The Missing Controllers

[Josh (J)]

OK, what do you think the non-infested people who were related to the Controllers who were killed by the Animorphs/Visser would think when their relatives/friends just disappear? After all, several people were killed during the course of the war. Takers?

[NateSean]

A lot of people filed missing persons reports and got a lot of "we're looking into it" responses from Police who were controllers trying to spin the story.

I imagine much like the early days of the Holocaust, some people knew there was something big going on but they didn't dare to question it or expose themselves. I mean, if you kept telling someone "I'm sure my family has disappeared", you would either wind up a controller, dead, or a victim of the very human psychiatric system. (Given a choice between a mental hospital and being a controller, I'd rather take the latter)

[SuperBlue]

Yeah the cops were controllers so they can easily pretend to be doing their best to find the "missing" person

[DinosaurNothlit]

They could have varied it up a bit, too.  They could say that this person was hit by a car, that person died in a forest fire, someone got decapitated by an out-of-control wrecking ball when they were demolishing a building.  Since they could probably find forensic scientists who were controllers, there would be nobody to argue with whatever they say happened.

Of course, that's if they feel like putting forth the effort of giving explanations for everyone who disappears.  Most likely, they're just going to be like "Oh, yeah, we're looking for them."

But then again, if they did that for all the cases, you'd think the news would pick up that there had been an awful lot of disappearances lately, after all not all of the news-people could be controllers.

[Nar Klawip]

But then again, if they did that for all the cases, you'd think the news would pick up that there had been an awful lot of disappearances lately, after all not all of the news-people could be controllers.

I don't know about that DinosaurNothlit, more than 2,300 people are reported missing in the U.S every day, and according to FBI statistics, 719,558 missing person records were entered into the National Crime Information Center, database in 2009. So it wouldn't be that hard for people to believe.

[TobiasMasonPark]

A lot of people filed missing persons reports and got a lot of "we're looking into it" responses from Police who were controllers trying to spin the story.

I imagine much like the early days of the Holocaust, some people knew there was something big going on but they didn't dare to question it or expose themselves. I mean, if you kept telling someone "I'm sure my family has disappeared", you would either wind up a controller, dead, or a victim of the very human psychiatric system. (Given a choice between a mental hospital and being a controller, I'd rather take the latter)

     Do you mean the former?

[DinosaurNothlit]

I don't know about that DinosaurNothlit, more than 2,300 people are reported missing in the U.S every day, and according to FBI statistics, 719,558 missing person records were entered into the National Crime Information Center, database in 2009. So it wouldn't be that hard for people to believe.

Woah, that many??  Holy crap.  I had no idea that many people went missing on a daily basis.  That just blows my mind.

But, you know, even despite that, I think the Yeerk invasion would still have caused a suspiciously high rate of disappearances for one particular area.  Keep in mind that the Yeerks had concentrated their efforts mainly in just that one city, and therefore the disappearances in that city would have shown a major spike during the invasion.  I'm betting almost all of the hosts that Visser Three randomly executed were from the same town.

[NateSean]

Woah, that many??  Holy crap.  I had no idea that many people went missing on a daily basis.  That just blows my mind.

Runaways, kidnappings, people on the lam, murders that haven't been reported yet. Gotta love humanity at its finest.

[LisaCharly]

The thing is, the reason missing Controllers might be noticed more is that the vast majority of missing persons are lower class or homeless, while the Yeerks seemed to go for more upward-bound, middle-to-upper class hosts. Sad to say, a chunk of middle class people going missing WOULD get attention when poor people going missing really doesn't.

[Terenia]

Well, I think that perhaps they also have a segment of the lower class population. From an infiltration POV it makes sense.

Infest a bunch of homeless people no one cares about and ship them off to the Blade Ship...no one notices. Then work towards the middle/upper classes.

I think a lot of the first Controllers were likely the ones no one would notice disappear (those would then be the most often killed as well). This was likely a plan put in place by Edriss, not Esplin.

[TobiasMasonPark]

     Not if most of those have mental dissabilites.

[NateSean]

Mental disabilities wouldn't stop a seasoned Yeerk. Continued drug usage didn't cause Edriss to lose control of the bimbo she took control of. (Though it does beg the question of what would happen if the host body had overdosed, which I'm sure Edriss had learned about during her time of holding control of the body)

[TobiasMasonPark]

     But didn't she leave her host because she found a more fitting one--Alison Kim?

     And wasn't it already established in book fifty that the handicapped aren't ideal hosts for Yeerks?

[LisaCharly]

That was the physically handicapped. We don't really know about the mentally handicapped or mentally ill. The only characters we saw dealing with mental illness either had it caused by the Yeerks (George Edelman, Hildy Gervais) or actually ended up getting along pretty well with their Yeerks (Tidwell), and we didn't see anything of mental disability.

Also, Edriss didn't lose control of Jenny Lines, but she did continue to use drugs, and it was left vague whether or not that was because it Edriss liked the rush, because she couldn't handle the addiction, or because it kept Jenny quiet.

[NateSean]

Edriss explained to the council that she kept up the injections to keep her host happy. She even speculated that it would be easier to infest druggies at first, which is probably what they did during the initial stages of the invasion.

But you're right. For all we know she could have easily had an off screen high during those injection moments.