you back!’
Through Eva’s eyes, through her memory, I saw myself, small and harmless in Marco’s grip.
‘I know you do, sweetheart. And, God, I need you more than life itself. But she’s the one pushing for a nonviolent invasion. Visser Three wants all-out war! He wants to incinerate cities from orbit, kill and kill till we submit!’
'We’ll never surrender!’ Marco blazed.
Eva took his face in her hands. 'Marco, that’s a nice sentiment, a brave ideal. But the truth is, Marco, humans do submit. Not all, and not always, but some, maybe most. Enough will submit, Marco. Enough to give the Yeerks what they want. And the rest will be dead. Millions. Billions.’
I saw Marco’s hand tighten around me. I saw how close I came to that inexorable power crushing the life from me.
'You can’t rely on slogans, my brave son. You have to win this war. For now Visser One must survive. Only she can restrain Visser Three. If she loses, or if she is seen as disloyal, he’ll have his way.’
Marco was not convinced. 'Open war would mean humans could fight back, at least. Better to the know the enemy. Know who to shoot.’
'Yes, but we may well lose,’ Eva said. 'And even if we win, how many millions or even billions of humans can we sacrifice?’
I saw his face through Eva’s memory. Saw him consider. A child! And he was now deciding the fate of Earth and of the Yeerk Empire.”
- Visser (Edriss 562), pg. 161 (by K.A. Applegate)
